Baltazar's Adventure through the Great Machine
- Submitting institution
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The University of Sheffield
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Output identifier
- 6887
- Type
- J - Composition
- Month
- -
- Year
- 2020
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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0
- Research group(s)
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-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- 'Baltazar's Adventure Through the Great Machine' was commissioned by the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, Sheffield University, and the Kelham Island Museum, Sheffield, as part of the research project 'From Brooklyn Works to Brooklynism'. The project explored urban regeneration, gentrification, and the rise of hipster culture in post-industrial neighbourhoods such as New York City’s Brooklyn and Sheffield's Kelham Island. This composition answered the following question: how might regeneration, gentrification and the transformation of cultures be explored through acousmatic music? The transformation of location recordings (captured in the historic industrial machines collection at the Kelham Island Museum) into beat-based acousmatic music provided an answer, serving to link between the sounds of the industrial past with the distinctive electronic music scene of the 1980s and 90s, whose luminaries drew on, and made use of, the industrial sounds emanating from the drop forges, works, and foundries (such as Forgemasters and Sweet Exorcist, who first signed to Sheffield-based record label Warp Records). The composition began with a two-week process of recording, editing and analysing those recordings, revealing a series of accented beats in various industrial machines: line-shafting powered machinery in the Die-Sinkers and Cutlers Workshops, powered by a waterwheel, belts and pulleys, varied between 2, 4, 5 and 8 beats per measure; the Don Engine, powered by the same source, had 13; the Crossley Gas Engine, powered by natural gas, 6 and 7. These were transcribed and Stanovic was able to isolate or recreate these patterns, separating them from the background noise of the machine engines. From this point on, the recordings could be synchronised to produce repetitive, cyclical beats, with the form of the piece mirroring this process of transformation from arrhythmic to rhythmic. The work was premiered at the Kelham Island Museum site in 2018.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -
