As the year continues, many of these posts will be philosophical in nature. Some will be in contradiction to previous postings. These are not intended as truths or assertions, they’re merely thoughts…ideas. Think of this as stream of consciousness over a wide span…
Last week, my wife and I were driving back through San Francisco from a family gathering. As we were stuck in traffic, waiting to get on the bridge to cross over the bay, my attention was drawn to two skyscrapers that are under construction. I’m not sure how many stories they are, but from somewhere around the 12th to 15th floor the structural frame that makes up the building (and the electrical, plumbing and HVAC work going on to make the floors habitable) are completely open. There’s nothing else in them. It dawned on me that only a few people get to experience the sound (and sights I guess) of the city from those open spaces 15, 20 or 30 stories up. Only those people performing the construction work, the architect(s) and possibly the clients get to know exactly what that sounds like.
This is true for more subtle…or maybe “less grandiose” is a better term…perceptual experiences. Even fewer people get to experience the sound of trains filtering and phasing down through the weird skylight in the bathroom of my apartment, or the pipes that groan in the floor the first time my neighbor turns on the water in the morning. There are things in your home that I will likely never experience. All of us in this industry work on projects where few people get to listen to the development of the sound as it moves towards its final release format.
We live in individual, and somewhat overlapping, perceptual and sonic worlds…like some sort of strange and complex Venn diagram.
I live on 50+ yo wooden floor, the creating and groaning as we move around is something worth recording and using.