A hi-fi soundscape and lo-fi
soundscape provide two very distinct and different experiences to the listener.
A hi-fi soundscape “…is one in which discrete sounds can be heard clearly
because of the low ambient noise level” (Schafer 43). For example, if one finds
themselves in the country. The perfect example, and one of my favorite
memories, took place while I was walking in a county park around a quarry. I
had turned my recorder on to record something else, and after realizing I had
turned it on too late to catch the sound, I was about to put it away when out
of the silence came the voice of a little boy in the playground across the
quarry shouting “Hello! Can anybody hear me?” It was absolutely the most beautiful
and haunting thing I’d heard. What made it so beautiful is that it took place
in a hi-fi system. The surrounding quiet allowed the lone sound to dominate the
sound space, floating it’s way through without competition. A lo-fi soundscape
is that of a space over-populated with sounds. Often a city or a crowded room,
any space in which a multitude of sounds are fighting for attention. I do think
to use such sharp phrasing as “All perspective is lost” and “…there is no
distance; there is only presence” (Schafer 43), is perhaps over stating.
Certainly, comparatively, there is far less ability to identify location
(including direction and distance) within a lo-fi system as opposed to a hi-fi
system. However I think, within a lo-fi system, the ear can find varying
sounds, and I believe it is not necessarily a complete loss of perspective, but
more of a disorienting process in which the listener has to work harder to find
that perspective. Schafer does go on to mention that for a sound to absolutely
stand out in a lo-fi space it must continuously amplify above the surrounding
sonic chaos. Continuing in that vein, I have distinct sound memories of a siren
cutting through all the ambient noise of a New York City street, making it’s
way into, through, and out of a soundscape, with a very clear sense of distance
and relative increasing or decreasing volume.
Schafer uses a beautiful sense of
visual language to describe certain sounds of his childhood, those being the
sounds of living on a farm, from butter churning to animal noises to the
stomping of snow boots. To describe a sound is to describe its shape, its
color, texture, size, volume etc. Schafer demonstrates this with his use of such
terms as “…slopping cream…” “…swoosh and bang of the screen door…” “…sudden
crack as a nail sprang from a board…” and “…deep pedal tones…” (Schafer 48). He created
a world for the sound, and the reader, to exist in, therefore leaving room for
rich textures that bring the sounds to life. His careful use of language brings
about a melancholy feeling for the reader, leading one to assume that these
everyday sounds from his youth were an important back-scape of his growing up. In
examining my own childhood I would describe the damp green fuzz of a woods walk
after rain. The soft crinkle of wet gravel in time with the rhythm of my step,
a lone (and perhaps projected lonely) birdcall carefully slicing through heavy air, the disappearing of oscillating road noise and passing cars on slippery concrete the further engulfed in trees I
became; all of these mixed in between a slight shiver to every sound despite the humid
atmosphere.
