MOBILE SOUNDSCAPES & STORYTELLING

Producing BBC documentaries has been the place where the founders of Historyworks, Jon Calver (Technical & Business Director) and Helen Weinstein (Creative Director) have learnt and honed their skills as storytellers and sound engineers to be programme makers.  Founding the media production company Historyworks was a way of being able to make more experimental art works and sound poems for heritage sites and arts projects, in addition to recording and producing sound content and film content for broadcasters. 

For experimental art works and traditional heritage narratives, Historyworks has devised and contributed to a range of mobile soundscapes and storytelling projects in cityscapes such as London and in York, and in rural situations, like the 'Downsteam' art work for Common Ground's 'Confluence' HLF project along the River Stour. 

Because Historyworks had already made mobile heritage products and sound installations in diverse projects in other landscapes, with Historyworks moving to Cambridge in 2013, Jon and Helen were keen to develop a project for people in Cambridge. With Helen's recent fellowship at Clare Hall at the University of Cambridge, it was super helpful last year to talk to a range of practitioners to share our idea for a project in the city, where you could explore the cityscape and potter around the streets listening to stories and a soundscape of poetry and song and drama inspired by the history of the place. 

The Mobile Heritage Conference was a great inspiration, and Historyworks was inundated with requests to visit museums and heritage institutions across Cambridgeshire. 

HISTORYWORKS ACTIVITY IN CAMBRIDGE

The genesis of the Cycle of Songs project in Cambridge therefore started with a series of meetings with potential partners to talk about history trails and sound scape projects.  Co-Directors of Historyworks, Jon Calver & Helen Weinstein ran workshops in Cambridge for the first time with a range of museum practitioners during the Autumn and Winter of 2013, providing practical guidance and coaching about storytelling, audio experiences through history trails, sound installations and films, talking too about the potential for apps and websites and videos to provide online resources, and how walking the streets listening to history can be very engaging.

'MUSEUMS SHOWOFF' EVENT AT CAMBRIDGE JUNCTION

“Museums ShowOff” event on 30th October at the Cambridge Junction welcomed Helen Weinstein back to the city by inviting her to give a presentation about how museums and galleries might tempt audiences to visit their premises and explore their collections by making trails via online websites and apps, and finding new audiences through cross-over art and sound installations. 

Photograph of Helen's presentation at Cambridge Junction courtesy of University of Cambridge Museum blog:

Helen gave examples of her experiences in York where Historyworks had produced a variety of work to tempt the public to connect with the heritage all around them, via personally guided history walks for the public (such as their ground-breaking Jewish History walk), sound installations in heritage buildings (such as their Minster Voices), and storytelling through the city scape (such as their “To Fight or Not to Fight” audio drama at the Guildhall); audio trails and apps to allow the public to have self-guided experiences (such as their audio history trails made in partnership with York Museum Trust and IPUP intern placement students from the humanities’ departments at the University of York).  Helen explained her role as a public historian entailed working with University researchers, artistic talent in the cultural sectors, community groups, and with major broadcasters.  

PARTNERSHIP EXPERTISE AT HISTORYWORKS

Helen explained that partnership and free audio products, can be a good method to draw in audiences to connect in new ways with galleries, museums and heritage sites and the heritage cityscape, because high quality and unique online resources can be a great way to reach audiences beyond the museum walls. She finished her presentation by inviting Cambridge heritage institutions to take up her offer to have help from Historyworks to explore what broadcast and technical media might suit their needs, and to scope what funded projects they might collaborate on to deliver new heritage products.

APP 101 - HELPING PRACTITIONERS LEARN THE APP LANDSCAPE

To help practitioners understand Apps, Jon Calver at Historyworks made this short online explanatory film called “App 101” to share with those we work with.  It is presented as an audio guide with a powerpoint presentation by Historyworks.

Historyworks welcomes practitioners sharing App101 on facebook & on websites & newsletters because Helen found that there was NOT a great deal of knowledge about the choices between app iOS and android Googleplay and the popularity of the various devices.  This film was super helpful therefore to showcase the different tech choices for delivering an app, explaining the issues of definition and resolution on apps, and ending with a review of the top Apps that have been made for heritage sites in the UK.  Do watch and listen:

SOUND INSTALLATIONS USING AUDIO BOO AND CALVIUM APP FURNACE

Because Historyworks tends to make audio tours and sound installations to make pieces of art in sound that reveal untold stories, it has been really important to use a stable provider to deliver audio streaming at high quality, and Historyworks has used audiboo for this purpse.  In addition, it has been important to source  a company that can provide a method to pin audio at a location, so the audience can walk through the right place whilst listening to a sound feature on their phone or ipad.

In heritage consultations, Jon and Helen particularly recommend the geo-located technology provided by the Bristol-based company Calvium.  The proceeding year, the research and intern students at Historyworks had reviewed and tested various apps with Helen, and the top rated heritage apps by far were King’s Cross Stories and the National Trust Heritage Trail of Soho both delivered by App Furnace, Calvium's product.

It was therefore no coincidence that once we were exploring the potential for a tender for Cambridge for a soundscape project, that Calvium’s app furnace with its geo-located capabilities became the top choice for delivering the soundscape app for Cycle of Songs.

THE TENDER PROCESS

With Historyworks moved to Cambridge in 2013 and after a series of Autumn talks and workshops offered to Arts and Heritage sites, - and having visited many practitioners to explore ways in which Historyworks might make mobile heritage happen in the city with history trails, soundscapes and app tecnhology, - it followed that Helen Weinstein, as Creative Director of Historyworks, received an invitation on 11th December 2013 from Cambridge City Council invitating Historyworks to tender for the Arts Council England funding to produce an Art Work for the city to mark the Tour de France visiting in July 2014.

During the development phase, Helen Weinstein as Creative Director of Historyworks and Jon Calver as Technical and Business Director of Historyworks, contacted a range of potential composers and choir leaders, local history professionals and heritage practitioners to discuss how best to create an experience that would enhance Cambridge's sense of place. 

Historyworks was the organization invited to tender for the funding and Helen suggested to Jon to invite Marcus Romer from Pilot Theatre to team up and together deliver the idea of a musical walking route around Cambridge offering untold stories delivered in a soundscape with lyrics and musicians and poets and choirs.  

Helen Weinstein, as a professional historian, in addition to being the Creative Director took the leadership for identifying the key history stories and potential artists for co-creating the pieces, and when Marcus Romer of Pilot Theatre came on board on 4th January for the first partnership meeting to shape up our tender bid together and walk Cambridge's Tour de France route together, a large number of the potential stories had been scoped, and several of the potential artists contacted.  What was needed for the project was an ambition of scale, which is why Historyworks approached Marcus Romer.

Jon Calver, Tehnical and Business Director of Historyworks agreed that having experienced the outdoor drama 'Blood and Chocolate" set outdoors in York's cityscape the previous Autumn, and enjoyed the experience when we worked with Marcus Romer to help us source voices for our BBC Radio features about York in World War One, teaming up with Pilot Theatre's artistic director, Marcus, offered the prospect of creating a winning project for Cambridge.   And so it was agreed that we would use the history storyelling and community project building expertise of Helen Weinstein, with the audio recording production and editing technical expertise of Jon Calver, to a scale and ambition made possible by the live expertise of Marcus Romer.

Photographic evidence of Helen delivering the packet containing the tender submission on January 17th! 

Following our pitch to the panel on 28th January, and being told of our winning the tender on 30th January, it was therefore decided that the project would be delivered by an equitabble partnership between the two organizations: - Historyworks and Pilot Theatre.  For VAT and accountancy reasons and because Pilot had more experience of production management for outdoor public events, it was decided that Pilot be the contracted organization, and we went forward using a contractual MOU to equitably negotiate the budget and tasks, with Historyworks taking all the responsibility for the creative content with contractual and consent negotiations for artists, performers, venues - and with Pilot Theatre overseeing the payments and overall budget.  

It was agreed that the production tasks would all be delivered by the Creative Director of Historyworks, Helen Weinstein, to shape the creative elements of devising the research, commissioning the artists, collaborating with the composers and poets and lyricists to utilise the history sources as inspiration for their pieces, source and work with the choirs and musicians, create and organize the partnerships for the events and venues, devise and manage the live performances, and deliver the website and the photography and film assets.  It was agreed that Jon Calver as Technical and Business Director of Historyworks was to manage the delivery of audio assets, scope the venues and provide the appropriate kit and sound engineers, overseeing all the essential recording and editing elements to support the choirs up to and including the performances for the app album.  It was agreed for Marcus Romer, Artistic Director of Pilot Theatre, to manage the app delivery with the company Calvium, and oversee the overall shape of the branding and marketing and messaging of the project, including delivering a final evaluation report to the funding panel.

For press for the project - do use the Cycle of Songs website at www.cyleofsongs.com to find all the resources - and call Helen Weinstein who is the lead for the project with any questions or to book interivews with Artissts - 07974-827-753

For an overview of the roles on the project, do see the Cycle of Songs roles/responsibilities here:

The project is delivered by an equitable partnership between two organizations who have come together to win the tender: HistoryWorks and Pilot Theatre.  Pilot Theatre are the contracted organisation and manage the budget, HistoryWorks are contracting the artists and choirs, venues and crews. The Creative Direction is delivered by Helen Weinstein, Creative Director of HistoryWorks and the Technical Direction is delivered by Jon Calver, Technical & Business Director of HistoryWorks. The Artistic Direction is delivered by Marcus Romer, Artistic Director of Pilot Theatre.  Helen Weinstein is engaged as overall Producer with the Historyworks team who are responsible for the delivery of the assets and commissions for live performances and for their use on the app and website. Also to deliver the outward facing media delivery of website and photography, video and audio assets.