Every Friday in the fall, Sennott Street between Atwood Street and Meyren Avenue is closed for a farmer’s market. Most of the vendors are regulars and some have formed relationships with frequent customers. Still, most of the market’s patrons are college students passing by on their way home. The market is a great place for poor college students to get fresh produce at reasonable prices. There are also baked goods, a meat truck and if we’re lucky, the hummus guy with his endless free samples.
As you walk into the market from Atwood Street, the pies and cookies are the first table on your left. The women of an Amish family make and sell these treats. The young girls, no older than fourteen, are timid and shy. Next to the baked goods is a produce table. Though many members of a farming family will work at the stand, it is often the matriarchs that are in control. It’s a strange transition from the quiet Amish women next door.
There’s always a certain buzz in the farmers market. It’s Friday, so friends who run into each other make plans for the evening. Students get excited about fresh fruits and vegetables, a once staple in their diet that is now lacking due to monetary restrictions. At the same time, the market’s locale is only a block from Forbes Ave, so the traffic and commotion of the city can still be heard in the background. Students plan a healthy dinner, then make plans to poison their bodies with alcohol. There’s chatter about peaches and squash, but the roar of the bus engine on Forbes can be heard in the background. It’s an interesting mix of natural and urban interactions and I’d like to capture it.
Rough Soundscape
Revised Soundscape Proposal
After we discussed my soundscape proposal as a class, I’ve decided to make a few minor adjustments to my plan. I originally planned to focus more on what people said rather than the other sounds of the farmers market. I think it would more interesting to capture the other sounds of the market, like coins rumbling, footsteps and plastic bags. To ensure my soundscape sounds like farmers market, I want to make the conversations I record more specific. I want to record the farmers and/or venders discussing their produce with customers. This is probably for the best because I realized it’s going to be harder to record personal conversations that I anticipated. Its going to difficult to record people without them wondering why I am so close. This is why I plan to record the market sounds and city background sounds more than the conversations themselves.