Hildegard Westerkamp
is a composer whose work since the mid-seventies has centred around enviromental sound and acoustic ecology. Based in Vancouver, Canada, she travels widely, giving concerts and lectures, and conducting soundscape workshops throughout the world. She is a founding member and is currently active on the board of the World Forum for Acoustic Ecology (WFAE). She is a co-editor of Soundscape-The Journal of Acoustic Ecology, a publication of the WFAE (see: www.wfae.net). Her own website offers more detailed information about her various activities.
"His Master’s Voice (1985)"
For two-channel tape
His Master’s Voice is a collage of the "macho voice" as it appeared to me in all walks of life in the 1980s: on the street, in the media (AM/FM radio), in the political and religious realms, in the contexts of popular culture and of high culture. For His Master’s Voice I have disconnected the macho voices from their settings and have re-contextualized them with each other. The message of the piece is as blatant as the voices themselves which penetrate our lives. The difference is that in daily life we often are numbed to them and we internalize their message with little resistance. His Master’s Voice makes them audible in all their blatancy. Perhaps it also makes us look more rigorously at what it covers up.
How would a 2007 version of His Master’s Voice sound, I wonder? How do women composers of 39 years of age (my age in 1985) hear the macho voices of 2007 and how would they present them in a piece of the same title?
Length: 4:55