Otocare Fuji Iyashi no Mori - August (no.3)
https://vimeo.com/1051331112?share=copy
東京大学のmemu earth lab では、多様な媒体を介して、固有の場所とその機会をどう再読できるか、その場所の情報を如何に資源化できるかという探究をしています。文字や言語に限らない媒体によるリレーション、情報生産技術とプロセスの検討を進めています。現時点では、音、糧、モノの三つの媒体による取り組みが始まっており、メム（北海道十勝の研究拠点エリア）とその人の営みを再読しています。多様な研究者が集い、再読活動を行う現場と仕組みを設けるため、「Research Retreat」（リサーチ・リトリート）という枠組みも作っています。きっかけは、メム（場所）ですが、決して特定の場所の再読にとどまらず、媒体そのもの（音、糧、モノ）の社会における役割の再読にもその活動をつなげています。 At memu earth lab of The University of Tokyo, we are exploring how we can re-read a unique place and its opportunities through various media, and how we can resource the information of that place. We are investigating media relations and information production technologies and processes that are not limited to text and language. At the moment, we have begun to work with three media: sound, nourishment, and objects, and we are re-reading Memu (a research base area in Tokachi, Hokkaido) and its people's activities. We are also creating a framework called the "Research Retreat" in order to facilitate a site and structure for diverse researchers to gather and conduct rereading activities. The impetus is the Memu (place), but we are not limited to rereading of a specific place, we are also connecting our activities to rereading the role of the medium itself (sound, nourishment, objects) in society.
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音を媒体とした再読活動「Sounding」では、主にフィールドレコーディングをとおし、現地の人の声、自然音など採集し、そこから見えてくる場所の可能性について透察を続けています。現時点では、メムという場所に点在する再現性のない音のスタジオ群（凍った湖水の上、波打ち際の流木の山、断層、競走馬の屋内トレーニング施設など）が、固有の音を生み出す場であることに気がつき、それらを「field studio」と呼び、メムという場所の新しい理解の仕方、まだ建物なき建築空間として資源化することに取り組んでいます。また、例えばコーネル大学の鳥類の音のアーカイブ（Macaulay Library）に携わる研究者とも会話をしつつ、音の集積から渡り鳥の移動を視覚化させる生態学的な研究との連携を模索したり、その土地に住む人々の音の発声（インターネットラジオ「memu radio」の開設、アイヌの音に関する情報発信）など、多岐にわたる情報プラットフォームとそれらに携わる研究者との連携を進めています。これらの学びを次世代の糧とすべく、現在、現地の自然の中から音を作ることと、環境音をフィールドレコーディングすることから音の学びを得る、若い年齢層向けの学習プログラムを試作しています。 In "Sounding," a re-reading activity using sound as a medium, we have been collecting the voices of local people and natural sounds mainly through field recordings and continue to investigate the possibilities of places that emerge from these recordings. At this moment, we have found that the studios of unrepeatable sounds scattered around Memu (on the frozen lake, piles of driftwood in the waves, fault lines, indoor training facilities for racehorses, etc.) are places that produce unique sounds. We call them "Field Studio," and we are working on a new way of understanding Memu as an architectural space without buildings yet. We are also in conversation with researchers at Cornell University who are working on an archive of bird sounds (Macaulay Library), and are seeking to collaborate with ecological research that visualizes the migration of migratory birds through the accumulation of sounds. In addition, we are promoting collaboration with researchers involved in a wide range of information platforms, such as the vocalization of the sounds of the people who live in the area (opening the Internet radio "Memu Radio" as well as disseminating information about the sounds of the Ainu). In order to pass on these learnings to the next generation, we are currently developing a prototype of a learning program for young people, in which they can learn about sound by creating sounds from local nature and making field recordings of environmental sounds. https://scrapbox.io/files/67995a5d41844c1077d4fefe.jpg
Otocare
Otocareは、memu earth labの音を介した再読活動により認識された可能性を、実践につなげるためのプロジェクトです。音でケアする／音をケアするというアプローチから出発しています。
Otocare is a project to put into practice the possibilities recognized by memu earth lab's re-reading activities through sound. It starts from the approach of caring with sound and caring for sound.
（社会）環境における音の役割の再読
メムにてフィールドレコーディングを通して蓄積された自然音を、都市空間やこれまで音が排除されてきた空間において、どのような役割があるのかを、コロナ禍において模索し始めました。様々な病をもつ患者相手に音によるケアを実践している音楽療法士の研究者と一緒に、医療現場において、その空間と雰囲気、職業現場における音の役割を再読しようとしています。これまで医療現場では医療行為を妨げないために音は極力減らすべきものとして捉えられることが多く、空間から音排除を目的とする研究が多くありました。そこで、自然音や生活音など、私たちの空間にあることが当たり前である音を、医療現場にてどうポジティブな要素として再度取り入れられるのか、実際に病院（済生会神奈川県病院、池友会新小文字病院）において介入実験をさせて頂きながら検証を進めています。
Rereading the role of sound in the (social) environment
We have begun to examine the role of natural sounds accumulated through field recordings at Memu in urban spaces, and spaces where sound has been excluded until now. Together with our music therapist researcher who has been exploring the role of sound/music with individual patients, we are aiming to re-read the role of sound in the space, atmosphere, and occupation in the medical field. Until now, sound has often been seen as something negative, and much research has been done to eliminate it from the space. We are currently conducting intervention experiments in hospitals (Otocare at Saiseikai Kanagawaken Hospital and Otocare at Shinkomoji Hospital in Kitakyushu-city). 環境音の社会的役割の再読
Otocareにはもう一つの探究があります。胎児の頃からすでに聞こえる音。生まれたのちも、寝ている間も聞き耳をたてる音。音楽ではなく、音に立ち返り、今一度その社会的役割を再読し始めています。
Re-reading the social role of environmental sounds
Otocare has another line of inquiry. The sounds we hear from the time we are unborn. Sounds that we listen to even after birth and while we sleep. It is not music, but sound that we return to and begin to re-read its role in society once again.
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Otocare Fuji Iyashi no Mori
この探究の一環として、富士癒しの森研究所（山中湖）の森の空間で、多様な音を奏でることで、環境音と人が発する音／音楽の関係性を改めて見直す機会：「Otocare Fuji Iyashi no Mori」を設けています。「Research Retreat」、一歩引き下がり研究や活動の原点に戻る機会と場所作りのトライアルとして行っています。これまで主に一般に音楽家やアーティストと呼ばれる方々を中心に集まってもらい、森林の研究を現地で実施している研究者の方々から場所に関するインプットをもらい、音／音楽に関して考えを深めてきました。閉ざされた音響空間で音だけにフォーカスするのではなく、多様なダイナミクスが存在する自然の中で、音を発することの意味、森に入ることが触発する聞くという行為の変容、音の社会的役割を異なるバックグラウンドを持つ参加者が集まり、再読しています。これまでの時間を通して、声を用いる音楽家からは、誰かに伝える意図をもたし準備し（てい）た「歌詞」は自然環境では意味を持たず（が次第に出なくなり）、「母音」だけが声として残るという体験（経験）や、アイヌの歌とトンコリの研究者からは、トンコリの音が小さいことで、環境の音と一緒に音を奏でることができ、それが音を大きくすることで存在する楽器との違いであるということに気が付いた体験（経験）など、これまでの音／音楽ということを改めて考え直すきっかけを持ち始めています。
As a part of this research, we are providing an opportunity called "Otocare Fuji Iyashi no Mori" which is to (re)evaluate the relationship between environmental sound and human sound/music by playing various sounds in the forest space of Fuji Iyashinomori Woodland Study Center (located in Lake Yamanaka / iyashi = healing). It is part of prototyping a "research retreat", an opportunity to step back and return to the starting point of research and activities, and a place to do so. So far, we have gathered mainly musicians and artists, and have received input about the place from researchers conducting forest research in the area, and have deepened our thinking about sound. Rather than focusing only on sound in a closed acoustic space, participants from different backgrounds have gathered to re-read the meaning of emitting sound in the presence of diverse dynamics, the transformation of the act of listening inspired by entering the forest, and the social role of sound. Throughout this time, we have heard from musicians who use their voices that the consonants, which they had intended and prepared to communicate to others, have gradually ceased to be produced, leaving only the vowels. The experience of the Ainu song and tonkori researcher, who noticed that the tonkori's small sound allows it to play along with the sounds of the environment, and that this is the difference between it and instruments that exist by making the sound louder, is beginning to cause people to rethink the conventional idea of sound/music.
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Participants to Otocare Fuji Iyashi no Mori (November, May, August)
Akaihirume (experimental vocalist): may
Akio Fujiwara (field data / cyber forest researcher) : november, may, august
Ayane Shino (classical guitarist) : may
Canon Nawata (actress): august
Carl Stone (composer / performer): august
Chihei Hatakeyama (ambient electronic music artist): november
Cole Fujimarimo (yamanaka lake mixed community choir) : november
Coppé (singer-songwriter): august
Emiko Miura (pianist) : november, may, august
GoRo (vibratian): may
Ichiro Miyagawa (memu earth lab research contributor) : november, may, august
Hataken (modular synthesizer performer / music producer): august
Haruo Saito (forest policy researcher) : november, may, august
Hikari Sandhu (otocare / music therapist): november, may
Junko Saito (forest research assistant / bird observer): november, may, august
Kaori Yokokawa (the wine store / research contributor) : november, may, august
Nick Luscombe (otocare / DJ / broadcaster): november, may, august
Nobuhiko Chiba / Hawhawke (ainu researcher/ tonkori player) : november, may
Mari Ono (vocalist) : november
Masanori Oishi (saxophonist) : november
Masashi Kitazato (art director / editor / artist): may, august
Reikan Kobayashi (jazz shakuhachi player): august
Takeshi Horie (fuchu kobo / cultural properties restoration): august
Utae Ehara (mukkuri player): may
Yu Morishita (otocare / architecture): november, may, august
Yukiko Matsunaga (bio-architecture / vascular biology researcher): november
Otocare is organized by Yu Morishita, Hikari Sandhu and Nick Luscombe