“This work sounds out the number of people who have died each week during the pandemic.” It was an inspiration that we hope were not available. But we are already in the thick of it, and very painfully, we cannot, and should not ignore.
I have tried to watch this work and to just listen to it. What it granted the audience was a mindspace, a repose, a place to think about this collective journey that we have all been taking since the beginning of 2020. It doesn't exactly tell you something. Instead it brings you somewhere. It is in this sense Lisa's work bears a similar sentiment as Katz. Katz’s work, being a composer, is understandably more musical in her approach, while Lisa’s, being a sound artist, is more soundscape in her treatment.
PS. Lisa's work is best listened to intimately. Quiet place and headphones recommended.
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| http://www.lisa--hall.co.uk/ |
Track Name: 100’000hz || Date Created: 27 Jan 2021 || Date Recorded: 27 Jan 2021 || Duration: 13:14 mins
In the midst of our third peak of CoVid in the UK, 11 months in, we find ourselves with a new strain of the virus, our national health service almost overwhelmed and more than 100'000 people dead.
At this devastating point in the pandemic, this work sounds out the the number of people who have died each week during the pandemic, as an attempt to understand these awful statistics. Starting from March 2020 when the first person died, to the latest weekly total of 7507 deaths captured in mid January, these numbers are compiled in an 11 piece score.
In the performance, each number is sounded as a frequency - to hear these deaths in hertz. Working from a field recording taken during the early days of the first lockdown, each frequency is drawn out and emphasized. Through this the statistics become audible, found in our environment. The peaks and decline of the pandemic are heard and the cumulative effects build to fundamentally change the sound of that sunny spring morning.