Listening Questions

Here is a listening questionnaire I completed for Daniel Dugas's Sound Class.


LISTENING QUESTIONS
from: Deep Listening: A Composer's Sound Practice by Pauline Oliveros

1.What is your earliest memory of sound? How do you feel about it now?
My earliest memory of sound is the sound of the vacuum cleaner going over carpet. The buzzing noise that changes pitch when the vacuum moves. Upon reflecting on this memory now, I find it interesting that such an ambient droning noise was my first sonic memory.

2. When do you notice your breath?
I notice my breath most, when I am self-conscious of it, when I’m late and don’t want to seem out of breath, or when I’m trying to be really quiet.

3. What is attention?Attention is the recognition of anything within your scope. Any kind of acknowledgement is a form of attention, whether it is a glance or hearing a sound. If it registers in your brain, I think you are giving it some form of attention.

4. Can you imagine composing or improvising a piece based on breath rhythms?
Yes, the rhythm of breath is very organic, and can certainly set a mood to a certain piece. If the rhythm mimics a breath pattern in a certain emotional state, I think the overall feeling can be imitated in the rhythm. Madonna’s Like A Virgin has a rhythm that mimics the speed of breath pattern during sex, which makes the song that much more sensual.

5. What sound reminds you of home?
The sound of my two Saint Bernard dogs downstairs reminds me of home. Their heavy steps on the hardwood, their constant panting and sighing are constant reminders of being in my house. When the dogs aren’t there the house seems eerily quiet.

6. Do you listen for sound in your dreams? What do you hear? How does it affect you?
Subconsciously, I’m sure I hear things in my dreams, as when I awake I can remember hearing things. Sometimes sounds seem so real it is hard to distinguish which sound I heard in reality and which in a dream. I know I listen in my sleep, as I often fall asleep with the radio, or television on and sometimes my dreams wander and incorporate stories on the radio or television into my dream.

7. The distinguished historian, Wiliam H. McNeil, has recently argued in his book Keeping Together in Time that "coordinated rhythmical activity is fundamental to life in society."
Can you imagine tracking a rhythm pattern in your daily life and writing about it?
Well, while many ordinary actions and objects around us operate on a rhythmic pattern or cycle, ourselves do not. Our lives can have a pattern, but at any time the pattern can be interrupted, therefore tracking a rhythm would be difficult, especially as our lives change day to day. I can’t imagine tracking a rhythm pattern in my daily life, as then I would be consciously tracking the rhythm, which would create superficial results.


8. Can you imagine rhythm pattern for the rhythm circle with your own form of notation?
I’m not sure if I entirely understand the question, however if it means using a personal form of notation while creating beat patterns, I’m sure I could imagine inventing my own notation, however using a standardized notation makes more sense, so others can understand your music.

9. Can you imagine composing or improvising a piece for voices using attention
patterns?
I think the attention pattern and cycles for people are interesting, as they are so different for everyone. Different things hold different peoples attention and for different periods of time, so making a piece would be interesting. If you made a vocal piece bringing in voices in and out and changing the volume according to how much attention is being used and such has a lot of possibilities.

10. What is sound?
Sound is the movement of the vibrations in the air that are processed by our ears, or other means of listening.

11. What is listening?
Listening is the reception of sound in our ears.

12. What action(s) is usually synchronized with sound?
What action isn’t synchronized with sound? I can’t imagine doing any actions without any sound at all.

13. When do you feel sound in your body?
I feel sound in my body whenever I am actively listening, for example when creating a piece, or putting together a set, or even listening to a record.

14. What sound fascinates you?
I like the sound of high winds when they almost whistle.

15. What is a soundscape?
A soundscape can be either created or natural. A natural soundscape is any environment with ambient sound coming from all directions. A created soundscape however, is a sound environment that incorporates the different directions of sounds, whether it is single sounds coming from different directions on different layers or surround sound.

16. What are you hearing right now? How is it changing?
I am listening to an IDM track by Mu-ziq right now, titled Hasty Boom Alert on studio headphones, so I can’t hear any ambient noise besides the music. The music’s beat is changing between slow paces and faster breaks.

17. How many sounds can you hear all at once?
The number of sounds I can hear at once is very dependent on the environment, and the volumes and pitches of the different sounds. For example on the plane, I can pick up the sounds of various passengers, as the airplane is generally pretty quiet, but with lots of ambient noise. In a louder environment however, such as a concert, the surroundings are designed to isolate the music as the primary sound, so it is harder to pick up on other sounds.

18. How far can you hear sounds?
The distance of sounds I can hear really varies with the natural environment. First, the existing ambient noise really affects how far one can listen, in a loud environment one might only be able to hear for a small distance. However in a quiet field, one can hear the sounds much better at greater distances. Also, the geography of the location affects sound, how many barriers the sound waves need to travel through or over, such as walls and buildings.

19. Are you sure that you are hearing every thing that is to hear?
No, I am definitely not sure I am hearing everything that is to hear. My listening capabilities are constantly improving, as I train my ear to listen more delicately.

20. What more could you hear if you had bigger ears? (or smaller)
I think within the human size range of ears the differences in size are insignificant, so I don’t think I could hear more. However if I had ears that were a different shape and kind, such as the ears of a bat, of course I could hear more, especially frequencies humans can’t hear at all.

21. Can you hear more sounds if you are quiet? How many more?
Yes, I can hear more sounds if I am quiet, but mostly of lower amplifications. And the number of sounds is dependent on the surroundings.

22. How long can you listen?
I can listen casually forever, I am always listening, consciously or unconsciously. However actively listening I find is difficult for very long periods of time, like when something is very hard to make out, or at a hard frequency, and you have to work to listen, it is a matter of minutes before I get tired.

23. When are you not listening?
I am always casually listening, but I am often not actively listening.
I am always listening to sounds, and my atmosphere, but sometimes not focusing or comprehending them.

24. Can you not listen when something is sounding?
No, unless your ears are closed or covered it is nearly impossible to not listen when something is sounding.

25. Try not listen to anything. What happens?
I actually seem to hear more, as I am consciously paying attention to my hearing as I am trying to not listen.

26. How can you not listen if your ears never close?
You can’t not listen to anything subconsciously or consciously; our hearing is constantly picking up sound vibrations. If we process them or not does not affect if we hear them or not.

27. What meaning does any sound have for you?
There are countless sounds that have meanings to them, but one that I hear often is the jingle of my small dog’s collar. I can hear the rhythm and pace in which he is running and the direction he is heading. He is really hard to find without his collar!

28. What is favourite sound? How is it made? When can you hear it? Are you hearing it now?
Well like earlier in the questionnaire, I like the sound of high winds for a natural sound, or the sound of rain hitting panes of glass. For synthetic sounds, I really like dirty synth sounds and deep bass tones. For the synthetic sounds, I can mostly hear it in any type of electro/electroclash music, in addition to many other types of electronic music. And yes I am hearing right now.

29. What is the soundscape of the space you are now occupying?
The soundscape with my headphones is the surround sound of my studio headphones, playing Boards Of Canada, so quieter ambient sounds, using a lot of minor notes and keys. If I take my headphones off, I can hear the television downstairs playing Dr.Phil, the tapping of my keyboard, the buzz of my external hard drive, and the soft hum of music on my headphones around my neck.

30. How is the soundscape shaped? Or what makes a soundscape?
A soundscape is made by incorporating all of the environmental sounds surrounding yourself, or artificially one can shape a soundscape by changing the barriers between the listener and the sound as well as changing the position of the source.

31. What is the soundscape of your neighborhood?
The soundscape of my neighbourhood is a combination of the ambient noise from the highway, including big semi trucks, and the wildlife and dogs in the area howling.

32. What is the soundscape of your city?
The soundscape of Calgary incorporates the sounds of the bow river or Elbow River, and the sounds of cars whizzing by. The bells of the LRT warning lights with the whoosh of air when the train comes by, and the constant sound of construction.

33. How many different soundscapes can you imagine?
I think every environment has a soundscape, as everything has a sound, so anywhere you ever go will have a different soundscape.

34. What would you like to have in your own soundscape?
I would want to have lots of ambient music with clear sound, bad quality sound hurts my head. I would want the comforting ambient sounds that I create, like the whir of my laptop and the sound of myself typing, but no unnecessary sound pollution.

35. What would you record to represent your soundscape?
I think I would be able to record my soundscape by writing down a portion of it on paper, similar to writing music. I would just write, what the sound was, and then the rhythm in which I did it, how I heard it.

36. What sound makes you speculative?
Instrumental music makes me speculative and always makes me think, it’s what I put on when I need to concentrate or think something through.

37. What sounds gives you chills?
The sound of anything with a chime to it, similar to sounds made in carnivals, music boxes, small toys, these sounds can be very creepy.

38. What sound ruffles your scalp?
The sound of someone breathing real close to me, ruffles my scalp and make me incredibly nervous.

39. What sound changes your breathing?
When any abrupt sound surprises me, I gasp, and then of course the pattern of my breathing changes as I catch my breath.

40. What sound would you like whispered in your ear?
Anything with soft consonants, like anything soft would be nice to have whispered in your ear, especially if it was saying something nice.