Relic (Button)
Relic (Button) comprises a very short composition made from MIDI data algorithmically extracted from a field recording of a specially composed bell peal rung by bell ringers at St.Edmundsbury Cathedral on the Queens Platinum Jubilee on 4th June 2022. The data is used to trigger a sample of the bell used by Town Crier Tony Appleton in Bury St. Edmunds to recreate a section of the peal played on the Jubilee day. The brevity of the piece was dictated by the digital limitations of the sound button hardware on which it resides. The sound button was placed in a rose garden at Abbey Gardens in Bury St.Edmunds, Suffolk as part of the project groving by curator Barbara Dougan, and was removed by an inquisitive member of the public never to be seen again. The project also featured a written response by Urve Opik.
Peal Press
A modest thumb’s worth, a full round
netsuke, smoothly toggling the invisible
strike and clamour of metallic sound
into binary code. Memento Digital
of pull and swing, pressed into zero/one.
A caught phrase, a meme for void and spire
mutter-full of dusty prayer, flinging open
centuries of vaulted, buttressed air.
Gusts of chimes handed up the ropes
and down the years, poise, ardently intent
to make a reliquary of your palm, their notes
will sound or mute by click of your consent.
Urve Opik