soft-loud
Main content: The relationship between loudness and timbre
Pedagogical objectives
- The student is able to merge sounds of differing timbres by manipulating their loudness
- The student is able to precisely calibrate the loudness of a sound
Pedagogical intentions
- Introduce to students, the concepts of texture, blending and maskingHighly used in contemporary instrumental and electroacoustic music, masking consists of hiding a sound, generally something soft and linear, by another larger sound that occupies the entire acoustic space. The sudden removal of this layer in the foreground (rupture) reveals the existence of another musical layer that was previously masked.
- Introduce to students, the techniques of the mixer.
- Improve students’ ability to control a sound’s loudness
- Improve students’ ability to perceive dynamics
Tools
Process
Auditory experiment
- The teacher asks the student to find a way of making a very soft sound, in their immediate environment. For example, this could be lightly scratching a table, a light rustling of paper or a whisper...
- Next, we add each sound, one by one
- The teacher asks the student to close their eyes and concentrate on the active listening of this blend of noises (sounds).
Option: point to one student at a time and have them bring their sound to the forefront of the texture (get slightly louder), and then return to a level where they blend again into the texture.
With the help of the iPad
A very soft texture
- The teacher asks the student to choose a long sound that they find calm and quiet. For example: stream, leaves...
- The student lowers the volume so that they barely hear it when the iPad is close to their ears (no headphones)
- The teacher plays the sounds of the students, to assure the request was well understood.
- The teacher signals each student to start their sound, one by one, encouraging the active listening of all and making sure that each student calibrates their sound such that they blend with the ensemble.
- Assessment: Did all the sounds blend well with the ensemble? If need be, identify which sounds stick out and ask the students to figure out why? (Sound too loud? Sound too different than others?, etc.)
Ruptures and masking
- The teacher asks to add another long sound, this one loud and aggressive. For example: revving, elastic-jam...
- Recreate the soft texture.
- At the conductor’s signal, all the students trigger their loud sound together, then begin a slow decrescendo until the two sounds merge as one.
- Assessment: Was the decrescendo well executed by all? If need be, identify which sounds stick out and ask the students to figure out why that’s the case. (Sound too loud? Sound too different than the others?, etc.)
Proposal for a creative activity
As a group, create a very quiet ambiance or texture that evokes an affect, a climate, a feeling you want to express (mystery, serenity, calm, sadness...).
- Locate the appropriate sounds and transformations.
- Perform the gesture while remaining aware of the result
- Assessment: Is the resulting texture sufficient and autonomous (like a calm Adagio)? or does one feel the need to add a contrasting element, or find ways to have the texture evolve towards a new place, for example, by gradually introducing sounds that are more prominent and aggressive, such as sounds with sudden attacks?
