Podcast 1
Sonic Alchemy: Mixing Environmental Sounds with Music
Objectives:
- Explore several examples of historical innovation in early electronic music
- Listen to environmental sounds and explore the modern recording techniques that allow arrangers to layer or combine them with music
- Recognize how environmental sounds, recordings, and music can influence other artistic creations, such as podcasts and movies
National Music Education Standards Addressed:
- Standard 6: Listening to, analyzing, and describing music
- Standard 7: Evaluating music and music performances
- Standard 9: Understanding music in relation to history and culture
Time/Materials Required:
- 15-20 minutes
- Digital media player or computer access to the Internet
Activity Summary:
Explore the ways in which recordings of environmental sounds, such as rain and thunder, can be combined with music using modern digital recording and mixing techniques, and how such arrangements can affect the emotions of the listener. The activity also examines the role of technology in the development of new instruments, innovative sounds, and composition techniques.
Download Audio Activity and Worksheet:
Click on the links below to download and listen to this activity. Print the worksheet to input your answers.
Click here to download this podcast
Click here to download Student Worksheet
Vocabulary:
Futurist: A group of activists in both the arts and politics in the early twentieth century who sought to incorporate industrial sounds into their music.
musique concrète: a system of electronic composition in which natural sounds are taped, edited, and shaped into a composition recorded on magnetic tape.
sampling: manipulating bits of prerecorded sound to form new sounds
stereo: designating sound transmission from two sources through two channels to achieve the effect of sound separation.
stereo panning: the spread of a mono signal in a stereo or multi-channel sound field.
theremin: an electronic musical instrument with two projecting electrodes, one that controls pitch and the other, volume. |
