“I have loved my tutors and the technicians and how inspiring they are. I have learnt so much and now I know the ins and outs of both the history of sound; I’ve enjoyed learning to record the sound of electricity and having a deep knowledge of artists and what they do. I’m dyslexic and had very low confidence in myself all my life. I feel the course has really freed me up and I feel I can hold my own now in a conversation in sound and electronic music.”
Tell us a bit about your work
“Here is my artist bio: Experimental pop musician and producer and performer CURRENTMOODGIRL makes sounds that dance between the dark and the light, resembling her the industrial landscape of Manchester, her Northern hometown. Utilising electrical pick-ups and dark, glitching synths, she creates textured soundscapes melting together with her siren-like but raw vocals, her rhythmic beats and anchoring basslines eminently danceable.
“CONTACT is about connections and the means of control between ourselves, our bodies, our minds, and one another. Manifested through sound, movement, and visuals, it is a multidimensional live performance intended to be experienced in the flesh. The work involves a self-made touch sensitive dance pole as an instrument which captures the sensory movement of the body. CONTACT is a sonic experience of electronic music and sound performance presented through a 5.1 soundsystem, transforming our visual sensibilities and challenges our societal idolisation of fragility and the female form. The performance grew out of the heavenly and broken unravelling of the self, trusting one’s own body, sexuality and celebrating being alive through the bad, the good and everything in between.”
CONTACT was performed at the Graduate Show.
What made you choose your course?
“I have been a musician for many years, and I was feeling dissatisfied with how limiting it was and I felt unfulfilled. I found the course when looking for alternative music and sound production courses. As an artist whose work spans numerous mediums, I needed something wild and unconventional that questions everything and uses abstract techniques to create sound. When I discovered DMSA, I immediately felt like I belonged there.”
Can you tell us about your favourite part of your studies and how it helped the development of you and your practice?
“I have loved my tutors and the technicians the most on the course and how inspired thay have left me. I have learnt so much and now I know the ins and outs of both the history of sound, all the facts and scientific stuff about sound too. For example Iv enjoyed learning to record the sound of electricity and having a deep knowledge of artists and what they doo.
“I’m dyslexic and had very low confidence in myself all my life. I feel the course has really freed me up and I feel I can hold my own now in a conversation in sound and electronic music.”
Can you tell us about any staff who particularly inspired you?
“All of them in different ways, its great to have a woman as the course leader Johanna Bramli has really looked after me, I feel she has been there for me alot.
“Stephen Mallinder is is a uplifting person to be around, he’s helped me lots to have more confidence in my writing and studying I’ve always struggled with reading and studying as Ijust have never felt good enough but Mal has always picked things for me that suit me as female artist and I’ve really enjoyed that part of my course witch was unexpected.
“Caleb has been really inspiring, his classes are the most fun for me. I took a lot from him in my exploring new sounds, he understands the way I make music, and helped me dive more into the weird side of sound.
“And our technician Paul, he’s taught me lots of production and mixing techniques and taught me how to play the modular synth and use other equipment.
“I’m planning to move to London and work more on my music. I would like to do a residency to further my practice, I’m also going to be doing some sound workshops. I’m thinking of doing a masters but I need a little break first to reset from all this madness.”
Finally if you could give your 17 year old self any advice about going to university what would it be?
“I’m a older student so I came to uni at 31 years old. I’m glad I waited, I think that was the best thing I would do I also have been against uni for as long as I new so this was a big surprise i never thought I would do, i would say to myself that just cos I had a horrible time in education before this. But uni is different and I shouldn’t let my dyslexia and mental health stop me from thinking I’m any less than anyone else.”
“As an interdisciplinary artist, this course has been the perfect way of building my skill set in various mediums. I have been able to dive deeper into the world of animation in my free time while developing my musical and artistic abilities.”
Please tell us a bit about your work
“The Arcade Project (2024) is an A/V, animated found footage horror installation consisting of a 5.1 sound setup in 3 arcade cabinets. An overwhelming concoction of visual and self-plundered sonic noise builds as we are left to feel helpless, dominated, yet awestruck. We watch as the once-perfect games become corrupted and mangled. The Arcade Project is a look into fantasy culture, tech gore, narrative and nostalgia in a short span of 10 minutes.
“I took inspiration from a variety of source; the analog horrors of Martin Walls; the anti-piracy horrors of ZeroVR; the noisy rebellion of Dreamcrusher, the Plunderphonic attitudes of John Oswald; the orchestration of Peter Gregson’s Patina (2021). These and so many more have led me to create something truly special.”
What made you choose your course?
“I considered so many other courses. I have such a wide range of interests – from visual arts to R.E. Once I dove deeper into the world of sound art, I was hooked. I recall getting odd looks in secondary school for sampling water bottles and rubber bands for bass tones. I’ve always loved sampling. My current methods of textural and Plunderphonic exploration are the direct result of my prior risk-taking.
“As an interdisciplinary artist, this course has been the perfect way of building my skill set in various mediums. I have been able to dive deeper into the world of animation in my free time while developing my musical and artistic abilities.”
Can you tell us about your favourite part of your studies and how it helped the development of you and your practise
“I enjoyed exploring alternative sound systems. The SDL and 5.1 surround systems were truly fun to experiment with as I combined spatialisation with my interest in orchestration. The Arcade Project was birthed from these concepts – moving away from the stereo field inherently creates freedom in composition and audience perception.
“I also enjoyed learning about noise culture, graphical scores and film scoring, each providing fresh, alternative ideas.”
Can you tell us about any staff who particularly inspired you?
“All of them!”
Can you tell us your plans after graduation?
“I will work both commercially and artistically. I have a very entrepreneurial mindset. I want to have that solid financial foundation while I build up my artistic expression. Many artists sit on this spectrum of art and income – I want to strike my own balance.
“I want to continue to develop The Arcade Project while working on my other installation, Swimming Pools (2021), featuring Daithi “Electronic Child” Donnelly. This memorial project almost feels full circle, it being the first project I worked on during my time at DMSA.
“I will also be working on publishing my final essay surround fantasy culture and modern day found footage horror.”
Finally, if you could give 17-year-old advice, what would it be
“Find purpose in what you do.”
Miles M Reid was the DMSA nomination for the Nagoya Prize 2024
To mark the course’s longstading partnership with Chris Evans-Robert’s (DMSA Alumni, 2007) ITHACA Studio, Chris and DMSA have created a new award, launched on this year’s graduate show. Known for its cutting edge audio and light installations, ITHACA Studio and the ITHACA Prize want to celebrate innovative creative work by our students.
This year’s winners were Jedd Winterburn’s breath-taking Zenith and Olivia Louvel’s (Runner Up Prize) intense and through-provoking The Whole Inside.
You can watch excerpts from both pieces in the videos below.
1-9 June | DMSA Facilities| Grand Parade, University of Brighton The private view is on the 31st of May and starts at 4pm. Last Entry – 9.30pm Weekday opening times are from 10am until 5pm, and weekends from 12pm until 5pm. FB Event
We are honoured to be presenting to you the works by our third year students consisting of an eclectic mix of sound and musical compositions, live AV performances, experimental films, sound murals, generative art and installation pieces. Spanning across this wide range of practices and processes, all the works are supported by an underlying thread of challenging our perceptions and engaging us in a more attentive process of listening, feeling and experiencing.
This year we are happy to nominate four of our student pieces for the Nagoya Award and the newly launched Ithaca Awards. An * will be added next to the nominated pieces.
Good luck to all our students and congrats on their hard work!
Detailed schedule to follow.
AD Design: Jedd Winterburn
::Works on Display::
Thom Aurelius – MAX (Animation) | SS1
MAX is a short, animated film that depicts a story of a young boy, Max, who is experiencing the struggles of fitting in socially at high school. The project itself is a collaboration between two creative artists, Thomas Aurelius (producer, composer and sound designer) and Peter Golijanin (animator).
The animation’s main intention is to use the power of punk-inspired musical motifs and naturalistic sound-design to represent the feelings of Max as a character and the world that he is living in. This results in the audience relating themselves to the character of Max and his onscreen experiences.
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Sonny Bacon Sonny Bacon – Lost In Process ( Experimental Film) | SS1
Lost in Process is an audiovisual experiment intended for large screen projection. The film explores sound’s ability to evoke, shift and steer atmospheres in combination with visual material. The audio of the piece was created using a variety of elements, featuring self-captured field recordings, foley and manipulated instrumental compositions.
The visual material was created through the recording and arrangement of still and moving image content captured using an array of visual technologies; DV Tape, 35mm and 16mm film. Themes of destruction, time and surveillance are presented as the experimental film unfolds.
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Danny Baron – A Call To Perish (Immersive Radio Play) | SDL
A Call to Perish is an immersive radio play, which explores a fictional settlement that takes a turn for the worst. The play travels through different areas of the settlement, highlighting its diverse and unique soundscape, executed through diffused sound. The main concept behind this project is to use sound to create an observable story for the listener without any visuals or, in other words, the internal cinema. This project is to be exhibited in a 5.1 surround sound setup, optimising the realism and making it as engaging as possible for the listener.
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Amanda Brooks – Sinkhole (Sound Installation) | Performance Studio
Sinkhole is a multi-channel sound art installation exploring themes of descent and life’s daunting threat of ‘going under’.
Using processed field recordings taken in various railway transport systems, the piece extensively uses audio relocation and movement, with sound panning between multiple speakers in an immersive cylindrical formation. The audio of the piece is manifested as a heavy volume of ‘water’ dropping onto the listener, creating a feeling of standing in an insurmountable sink under a giant tap. The sound then takes on different directions, engulfing the listener horizontally, vertically and diagonally.
The digital audio workstation Logic Pro X audio was used, alongside a fundamental production system with IRCAM plugin software. T.R.A.X Voice Transformer v.3 was utilised for sound processing with S.P.A.T Revolution controlling the vertical, horizontal and diagonal movement of the audio.
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Duncan Cabral – Digital Forest (Surround Sound Composition) | SDL
Digital Forest is a surround sound composition that utilises environmental sounds to create a sonic space. Examining concepts of audio exploration and immersion, Digital Forest looks at sound’s potential to transport a listener to another place. Sound design, soundscape building, and surround sound mixing are all used within this work. The digital audio workstation Logic Pro X was used extensively, with plugins such as Serum, ES2, ESE being utilised alongside hardware synthesisers such as the Korg Monologue, Microbrute and Yamaha CS.
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James Carroll – London Atmospheres (Experimental Film) | SDL
London Atmospheres aims to utilise soundscapes and visuals in order to capture the urban atmosphere found in various locations of London. Exploring the relationship between sound and image in film, London Atmospheres focuses on how atmosphere and tension is created. The footage of this piece was shot in central London at night in order to relay the intended atmosphere, with field recordings of the various London locations also being taken.
The soundtrack London Atmospheres uses musicality alongside environmental sounds in order to create an immersive piece, with a sense of underlying suspense in order to capture the listeners attention. A variety of software was used in the recording and editing processes, such as Adobe Premiere Pro CC, FL studio 12 and Logic Pro X.
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Jack Cleary – FLUCTUS (AV Performance) | Performance Studio
Fluctus, which is Latin for waves, explores the concept of brightness in sound and visuals.
The work synthesisers the ideas of musical “Brightness, Flux and Logos” presented by philosopher Heraclitus, which attempt to describe how the universe works.
Brightness is a sonic quality determined by the number of harmonics, the more harmonics the brighter the sound. Flux is fluidity whilst Logos is structure, generating the tension necessary for the string to vibrate to create sound.
Inspired by classical Indian and ambient music, the performance is produced using Ableton and a collection of electronic instruments. The visuals, created in Touch Designer, are vibrating lines organised into a spherical shape while the timbre of sound informs the colour of the visuals through interaction with an OSC controller.
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Nile Ezra – Nightshift (Musical Composition) | SS1
Nightshift is a series of three atmospheric instrumental tracks, which explore themes of darkness, inspired by science fiction and horror films such as Interstellar and The Shining. Using the digital audio workstation Ableton, various sound design techniques such as sampling, granular synthesis and Foley have been implemented to create varying aspects of sounds reminiscent of nightfall.
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Daniel Fadil – Erosion (Short Film) | SS1
Erosion explores the physical forces at the coast as a metaphor for Britain’s erosive nature towards languages from other shores, with the sounds of the physical washing out eternally those of a minority culture. In this case, the examined language is Romany, or rather, the remnants of it familiar to the artist. Even in its distanced existence from British influence, it has still been diminished to the point of no longer being a language. A narrative based on isolation and foreignness is used to play out the history of this phenomenon.
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Tarek El Goraicy – Singularity (AV Performance) | Performance Studio
Singularity is an audio-visual live performance of two songs from of my upcoming release Human Condition.
The presentation, containing elements of improvisation, consists of one laptop running an Ableton Live set, which is navigated through the use of a MIDI controller. Live synthesizers and live vocals are utilised, with a second machine also generating realtime visual projections through the use Touchdesigner and a MIDI-interface.
The performance aims to present a coherent interactive relationship between sound and visuals in the context of an immersive live performance, countering the traditional DJ/laptop-performance of electronic music.
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Brianna Leeds – The Safe Space (AV Installation) | SDL
The Safe Space uses a quadraphonic audio set up to combine meditative tones and abstract art, forming an encompassing environment of mindfulness and peace. This project integrates research from the field of colour therapy, music therapy and spiritual influences. In the safe space the audience can gradually disengage from personal symptoms of anxiety or stress by experiencing the serene audiovisual display in their own time.
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Olivia Louvel – The Whole Inside (Generative AV Installation) | SDL * ITHACA AWARD NOMINEE
Guidance: this work contains sensitive content.
The Whole Inside is a generative sound mural combining artificial and human voices, expanding the plastic dimension of voice on contouring the body.
The work confronts femininity and abuse, when the body is being depersonalised, subsequently dissociated as a defence mechanism to cope with a traumatic event.
The harrowing polyphonic vocal composition is based on a text sourced from the Incels (involuntary celibates) forum. On debating how to murder a woman, some members of the Incels community propose diverse actions, one being to rape her then to “take a surgical knife, cut open her abdominal area and remove the organs”.
Since October 2018, the site incels.me has been suspended due to the content that violated the domain’s anti-abuse policy. Applying principle of conditional logic, the randomised audio is carrying on indefinitely, revealing itself to the experiencer over time.
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Jamie Moore – The Lily Pond (AV Installation) | Performance Studio *NAGOYA AWARD NOMINEE
Consisting of three large projector screens and 6.1 channel surround sound, The Lily Pond is inspired by Monet’s Water Lilies series (1914 – 1926), in a modernisation of their concepts. The work runs for a total length of 1 hour 40 minutes, creating a slow moving and enveloping spectacle on a grand scale, which cannot be interpreted in the same way from any viewpoint or temporal instance.
It uses field recordings and video taken at Monet’s garden in Giverny, as well as images taken of his paintings at Musée de l’Orangerie in Paris, re-imagining the works and expanding them into a multi-sensory environment, within a contemporary context.
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Joseph Purefoy – Sampling the World (Musical Composition) | SS1 – 229
Sampling the world is a five track EP exploring the art of sampling in an attempt to demonstrate the vast possibilities found in manipulating and repurposing a sound. The work was produced with the digital audio workstation Logic Pro and focuses on expanding audio from its original context, shifting sound to a new sonic dimension.
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Dominic Rae – Fits the Frame | SS1 – 229
Fits in The Frame is an experimental folk-inspired concept EP. Informed by themes of narrative, Americana, analogue photography and folk music, it aims to explore the gap between the continuous, uninterrupted flow of time and people’s tendency towards quantizing the idea of time into discrete, separate moments and sections.
A key facet of the EP is the consideration of ‘Morii’, the desire to capture a fleeting moment, which brings together the ideas of music, photography and storytelling by each component’s intrinsic nature: music as continuum, photography as instantiative capture, and storytelling as a bridge between the two.
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Luke Vosper – My Bedroom (AV Performance) | Performance Studio
Stemming from a desire for a more natural and immersive way of composing and performing electronic music, My Bedroom is a studio and live setup that focusses on DIY and self-built hardware and instruments. Drawing inspiration from a space used for composition, performance, and instrument construction, My Bedroom explores an improvisation-based approach to electronic music.
As well as analogue and acoustic instruments, My Bedroom takes full advantage of digital tools. Using custom software and patches alongside complex synthesis techniques and an extensive sample library, this allows the music of the piece to be created in an improvisation-driven, performative way.
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Matt Were – Piano I Ching (Prepared Piano / Interactive AV Installation) | 229 *ITHACA AWARD NOMINEE
Piano I Ching is an interactive audiovisual piece. The audio from the installation starts when a webcam picks up movement within close proximity to the piano. This results in solenoids and motors being triggered, brushing, scraping and hitting the piano, giving a familiar object a completely new vocabulary of sounds.
Each casting yields two trigrams (a hexagram), and each of the trigrams is associated with a sound sequence relevant to the time of the year. This piece attempts to create a synthesis of a Western cultural icon, the piano, with an Eastern cultural icon, the I Ching, by interpreting the latter divinations through sound on a prepared piano.
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Jedd Winterburn – Zenith (AV Composition for multiple screens) | Performance Studio *ITHACA AWARD NOMINEE
Zenith is an audiovisual installation that incubates the practise of attentive listening, inviting the listener to discover an awareness of sound that can enrich one’s life after the event. The unique viewing experience of Zenith is notably engaging, operating over two screens and 4.1 surround sound in a highly curated environment. Hosting a palette of noise curated to explore the fringes of musicality, Zenith aims to promote the abstraction of sound’s form and function.
Two of our Level 5 students have received awards for their outstanding performance on the course as part of University of Brighton’s annual Student & Staff Celebration Event.The event is an opportunity for the University to thank their donors for their fantastic, generous support and to celebrate the achievements of students, Olivia Louvel has been awarded the Norman Cook Digital Music and Sound Arts Breakthrough Award and Louis Sterling an Employability Fund Award!
Greek sound artist/sound designer/music producer (aka Jeph1) and DMSA student Jeph Vanger was recently awarded the Norman Cook Digital Music and Sound Arts Breakthrough Award 2016/17 for finishing first in his year (Level 5). This is the second year this award has been around and it is a way for showing appreciation to students who excel at their studies. The award was established by famous music producer Norman Cook aka Fatboy Slim.
On the occasion of the award, we asked Jeph a few questions.
DMSA: three important words that represent you as a creative person
JW: Sound, Vibration, Viscerality
DMSA: When did you start working with sound and music?
JW: It was right after school (18 years old) when I sold my video game console to buy my first turntable and start experimenting with records, music and sounds.
DMSA: In what ways has the DMSA course supported or help you to develop into who you are today creatively and professionally?
JW: The Digital Music & Sound Arts course in Brighton has made me believe that every single creative idea can be possible through experimentation and exploration. It has also widen my music horizons and helped me to open my ears and listen. In a world where overwhelming amounts of information and screens are taking over our lives through passive immersion, I think that is important to return back to pure non-distractive listening processes. More importantly, the DMSA course has filled me with hope in regards to make my goals and dreams reality as, over this year, I have been already involved in 6 theatre and performance professional projects as a sound designer and composer. Moreover, through the course, I have exhibited sound and visual installations which have been originally made for one of the course’s modules.
DMSA: What are your plans for the near future? projects, events, visions
JW: I am currently focusing on the development of my dissertation and also my final sound installation. Both of those are going to be related with how hand-made speakers can sculpt the final sonic result in a specific space -“Physical Sound Design” as I’d like to call it- and they are going to examine the relation of space and sound in general through the construction of original replicas of the historic Altec 1505b Horn which has been used in theatre spaces during the 60’s & 70’s.
In addition, in regards to my sound design & composition projects, I’m putting the finishing touches on the modern take of “The Picture of Dorian Gray” theatre play directed by John O’Connor. This play is touring in Italy for the next two months. I’m also going to be working on the sound design of “The Opportunist” short film about kleptomania directed by Matt Page
When it comes to events, after my last gig in Brussels, I’m about to announce new dates for my Dub music project “Jeph1”. I’m also performing an experimental set at Green Door Store in Brighton on the 4th of December for “Splitting the Atom” experimental/free/noise all dayer.
My overall vision for the near future is to continue working on various sound and music projects which are different, but at the same time influencing each other.
