Radio Papesse

A friend and I went to record birds at Point Pelee in Ontario. One morning, amidst our 5 am grogginess, all the birds exploded to life simultaneously, like someone was conducting them. Like they were all conducting each other. It was beautiful, symphonic. 

Naturally, we tried to record it the next morning, and even more naturally than our urge to try to record it the next day, it didn't happen. So that was hilarious. We come with all this equipment, and the most amazing sonic experience, we missed. It felt like a prank - like the birds were doing a very good prank. 

I decided to try to capture that moment post-mortem. I began the painstaking and enjoyably obsessive task of resurrection. And it was very difficult. I used recordings from Point Pelee as a blanket or a bandaid to help nurture the memory from its palliative state, because it's was degrading and morphing from its original state. Those Point Pelee recordings were like touchstones, and the closest thing that I had to documentation of that experience, but the vast majority of the sounds used in the piece were sound effects from a library.

I've been cutting a lot of background sound effects lately for visual media. In this field, you're manufacturing what's natural. I've said to myself often, 'oh this isn't natural.' Yet when all the birds came together in such a rare musical way, I thought about how although this movement is part of nature, it’s considered unnatural, or feels unnatural, if it’s not in service the story being told by the visual images, or of the dialogue. Background sound always must be isolated, controlled so that nothing competes with the story. What I create through sound design is a false representation of nature, but a constant reminder that it exists. [Ayaz Kamani]


Ayaz Kamani is an artist and sound designer, primarily for film, based in Toronto.

Point Pelee by Ayaz Kamani is presented by Constellations Audio in the context of Lucia La Radio al Cinema, an international festival devoted to the craft of audio storytelling in radio and podcasting, organized by Radio Papesse in Florence, December 12-14, 2019. 

Constellations Audio is a sound art and experimental narrative collective that highlights international artists making sound works that convey meaning through evocation and abstraction. They curate and produce a podcast, live events, and publish sound materials. Constellation’s pieces unravel distinctions between documentary, sound art, soundscape, fiction, and music. They demand a deep listening experience, encouraging listeners to expand their conception of narrative, musicality, and attention.