“This is a structure. It is not noise. Common sounds, known to everyone, their beauty and horror, a condensation of everyday-life sounds that we are not even aware of”, Nina Dragičević explained to me in the proccess of composing “Overheard fragments of sound”.

»To je struktura. To ni noise. To so vsakdanji zvoki, njihova lepota in grozota, kondenz iz vsakdanjega življenja, ki se ga sploh ne zavedamo«, mi je ob nastajanju kompozicije »Preslišani fragmenti zvoka« pripovedovala njena avtorica Nina Dragičević.


“We are surrounded by sounds, but they surpass us, because we are poorly cultivated in absorbing them. At the same time, we fail to notice sounds that should not be overheard”, she continued and created a musical composition, which starts with sounds of the violin, words by Gertrude Stein and smoothness of city traffic – a warm, pleasant sound environment, which then suddenly and disturbingly breaks into distortions, gorging, heavy breathing and squealing, door slamming, knife whetting and loud talking, an enormous unbearable pandemonium. And, once we hear the spoken word again, this time by Audre Lorde, it is again overridden by various disruptions, including slamming of the door, which – we suddenly comprehend – represents a transition into temporary, deceptive tranquility, an illusion of peace and safety; a new round of endless sound violence in all its brutality. For, as Nina explains, “in sound there is no culture of stopping it, not in the way we stop certain gestures or words when they are unacceptable. With sound, there is no way for correcting one’s behaviour. You wish to escape, but you cannot. This sinusoid is infinite in its repetition.”

»Obdajajo nas zvoki, ker pa nismo kultivirani v poslušanju, gredo mimo nas, a ob tem gredo mimo nas tudi tisti, ki jih ne bi smeli preslišati«, je nadaljevala in sestavila glasbeno kompozicijo, kjer se prekrivajo violinska glasba, besede Gertrude Stein in mehkoba mestnega prometa, varno, prijetno zvočno okolje, a takoj nato njegov zlom, distorzije in motnje, človeško žretje, težko dihanje in cviljenje, loputanje vrat, brušenje noža in preglasno govorjenje, celovit, neznosen trušč. In ko znova slišimo besede, tokrat Audre Lorde, se nad njimi znova ponovijo vse prekinitve in vse preglasitve, tudi loputanje vrat, ki – naenkrat dojamemo – predstavlja prehod v začasni, varljivi mir, v iluzijo miru in varnosti, skratka, zgolj v nov krog brutalne neskončnosti zvočnega nasilja. Kajti, pravi Nina, »pri zvoku ni kulture ustavljanja tako kot pri gestah ali besedah, če so nesprejemljive. Pri zvoku ni načina, kako koga korigiraš. Hočeš pobegniti, a ne moreš. Ta sinusoida je v svojem ponavljanju neskončna«.

The composition was presented for the first time at an opening night of Lezbična četrt festival in ŠKUC Gallery, Ljubljana, on 2 December 2013. The performance by Nina Dragičević gave us, the public, a second chance to hear our everyday life – to listen carefully to what we really hear – the sounds in their beauty and horror, tranquility and uneasiness they awaken.

Kompozicija »Preslišani fragmenti zvoka« je bila prvič predstavljena na otvoritvenem večeru festivala Lezbična četrt v Galeriji Škuc v Ljubljani 2. decembra 2013. S koncertom Nine Dragičević smo poslušalci in poslušalke dobili drugo priložnost, da znova slišimo našo vsakdanjost – da prisluhnemo temu, kaj pravzaprav slišimo, da prisluhnemo zvokom, njihovi lepoti in grozoti, miru in nelagodju, ki ju prinašajo.

 

Text: Nataša Velikonja