#1b Deep Listening®: Pauline Oliveros and the Sonosphere

If we wish to develop a more sustainable future, we urgently need to reconnect to our environment and restore a more reciprocal relationship with the earth. In the Radio ArtEZ podcast series Sounding Places / Listening Places writer and music journalist Joep Christenhusz and creator of sound works, writer and Deep Listener Sharon Stewart enquire how sound and listening can help us to do so.

In contemporary Western culture we seem to have lost an intimate connection with the land. More often than not we consider our surroundings as a passive backdrop in which humankind can take center stage: controlling the landscape, developing infrastructures, and extracting resources at will. This rather anthropocentric position has become unviable, however, as recent human-driven ecological crises – like climate change, the dramatic loss of biodiversity and large-scale destruction of habitats – are clearly indicating. If we wish to develop a more sustainable future, we urgently need to reconnect to our environment and restore a more reciprocal relationship with the earth.

This three-part miniseries centers around Deep Listening®, the lifework of composer, musician, writer and humanitarian Pauline Oliveros. Aspects of this creative and meditative practice are shared from the perspectives of Sharon Stewart, Tina Pearson and Lisa E. Harris, Deep Listening® certificate-holders.

In the first mini-episode Sharon Stewart offers facets of her connection to Deep Listening® along with some of the history of the practice, as related to the sonic environment – or the sonosphere – with pertinent excerpts from Oliveros’ text scores. Together with Sharon Stewart you can perform a seminal Sonic Meditation, number VIII: Environmental Dialogue.

Shownotes:
“Listening to Deep Listening®: Reflection on the 1988 Recording and the Lifework of Pauline Oliveros”, by Sharon Stewart, Journal of Sonic Studies, 2012

Excerpt from an essay from 2007 – entitled My “American Music”: Soundscape, Politics, Technology, Community. This essay can be found in the book Sounding the Margins by Pauline Oliveros.

Excerpts from a 2006 article “Improvisation in the Sonosphere” for Contemporary Music Review. This essay can be found in the book Sounding the Margins by Pauline Oliveros.

∞ = 0 poem by Pauline Oliveros, printed in The Roots of the Moment (1998: 27).

“Pauline Oliveros” at Red Bull Music Academy, Hosted by Hanna Bächer

Masterclass Pauline Oliveros at Sonic Acts 2021: ‘Introduction and Background of Deep Listening’ (Stories start around 15m30s)

Pauline Oliveros, Deep Listening®: A Composer's Sound Practice, 2005. New York: iUniverse, Inc.
The introduction details a short conceptual story of the practice, followed by various exercises for personal and group practice and process training, a number of Deep Listening® Scores and questions and concluding with an Appendix of essays written by participants.

Deep Listening® Album 1989 with Pauline Oliveros, Stuart Dempster and Panaiotis

TEDx Talk 2015 The difference between hearing and listening | Pauline Oliveros | TEDxIndianapolis

The Center for Deep Listening® at Rensselaer (RPI)

Deep Listening® Retreats

Anthology of Text Scores by Pauline Oliveros (2013) Deep Listening® Publications

“VII: Environmental Dialogue” from Sonic Meditations by Pauline Oliveros (1971) Smith Publications

Excerpts from "Healing Dream Mandala: Beehive version," by IONE and "Slow Walk, Slow Song" by Pauline Oliveros, led by Jennifer Wilsey, at the Ratna Ling Deep Listening® Retreat in 2018. Both recordings were made and edited by Sharon Stewart.