newsmusic
2002
string quartet, soundtrack
16min.
Newsreaders have in the last fifty years been the medium through which
the ideal form of a language, "BBC English" for example, has often been
presented and upheld. In recent years this unity has been breaking down
with stations such as CNN having to include speakers from across the
globe in their attempt at international coverage. In South Africa the
attempt to include readers from all groups of the population has led to
newsbroadcasts in which English is spoken with a range of inflections
and accents. Instead of lamenting this phenomenon I decided to see the
music in it and use it as the basis of my string quartet.
Alongside the speech inflections themselves the form of the
Newsbroadcast is also of interest in itself. Every night an extremely
wide range of content is pressed into the same format that while
providing a convenient grid by which to process the varied information
on offer somehow also neutralizes the character of the stories being
told.
The basic material for the piece is taken from the eight o'clock news
as broadcast by the South African Broadcasting Corporation during the
first week of November 2000.
NEWSMUSIC
Top Stories Tonight:
- Shocking footage of police brutality
- The race for the US presidency heads towards a nail biting finish
- Government blamed for not doing enough to contain foot & mouth
Good evening and welcome to the news at eight.
- SABC news has obtained footage of possibly the most blatant ...
- Two years ago six members of the North East Rand Dog Unit ...
- What I think we need to do is to identify these people and get ...
- That is a blatant display of racism that is likely to cause serious ...
- A team of detectives drawn from the Special Task Force and serious and...
- Late this afternoon six members of the North East Rand Dog Unit ...
- We have effected the arrest of six police officers here at the ...
- All six men will be held until their court appearances later this week.
- This shocking proof of police brutality and racism is the subject of ...
A russian built passenger plane has crashed in northern Angola ...
- Rescuers battled downpours throughout the night at Taipei airport ...
- We heard a loud bang and next thing we knew the plane was sliding ...
- The death toll is expected to rise as many of the injured suffered ...
Israeli soldiers have killed five Palestinians in the West Bank ...
- The latest victims of the violence are two teenagers and a policeman.
- Here tonight I continue to call on the palestinian leadership for the ...
- In Gaza palestinian leader Jasser Arafat met with german chancellor ...
The Azanian Peoples Organisation president Mosebudi Mangena ...
- Pampierstad is a poverty stricken town where people struggle to ...
- Well we are promising something different and that is service with ...
Leaders of the Rebel Movement for the Liberation of the Congo ...
- Rebels in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have vowed to ...
Former president Nelson Mandela has commended countries ...
- Madiba who is widely regarded as an icon of reconciliation and ...
- “So when I was invited here, I said not, here is a source of publicity ...”
- The theme of Madiba's address the importance of democracy in ...
- “When you have such independent such independent bodies, ...”
- Mandela said he had always welcomed scrutiny from such institutions ...
- “It was to me, never reason for irritation, but rather a source of ...”
- The conference ends tomorrow, Bheki Ngube, SABC, Durban.
President Thabo Mbeki has called for an end to speculation ...
- Mbeki extended condolences to the Mankathlana family on behalf of ...