Open windows
Oct 08, 2022, 08:20 AM
"The original recording provided for this project appealed to me as it captures some of the silver linings of COVID lockdowns in Australia and around the world. Despite all of the tragedies, lockdowns slowed everyone down and so many people around the world started to reflect on the importance of social and environmental connection in their lives.
"In my own town, our bookshop sold 5 times more bird books than they had previously, people expressed joy in connecting with their neighbours who may have previously been strangers, and in forming a deeper attachment to their local environment. Many people commented to each other on their allotted hour of daily exercise how loud the birds were and wondered if they had always been that loud. Maybe they were singing new songs to fill the frequencies freed up by our enforced quietness? Were they celebrating or mourning our sonic absence? Musicians played on their porches and balconies and helped to fend off feelings of loneliness and isolation.
"In this piece I have used the atmosphere of the original recording in an apartment block in Adelaide as a starting point to consider what does a city that prioritises health, wellbeing, equity and resilience look like. As a central premise to the piece is the idea that COVID taught us how to listen more deeply to our environment and to each other. Through that deep listening we accommodate more diversity, and diversity itself is what makes us resilient and less isolated.
"Starting with the original recording the sounds of diverse birds can be heard amongst the faint sounds of neighbours going about their day. The source recording has been eq’d to remove the dominant hum of an air conditioner to emphasise how a city could sound in the future as man made technologies become quieter. This longing for social connection and desire to bring the outside world in is explored as the music builds.
"Using a stereo pair of microphones set up in one room, different musical instruments, whistling, and kitchen utensils start to sound in other rooms. People are slowly listening more closely to one another and also to the birds and frogs, increasingly falling into interlocking rhythms and melodies as an ecosystem. The sound of my own son playing in the lane outside my window hints at a world where children can be close to nature and full of wonder. As the piece progresses the sounds become more present almost as if the walls of lockdowns have fallen away and every human and non human being is moving in this celebratory swell yet always maintaining sonic space for each other.
"The final moment hears the cars return and the birds fly away. This contrast feels poorer and melancholic. It asks us to remember the years we were quieter due to COVID and what we learnt about the types of cities we want to create and inhabit into the future. The title "Open Windows" refers to both the idea of opening ourselves up to each other and our environment but also humanities last window to create a world that is more harmonious and liveable in the face of climate change and environmental destruction."
Australia in lockdown reimagined by Rob Law.
Part of the Well-Being Cities project, a unique collaboration between Cities and Memory and C40, a global network of mayors of nearly 100 world-leading cities collaborating to deliver the urgent action needed right now to confront the climate crisis. The project was originally presented at the C40 Cities conference in Buenos Aires in 2022. Explore Well-Being Cities in full at https://citiesandmemory.com/wellbeing-cities/
"In my own town, our bookshop sold 5 times more bird books than they had previously, people expressed joy in connecting with their neighbours who may have previously been strangers, and in forming a deeper attachment to their local environment. Many people commented to each other on their allotted hour of daily exercise how loud the birds were and wondered if they had always been that loud. Maybe they were singing new songs to fill the frequencies freed up by our enforced quietness? Were they celebrating or mourning our sonic absence? Musicians played on their porches and balconies and helped to fend off feelings of loneliness and isolation.
"In this piece I have used the atmosphere of the original recording in an apartment block in Adelaide as a starting point to consider what does a city that prioritises health, wellbeing, equity and resilience look like. As a central premise to the piece is the idea that COVID taught us how to listen more deeply to our environment and to each other. Through that deep listening we accommodate more diversity, and diversity itself is what makes us resilient and less isolated.
"Starting with the original recording the sounds of diverse birds can be heard amongst the faint sounds of neighbours going about their day. The source recording has been eq’d to remove the dominant hum of an air conditioner to emphasise how a city could sound in the future as man made technologies become quieter. This longing for social connection and desire to bring the outside world in is explored as the music builds.
"Using a stereo pair of microphones set up in one room, different musical instruments, whistling, and kitchen utensils start to sound in other rooms. People are slowly listening more closely to one another and also to the birds and frogs, increasingly falling into interlocking rhythms and melodies as an ecosystem. The sound of my own son playing in the lane outside my window hints at a world where children can be close to nature and full of wonder. As the piece progresses the sounds become more present almost as if the walls of lockdowns have fallen away and every human and non human being is moving in this celebratory swell yet always maintaining sonic space for each other.
"The final moment hears the cars return and the birds fly away. This contrast feels poorer and melancholic. It asks us to remember the years we were quieter due to COVID and what we learnt about the types of cities we want to create and inhabit into the future. The title "Open Windows" refers to both the idea of opening ourselves up to each other and our environment but also humanities last window to create a world that is more harmonious and liveable in the face of climate change and environmental destruction."
Australia in lockdown reimagined by Rob Law.
Part of the Well-Being Cities project, a unique collaboration between Cities and Memory and C40, a global network of mayors of nearly 100 world-leading cities collaborating to deliver the urgent action needed right now to confront the climate crisis. The project was originally presented at the C40 Cities conference in Buenos Aires in 2022. Explore Well-Being Cities in full at https://citiesandmemory.com/wellbeing-cities/