About 900 VOICES
This sound art work was commissioned as part of St Giles’ Cathedral’s 900th anniversary celebrations. When St Giles’ became a cathedral, Edinburgh became a city.
900 Voices is a participative project inviting people from different walks of life and areas in the city to take part by recording conversations about belonging, connection and community. These recordings are shared through the 900 Voices sound installation in St Giles’ Cathedral, launched in the International Festival and carrying on through September until December of this year.
Each new recording is added to the installation’s database and enriches the palette of voices and ideas 900 Voices draws from. The sound installation can be experienced in person in St Giles’ Edinburgh.
900 Voices sound installation uses a variety of computer procedures to select, combine and place sounds in real-time, making new choices for each cycle by searching the conversation database for words and themes. Sometimes individual words will emerge and at other times longer reflective sections allow listeners to encounter and engage with individual contributions.
The installation works with the rhythms and tonality of conversations in a more abstract way too, generating playful echoes, choruses of frozen speech and rippling phrases that activate and celebrate both the musical qualities of voices and the wonderful acoustic character of St Giles’ Cathedral. Every sound heard while 900 Voices is playing comes from the participants' voices, however musical and abstract.
The subject matter is broad, sometimes touching on difficult experiences. To talk about belonging, it has been useful to talk about not belonging too. You may hear fragments of personal experiences of prejudice and other challenges, as well as insights into belonging and connection.
The composition has been designed to be evolving and ever changing. It provides an exciting and physical way to explore the conversations. When you visit you will hear a selection of specific voices, people sharing their thoughts and feelings, the specific combination of voices that come up during your visit will be unique. The specific things that are audible from where you are standing or sitting listening is unique too. The nature of the work can bring up surprising juxtapositions or a sense of consensus about something.
The having and gathering of conversations and the compositional programming of the piece are considered to be equally important aspects of the 900 Voices project.
Some of the community organisations and places that have welcomed 900 Voices conversation recordings in the first half of 2024:
Central Library / Craigmillar Library / The Crannie / Granton Primary School / Homescott House / Hope Cottage Nursery / Leith Community Centre / LGBT+ Health and Wellbeing / Lothian Buses / Oxgangs Library Link Group / Screen Academy Scotland / Southside Community Centre / Space Hub Broomhouse / St Mary’s RC Primary School / The Storytelling Centre / The Washhouse Portobello / West Pilton Neighbourhood Centre / Wester Hailes Library / The Yard
About St Giles' Cathedral:
St Giles' Cathedral, the High Kirk of Edinburgh has been a focal point of religious and community life for nine centuries. A backdrop to Scotland’s turbulent religious history, it has seen the seeds of civil war sown and acted as John Knox’s parish church during the Reformation. St Giles’ Cathedral is open to all, to worship, to visit and to experience music, art, and history within its walls.
“We are delighted that the voices and stories of the people of Edinburgh are going to form a central part of the legacy of St Giles’ during our 900th year.
The 900 Voices project’s key themes of connection, community and belonging are so important to explore in today’s society and central to our mission to be an open and inclusive space for all.
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“For 900 years the voices of so many people have echoed round the walls of the Cathedral. It is entirely fitting that as we pass this milestone we hear each other talk about the things which matter to us and which we hold in common.”