Workshop: Sonic explorations at Ford Park Cemetery

This workshop is led by musician and sound artist,Shirley Pegna and improviser, flautist and composer, Tina Hitchens, as part of Rame Project's residency artist Bryony Gillard’s project exploring Ford Park Cemetery.

Using improvisation and deep listening, together we will embark on a sonic exploration of Ford Park Cemetery. Paying mindful attention to our auditory environment and taking influence from the great Pauline Oliveros’ method of ‘deep listening’, we will undertake active and experiential listening to the cemetery and the life (and death) that inhabits it. Through a series of guided exercises and meditations we will create sonic maps of our own internal/external sound worlds and play and improvise these together.

This workshop is aimed at anyone with a curiosity or a passion for listening, making and improvising with sound. No previous experience is necessary but you are welcome to bring your own sound making devices or instruments to the workshop.

*Pauline Oliveros described deep listening as: “listening in every possible way to everything possible to hear no matter what you are doing” and “such intense listening includes the sounds of daily life, of nature, of one’s own thoughts as well as musical sounds.”

Tina Hitchens is a improviser, flautist and composer / sound artist who works largely in the fields of free improvisation, sound art, and contemporary classical music, playing and writing in a variety of musical groups as well as working with artists from other disciplines. Tina is also a music therapist. Recent releases include Right Into The River via TBC Editions. Projects include as a recipient of an ‘Interpreting Isolation’ grant from the British Music Collection and Sound & Music: Tina collaborated with artist Sam Francis to produce a new work, High Tide. In 2023, she was a commissioned artist for Promenade, a project in Weston-super-Mare, and created a new audio work – Untold Skies – in collaboration with poet Jen Green.

Shirley Pegna is a sound artist and musician from Bristol, who’s work in concerned with field recordings, improvised sound making and composition. She is interested in sound as a material where elemental signals can signify in the perception of our habitat. Collaborations feature in her work including lately – scientists at Bristol University Geological Department and specialists at the University Of the West of England Fine Art Printing Department, dancer/artists including Brenda Waite, Kyra Norman and Will Pegna. Artists and musicians – Copper Sounds, Veridian, Louie Pegna and Dominic Lash. She is a member of BEEF (Bristol Experimental Expanded Film).

Information:

Meet outside Ford Park Cemetery visitor centre. If you have any access requirements please get in touch at rameprojectscornwall@gmail.com