The cocktail party effect is a pyschoacoustic phenomenon in which a listener is able to zoom in and pick out single conversations in a room filled with noise.
"Human Mixers" plays with this phenomenon as a compositional method through active listening. Two performers read out two separately written lectures on the cocktail party effect. Audiences are then put in the position of choosing to listen to both lectures simultaneously, switching between the two, choosing one over the other, passively receiving the lectures as noise, or all of the above.
Composers who have contributed their words to this work include Madam Data, Todd Lerew, Robert Blatt, and Hubbard M Jones.
Video credits
Performers: Ingrid Lee and John Niekrasz
Texts by: Ingrid Lee and Robert Blatt
Past performances
4-5-17: Sonic Cyberfeminisms, Lincoln UK
23-4-15: Wonderwerp #61, The Hague NL
9-3-14: Atlantic Center of the Arts, New Smyrna Beach, FL US