It’s not easy to write aboutsound, so maybe it’s better to start with the objects that emit them. As part of a NSF program which invites artists and writers to exploreAntarctica Cheryl spent 6 weeks in the extreme environment seeking unique soundsand materials that could make sounds. Her trip was the basis for a suite of compositions which she further elaborated on with a trip to the Arctic. The centerpiece of the performance is the Limpent Spine Instrument made from very, very long living Antarctic limpent shells which are assembled in an arrangement that is tonally scaled. Call it music on the half shell — bowed on the edges, the shells hum, or conversely brushed on the side they make a light scraping sounds.
Salt trickling from a bottle set upside down cascades on a pair of granite stones, creating a background white rustling sound, changing pitch as the salt grains tumble onto each stone. The spine of an Adelie Penguin (removed from Antartica with permission) makes a wispy note evocative of wind when a string is pulled through it. An Adelie Vertebrae Mobile provides more acoustical texture. Even Pacific sea kelp is dried and turned into a wind instrument.
As part of Front Range Community College’s sound sculpture exhibition Sound Through Barriers Cheryl played her compositions, which are a mix ofrecordings and live instrumentation. The recordings were an eclectic array of soundscapes from a group of sleeping, snoring southern elephant seals (take a listen) to the reverberations caused by striking steel railings in an abandoned Russian city. The recordings set a base rhythm for the hand-made natural instruments to play off of. Cheryl’s compositions are methodical and deliberately paced, sometimes musical and at other times evocative of natural sounds emanating from distant, open places.
+ Cheryl Leonard
+ Sound Through Barriers
