Noise

In today’s busy, fast-pace world noise is inevitable to escape.  We live in a culture that never sits still and never stops.  Whether you live on an isolated farm in Mississippi or a high rise in Time Square, sounds are prevalent 24 hours around the clock.  Steve Reich explains the concept of noise as, “When I talk about the crowded spaces of info-modernity- I’m talking about a world filled with noise, and if there’s one thing we learned from the twentieth century, it’s this: noise is just another form of information.” John Cage and Steve Reich discuss their fascination with noise through the absence of sound and looping sounds.
 Cage describes his fascination with everyday sounds as, “Wherever we are, what we hear is mostly noise. When we ignore it, it disturbs us. When we listen to it, we find it fascinating.”  I do have to disagree with this statement.  First, how do you ignore noise? It’s impossible. The more you try to “ignore” sounds the more you focus on the sound, the more you hear the sound, and the more you are annoyed with the sound.  When you are not focused on “ignoring” the sound your brain subconsciously allows the sound to exist/pass without consciously processing the noise.  However, the longer I sit here and try to focus on pure silence, the more I hear the ice machine growl, the neighbor’s dog barking, the air conditioning humming, etc.  All of these noises I was not aware were even around me seconds before but as I focus on silence, the sounds become aware.  Second, ‘when we listen to it, we find it fascinating’ applies to only some sounds.  I cannot say I necessarily enjoy all sounds, naturally or artificially made.  The video we listened to last class (do not remember creator) looped recording, recording more recordings that eventually turned into the most horrific sound that I could not stand for longer than ten seconds.  If I were to rewrite his statement, I would prefer to say: when we try to ignore sound, it only disturbs us more.  When we listen to select sounds, we find them fascinating.