Disquiet Junto Project 0074: Applause Rousing

Each Thursday at the Disquiet Junto group on Soundcloud.com a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have just over four days to upload a track in response to the assignment. Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate.

This assignment was made in the evening, California time, on Thursday, May 30, 2013, with 11:59pm on the following Monday, June 3, as the deadline.

Below are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto).

Disquiet Junto Project 0074: Applause Rousing

This week’s project takes the response to a music performance and makes music out of it. Specifically, we’ll be using a recording of applause as the source material for an original piece of music. These are the steps:

Step 1: Download the 16-second recording of applause at this URL:

http://www.freesound.org/people/unfa/...

Step 2: Listen to it closely, to get a sense of its pace, timbre, tone, etc.

Step 3: Record yourself applauding for 10 seconds, keeping in mind how your own applause relates to the recording from step 1 above.

Step 4: Create a piece of music with the following structure:

i: For the first 5 seconds we should only hear the applause from step 1, unadulterated.

ii: At the 5-second mark, introduce your own applause, also unadulterated, alongside the continuing applause from step 1.

iii: At the 10-second mark, begin to loop and transform the recording of your applause into something more sonically interesting and musical. Do not yet alter the applause from step 1; just let that applause continue to play as is.

iv: At the 15-second mark, just as the recording from step 1 is about to end, begin to loop and transform it into something more sonically interesting and musical.

v: For the remainder of your piece, continue to loop and rework the two recordings of applause into a composition of your own making. Do not add any other elements, but feel free to transform both source recordings of applause as much as you would like.

vi: The final 5 seconds of your piece, whatever the length overall, should return to the unadulterated applause from step 1.

Deadline: Monday, June 3, 2013, at 11:59pm wherever you are.

Length: Your track should have a duration of between two and four minutes.

Information: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud, include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto.

Title/Tag: Include the term “disquiet0074-applauserousing” in the title of your track, and as a tag for your track.

Download: Please consider employing a license that allows for attributed, commerce-free remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).

Linking: When posting the track, be sure to include this information:

More on this 74th Disquiet Junto project, in which applause is turned into music, at:

http://disquiet.com/2013/05/30/disqui...

Source audio of applause by unfa via:

http://www.freesound.org/people/unfa/...

More details on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet...

Image up top adapted from one at flickr.com/photos/kaptainkobold.