Sound microscopy: Bill Gunn's field recording and the ethics of slow | Institute of His... - 0 views
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john roach on 02 Dec 22"Dr. William W.H. 'Bill' Gunn (1913-1984) was a field recordist, conservationist and early populariser of nature sounds, recording landscapes in the Galapagos Islands, East Africa, Sri Lanka and locations across Canada including its Far North. A key technique in his practice and teaching was sound microscopy-slowing down the playback of his recordings to reveal details unable to be perceived at full speed. This presentation considers Gunn's slowing in relation to a range of contemporaneous practices of slowing (in speech therapy, music composition, etc.) as well as the context of his field and the 'slow violence' of ecological devastation. As listeners, we meditate on the wonder elicited from Gunn's human audience but also the absences, extractions and exclusions entwined with Gunn's exploration of musical microcosms."