Noise Fields

Free event

Colin Frank percussion / electronics

Colin Frank (Canada, 1993) Noise Fields (2023) 50’ World Premiere

Machines pervade urban environments, yet their sonic performances are little considered. Everything from air conditioner units to electrical boxes continually hum, clunk, and sing everywhere around us. They create sonic landscapes that are often ignored or given little attention to, even though they underpin the psychogeography of the spaces we live, work, and travel in. By considering the sounds of machines as posthuman performances, then we can reimagine the spaces around us as living and breathing environments.

This performance gives focus to the noise fields that pervade urban environments by combining field recordings of machines with improvised percussion and live electronics. The performance draws on two of Colin Frank’s previous projects: a site-specific sound installation made at the Sovereign Design House in Huddersfield, titled Humming, Vibrating Architecture, which amplified the sounds of the electrical and mechanical systems spread throughout the building; and field recordings of machines encountered throughout the city of Sherbrooke in Canada, where Colin undertook an artistic residency in 2022. The droning, buzzing and noisy recordings merge with Colin’s textural percussion playing, whereby found objects are activated in changing configurations. Colin additionally manipulates the field recordings in real-time using his custom built ‘Truncated Tetrahedron’ controller.

Colin Frank is a percussionist, field recordist, installation artist, improviser, and multimedia composer. He is a founding member of Brutalust and Drift Ensemble, and has worked notably with the International Contemporary Ensemble, the Noisebringers, TAK Ensemble, AndPlay, Gods Entertainment, and the Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble. His installations have appeared at Salem Art Works, Dai Hall, and Analix Forever. His PhD dissertation at the University of Huddersfield, titled Making With Agential Objects: An Autoethnographic Account of Fluidity in Artistic Practice, considered how unconventional instruments and objects influence his creative process. He teaches percussion, improvisation, and experimental music.

Produced by hcmf// in partnership with Cultures of Sound as part of The Current Climate; also supported by Sporobole

Photo credit: Laura Mateescu