J: What were your expectations before coming here?

N: I came knowing that I wanted to make high quality and unusual recordings, so I brought everything I could practically take out in the field. I looked on the Internet beforehand and knew I would get a lot of ‘weather’ - a lot of wind and water. My water recordings have superseded my expectations. On the other hand I was disappointed with the “sleppet” (the sheep/cow release) yesterday. I have seen this on English TV shows - with and the sound and dynamics that come with a heavy animal ‘dancing’ on wet turf. I didn't expect to be able to record quite that, and knew any chance of doing so would be a ‘one shot’. But when the sheep were released they bleated and just wandered about. Seemed like the sheep didn't care if they were in or out – but guess the farmer could see a difference in their behavior. I suppose I had a slightly fantasyful idea of what the “sleppet” would be like!

J: Had you already decided what you were going to make?

N: After our conversation some time ago I decided to make an installation and not a concert work. For some time I have been preoccupied with space and spatialization. Capturing the complete spatial environment is one of the last unsolved issues in sound recording and reproduction. We have the technology for a pretty accurate recording and reproduction of the sound’s temporal and spectral content - good microphones, loudspeakers and recording devices – but the means for recording and reproducing spatial information is less advanced. There is a lot of work to be done in the studio to recreate the reality of space and this involves understanding perceptual psychology as well as technological issues.

J: Can you talk more about how you have been working the past week?

N: I use the microphones to search out sounds that you normally wouldn't hear. So I have been sticking my microphones in the craziest places the last week, sometimes risking damage just to get that one special recording. I’ll use these recordings to make hyper-realistic (‘more than’ realistic) sound worlds to grab your attention. For example, everyone has heard the sound of water, but I want to present it such that it reaches out and touches you in a new way. To ‘treasure’ the sounds, rather than just play back normality is very important to me.

As we talked about the other day, it is important to think of the microphone as a compositional tool, to use it as a ‘sound microscope’. To improvise with the microphone is a never-ending learning process. I have learned more over the past week than over the past year when it comes to improvising dynamically in the field – its quite different from in a recording studio. Simply by placing a stereo microphone on a pole and slowly rotating it you suddenly hear the space of the environment. This is because you get the full picture evolving through time. Simple techniques like this I realize I haven't used enough – even if it’s just as a way to remind me later of the complete sound space. Or hanging microphones in the trees and just letting them swing like pendulums is another interesting technique where the initial location of the microphone is completely determined by the forms in the natural environment.

J: What are your audience expectations?

N: I want to disturb their expectations by giving them the hyper-realistic or even surrealistic experiences I’ve mentioned. To make them think, "Gosh, that's right!" by packing all the listeners' five senses into one auditory perception. In a concert the audience enters with expectations that they are going to listen to a structure of timed duration that requires them to be present throughout.

 

In a sound installation the audience has free choice on their listening tactic – they can come and go as they please to gain an experience that is independent of the duration of the work. Although in an installation I have no idea how long a listener will choose to be present, I try to provide the same level of detail and information as in my concert works. In both my acousmatic (non-visual) concert and installation works I generally try to use low lighting or as close to blackout as possible. This way it is clear that the visual sense is not part of the listening process and the ears ‘wake up’ considerably!