Knock Knock... anybody there?

1994, for quadraphonic tape.

2012, for 3rd order ambisonics.

Program Notes

"Knock Knock... anybody there?" is an extension to four channels of the original stereo sound track I composed for a collaboration project with visual artists in which I took part during 1994. Willie Scholten and Ruth Eckland provided the sculptures and visual framework while I provided the sound environment for the installation. The music explores altered states of consciousness and in particular insanity, in a journey through a three dimensional soundscape where voices and sounds evoke multiple and conflicting states of mind. All the concrete sound materials used in the piece were gathered during a small meeting with friends where we freely discussed the central topic that motivated the project. From the digital recording I extracted small but significant fragments of the conversation and subsequently processed them in the digital domain by using CLM instruments (CLM, Common Lisp Music, a non real-time Lisp based software synthesis and processing environment written by Bill Schottstaedt at CCRMA, Stanford University). The processing included dynamic spacialization of multiple moving sources rendered in a four channel reproduction environment. The listener moves through the soundscape while voices and sounds tell several overlapping stories that might occur in the hazy border between sanity and insanity. The music even include the piano jam session that happened at the end of the meeting...

About the piece

For the Transitions: Soundscapes under the stars concert (September 27th 2012), I rescued the original source code and materials of the piece from deep digital hibernation and updated them to run under Bill Schottstaedt's latest version of CLM and S7 Scheme. After much hacking the piece compiled and the result is a 32 bit floating point Ambisonics 3rd order 3D version which was diffused through a 24.4 outdoor system during the concert. Subsequent concert performances use this new re-rendered version.

Performances

• 40, 50, 80 - CCRMA en Montevideo, November 11, 2014, eMe, Montevideo, Uruguay
• Transitions: Soundscapes under the stars, September 27th 2012, CCRMA Courtyard (new version re-rendered for this concert)
• CCRMA Fall Concert 1994, Campbell Recital Hall, Stanford, November 15th 1994

Fernando Lopez-Lezcano

Composer, performer, lecturer and computer systems administrator at CCRMA, Stanford University

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