Living Sounds: Live Nature Sound as Online Performance Space

Gershon Dublon, and Xin Liu

Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression

• Year: 2021
• Location: Shanghai, China
• Article Number: 42
• DOI: 10.21428/92fbeb44.b90e0fcb (Link to paper)
• PDF link
• Presentation Video

Abstract:

This paper presents Living Sounds, an internet radio station and online venue hosted by nature. The virtual space is animated by live sound from a restored wetland wildlife sanctuary, spatially mixed from dozens of 24/7 streaming microphones across the landscape. The station’s guests are invited artists and others whose performances are responsive to and contingent upon the ever-changing environmental sound. Subtle, sound-active drawings by different visual designers anchor the one-page website. Using low latency, high fidelity WebRTC, our system allows guests to mix themselves in, remix the raw nature streams, or run our multichannel sources fully through their own processors. Created in early 2020 in response to the locked down conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic, the site became a virtual oasis, with usage data showing long duration visits. In collaboration with several festivals that went online in 2020, programmed live content included music, storytelling, and guided meditation. One festival commissioned a local microphone installation, resulting in a second nature source for the station: 5-channels of sound from a small Maine island. Catalyzed by recent events, when many have been separated from environments of inspiration and restoration, we propose Living Sounds as both a virtual nature space for cohabitation and a new kind of contingent online venue.

Citation:

BibTeX Entry:

  @inproceedings{NIME21_42,
 abstract = {This paper presents Living Sounds, an internet radio station and online venue hosted by nature. The virtual space is animated by live sound from a restored wetland wildlife sanctuary, spatially mixed from dozens of 24/7 streaming microphones across the landscape. The station’s guests are invited artists and others whose performances are responsive to and contingent upon the ever-changing environmental sound. Subtle, sound-active drawings by different visual designers anchor the one-page website. Using low latency, high fidelity WebRTC, our system allows guests to mix themselves in, remix the raw nature streams, or run our multichannel sources fully through their own processors. Created in early 2020 in response to the locked down conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic, the site became a virtual oasis, with usage data showing long duration visits. In collaboration with several festivals that went online in 2020, programmed live content included music, storytelling, and guided meditation. One festival commissioned a local microphone installation, resulting in a second nature source for the station: 5-channels of sound from a small Maine island. Catalyzed by recent events, when many have been separated from environments of inspiration and restoration, we propose Living Sounds as both a virtual nature space for cohabitation and a new kind of contingent online venue.},
 address = {Shanghai, China},
 articleno = {42},
 author = {Dublon, Gershon and Liu, Xin},
 booktitle = {Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression},
 doi = {10.21428/92fbeb44.b90e0fcb},
 issn = {2220-4806},
 month = {June},
 presentation-video = {https://youtu.be/tE4YMDf-bQE},
 title = {Living Sounds: Live Nature Sound as Online Performance Space},
 url = {https://nime.pubpub.org/pub/46by9xxn},
 year = {2021}
}