I did a few small "listening to a rock" experiments today - taking my contact mics and recorder to Cornwall Park and Tāmaki Drive to see if anything could be picked up through the scoria walls and seawall respectively. Unfortunately I realised halfway through that me occasionally touching or moving the microphone cords did register in the recording, but by the end of the day I learned how to keep very still when doing it to avoid any weird clunks :)
At Cornwall Park, I set up on the stand-alone scoria wall - there wasn't very much vibration occurring around the structure to create sound, but in hindsight there's something nice in that. I don't want to go into these recording experiments wanting a particular outcome, but rather to observe what is there... What was recorded is slight ambiance from the rumble of cars or other things in the distance and some of the wind over the microphones themselves. To me, there's an earthiness in the recording that reflects the material that still comes through (to me at least).
I also placed the microphones on the wire fence next to the wall, which was really cool to listen to - the wind created a very soft resonant hum, like a giant string instrument. Although not what I was intending on capturing, I think it is beautiful...
At Tāmaki Drive, I recorded directly on the rough Mt Wellington rocks at the base of the seawall. The tide was coming in and the sound of the ocean along with some of the rumblings of activity nearby can be heard. It sounds like one is listening from inside the rock itself, which I really like (and which was sort of the point of the experiment I suppose - to hear what the rock feels in its space and time...).
It is my aim in the next few days to head out to Maungawhau to do similar recordings, then to visit what remains of the various mountain quarry sites that correlate with the structures that their materials have built. I'd like to hear them in conversation; what they each hears/feels sensorially, as individual and as iterations of a mountain.
I will continue adding to the playlist as I upload recordings :)
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