You have two parts to your homework this week, to respond to the reading on tape, and to create your first Reaper-based sonic artwork.

1. Respond to Michael Barron’s Article

I asked you to read Michael Barron’s Brief History of Tape — in Music & Literature. Within that article are five linked artworks. Please re-listen intently to two of these linked works. Then, respond referencing not only what you hear, but Michael Barron’s comments on the works. This response should be a few paragraphs in length.

You might choose to talk about the technical qualities of the work; whether they are new ideas to you, surprised you in how they were created, interested you in exploring similar techniques, or you could provide a critique of the technical quality of the works.

You might also or instead choose to discuss the resulting artistic qualities of the work; what is interesting about these works, why are these works successful or not.

2. Your First Sonic Artwork

Your most significant homework project this week is to create your very own, “First Sonic Artwork using Reaper”. You should adhere to the following specifications;

1. Create a new project or modify any project you started while following along this week.
2. Aquire at least three audio files from resources discussed earlier in the week.
3. Arrange these sounds together however you would like in Reaper. You are welcome to cut them up, repeat them, or splice them together however you see fit. The main goal is to have fun and explore the possibilities of playing with sound files in Reaper.
4. Use the gain faders to set the relative levels for each track, in relation to the other tracks.
5. You are also welcome to explore techniques such as panning, splitting audio, and moving audio
6. Please remember to save often while you work!
7. For this first project, please keep it short. Your project should not be longer than 2 minutes. (Try to keep it closer to 30 or 45 seconds for this first exploration)
8. When you are finished, you should select the projects entirety, and create a “mixdown”
9. Once you have a final mixdown, please take a few moments to write and reflect on this experience. This needs only to be a paragraph or so in length. You might talk about;
   • What worked
   • Where you had problems
   • What was fun in this project
   • What was stressful
   • Your experience playing with and arranging audio files together
   • Or how this project excited you for the rest of this class
10. Additionally, please take a few moments to specifically discuss what you were attempting to do with your artwork.
11. When you are finished, please upload the resulting mixdown file and copy your response text into a new discussion post