Soundnet is a new live performance musical instrument of monumental proportions
created by Sensorband (Zbigniew Karkowski, Edwin van der Heide, Atau Tanaka). It is
a giant web 11meters x 11 meters, created with 16mm thick shipping
rope. At the end of the ropes are eleven sensors that detect stretching
and movement. We perform the instrument by climbing on it, all
three of us at once.
Soundnet is inspired by The Web, a 1 meter diameter spider's
web created by the composer Michel Waisvisz, at STEIM, Amterdam. Our goal was to make a life sized version of this
idea. The sensors were designed for us by Bert Bongers, electronic musical instrument builder, and fabricated by Theo
Borsboom, a Harley-Davidson mechanic. Each sensor is a cylinder
and piston that can sustain 500kg of force. Inside is a large
spring, somelike in the shock absorber of a motorcycle. Inside
the spring is a fader from a Soundcraft mixing board. As we climb
the ropes, the sensors stretch and move in response to our movements.
This displaces the fader inside, which sends a control signal
to our interface box, the I-Cube System, created in Canada. The interface box outputs a MIDI signal to
a Macintosh which is running special performance software created
with the Max music programming environment.
We are creating music with interactive technology, but the technology
part is tiny compared to the physical part. The rope, the metal,
and the humans climbing it take on an incredible physicality,
and focus more on the organic nature and the human element of
interaction rather than on mouseclicks and screen redraws. This
puts the emphasis in man-machine interaction back towards the
human side. As a result, the sounds the Soundnet makes as an instrument
are organic as well. We work with digital recordings of natural
sounds. The signals from the Soundnet control DSP (digital signal
processes) - filters, convolution, waveshaping to sculpt the sound.
Again, natural elements are put in direct confrontation with technology.
The physical nature of our movement meeting the virtual nature
of the signal processing creates a dynamic situation where we
deal directly with sound as our material. Through gesture and
pure exertion, we sculpt the sound to create sonorities emanating
from the huge net.
photos Christian