[microsound-announce] [framework radio] #745: 2021.02.21

Mon Feb 22 04:46:01 EST 2021

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framework radio
phonography ::: field recording ::: the art of sound-hunting
open your ears and listen!

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#745: 2021.02.21
listen to this edition here:
https://frameworkradio.net/2021/02/745-2021-02-21/

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this edition of framework:afield has been produced in scotland by mark 
vernon. for more information see his website at 
http://meagreresource.com. producer's notes:

Lend an ear, leave a word
Audio Archaeology series Vol.1: Lisbon

The composition of this soundscape combines field recordings of 
contemporary Lisbon with found tape recordings from the past; 
reel-to-reel tapes, micro-cassettes and Dictaphones collected from the 
Feira de Ladra market - a popular and lively flea market in the Alfama 
district.

Each tape recording is an audio snapshot of a specific time; a family 
album in sound, a musical performance, a compilation of treasured music 
or even just the fun of playing around with a tape recorder captured for 
posterity. Every thoughtless edit or push of the record button teleports 
us to a different time and place. The musical material extracted from 
the tapes is also an evocative signifier that locates it within a 
specific era. The thing that interests me is how the tapes accumulate 
different strata of time even within a single side. There are 
consecutive chronological recordings but also sequences with unexpected 
breakthroughs where the user has carelessly fast forwarded through the 
tape randomly ‘dropping-in’ new recordings. These accidental edits 
create instantaneous new collages of sounds and voices. I have 
endeavoured to retain the essence of these unintentional edits and 
unexpected outbursts in this programme. The noisy whir and clicking of 
the various tape mechanisms is evident on many of the found recordings. 
As the material is sped up and slowed down it acts as an internal clock, 
a continuous, steady marker of time, almost like the second hand of a 
timepiece.

One particular tape bought from the market also contained recordings of 
that location itself. The stall owner is captured repeatedly 
demonstrating the functions of the Dictaphone to a customer. In this 
exchange we also hear the customer testing out the machine at the market 
with the seller and later, presumably having purchased the recorder, 
back at home taping messages to the mysterious ‘Anna’. Then, somehow, 
after an unknown period, the Dictaphone appears back for sale at this 
same market which was captured yet again on my field recorder as I 
purchased the Dictaphone. There is a circularity to this. The 
unmistakeable sound of the air raid siren that signifies the close of 
the market is audible on both the Dictaphone tape that came with the 
machine and in the higher fidelity digital recording that I made of the 
market myself.

All of the recordings contained here within explore one particular 
environment – the city of Lisbon. Field recordings by their very nature 
are time-based but the introduction of found tapes into the mix expands 
the timescale of these studies from just the short period spent in the 
city making recordings, backwards to possibly forty or more years in the 
past. It is a portrait in time and place, an archaeology of sound. The 
result of the audio flotsam and jetsam washed up on the shores of low 
commerce in the flea markets of Lisbon.

‘Lend an ear, leave a word’ was originally released as an LP on Graham 
Lambkin’s KYE label in 2016. This is a reworked soundscape version of 
that project containing large amounts of additional material that wasn’t 
used on the album due to time constraints. All recordings made or found 
in Lisbon in 2012.

Mark Vernon, Glasgow, February, 2021.

again, we are always looking for new material, whether raw field 
recordings, field recording based composition, or introduction 
submissions. we are also now accepting proposals for full editions of 
our guest curated framework:afield series. send proposals or material, 
released or not, on any format, to the address at the bottom of this 
mail. if you have any questions, please don't hesitate to get in touch!

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The tape recordings uncovered amongst other things:
- Someone waiting in a car at an airport for over half an hour, 
occasionally blowing raspberries into the microphone to relieve the boredom
- An eight minute recording of someone eating in extreme close-up to the 
microphone
- Numerous different mic tests (1,2.. 1,2.. testing etc.)
- An accidental answerphone recording of a drunken phone conversation 
about stolen car parts
- Baby recordings
- A child singing
- Accordion playing
- The answerphone messages of the family Carmino Vazio
- TV, popular music, radio, white noise, pause button clunks, wowing, 
fluttering, wrong tape speeds, cross talk, feedback, mic handling noise

Amongst the field recordings used in the piece were:
- An air ventilation unit
- A band practicing for a presidential visit to the Mouraria area
- Workmen re-laying a cobbled pavement
- Caged canaries
- A creaky tap
- Traffic and street noise
- A recording of a man crying and praying in a toilet cubicle in Lisbon 
airport (accompanied by the sounds of farting, shitting, automatic paper 
dispensers and toilets flushing)
- Exercise machines in the Jardim de Estrela park
- Waves breaking on the coastline at Cascais
- Peacocks at the Castelo de São Jorge
- Overheard conversations
- Traders at the Feira de Ladra flea market
- Trains and tannoy announcement bongs at the Metro station
- A sun lotion dispenser

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framework intro submissions:

    1)    take yourself and an audio recorder to a location of your choice
    2)    record for AT LEAST 1 minute before you -
    3)    read aloud the following text (in english or translated):

welcome to framework. framework is a show consecrated to 
field-recording, and its use in composition.  field-recording, 
phonography, the art of sound hunting; open your ears and listen!

    4)    continue recording for AT LEAST 2 minutes after the text
    5)    post the 
recording to us on any format, or send us an mp3

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