Assignment 8.2 - Impact 25 Presentation and Reflection

Impact 25 - Collaborative Sound Piece (collab. with Jane Lillard) 

Full piece: 

Kate Scott · Impact 25

Google Form for Participants 

Participant Audio Descriptions: 

i was in a bathroom with great acoustics and it was at the end of my work day, so as i was washing all the paint and craft supplies off my hands i sang this song that i love 

I really enjoy this song because of its passionate and has beautiful melody that captures the intensity of deep devoted love. It's something I always go back too if I feel down or feel that I don't love myself enough.

Sounds from my favorite place 

It’s all about life and balance, freedom, simplicity, and joy — my bike! 

This is an audio clip of me typing up an assignment while sitting in quiet space at TC. It’s a simple, everyday type of moment that many of us students share in common. 

I submitted the first few seconds of one of my favorite songs (one by moving panoramas). I was between sending the beginning melody notes or the words but I figured the words held a higher meaning to me. The song is an empowering reminder to view being whole as one instead of pursuing the two person component society is constantly begging us to pursue. Sure, love is beautiful and whole but I like to remind myself, especially in my thirties that one is more than enough and its time to stop fearing being “one.”"

This sound is of a modular shelving unit being turned along its track. I love the sound of the wheel in the track as one range of shelves moves to accommodate another range. It is a sound that says there is room for everything. 

I have crossed the 4th floor of Zankel Hall as an MA student, a doctoral student, a gallery fellow, a doctoral candidate, and, in this recording, as an artist-maker, hustling between the Offit Gallery and my office for the Macy Gallery, so grateful to be, and feel, and hear how I am part of the community, floorboards telling me where I am. 

It is from one of the oldest elevators still working at Teachers College, and one that i use frequently to bring material up and down from the archive in the sub-basement. The sounds are simultaneously man-made ruckus, with the familiar (primal?) sounds of natural caverns. 

This is the bridge of the 1986 single "Live to Tell" by Madonna Louise Ciccone, captured by my phone's mic from my headphones, an object that holds significance for me. The singer asks herself questions which feel significant in their own ways outside of the context of the song, and indeed, the film "at close range", the soundtrack for which it served as a cornerstone.

The sound of the moka pot I’ve used for over ten years carries a feeling of home.

I have submitted a recording of me on break at work. This is a snippet of audio that represents what I hear daily in my life. 

This was a song sung during an emergency rally when a student was detained by ICE. The first time I heard this song was during the encampments in 2024 that supported Palestine & Palestinian life. It’s from Ruth 1:16-17 and continues with “Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried.” It’s a song that reminds me that we keep each other safe, not the institution. 

This is an audio file describing a framed playbill from the musical Hedwig & The Angry Inch. A dear friend surprised me with tickets to see the original cast perform. It was an unforgettable experience.

I’m falling asleep at a social event. 

Water is life.

Drinking drinks 

The joy of love and tenderness

This is one line from the Skye Boat Song, a favorite ballad. I would have recorded an entire verse, but the size limits of the video meant one rapidly sung line. "Onward, the sailors cry!" was the line I chose.

New Orleans by way of Nashville on a Saturday night

It's a message of love. 

I had another idea in mind, then serendipity intervened and this was recorded accidentally in my pocket on metro north on my way to school… 

I have been traveling down the east coast all week alone, and its interesting to be in new cities while finding new music. it was special to find this song at this time, which is why I have it here.

This is me playing a bass that my good friend Ben gave my to use in his band!!

audio of a clown game i dearly love

Reflection: I had so much fun working with Jane! I think that we both aimed to approach this project with curiosity and playfulness from day one, and that made this collaboration work. I do wish that there was more engagement from the posters/QR codes, if only because it would have made the project easier. But I think, if anything, the fact that the direct ask was the most successful mode of engagement proves that, by and large, people want to be connected with in a human way. For instance, I had a couple of great conversations about sound art (specifically Musique Concrete) with my library colleague, Conrad, who was *super* into the project. We typically don't interact a lot, simply because of our roles, but this project served as a conduit between us, and tapped into a bunch of mutual interests.

A side-effect, if you will, of the project was the surprise of dividing the groups between TC Participants and non-TC Participants, and experiencing the aesthetic choices the two groups made. I think the meat of participatory art is how the audience's choices impact the outcome of the final piece. Jane and I worked with the submissions to synthesize them into a whole sound piece, but they only required a touch of nudging, if only to avoid a cacophony. We ultimately wanted to let the sounds speak (strategically, harmoniously) for themselves, and for our participants.