In London, it is common to see people mudlarking along the banks of the River Thames (scavenging for artifacts) during low tide. When I asked a couple from Poland what they were going to do with the artifacts they found, they responded that they were going to make a mosaic that spelt out the word “London.” This special radio edit of The London Ear Drops, is my sonic mosaic, and result of my “soundlarking” (or scavenging for sonic artifacts) throughout the city of London.

Some of my scavenging for sonic artifacts occurred on public transport, notably on the “17 to Archway” bus route that runs from London Bridge to Archway station via Kings Cross station. The low bass frequency from the field recording of inside the “17 to Archway” is used as the bass note for this movement that is interspersed with Londoner Hannah Brown’s impressions of her home city and my “soundlarking” (of location recordings made throughout London).

So, what is it like to live in a densely populated city I asked Londoner Michael Umney,

“... after a while you don’t really notice the people, because of the fact there’s so many people, they become like part of the environment really ... most of the time they are moving and there is so many of them that they don’t differentiate that much from each other. That’s why it’s such a surprise if you catch someone’s eye, or somebody speaks to you ... it’s like a bus stop talking to you, because you are so use to them.”

While wandering through St Pancras International Railway Station I noticed a piano that members of the public could walk up to and play at any time they felt like. I decided that I would record myself improvising on the piano while thinking about the famous Australian pianist David Helfgott (who the 1996 movie Shine was a biographical drama about his life). I remembered that at the age of nineteen, Helfgott won a scholarship to study at the Royal College of Music in London. However, during his stay in London in the late 1960s he began showing definite manifestations of schizoaffective disorder. As an Australian I thought of Helfgott while I sat at the piano and how his disorder may have affected his perspective of the world around him. I began thinking, what if inanimate objects, like pianos, had memories, would they remember all the people who performed on them? If Helfgott practiced piano in St Pancras International Railway Station on this piano, how would it remember Helfgott?

One of the notable features of London, as explained to me by Michael Umney, is that you can’t see the horizon unless you walk over a bridge. In a way it is a claustrophobic view that blinds people to the idea of other far off places. So, for part of this movement I interpolated interview recordings of Michael Umney and “trapped” them between location recordings of London. The idea here was to sonically mimic 3D maps of London where the people are in the street and the view is blocked by the buildings all around them.

Even though you can’t see the horizon, London does have some beautiful parks. So, at 6am one morning I made a recording of the wind blowing through a left on a tree in Regent Park that was later treated in the studio. When I use audio filters I think of them as “memory filters” as they add a layer of interpretation to the original sound source, similar to how memories reinterpret lived embodied events.

The last movement of this work begins with the sound of the River Thames and fades into the sound of people walking across the Millennium Bridge. These sounds become slowly heavily filtered to create “memory” music, that is augmented with other electronic sounds, setting the scene and mood for Londoner Hannah Brown. Brown exclamates that in London, she could, “become whatever I wanted because nobody knew me.” This idea that no one knows you in London, this anonymity is also a theme that emerged in Michael Umney’s interview as individuals merge into the overall texture of the city or as Umney explains become “part of the environment.” However as Brown states, “that’s part of the joy of moving to a big city...” and that is where this work leaves its listeners, pondering the joy of living in London as the sounds fade from earshot and this sonic encounter with London is implanted in your memory.

Acknowledgements

Special thanks to Yanna Black, Ed Baxter, John Drever, Atau Tanaka, Goldsmiths, University of London, Resonance104.4fm and Frequency Oz.