sound.hudsn.org

The wind blows an empty styrofoam cup down a street in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn.

The sound of the Atlantic Ocean. Seltjarnarnes, Iceland

Nov. 2009

6:20am GMT, Welcome to Iceland

On that day in 2009, 1969, and 1851 

July 21 was a Monday. I had taken the day off from work and I spent a few hours walking around Central Park making sound recordings and taking photographs. On the northwest side near the reservoir I passed by a bearded man under a tree playing a mandola, also known as the octave mandolin. Like a viola to the violin, it has a longer neck and a deeper pitch than the mandolin. Joe is his name. On his shirt he’s wearing a small pendant commemorating the Apollo moon landing on July 21, 1969. The song he plays is about another event that happened on that day in history. It’s the ballad of the outlaw Sam Bass. In the ambient background you can hear the summer birds chirping, a gust of wind, and a plane flying overhead all before Sam meets his fate.

Rhys Chatham’s Crimson Grail for 200 guitars

Audio of the crowd waiting and the very end of Part I of “A Crimson Grail.” August 8 at Damrosch Park, Lincoln Center.

brooklyn. late june, 2009
the sound of neighbors on a sunday afternoon: one does yard work, another sings along to Jay-Z, and a cop car roars by.

not the gentle crash of waves, not even the faint music of the brooklyn bands, but the crowd at Toddp’s unamplified BBQ on the beach at Fort Tilden, where the local law enforcement authorities took special interest in our gathering.