Writing by Hildegard Westerkamp
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Soundtracks Everywhere
by Hildegard Westerkamp
In Immediacy and Non-Simultaneity: Utopia of Sound, edited by Diedrich Diederichsen and Constanze Ruhm, Publication of the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, Volume 10, Schlebrügge-Editor, Vienna, 2010.
Abstract
The composer, radio artist and sound ecologist Hildegard Westerkamp is internationally renowned for her soundscape recordings and compositions, as well as her research into environmental sound. In her text she criticizes the increasing pervasiveness of industrially produced sounds, from the inception of the Muzak Company in the 1930s to the ubiquitous presence of such sounds i contemporary sound environments. Regarding the inclusion of her compositions in the works of the American filmmaker Gus Van Sant, she advocates what she refers to as a "soundtrack-that-listens."