1)3/14/13 5:45 p.m, parking lot outside of the Netherlands
2) Footsteps of people crossing the street, talking of people crossing the street
3) Jingling of keys, more footsteps as people approach, the door to the bridge opening and closing
4) The squeak of the turnstile, more people talking, the cars passing by, honking
5) The sound activity is high, it is loud
6) Busy
7) The cars, the turnstile, and the footsteps
1) Studio 3/14/13, 5:24pm
2) Phil and Beja being ridiculous/singing/who knows, Abbie being cranky with them, Jack rustling papers and glue, the air conditioner whirring, backpacks moving, typing
3) Geena playing sound projects across the desk for me, Nic muttering something tiredly, my chair squeaking.
4) My own breathing, typing, my elbows hitting the edge of the desk.
5) The sound level is medium high, but the sound activity is very high.
6) Abrasive
7) As I am so tired, the sound projects, the air vent, and the rustling are all too much for my head.
1. March 14th – 4:45 PM – Drama Lounge
2. Marina typing on her computer, people talking outside the window, Max and Peter talking in the psibrary
3. Caitlin, Marina, and Laura singing and “bllrrrbb”-ing, Marina laughing, Mike snorting/snickering
4. Ringing in my ears (so annoying!), my phone vibrating
5. The sound level was moderate to high, which isn’t surprising considering it’s the drama lounge. The amount of sound activity is also moderate to high – there was a bunch of different things making different sounds all over the room/outside the room
6. Chaos
7. The singing/bllrrrbb-ing, the laughter, the people talking outside of the room
1- 3/13/13 – 9:22 – JCA Playhouse
2- Identify and list the sounds farthest away from you. – Furthest from me I can hear faint clangs and rumbles of items and actors moving around backstage and hitting different props and tings as the lumber around.
3- Identify and list the sounds at a medium range from you. – At a medium range from me I can hear the noises of the actors projecting their lines our into the audience and the occasional clang or their swords or the sturdy plastic noises of their armor hitting other objects. The loudest noises are coming from the actors as they recite their lines and kill themselves on stage.
4- Identify and list the sounds closest to you (You can include internal sounds if noticed or relevant). – The sounds that are closest to me is an array of different high-pitched beeps and rhythmic clicks of shutters as each camera snapped off hundreds of photographs. In total there were four cameras all clicking and snapping photos at different times. If I shut my eyes I was able to pinpoint the exact spot of where each photographer is sitting in the audience and how far away each of them were from me.
5- Describe the general sound level and amount of sound activity. – The loudest and most bold noise in this space is the sound of the actors on stage and moving around as they project their lines to the audience. Oddly enough the most overwhelming noises in the space are the noises of the clicks of the camera. I found it very difficult to block out these noises as they were never at a constant pace and seemed to just be an annoying noise that I could never tune out.
6- Assign a one word description to the “sound environment”. – Active
7- Select and list 3 sounds which are essential to the sound environment. Note: you need to try to figure out what sounds make up this environment and which of those sounds need to be there for the feeling of the environment to stay intact. – Camera click, Actor movement, and camera beep
1. March 14, 2013. 4:15 pm. Roosevelt 13.
2. Hum from air unit, jacket unzipping, door
3. Footsteps, voices, pretzel bag, notebook pages turning
4. Voices, bag being moved, chair moving, keys being placed on table
5. Low/medium. There are a lot of things happening, but most people are trying to not be very loud.
6. Subdued.
7. Notebook pages, voices, keys
1- 3.12.13, 11:05am, 011 Davison Hall
2- Footsteps echo down the hall and above us; the occasional voice is heard, muffled through the door
3- The door opens when a student enters, but other than that, this area is silent.
4- Someone taps lightly on their desk; once in a while a person will shift in their chair creating a light swooshing noise; sometimes I can hear the breathing of the people around me as they take a deeper breath or sigh; the person next to me emits the tin-y beat from their headphones
5- The general sound level and activity is low. It seems as though we are sitting with baited breath – class begins in five minutes
6- Waiting
7- The echoing footsteps, breathing, the tin-y sound from someones’ earphones
1. March 7, 10:13 pm, Dutch Treats
2. Cars outside, wind
3. Voices, cash registers
4. Refrigerators, door and bell
5. Low. Mostly quiet.
6. Still
7. Cars, cash registers, door/bell
1: Saturday, March 1, 2013, 1:17 am, Social Sports Kitchen, The Gallery Room
2: Identify and list the sounds farthest away from you.
I am sitting in the coat check of the basement level of Social Sports Kitchen, counting the cash accrued from checking 87 hoodies, parkas, blazers and peacoats during the Saturday night mob scene. The door to the walk-in-closet-turned-coat-check is hinged in two separate halves, so that I can partition myself from the bedlam of mass, collegiate inebriation like I’m taking orders at a drive-through window. Being set apart from the nucleus of pulsating sounds that is the dance floor means that I am spared certain hearing loss by the walls around me. I have never heard the music played so loudly at the bar before. Even with the sound cushion of my partial seclusion, the amplitude of the music feels like it’s battering my eardrums.
3: Identify and list the sounds at a medium range from you.
Flocks of girls occasionally clomp unevenly past my window, one complaining loudly to the others about her heels or her sorority sister or some other bane of her existence. I usually can only hear the women that pass because they speak in higher pitch tones that can be heard over the bass-heavy roar of the music. The men’s voices just become vague, mellow inflections wavering somewhere in the less intelligible levels of the soundscape.
4: Identify and list the sounds closest to you (– you can include internal sounds if noticed or relevant).
I literally cannot hear anything inside the coat check. The noise of the party is so all-encompassing that the little sounds of metal coat hangers sliding against the metal of the rod and pen on paper as I tally the ticket stubs are indiscernible. Only once in five hours does the music stop (due to a computer problem), and I can hear the swishing sound of paper money as I bank-face my tips. Even that is almost unnoticeable to me, however, as the ringing in my ears is so strong.
5: Describe the general sound level and amount of sound activity.
The sound level is remarkably high, to the point of discomfort. I’m always the girl chided for listening to music too loudly through my headphones, yet I can barely handle the sound pressure. The cement floor seems to move with the bassline, as if car bombs are going off outside.
6: Assign a one-word description to the “sound environment”.
“Aggressive”
7: Select and list 3 sounds that are essential to the sound environment. Note: you need to try and figure out what sounds make up this environment and which of those sounds need to be there for the feeling of the environment to stay intact.
The only really pertinent sound is that of the music. Overly loud dance music in a nightclub has such a signature sound – wide, fuzzy, and mind-numbingly percussive. The occasional snippets of shouted conversation as people move from the bathroom to the dance floor can also help build this particular sonic atmosphere.
1- 3/6/13 7:30 P.M. Sitting in Bits, near the front windows
2- Wind, Leaves rustling outside, men’s voices
3- Women laughing, talking, YouTube music video
4- chewing, shifting weight on a chair, bottle cap being screwed on
5- Some pockets of loud noise, such as the laughing, but overall a muted sort of rumbling white noise.
6- Tired
7- Laughing, talking, wind
1- March 3, 9:40am, LIRR train from Mineola to Penn
2- High pitched humming in the background due to the heating system at the other end of the car, other train-like mechanisms make soft noises off and on.
3- The sounds of the train moving on track creates a hypnotic lull, an announcement is made regarding the next station and that patrons should watch the gap between the train and the platform, the doors ding and slide open with a groan
4- The person in the seat in front of me coughs occasionally and ruffles the papers of their newspaper; when the doors open, a large gaggle of high school girls with a chaperone, talking and laughing loudly – clearly on a field trip of some kind. They discuss a woman they saw on the train another time who decided to appear in public topless in high pitched voices, talking over each other and finishing each other’s sentences.
5- The sound level and activity begin at a low and are abruptly shifted to a high sound level and activity
6- Interrupted
7- The background humming, the clacking of the train tracks, and before: the shuffling of the newspaper, after: the loud chatter and laughter