The sound recording of Homecoming is a great example of how the sound can be a form of narration too. Spending several years on the music studies, I have a learned a lot about how to listen to the story-lines of classical music pieces, learning how to “read in between the lines” and recognize how a combination of rythm, the height and choice of notes, their length and the manner in which they are played tell the overall story with focus on the mood. To me, the Homecoming is just an extention to it. It uses the speech to give a more clear idea about what is taking place, leaving for the listener less to guess, while using the sounds (not including the speech) as a form of background, that helps to set the place and time. The story Homecoming is based on a story, that happened in the past, towards with all of the other story “windows” refer to. This past narration’s backgroud is clear, all of the sounds one can hear are with clear purpose to further describe the sitting, and compared to the other story windows, it’s without any disturbing rustle. Compared to other typical audio stories, Homecoming is not “played” in front of the microphone, it’s speech is not evenly spaced and from the recording, it is obvious the actors are situated in a space with a varying distance from the recorer, giving the listener more indications on how to imagine the whole scene, as if drawing a 3D map.
I believe sound is not at all inferior to other forms of narration, such as written ones or visual forms. It brings to play the sense of hearing we are not so prone to relay on in everyday life, as we are prone to relay on the sense of sight.