LECTURE: The Architecture of Sound | Shea Trahan

Interactive nature between architecture and sound. (15:46) Shea Trahan’s TEDxVermilionStreet talk explores the interactive nature between architecture and sound.  Using a combination of live demonstrations and pre-recorded examples, Trahan shows us the power the built environment can have on sound and our emotional connection with that sound and space. He proposes using our current knowledge of the relationships between structure and sound to develop ideal chambers of meditation for therapy, study, and enjoyment.

Soundscape: Shanghai

The Soundscape of Shanghai (5:24) Beyond the city’s iconic sights plays a soundtrack that tells the story of its past and present..  The air of Shanghai is saturated with an immeasurable number of sounds: the braying of street vendors, the pumping anthems of dancing grannies, the ice cream truck jingle of the city sweeper, the rumble of a passing car, the chirping of birds in a park, the wind passing through a narrow alleyway

Lecture: Charles Amirkhanian, Bernie Krause, Walter Murch

Surrounded by Soundscapes: (1:24) Composer Charles Amirkhanian, soundscape ecologist Bernie Krause, and film editor and sound designer Walter Murch consider the environmental implications and artistic possibilities of aural landscapes and ambient sounds.

Education: Body sounds - Rain Storm

Rain storm: Using the body to make sounds (1:46) A teacher experiments with children using their bodies to create the sound of a rain storm. Source: YouTube

Lecture: Ocean’s Soundscape

Finding your Way in the Ocean’s Soundscape (17:37). Lino Camprubí presents a Haus der Kulturen der Welt lecture on underwater communication. November 2, 2018. Lino Camprubí is Researcher at the University of Seville in the Ramón y Cajal program. He focuses in oceanography, acoustics, and the global environment, as well as the acoustic construction of the maritime as a sonic space. Among his publications are Engineers and the Making of the Francoist Regime (2014), Technology and Globalisation (with David Pretel, 2018), the special issue Experiencing the Global Environment (with Philipp Lehmann, 2018), and articles such as The Sonic Construction of the Ocean as the Navy's (2018).

Education: Soundscape lesson grades 3-5

Creating a Soundscape (6:09) A music teacher works out a quick soundscape lesson that he will be teaching grades 3-5.  Source: YouTube

Lecture: Applied Soundscape

Applied Soundscape: How Sound Connects Us (17:54) Sound is all around us, but how often do we think about the impact it has on us and how it connects us to our environment? 

In this unique talk, Lisa Lavia of the Noise Abatement Society and Harry Witchel from the Brighton and Sussex Medical School illustrate through a series of auditory demonstrations the importance of sound quality (rather than simply decibel levels) in the built environment. Source TedXSquareMile

Soundscape: Mission San Juan

Mission San Juan Part 1 (0:34) Take a moment to close your eyes and take in the soundscape at Mission San Juan (San Antonio, Texas). The Yanaguana Trail and nearby San Antonio River attract native bird species to the site. Carp splash in the river below. In the distance, hear airplanes taking off and landing at the historic Stinson Municipal Airport. City sounds fade into the background. What do you hear at Mission San Juan that people have been hearing at the site for over 300 years? Source: Facebook.

Documentary: Magpie Mimics Siren

Magpie Mimics Fire Siren (0:23): An Australian magpie has been caught on camera mimicking the sound of emergency vehicle sirens during the bushfire crisis affecting large parts of the country. The Australian magpie is well known for mimicking the sounds it hears most frequently, such as dogs and car alarms. Source: The Guardian

Lecture: Vocal Sexism in Video Gamers

Sounding out Sexism in Video Games (14;51) Why don’t women play women characters in video games? Milena Droumeva sounds-out the impact of audio in video games, and how portrayals of female characters in games have significantly impacted gaming experiences. “If we can’t represent women as fully human, how can we think as women as fully human?"

Research: Haptic Hearing for the deaf

Sound shirt (3:49)  The soundshirt is a haptic wearable device that allows deaf users to feel music on their skin. designed by fashion tech company cute circuit, the sound shirt brings music to life using a series of haptic sensors that are built into the material.

Sound Installaltion: Wind Sound Sculpture

The Singing Ringing Tree (3:15) The Singing Ringing Tree is a wind powered sound sculpture resembling a tree set in the landscape of the Pennine hill range overlooking Burnley, in Lancashire, England.

Documentary: Sounds of Extinction - B. Krause

Recording the Sounds of Extinction (3:20) Bernie Krause has been recording wildlife sounds, or "soundscapes," for over forty years. He's amassed the largest archive in the world, and in doing so, can chart how wildlife sounds have changed over the course of climate change. Listen for yourself: the rising silence speaks volumes. Source: Great Big Story

Documentary: Gordon Hempton - Silence

How to Find Silence in a Noisy World (7:19) “Sanctuaries of Silence” takes you on a virtual journey into one of Earth’s last remaining bastions of true quiet — the Hoh Rain Forest, in Washington State. Shooting in beautifully immersive 360 video, directors Adam Loften and Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee follow acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton as he explores the mossy, green heart of silence. Vaughan-Lee’s previous Op-Doc, “Vanishing Island,” also took us to a place physically endangered by modernity — Louisiana’s Isle de Jean Charles. In “Sanctuaries of Silence,” the threat is not so much to a place, as to our very ability to encounter the natural world on its own terms. As Hempton puts it, “Silence isn’t the absence of something, but the presence of everything.” Source: New York Times Op-Docs 360.

Documentary: Science of Sound

The Nature Of Things Sonic Magic (37:41) A 2015 Documentary about the wonder and science of sound. Though our world is full of sound, we only notice the noise. Sound can thrill, delight, warn, and scare us. But there's much more to the story. Sound can cure the sick and make the blind see: Source: The Nature of Things.

Lecture: Bernie Krause Natural World

The voice of the natural world (14:48) Bernie Krause has been recording wild soundscapes -- the wind in the trees, the chirping of birds, the subtle sounds of insect larvae -- for 45 years. In that time, he has seen many environments radically altered by humans, sometimes even by practices thought to be environmentally safe. A surprising look at what we can learn through nature's symphonies, from the grunting of a sea anemone to the sad calls of a beaver in mourning. Source: TED Talks