“The soundscapes of the world is changing. Modern man is beginning to inhabit a world with an acoustic environment different from any he has hitherto known. These new sounds, which will differ in quality and intensity from those of the past, have alerted many researchers to the dangers of an indiscriminate and imperialistic spread of more and larger sounds into every corner of a man’s life. Noise pollution is now a world problem. It would seem that the world soundscape has reached an apex of vulgarity in our time, and many experts have predicted universal deafness as the ultimate consequence unless the problem can be brought quickly under control.” (Schafer, 1977)
Is it me, or is the paradigm of the next century in due for some real change, whether we are aware or not. Real change that effects everyone and everything, from personal dreams to community issues. When that change happens is indiscriminate upon where, when, or even sometimes why, but it is certain it starts with you. The environment is enriched with both sounds and no sounds and in between, is all up to the way you choose.
In history’s past, the most salient sound signal in the community of town might be its church bell. “The church bell is a centripetal sound; it attracts and unifies the community in a social sense, just as it draws man and God together. At times in the past it took on a centrifugal force as well, when it served to frighten away evil spirits.” (Schafer, 1977)
If the world were to drastically change as to make us asses the need to start over, we argue that any society suggest a ritual of communication and progress. If done daily, the ritual throughout the day would be vital to success. If practiced individually, the routine would be the rhythm of success; relax, breath, think, and move. If done fluently, then the body and mind will be valuable to each other. This act is what separates the community from the mundane society that has no value of rhythm, but lead more authoritative control over the public.
“There is often a threatening note, something blatant and metallic, in the voice of bells, that I believe we have fully more pain than pleasure from hearing them; but these as they sounded abroad, now high, now low, now with a plaintive cadence that caught the ear like the burthen of a popular song, were always moderate and tunable, and seemed to fall in with the spirit of still, rustic places, like the noise of a waterfall or the babble of a rookery in spring.” (Robert Louis Stephen)
Shortly thereafter, the bell became a city beacon for the master of the consciousness; time. The invention of the mechanical clock would differ all other clocks in there time, i.e. “water clocks, sand clocks and sundials – which were silent.” (Schafer, 1977).
Create Your Own Atmosphere / Soundscape:
1.) “Mixed Media”
2.) “Film”
3.) “Live Event”
4.) “Studio Music”
5.) “Live Music”
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