“One problem with decibel measurement is that it does not differentiate between “negative” and “positive” sounds. Take the sounds made by a fountain in a town square, happy children in a playground or the cheerful toot of the Manchester tram – any one of which might exceed permitted sound levels. Increasingly, researchers have been pressing for these positive sounds to be considered within urban design alongside more traditional noise-control approaches.”

New Scientist article

“Future US Army ground sensors in urban terrain will process acoustic signals to detect, classify, and locate sources of interest. Optimal processing will require understanding of the effects of the urban infrastructure on sound propagation. These include multi-path phenomena that will complicate sensing, and must be accounted for in sensor placement and performance algorithms. The objective of this work is to develop spatial processing techniques for acoustic wave propagation data from three-dimensional high-performance computations to quantify scattering due to urban structures and develop reduced-order models of wave-field data.”

and from a second paper:

“The United States Army is continuously improving upon its situational awareness in operational environments. This is particularly difficult in an urban scene because line of sight is limited and because the acoustic interaction between and over the top of the buildings is not yet fully understood. Once this is fully understood the acoustic detection, classification, and localization can be accomplished through the use of well-placed acoustic sensors.”

A student of Kevin Lynch and Professor of Urban Studies at UC Berkeley, Michael Southsworth created experience maps of 1960 Boston’s sonic environment. Unlike Schafer, Southworth did not try to describe characteristic sounds for an urban place, but was mainly interested in the strength of the relationship between soundscape and place. This links back to Lynch’s idea of imagibility, the extent to which an urban environment can form a concise mental image.

Thanks, pauline!

Michael Snows classic (seen on ubuweb) contains a lot of what stadtmusik is about … note the similarities to the ending of Antonioni’s younger film “the passenger”

Sam Auinger and Reinhard Braun (steirischer herbst, Graz) / Image from the Paneldiscussion (Stefanie Schulte Strathaus (Arsenal, Berlin), Mike Sperlinger (LUX, London), Josef Dabernig (Secession, Wien), Alexander Horwath (Filmmuseum, Wien))

Link

The Austrian Film Museum will be the illustrous setting for the premiere of our last film on Sept. 14th. Sam Auinger will present the film in the following panel discussion with Stefanie Schulte-Strathaus (Arsenal, Berlin), Mike Sperlinger (LUX, London), Josef Dabernig (Secession, Wien), Alexander Horwath (Filmmuseum, Wien), moderated by Reinhard Braun (steirischer herbst, Graz).

A crappy celphone pic from the “zurückbleiben bitte” show during ars electronica 2009. On sunday 11.am Sam will give a lecture on stadtmusik as part of the pixelspaces symposion.

please stand back! and azra in deep space

At this years ars electronica, stadtmusik will present “please stand back!” as a stereoscopic, immersive environment in the “deep space”, the impressive virtual environment of the ars electronica center. Thanks to the developers of the system, Oliver and Ronald, for their help!