Bloc Gallery, Sheffield, UK.
April 25-30.
Sensoria Festival of Film and Music.
by David Butler (Centre for Screen Studies) and Camilo Salazar (artist in Residence 08-09 at the NOVARS Research Centre, University of Manchester, UK)
To An Independent Listener takes the audience on a journey through the diverse works contained in the Delia Derbyshire Archive. In all, there are 267 tapes – master tapes of complete works, makeup reels of component parts and raw sound elements, and off-air recordings made by Delia of music ranging from Bach and Mozart to Stockhausen, Penderecki and Ray Davies.
The archive contains music, atmospheres and treated speech for radio, theatre, television and film productions as well as special events such as the Brighton Festival and an ICI-sponsored fashion show.
The mix of tracks start out with Delia’s voice then goes into a sequence that includes Brian Hodgson introducing a Kaleidophon advertising demo tape, Delia’s music for Lowell – a short 1970 film directed by Caroline McCullough about the American poet and conscientious objector Robert Lowell, atmospheres for Tony Richardson’s Roundhouse production of Hamlet (featuring Nicol Williamson’s treated voice as Hamlet’s father’s ghost), speech and sound for Medea, soundscapes for Amor Dei (one of the ‘inventions for radio’ Delia collaborated on with Barry Bermange), the extended rhythm track for Dance from Noah (released on the LP EMS LP1 in 1971), music for the Brighton Festival and a closing sequence from Amor Dei.
The majority of the material featured has not been presented to a public audience outside of the University of Manchester.
This installation was compiled by David Butler and Camilo Salazar, using materials from the Archive.
A NOVARS Research Centre and Centre for Screen Studies Project
link to sensoria.org.uk here
