The London Sound Seminar offers an opportunity for research students and faculty in London to explore issues relating to the history and theory of all forms of sound-making and auditory culture.

This term, we will be combining field trips with more sedentary reflections. All meetings will be in room 308, 30 Russell Square, London WC1

Monday 1st June, 5.30
We will be discussing Bill Fontana’s Silent Echoes, at the Haunch of Venision, 1-30 May.

Friday 12 June, 12.00
The seminar will constitute a pilot study for Jonathan Gross’s ethnography of musical listening, focussing on the experience of the Festival Hall concert of 11 June, featuring performances of Alban Berg’s Three Pieces for Orchestra and Mahler’s Symphony no. 7.

Thursday 18 June, 12.00
Setting Sound. A series of listenings exploring the theoretical implications of ‘noise’ along with other non-standard forms of music, curated by Matt Clements. ‘My main point of concern is the capacity of listeners to contract ostensibly arbitrary dissonant, or contingent sound-events into relationships and patterns that invoke musical meaning, whilst extending beyond the immediate moment of consciousness. A provisional list of composers includes Bernhard Gunter, Ivan Fedele and Kevin Drumm.’

Thursday 25 June, 5.00
Steven Feld, ‘Sound Worlds’, in Sound, Patricia Kruth and Henry Stobart (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp.173-200.
Steven Feld, ‘Communication, Music, And Speech About Music’, in Steven Feld and Charles Kiel, Musical Grooves: Essays and Dialogues, 2nd edn (Tucson, Arizona Fenestra Books, 2005 [1994].) pp. 77-95.
Copies of these texts are available in 30 Russell Square photocopy room.

Wednesday 1 July, 12.00
Glenn Gould, The Idea of North (1970).
extract

If you would like to join the London Sound Seminar or help develop its activities, please contact Steven Connor