Do you regard sound of surrounding as music ? If so why?
John Cage in one of his interview in 1991, he mentioned "The sound of traffic are acting, there are sound that are high and low, loud and soft, short and long", "When you listen to Mozart and Beethoven, the music is always the same, but when you listen to traffic, it is always different". The sound of the traffic is the reason why he choose to stay at the corner apartment at the Sixth Avenue, New York.
Bearing what John Cage said in his interview in my mind, I started to listen to sounds of my surrounding more cautiously. It is amazing to hear the beauty of the sounds from my surrounding, for example when i walk through a market place with shops at both sides of the path, I could hear hawkers cooking their food, CD shops playing their featured CD, fruit hawkers shouting their deals and also music played from different shops. All these sound from radio and sound from human join force to form a "symphony of sound" which is the most natural and most beautiful music i ever heard.
Another interesting things about "Symphony of Sound" is that I can get to hear lots of improvisation being carried out like for example the sound of people talking, sound of hawkers stir frying "Mee Goreng"(Malay Style Fried Noodles). John Cage said that "Sounds does not mean anything" which i totally agree but from my point of view, i feel that although sounds does not mean anything but if you put the sounds together it does means something. Like the "Symphony Of Sound" at the market place serves like a "quotation and collage" piece of music which tell the story of a typical singaporean market place. It is these sounds that made the "Symphony Of Sound" very singapore which is so significant to me.
I have friends who are studying abroad, they always tell me they miss the singaporean food like char kway tiao (Stir Fried Rice Noodle with Black Sauces), Satay (Sticked Meat) and etc. Other than food, what i think makes more significance are the beautiful sound which can only be found in singapore, I am sure the sound of singapore can't be found in another other countries. For example you can't find any other sound like "Liew Lian, Liew Lian !!! "Bao jia" (meaning sure good quality in hokkien), 3 for $10" and the sound of stir frying Mee Goreng at any other countries.
Its a joy for me to always take a detour to the market place whenever I go to school (although there is a short cut) as like what John Cage said "Listening to traffic is always different" to me listen to sounds of singapore is always different too and it is not possible to find any recordings of this any where.
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2 comments:
JX: Great thinking here! Given your interest in Cage's musical philosophy here, you will enjoy Murray Schafer's work.
Also, your "musical" responses to marketplace sounds reminds me of Leong Yoon Pin's Streetcalls, which we have in the library. See how Leong turns hawker calls into music.
Hi JinXing,
I read with interest your blog post on sound of surroundings as music.
The way I see it, I think that in order for sounds of our surroundings to be music, it has to be put in context of something. For example, the sound of our local market calls and local hawker sounds would not mean anything if they're taken in isolation just the way they are. But the listener can only appreciate its value when the sound is put against the context of our local lifestyle and daily living.
Some cool stuff you got here in your blog!
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