Black Water Brown Water is an evolving sound piece, originally commissioned as a sound walk for the Stourport canal basins in Worcestershire, UK. The basins form an intersection between the Staffordshire and Worcestershire canal and the river Severn and the piece is really about the relationship between these two water systems.

My ‘way in’ was the experience of standing on a lock-gate that separates the canal and the river and on one side there was this chaotic, gushing, brown water and on the other, the water was controlled, black and serene. Black Water Brown Water. The piece is based on an imagined dialogue between the great canal engineer James Brindley and Sabrina, Goddess of the river Severn – but in a way it is a dialogue between the two water systems themselves with these two characters giving voice to the myths that represent them.
The language of the work draws heavily on John Milton¹s Comus and to a lesser extent Michael Drayton¹s Poly Olbion, both of which make reference to Sabrina. Additionally, I¹ve taken a lot from the biography of James Brindley – both real and imagined.

In the original walk, visitors pick up an mp3 player and listen to the piece on a small, man-made island that sits between these water systems. This version though has been re-edited specifically for RADIA.

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In Black Water Brown Water, the readers were John Hall as James Brindley and Ella Turk-Richards as Sabrina.

The Pieces was commissioned by British Waterways with funds from the Arts Council of England, Arts & Business new partners, Advantage West Midlands, Wyre Forest District Council, Heritage Lottery Fund and Stourport Forward.

Black Water Brown Water was created by David Prior for liminal and this radio mix comes from Sound Art Radio, Dartington.

For more information on liminal, please go to www.liminal.org.uk

An Illustrated Radio Journey By Anna Keleher and Claire Long Journey Collaborators, Rebecca Beinart, Claire Long and Anna and Mark Keleher.
Based on a journey from the UK to Helsinki and back by land and sea, the “illustrated radio journey” sits somewhere between sound art and travel documentary.

Based on a journey from the UK to Helsinki and back by land and sea, the “illustrated radio journey” sits somewhere between sound art and travel documentary. On-site recordings, ambient sounds, creative reflection and narration are woven together to give the listener glimpses of the experiences of the journey. Collaborative drawings and tally-sticks also created on the journey provide a visual counterpart to the radio piece. The illustrated radio journey lives on the web at http://journey.uber.com and through a series of coordinated installations and radio broadcasts.

Visit the Radio Journey Project website at: http://journey.uber.com

Claire Long and Anna Keleher have been collaborating since October, 2007. Their collaborative practice arose from shared interests in archaeology, Dartmoor, walking and sound collection and has evolved through continued exploration of place, site-specific and sound-based works.

Reading, UK, Seville, Spain by Duncan Whitley for Soundart Radio

The piece weaves together a series of field recordings from two projects, the first of which examines, critiques and celebrates the language of football crowd sound, the other, a collaboration with sound artist and composer James Wyness, takes as its subject the ritual Holy Week processions of Seville, Spain.
These two phonographic projects develop through growing archives of multichannel sound, which Duncan uses as raw material for his sound installations.

“My artistic practice is orientated towards sound installation, and radio presents quite a different challenge. In this piece I wanted to see how it felt to slip between the two dynamic and contrasting soundscapes of Holy Week in Seville and a football match at Reading FC’s Madejski Stadium. The editing is simple and transparent, working with real-time events and with few cuts.”

Duncan’s work appropriates forms and conventions of sound installation, field recording, oral history, and sonic archive. In ongoing sound recording projects Duncan has focussed on collecting, analysing, categorising and editing raw material extracted from the social and urban fabric. Underpinning his work is an interest in the social and documentary value of sound as a medium, and the use of sound and new media to develop alternative narrative forms. Whilst displaying a critical interest in sound and audio work, Duncan remains committed to producing intuitive, accessible work for broad audiences.

James Wyness is a sound artist and composer, working almost exclusively in the electroacoustic medium. He produces soundwalks, work for radio, sound installation and multichannel concert works. He is currently studying a PhD in composition at the University of Aberdeen.

Radia 149 is a collage for radio made by Richard Povall of Aune Head Arts, a contemporary arts organisation based on Dartmoor National Park. Aune Head Arts uses the arts to develop and nurture understanding about rural life, trains and mentors younger professional and pre-professional artists,
encourages and supports cross-artform working and works closely and collaboratively with communities. This programme features sound recordings made at various events over the last year. Richard also produces a regular show for Soundart Radio.

http://www.auneheadarts.org.uk/

In early October, artists Jem Finer and Ansuman Biswas visited Dartington College of Arts as part of the Arts and Ecology MA. In collabortation with Soundart Radio a home made radio telescope was constructed with a receiving device tuned to 20.1 mhz, allowing us to pick up radiation from storms on Jupiter. These recordings were all made between 6 and 9 pm on 4th October as we stood out under the stars waiting and listening, and includes interviews with Jem Finer.

3 pieces by artist Stormsmith Nomi at Soundart Radio, Dartington, UK, on the theme of ecology: Eat Me; Home Sofa Earth Home; Return Return.

Stormsmith Nomi presents 3 of her recent works on the theme of ecology. ‘Eat Me’ concerns relationships between food, farming, supermarkets and the individual; ‘Home Sofa Earth Home’ is a true story of belonging and belongings; ‘Return Return’ examines the choices we make in what we believe to be real.

A site-specific field recording composition.
In 2012 the Olympics will come to London. The site, situated in north east London between Stratford, Hackney Wick and Pudding Mill Lane, currently a hotchpotch of industrial estates, disused waterways, railway sidings, traveller ‘s homes and allotments will soon be the biggest building site in Europe. In just over five years the entire area will be cleared, it’s map re-drawn ; transformed firstly into state of the art sports facilities, then re-regenerated to provide more homes yet another shopping centre and eventually re-sold to the public. The same public who, through government compulsory purchase order, have just bought the land once and will of course foot all the bills in the meantime. The latest leap in the budget for the whole project will likely cost the arts council 35% of its annual government subsidy.

Produced by Lucinda Guy and Alexander Paterson.
“Originally we thought about doing a dance/movement piece for radio, but as we worked we became more interested in the variety of sounds the floors here make. Some of the studios we recorded in have been here for decades, as part of Dartington College of Arts which was formed in 1961. The college is now to be closed down, or move 80 miles to merge with a larger institution. It’s the smallest academic institution in England and is no longer considered viable. This piece is a homage to the floors of Dartington with their unique creaks and squeaks, and to a college which could not be replicated anywhere else.”