String Solo (2018)
Mono source spatially orchestrated for eight channels | 5′39″
Source recording made c. 2005 at iSAW
Dedicated to Vito Acconci
String Solo (2018) | 5′39″ | Binaural documentation of the eight-channel spatial orchestration created for Audiotheque 2.0. Best heard through headphones.
THE WORK
The source recording for String Solo was made around 2005 at iSAW. A thin piano wire, approximately four to five feet long, was held by C-clamps against a flexible wooden plank and activated magnetically.
Bending the plank altered the behavior of the wire and provided most of the performing possibilities explored during the recording. The action continued without interruption, like drawing without lifting the pencil, and ended when the string stopped vibrating. The complete recording lasts 20′47″.
A phono cartridge captured the vibration directly. Unlike a conventional microphone, which also records the interaction between a sound and its surrounding environment, the cartridge received the activity of the wire without an audible acoustic space around it.
The resulting perspective feels unusually close—as though listening from within the vibrating string rather than from a position nearby. The amplification functions like a form of magnification, revealing internal activity that might otherwise remain inaccessible.
In 2018, I selected a 5′39″ passage from the longer continuous action and declared that shorter form as String Solo. It became the third work in Four Audible Experiences of Movement of Sound in Space, the opening installation exhibition at Audiotheque 2.0.
EIGHT-CHANNEL ORCHESTRATION
Audiotheque 2.0 was assembled from speakers of different kinds rather than as one uniform, matched system. Its 30-channel environment offered several configurations that could be used independently or in combination according to the needs of each work.
For String Solo, I selected a configuration of eight K&H speakers positioned around the audience at ear level. The source recording was mono. During the spatial orchestration, the string changes location and travels among the speakers. At times it remains close to the walls. At others it enters the listening area, making the listener feel enveloped by the vibration.
The movement does not illustrate an external image of a string. It gives changing architectural scale and position to a sound captured without its own acoustic environment. What began as a direct vibration inside a wire acquires space through the loudspeaker system and the room.
FOR VITO ACCONCI
Each of the four works in Four Audible Experiences of Movement of Sound in Space was dedicated to an artist friend whose work and presence had been important to me.
I dedicated String Solo to Vito Acconci, who had died the previous year. Its inward perspective and subsequent movement into the listener’s physical space felt appropriate for remembering an artist whose work moved through poetry, voice, body, performance and architecture.
EXTENDED VERSION AND FILM
On September 22, 2018, Audiotheque 2.0 presented a program devoted to String Solo. The complete 20′47″ recording was heard as a stand-alone work.
My brother, filmmaker Ricardo Matamoros, also created a black-and-white film for the 5′39″ version. His visual interpretation of the sound centered on a grinder sending sparks into darkness. The film was presented during the program in conjunction with a meeting of the Miami chapter of the Sociedad Venezolana de Cinematógrafos, which Ricardo directed at the time.
The featured image is a still from Ricardo’s film.
PRESENTATION HISTORY
September 22, 2018
String Solo: Extended Version
Complete 20′47″ continuous-action recording by Gustavo Matamoros
Black-and-white film for the 5′39″ version by Ricardo Matamoros
Audiotheque 2.0, ArtCenter/South Florida
Miami Beach, Florida
Presented in association with the Miami chapter of the Sociedad Venezolana de Cinematógrafos
September 13–December 15, 2018
Four Audible Experiences of Movement of Sound in Space
Eight-channel installation orchestration | 5′39″
Audiotheque 2.0, ArtCenter/South Florida
Miami Beach, Florida
c. 2005
Original 20′47″ continuous-action recording
iSAW, Miami, Florida