To start I am a DJ and a music producer.
My ears are usually plugged with earphones and I am in a perpetual state of “music
video.” My visuals rarely are in sync with my audio for this reason. I spend
time outdoors without music, only when I am conversing with the company I am
surrounded with. Unless there is a blaring siren or a loud commotion, I am used
to tuning out noise other than the sound of conversation. It is not that I am
unaware of the background noise, but I don't acknowledge it. Though simple, an
opportunity for a soundwalk was refreshing and a new experience for me. I spend
almost all of my days in the city and get home to Queens fairly late. I decided
to do my soundwalk in my immediate neighborhood, which is a more suburban area.
Compared to the city, and especially at night, my neighborhood is quiet.
My immediate thought was that the area
had a dry texture of sound. Usually, I would regard the wind as a background noise.
In comparison to the lack of sound, the strong winds caused the loudest noise.
Immediately after, I would hear the dry leaves shaking in the wind and sounded
like an instrument called the rainstick. Ironically, the dead leaves moved by
the wind, would sound similar to rain. The wind would also cause signs to clink
metal, and occasionally cause litter to roll around. It sounded like an industrial
track without rhythm.
I also never realized how much I hear
the movements that my body makes. Obviously, this was a sound loudest to me,
but one I tune out the most. I heard myself breathing at times, my nose
sniffling in the cold, and my feet hitting the ground.
In the
foreground, the most “exciting” sound of was cars passing by. Concentrating on sound made it seem as if each
car’s sound was reflective of the driver. There were cars with loud or quiet
engines and the sounds were different at variable speeds.
My
soundwalk’s soundmark was actually the absence of sound. My neighborhood is
away from the bustle of the city. Due to the lack of sound, I was able to
realize how loud background noise can be at times. I wanted to have a soundwalk
with unique sounds. What was unexpected was that the quiet could be a unique
experience in itself. Through the soundwalk I was able to think about how much
more detail I could add to the audio aspect of a film.
