ON SOUND/IN SOUND
Liapi
7-10/11/2024.
Soundscape composition.
Presented at the 7th Conference on Acoustic Ecology: Soundscape, Biophony and Climate Crisis.
Athens, Department of Music Studies of the University of Athens/ Ancient Epidaurus.
Liapi is a soundscape composition designed for a 5.1 surround system involving transformations of environmental sounds. The piece captures experiences from five key locations in East Zagori Liapi, emphasizing the region's biodiversity through seasonal sound recordings, which took place during springtime and during summertime. The field recordings were made along pastoral routes with the guidance of the local community, as part of awareness activities organized by environmentalist social enterprise EcoMuseum Zagori. It could be said that the composition unfolds in three movements. The first movement features the uninterrupted flow of groundwater through rocky paths and the communication between nightingales in forested areas, gradually transitioning into the second movement, where the sounds of a sudden hunt emerge as shepherd's dogs drive away a wolf. The final movement is marked by the sound of bells worn by goats returning from grazing, filling the acoustic spectrum and bringing the composition to a close.
The work engages with the study and practices of Acoustic Ecology by focusing on biophony and soundscape analysis. The piece draws from field recordings in East Zagori to document the region’s natural sound diversity in the soundscaper platform EchoLoci, while highlighting the connection between biodiversity and seasonal environmental shifts. The collected environmental sounds contribute to the exploration of bioacoustics and soundscape ecology, particularly by illustrating the dynamic interaction between natural and human-generated soundscapes. This interaction forms the compositional framework of the piece, reflecting the conference's emphasis on soundscapes as tools for understanding ecological systems. By emphasizing the acoustic signature of pastoral routes and local wildlife, Liapi illustrates how sound can raise awareness of ecological concerns and deepen the connection between people and their environment. Through the EcoMuseum Zagori’s initiatives, the work contributes to the dialogue around using sound in environmental education and community involvement, promoting sustainable practices.
The composition is particularly enhanced by its design for a 5.1 surround system, which envelops listeners in the auditory experience. This multi-channel setup enables the audience to be immersed in the sound environment, creating a heightened sense of presence. Overall, the experience relates to conference topics such as soundscape mapping and the semantics of soundscapes, placing sound as a crucial medium for both artistic expression and ecological awareness. The intention is for the listener not only to observe but also to experience the soundscapes, developing a profound and meaningful connection to the natural world.
Soundscape composition.
Presented at the 7th Conference on Acoustic Ecology: Soundscape, Biophony and Climate Crisis.
Athens, Department of Music Studies of the University of Athens/ Ancient Epidaurus.
Liapi is a soundscape composition designed for a 5.1 surround system involving transformations of environmental sounds. The piece captures experiences from five key locations in East Zagori Liapi, emphasizing the region's biodiversity through seasonal sound recordings, which took place during springtime and during summertime. The field recordings were made along pastoral routes with the guidance of the local community, as part of awareness activities organized by environmentalist social enterprise EcoMuseum Zagori. It could be said that the composition unfolds in three movements. The first movement features the uninterrupted flow of groundwater through rocky paths and the communication between nightingales in forested areas, gradually transitioning into the second movement, where the sounds of a sudden hunt emerge as shepherd's dogs drive away a wolf. The final movement is marked by the sound of bells worn by goats returning from grazing, filling the acoustic spectrum and bringing the composition to a close.
The work engages with the study and practices of Acoustic Ecology by focusing on biophony and soundscape analysis. The piece draws from field recordings in East Zagori to document the region’s natural sound diversity in the soundscaper platform EchoLoci, while highlighting the connection between biodiversity and seasonal environmental shifts. The collected environmental sounds contribute to the exploration of bioacoustics and soundscape ecology, particularly by illustrating the dynamic interaction between natural and human-generated soundscapes. This interaction forms the compositional framework of the piece, reflecting the conference's emphasis on soundscapes as tools for understanding ecological systems. By emphasizing the acoustic signature of pastoral routes and local wildlife, Liapi illustrates how sound can raise awareness of ecological concerns and deepen the connection between people and their environment. Through the EcoMuseum Zagori’s initiatives, the work contributes to the dialogue around using sound in environmental education and community involvement, promoting sustainable practices.
The composition is particularly enhanced by its design for a 5.1 surround system, which envelops listeners in the auditory experience. This multi-channel setup enables the audience to be immersed in the sound environment, creating a heightened sense of presence. Overall, the experience relates to conference topics such as soundscape mapping and the semantics of soundscapes, placing sound as a crucial medium for both artistic expression and ecological awareness. The intention is for the listener not only to observe but also to experience the soundscapes, developing a profound and meaningful connection to the natural world.
01/07/2024-30/06/2025.
Field recording, soundscapes and community engagement.
This project, undertaken in collaboration with EcoMuseum Zagori and funded by the Prespa Ohrid Nature Trust (PONT), focuses on acoustic ecology to raise awareness about biodiversity and traditional livestock farming in the Zagori region. As part of the initiative, fieldwork involves capturing seasonal soundscapes at five georeferenced pastoral routes, documenting the natural environment's unique biodiversity.
Key elements include the creation of seasonal soundscape recordings that highlight the interplay between biophony, geophony, and anthropophony, showcasing the ecological richness of pastoral routes. Community engagement is a core aspect, with citizen science workshops such as BioBlitz encouraging local participation in biodiversity monitoring and sound documentation to foster environmental awareness. The recorded soundscapes enrich the EchoLoci app, creating an interactive digital sound map that connects ecological and cultural heritage.
These recordings and associated workshops aim to preserve cultural practices such as transhumance, emphasizing the region’s interconnected natural and cultural heritage while inspiring sustainable practices. A blend of art, science, and community effort, the project bridges the gap between conservation and local traditions, ensuring their legacy is both celebrated and protected. The work represents a contribution to understanding how soundscapes can foster ecological and cultural preservation, making the inaudible dimensions of biodiversity accessible and immersive at the same time.
13/06/2024.
Graphic Score and Soundscape.
Participation and award for the Sound of the Year Awards: Minute of Listening, Museum of Sounds and The New BBC Radiophonic Workshop.
Winning Submission.
Primary School of Volakas - Year 3 and Year 5.
The chosen community was situated around the primary school of the village of Volakas in Drama, during the morning hours before the start of the school day. The children identified various elements of their surroundings, including the sound of the river flowing, the melodic tweets of birds, the rhythmic chiming of cowbells in the adjacent fields, the robust gusts of wind, and the distinctive echoes of explosions from the nearby marble quarries, for which Volakas is renowned. These experiences formed their connection to the environment and sparked new possibilities for creative interpretation.
Oracles in Sound
21/01/2024-ongoing.
Online radio show broadcasted bimonthly on Stegi Radio, funded by the Onassis Foundation.
Culture, Society, and Politics in the Digital Age features recitations and research on themes for each episode, exploring passages from various books covering sociology, politics, history, philosophy, and more, conducted by Nikos Tsinos. The research of the themes along with the curation of the soundtrack, which includes references to sound art, is undertaken by Dimitris Batsis.
The episodes include the folowing themes:
Aesthetics, Criteria, Perceptibility.
Disciplining Gendered Bodies.
The Machine and the Post-Modern.
Education, Conformity, and the Culture of Insignificance.
Private Norms in a Bureaucratized World.
Photos by: Katerina Tsiloni
Chant
24/08/2023.
Composition and sound design.
The piece was played at Gallery 46 for the launch event of LIMINALITY [A FRIENDLY ABYSS] in London, a series of exhibitions and events featuring cross-disciplinary works comprising of visual-sound performance.
Chant was originally created to evoke a tense and alarming, while preserving a welcoming and mysterious mood. Halfway through, the strings emerge from the low-end frequency drones, intending to indicate an eerie, otherworldly atmosphere. One could argue that the composition exhibits a centrifugal trait as the horror-like strings repetitively sprawl out, aiming to convey a sense of peculiar and hyperreal territorial formation.
2-20/08/2023, 2-20/08/2023.
Video animation.
loop, 1920x1080, stereo.
6-9/07/2023: Video Art Miden festival, Kalamata, Greece (reference at p.4)
2-20/08/2023: International Exhibition Circle 2023 (reference at p.2) at Cong Institute of Contemporary Art (CICA Museum), Seoul, South Korea.
10-24/07/2024: Fonland Festival Coibra, Portugal.
In this brief 3D animation video, the central theme is the formation of new subjectivities in industry 4.0. The use of automata generates machine approximation to human life through non-human resemblance technologies, following the materialisation of a technological territory that simulates human lived time, simulacra.
The video’s opening takes us on a wander through this technological territory, the microchip world. As it zooms out, we encounter multiple microchip worlds that spread across each side of seemingly identical cubes. Signs and their references to the real world break down through an alienating process that breeds a chaotic sign exchange in a network that cannot be represented further. Still, it is a system of continuous simulation. The intention is to interpret this simulation system by creating an environment that reflects this visceral computational reality.
The towering trunk, which appears halfway through the piece, is the only element that resembles organic life. It has flesh that seems to absorb the microchip worlds, which are spread on the cubes. The organic body of the trunk becomes a multi-projected and omnipresent organism; the body-flesh resembles a fold that can transcend its own presence; there is the possibility of existing in the absence of the original being and the presence of an avatar.
The era of transhumanism offers the technological and reflective tools to consider the extension, dissolution, and unfolding of the body-flesh within the body-I. The cubes, which are gradually absorbed through the trunk’s foundations and onto its body, signify the spread of technologies that disappear into our everyday operations to the point of becoming universal, casual, as well as unseen. As the lens zooms out giving us the full perspective of this assimilating process, a cube appears in close distance directing us into its microchip world, implying another wander in an identical territory which was just experienced.
This pattern might bring to mind an Escher painting, a paradox of infinite production and reproduction. It could be argued that in this sterile environment, the cubes that breed other cubes, hence Hypercube, symbolize networks that form an ever-growing perception that is raised in tandem with everyday life, a symbiotic condition. In other words, Hypercube functions as a metaphor, revealing a system that suggests the transitory process from human to transhuman and from real to hyperreal.
3D & animation: Michalis Kotaidis & Lefteris Delimpasis
Initial concept and design: Manousos Manousakis
Sound: Dimitris Batsis
Sound design and production for audio visual installation with BKDM (Michalis Kotaidis, Lefteris Delimpasis, Manousos Manousakis).
Two live performances in the context of the parallel events of the international exhibition Plásmata II, in Ioannina.
The performances were comissioned by Stegi, Onassis Foundation.
26/06/2023: Participation in the series of events organized by Onassis Stegi and Movement Radio with a selection of ambient-experimental music and field recordings.
27/06/2023: Insiders.
Live-coding audio improvisation.
Insiders is a project that challenges conventional perceptions of time through live coding. Drawing inspiration from Derrida's concept of hauntology, the work explores how traces of the past and unrealized futures intermingle in the present, creating a layered experience of unease and unpredictability. It reinterprets archived audio created over the past 20 years for installations, short films, animation, and multimedia performances. The live performance deconstructs and reshapes these works, blending improvisation with rigid narration. It features excerpts from Bret Easton Ellis's The Informers, which adds a stark narrative to the sonic palette and provides a dispassionate portrayal of life.
In this fashion, the audio material and the performer’s narration which are featured in the live-coding audio improvisation of Insiders resurface, undergoing resynthesis and transfiguration, and become part of a shared sensory journey for the performer and audience. Utilising open-source software, the performance empowers real-time transformation and mixing of audio files, encouraging flashes of spontaneity through improvisation. This interplay between performer and audience weaves a dynamic soundscape that blurs the boundaries between past and present.
Live coding transforms the traditional music performance into asynchronous and unpredictable interactions between the performers' actions and their sound output. This practice creates a unique, immersive experience, where both performer and audience navigate a shared sensory journey through sound. Unlike conventional performances, live coding is not just about the present. The disconnect between editing of the code and the resulting manifestation of sound uniquely allows the performer to anticipate future moments, making it a dynamic exploration of time and sensory perception.
The project embodies the concept of an insider who possesses information that others lack. Through the reinterpretation of archived works, live narration, and spontaneous audio improvisation, it uncovers hidden dimensions and fosters intimate connections. Fundamentally, the work is grounded in transmediation, diversity, and concepts pertaining to the reappearance or enduring presence of elements from the historical or cultural past, akin to a spectral phenomenon.
Photo credits (top to bottom):
Image 1 by Kostis Emmanouilidis.
Image 2 by Bill Prokos.
Image 3 by Hak.
Image 4 by Bill Prokos.
23/05/2023.
Re-imagined soundscape composition.
Koforidua is a composition comprising field recordings from the Wetland Ghana 2022 Archives recorded by Samuel Kudjodzi in binaural format in a suburban settlement in Koforidua, Eastern Region, Ghana. It is contributed to Cities and Memory, Oxford, UK, citiesandmemory.com, and explores the musical patterns of natural acoustic phenomena found in wetland ecosystems in suburban Ghana, and the creative possibilities that come with them.
Cities and Memory podcast platform for field recording and sound art, with thousands of recordings covering more than 100 countries and territories all over the world, each of them remixed and reimagined into a completely new composition.
The main goal of this project is to encourage focused listening, raise awareness about fragile ecosystems and encourage positive attitudes and protection of disappearing ecosystems.
30/04-01/05/2022.
Soundscape stream of the Bet Chaim Jewish Cemetery.
Online.
REVEIL SC 9, a 24+1 hour radio broadcast following sunrise around the earth on Dawn Chorus Day, is a project of Soundcamp with Stave Hill Ecological Park (TCV) and the Acoustic Commons network: Full Of Noises (Cumbria UK) · Locus Sonus (Aix FR) · Radio CONA (Ljubljana SLO) · HMU (Crete GR) · Cyberforest (Tokyo JP). Streams are part of the live soundmap operated by Locus Sonus at ESAAIX, Aix-en-Provence. Projects by the Acoustic Commons Network. The Reveil mix is hosted by Wave Farm in Acra, Upper Hudson Valley, New York. Resonance Radio is the UK broadcast partner. The show is carried each year in whole or in part by a Soundart Radio (UK) , NAISA Radio (Canada), and a network of FM and net radio stations around the world. More information at soundtent.org.
link to the profile of the Bet Chaim Jewish Cemetery soundscape.
20/02/2022-today.
Geolocative online activated sound installation.
loop, 2 speakers, wifi, media player (single-board computers), activated by a geolocation API in a mobile app, featuring story locations and interactive art installations for an integrated museum experience.
Supported by Interreg Palimpsest Art Museum (co-funded by the Interreg V-A Greece-Italy 2014-2020 Programme), University of Ioannina, University of Bari, Region of Epirus, Province of Lecce and the Municipality of Ioannina. The project was commissioned by The PALIMPSEST Project.
The main idea of the work focuses on the interpretation of an animating force, a journey to history through the propagation of sound. The piece manifests through the use of whispers. The rich sound of whispered phrases from various persons, which constantly appears and disappears, intends to create a field of perplexing energy, a return to a spot that awaits to be experienced, a world of memory and recollection. The interior of the space in the castle where the sound plays from on repeat, symbolizes an enigmatic setting: the little space in the castle becomes a metaphoric dimension of a mysterious, possibly dangerous activity.
Concept, composition, design and editing by Anastasis Karras & Dimitris Batsis.
Video credit: Aris Panagiotidis