Cellphonia: 4’ 33”

Steve Bull, and Scot Gresham-Lancaster

Installation Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression

• Year: 2009
• Location: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Abstract:

Cellphonia: 4’33” is a tribute to the concept embodied in John Cage’s landmark piece, 4’33”. It is a structural and aesthetic construct that is a formal expansion of the piece. Technology is used to examine the sounds around us, but also to include those parts of our personal soundscape that are augmented by technology, by the addition of the cellphone to our acoustic world. There are two distinct audio elements. The first is a “bed” created by an ambient microphone. This recording is regeneratively looped at intervals that coincide directly to the timings of Cage’s original score. Changes are injected in key parameters of the “looping” to perturb and rearrange the material already captured in the previous section. The second element is the “cellphone opera” score that takes input from participants and redistributes the audio material from the calls to specific slots in a prearranged “score”. Each new call rearranges the entire score as the recordings move to a new temporally ordered location in the 4 minute and 33 second time frame. “At the beep” participant callers are prompted to respond to randomly chosen requests. “Make the sound of a radio out of tune” “Tell us about Cage’s 4’33” performance.” “What is your mother’s name?” “Did David Tudor like mushrooms?” Each cellphone call will be recorded for 4 seconds and 330 milliseconds.

Citation:

BibTeX Entry:

  @inproceedings{Bull2009,
 abstract = {Cellphonia: 4’33” is a tribute to the concept embodied in John Cage’s landmark piece, 4’33”. It is a structural and aesthetic construct that is a formal expansion of the piece. Technology is used to examine the sounds around us, but also to include those parts of our personal soundscape that are augmented by technology, by the addition of the cellphone to our acoustic world.

There are two distinct audio elements. The first is a “bed” created by an ambient microphone. This recording is regeneratively looped at intervals that coincide directly to the timings of Cage’s original score. Changes are injected in key parameters of the “looping” to perturb and rearrange the material already captured in the previous section.

The second element is the “cellphone opera” score that takes input from participants and redistributes the audio material from the calls to specific slots in a prearranged “score”. Each new call rearranges the entire score as the recordings move to a new temporally ordered location in the 4 minute and 33 second time frame. “At the beep” participant callers are prompted to respond to randomly chosen requests. “Make the sound of a radio out of tune” “Tell us about Cage’s 4’33” performance.” “What is your mother’s name?” “Did David Tudor like mushrooms?” Each cellphone call will be recorded for 4 seconds and 330 milliseconds.},
 address = {Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania},
 author = {Steve Bull and Scot Gresham-Lancaster},
 booktitle = {Installation Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression},
 editor = {Golan Levin},
 publisher = {Carnegie Mellon University},
 title = {Cellphonia: 4’ 33”},
 year = {2009}
}