Barely: part-1
Natasha Barrett
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1Barely: part-1 (2006-07)Natasha Barrett Arr. Natasha Barrett, 2008 [original work]38:58
Programme notes
Barely
The work was designed as a site-specific installation for Kanonhallen in Oslo (Norway). The Germans requisitioned Kanonhallen during WWII for use as an artillery factory. The space is 50 meters long, 13.5 meters wide and 8 meters high. The walls and floor are concrete. High glass windows allow the changing light to penetrate the room throughout the day. Barely
Visual materials for the installation consist of 20 clear, colourless one-mm thick, one-meter wide and four-meter long polycarbonate foils hang from a 9 by 8-meter ceiling grid. The foils were painted with a line pattern in ultraviolet reflective paint. This pattern was designed in detail through computer simulations to both enhance and skew the spatial topology. Naturally occurring sounds from in- and outside the space were recorded and classified in terms of intrinsic (spectral and temporal, or ‘inside’ the sound) and extrinsic (referential, or referring ‘outside’ the sound) content. These materials included everyday sounds such as the activity of a janitor and two onsite workers, sounds from the neighbouring building site, a kindergarten, a motorbike courier and a distant propeller plane. Outdoor sources were recorded both outside and inside Kanonhallen so as to be filtered through the unusual room acoustic. The blend of indoor and outdoor sounds dissolved the sense of boundary. In addition, close-microphone recordings, which exclude room acoustics, were used to rearticulate detail when micro-scale variations in temporal and spectral information were lost. Editing and transformation served two main functions. To explore extrinsic information by creating a continuum from a sound suggesting a direct causal basis or concrete reference, to a sound of remote causal basis or abstract reference. Sounds of concrete reference were used to create a network of indicative relationships suggestive mainly of human activity in ordinary environments. And to explore intrinsic information by drawing attention to, and isolating, small details and fluctuations in sound identity, spectrum and morphology. (Even more information about the work can be found in the composer’s website.)
The listening level of Barely
[xii-09]
The audio of Barely
- Composer(s): Natasha Barrett
- Year of composition: 2006-07
- Arranger(s): Natasha Barrett
- Version: Arr. Natasha Barrett, 2008 [original work]
- Cycle: The Barely Project
- Duration: 38:58
- Instrumentation: fixed medium
- Publisher(s): Ymx média
- ISRC: CAD501010221
