Sound writing with my New School students

I just completed the first week of Fundamentals of Western Music at the New School. We began the semester with critical listening. Before having the students analyze recorded music, I had them warm up by doing some writing about the sound of a mundane environment. As it turns out, New School students are terrific and imaginative writers, and I thought I would share some excerpts of their work here.

The assignment: Choose a physical location, and describe its soundscape in 500-1000 words. List all of the sound sources you can and describe them in as much detail as possible. Describe your emotional reactions to these sounds individually and collectively. If you like, review the sounds as if they are a musical work.

Everybody complains about noise pollution, both from New York City street sounds and from their own air conditioners.

The most audible sound in my room is the AC vent blowing air. The vent creates a sound similar to television static. It is like various low and high pitches are all stacked on top of one another. The sound reminds me of someone exhaling out loud, but constantly.

Some of the writing got specific and analytical.

Under the sound of the vent, I can hear a high-pitched ringing coming from one of the plugs in the wall, currently. The ringing is similar to the sound of the vowel “E” had someone drawn out the pronunciation, looped it, and raised the pitch. I hate this sound.

While most students described their bedroom, several chose instead to write about the library.

Sitting in the library on the sixth floor of the university center, the most immediate noise is the music bleeding out of the headphones belonging to the student next to me. While it is loud enough to be slightly irritating, I cannot make out what he is listening to. I can hear a male singer, some shimmering guitars, and a steady drum beat. His loud grunting as he strokes his beard and looks at his phone indicates to me that he is unaware of how many other people are listening along with him…

People come and go, and because of how quiet the library is these occurrences do not go unnoticed. The chairs squeak and scratch the floor as they become a place to sit. Backpacks are dropped, the contents of which can sometimes be discerned based on how loud the thud is when it hits the ground. Computers and phones make crisp clacking sounds as they are set down on the wooden desks. Outlets creak as the prongs of the charging cables are thrust inside.

This student thought to include the sounds she subjectively perceives, not just the ones that are “really” there:

As the air conditioner takes a break again, all I’m left with is faint, powerful music, the small hiss of my diffuser, the clicks of my keyboard, and that which is the loudest of all: the sound of my own thoughts. Though not audible outside of my own body, it rings loud and clear. I hear the words on this page, and as my mind wanders, the rest of my evening, my grocery list, and plans for my friend visiting me next week from Germany. Regardless of this sound being “sonically intangible,” it is without a doubt the sound I focus on.

This one addressed her internal soundscape more literally.

In my ears, I feel some saliva bubble down my throat. It vaguely sounds like a baby cricket chirping.

This assignment was inspired in large part by Marc Weidenbaum, who has provided the basis for a lot of my teaching practice over the past few years. In New Music Box, Marc compares verbal description to recording as a way to capture and communicate sounds.

[A recording] never sounds like what I heard. The ear doesn’t work that way. The ear hears through things, focuses on things, filters out things. That happens in the world as a mix of brain wiring and personal inclinations. Once reproduced as a recording, those varying degrees of attentiveness are flattened: everything becomes evident relative to its respective volume.

Another inspiration for the sound writing assignment is Rob Walker, who has written extensively on the importance of deep attention for any kind of creative work. He wrote a terrific book on the subject, in which I make a brief appearance.

We further warmed up for musical analysis in class by doing an exercise I also love to do with music tech classes. First, we listened to “Beat It” by Michael Jackson and tried to extract as much information from it as we could. What sounds and instruments are present? What is the melody? What are the chords? What is the bassline? What is the beat? How do they change from one section to another? Then we listened through the multitrack stems, so the students can hear each part in isolation. This makes it much easier to pick them out of the sound mass afterwards. Next, we tried to similarly pull apart a few other recordings without the benefit of the multitracks. I’ll be interested to see how everyone does with this on their own.