Hybrid Venue: From Network Audio to Future Gigs

Lead Research Organisation: Goldsmiths College
Department Name: Computing Department

Abstract

Hybrid Venue is an engagement project that builds on the research insights gained in the AHRC UK-US project, Hybrid Live. It is a collaboration between Goldsmiths and Iklectik Art Labs in London with CCRMA at Stanford University in California. The project will consolidate advanced network audio streaming technology, JackTrip developed at CCRMA with creative audiovisual interactions created at Goldsmiths to enable independent live music venues like Iklectik to expand their offer in a rapidly changing cultural sector.

Multiple factors, including new technologies, the COVID pandemic, and eco-crisis have had an indelible impact on the dynamics of live music and electronic audiovisual arts. COVID has made some audience agoraphobic whilst commercial streaming platforms offer an endless catalogue to 'Netflix 'n chill' at home. Touring artists are increasingly conscious of their carbon footprint and are more and more reluctant to fly to gigs. Meanwhile disruptive technologies like NFT have infiltrated the visual arts world with speculation. How do these factors combine to reshape the dynamics of live music and electronic visual arts?

Independent arts organizations need to continuously engage with, and expand their audiences. Whilst a physical venue enables local communities to come together, a network presence unlocks access to new audiences at a global scale. High quality streaming may alleviate air travel for international artists but also opens up new possibilities for multiple artists from different countries to perform together for an audience in a third location. The original Hybrid Live project carried out research configuring network audio and computer vision and graphics technologies to create new performance experiences for artist and audience alike. The new Hybrid Venue project will consolidate these advancements and explore a streaming, publication, and membership eco-system to create a prototype platform that can power the venue and label of the future.

The Hybrid Venue platform will consist of three key components. High quality, low latency network audio will allow immersive audio to be streamed to remote audiences, replicating the spatial sensation of a physical venue. Realtime computer vision, 3D graphics and audio reactive visuals will make interactive visuals that can be engaging as audio/visual art and also be informative in the way that album cover artwork and gig flyers once were in the print era and material epoque. A membership subscription offer exploring the use of blockchain technology will facilitate an economic model where audience buy tickets, artists are paid, and venues earn revenue on a secure, transparent distributed ledger. These three components come together to enable Iklectik to be the test case for a hybrid venue of the future: a local gig space, an international streaming channel, and a new kind of 'record label' publishing interactive a/v works.

Publications

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Tanaka A (2024) Telematic music transmission, resistance and touch in International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media

 
Title Iklectik <> Star & Shadow 
Description Simultaneously taking place at Star & Shadow in Newcastle and at SIML, Goldsmiths, featuring 3 remote collaborative performances using JackTrip technology. Sharon Gal + Mariam Rezaei + Atau Tanaka + Noize Choir + Dane Law + Gwilly Edmondez + Kenosist DJ Saturday 9 November 2024 | Doors: 7:30pm London (IRL), Saint James Hatcham Church 26 Laurie Grove, London SE14 6AD Newcastle (IRL), Star And Shadow Cinema, Warwick St, Newcastle upon Tyne NE2 1BB Online: IKLECTIK Youtube, Twitch, Facebook We are excited to announce another groundbreaking event as part of the Hybrid Venue research project. Co-curated by IKLECTIK, CSTC and Gustav Thomas, the live event will take place simultaneously at Star & Shadow in Newcastle and at Goldsmiths in London, celebrating once again IKLECTIK's 10th anniversary of pushing boundaries in experimental music and arts. The event will feature 3 remote collaborative performances using JackTrip technology, a revolutionary low-latency tool that enables real-time, multi-channel performances across distances. Audiences in Newcastle and London will witness artists from both cities performing together as though they were in the same room, showcasing the power of technology to create new forms of live artistic expression. Programme: Atau Tanaka (London) + Noize Choir (Newcastle) Dane Law (London) + Gwilly Edmondez (Newcastle) Sharon Gal (London) + Mariam Rezaei (Newcastle) And in Newcastle the party will continue after 10pm with an explosive DJ set by Kenosist [aka Mark Wardlaw] Event supported by AHRC Project Hybrid Venue. 
Type Of Art Performance (Music, Dance, Drama, etc) 
Year Produced 2024 
Impact telematic concert best practice 
URL https://www.gold.ac.uk/calendar/?id=15214
 
Title Väki 
Description VÄKI As part of the AHRC funded Hybrid Venue research project and in partnership with Prof Atau Tanaka, we are excited to bring you another extraordinary collaboration from the Tank in Svano, this time seeing the live performances by the Inner Ear. VÄKI :- A Finnish folk tradition term that means magic force, power, strength - a type of dynamistic magic charge used in magical workings, which facilitates exchange between visible and invisible layers of reality. VÄKI :- In modern Finnish - people - as in a crowd of people. The Tank (Cistern) is an old oil storage vessel with a beautiful 25 second reverb, and on this occasion The Inner Ear Performance Collective (who are based there) will use their own brand of shamanistic sonic shenanigans first to raise the Väki of the Tank, and then to extend this Väki across the waters, lands and mountains - all the way from Svanö in northern Sweden to the Sonics Immersive Media Lab (SIML) at Goldsmiths College in South London. As the Tank's Väki reaches Goldsmiths the two places will surely become one, although in another sense they will retain their discreet identities. This being the nature of Finnish Väki magic. 
Type Of Art Performance (Music, Dance, Drama, etc) 
Year Produced 2024 
Impact Development of telematic concert best practice 
 
Description We have shared advanced telematic performance technologies with creative practitioners in the UK creative community
Impact Types Cultural

 
Description Iklectik Art Labs 
Organisation IKLECTIK
Country United Kingdom 
Sector Charity/Non Profit 
PI Contribution partnership with Local cultural institution, Iklectik Art Labs
Collaborator Contribution see above
Impact I sit on the board of advisors
Start Year 2019