Mikhail Borzenkov: ‘Sound Art Is Music Freed from the Dictate of Melody’
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Sound is a combination of different frequencies waves surrounding us every second. And sound is also the basis upon which the track of ‘Sound Art & Sound Studies’ at HSE Art and Design School is built. What is sound art? How is it perceived and what is it in practice? How and why does it intersect with the world of audiophilia? We discussed these topics and much more with Mikhail Borzenkov—a well-known audiophile, TV presenter, blogger, and the new curator of the ‘Sound Art and Sound Studies’ track.
Mikhail Borzenkov
Curator of the ’Sound Art & Sound Studies’ track at the HSE Art and Design School, instructor of the ‘Video blogging in the Music Industry’ course. Journalist, TV presenter, videoblogger, musician, DJ, audiophile.
— Mikhail, you have held a great number of jobs in your life, but sound seems to be the most important for you. How did your ‘sound’ story begin?
— I practically became an audiophile from birth (laughs). My dad once bought a record player ‘Electronica B1-01,’ and after that, there was no money left to provide for the baby. So, I slept in the box from the record player. That record player still works, it’s at my father’s place. I fixed it two years ago. I have a degree and am a history teacher. In my third year of college, I started working at a state television and radio company and then I moved from television work to blogging.
After mastering the basic skills of working with images, I returned to sound and dedicated myself to it in the form of my own video blog on YouTube. My blog still remains one of the most popular in the field of Hi-Fi and Hi-End in the world.
Among my subscribers, I have been promoting sound art for a long time, and I regularly play records of my favourite eccentric performers at various audio events. It turned out that there is a whole cohort of people at the HSE Art and Design School, who not only promote but also engage in sound art. This art, by the way, is no worse than any foreign one, and maybe even better, because it is original, authentic. For example, we have our own synthesisers, from Soma Laboratory, and our department is equipped with them. As I remember, my English colleagues asked me to bring them to London… Thanks to HSE, I met those performers whose recordings I have been listening to for many years. I still have their records in my collection. I mean, Kurt Liedwart, the founder of Mikroton Recordings and Ton Editions, Gleb Glonti, the founder of Kotä Records, and, finally, Alexey Borisov, a living legend of Russian electronic music…. Of course, I could not help but join these people.
— What is ‘the love for good sound’ from your point of view?
— The task of high-level audio equipment is to reveal the maximum details of the music compositions created by authors and performed by musicians. But it also has another important goal: to reveal new aspects of music through technical means. Firstly, you find pleasure in the sound on a purely physiological level, and secondly, it opens up completely new perspectives in musical development for you. For example, if you always listen to your favourite songs through a radio or a mobile phone, when you encounter other music, you don’t understand why you need it. And then you listen to the same songs on Hi-End equipment, and you encounter that other music, but thanks to the fact that it is presented in sound perfection, you might be captivated by how the low frequencies sound, hear previously unheard sounds that suddenly emerge... Audiophilia introduces a person to a completely new musical world and elevates them to a new, higher level.
— So, it was through audiophilia that you ended up at the HSE Art and Design School and its ‘Sound Art and Sound Studies’ track, right?
— Exactly! Such an art form as sound art is entirely based on exploiting not so much the harmony as the timbre. It is therefore ideal for listening on serious audio equipment, revealing the essence of what is happening. Sound art is music freed from the dictate of melody, one of the peaks of the development of human artistic culture, which consists, on the one hand, of creating sound canvases, but equally of a system of principles and technology for perceiving these canvases. Therefore, here, the equipment for sound reproduction and its creation conceptually converge, and as a result, you find yourself in a world of sounds that, thanks to modern technology, you can create for yourself, live in, and constantly discover new aspects and depth.
Sound Laboratory of the HSE Art and Design School
— What exactly will you do at the HSE Art and Design School?
— I will certainly promote the ‘Sound Design and Sound Studies’ track at best. I will create a video blog about our direction of studies, from which viewers will learn about our life, what is happening with us, what interesting subjects we teach, what they can do at our School, how they can experiment with sound and create sound special objects—and even master conceptual DJing, not just track mixing. I will also have my own original course ‘Video blogging in the music industry.’
— If possible, could you tell us a little bit more about it?
— This course has another name for our own use, ‘How to make a video blog without spending a single extra penny.’ My experience is based exclusively on using my own skills, without any additional resources, to occupy my, albeit small, but still distinct niche in this world, and relying only on the natural algorithms of platforms where social networks operate. So, I will try to explain through my own example how to crystallise your format, how to find techniques that work and discard those that do not, how to find your identity that will allow you to build a loyal community of followers, and not those who clicked because of advertising, liked and then forgot about you forever.