Podcast 7.0

A piece of soundart I have made to commemorate and celebrate the joining together of two fantastic organisations: RNIB Cymru (Royal National Institute of Blind People) and CIB (Cardiff Institute for the Blind).
I have again used braille as the focus of the work, but this time I have used the bilingual strapline of both organisations: RNIB Cymru and CIB working together to support blind and partially sighted people / RNIB Cymru a CIB yn gweithio gyda'n gilydd i gefnogi pobl ddall ac â golwg rhannol.
I allocated each dot of the Braille cell a different note of a version of the pentatonic scale, and used the above strapline as the base. I then transcribed it into Braille, and carefully placed each note according to itâs braille counterpart. So one letter in my transcribed version can be up to five notes played together.
The percussion is made up entirely of sounds I sampled from a Perkins brailler. The kick drum is the sound of a Perkins being put down on a desk, and the snare and other percussion noises are made from the various keys and knobs being pressed and turned.

Download here.

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More information:
rnib.org.uk/cymru
cardiffinstitutefortheblind.co.uk
perkins.org
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perkins_Brailler

Film meme

1.Name a film that you have seen more than 10 times.
Star Wars – all of them

2.Name a film that you’ve seen multiple times in the cinema.
Revenge of the Sith, but it was only twice. Honest!

3.Name an actor that would make you more inclined to see a film.
Scarlett Johansson

4.Name an actor that would make you less likely to see a film.
Adam Sandler, Ben Stiller and Will Ferrell; also Sarah Michelle Gellar, Lyndsey Lohan

5.Name a film that you can and do quote from.
Withnail and I

6.Name a film musical that you know all of the lyrics to all of the songs.
Little Mermaid

7.Name a film that you have been known to sing along with.
See above

8.Name a film that you would recommend everyone see.
Princess Mononoke

9.Name a film that you own.
Barbarella

10.Name an actor that launched his/her entertainment career in another medium but who has surprised you with his/her acting ability.
Björk – Dancer in the Dark

11.Have you ever seen a film in a drive-in?
No, but I would love to

12. Name a film that you keep meaning to see but just haven’t got around to yet.
The House of Flying Daggers

13.Ever walked out of a film?
Yes, Diary of the Dead. What a waste of time

14.Name a film that made you cry in the cinema.
A Very Long Engagement

15.What’s the last film you saw in the cinema?
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

16.What’s your favourite/preferred genre of film?
Magical realism

17.What’s the first film you remember seeing in the cinema?
The Fox and the Hound

18.What film do you wish you had never seen?
No Country for Old Men

19.What is the weirdest film you enjoyed?
Häxan

20.What is the scariest film you’ve seen?
My Little Eye, Ringu, 28 Days Later

21.What is the funniest film you’ve seen?
Superbad

Buzz

I'm full of ideas at the moment, literally buzzing. I'm working on a new piece of soundart, but this one needs somewhere expansive to exhibit it - and I'm at a loss, frankly! If you know somewhere/someone who would exhibit my piece, please pass on my details.

I'm interested in vinyl recordings at the moment. Everything from the hiss and crackle of old vinyl, to the effects you can get by slowing something down from 45 to 33.

I'll put it up here when I'm done.

Edit: I think I'll release a downloadable album of all my soundart. Here's the tracklisting so far:

She Machine
Blodeuwedd's Song
A Tree is a Poem Too
Perkins
Conversation

and I'll make (at least) one exclusively for the LP. Should keep me out of trouble for a while.

Podcast 6.0

A piece of soundart I have made to highlight problems faced by deaf people. If a deaf person was to receive a CD through the post, or listen to an advert, they would not be able to hear it - or hear very little of it. I am deaf in one ear, and last year started a British Sign Language course; I am now a level one signer having completed my Foundation Course.

Download here.

This piece of soundart is a conversation recorded today at RNIB Cymru's studios between myself and Nerys Probert, South Wales Group Co-ordinator for Deafblind Cymru. If a hearing person listens to this recording, they will not understand what the conversation was about - also, it is not accessible for deaf people either. I want to question, and raise the question of, accessibility; something I am passionate about.

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