SNRatio i, ii, iii & iv (2001)

by Philippe-Aubert Gauthier

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experimental art sound radio

4 tracks

64:23

1	SNRatio i	16:25
2	SNRatio iv	15:59
3	SNRatio iii	15:59
4	SNRatio ii	16:00

Description

WARNING :: SNRatio II INVOLVES A HUGE DYNAMIC RANGE AND STRONG NOISE BURSTS APPEAR AFTER LONG PERIODS OF VERY SOFT SOUNDS. LISTEN AT NORMAL LEVEL (USE YOUR NORMAL VOLUME LEVEL).

This is a suite of four sound art (or radio) pieces created for the radio show "Excavation sonore" (Avatar, Québec, Canada) in 2001. All the pieces are inspired by auditory masking phenomenon. As these pieces are frozen in time, they are presented as sound states or situations more then temporal compositions. It is also a conceptual proposition. SNRatio i and ii are the most achieved compositions of the four pieces.

"SNRatio i" is an imagined "reversed" free jazz recording: a composed background noise dominates the recording but a careful listening reveals a 16-minutes free jazz trio improvisation in the background. At every moment, the listener must fight against psychoacoustic masking to enjoy the jazz trio hidden behind the deep noise track.

"SNRatio ii" is a composition inspired from pre- and post-masking. A soft and subtle composition (a typewriter and Yamaha Diskclavier [a real piano controlled by MIDI], piano generative composition by P.-A. Gauthier) is sometime hidden by blasts of noise which operate as maskers. Few milliseconds are needed to hear the subtle track after the blasts. It also create a tension for the listener as he might fear the comeback of the blasts as he tries to listen to the delicate piano track. As the composition passes, the density of the repeated maskers increases.

"SNRatio iii" is concerned by spatial masking or spatial segregation. A composition is presented on a loudspeaker while the other loudspeaker presents a noise mask to disturb the listening. Here, the spatial separation of the composition and the mask allows the listener to focus on the composition ... or the mask.

"SNRatio iv" is a sine tone composition which plays with psychoacoustic interference between tones.

The order of listening is also important, as the transition between the four pieces operates as musical transitions. Unfortunatly, the piece order is wrong on this Jamendo album.

Philippe-Aubert Gauthier: Direction, composition, recording, sounds, mixing and mastering.

Charles Varin : Recording and sounds.

Steeve Lebrasseur: Recordings.

Martin Desjardins, Thierry Gateau, Jean-Étienne Joubert: Jazz trio on "SNRatio i".

Thanks to Avatar.

Reviews

KraftiM

Soundschool

20/12/07

Great experimental album. Indeed its a pity the right sequence of the tracks is not on the album, why not correcting it if its essential? The idea of mixing melody and noise is basically mixing music with music, appreciated or not by various listeners. A question of listening to what you except or want to hear. In this sense it's true experimental. For myself i very much like part 1 and part 3, where active listening is evoked. Part 2: I feel overwhelmed with the enormous contrast, so i wondered if my ears or equipment was ruined: a shockeffect. Personally i prefer a more modest contrast, that could be as affective, without scaring most listeners away... Part four comes as a great finale, very effective relaxing after those tracks, and fitting perfectly to them. A superb album from a soundarchitect.

Rhaaaaa.....Que du bien.... mmmmhhhhh.....

20/12/07

C'est incroyable! J'avais un peu peur(au sens premier du terme), apres la blessure pt.II d'ouvrir, une autre porte avec un vieux parchemins a taches d'huiles cloue (!) a hauteur du regard, sur lequel on pourrait voir PAG ecrit.
Mais j'ai ose, et, franchement... bien sur, c'est un choc, mais cette fois, il ressemble plus a une douche prise en hiver avec de l'eau froide- essayez vous verrez c'est le meme effet. Bien sur, ce n'est pas d'un hiver Parisien dont j'ecrit, non, c'est d'un hiver disons...Polonais... Ou russe tiens( mais pas non plus le Sybir), a ca il faut ajouter une cabanne en bois, dans la foret...(SNRatio I) Et la seule piece qui est chaufee/ au bois gele, qui bout et fume plus qu'il ne brule/ n'est pas la salle de bains...(SNRatio IV)
And this hurly wind that never stops, it's just not a place for a human being to be(SNRatio III), on its own(SNRatio II)
Merci Philippe Aubert Gautier, pour ces deplaisants souvenirs, que vous me faites revivre. La semaine prochaine j'en ouvre encore une autre(de porte PAG, bien sur!). Je dois me rechauffer maintenant...

ATTENTION: Je penses quand meme que le mp3, c'est peut etre quand meme pas le meilleur support pour ce genre de travail, non ??!!!!

Album information

Genre

Sound art, radio art

Release

November 27, 2007