Otodate —listening exercise by Akio Suzuki

Q: Why is pier a suitable place to perform sound art?

A: That’s because sound assembles there.

  I have never thought that sound could be a form of art. I know music is one of the kinds but when it comes to sound, I really have no idea. Kwun Tong Ferry Pier is a spacious place where we could hear a lot of echo from the sea and from the road. We headed to the second floor to watch the performance of a Japanese artist called Akio Suzuki and his partner, Hiromi Miyakita.

  I was very confused at the beginning of the performance as I was not sure who Mr. Suzuki was. He did not dress up and was carrying his backpack. Later, I realized it was him the artist until he started to build the wood sticks. He connected ten sets of wood sticks in a row with a rope putting underneath as a mark. Soon, nails were hammered on the sticks one by one and sound was produced. The nails were hammered in regular time slot and therefore the sound produced was monotonous and dull. Hiromi started to ‘move’ her body according to the sound. Her movement was slow and not graceful. I wonder what would happen next.

  

Then Mr. Suzuki hammered the nails more quickly and lively. He concentrated very much on his work. It seemed that he picked up the nails from the bucket then hammered them without thinking. Hiromi started to dance instead of ‘moving her body’. Her movement was more coherent and with elegance. However, I don’t think her dancing is widely accepted by the public because we can’t tell which type of dancing she was doing. It was a bit weird although it followed the sound well.

  

After Mr. Suzuki had hammered all the nails (there were almost 300 nails!), he suddenly took out a pair of chopsticks from the bucket. He used the chopsticks to sweep through all the nails. The sound produced was like xylophone. It was clear and had different pitch. He swept through the nails in different pace and his partner danced with bigger movements. I think this was quite a nice piece of music. Some of our students said Hiromi was like a caterpillar struggles to become a butterfly. I think this is true because she just sat down and did some hand gestures. But later, she stood up and danced and ran with energy. However, you really had to get into the show to see this or else you would have no idea what they were doing.

  

When it came to the second part of the performance, the two artists shifted to the other side of the pier area to start another performance. There were ten glass bottles which were filled with water on the floor and Hiromi took up the bottles and danced. The water splashed out according to her movement. Some beautiful patterns which were in circle form were made on the floor. The only sound we could hear was the breeze. Later, Mr. Suzuki joined. He blew on the mouth of the bottles. People who stood beside me seemed to have some giggles. I think that’s because we all played this when we were small! It was really fun and actually, the sound was pleasant to listen to. It was like the whistle of the boat. They were not looking at each other but they were like having a conversation, a casual conversation using sound. Hiromi danced without remembering the steps. She just danced randomly with what she heard.

  Is this mean by freeing the sound? Using sound to communicate (instead of talking)? Maybe this is a way for human to communicate with the environment. We were masked by many ‘man-made’ sounds nowadays: phones, machines, transports etc. There are fewer and fewer chances for us to listen to birds whistle, water flow and breeze. I don’t think human can communicate only by using sound as we have language. We are all used to talking as our communication channel. You can do so unless you are Mr. Suzuki, having such a familiar partner who practises lots and lots to communicate with you in this way!