The Rest Is Just Noise

Throughout the last year, we've seen a whole bunch of articles, projects and research about how much urban noise was reduced due to COVID-19 lockdowns. This is our 2nd episode in a series looking at the impacts of those lockdowns worldwide on sound in cities.

Today we're speaking for the 2nd time with Pamela Jordan, a researcher at University of Amsterdam, about her project looking, in a very interesting way, at how the soundscape at the Berlin Wall Memorial changed during lockdown, as it shifted from this tourist space, to a public space.

Find Pamela at the University of Amsterdam

Read Pamela's and André's paper in the Special Issue about Historical Acoustics.

Change Over Time - Sounding Heritage - https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/44786

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod    

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

We've talked a lot about soundscapes: how we perceive them, how we measure them, how we can predict them... but all of these soundscapes existed. What about the ones that - like purgatory - are just somewhere in our minds or floating out there in space? These are historic soundscapes - ones which used to exist but no longer do.

So the question is - how do we talk about those? How do we measure those?

Today we are speaking with Pamela Jordan, a researcher at University of Amsterdam, about historic soundscapes and her experience in measuring and describing them.

Find Pamela at the University of Amsterdam

Change Over Time - Sounding Heritage - https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/44786

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod            

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

In our very first episode, we learned that not all natural sounds are equal, and not all of them are pleasant. In today's episode, we'll talk about how not all mechanical sounds are equal and not all of them are necessarily bad. As we move into the "age of the future" we expect to see drones flying around our cities, dropping off packages and making our skies look like those of Coruscant from Star Wars. But what do these drones sound like? Are they good or bad? What do they mean for the soundscapes of our cities?

Today, we're speaking with Antonio Torija-Martinez, a Lecturer in Acoustic Engineering at the University of Salford about the noise of unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones. He'll take us through his recent research on whether we can design drones to sound pleasant (or at least, less annoying), and how these drones impact urban soundscapes. And, if you'll indulge us a bit, I hope you enjoy some rambling off into our thoughts on how we measure and describe complex soundscapes. Enjoy!

Follow Antonio on Twitter @ajtorija

Psychoacoustic analysis of contra-rotating propeller noise for unmanned aerial vehicles - https://asa.scitation.org/doi/10.1121/10.0003432 

Make drones sound less annoying by factoring in humans at the design stage -  https://theconversation.com/make-drones-sound-less-annoying-by-factoring-in-humans-at-the-design-stage-151421

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod                 

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

This month we're kicking off a new series of episodes looking at how the COVID-19 lockdowns impacted urban soundscapes around the world! Throughout this past year, we've seen countless articles, podcasts, and twitter threads about how cities went quiet as people were forced to stay at home. We hope to bring you the in depth stories directly from the scientists who were conducting this research. Hopefully we'll be able to answer questions like 'What do our cities sound like when people aren't using them?' 'How did people's perceptions of urban sound change throughout this period?' and 'Just how quiet could our cities be, and would it actually make a difference?'

For the first of this series, we're speaking with Romain Rumpler, a researcher at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, about the effects Romain and his team measured under Sweden's unique lockdown conditions. Make sure to subscribe to keep up with our future lockdown-focussed episodes!

Resources:

An observation of the impact of CoViD-19 recommendation measures monitored through urban noise levels in central Stockholm, Sweden - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2210670720306892

Noise measurements as a proxy to evaluating the response to recommendations in times of crisis: An update analysis of the transition to the second wave of the CoViD-19 pandemic in Central Stockholm, Sweden - https://asa.scitation.org/doi/full/10.1121/10.0003778       

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod                      

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

Number 9, number 9, number 9...

As promised, today we're back where we left as we talk with  Associate Professor Gascia Ouzounian, joined by her colleague, a Bartlett alumna Dr Ruth Bernatek. They reflect on their ongoing ERC project Soncities at University of Oxford that brings together sound theorists, urban sociologists, architects, urban designers and sound artists to develop critical approaches to sonic urbanism. Their goal is to foster socially conscious approaches to sonic practice in forms of research, analysis and design.

Oh, and there's a chat about the unavoidable John Lennon, oops I meant Xenakis.

Shall we continue? 

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

UK Acoustics Network 
UKAN brings together the internationally leading, but disparate UK acoustics research community.

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

Today we understand sound is inherently spatial. It interacts with and informs us about the space it - and we - exist in. But as recently as 1900, scientists held that sound itself could not relay "spatial attributes" and that the human ear had physiological limitations that prevented it from receiving spatial information. How did we go from there to our current understanding of spatial sound?

In her new book, "Stereophonica", Oxford Associate Professor of Music, Gascia Ouzounian,  traces the development of this spatial understanding from its modern birth, through science, war, music, and finally to our cities. In this month's episode, we sit down with Gascia to talk about some of the episodes she tells which we found particularly interesting. Enjoy!

Buy Gascia's book, "Stereophonica - Sound and space in Science, Technology, and the Arts": https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/stereophonica

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

This month we return to one of our favourite topics - how do you actually measure perception? We trace the development of the circumplex model of affect from it's start in 1980, to it's first application in soundscape in 2010. Finally we speak with Simone Torresin, who has done the most recent expansion of this idea by deriving a soundscape circumplex model for indoor environments. 

Are you just confused about what a 'circumplex' even is? Well, listen along and we'll walk you through it!

Resources:

• Indoor soundscape assessment: A principal components model of acoustic perception in residential buildings -  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360132320305266
• A principal components model of soundscape perception - https://doi.org/10.1121/1.3493436
• A circumplex model of affect - https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1981-25062-001                                                                                       

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

Happy May the Fourth! 
In this episode, we're speaking with Linda O'Keeffe, a sound artist and head of the School of Art at Edinburgh College of Art. Her work on gender inclusion in the sonic arts has led to the development of the organisation Women In Sound, Women On Sound, whose goal is to make visible women who work in the multitudinous areas of sound - from music technology to sound art, sound & society, the politics of sound, and every are in between.

Today we'll talk with Linda about her journey in sound, her research on the under-examined cultural and acoustic impacts of renewable energy sources, and her latest album, titled 'Silent Spring' which focuses on the new sounds associated with renewable energy.

Find Linda's album here: https://flamingpines.bandcamp.com/album/silent-spring
Find more of Linda's research: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Linda-O-Keeffe/research

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod

This week marked the second Urban Sound Symposium, held virtually! Featuring keynotes with 30 speakers, panel discussions, and 27 posters, the Symposium brought together some of the leading researchers in urban sound and soundscape. In today's bonus episode, Andrew and Francesco discuss their personal favourite bits from the week as well as talking, once again, with Edda Bild about the extended discussion around representation, inclusiveness, and fairness in urban sound research that was sparked at the Symposium.

We recorded this very quickly right after the final day and obviously can't cover everything - if you think we missed something important be sure to let us know on Twitter @JustNoisePod

If you'd like to be a part of the working group on urban sound EDI, reach out to Edda at [email protected]

Keynote talks mentioned:
"Urban trends and their impact on soundscape" - Dick Botteldooren, Arnaud Can
"Public space soundscapes - three continents, three approaches" - Sarah Payne, Jin Yong Jeon, Daniel Steele
"Smart city sound monitoring and its applications" - Juan Bello, David Bernfeld
"Mapping and prediction" -  Pierre Aumond, Maarten Hornikx, André Fiebig
"Participatory approaches" -  Lisa Lavia, Mattia Cobianchi, Nadine Schütz

Music used with permission from Jack Mac

Find our website: https://www.justnoisepod.com/
Twitter: @JustNoisePod