Transmissions
In The Dark What’s New: Bedstuy Beats
Vivienne Schutz (DE 2023)
Vivienne Schutz (DE 2023)
1 min
Vivien Schütz is a German radio maker living in Brooklyn, New York. She typically produces radio documentaries and fictional stories for German public radio, but this was her first time experimenting with something non-narrated piece using only field recordings.
The piece was inspired by the prompt "What does your neighborhood sound like to you?". It’s called “Bedstuy Beats”. Bedstuy is short for Bedford-Stuyvesant, a neighborhood in Brooklyn, where Vivien has been living for the last two years. A lot of the recordings were spontaneous — she just grabbed her phone when something interesting was happening around her.
Produced by: Vivienne Schutz
In The Dark What’s New: Life Begins in the Stillness
Julie Censullo and Gabriel Rodreick (US 2023)
Julie Censullo and Gabriel Rodreick (US 2023)
10 min
Julie Censullo is an audio producer based in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Her piece, "Life Begins in the Stillness", was produced as part of the Spring 2023 In the Dark short feature course, and was featured on BBC Radio 4’s Short Cuts. It’s Julie’s first non-narrated and heavily sound designed piece. It was recorded in the Quaking Bog in Theodore Wirth Regional Park in Minneapolis. The interviewee is a man named Gabriel Rodreick He is a musician and artist who goes by “Freaque”, and he created the bog spirits heard in the piece.
Produced by: Julie Censullo
Music by: Gabriel Rodreick, AKA "Freaque
In The Dark What’s New: The Meaning of Alexa
Owen Duff UK 2023)
The Owen Duff (UK 2022)
6 min
Owen Duff is an independent musician who also works part time for a London council. In the past couple of years he’s been experimenting with sound art, after taking a music masters course at Goldsmiths University.
“The Meaning of Alexa” is one of the pieces that he made on the course - an improvised piano and voice “duet” between Owen and an Amazon Echo smart speaker. It was originally a live performance, with improvised questions and piano playing in response to Alexa’s answer. Owen then edited and augmented this with sound design and also added in recordings that the Amazon Echo took itself, of him. It was inspired by writing on digital capitalism and neoliberalism by authors Han Byung-Chul, Wendy Brown and others.
Produced by: Owen Duff
My Synthetic Thoughts
Samuel Robinson ( 2023)
Samuel Robinson (UK 2023)
14 min
In 'My Synthetic Thoughts' the protagonist grapples with puzzling experiences, seeking meaning in a labyrinth of mental health, medication, memory, and the subconscious. Amidst the fog of unresolved time, their quest for understanding and peace becomes a poignant journey, revealing the intricate tapestry of their psyche.
Produced by Samuel Robinson
The Peephole
Andrea Kristinsdottir (US/ISL 2023)
Andrea Kristinsdottir (US/ISL 2023)
10 min
A deepdive into a workplace bathroom. What exactly happens there other there other the obvious? Why would you not want to do the things that you’re supposed to do there?
Andrea Kristindottir likes to focus on the smallest everyday places that reveal musch more about the wider world around us.
Produced by: Andrea Kristindottir
Soft Life: Time
Alannah Chance and Axel Kacoutié (UK 2023)
Alannah Chance and Axel Kacoutié (UK 2023)
32 min 3 of 4
This four-part series takes the idea of ‘soft life’ as a launch off point to explore alternative ideas around work, time, the body and ecology emanating from Somerset House and beyond. They talk to radical thinkers, artists and writers, who are carving out these new ways of being in the body, centring the soft and the in-between, finding space for rest and looking at ways of expanding time beyond the clock.
How can we make time free?
This episode contemplates different ways of experiencing time beyond the linear, with Somerset House Studios artist Shenece Oretha on transforming time through the practice of listening, sociologist Judy Wajcman on unpicking progress from speed in the digital sphere and psychologist Dr Ruth Ogden on how our experience of time is relational and whether it’s possible to conceive of ‘free time’ in a modern world.
Produced by: Alannah Chance and Axel Kacoutié
Sound by: Axel Kacoutié and additional music by Ellen Zweig
Produced by Somerset Studios
XMTR Radio Hour Ep24 : Tapes and Time
Social Broadcasts (UK 2023)
Produced by Social Broadcasts (UK 2023)
60 min / Episode 24 of 24
This Transmitter Radio Hour is an ode to tapes and time, featuring Glasgow based sound artist Steve Urquhart’s Doing Bird a mixtape recorded with inmates at Perth Prison (Scotland), a meditation on time by Brighton based composer and sound artists Joseph Wilkinson and a wonky plunderphonic mixtape by Bristol based Limbo Tapes.
1. Radio producer and sound artist Steve Urquhart worked with inmates at HMP Perth engage with archive birdsong and oral history recordings from the Scottish Ornithologists’ Club in a unique, creative audio art collaboration.
You can listen to side B of Doing Bird here
2. Joseph Wilkinson is a composer, sound designer and audio artist based in Brighton, exploring the relationship between sound and our inner worlds. He collaborates with his wife and creative partner Cam Brandow as Farfar Studio, their combined channel for enchanting experiences through bespoke music, sound, and storytelling.
I sit in the shade is a short form documentary that is a meditation on time, our relationship to it, and the world around us. A mix of introspection, interviews with thoughts from authors, thinkers and tree-people.
3. Side B of Limbo Tapes is from a compilation of sounds made for monthly show Radio Limbo on Noods Radio, which is the flagship for cassette label, Limbo Tapes, a collaboration between Pete Hazell and Sean Lee.
You can hear side A of Limbo Tapes here
Produced by Lucia Scazzocchio
Follow the series
I Am Better Than I Was
Myriam Pruvot (BE 2018)
Myriam Pruvot (BE 2018)
14 min
Music and spoken word in fragments with texts taken from Mohamed Ali's speech before his fight with George Foreman in 1974 mixed with extracts from the diary of a young woman.
Produced by Myriam Pruvot
Night Walking - A Call from Terry
Bianca Giaever ( 2023)
Bianca Giaever (US 2023)
29 min Episode 1 of 4
Constellation Prize, the podcast from The Believer magazine, talks to subjects about their existential problems—how art, God, and loneliness fit in their lives. Nightwalking, is a four-part mini series featuring the poet Terry Tempest Williams.
Bianca receives a call from a famous writer, Terry Tempest Williams, who suggests they do a project together. They plan to embark on a ritual—taking walks at night, and writing each other daily letters. Terry promises that this will bring them closer to God. Bianca has doubts.