Listening with Misophonia (1): Fascinated by Sound
“How we listen creates our life. Listening is the basis of all culture,” writes Pauline Oliveros. The composer has spent her entire life thinking about sound.
The huge, abandoned Fort Worden Cistern in Port Townsend in the US state of Washington, built in 1907, is the place where Pauline Oliveros, trombonist Stuart Dempster and singer Panaiotis decided to improvise together in May 1989. The reservoir’s unique acoustics offer a challenging and fascinating listening experience that is new to the performers.
With a diameter of 55 metres, the room offers a reverberation time of 45 seconds, making it ‘an additional instrument being played simultaneously by all three composers,’ as Pauline Oliveros writes in the liner notes of the album documenting the results of the trio’s collaboration.
Pauline Oliveros, Stuart Dempster, Panaiotis – Deep Listening (1989), detail cover art (RE: Important Records, 2020)
The title Deep Listening refers not only to the fact that the cistern is located four metres below ground. Deep Listening became a term used to describe a new kind of conscious listening according to Oliveros’ standards.
For her, listening means being aware of oneself, not only in the present moment, but also when reflecting on one’s position in the collective whole that encompasses the universe.
What is heard is changed by listening and changes the listener
Oliveros has built her career as a composer, musician and researcher since the early 1950s, when she began to explore the perception of sound.
Over the years, she has developed a variety of techniques and strategies to explore the difference between involuntary hearing and voluntary, selective listening. In her 1999 manifesto, Quantum Listening: From Practice to Theory (To Practice Practice), she writes:
Deep Listening is a life long practice. The more I listen, the more I learn to listen.
Deep Listening is active.
Deep Listening involves going below the surface of what is heard. This is the way to connect with the acoustic environment, all that inhabits it, and all that there is.
Deep Listening is exploring the relationships among any and all sounds whether natural or technological, intended or unintended, real, remembered or imaginary.
What is heard is changed by listening and changes the listener. I call this the listening effect or how we process what we hear.
Listening is directing attention to what is heard, gathering meaning, interpreting and deciding on action.
How we listen creates our life. Listening is the basis of all culture.
Pauline Oliveros, Stuart Dempster, Panaiotis – Suiren (1989, New Albion)
The shortest improvisation recorded by Oliveros, Dempster and Panaiotis in the cistern lasts ten minutes. Suiren is a meditative piece based on voice, whistling and a garden hose as a wind instrument. It moves slowly, making listening a rewarding and captivating experience. There is always something new to discover.
