lean to go up, slow to go loud

 

lean to go up slow to go loud  is the first piece made for Sensory Bikes, composed by Matthews during her Edgar Varèse guest professorship in bicrophonics at TU Berlin, and technically realised in collaboration with Sukander Kartadinata and Marcus Zepp.  It was commissioned by and performed at mikromusik 1.9 – 4.9.16,  Villa Elisabeth, Berlin 10115.

Made whilst in residence at Villa Elisabeth, the piece follows a route mapped between two churches and the old Berlin wall, taking the rider north from the Elisabethe church, west along the north side of Bernaueur Str and into the far end of the Nordbahnhof park.  With the central melody a sonification of the route of the wall sung by four voices separately recorded within the vast reverb of Villa Elisabeth, the piece also considers the Hungarian Serbian wall, inviting reflection on contemporary systems of community control and the prevention of free movement.

Audience/visitors were invited to come take out and ride one of the bikes along the route, the score.  As they rode, the piece played, the sounds and layered fragments changing with the bike’s location. With this new sensory system, the rider also found that they could  play the sounds by how they rode. Riding more slowly slowed texts to tones, faster sped them up to noise, backwards played it backwards and stopping changed a note or lowered a pitch. Tilting and leaning filtered sounds, and the breaks stepped to different modes.

 

The Sensory Bikes were made in collaboration with Sukandar Kartadinata & The Bicrophonic Research Institute (BRI)

Bike instrument coding: Marcus Zepp
Hardware assistance: Esther Selander
Bike speaker bar design + construction: Christophe Vaillant
Voices: Boris Hauf, Christian Kesten, Kaffe Matthews, Andrea Neumann
This project has been realised through support from the Edgar Varèse Guest professorship DAAD, TU Audio Communications, INM

This is a world premier of the sensory bikes, which will remain in Berlin for future projects.
Contact: info@sonicbikes.net for further details.