Composing a Soundscapes︎︎︎
Sound artists often create immersive soundscapes. Soundscapes are compositions made up of combinations of different sounds that evoke a particular feeling or environment. They can be created from field recordings, digital sounds, or percussive and non-traditional instruments. You can create a soundscape with your class using everyday objects, voices, and movement.
Materials
• Newspaper pages
• Classroom objects (optional)
• Percussion instruments (optional)
1. Give each student a newspaper or wad of newspaper pages.
2. Break students into small groups and have each group invent as many different sound effects as they can using their newspaper (e.g., rustling or ripping the pages; rolling it to use as a percussion stick or even a megaphone). If you like, you can invite them to use objects from around the classroom as well (e.g., fanning the pages of a textbook), or percussion instruments that you have available.
3. Next, groups prepare their soundscape compositions. Encourage them to think about how they will coordinate the sounds to create their soundscape. When will they introduce new sounds? How loud/quiet will it be? What rhythms will they use? Will they use repetition?
4. Each group shares their soundscape composition with the class.
Need inspiration? Use the following websites to get students to think about what kind of sounds they would like to evoke. Noisli allows you to build up layers of different sound effects (such as leaves rustling, storm clouds breaking, or coffee shop chatter). Cities and Memory is a collection of field recordings submitted by people from all over the world.
Materials
• Newspaper pages
• Classroom objects (optional)
• Percussion instruments (optional)
1. Give each student a newspaper or wad of newspaper pages.
2. Break students into small groups and have each group invent as many different sound effects as they can using their newspaper (e.g., rustling or ripping the pages; rolling it to use as a percussion stick or even a megaphone). If you like, you can invite them to use objects from around the classroom as well (e.g., fanning the pages of a textbook), or percussion instruments that you have available.
3. Next, groups prepare their soundscape compositions. Encourage them to think about how they will coordinate the sounds to create their soundscape. When will they introduce new sounds? How loud/quiet will it be? What rhythms will they use? Will they use repetition?
4. Each group shares their soundscape composition with the class.
Need inspiration? Use the following websites to get students to think about what kind of sounds they would like to evoke. Noisli allows you to build up layers of different sound effects (such as leaves rustling, storm clouds breaking, or coffee shop chatter). Cities and Memory is a collection of field recordings submitted by people from all over the world.
Welcome to mapping collaboration, a toolbox for workshopping and creating across disciplines...
In spite of a long history of interdisciplinary creation, from our earliest recorded arts to our present moment, artistic pedagogy has created divisions between disciplines. This has left artists in a "post-Babel" condition where we don't share the same language and definitions. It’s also encouraged artists to develop practices for devising, creating and composing work that are distinct to their disciplines.
In spite of a long history of interdisciplinary creation, from our earliest recorded arts to our present moment, artistic pedagogy has created divisions between disciplines. This has left artists in a "post-Babel" condition where we don't share the same language and definitions. It’s also encouraged artists to develop practices for devising, creating and composing work that are distinct to their disciplines.
The inspiration for this project came from faculty and students at Simon Fraser University’s School for the Contemporary Arts where BFA, MFA and PhD programs in Dance, Theatre Production and Design, Visual Art, Film, and Music and Sound all work together in studio settings and playfully experiment with processes of art-making.
We wanted to create a database of projects, assignments and theory that we collect inside the studio and from research happening in other places. We are curious about how we collaborate and how structures reoccur, translate and deviate from one discipline to another.
Composition is central to these processes and offers a base for our approaches and experiments. We are excited about what our students are doing and inspired by the new languages in contemporary art and performance we continue to see develop.
︎︎︎select a category above to build assignments, learn more about how artists process ideas across disciplines and to create a collaborative process of your own
︎︎︎these tools are collected and used in workshops and classes; some are resources from artists; some are quotes about art-making and how bodies think and listen; others are ideas to expand and disrupt your own training and processes.
︎︎︎Each idea is intentially short- and not meant to be executed as written, but to be adapted to your own practice and specific project/context. Some may be taken in parts or combined with others to spark new ways of training and making together.
︎︎︎submit your own ideas and tools so we can keep building this site!
︎︎︎select a category above to build assignments, learn more about how artists process ideas across disciplines and to create a collaborative process of your own
︎︎︎these tools are collected and used in workshops and classes; some are resources from artists; some are quotes about art-making and how bodies think and listen; others are ideas to expand and disrupt your own training and processes.
︎︎︎Each idea is intentially short- and not meant to be executed as written, but to be adapted to your own practice and specific project/context. Some may be taken in parts or combined with others to spark new ways of training and making together.
︎︎︎submit your own ideas and tools so we can keep building this site!
