Leigh Landy: Radio - Voice - Overs (150th PremEdition of Radioatelier)
Radio - Voice – Overs combines the composer’s approach to sampling a nation’s diverse radio broadcasts with the specific rich and unique cultural offering of Czech radio leading to a musical work that is a mix of collage, rhythm, counterpoint, humour, earnest thought and a hint of Švankmajer-inspired surrealism …
In short, this work presents Czech daily life recomposed. The piece works both at the level of heightened listening – understanding every word spoken if that is what you want to pay attention to – and reduced listening – catching the occasional phrase, but listening to the work as organised sound. The piece seeks to take the known, tilt it ever so slightly and re-present it as a sound-based artwork.
It is the fifth sample-based work in Landy’s radio series and follows the GRM-commissioned ‘Oo là la radio’ (F), ‘To BBC or Not’ (UK), ZKM-commissioned ‘Radio-aktiv’ (D) and ‘China Radio Sound’ (CN, made in collaboration with conservatoire students in Shenyang) and will be followed by a pan-Irish ‘On the Eire’ later this year. 'Mezihlas -- Přeshlas -- Nahlas’ is the first work in the series that is made specifically for radio broadcast – an 8-channel surround sound concert version also exists – and it is also the first in the series that is, in fact, legal as the Czech radio holds the copyright on its broadcast materials whereas the other works controversially challenge copyright legislation.
Some elements of the piece can be found on any nation’s broadcasts while others might be considered to be typically Czech. The series attempts to celebrate cultural diversity and our shared experiences as well allowing individuals to make connections through samples that are meaningful to them as well as musical connections. The composer would like to express his gratitude to Michal Rataj of Radiocoustica for the invitation to create and to broadcast this work and to Ian Mikyska for his translation, grammatical, cultural and musical tips.
"This multichannel-to-binaural conversion has been done using the 3D Tune-In Toolkit Test Application (http://www.3d-tune-in.eu/toolkit-developers). For more information, contact the 3D Tune-In project coordinator (Lorenzo Picinali - l.picinali@imperial.ac.uk).”