The invention of the tape machine changed the landscape of music making forever. From the sound of air raid sirens to the church bells of Coventry, Delia Derbyshire exploited the new capabilities of audio manipulation to recycle and recontextualise the sound of everyday life, in doing so unpacking her most salient memories, and instilling her works with a sense of childlike wonder.

 

In an age removed from analogue music making, Soundhouse aims to reclaim the tape machine as a token of time of intense auditory development, using this premier radiophonic instrument as a material with which to interrogate the dual malleability of both medium and memory.

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Sound house was first premiered in the John Rylands Research Institute and has since received plays in the Manchester Central Library, with source sounds being released as a sample pack for the North West Sound Heritage project.