1st Edition

The Routledge Companion to the Sound of Space

Edited By Emma-Kate Matthews, Jane Burry, Mark Burry Copyright 2025
522 Pages 109 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

522 Pages 109 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

522 Pages 109 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

This companion explores a range of conceptual and practical relationships between sound and space across various disciplines, providing insights from technical, creative, cultural, political, philosophical, psychological, and physiological perspectives. The content spans a wide range of spatial typologies, from large reverberant buildings to modest and intimate ones, from external public squares... Read more

List of figures

List of tables

List of contributors

Introduction

Emma-Kate Matthews and Jane Burry

Part I: Architectural acoustics

Jane Burry

Chapter 1: Designed extremes

Shane Myrbeck

Chapter 2: Introducing acoustic shadows

Pantea Alambeigi and Jane Burry

Chapter 3: Transferring the impression of real and imaginary spaces

Philip J B Jackson and Philip D Coleman

Chapter 4: Beyond the sweet spot: Sound, space and emotion

Raj Patel, Iain Forsyth & Jane Pollard and Gerrie Van Noord

Chapter 5: Architectural acoustics of the Sagrada Família Basílica

Sipei Zhao and Mark Burry

Chapter 6: Intimate acoustic environments on record

Emil Kraugerud

Chapter 7: Embracing subtlety: Reflections on an acoustic surface of glass

Zackery Belanger, Catie Newell and Wes McGee

 

Part II: The psychology and physiology

Jane Burry

Chapter 8: Immersive Ambisonic spatial audio design for extreme environments

Stuart Favilla

Chapter 9: In an open (music) field. Space and time notation for representing landscape

David Buck and Carla Molinari

Chapter 10: Lend me your ears

Michael Fowler

Chapter 11: Imagining together

Nina Garthwaite

Chapter 12: Aural diverse spatial perception: From paracusis to panacusis loci

John Levack Drever

Chapter 13: On sonic growth and form; biometric evolution of sound and space

Paul Bavister

Chapter 14: Infrastructures of inaudibility: The spatial politics of assistive listening

Jonathan Tyrrell

 

Part III: Philosophy and politics

Mark Burry

Chapter 15: Reading aloud: The vocalisation of living space

Paul Carter

Chapter 16: From affordances to value chains: Probing the system of sound, space, and public

Sven Anderson

Chapter 17: On vibrational architectures

Gascia Ouzounian (Text) and Jan St. Werner (Images)

Chapter 18: House of silence, of stillness, of solitude

Mark Taylor

Chapter 19: Dimensionless space (with serrated edges and sucking noises): Intimacy, ASMR, micro-magic, sensory scholarship, and other taboos

David Toop

Chapter 20: Posthuman listening to the more-than-human soundscape

Jordan Lacey

Chapter 21: Towards a topology of music

Ildar Khannanov

Chapter 22: Sound’s spatial-material circuitry

Raviv Ganchrow

Chapter 23: Place, sound, and architecture

Jeff Malpas

Chapter 24: Shaping sounds of future environments

Eleni-Ira Panourgia

Part IV: Sound art and music

Emma-Kate Matthews

Chapter 25: Spatiosonic dialogues: Exploring architecture's role in music composition and performance

Emma-Kate Matthews

Chapter 26: In praise of emptiness: A future for performance venues

Fabricio Mattos

Chapter 27: Opera in the bathhouse: Exploring an acoustically led approach to dramaturgy and scenography

Rosalind Parker and Pedro Novo

Chapter 28: Sound, space and the Iko loudspeaker – the apparent paradox of diversity with unity

Angela Mcarthur and Emma Margetson

Chapter 29: Intimate sound: Making known, curating and composing for small spaces

Lawrence Harvey

Chapter 30: Listening with, listening toward: Proposing graphic transcription as a means of (re)hearing space

Ben Mcdonnell

Chapter 31: Site-oriented music curation. Contouring the listening spaces

Sasha Elina

Chapter 32: Notes from the far field

Philip Samartzis

Chapter 33: Fluid architectures and aural sculpturality – towards an aesthetic of sonic spatio-temporal environments

Gerriet Krishna Sharma

Chapter 34: Acoustic atlas - an orchestra of echoes

Cobi Van Tonder

Index

Biography

Emma-Kate Matthews is an architect, composer, musician, and researcher. Her work explores the creative intersections between sonic and spatial practices through the production of site-responsive and spatialised audiovisual projects.

Jane Burry is an architect and Head of the School of Architecture and Civil Engineering at the University of Adelaide. Her research leverages digital fabrication with simulation and feedback to create better, more sensitive, human-centric spaces through linking to environmental and perceptual experiences including the auditory.

Mark Burry AO is an architect and the Founding Director of the Smart Cities Research Institute (SCRI) at Swinburne University of Technology. His role is to lead the development of a whole-of-university research approach to ‘urban futures’, helping ensure that our future cities anticipate and meet the needs of all – smart citizens participating in the development of smart cities.