Cities and Memory - remixing the world

Cities and Memory - remixing the world

By Cities and MemorySociety & CultureArtsMusicPlaces & Travel
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Cities and Memory - remixing the world episodes

  • Distanced
    Liverpool Street station reimagined by The Gaye Device.

    "The piece is inspired by the sudden stop of everyday life,completely unknown to everyone at that moment and my own personal experience. The everyday sounds of travel we experienced became like ghosts to me over the summer of 2020.

    "Those chaotic, noisy, sometimes overwhelming sounds, felt like echoes reverberating away like ripples in a sonic pool.Replaced by bird song, sounds of nature and the stillness of the day, where introspection and thought can be used positively. 

    "The piece tries to convey those experiences using the field recording of an empty station by Jon Bender, transformed into a dense maelstrom of echoing station announcements, malevolent synth, stretched and distorted voice, and treated birdsong recorded in the garden during a day in lockdown."

    Part of the Until We Travel project to map and reimagine the sounds of transport and travel in a pre-pandemic and pandemic world. See the whole project at https://www.citiesandmemory.com/travel.
    7 min
  • Benfleet to everywhere
    Benfleet train station reimagined by Simon Woods. 

    "The piece is based around the rhythmical qualities of the station announcer’s voice. Each section builds on travel to a different place before boarding the train, in the final section, and passing these places – although in fact once on the train you could be going to everywhere."

    Part of the Until We Travel project to map and reimagine the sounds of transport and travel in a pre-pandemic and pandemic world. See the whole project at https://www.citiesandmemory.com/travel.
    4 min
  • Arriving into Benfleet
    "Just waiting for a train to arrive one evening and recorded one arriving and departing on the opposite track. The sound from the overhead powerlines as it pulled away was awesome." Recorded in Benfleet, UK by Shaun Malone.

    Part of the Until We Travel project to map and reimagine the sounds of transport and travel in a pre-pandemic and pandemic world. See the whole project at https://www.citiesandmemory.com/travel.
    3 min
  • Pandemic Underground
    Recording made on the London Underground from London Bridge on the Jubilee line, February 28th 2021 by Jon Bender.

    "London's Jubilee line, major commuting route and popular pedestrian highway straight into the heart of the city. This clip takes you on a short ride between London bridge and Green Park, a typical tourist route if heading towards the Palace. Normally, a chocked ride - claustrophobic with passengers, now during the pandemic, filled with empty seats."

    Part of the StayHomeSounds project to map and reimagine the sounds of the Covid-19 lockdowns.
    7 min
  • Always falling
    "Much of the inspiration came from the beginning section with manipulation of the  busking performance using a modular sampling tool... this created many sounds that were used for the rhythm parts. 

    I also used other sections that run through the whole piece as textures.This was a great field recording to use as so much could be taken from it!"

    Piece by Alex Hehir as part of The Orange Garden project by Cities and Memory, in which multiple artists create a new composition using the same original field recording as source material and inspiration - see the whole project at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/orangegarden
    5 min
  • The orange tree, the fountain and a long-forgotten love
    "Rome's  Orange Garden is extraordinary - a spiritual place of deep significance to so many people over hundreds of years.

    My piece starts with a gently sweeping, dreamy soundscape that is 100% created from the awesome original field recording - so many possibilities in there! Granular synthesis and sampling techniques have been used on nearly every sound from the recording (including the mechanical noises - turned into deep,  gentle booms).

    At around 90 seconds, an acoustic guitar enters and the mood changes. In my mind the story moves from a nebulous set of memories where you can almost (but not quite) pick out individual sounds from the garden, to a more definite musical 'moment' accompanied by the gentle sound of the fountain (again - processed via granular synthesis). Other sounds from the original recording heard behind the music include the first percussion entries at 2 minutes - created from layers of various sounds, including the gravel footsteps.

    The musical story rises and falls, led by the warm tone of a xaphoon (single reed wind instrument that has similarities to the more well-known duduk). A battered old dulcimer takes on the melody for the contrasting section before dramatic live vocals and a duduk join with the xaphoon as the main melody returns.  As the guitar fades away, the narrative slips back into a more ethereal dream-state to finish."

    Piece by Mark Taylor as part of The Orange Garden project by Cities and Memory, in which multiple artists create a new composition using the same original field recording as source material and inspiration - see the whole project at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/orangegarden
    7 min
  • Il Giardino degli Aranci tutto il giorno
    "On a cold day in early Jan 2021 (UK), I ventured through my snowy garden to the garage. Here we have an old piano from a school in Nottinghamshire. It is in need of renovation and retuning but some of the keys still work. 

    I recorded a number of improvised piano parts, many where the key did not register the note making just a dry hammer noise. These formed the basis for the track and when added to the original field recording directed the rest of the track. 

    I wanted to capture (with all of the key elements of the original field recording) what a day in the Orange Garden might have been like. I imagined the temperature rising as the sun tracked the sky. 

    I imagined myself people watching and with the hum of the city in the background the day unfolding in the garden. It seems a long way away from the current reality and lockdown rules we are all facing into. How strange to miss a place you have yet to visit..."

    Piece by Andy Billington as part of The Orange Garden project by Cities and Memory, in which multiple artists create a new composition using the same original field recording as source material and inspiration - see the whole project at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/orangegarden
    7 min
  • The garden of love
    "I was inspired by the busker singing can't help falling in love with you. I broke down the vocal line and stretched it to create a heavenly choir ambience and overlaid the original field recording drenched in reverberation and echoes to create a dreamlike soundscape. 

    The Garden of Love is a place where everyone is welcome, free from prejudice and hate. The fighter jets roaring overhead are to remind us of the dangers of hate and intolerance and where these negative emotions can lead the world."

    Piece by The Gaye Device as part of The Orange Garden project by Cities and Memory, in which multiple artists create a new composition using the same original field recording as source material and inspiration - see the whole project at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/orangegarden
    10 min
  • Can't help falling...
    "I liked the busker in the original and thus wanted to create some sort of loop of the guitar and voice and put some soft beats behind this. That was the basic idea of the track before I started to make it. Whilst attempting to do this, I used other elements of the field recording coming in and out in various places. It felt however like it needed more ideas.  

    I therefore used a sample of some modular synth sounds (played by IKJoyce - with his permission - IKJoyce is a musician that I am currently collaborating with) and added some swooshing synth noises myself.  

    "I felt also it needed a voice at the start to help frame the piece. I contacted my Italian friend Marco Alessi who runs Naviar Records and he agreed to record the voice you can hear at the start of the piece."

    Piece by Audio Obscura as part of The Orange Garden project by Cities and Memory, in which multiple artists create a new composition using the same original field recording as source material and inspiration - see the whole project at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/orangegarden
    5 min
  • Garden of glass
    "We looped a single moment and allowed others to float around it. We liked the idea of taking a kind of sonic photograph, bringing that moment in time to the forefront, zooming in and imagining all the particles making up the atmosphere in the garden within that moment."

    Piece by Kit Monteith & Al Sundvall as part of The Orange Garden project by Cities and Memory, in which multiple artists create a new composition using the same original field recording as source material and inspiration - see the whole project at http://www.citiesandmemory.com/orangegarden
    10 min

About Cities and Memory - remixing the world

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Cities and Memory remixes the world, one sound at a time - a global collaboration between artists and sound recordists all over the world.