| Issue #011 (May 2005) |
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| Jodi Rose & Recording Bridges |
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Interview by Bob Baker Fish
Do bridges sing? It may seem like a peculiar question to ask, yet it was this very question that sparked a ten-year odyssey for Sydney-based sound artist Jodi Rose that continues to this day. Of course when this notion popped into her head she, like many of us, had never actually heard a bridge sing, yet unlike many of us she never actually ruled the possibility out. So now, some ten years later, she has her answer: documented proof on a double CD entitled Singing Bridges, featuring the ‘voices’ of bridges from places as diverse as Finland, Vietnam and Tasmania. In fact, these days Rose feels unmistakably drawn towards bridges, possesses an incredible body of knowledge on bridges the world over, and has some grand plans that are only now beginning to come to fruition.
‘Everyone wants to know: “Why bridges?”' she laughs pre-empting the obvious question. You get the sense that it’s a question she’s become more than accustomed to answering, though she approaches her obsession (she’s the first to admit it’s an obsession) with such good humour and enthusiasm that it’s hard not to be carried along for the ride. ‘Bridges are beautiful, they’re in between places and they have a strong draw on the imagination for people,’ she offers sitting in the empty confines of Loop Bar in inner city Melbourne, a few hours before the launch of her debut CD. ‘But essentially it was a moment of curiosity. I was at art school, going across Sydney’s old Pyrmont Bridge when the Glebe Island Bridge was being built and it looked like a giant harp. And I thought, “Hey, I wonder what that sounds like.”’
The reality is that to human ears, bridges sound like nothing. Sure, you can hear the sounds of the traffic and other external factors, yet what interested Rose were the cables and, in particular, what she refers to as the secret voice of the bridge, that which is inaudible to the human ear. After contacting the Australia’s national broadcaster, the ABC, for equipment, she arranged with the engineer to record the still uncompleted bridge (‘I wrote this really nutty letter saying “I think the city is our temple, the electronic networks our religion, and the sound of the bridge is the voice of the divine”’), utilising contact microphones and Piezo transducers placed directly on the cables.
‘I can attach directly to [the cables] so they pick up vibration basically,’ she offers, ‘“and it can be internal or set off by traffic or wind, or sometimes I can play on them a little bit, touch on them or bang on them. But the things I really like about it are the inaudible sounds that are all around us that we don’t actually tune in to.’
Whilst this recording occurred in 1994, Rose didn’t return to bridge recording until 2000, though since 2000 she has been steadily travelling the world, recording and researching the hidden voices of bridges. Her travels have taken her to some of the most iconic bridges in the world, including the Millennium Bridge in London, the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and the Brooklyn Bridge in New York. What has surprised Rose is each bridge’s unique voice, with its design and immediate environment playing an important role in the timbre of the voice.
‘I guess I’m most surprised by how different they all sound,’ she reflects. ‘One of the things I wouldn’t have imagined – which is kind of strange and a little bit spooky – is that every bridge has a sound that relates to the place where it is. Like the bridge on the Mekong Delta in Vietnam – even though the sound is me hitting it with my ring, its still part of the bridge – which people say sounds like an Asian gong, or the bridge in Helsinki that sounds like an icy Scandinavian tinkling sound.
‘Every one is completely and utterly different,’ she continues. ‘They all have their own voice. I read a book on Sufi mysticism a while ago, about the way vibration is the key to the order of the universe, and everything vibrates at different frequencies. There’s this whole idea that human beings have an electrical current in our body and we vibrate at a particular frequency, but you can actually tune yourself up or down. And that’s one of the things: bridges actually have a resonant frequency, any kind of structure does. I heard about the bridge in Tacoma Narrows in Washington State that collapsed in 1940. It was called Galloping Gertie because it was already a little bit wavy – they hadn’t quite worked out the stiffening trusses yet – and the wind picked up enough speed that it hit the resonant frequency of the materials of the bridge and they just buckled and fell into the water. When I heard about that I did have some kind of anarchic dream of being able to tune into all these bridges and set them off at once and to see them just dissolve and fly off into the ether.
‘But I’m not promoting war, I’m a peace loving girl,’ she laughs. ‘It’s more that the bridges are all singing together; a global symphony is what I’d really like to create.’
Surprisingly, this notion of a global bridge symphony is something that has been with Rose since the beginning, and whilst it was a financial impossibility a decade ago, the democratisation of technology has now put this goal within her grasp. She is currently at work with Sophia Lerner on an experimental radio project in Helsinki, work shopping different ways of making radio.
‘Part of what I’m going to do for that is to test out my idea of getting live sound from different bridges,” she offers excitedly. ‘“I’m hoping to get one in London, one in New York, and one in Helsinki. We have people with software that allows you to take multiple live streams and mix them and broadcast them back out as a single stream.’
Rose doesn’t see herself as a musician or a composer, primarily because she doesn’t work with any sounds except bridge sounds. However this has allowed her to accept her sounds for what they are, without feeling the need to engage in any form of electronic manipulation trickery.
‘It’s been a really good lesson,’ she reflects. ‘I’ve just had to say to myself “It is what it is.” The main thing is hearing what’s there and not imposing my own judgments or ideas on to it; just being really true to bringing out those sounds. I’ve selected them and shaped them a bit by going by textures and I’ve had a couple of composition methods over the years, so I think the CD takes you through all of those as well.
‘When you hear them they have really strong, definite rhythms,’ she continues. ‘They don’t have a strictly musical development but if you take the John Cage/Pierre Schaeffer idea that any sound or noise is music once you listen to it with those ears in that context, then of course it will have a musical development. But in terms of electronic music there are definitely things you can hear in there. It’s perhaps a bit raw and unformed, but it does take you somewhere.’
Whilst there are some similarities to the work of telephone wires recordist Alan Lamb (whom she hadn’t heard prior to working with bridges), Rose’s textures and approach are all her own. She could perhaps be considered part of the Australian Aeolian sound art movement (An Aeolian Harp is played by the wind – named after Aeolus, the Greek God of the Wind), comprising of herself, Lamb and Jon Rose (no relation), who records fence posts. However, for Rose, it is less about the wind than about her love of not only the infinite sonic possibilities of the bridge, but its resonance within a culture.
‘They define a place and become an icon,’ she reflects. ‘And they’re often at the forefront of technological innovation. The fact that they stay up is amazing, and I like cable ones because you can see the tension of the architecture in the bridge. I’ve recorded other steel bridges and they had interesting sounds, but for some reason they didn’t capture me as much as suspension bridges.
‘There’s an inherent musicality about bridges because they’re cables, just like stringed instruments,’ she continues. ‘It’s the whole thing of bridges being these huge structures, but tenuous as well. Something about that juxtaposition is quite intriguing and beautiful’
People have assumed that bridges are only a phase for Rose, and have wondered what’s next once her interest wanes, though to see her enthusiasm and hear the passion with which she speaks it quickly becomes clear she is in it for the long haul. ‘I can very clearly see the ludicrous side of it, even though I’m passionate about it and I’m dedicating my life to it,’ she says laughing. ‘I’m always excited to go to a new bridge, a new place and hear what it sounds like. It’s quite beautiful. I take it seriously but I don’t take it too seriously.’
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