The World According to Sound, LIVE!
Chris Hoff and Sam Harnett are co-creators of The World According to Sound, a podcast and public show that helps listeners reimagine the world through their ears instead of their eyes. The Washington Post writes that “each episode is 90 seconds, containing a neat little story about an evocative, unusual sound rendered in intense aural detail.”
The World According to Sound is more than just a radio show, however. Chris Hoff and Sam Harnett have turned it into a live performance where they set up a ring of speakers, pass out eye masks, turn out the lights, and take the sounds from their show and move them all around the audience. You will hear bridges and ants and the gurgle of mud pots. The sounds will transport you inside another person’s head and back in time a hundred years to the streets of Berlin. There will be a musical performance by a washing machine, a sonorous tennis match, and a disturbing howl Marco Polo heard centuries ago while crossing the Gobi Desert. There's absolutely nothing to see. It will be a spectacle entirely for the ears.
Sam Harnett is a reporter for KQED and a frequent contributor to Marketplace, and NPR programs like Morning Edition and All Things Considered. Chris Hoff is a public radio sound engineer who’s worked at KALW and KQED in San Francisco. The pair has performed at art galleries, theaters, and centers for the blind in the Bay Area and throughout the Northeast.
Sam and Chris are working on a new radio series and live show in partnership with the LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired. They are going to use ambisonic and binaural recordings to share the stories and sonic experiences of the blind. Meyer Sound is providing the sound system for the live shows, Sennheiser all the recording equipment and other specialized audio gear, and Cal Humanities furnished a grant to get the project started.
More info: http://www.theworldaccordingtosound.org/live