This soundscape composition takes the listener on an imaginary descent into the depths of the ocean in an immersible capable of withstanding the tremendous pressure of the undersea environment. We hear the creaking of its frame and encounter swarms of strange sea creatures. A strong vortical undercurrent propels the return ascent and we emerge back on the shore of a subtropical island in the evening.
Ocean Deep is an extension of the first movement of the author’s 1990 quadraphonic work Pacific, the first to use granular time stretching of environmental sound using the composer’s PODX software. The new work was realized with spatialization created by Harmonic Functions’ matrix mixer. The accompanying video was assembled by David Murphy from images created by the late Theo Goldberg, based on the famous Hokusai woodblock print, The Great Wave.
Ocean Deep was commissioned by and premiered at the the RMIT Oceans concert, in Melbourne, Australia in May 2017.