Dear Members of the Disquiet Junto,

Hello. It is the end of another year, and of another year of the Disquiet Junto. Every year we close things off with the same project, and then we start up again the next year with the same project. The first of those two projects, this week’s, is a diary, and the subsequent one, next week’s, is the “ice” project. We’ve been doing them both since 2012, when the Disquiet Junto first began.

And that just about covers it. The delayed playlist for project 0640 is plugging along, hung up by my having scheduled it at such a busy time of the year, and some complexity I built into it unintentionally. Anyhow, it’ll be up shortly(ish).

Thanks, as always, for your generosity with your time, creativity, and curiosity. Several of you have gotten in touch about the Junto Profiles interviews, and if I haven’t gotten back to you yet, I will be shortly. And there’s no deadline to ask to join in. Just lemme know if you’re interested.

Best from San Francisco,

Marc Weidenbaum
marc@disquiet.com

. . .

Disquiet Junto Project 0678: Commonplace Playlist
The Assignment: Create a sonic diary of the past year with a dozen (or more) super-brief segments.

As has become the tradition at the end of each calendar year, this week’s Junto project is a sound journal: a selective audio history of your past 12 months.

Step 1: You will select a different audio element to represent each of the past 12 months of 2024 — or you might opt for even more elements, choosing a segment for each week, or each day, for example. These audio elements will most likely be of music that you have yourself composed and recorded, but they might also consist of phone messages, field recordings, or other source material. These items should be somehow personal in nature, suitable to the autobiographical intention of the project; they should be of your own making, your own devising, and not drawn from third-party sources.

Step 2: You will then select one segment from each of these (most likely) dozen audio elements. If you’re doing a dozen items, one for each month, then five-second segments are recommended, for a total of one minute. Ultimately, though, the length of the segments and of the overall finished track are up to you.

Step 3: Then you will stitch these segments together, equally weighted, in chronological order to form one single track. There should be no overlap or gap between segments; they should simply proceed from one to the next.

Step 4: In the notes field accompanying the track, identify each of the audio segments.

Tasks Upon Completion:

Label: Include “disquiet0678” (no spaces/quotes) in the name of your track.

Upload: Post your track to a public account (SoundCloud preferred but by no means required). It’s best to focus on one track, but if you post more than one, clarify which is the “main” rendition.

Share: Post your track and a description/explanation at https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0678-commonplace-playlist/

Discuss: Listen to and comment on the other tracks.

Additional Details:

Length: The length is up to you. How many samples will you use, and how long will they be?

Deadline: Monday, December 30, 2024, 11:59pm (that is: just before midnight) wherever you are.

About: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Newsletter: https://juntoletter.disquiet.com/

License: It’s preferred (but not required) to set your track as downloadable and allowing for attributed remixing (i.e., an attribution Creative Commons license).

Please Include When Posting Your Track:

More on the 678th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Commonplace Playlist — The Assignment: Create a sonic diary of the past year with a dozen (or more) super-brief segments — at https://disquiet.com/0678/