Nodes is a new commission created for the Peer to Peer: UK/HK online festival which ran from 11th - 14th November, created as a reflection on the interconnectedness of the global live coding community.
Live coding is a performative practice where artists make music and visual art live using programming. This happens primarily at events such as Algoraves, but there is an equally active online community which organises regular performances, conferences, workshops and more.
On November 6th the Compassion Through Algorithms Vol. II compilation was released, raising money for Young Minds Together . The compilation is still available, and of course you can donate directly to Young Minds Together if you prefer.
In this blog post I’ll be going over how I made my track, Pulse.
I’m two years into making music and I’ve recently become more comfortable and confident in my processes. I’ve gotten over the technological hurdles and, having experimented in making music/sounds of different styles both in private and at Algoraves, I feel I’ve found a range of styles that I like making music in. In the live coding music world some of my biggest influences have been eye measure, Miri Kat, Yaxu, and Heavy Lifting. Their work spans many genres but what I’m drawn to in their music is the more sparse, ambient and even sometimes aggressive sounds. I tried to keep this in mind when making Pulse.
From 1st - 29th July I was happy to be selected as an artist in residence for The New Art Gallery Walsall’s Stay at Home Residencies.
In the second blog post I looked at how I approached filming. In this third and final blog post I’ll be detailing my sound making process and sharing the finished film.
The next stage in making this film was working on the sound. As you can hear in a couple of the clips in the previous blog post the area that I live in is really really quiet! Everyone in the local area was using the Summer time to sit outside bathing in the sunlight. Was very relaxing for sure but recordings of the ambient background noise didn’t make for an interesting soundtrack. There was once the sound of a wood chipper but otherwise it was mostly silent. At times me playing music was the loudest sound!