A Door to another World

Art Encounter Series Three

Key Words: Sound, Aaron Ximm


There is always more than one way to learn about the world around us. Sound artist Aaron Ximm introduces a fantastic world for us by his field recording sounds which collected in his journey to many countries. I went to the performance which Aaron presented his two long pieces. Aaron also came to our class and performed his works with other sound artists. I was lucky to listen to his live performance and felt very sad that I could not listen again. One of his sound pieces lasts for forty minutes, but I felt that it was a very short time. Perhaps it was so musical to me that I forgot the time when I was listening.

Aaron opens a door for me, a door to a world which I need to learn to listen in a new way. His field recordings show me how to experience the world through listening. Field recordings from Aaron are sounds including human sounds, mechanical sounds and natural sounds. Many of them are ambient sounds of certain areas. Aaron combined these sounds into short or long pieces. But he would not add musical sounds into his sounds. Just as Glenn told us in his lecture, “Nature has its own music, and we should listen to this music”.

I went to Aaron’s performance in theater. That is a large room and equipped with great speakers. We sit in dark and listened. One of his sound pieces tells the story that his wife was giving birth. The whole piece lasts for forty minutes. At the very beginning, there was a drone growing gradually. It needs much attention to hear. With the drone was going on, it was silence but uneasy. I knew that it would prepare us to enter the climax. And then people started talking and making sounds with medical equipment in the operation room. A woman started moaning because of pain in her body. Doctors’ voices and her husband’s voices were added. Her moans seemed to come from a far place but still clear. At this time, I could feel the intense atmosphere even in dark. Everyone seemed to be able to feel her pain. But suddenly, there was a surprised silence. And then we all heard sweet baby crying sounds which melt our hearts. The silence-sound contrast that Aaron made in this piece is amazing. I felt that for the sweet baby voice, all the suffering from the silence and drone was nothing. At the end of this piece, I felt that I arrived to a bright world after traveling through darkness. Aaron didn’t use any musical sounds to help us experience his story. So I guess that is why Glenn said in class, let the sound speaks and tells the story.

Listening to Aaron’s sound pieces makes me feel warm. But why and how do I have such feeling? I think because they are come from common sounds but organized in a way that I like. Aaron would compose his raw materials into long pieces by combining and editing sounds pieces. However, he did not add musical instrument sounds into them. When he came to our class and performed his sound pieces, I just sit there and listened to one piece. I could not remember the beginning part, but then I heard the sounds of flip-flop, sounds of a window blew by wind and sounds of raindrops. And it was such a silence after the rain stopped that I could only hear the window shaking lightly in a breeze. My eyes were closed. I saw that I was in my sweet old house and just awoke after a nap at an afternoon twelve years ago. The contrast between the silence and sounds is powerful. When I heard the silence after sounds of raindrop, my memory of that afternoon was so clear that I could remember the shapes of the raindrops on my window. It was not a special afternoon and the sounds were not very euphonious. But they related to my memory of lovely childhood which I didn't have too much homework to do and didn’t have to face pressure from school. I would not talk about such experience in that afternoon because it is too trivial. But it never lost in my memory. So I was moving when I heard these sounds. Aaron has the ability to present beauty with these common sounds.

Aaron also has a talent to capture beautiful sounds which we may not familiar with. Most of his field recordings were collected in warm places such as India, Vietnam and South America. The ambient sounds in certain areas, just like images, have their own tune. Usually, people in these places are able to enjoy many outdoor activities most of time in a year. They are fond of dance and gathering together for celebration. So it is not strange that there would be sounds of singing, music and talking. Even the sounds of thunders and rain seem to be pleased. Aaron said that there are many interesting sounds in India and he would travel there again.

Aaron decided that he would make his sounds warm. Given the same raw materials, different people would make different sound pieces. It is just like to make a movie. A director would use the footage to make a movie which reveals his or her own personality. Aaron’s every sound piece that he performed for us likes a movie. We need to experience his stories using our ears. His sound pieces reveal his personality. But he did not dominate the stories in his works. We listen and imagine our own images in the mind, which is promising.

Aaron’s exploration in sounds which exist in human societies and natural environments opens a door for me. I entered a strange world that I saw people’s daily lives, a train with passengers, rain and thunder, a flying bird……I even saw a world that in my memory. If they are appeared in front me in the form of a movie or pictures, I would not feel exciting at all. When I was watching movies, my eyes and ears accept the information together. When I was looking at pictures, my ears could fall asleep. But when I was listening to Aaron’s work, my ears were totally awoke and activated to accept the information. I am trying to learn this world in a new way. It is so amazing to have more than one way to know about the world.

Click to visit Aaron Ximm's website.