https://soundcloud.com/donandsherri/double-dribble

Double Dribble is a 3-minute audio piece centered around the producer and acts as a pseudo exposé into the internal battle that the producer is faced with when recording their material. I decided to structure the piece in its narrative nonfiction state, so that I could further explore the internal struggles that can sometimes plague a producer. Drawing on audio works from ‘Radiolab’ and ‘This American Life’, and employing the type of narrative structure that they utilize, I aimed to deliver a piece that explored the concepts of mental instability and mental insecurity.

After visiting the Atherton Gardens Commission Homes and obtaining all the audio that I could, I discovered that the recordings were plagued by repetition. Be it the constant bounce of the basketball on the court, the infrequent bursts of rain or the children’s screams of excitement and frustration. This constant repetition inspired me to develop the ideas of the unstable mind. Once I had a concept in mind, I then needed to develop a script for the narrative structure of the piece.

After listening to Kyla’s recommended audio feature by Jad Abumrad and hearing how he employs the use of differing voices to build scenes, I decided to script the narrative with a my voice as the external dialogue and having a different persons voice acting as the thoughts of the producer. By having two opposing voices acting as the interior and exterior dialogues, I feel that I was better able to convey the idea of the unstable mind. However, to ensure the listener knew what was happening, I made sure to use similar turns of phrase for the two voices.

By looping the background sounds of the kids and their conversations, I was able to (I feel) further this idea of an unstable presenter. Hearing the same audio on repeat in the immediate background would prompt the listener to reconsider what exactly it is they are listening to and hopefully allow them to see the ‘picture’ that I was painting.

The choice to use the rain as a final scene and to then hard cut the whole piece after the producers inner dialogue eludes to it, was done to leave the audience in a state of bewilderment and an attempt to get them to listen to the piece again. By prompting the listener to hear the piece a further time, I feel that the dual narrative structure of the composition could be better understood and the ideas behind it to be absorbed.

I feel that the piece as a whole is quite strong and delivers the ideas that I wanted to convey to the audience. However, I think if I were to do it again, I would have the concept in mind earlier and try to gain recordings that would help the narrative evolve further.

https://soundcloud.com/donandsherri/bounce

The audio piece bounce is a 3-minute audio expose that comprises of both recorded sounds and minor Foley effects, to deliver the listener into the chaotic and childish space that is the Atherton Gardens Housing Commissions.

The recording process: getting the kids to be quiet, battling the weather and getting release forms signed and returned, turned out exactly as difficult as it sounds. Working with children under the age of 12 meant that there was a lot of audio spill, with other children screaming and making sounds in the background. By using a shotgun mic and a H4 audio recorder, I was able to minimalize (as best I could) the amount of foreign sounds spilling into the microphone and gain a slightly cleaner recording. This minor achievement was only to be outdone by the natural elements, having the basketball session interrupted by a severe downpour of rain. The rain initially proved a major inconvenience, as the equipment could not be exposed to the wet conditions; however, I was able to use the sounds to gain a greater effect in the mixing and narrative process. Having now overcome two problems and recorded enough material to produce coherent audio pieces, I faced my greatest challenge yet: getting the release forms signed by the children’s parents. Although not all the kids returned their forms, I was lucky enough to have recorded enough material to only use the audio from the children that did return their forms.

When I first chose the Helping Hoops basketball programs at Atherton Gardens as the space in which I would like to record and display to the listening audience, I immediately conceived the idea of portraying the chaotic and childlike place that it can become. I aimed to achieve this childlike feeling by using a combination of editing techniques and appropriate dialogue. Drawing from the ‘cascading voice’ that I heard in set class listening’s, I aimed to have the childrens voices cascade under the next child voice and further the sense of chaos. Aiding to the cascading voice, I also added filters, pan and volume changes to the voices heard saying “bounce”. This was done in an attempt to have the words of the kids swirling around and gradually getting louder to give the listener a sense of how intense that space can be. After achieving this chaotic sound, I decided to then introduce the listener to the coach that keeps the chaos to a minimum, and to do this, I felt his voice needed to be heard.

Coupling Omar’s (the coach) words with a royalty free piece of music, I felt that the calming positive message he was hoping to achieve gained greater poignancy.