LOURDES GROTTO
By Morgan Rockwell
How much do you think about traffic noises in relation to the sound environment of Duquesne University's campus?
No matter your answer the above question, I challenge you to think of it from a location that you may frequent very often (or not at all): the Lourdes Grotto. Listen to the following soundwalk audio, this is a recording of walking from the Jesus statue by Rangos School of Health Science down to the grotto, which is on the edge of the bluff past Old Main and next to Trinity Hall.
What is a grotto? Grottos are natural or artificial caves that have been used by humans throughout history. The Lourdes Grotto at Duquesne is nestled in a remote corner of our campus, intended to be far from the hustle and bustle. When it was created in 1956, this may have been the case. The highway and Liberty bridge were still major motorways, but they likely were not causing nearly as much noise as these areas do now. Additionally, Duquesne itself was a very different environment, with roads and businesses where we now have Academic Walk. At the time of the Grotto’s construction, there were still cars parked up and down A-Walk (Pittsburgh Historic Maps).
Now, let’s think about what “sound environment” means in terms of Duquesne University. If you have already done some of this soundwalk, then you have already become familiar with some unique sound spots on our campus. The sound environment of Duquesne comprises the sounds that are unique to our campus, that you may not always notice. From the birds in the trees to the chapel bell, there are many sounds that are specific to our campus.
Consider the soundwalk: how much of a difference in sound is there from the statue of Jesus to the Grotto? Is this something that you find to be disruptive to the peace of the Grotto?
Do you find the traffic noises to be disruptive to the Duquesne sound environment?
Yes?
No?
Something else?
Further Discussion
“A soundwalk is any excursion whose main purpose is listening to the environment… The intention of soundwalking is listening.” – Hildegard Westerkamp (Andra McCartney, “Soundwalking: Creating Moving Environmental Sound Narratives”)
The reason I chose to do a soundwalk for this sound site is to demonstrate the vast sound differences between our campus bubble and the busy soundscape of the highway and bridge that lay just beyond it.
Music educator and environmentalist Murray Schafer classifies soundscape into two different categories: lo-fi and hi-fi. In a hi-fi system, it is possible to listen to discrete sounds in the environment because there is no background noise to obstruct even the smallest disturbances. In a lo-fi soundscape environment, the sounds are all very close and compact. A person can only really listen to immediate encounters, and it is harder to differentiate between discrete sounds. City soundscapes in general are lo-fi environments, which many people would consider to be noisy and disruptive.
However, I think a large reason many students choose Duquesne is because of our unique, practically downtown location coupled with the effect of being on a self-contained campus (versus being completely downtown at Point Park University or in Oakland for Pitt, Carlow, and other universities). The campus-feel creates a soundscape that is completely unique to Duquesne University, both secluded and in an urban environment. Not exactly a lo-fi environment but not quite hi-fi either.
In this case, the “soundwalk” audio that I have chosen to present is more like a “listening walk” as presented in Andra McCartney’s Soundwalking: Creating Moving Environmental Sound Narratives.A “listening walk” is a recording soundwalk of an individual sound walker (which in this case is me) with a specific goal. The goal of this listening walk, for me, is to draw the listener’s ear to how sounds in the environment change as you walk through different locations. From the Jesus statue, to between Old Main and Trinity Hall, to the Bluff, and then down to the Grotto there are many different sounds. Birds in the trees, tour guides talking to prospective students, and twigs snapping under the feet of the other people walking by are all noticeable aspects of being on campus, which then fade away as you near the Bluff and the grotto, where the white noise of traffic begins to take over.
My overall goal is not to paint these traffic sounds as a nuisance to the Duquesne environment, rather to point out the juxtaposition between the contemplative grotto and the active and energized sounds of traffic. Some may think that these are “bad” sounds in the sound environment. However, there may be people who do not find these sounds distracting or “bad” at all. Rather, the sounds may just be a sonic feature that could be taken for granted. What really qualifies a “good” or “bad” sound? That is up to you: the listener.
The impact of modernization of our campus has done many things. The campus itself has expanded and become more self-contained and secluded over the years. As a resultthe soundscape of campus has simultaneously evolved. There is a more hi-fi environment at the center ofcampus, as evidenced by the beginning of my audio file. Modernization on the outside of our campus, however, has had the opposite effect. Highways, bridges, and overall city sounds create a lo-fi environment. Duquesne has the unique space of teetering between the two kinds of soundscapes depending on your location on campus.
Works Cited:
Andra McCartney, “Soundwalking: Creating Moving Environmental Sound Narratives” The Oxford Handbook of Mobile Music Studies, edited by Sumanth Gopinath and Jason Stanvek, 2 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014)
Murray Schafer, The Soundscape: Our Sonic Environment and the Tuning of the World. 1994.