American Society for Acoustic Ecology

Initial Comments from people interested in the project (Summer 03) [GO THERE]

Members of the ASAE listserv, along with comments if sent, as of 1/22/04:

Aftandilian, Dave (Chicago, IL)
I found acoustic ecology through my overlapping interests in environmental work and music, both in an avocational and semi-pro sense. I do freelance music reviews, for one thing, and had the privlege of reviewing several of the fine EarthEar releases. I've also written articles on noise pollution.

I used to write a monthly env. news column for a Chicago-based magazine called Conscious Choice, and still write for them occasionally. More recently I took a part-time job with the Env. Studies Program at the University of Chicago; half of my time is spent teaching and supervising students; the rest is spent doing administrative work, setting up events, scheduling courses, maintaining our web sites, and so on.

In a not entirely unrelated arena, I'm also trying to finish up my dissertation in anthropology at the Univ. of Chicago. I'm using representations of animals on pots, pipes, and other art objects from precontact Illinois to investigate how perceptions of animals changed when Native Americans in this area adopted settled maize agriculture.

I'm also VP and publications editor of a group called Nature in Legend and Story (NILAS). Our goal is to use stories, myths, and other cultural products to help people reconnect with animals and plants. Several WFAE members have kindly contributed acoustic ecology-based stories to the newsletter I edit for NILAS.
Guess that's it for now.
Anderson, Travis
Bach, Glenn (CA)
I am a poet and visual/sound artist living in Long Beach, California. I became interested in acoustic ecology after reading R. Murray Schafer's _The Soundscape_, and getting involved with the phonography.org discussion list/community. I am currently working on a project that consists of a long poem inspired by a local soundwalk, with research, drawings, and phonographic compositions spun off from the core skeletal structure of the long poem. So, my involvement in acoustic ecology and this list is mostly artistic/aesthetic. I am interested in soundwalks, and possibly teaching a sound/listening based curriculum. I have my final show for my MFA degree in Painting in the Fall of 2004, so until then I probably won't have a wealth of free time to contribute, but I do want to participate in whatever way I can.
Berger, Elliott (CA)
As you can see from my "canned" bio below, my professional interest is quite tangential to acoustic ecology. However my passion is listening, especially in the wilderness, and especially in quite spaces. The desert is a favorite of mine. I hope to drift further into the acoustical ecology realm with time and call liberally on my learnings there in the work I do to educate noise-exposed individuals on their importance of protecting their hearing.

Because of a heavy work load currently, especially with some other professional organizations, I fear I can contribute little to ASAE at this time, but want to stay in touch, monitor activities, and lend my expertise should it be useful. Some of my professional work that may be of interest to you is posted on the E-A-R/Aearo web site at http://www.aearo.com/html/industrial/tech01.asp

You might enjoy my "Life can be loud," pamphlet, my technical article entitled "The ardent hearing conservationist," or my audio demonstration CDs.
----
After receiving his M.S. in Acoustical Engineering from North Carolina State University, Elliott joined the Aearo Company in 1976. As E·A·R/Aearo's Senior Scientist, Auditory Research, he conducts hearing protector research and development. He has written over 60 articles on hearing protection/conservation, and was the principal editor for the 4th and 5th editions of the AIHA Noise Manual. Elliott chairs ANSI working group S12/WG11 on hearing protector attenuation and performance, and is also involved with numerous other standards committees. In 1993 he was the recipient of the National Hearing Conservation Association's Outstanding Hearing Conservationist Award, and in both 1993 and 1998 received their Outstanding Lecture Award. Elliott is Past President of the National Hearing Conservation Association (NHCA), Past-Chair of the American Industrial Hygiene Association's (AIHA) Committee on Noise and a Fellow of the Association, a Board Member of the of the Council for Accreditation in Occupational Hearing Conservation (CAOHC), a Fellow of the Acoustical Society of America (ASA), and a member of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA).
Brechter, Bob
Bronzaft, Arline (NY)
Research and write on effects of noise on mental and physical well-being, especially that of children. Advise-anti noise groups in U.S. and abroad. Serve on Mayor's Council on the Environment in NYC, chairing noise committee (have been appointed by four mayors). Consult to the League for the Hard of Hearing in NYC. Council on the Environment, www.cenyc.org and League for the Hard of Hearing website, www.lhh.org/noise, contain articles I have written as well as references to other writings. Lessening the din will help us appreciate the beautiful sounds in our soundscape. My children's book Listen to the Raindrops (illustrated by Steven Parton) introduces children to the good sounds and cautions them about the bad sounds - League for the Hard of Hearing has published the book.
Cummings, Jim (NM)
I am a writer and editor who has lived in New Mexico for the past 20 years, since shortly after college (I'm a Mainer before/beyond that). I came to AE via an interest in soundscape art CDs. I began EarthEar (an online catalog and record label, see EarthEar.com) five years ago, and in that context came to know the diverse communities of producers around the world, many of which had direct or indirect links with the World Soundscape Project and its works.

I've been a relatively passive member of the WFAE for several years, and have greatly enjoyed the evolution of the journal, which I dearly hope can continue.

From the beginning, EarthEar had a central theme of the importance of opening our ears to our home places (this a variation on my longtime bioregional interests), and the site included some coverage of sound-related environmental issues. Over the past year or so, most of my time and energy has gone into developing a web site focusing on these interests, and I recently formed an "Institute" through which I can apply for grant funding to continue this work (for now the AE Institute is a project of a local 501c3, the Art and Science Laboratory, which has acoustic ecology among its explicit mission elements. The ASL was founded by David Dunn, a writer and composer known to some on this list.)

My focus with the AEI is largely toward news and information, with a strong element of addressing public policy issues regarding human noise in wildlands and the ocean (and in this, offering layman's guides to current science research). I include coverage of urban issues, but feel that other orgs (Noise Pollution Clearinghouse and Noise Free America, along with local groups around the country) are doing that work well, so my energies are more directed to noise's impacts on the non-human world. I realize that this is but a small part of what "acoustic ecology" has addressed historically; yet it seems still appropriate to bring the acoustic element of environmentalism into sharp focus in this way. The web site and Institute has begun to have a good reputation among journalists working on these issues, researchers in the field, and other environmental organizations whose projects may at times include concerns about sound, but which do not focus on this.

It would be great to see a national AE org emerge that incorporates the more wide-ranging elements of the field, including education, arts, architecture, etc.
Doyle, Tony (TN)
...I have recently become interested in acoustic ecology as a result of researching the physics implication in frequency definition at infrasound ranges, and the potentialities expressed artistically. I stumbled on the primary acoustic ecology site and, again with novice pursuit, was enamored with various individuals work in the area of field recording collection; particularly the site of the "Quiet American" (www.quietamerican.org)...

So as artist, novice, and being in the "south" (Memphis, TN)...is their room for a remote member? I also do websites for a couple of .orgs, so I'd be glad to do, or work with someone, on setting up some initial internet visibility. Let me hear!
Ferrington, Gary (OR)
I took early retirement five years ago. For over 32 years I was an educator at the University of Oregon. I was the coordinator of the Instructional Systems Technology program most of that time but ended my career by teaching about children and mass media as well as workshops in attentive listening and soundscape studies. Education is a passion and I look forward to working on educational projects in with the ASAE.

I have been involved with the World Forum for Acoustic Ecology since 1995 and serve as the WFAE web site manager and WFAE secretary. I also serve on the SJAE Editorial committee which publishes the biannual Soundscape; The Journal of Acoustic Ecology. WFAE gives me a full platter of activity in the area of acoustic-ecology. I come to the area of acoustic ecology from the perspective of environmental education. Although I am a media designer and musician, my interest in acoustic ecology is centered on social, economic, political, and biological issues around sound.
Ford, Penny
Frantz, Alicia M (IL)
I'm an audio recordist doing mostly independent recording of audio for my own personal amusement as well as the amusement of a few friends. I'm here in Chicago, IL and would love to participate in something regional as well as travel to something not so regional.
Frayne, Nigel (Australia)
Gonçalves de Oliveira, André Luiz
Grady, Kraig (CA)
ASAEians
I work in building /developing. acoustic instruments tuned to very precise intonations that due to their properties 'interacts" with environments often causing the sound to appear to come from different directions. Whereas most of us are use to a cetrtain degree of noise, working with such material lacking noise has caused a sensitivity to the effects of noise, both psychologically and over large distances. In other words , if you take away the noise, you can feel the result when it is brought back into the mix. My interest is like Glenn, artistic/aesthetic, also therapeutic.
Hedfors, Per
Howard, Paul (CA)
I attended the WFAE symposium in Melbourne, Australia in March, 2003. I wrote daily reports, and a review of the symposium. The symposium was a transforming experience. I had never experienced the sound world from a holistic perspective. My audio background emphasizes the technical (mixing, trouble shooting, circuit development, tech writing). The symposium was an ear-opening event, because of Nigel Frayne, Murray Schafer, Hildegard Westerkamp, Sabine Breitsameter, and several others. One priority of ASAE should be to have a similar get-together. I might be able to contribute as a writer.
Karlow, Edwin A.
Kaufmann, James J. (NY)
137 Aldine St.
Rochester, NY 14619
Musician
Founder: Rochester Soundcape Society

I am a pianist/music-lover/teacher. I was thrust into the movement as it became more and more difficult to find quiet places for music to be shared. As you all know, the past dozen years has brought us an increase in invasive, deliberately-generated low frequency noise that would have been unfathomable at its onset. Before having a child, I dreamed of showing her the sublime beauty of a silent moment in a piece of music. Who would have imagined that it would become so difficult to do in such a short amount of time--that a dozen years could bring such a monstrous change to our soundscape? I ended up founding a group called Rochester Soundscape Society for education and advocacy. See: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rochestersoundscapesociety/ an affiliate of Noise Free America www.noisefree.org

I am passionate about the medium of unamplified sound, and promoting environments that allow this medium to be maximally effective. I believe that a quiet room is one of the most powerful pieces of information technology that ever was or ever will be. Yet as a society, we seem to have forgotten the value of this technology, as we have almost completely negelected in favor of attempts to overpower noise with more amplification, as well as signal-processing, storing, and sending technology that must seem sexier to many. I have started a group for true-believers in this medium: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/unamplified/ Imagine an environment where we can once again hear the deep and subtle musical overtones of a fellow human speaking to us in an every- day environment like a bank or a cafeteria, unmasked by ubiquitous humming, rumbling, and hissing. Imagane a society where soundscape considerations are considered before installing a Coke machine....
Jones, Darvin
Leeds, Joshua
Thrilled to see this becoming a reality. Please put > me on your lists. > > I am an author (THE POWER OF SOUND and SONIC > ALCHEMY), educator, and record > producer specializing in psychoacoustically-designed > soundtracks. My albums > are used in classrooms and clinics around the world. > I also teach about the > therapeutic applications of music and sound. > Consequently, I am an enormous > proponent of Acoustic Ecology. > > How can I help you? > Yes! Onwards...
Loge, Ken
Lowrey, Norman (NY)
I am a maskmaker ("singing masks"), composer, and educator (Chair, Music Department, Drew University, Madison, NJ). Ever since doing a collaborative project with the then Delaware River Keeper in 1994, called River Sounding, in which we invited people to gather at seven sites along the Delaware to listen to the river and eventually make some kind of response, I have incorporated recordings that I made then at those sites into my mask ceremony performance work, and successively other recordings of various environments special to me.

That experience of listening to the river, along with doing work for several years with Pauline Oliveros, led to my joining the WFAE list, and though I have never been able to be very active, I have continued to do what I can in support, both in my teaching and in my continuing mask work in which the masks function as guides into making deep connections with the non-human realm through sound. My web site may clarify some of this: http://www.users.drew.edu/nlowrey.
May ASAE take off and flourish in this new year.
Louis, Levon
My name is Levon Louis and I am the owner and Audio Director for Chakrasound, a third-party provider of sound effects, voice recording, and music soundtrack services for the games industry. Although I am very passionate abuot both nature and sound, I am just learning about the field of acoustic ecology and would like to know more - particularly how I can use my positioning [both location and professionally] to help the group and the cause. I am grateful to have the opportunity to work in audio every day, and very much exited to have found an opportunity to apply any knowledge and skills I have to "make the world a better place". Let me know how I can help, hit me on or off list with questions or introductions, and please feed me informatin by the pound ... many thanks.
Lumban, David
Maehr, Mike (IL)
Marble, Matt (OR)
my name is matt(hew) marble. i am 24. i currently reside in portland, OR (originally from Mississippi). i am a sound artist/composer, student of speech and hearing sciences, and co-editor of a monthly journal, FO_A_RM, concerning auditory culture/arts and expirimental poetics. I am interested in sound and listening as a mode of being. i believe the sounds without and within us are of utmost importance in regards to our quality of life and i aspire to proliferate this awareness and our consequent 'responsibilities' amongst those who are hard of hearing, and to probe ever more deeply amongst those already tuned in. I have plans to create a sound museum in the near-distant future and am interested in making Portland a center for acoustic ecology activity. As, it seems, sound and listening are becoming more and more attended to in the area by a young and vigilant community, i feel the presence of the ASAE in the city will be of increasing interest and affect. i hope all are well and i look forward to meeting you all both virtually and actually.
Matzner, Paul (CA)
Miller, Steven (NM)
Professor, Contemporary Music Department, College of Santa Fe. Musician, producer.
Mitchell ,Will
Moore, Jeremiah
I'm a sound worker / artist. I work as a freelance recordist / engineer / editor / mixer / designer. More often than not these days my work is in support of some kind of storytelling, be it narrative or documentary film, television, animation or theatre. There's definitely a nitty-gritty workaday-world aspect to my involvement with sound. I'm also involved in a more exploratory, purely creative aspect.

I enjoy making installations with sound. I do the occasional live performance of some sort, and compose works with field recordings and other materials including musical instruments.

Here's a statement I've written on working in sound: http://www.northstation.net/reel/statement.html

I was involved for a while in the WFAE efforts / organization in about 1996/1997, when the structuring committee was laying out the global structure. The development of the ASAE is exciting. It feels good to reconnect with, as in I'm-Not-Sure-What-it-is-exactly but-my-interests-have-retained-this-kind of-direction so-there-must-be-something-here.

At the time of structuring the WFAE organization, the identity question kept floating around: What should this AE thing focus on? Noise abatement policy, Environmental art, Sound design, Architecture, Soundscape composition? After a few years watching, the simple answer has surfaced: "yes." In an age of specialization, fragmentation and balkanization, there is a real need for functional general attractors. WFAE has been around as a concept for almost 10 years, since the Banff meeting. It hasn't gone away, and continues to attract interesting people and ideas across disciplines.
thanks all - nice to read everyone's intros.
Nagai, Michelle (NY)
I am a composer/sound artist living in Brooklyn, NY.

My initial interest in Acoustic Ecology arose out of a small discussion group that I stumbled across some years ago (I think it may have emerged from the WFAE main list). Each week or so we would read a piece of writing from the WFAE website's list of resources and one of us in the group would lead a discussion about the work in question. One day someone on the list made a post about an interesting sound they were hearing down the street from their apartment. I quickly recognized the description and realized that this writer was talking about the Williamsburg bridge, right in my own neighborhood. This experience encouraged me that somehow I was interested in the right kind of thing, making connections that were at once universal and local.

Since then, I have been involved in a number of activities related to soundscape studies, acoustic ecology and radio activism. This year (oops, last year now...) I embarked on a long-term project called EC(h)OLOCATOR which involves collaboration with community radio stations throughout North America. The primary intent is to get volunteers at community based radio stations to experiment with field recording and technology as a means for expressing themselves creatively and making a stronger connection to the places they inhabit. Our activities include soundwalking, field recording, interviewing community members, Deep Listening exercises (courtesy Pauline
Oliveros), more soundwalking, live radio broadcasts, etc. Ultimately, the project is trying to encourage community broadcasters, and especially those people responsible for what actually goes on the air, to consider the SOUNDS of their communities - in the literal as well as the metaphorical sense - as key to shaping the arc of each day's broadcast.

I am especially interested in being involved in the ASAE because so much of my creative work centers around issues of community and sound awareness. I am really excited to see how this thing evolves, especially as an organizing body for activism, a resource for education, and an outlet for creating more meaningful sonic experiences for the average (and generally not listening) person in the US.
That's my blurb for the moment, and thanks to all who have posted about themselves. I look forward to reading more.
Owens, John (FL)
I have been a very passive observer and member of WFAE for a few years and as a novice I am VERY interested in Acoustic Ecology. The formation of an American Society for Acoustic Ecology has been needed foe some time.

Unfortunately, I seem to be located in a region with very little if any recognition of the Acoustic Ecology concept ((the tip of South Florida). Biscayne National Park has begun some work and Everglades National Park has acknowledged some importance of soundscapes, but except for these National Parks there seems to be very little interest.

I have proposed a study of the Soundscapes of the parks within the Florida State Park system and have been given a preliminary "go ahead" from the Park service (no money from the Park Service). and have just started with a single study of one park. At this time I am not able to devote much time to the project as I am employed full time in a unrelated field and part time as a naturalist/guide with an adult education program.

I am rapidly approaching "retirement" and plan to pursue this project in depth (when I have more time). I would also like to set up a program with a local community College or University (I am employed full-time by a University, part-time at a second university and have taught as an adjunct lecturer at a community college)

I would be interested in helping with the development of ASAE in any way that I am able, but especially in contacting fellow "AE ists" in the S.E. US and Florida perhaps to set up a group. Please continue the work and let me know how I can help.
P, Chuck (CA)
My name is Charles Previtire.

I live to the north of LA.
While I've been in commercial radio for the past 15 years (all aspects, from on air to Creative Services director, making promo's and sweepers), I've only recently begun to engage myself in the ecology of sound. During the past five years, I've been building an arsenal of recording equipment and knowledge to document life around me. During that time, I've begun to play and record music as well, incorporating field recordings whenever possible. I also make sound design for a production library. I found it fascinating to listen to the environment, but also have found it difficult to get past man made sound. It was this frustration that led me to R. Murray Schafer, and like Glenn, the phonography mailing list. Since then I've been voraciously reading and recording as much as possible. While I'm not sure how I can contribute, I am enthusiastic about the movement. I was mulling the possibility of designing an educational/public service radio show focusing on sound ecology. Perfect medium for it, no distracting visuals. The show can even rotate hosts and producers, perhaps those specialized to certain aspects of sound, from educational to entertainment to environmental and more. Would also enjoy meeting up with any LA folks for discussion, field recording trips and so on. Happy to be here, Charles
Polli, Andrea (NY)
Associate Professor, Film and Media, Hunter College
Pru, Jeannie
Rabben, Brian
Roquet, Paul (CA)
I'm currently in the middle of a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship, a yearlong independent study project awarded to recent graduates to learn about an obscure obsession. My project centers around this very thing called 'soundscape studies.' So far I've been through the Cook Islands, Fiji, NZ, Australia, and now Singapore & Malaysia, with India as the likely next stop.

Home is Davis, California, a little outside of the bay area, and once I return in July I hope I can play a more active role in the ASAE (alongside applying for graduate school and all that business!). I'll also hopefully make something of all these recordings & questions I am amassing about AE and its place in the global tangle of things.

Glad to be here!
Rueger, Barry
Hi all from the Great White North. Somehow I always seem to be on the periphery of things acoustic ecology, and this is no exception. Certainly I know probably half of the Board of CASE up here in Canada, yet since living in Kentucky for a few years I have also built up strong ties to the U.S. My partner Victoria Fenner is founder of the Full Moon Audio Art camps, and is on the Board of CASE. She has also found herself lecturing on soundwalking in the U.S. Stretching things a bit further, she also curated the "Radiant Dissonance" series of radio programs by Canadian audio artists, which included people well known within the acoustic ecology community such as Hildegard Westerkamp and Darren Copeland.

On my own part, I am on the Board of the Association for Independents in Radio (AIR), an American group of radio producers that numbers roughly 500 in membership. Among them are any number of people who are at least somewhat of interest to ASAE, such as Jim Cummings and Jim Metzner. There is of course a longstanding and natural alliance between radio producers and acoustic ecologists, and I am happy to promote ASAE to my AIR brethren, and beyond to the Public Radio and Community radio communities. Anything that teaches people to listen critically and thoughtfully to their environment cannot help but improve the works that we hear on the radio.

Those who know me know that I monitor far too many mailing lists, and take the time to pass information back and forth between them where appropriate. That is the primary reason that I signed up for the ASAE list - so that I could encourage American radio producers to be part of the development of the acoustic ecology movement in the U.S., and so I could share the insights of ASAE list members with AIR members. So although I may contribute infrequently, I will be watching carefully.
Schoen, Claire
Schroeder, Mary
Snyder, Rima
Shapiro, Ben
I live in New York and these days work mostly in the world of public radio documentary. I am the editor of a public radio show The Next Big Thing, and produce independently and in collaboration with others like Joe Richman, the Kitchen Sisters. I also sometimes produce documentary's for tv, often about musical subjects and do some writing about radio and sound. It's exciting seeing all the diverse and interesting folks gathering around this ASAE list.
Silver, Michah (NY)
Sinkinson, Toby (CO)
Strike, Don
Ximm, Aaron (CA)
I'm a sound artist who works primarily with field recordings. Most of my energy is spent on collecting and composing soundscapes under the name Quiet American. Many hours of my work, and the scope of my activities, are documented on my website, www.quietamerican.org.

I am based in San Francisco, where I curate and host Field Effects, a concert series that presents work based on found sound and field recordings in a uniquely comfortable environment. I fall into a category of contemporary recordists who have taken the name 'phonography' for the work they do. Speaking for myself, I appreciate that the repurposed word 'phonograph' emphasizes that the interest in and pleasure I take from my own recordings is analogous to that a photographer might take in their photographs. Though the 'phonograph' has many applications and sources of appeal, the primary one is aesthetic ~ as with the photograph. I collect and listen to recordings of the natural and human world(s) as objects to be enjoyed and studied in its own right. I say this to emphasize that I am not an ethnomusicologist, anthropologist, botanist, orinthologist (amateur or otherwise), etc. My interest in most of my recordings is rooted in what is self-evident in the, in their timbres, sonorities, rhythms ~ everything else that follows, follows.

My current interests include expanding my installation work in various directions, finding ways of doing maximally portable surround sound field recordigns, and developing a professional field recording and sound design practice. Part of my energy is perpetually spent on field recording advocacy ~ one reason I am interested in joinging the ASAE. With that in mind I would invite participants in this forum to consider helping me by sharing unedited one-minute field recordings for my 'one minute vacations' project, which is by far the most popular section of my website: http://www.quietamerican.org/vacation.html