Janek Schaefer
Local Radio Orchestra
120 years ago the Radio was patented by Edison. The transmitter enabled one voice to broadcast to many remote people, and the limited range defined each local community. In the Local Radio Orchestra this idea is combined with the engagement of the audience, who create a shuffling and shifting orchestra using 12 classic portable radios, as they move them around and adjust the settings within range of the transmitter trunk. Onlookers will be able to tune out and then tune in to the 12 separate parts of the composition to form infinte new arrangements.
This is one my favourite things, an apparently simple idea with immense hidden depths and possibilities. They may be 12 vintage radios but we and Janek together will create a symphony, a cacophony, a mash up, a dance. We tune them in and out and move them around while Janek conducts. It’s completely open and yet structured. We don’t know what we will create until we do it and anyone can take part. Annie Lloyd
120 years ago the Radio was patented by Edison. The transmitter enabled one voice to broadcast to many remote people, and the limited range defined each local community. In the Local Radio Orchestra this idea is combined with the engagement of the audience, who create a shuffling and shifting orchestra using the 12 classic portable radios as they move them around and adjust the settings within range of the transmitter trunk.
Inside the trunk are lots of little short range FM transmitters, and each is tuned to a different frequency between 88-108 FM. Together they saturate the entire radio spectrum within an short radius. This then enables you to tune out and then tune in to the 12 separate parts of the composition to form infinte new arrangements.
A community radio station!
See images of Janek Schaefer’s Local Radio Orchestra on the Compass Image Archive on Flickr
About the Artist
Sound Artist, Musician & Composer Janek Schaefer was born in England to Polish and Canadian parents in 1970. While studying architecture at the Royal College of Art [RCA annual prize], he recorded the fragmented noises of a sound activated dictaphone travelling overnight through the Post Office. That work, titled ‘Recorded Delivery’ [1995] was made for the ‘Self Storage’ exhibition [Time Out critics choice] with one time postman Brian Eno and Artangel. Since then the multiple aspects of sound became his focus, resulting in many site-specific installations, exhibition & dance soundtracks, albums and concerts using his self built record players with manipulated found sound collage. The ‘Tri-phonic Turntable’ [1997] is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the ‘World’s Most Versatile Record Player’. He has performed, lectured and exhibited widely throughout Europe [Sonar, Tate Modern, ICA], USA/Canada, [The Walker, XI, Mutek, Princeton], Japan, and Australia [Sydney Opera House]. In 2008 he won the Paul Hamlyn Award for Composers Prize, and The British Composer of the Year Award in Sonic Art. The Bluecoat Gallery exhibited a Retrospective of his 20 year career in 2009.
The context of each idea is central to its development and resolution. His concerts and installations explore the spatial and architectural aspect that sound can evoke and the twisting of technology. In concert, hybrid analogue and digital techniques are used to manipulate field recordings with live modified vinyl and found sound to create evocative and involving environments.
Flickr Image Archives:
Local Radio Orchestra
Compass Projects
