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Aural Tools

Aural Tools uses small runs of simple objects to document the material and conceptual processes of specific musicians’ sound production practice. It is a series of devices for relating sound to space, the listener and the body in ways unavailable through traditional recorded media such as CDs or LPs.   Aural Tools was founded by Attila Faravelli, who is also its curator.

Aural Tools Box
Lovely wooden box containing the complete series of seven aural tools, each in its own box. Few copies available
Minuzia
Minuzia consists in an acoustic version of an audio installation that the French bassoon player Dafne Vicente-Sandoval had been presenting at a few sound art exhibitions; a handful bassoon cane reeds were regularly soaked into water, and these very thin slices of wood would start crackling in the course of their drying out process. These minute sounds were amplified by contact microphones and listened to through headphones. With an original text by the British anthropologist Tim Ingold. Score: S…
Pietra di Langa
Pietra di Langa extends Enrico Malatesta’s investigation on the oscillatory patterns by stones and ready-made objects. It consists in a solid made of concrete, whose shape has been obtained by silicone casting an actual stone.  With an original text by the British anthropologist Tim Ingold: “Who says that stones cannot speak? Most of us, if asked. We are pretty convinced that stones are inanimate objects, and that they are therefore incapable of moving of their own accord. And without movement, …
30 Meters Stretch
30 Meters Stretch is an extension of a series of works, correspondingly titled 500 Meters Stretch, 480 Meters Stretch and so on, by Seiji Morimoto, a Japanese sound artist based in Berlin. It consists of a spool of 30 meters long, 5 cm wide, lightweight fabric, to be stretched out between trees or poles in any open space. As these long lines wave, rattle and flutter according to the wind, they make air both visible and audible.  The object’s aim is to bring the listening experience outside the a…
Transducer
Transducer derives form a functionally similar instrument built by the Australian sound artist Felicity Mangan. Instructions: • Turn on the transducer by the red switch in the tee. • Turn on Bluetooth on phone or computer, pair your device with MH38. • Check sound levels on phone or computer (about 3/4 of maximum is usually best), then play sound. • Attach the stronger magnet (the disk shaped one) to any magnetic metal surface/object or clamp a non magnetic object with both the disk and the ring…
Trifoglio
Trifoglio is a portable mid/side stereo speaker.
The device is designed to be listened to while holding it in the hands (like a book) and plays music created specifically for it* by different artists: as soon as new contributions are available they are published online.  Current sound compositions by: Adam Asnan, Alessandro Bosetti, Andrea Belfi, Andy Guhl, Attila Faravelli, Choi Joonyong, Dario Lozano-Thornton, Enrico Malatesta, Fabio Selvafiorita, Felicity Mangan, Francisco Meirino, Giovanni L…
Bilia
Bilia derives from the work of percussionist Enrico Malatesta. The release consists of five wooden balls (3,5 cm Ø) carved from different woods. Enrico’s very own sound comes from a horizontal approach to the percussion instruments that are, in his practice, a space for movement, where every action is also a form of exploration and listening as well as an exercise in imagination.  «Percussion instruments are round-shaped, and I utilize this simple notion as a starting point. I often apply fricti…
Freie Aerophone
Freie Aerophone is based on Matija Schellander’s solo pieces for double bass, The Drill and Matija Schellander, that make extensive use of indistinct low pitches resonating a space, and sound projections by circular movement of the performer with the instrument. In the Hornbostel-Sachs musical instrument classification (Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, 1914), the freie aerophone  is an instrument in which the vibrating air is not contained within the instrument itself, for example a siren or a bullro…
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