Simon Atkinson & John Richards / Voices of Leicester

Simon Atkinson & John Richards / Voices of Leicester

Date: Thu, 07 Jan 2010

Venue: Phoenix Cube

Sound & Mixed Media Installation

'Voices of Leicester' is a sound installation that presents the voices of Leicester's children, featuring almost every language spoken in the city. Over a hundred school pupils wrote poems about sound and listening, as well as highly personal descriptions of the city's soundscape. These poems were then recited by the pupils and recorded.

'Voices of Leicester' explores the children's texts through a multi-channel sound environment, investigating the rich rhythms and textures of the many languages spoken in the city. Copies of the original poems form a collage that stretches around the exhibition space, illustrating the wide range of scripts used in the poems and allowing visitors to view the texts in their original state.

'Voices of Leicester' was produced by pupils from Sir Jonathan North Community College, Beaumont Leys School, Crown Hills Community College, St Paul's Catholic School and Leicester Grammar School. The project was assisted by BBC Radio Leicester.

Simon Atkinson's work focuses on recorded sounds and the potential power of sound to act as a mediator between material and imaginative worlds. Atkinson's recent work has been divided between concert hall performance and collaborative community arts projects, as well as a composition based on feedback sounds. He has published articles on the theme of the 'sonic image' and contributed to the ElectroAcoustic Resource Site (EARS).

John Richards' work explores performance with self-made instruments and the creation of interactive environments. He has worked with many leading improvisers and musicians in the field of live electronics, and composed pieces of a collaborative nature. Since 2005 he has directed the Dirty Electronics Ensemble, giving workshops and performances internationally. He has written numerous articles on hybridity, post-digital theory and dirty electronics: DIY and bricolage approaches to working with sound. www.jsrichards.com

Simon Atkinson and John Richards are part of the Music, Technology and Innovation Research Centre at De Montfort University, Leicester.

Tags: Phoenix, Phoenix Archive, Phoenix Cube