On the Way to a Piano Class
Jingchen Gao
I. Concept
The purpose of this project is to record various kinds of sounds and put them together into a short sound clip that can trigger a certain piece of memory whenever I listen to it. As soon as I got to know the requirements of this project, I decided to pick my memory of going to a piano class when I was still a kid. The reason why I chose the way to a piano class instead of having a piano class is that I consider having a class too long and the soundscape would be boring because the only sound that appears would be me playing the piano.
This special memory lasted about 13 years, which is the total duration of me learning the piano. However, I would like to specifically focus on the last period of my learning experience. I had learned this instrument in various locations, from musical instrument stores to my teacher’s home. Nevertheless, the last two years were spent in Shanghai Conservatory of Music since my teacher was a professor of music at Shanghai Conservatory of Music at that time. It was a place where various captivating melodies floated in the air. Students learning different musical instruments would wander around on campus, chatting and laughing, discussing about their new musical assignments. Outside the campus, there were cars buzzing, and I could recall the irregular footsteps of pedestrians. Besides, as that area is an artistic location near the most prosperous part of Shanghai, melodies of both musical instruments and human voices were always constantly wafting through the air. This kind of luscious atmosphere of music really impressed me and served as the spice of my life.
When it comes to the aspect of the memory (actual sounds, feelings, ideas, etc.) I aimed to convey to my audience, I didn’t focus much on the feeling part as was later pointed out by my professor. I didn’t expect it to have that much of an importance to the whole project, so I didn’t spend much time focusing on the expression of my emotions when I was still engaged in this experience. Instead, I spent a lot of effort recording the actual sounds that I heard on my way to the class, such as the sound of traffic, the voices of pedestrians, the piano songs circling around in the air, the sound of a girl singing, the sound of wind weaving through the leaves, and so on. I spent most of my time figuring out an appropriate way to combine multiple pieces of soundtracks together and still make it beautiful. The general idea when I was doing this project was to convey to the audience that this piece of my memory means a lot to me and I really miss the days when my mother and I were walking down the avenue lined with planted phoenix trees on both sides.
This part of my memory is a summary of a crucial part of my life experiences, the days when I had passion of music and held the dream of turning impossibilities to reality. Therefore, I decided to pick this piece of memory as the theme of my Memory Soundscape assignment.
II. Process
In order to mimic the effects that I have mentioned above, I went to the Shanghai Conservatory of Music again with my friend to refresh my memory of this experience as well as to record the real-time sounds that appeared on my way to the Conservatory. 
On our way to the Conservatory, one sound that I didn’t expect was the twitter of the birds. They were clear and beautiful, and the reason I used it in the beginning of my recording was that I think this vivid sound could really bring about the vibe of early spring and the feeling of childhood. Besides that, I also recorded relatively normal sounds such as the sound of traffic, the sound of the breeze, the shaking of the leaves, the communication between passers-by and so on. Meanwhile, as I have noted before, the whole area surrounding the Conservatory was a really artistic place, so even though I was still outside the music school, there were also sounds of piano and violin that came from nearby music schools. I decided to record that sound as well since I wanted to stay true to the real situation.
Above is the first phase of my Memory Soundscape Project. It basically depicts my experience outside the gate of the Conservatory, and is more about the outside surroundings of the school.
The next phase starts with the footsteps of me and my friend walking up the wooden stairs of one building in the Conservatory – the exact building where I used to have piano classes. Part of the reason why I went there with a friend was because her footsteps could imitate that of my mother. I picked the recordings of the footsteps to suggest the audience that I had now entered the Conservatory and a second phase has now started. Also in this stage, I combined various kinds of musical sounds together with the footsteps to convey that as I was walking in the school building, I would encounter a lot of music forms that were beautiful and added to the rich musical atmosphere of the Conservatory. That is the reason why I picked different melodies of piano songs as well as the singing of a girl during my choice of sounds. I also incorporated the sound of violin. In the end, I ended the soundscape with a slam of the door to indicate that my short journey to the Conservatory has now ended and what follows is the beginning of my piano class.
When it comes to the recording techniques, I didn’t think very much before deciding to use the Tascam as the tool I was going to use for this project. Tascam is well-known for its rich capacity in recording high-quality sounds so I used it instead of my phone. However, one problem I encountered during the recording process was that I found the Tascam was too easy to be affected by the wind, and that would cut the quality of the recordings. Actually a lot of my recordings were ruined because of this issue. Maybe the reason behind this was that I forgot to borrow a windshield when I was checking the Tascam of the Equipment Room of our school. My solution to this problem was that I used my phone for some of the recordings, and that partially helped solve the problem. Maybe next time I should really get a windshield before putting my hands on any kinds of recordings.
As for the editing process, I think it was rather successful. In previous assignments and exercises I have already gained enough knowledge that I would like to use in this project, such as the employment of filters, the way to adjust the volume smoothly, the method to incorporate different tracks, etc. Therefore, I just tried my best in putting all the techniques I have learned previously together to create a mature soundscape. One thing and also the most crucial takeaway I learned during the whole process was from the conversation between my professor and I during the mid-critique. After listening to my soundscape, he thought that overall I had done a good job putting the recordings together. However, he suggested that the way I could move a step further was to create multiple different layers of the sounds. In his opinion, I should distinguish the volume and texture of each sound track from each other to avoid the delayering of the whole project. This somehow corresponds with his suggestions for my Sound Visualization project, and it definitely deepened my understanding of the importance of layers.
III. Conclusion
Before the final presentation, I had been pretty satisfied with my project since I thought I had done a good job combining various sounds together and recreate the scene in my memory using the recordings of sounds. However, it was not until the final presentation that I heard the comment from another professor that I should also try to convey a sense of feeling in my project. That is the part that I ignored and I think I would try to refine that by adding sounds that I recorded elsewhere or applying some filters to my original soundscape if I had more time.
In all, I think this project is my favorite one throughout the semester so far, and I gained practical skills of editing sound recordings during the whole learning process!
IV. Image of Audition
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