Browsing by Author "Epstein, Marcia Jenneth"

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    Manifest: A Music Composition for Soundscape and Amplified Clarinet Engaging the Windsor Hum
    (2020-09-25) Garbet, Brian David; Radford, Laurie; Bell, Allan; Eagle, David; Sallis, Friedemann; Epstein, Marcia Jenneth; Smallwood, Scott
    Manifest is a five-movement composition for amplified clarinet and fixed multi-channel audio. The context for this work is the subject of noise pollution and the effect it can have on people and the ecosystem. In addition to the industrial noise of a manufacturing region, areas of Windsor, Ontario, are afflicted by a bothersome and persistent low frequency excitation known as the Windsor Hum. Unlike visible pollution, noise is an often-neglected concern, and much more discussion is needed to bring awareness to the health issues that arise from prolonged exposure to it. A community of resilient citizens has been enduring the disruptive consequences of industrial noise in Windsor and strive for a peaceful, healthy quality of life. Manifest is a social commentary delivered in the form of musique documentaire, a documentary-inspired approach to electroacoustic music. The foundation for the work was a series of investigative field recording trips to the Windsor region to capture the soundworld that would be used to establish the piece’s setting, while also acquiring an understanding of the predicament people were reporting. Through these recordings, additional research, and interviews with local residents, the relationship between heavy industry, industrial noise, the geography of the area, and the experiences of the people were developed into a narrative structure that was then used as the framework for the piece. The composition presents an immersive journey through Windsor, and the phenomenon of the Hum unfolds en route. The heterogeneous soundscape evokes parklands, a steel mill, and a large active river, all unified by recordings of spoken word, the clarinet, and brief transitional segments. The clarinet with live electronics represents the people and technology and serves as a common element linking these diverse sonic environments, featuring the versatility of this expressive instrument. As a compositional point of departure designed to strengthen the relationship between the clarinet and the soundscape, pitch material was derived from transcriptions and spectral analysis of the field recordings. This report presents the context, conceptualization, creative process, and analysis of this composition.
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    Voice Station: A Portfolio of Four Works Exploring Radio Art and Its Mediated Voices
    (2023-09-19) Ceylan, Melike; Radford, Ronald Laurie Charles; Hynes, Laura Anne; Bennett, Susan; Epstein, Marcia Jenneth; Rogalsky, Matt
    This study pertains to the creative explorations of the human voice and the radio medium through a portfolio of four projects titled Voice Station. The research and creative processes of the portfolio draw on the practices of radio art, a genre that encompasses a wide range of artistic experimentations with the conventions and complexities of the medium. Voice Station centres the human voice as the only compositional material to investigate how recorded and mediated voices can be used artistically in diverse radio environments by employing distinct platforms and technologies: Voice Station I (2019-21) is a fixed-medium composition that offers a sonic vocabulary for the portfolio and, thus, establishes its conceptual and technological foundations; Voice Station II (2021-22) is a web-based, participatory live stream comprising vocal materials contributed and curated by the participants; Voice Station III (2022) is a radio installation that invites visitors to an interactive listening experience via the radio dial in a gallery environment; finally, selected episodes of my ongoing radio program at CJSW FM, Vocal Cords, provide an examination of the relationships between radio and voice from a broader perspective of campus and community broadcasting. The vocal catalogue, audio processing methods, and formal strategies emerging from each project are recycled and evaluated throughout the portfolio. This iterative practice uncovers sonic and metaphorical similarities between the two core concepts of this study, radio and voice, and presents a structural model shared by each project.