NIME 2014 (New Interfaces for Musical Expression)

Humming Mississippi is a sonic sculpture that performs a section of the Mississippi River on resonant wood planks as an organic instrument. In collaboration with researchers from Louisiana State University’s Coastal Hydraulics Lab a LIDAR scan of the Mississippi River floor was used to translate 18 miles of riverbed into individual planks of cedar. Small transducers attached to the back of each plank transform the board into a speaker colored by the individual characteristics of the wood and influenced by the carving of the river’s contours. The audio composition is generated based off a linear reading of river topology combined with a sonification of real­time river data including temperature, salt content, flow rate, and river height.

The piece is presently installed at the Louisiana State University Museum of Art until March 2014. As it’s currently operating the work provides interactivity with real­time river data. For the next showing of HummingMississippi the artists are extending the work into a multimodal form allowing for interaction with the installation through an online representation of the work. Individual panels from the river are presented to web users who are invited to explore the river’s depths. Device clicks or touches use the contours of the river to create a spectral pulse through the web browser on the local device and induce an immediate sonic response in the corresponding physical board. Aggregate user data is retained to create a heat map of interactions which is then used to guide the spectrum at the physical installation. The installation becomes a meta­instrument performed by web viewers and the river itself.