Chart pop is recorded through a live-streamer’s laptop or camera microphone. Lyrics become nearly indiscernible and the spectrum of the music is muddied. For me, these recordings sound readily intimate – music through the walls of your neighbour’s house, music heard from the bathroom of a party. I wanted to emphasise this intimacy but also the voyeurism of streaming culture. I used the basic autotune software Melodyne to contrast a machine heard and interpreted version of these songs, against my own listening. The ubiquitous ‘Audio to Midi’ algorithm on many DAW’s has its own set of listening biases. In my animation, humanoid avatars float and move with the sound, lyrics from the music hanging off them and flying in an imagined wind.
Premiered by Syzygy Ensemble1 at the Melbourne Recital Centre. For Laila Engle (flutes), Robin Henry (clarinets), Jenny Khafagi (violin), Campbell Banks (cello), Leigh Harrold (piano) + Electronics. 21:34
This piece was made possible by the generosity of patrons Mark Lazarus and Kingsley Gee.
Recording made at ABC Iwaki Auditorium, with sound engineer Chris Lawson.
Listen here … https://soundcloud.com/emilefrankel/tracecore
or to this ABC interview with Jennifer Mills.2