Andrew Greaves and I have released an album of the work we made as part of our residency at The Rose Hill in 2022.

The audio sources and ideas for Inside Journeys were sourced by making instrumental recordings in the space to use as textures, recordings of soundings of objects we found, and field recordings made over the course of the residency. I recorded chairs creaking, barrels rolling, glasses being rubbed and and scratched, and all of these are in the mix. Andrew took pictures and filmed the space and the objects scattered throughout.

We spoke to Dave and Gill Barwood, who visited the pub in the late 1980’s, as well as Jim Purbrick who shared a tale of visiting more recently as part of an immersive art performance, and collected memories of the Rose Hill from regulars and local residents. Andrew worked with the Brighton Past group who shared their stories of the pub over the years.

We worked on a text score and used extensive rehearsals and discussion to refine the sound of the piece, which was added to by local historian Dr Geoffrey Mead who we consulted with on the piece, and who gave a series of vignettes on the history of the area around the Rose Hill as part of the performance. 

Andrew created themes and rhythmic motifs based on his exploration of popular songs of the kind that might have been performed in the Rose Hill from the 1930s onwards. His sound palette is suggestive of the audio technology of the time. I used software to manipulate the audio sources recorded in-situ, as well as working with amplified objects sourced from the Rose Hill.

Andrew’s photos and film footage were turned into a complementary visual work by Brighton Synth Explorer, Programmer, and Sound Designer Symmetrical Forces. The performance was complemented by audio interviews played throughout the space to create an immersive, open ended experience during the course of the whole evening.

You can listen and download the album free here: