“Fly-By” considers the poetry of sound and timbre in space and our perception of everyday surroundings when mediated by a musical or sonic event unexpectedly in our midst.  Projecting from a pedicab (bicycle rickshaw), I processed recordings of masses of honey bees inside glass jugs, frogs, birds and filtered shoh (mouth-organ) using a laptop with amplifyers placed at the front and rear of the pedicab as Micheal Johnson - pedicab driver - enthusiastically guided us throughout the streets of Little Italy, up to Little Korea, along Bloor past Honest Eds and down Avenue Road/University to College and The Donelly Centre.

At the end of the journey, we rolled into the atrium of the Donelly Centre, joining the other improvisors gathered there for Four Lines, where I made a transition to the spacious, lush upper bamboo grove in the atruim. Part two of this improvised performance consisted of the above sounds mixed with live shoh performance and a small installation of stainless steel mixing bowls planted among the bamboo, which reverberated with the sounds of processed bees, the vibrations transmitted to the bowls via transducers (speaker drivers) beneath the bowls.

The beginning of our journey, La Palette restaurant on Augusta St. just South of College, in Kensington Market, and at the Donelly Centre, June 8, 2006: 

Flickr: photos by Rob Cruickshank

Reverberating bowls with Chris Cammidge on the Leslie St. Spit:

photos by Sarah Peebles

Antique Indian pedicab courtesy of Shimez Amlani of La Palette in Kensington Market; Micheal Johnson, pedicab driver. Technical assistance plus longboard-facilitated video and photos courtesy of Rob Cruickshank. Production assistance John Sherlock.

"Fly By" audiopedicab ride was commissioned by Continuum for “four lines” and “touch space” at the soundaXis festival and premiered June 8, 2006 in Kensington Market -Little Italy-the Donnelly Centre, Toronto. “Four lines” was a city-wide mobile prelude converging on the Donnelly Centre (160 College, w. of University):

www.continuummusic.org

“Fly-By” is a part The Pollinator Series, which includes the audio works “Clear Dawn” and “Flight Paths”, and the installation-in-progress, “Resonating Bodies”.