Listen.HK showcase at CIL Creative Bulletin #2- Lithium Carbon

The showcase was held during late January and early February. Documentation photos and comments quotations will update soon.

Thanks for your support to my work and the exhibitions!

P.S. Phase III of Listen.HK to be started soon.

Sound Walk along the new and old Coastlines

Last week, we have learnt about sound walk. And I find that it is a way to know more about the soundscape that we have never come across and we may find new things. And it is just like the idea of drifting. Both of them are challenging.

Hong Kong Island is not a place that I go often. Wan Chai impresses me a lot as it is a reclaimed land and fulls of different cultures there. There may be changes of soundscape as the development of the coastlines. So, I decide to do a sound walk there and try to record how the soundscapes change as we walk nearer to the recent coastline of Hong Kong Island.

And the other study / research direction would be we will walk along the tram route, where the previous coastline located, to find out the difference of each district along the route.

Therefore, of course, this would become by final project of the course.

Going Home (or Not)

I don't know much about sound artists in the past as there isn't too much activities or concern group on soundscape (but when I was doing my Intermedia Project, there is suddenly a growing number of festivals and events on soundscape).

Once Cedric introduces me about Anson Mak as I have such a great interest in soundscape recording and I immediately be interested in what she is doing. Anson previously was a film maker, musician and of course artist. She was a AMK members playing experimental and rock music. Cedric told me that she is now doing something similar but not quite similar as mine at Kwun Tong. What Cedric mentioned is about the soundscape and culture research of Kwun Tong.

An album called Going Home (or Not) was released and is full of sound of Kwun Tong. She does this and a website is to show the uniqueness of Kwun Tong and a need to preserve. I buy this album and listen it in an in-depth approach.

After listening, I find that she has chosen some representative events and spots to record. And the whole picture is showing that Kwun Tong is a society full of warmth and special. This would let me ask a question: why Kwun Tong should be redeveloped by demolishing everything?

One track impressed me a lot. It is Chiu Chow Music Remix. Chiu Chow traditional music makes us feel old-fashioned. After a crazy mix of what Anson has recorded, it becomes more trendy and modern. Chiu Chow music can be hip and pop!

http://www.re-records.com/discography/re-on-002r/

Listen.HK

In my second entry, I mentioned that I started my interest in one of my project as it was a success that people accept my work. As Hong Kong is a place that have various and unique features of each district, so I decided to make a soundscape work in my Associate Degree FYP (i.e. Intermedia Project).

At that moment, I just thought that there seems no one uses the medium of audio to record the soundscape of Hong Kong. And I think each district must have difference. Thus, I do the project of Listen.HK to preserve our Hong Kong's unique sounds.

At that time, Charles is my supervisor. He asked me that what is special? What are the methods to distinct each district from each other? So, I pick some public transport announcements, some tourist and crowd spots to record. I mix them together in a geographical way as a music piece to be released on the internet.

But after I attend the lesson on soundscape which is the one I expect most recently, I find that it is not at all a soundscape work. I just treat them as sound object and put them together. It seems that too macro and they are finally mixed to mono. The feeling of a soundscape is not so strong. It is more like a collage of several soundmarks.

As I have said in the making of, I would like it to be continued. I hope in the following stage, I could find more specific topics to include in the recordings. And also, I will look in a much more detailed way of the soundscape. In addition, it is important to make them and the future recordings back to stereo.

I hope this work can be enhanced and more meaningful to Hong Kong.

http://listenhk.spu08.coms.hk

Electric Requiem: God Save the Queen

As Hong Kong has been handover for over 10 years, something remarkable and memorable are now gradually demolished. Samson Young, the school new teacher as well as well-known emergent media and music artist and composer, produced a show to remember the days of colonial ruling by the U.K..

In this entry, I won't discuss about the multimedia theater but on the arrangement of the whole requiem. Samson is trained as a traditional music performer and composer. However, he always composes contemporary style of music and matches with some videos with symbolic meaning. This show has no exception.

In this show, he includes some sound extract from TV news in the requiem. Most of them are related to the government officials attitude towards protection of historical building and also the comments from public on it. This makes the requiem more like a complaint to the government policy and dissatisfaction which is more experimental and different from the traditional.

The show just presents the name of each movement but not the contents and lyrics. They are all printed on the programme booklet. However, as the light are dimmed in the black box theater, people who don't understand Cantonese might not know what's this show about. They are forced to listen the content by reduced listening. It is a kind of fun!

In the end of the show, there is an interview recording of Law Lan who is performing in the video. This makes us remember she acts as a queen which is a symbolic icon of colonial Hong Kong. Also, this shows the different personalities of Law Lan and remembers us that something are missing and thus we should preserve them.

I also use reduced listening to listen to the whole show as the videos and images are vague. After all, I still don't understand a lot about the message behind and the colonial Hong Kong immediately. But I can feel there is an urgency of saving the things missing. God Save The Queen, Please!