I am exploring the space where text, sound, beats, textures, silence, music, poetry, science, nature, technology, performance, installation and visual art meet. This is often done in the messiest of ways, while also attempting to discover the spatial and architectural details that sound can evoke. I have a passion for storytelling, and an increasing fascination with hardware and equipment (digital and analog), instruments and other objects that make a noise, recording techniques and audio production. I can splice and edit tape by hand (which is of little use in the 21st century), know my way around a mixing desk and also use DAWs that include Ableton Live and Pro Tools.
Below are some ventures into sound design, sound installation and audio production, although this is not a complete audiography.
Developing Your Creative Practice – Arts Council England (2022-23)
In 2022 I was awarded Arts Council England DYCP funding to develop my artistic practice in audio production, sound design and sound installation, which led to the production of a pilot audio literature tour for Hull, which will be further developed as a full project in the coming months. An iteration of the pilot project will be posted here in due course.
Flow of Words – Risky Cities (2022)
An artistic response to work written by community groups in workshops, leading to the production of sound design and visuals based around the themes, stories and ideas found within this material. The Flow of Words project aimed to help shape new narratives around flooding and flood risk. Presented live, the following soundscape was augmented in performance with live guitar, live saxophone and additional SFX. The percussion comprises samples of field recordings of a storm, the tidal sounds are field recordings of the Humber estuary and the North Sea. Commissioned by Risky Cities – the University of Hull Energy & Environment Institute, funded by Arts and Humanities Research Council, Natural Environment Research Council and UK Climate Resilience Programme.
Create_Space Research Project soundscapes (2022)
Soundscapes created for the Create_Space Research Project, which explored collaborative artistic practice in a virtual environment, supported by Freedom Festival.
Alluvium // Drift (2021)
Performance and sound installation as part of the Alluvium // Drift exhibition at Hull Artist Research Initiative, which featured visual and sonic art, projections and performance, exploring topography, strata, boundaries, maps, politics and the environment.
Sea and Strata (2021)
Sea and Srata is sound design created for a geo-located audio installation by artist Sarah Mole working to commission for Crescent Arts, Scarborough. The installation, utilising field recordings, combined sounds of the Sea with geomorphic sounds of Strata.
Man lost overboard Honoria (no relation) – audio version (2021)
From Ten Miles East of England, published by Wrecking Ball Press in 2013.
Urban Picnic soundscape (2020)
Urban Picnic navigated a route from the city to the country, passing electricity substations and railway lines before heading into nature. An ‘as the crow flies’ path led to an apple orchard. These audio files were part of a sound installation and audio walk that accompanied this journey.
Waves soundscape (2020)
Created for Urban Picnic.
What Is Light? soundscape (2018)
Soundscape for What Is Light?, a multi-disciplinary exhibition supported by Hull City Arts, Heads Up Festival and Battersea Arts Centre’s Collaborative Touring Network.
What Is Earth? – Earth Words (2018)
Earth Words, by Dave Windass, comprises five audio tracks – Constant, Earth Rise, I & II, Ode to Lumbricus Terrestis and Earth – each of which has a running time of 90 seconds. In other words, a moment in time. A moment (momentum) was a medieval unit of time which, on average, corresponded to 90 seconds. The track Earth is the result of recording the word and stretching it to the length of a moment. This track is best heard via headphones, as it is a binaural recording.
Most of these audio tracks are underscored by a tone at the frequency of 7.83 Hz, which is the frequency of the Earth’s magnetic field, and a frequency considered by many to have healing qualities.
This installation is an attempt to fuse audio with text without the end result being spoken word or poetry set to music. Whether this approach is successful is up to the listener.
Place your ear to the soil of the earth and listen. The total running time is 7.5 minutes, after which the track selection will begin again.
What Is Earth? also includes a monologue by Michelle Dee, with sound design by Dave Windass.
Artificial Limb Unit (2020)
Ongoing experiments in audio production and sound design.
Amy Johnson – Twenty Days (2020)
Twenty Days is an audio dramatisation of the diaries of Amy Johnson, the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia. Based on flight records, logbooks, interviews and newspaper reports of the day. Created for the Amy Johnson Arts Trust, originally broadcast across BBC local radio and available on BBC Sounds and Hull Is This, written and produced by Dave Windass, performed by Rachel Harris, with music by Jessica Dannheisser as part of her Orchestral Portraits | Seven Pioneering Women album released on Audio Network.
The Common Vegetable (2017)
Commissioned for Invisible Dust’s three year Surroundings project. Produced by Jerome Whittingham, performed by Charlie Sellers.