New Release: Excerpts of Dis Poem Wordz and Agro Festival 2019

Excerpts of the Dis Poem Wordz and Agro Festival 2019 is a recording for Sounds of Life by dj afifa using a Panasonic RR-US511.

Listen to the Excerpts here:

or download it directly here it

Here are the recording notes from dj afifa

These excerpts are produced from a sound recording experiment at the 9th Annual Dis Poem Wordz and Agro festival.

My first recording of the Dis Poem Wordz and Agro festival was in 2017, I was hired to be the selecta at the event. Outdoor music events such as these in Jamaica provide a rich sonic experience. Capturing the dynamics of an event in audio can be an interesting challenge for sound artist. These excerpts are the result of my experiments at the festival.

Typically audio recordings of live events are made by capturing a direct audio signal, this is how I got my recording of the event in 2017. I was connected to the mixing board 36.and got a direct audio signal. The disadvantage of recording like this is that it misses ambiance. At the 2019 edition of Dis Poem I tried to collect some of the ambiance of the event by recording from the audience using a digital mp3 recorder (a Panasonic RR-US511 I used for recording interviews). The recording came out much different than I had expected. Previously I had recorded another poetry event using my Huawei NS L53 and the audio was much clearer.

The audience sat in pavilion style seating facing the stage that was on an open field with the sea behind it. There was a hugh tree hanging over the pavilion. I got to the event at about 2:30pm and started recording immediately. I recorded at least one performance for each poet. I changed location twice during my recording.

I attempted to edit the recordings in Audacity to improve the clarity of the audio, this was not successful.

Factors which affected the clarity of the recording. The first factor was the recording device (Panasonic RR-US511) which records in mono, performances that included music where more muffled than performances with no accompanying music. Recordings which were done earlier in the evening when there was a smaller audience were clearer. Recordings where I was sitting directly at the back of the pavilion as opposed to closer to the stage or to the far left were much clearer.

 Because of the recording device used and the recording condition it is best to listen to the Excerpts using headphones; the audio will be clearer.