Audio-visual Interiors

Audio-Visual Interiors is a quadraphonic audio-visual composition performed by the live electronic duo of John R. Ferguson and Andrew R. Brown. Both composers have developed bespoke instruments for this work. Brown explores ring modulation synthesis controlled by multi-dimensional touch gestures; this provides a rich diversity of sonic potential whilst maintaining remnants of physical gesture. Various effects/algorithmic sound diffusion enhances and relocates what is otherwise a simple monophonic sound source. Brown’s instrument is written in Pure data and runs on an iPad. Ferguson’s instrument has Euclidean rhythms and sound-file granulation at the foreground. He has created a bespoke hardware interface that connects to a software environment written in Pure Data, which runs on an iPhone. Data from both performer’s interactions with their instruments is passed to a Touch Designer system, which is used to generate and/or manipulate various live visual materials.

This project contributes to the discourse around what is possible in the realm of live audio-visual performance. The work involves performance with live algorithms where performer agency is augmented by machine agency. The use of mobile devices, as well as free/open-source software, is an important undercurrent. Overall, the human performers remain central, but the audience engages with an audio-visual spectacle that is sonically and visually immersive, and there is a clear technologically-mediated agency, which reconfigures the role of what it is to be a live musician.

Ferguson and Brown perform ‘Audio-Visual Interiors’ live at the 2019 Australasian Computer Music Conference (ACMC), Monash University, Melbourne.

‘Audio-Visual Interiors.’ Live solo performance (by Ferguson) of audiovisual work created with Andrew Brown at Glasgow Electronic and Audiovisual Media (GLEAM) Festival, Glasgow University, October 2019. For this version, both performer’s Pure data systems were amalgamated to run on one iPad and Ferguson’s bespoke system was replaced with a Korg MIDI controller to better manage juggling two audio systems at once (see Purple Pd Machine for the system used in the duo).

‘Audio-Visual Interiors.’ Live solo performance (by Ferguson) of audiovisual work created with Andrew Brown. Electronic Music Concert, University of Derby (UK), November 2019. For this version, both performer’s Pure data systems were amalgamated to run on one iPad and Ferguson’s bespoke system was replaced with a Korg MIDI controller to better manage juggling two audio systems at once (see Purple Pd Machine for the system used in the duo).