Work
Mouth Piece
for voice, electronics and film
Films, Audio & Samples
About
Mouth Piece makes use of an electronic headset that transforms ordinary speech into musical tones. The device works by repeatedly recording and playing back vocalisations through a small speaker that is located inside the mouth cavity.
This process-based composition is founded on a paradigm similar to that of Alvin Lucier’s I Am Sitting in a Room (1970): the novelty of Mouth Piece is that it extends on Lucier’s ideas through the use of a dynamically changing resonant space (the buccal cavity), which in turn results in dynamic changes in formant characteristics and perceived pitch.
Performance history
03 Sep 2009: Performed by John Coulter, at Seeing With Ears: Video Works by John Coulter the New Zealand Electroacoustic Music Symposium (NZEMS), at the University of Auckland, in Auckland.
26 Mar 2012: Performed by John Coulter at Out Hear: The Body Electric, New Zealand at Kings Place, Hall Two, Kings Place, in London.