Commission from the programme, PRemEdice, national Czech Radio – the 5th radio series piece; stereo radiophonic and 8-channel and binaural versions – 17’08”.
Programme note: The Radio Series, like many of my works, focuses on recycling sounds. They all use diverse radio broadcast recordings from a single nation covering a short span of time as source material. In this case recordings were used from both national and regional Czech broadcasters spanning a very wide range of programmes. Sounds are exclusively presented in their original state. My role is simply to chose and re-compose material from the dozens of hours of broadcasts. One can focus on the content at any given moment or move on to listen to the sonic development choreographed in space, what I call ‘sound theatre’. The piece seeks to take the known, tilt it ever so slightly, and re-present it as a sound-based artwork. This work is the first and only work in the series that is legal as Czech Radio has the rights to all of its broadcasts. The idea was to combine universal aspects of our daily life found in radio and highly specific Czech ones. One of the Czech influences is that this work possesses a hint of Švankmajer-inspired surrealism as well as a mix of collage, rhythm, counterpoint and humour.
This piece has also appeared on the DVDs: R{A}DIO{CUSTICA} Selected 2003-2017 – Czech Radio recordings (2017) and A Bouquet of Sounds 2 (MTI2 2018). I would like to acknowledge Michal Rataj for the invitation to create this work, Ian Mikyska for his grammatical, cultural and musical tips and Tim Hall for making the translation movie.