Archive for the ‘Events’ Category

The Institute takes the floor

The Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate was dedicated this week at a ceremony attended by the President, Vice President, the Kennedy family, and former colleagues of the Senator, with coverage on Meet the Press and the New York Times. The Institute is adjacent to the JFK Library on the University of Massachusetts Boston campus and includes classrooms, exhibit space, and a full size replica of the United States Senate chamber. Working with Rafael Viñoly Architects, we helped the building architectural and mechanical designs achieve acoustic environments conducive to speech intelligibility, learning, productivity, and reflection.  The Institute opens to the public on March 31, 2015—see you there!

Did you hear that meteor?

This past weekend, the Perseid meteor shower reached its peak overnight between Sunday and Monday.  With a little patience and clear skies, the electromagnetic radiation in the visible spectrum that meteors release is easily seen.  But did you know that meteors also release very low frequency radio waves, below 30 kilohertz? According to livescience, going back hundreds if not thousands of years, people have claimed to hear sounds of meteors as they raced across the sky.  The very low frequency radio waves travel at the speed of light (not at the speed of sound) and arrive at the same time observers see a meteor passing overhead.  However, the radio waves need a transducer to could create a sound that is audible to people. This phenomenon is known as electrophonics, and in order to study it further, physicist Colin Keay created sounds in ordinary objects by exposing them to very low frequency radiation in a laboratory. Lightweight, membrane-like objects such as aluminum foil, foliage, thin wires, even dry frizzy hair produced sounds that were easily heard.

2012 Geminid Meteor Over Texas

Never having heard this before, we thought we would head out to Long Island to try and hear it for ourselves. We saw and heard a few things…First, there are quite a few sky-watchers in New York, which unfortunately meant that second, people noise and car stereos are louder than the sound from meteors.  Also, being by the beach, the sound of the ocean waves were also louder than the meteors.  Even if we couldn’t hear them this time, and although there were a few passing clouds, meteor showers still create a wondrous sight.  We will just have to make plans to go somewhere a bit quieter next time.

 

But I know what I hear

This week, New York’s Museum of Modern Art is opening its first major exhibition of sound art, “Soundings: A Contemporary Score”.  Through November 3rd, visitors will be able to immerse themselves in auditory pieces designed by sixteen of the most innovative contemporary artists working with sound.

Forty-Part Motet

Not to be outdone, on September 10th the Metropolitan Museum of Art will present Janet Cardiff’s “Forty-Part Motet”, pictured above.  This first foray into sound by the Met (to be installed in Fuentidueña Chapel at The Cloisters) combines forty separately-recorded voices from forty loudspeakers into a 16th century choral ensemble, a synthesis that the New York Times notes has brought visitors to tears.  The Times also provides audio clips from the MOMA exhibition, noting that “while you can close your eyes to an image you hate, you can’t close your ears to a noise”—a risk without a parallel in the visual arts.

New tunnel between 33rd St and 40th St?

Well sort of….As part of the NYC Summer Streets 2013, artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer will install Voice Tunnel, which includes 360 spotlights controlled by a special intercom located at the center of the tunnel that passses under Park Avenue between 33rd and 40th Streets.  The intercom will record public  participants voices and influence the intensity of the light – louder speech will increase the brightness of the lights.  The intent is to create ‘Morse-code like’ flashes based on the sound pattern and volume of speech.  The individual voices will also be audible on 180 loudspeakers located along the length of the tunnel.  It will be open on Saturdays between 7 am and 1 pm Aug 3rd, 10th and 17th.

The content of the piece will change constantly as participants come and go.  We are curious to hear how the reverberation within the tunnel and potential added acoustical absorption of people in the tunnel will influence the piece. That, and of course it is always neat to go places on foot where you can usually only drive…maybe we will see you there.

MakeMusicNewYork

Today is MakeMusicNewYork, a FREE live music celebration on the longest day of the year! check it out….

mmny-summer-2016

 

INTER-NOISE 2012 in NYC

This coming Sunday through Wednesday (August 19-22, 2012) brings INTER-NOISE 2012 to New York City, the 41st International Congress and Exposition on Noise Control Engineering.  We are excited to be presenting two of our favorite projects during the conference: our Subcat Music Studios project in Syracuse, and our contributions to an ongoing study of wind turbine noise in western New York State.

 

The theme of this year’s conference (the largest ever held!) is Quieting the World’s Cities, an especially relevant topic for a conference held in the heart of Times Square.  A free Community Noise Public Outreach workshop will be held on Wednesday 8/22 from 8:30 am – 1:45 pm at the Marriott Marquis, including presentations and discussion on the NYC Noise Control Code and noise in general as a community concern.  A top-notch panel of experts and officials has been assembled for this free workshop, and anyone with an interest in community noise (which should include almost anyone living in New York City) will find it enlightening!