1976
0001_4.jpeg)
The Water Whistle works done throughout the US (17 works for different pools from 1971-74, see volume I) were the original underwater music made with whistles. I started using the title Underwater Music later when I began using electronics. Max Neuhaus
____
At the MPIWG, I will research Neuhaus’s activities in West Germany, 1976–1977, encompassing his DAAD artist residency and creation of underwater sound installations in public swimming pools. Collectively known as Underwater Music, these works were among Neuhaus’s earliest experiments with the electronic circuit to create continuous, immersive sonic environments. I will analyze the technological, artistic, and cultural forces that supported Neuhaus’s experiments in underwater sound generation and perception, including the artist’s unexpected connections to the American corporate and militaristic ambitions of Bell Labs and the U.S. Navy’s Underwater Sound Reference Division (USRD), in addition to the public radio stations Rundfunk im amerikanischen Sektor (RIAS) and Radio Bremen. My research provides a naturally interdisciplinary frame for contextualizing Neuhaus’s emergent sound installation practice as circumscribed by conflicts between new music, sonic art, public space, acoustical engineering, and the geopolitics of listening.