David and Ben Crystal Discuss Original Pronunciation

Linguist (and author of the Dictionary of Original Shakespearean Pronunciation, forthcoming from the Oxford University Press) David Crystal and his son the actor Ben Crystal (see image below of Ben recording Donne's Gunpowder Day sermon for 1622) were recently featured in an extended conversation about Original Pronunciation on BBC Radio 4, on the Word of Mouth program.
















Go here -- http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b06ycr4v -- for their conversation about the theory and practice of Original Pronunciation Early Modern English.

The program is very informative, and includes lots of examples of their work.

The Virtual St Paul's Cathedral Project is honored to have David and Ben as part of our Production Team.
 

David and Ben Crystal in the Recording Studio

David  Crystal and his son Ben Crystal have released original pronunciation recordings under the sponsorship of the British Library. 

David's recording is of the Gospel of St Matthew, in the translation of William Tyndale (see image above). Ben's is of several of the sonnets as well as of speeches and scenes from various of Shakespeare's plays.

On this recording, Ben is joined by actors Learn more about Ben Crystal's work in drama, including more original pronunciation Shakespeare here:

http://www.passioninpractice.com/


David and Ben are, of course, members of the Production Team for The Virtual Cathedral Project. 

Ben is the voice of John Donne in original pronunciation, delivering Donne's sermon for November 5th, 1622 for the Virtual Paul's Cross Project, using a script of Donne's sermon prepared by his father David.

Damian Murphy Helps Create Lost Spaces in Live Performance

Damian Murphy, a member of the Virtual Cathedral Project's Advisory Committee and Reader in Audio and Music Technology at the University of York, has recently been involved in a project to model the acoustics of York's St Mary's Abbey.

This project led to a live performance by members of the Ebor Singers this past September 25th, 2015 of a new composition for voice entitled Archite​x​ture II, by composer Ambrose Field.

Dating from 1088, St Mary’s Abbey was one of the largest Benedictine establishments in the north of England. Yet since ​its dissolution in ​1540, it has declined into ruin. 

A cross-disciplinary team from the University of York is ​bringing the space back to life, ​by re-constructing the acoustics and sounds of the building. 

Dr Jude Brereton, Dr Helena Daffern, and Amelia Gully from the Department of Electronics at the University of York led the real-time application of the reconstructed acoustic, originally modeled by Stephen Oxnard and Dr Damian Murphy. 

Through use of augmented reality acoustics, the audience gathered in the Abbey's ruins heard the composition as though it were being performed in the Abbey before it was abandoned in 1540, during the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII. 

This project reflects recent developments in the technology of recording because it means that recordings of sounds for playback through acoustic models of lost spaces no longer have to be made in anechoic chambers to eliminate ambient noise from the recording.

Field’s work was composed to take full advantage of the 11-second reverberation time of the original building. 

You can hear part of Field's composition and get a feeling for the reverberation time of the reconstructed space by going here:

 http://www.eborsingers.org/#!news/cwpd

You can read more about the composition here:

https://ambrosefield.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/architexture-ii-st-marys-reconstructed/

You can learn more about the event on S3ptember 25th here:

https://www.york.ac.uk/news-and-events/news/2015/events/yornight-finale-2015/ 

The Virtual Cathedral Project will incorporate, in future manifestations, both this new recording technique, as well as new modes of display for the visual model, such as 3-D visual modeling technology. 

Paul's Cross Co-PI's Featured by NC State Arts

David Hill and I were featured in the fall 2015 issue of #creativestate, the official magazine of ARTS NC STATE, the visual and performing arts program here on campus in Raleigh.

Appropriate for our use of digital technology in the Virtual Paul's Cross Project, the image above is a digital construct. 

Our schedules did not mesh when the magazine's photographers needed to make this shot, so David and I were photographed on different days, standing before projected images of the Gipkin painting of Paul's Cross. 

Virtual St Paul's Cathedral Project Receives Major NEH Grant

The Virtual St Paul's Cathedral Project has been awarded a Digital Humanities Implementation Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. 

For the official announcement of the grant on the NEH's website, go here:

http://www.neh.gov/news/press-release/2015-07-28

The official story says they gave away 36+ million dollars and lists a few typical recipients (but not us).

To get the the list of the actual grants and their recipients, click on the link they provide, which takes you to a 38-page pdf, and you will find us on page 29.

There, you will learn that we have been funded to do "further work on a three-dimensional, immersive model of the visual and aural environment of St. Paul's Cathedral and Churchyard as they stood in London during the early 17th century. 

"The project would also further develop and publicly release open-source software for the modeling and representation of sound in historic spaces."

The news was delivered by William Adams, Chairman of the NEH, in person, during a visit to NC State University to see the Installation of the Virtual Paul's Cross Project at NC State's Hunt Library.

For a fuller account of the announcement at NC State, go here:

https://news.ncsu.edu/2015/07/digital-humanities-team-not-donne-yet/

This is very exciting news, indeed!