For many years, my Mum has been bugging me to go on a trip with her to Berlin. She had been a nanny there, based with the British Forces for a time when the Berlin Wall was up and hadn’t returned since it had fallen. Being young, the idea of going back to a place just to go everywhere Mum had been really hadn’t taken my fancy. Until I started composing electroacoustic music, I had not really seen the potential of mixing her experience with music- something that frustrated her quite a bit!

Because I am particularly interested in Acoustic Ecology and the change in a cities physical and auditory features, I wanted to attempt to incorporate this into some of Mum’s memories- especially the scarier bits such as being tailed by the Stasi’s through Checkpoint Charlie to a restaurant and even being followed into the toilets. At the same time, I thought it would be unique to have someone with a variety of memories of Berlin to go back there over 20 years later and to record what, if anything had changed, and to put the stories that she told me, into context.

The main problem I had was working out how exactly I was going to go around recording all of these memories and changes in a vast city, and making good pieces of sound art out of them.

The first stage of the project was to secure funding- in case the project didn’t materialise due to a lack of funding, I recorded my Mum’s memories in the studio at the University of Aberdeen- it would still act as a standalone sound documentary after all…

Thankfully for me, the Music Department at the University of Aberdeen has been very supportive throughout the project- from its conception right to where it is now. I had discussed my idea with Pete Stollery, and Miriama Young who specialise in electroacoustic composition at the university. They had said that it was feasible and gave me some ideas to look into. I ended up being fully supported by the University of Aberdeen through a ‘Small Grants Award’ and the Alfie Tough award, and this enabled me to travel to Berlin for a full week and carry out everything I needed to create the Project.

Before going to Berlin, I had a steep learning curve to follow. With my fascination of Acoustic Ecology, Aesthetics of Music and my readings of Walter Benjamin, I had decided that on the first day, I would do a ‘Flaneur’ Soundwalk. Where Benjamin would explore a new city by smell, rather than with a map, I would do the same, but instead of exploring the city by smell, I would do so by sound- especially as research shows that one is more susceptible to hearing new sounds due to the flight and fight mode of the human body when in a strange/ possibly unsafe place.

The other learning curve was to come from attempting to build my own website. I knew that I wanted to share my experience (and Mum’s) of where I walked, what I heard and saw. I also knew that the whole pin on a map that plays a sound idea would work best- but a lot of online sound maps already do that- Montreal sound map for instance. Google Earth seemed a good way to present the project- especially with its tour/ path feature- I knew that I should be able to map the routes I recorded sounds on- along with images – both old and new- and Mum’s spoken memories.

Mum and I travelled out to Berlin at the end of August for a whole week. I had split the week into two main tasks- The first day was spent doing my flaneur sound walk- which apart from anything else was very tiring having being up since 2am and flying in from Edinburgh- but a lot of really interesting and unique sounds where captured- a car backfiring down the Kufurstendamn, the vast public transport of the city and an African Drumming Band amongst many other unusual sounds..

The majority of the week however, was spent touring around Berlin- both the well known areas, but also the lesser known places such as Spandau and the East of the city- both are absolutely beautiful and have a very rich history. Over the course of the week, we visited areas where Mum had both lived and worked and recorded her memories from the past and also the differences that she noted all those years later- some of which where quite striking.

There will be several outcomes to this project. Just before Christmas, I completed the piece that consists of the recordings taken on my ‘sound walk’ on the first day. It’s called ‘No Man’s Land’ and is available to listen to on the project website- www.projektberlin.com. I am currently working on the sound documentary. My Mum’s memories from before the trip are already online and she’s coming up to Aberdeen soon to help me finish off the project- she’s taken a bit of time to reflect on both experiences and these too will be interesting to listen to I’m sure.

The web development is also well under way and should be completed by mid March. I had to change my idea slightly as I’m very much a novice at websites… I had planned to import Google earth into the web page so to speak, but to do this limits some of the programmes great features. Instead, I have opted to embed a .kmz file that can be downloaded by the user into Google Earth- The current version incorporates 2 pathways- one showing the route the Berlin Wall took, and the other, the route I took on my first day of the project. The user can follow both routes using the path feature on Google Earth, but as well as this, also has the ability to click on icons I have placed on the map which enable them to bring up a dialogue box with a environmental sound recording and a picture. The user- if they wanted to- could follow the path I created for my ‘Flaneur walk’ and listen to the environmental sounds which I created ‘No Man’s Land’ from.

I would hope that this project would have several outcomes- apart from it being the first major project I have undertaken as someone interested in electroacoustic music.

I think it’s a great way to potentially introduce people to sound art- to get them to listen to their own environment when they’re out and about- rather than relying on Mp3 players and iPods to block environmental sounds out.

A lot of people use the internet as a key source for information. Within this project, I have aimed to give a historical perspective to a city that is sometimes forgotten about. I felt this was especially appropriate when 2009 with the 20^th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. I have also tried to aim the content at all age groups. Even with just the basic site up and running, one can follow the route of the Berlin wall and see the modern city in Google Earth.

I wonder then, if there isn’t perhaps a place for projects like this one in schools alongside the likes of Sound and Music’s ‘Sonic Postcards’ ? The new Curriculum for Excellence for instance, encourages collaboration between subjects. It is a relatively simple way for kids to learn about their own aural environments and the history of that environment as well. It needs very little in the way of equipment- a simple recording device- and a computer with internet access… It lends itself, I feel to a whole world of creativity.

Perhaps this type of project could be used as a starting point for collaborations? I worked alone on the project on the creative side of things- but surely the idea has potential for composers, artists, photographers etc to collaborate on similar projects and to perhaps map cities- or memories in more than one way?

I think that there is a huge potential for the use of Google Earth in music projects like this one. Its a great way of opening up would could be argued as a particularly academic strand of music which is rarely heard outside of University Music Departments- and even less so by the general public…

Find out more about Louise here.

/////

Mix-Blog: A bit like a mix-tape but with blogs instead. Read more from the series here.