STIRRING, SHAKING, AND MIXING: MUSICALIZING
EVERYDAY ACTIONS
Juraj Kojs
Virginia Center for Computer
Music
University of Virginia
koj
[email protected]
ABSTRACT
This paper discusses how physical and cyber everyday
objects formed a union in the composition Neither
Stirred, Nor Shaken. Cocktail glasses, metal shakers,
and electric blenders were defined as musical
instruments. Actions such as stirring, shaking, and
blending were tracked by sensor technology. The
physical models of these everyday objects were created
to timbrally augment the sonic qualities of the physical
instruments. A real-time performance engages three
percussionists who operate the everyday objects and
control the cyber ones.
1. INTRODUCTION
Everyday objects have rich history in music. Already in
the early 20th century, Italian Futurist Luigi Russolo
designed, built, and used in music compositions a set of
musical instruments called intonarumori (noise
intoners), which mechanically and electrically
reproduced everyday sounds. After Russolo, the
everyday objects became subjects of exploration for the
generation of Fluxus musicians and experimentalist
composers such J. Cage, H. Partch, L. M. Young, C.
Cardew [1].
Engaging everyday objects in electroacoustic
music compositions is however uncommon. Pairing
physical and physically modeled everyday objects and
contextualizing them in a musical performance
stimulates a creation of a novel musical forms and
expressions.
In Garden of the Dragon (2003), the amplified
cellophane and plastic corrugated tubes were used to
shape a musical ecosystem. A choir of the singing tube
physical models was 'nurtured' by the action of the
physical performance. The parameters of the sonic
signal provided by the performers controlled the models
real-time [2].
In Revelations (2005) for circular toys,
resonant plates and electronics, the everyday objects
such as plastic superballs and glass marbles excited a set
of custom-designed resonant plates of while bouncing,
rolling, and scraping. Figure 1 displays everyday objects
involved in Revelations. The audio signal emanated
from the plates was mapped into a number of
cyberinstruments by physical modeling synthesis
implemented in MAX/MSP [3]. The cyberinstruments
complemented the actions of the physical objects and
Stefania Serafin
Medialogy, Aalborg
University Copenhagen,
Denmark
[email protected]
participated in creation of augmented analog-digital
instruments.
Figure 1. Individual and group set up of
Revelations for circular toys, resonant plates, and
electronics.
Music making with everyday objects is also the
primary activity in the composition Neither Stirred, Nor
Shaken (2007) for cocktail glasses, shakers, blenders,
and electronics. As opposed to the previous works,
however, this composition uses sensor technologies to
mediate contact between the physical actions of the
performers and responses of cyberinstruments by means
of physical modeling.
In the following paragraphs, we examine the
compositional structure, design and function of involved
cyberinstruments, tracking and mapping consensus
between the physical and cyber objects, and
performance issues connected to composing with
everyday objects and electronics.
2. NEITHER STIRRED, NOR SHAKEN
Neither Stirred, Nor Shaken (2007) is orchestrated for
everyday objects such as cocktail glasses, shakers,
blenders, and electronics. Writing the composition was
motivated by research published in [4], in which
Trevithick et al. discuss the potential health benefits of
stirring over shaking in preparation of martini. It
became curious to examine the sonic properties of
making the cocktails in a multiplicity of ways.
In Neither Stirred, Nor Shaken, the three
performers produce sounds, while they stir liquids and
ice with metal spoons in highball cocktail glasses, shake
their concoctions in metallic shakers and mix them in
electric blenders. The sonorities produced by these
activities are pitched and percussive. While the
percussiveness is directly related to the performance
action, the pitch content depends on the resonance
frequencies of the particular container. The instruments
are rather simple and produce limited, yet attractive,
timbres. In general, simplicity is both the most
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