Welcome to Canned Audio. Thank you for taking a moment out of your busy day to experience this space in a new way. These audio installations play on an indefinite mono loop in the restrooms on LL3, LL1, and Balcony Level 3 in The Lindemann Performing Arts Center at the discretion of BAI staff. This activation aims to transform a utility space into something new/unexpected. We hope you enjoy it.

AInauguration

Stephanie Obodda
Located on LL1 and Balconies

As a German major at Princeton, I read Freud’s essay Das Unheimliche. The word Heimlich has two conflicting meanings: homey/cozy and secret. Unheimlich is not simply the opposite; it is a mixture of the familiar and the strange.

AI embodies this duality, creating content that is realistic yet somehow unfamiliar - an unsettling digital doppelgänger. Once I recognized this, I felt compelled to collaborate with it artistically. I want to watch it interpret the human world, to see what it digs up from our collective unconscious.

My freshman year, I snuck into one of P. Adams Sitney’s screening of avant garde films. Kenneth Anger and Maya Deren flickered on the screen, and I felt like I was levitating an inch above my seat, only taking shallow breaths as not to break the spell. After the screening, the other students laughed and talked and left the room, and I wondered (and doubted) if anyone had this same experience as me. It was a moment that felt entirely my own, and made me feel even more removed from my classmates.

Here, I explore how my digital doppelgänger might experience an avant garde film (in this case, Kenneth Anger's Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome), to see if a large language model could also have an out of body experience.

Critical Inquiry

Aanya Kaur Agrawal
Located on LL1 and Balconies

Dreamscape (10.3-10.4)

Sophia Nicogossian
Located on LL1 and Balconies

Audio composition (10 minutes, 36 seconds) derived from sleep EEG, EOG, and EKG data.

The Red Umbrella

Evie Dumont, Hugo Pierre Martin
Located on LL3

This an episode of the diaries of netovicius the vampire performed by Brown Trinity MFA actor Evie Dumont. Recorded in the Granoff Recording Studio.

In Plain Listen

Jeanette Andrews
Located on LL1 and Balconies

The secret for one of the first magic effects in written history was translated into a Morse-code-based musical notation system to create this score for solo cello. It is performed in tandem with the original magic effect.

Commissioned by the University of Houston's Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center.

This work explores secrets that are hidden in plain sight, or in this case, plain listen. Andrews created a musical notation key to transform traditional Morse code beep sequences into a musical notation system. Andrews translated the text that describes the secret of a magic trick – one of the first to have been published in the West – into her Morse code musical notation system and then created a lush score for solo cello. What you will see is a performance which encodes the ancient secret in the form of music in tandem with a performance of the piece of magic that manifests that secret information in visual form. 

Recorded: January 26, 2023 • Ice Plant Recording Studio, NYC
Premiere: March 9, 2023 • University of Houston (Cello: Issei Herr)
New York City:  June 6, 2023 • National Arts Club, NYC (Cello: Iva Casian-Lakoš)
London:  July 11, 2023 • Magic Circle / British Society of Aesthetics (Cello: Rob Lewis)
Boston: September 20, 2023 • MIT Museum (Cello: Valerie Chen)
Providence: March 19, 2026 • Brown University

We Will Rise Again: A Post-Melissa Reflection (Episode 120 of Strictly Facts: A Guide to Caribbean History and Culture)

Alexandria Miller
Located on LL1 and Balconies

A storm can level homes, but it also reveals what we stand on. Hurricane Melissa’s record winds and devastating surge tore through Jamaica and neighboring territories, but the story is bigger than wind speed—it’s a living history of language, science, memory, and community that runs through the Caribbean. We trace the roots of “hurricane” to Taino and Kalinago cosmologies, revisit Cuba’s pioneering forecasting under Father Benito Viñez, and connect these legacies to today’s urgent fight for climate justice and long-term recovery.

I open up about the shock of seeing beloved places underwater and the ache of waiting on WhatsApp for family updates from afar. This episode offers more than reflection; it’s a roadmap. You’ll hear concrete ways to help now and sustain support later, from vetted donations and mutual aid to advocacy for loss-and-damage financing and regional capacity-building. If the Caribbean sits on the front lines of climate change while contributing the least to its causes, then fairness means resources, protection, and policy that match the stakes. Listen, share the links, and stand with communities rebuilding today for a safer tomorrow. If this conversation moved you, subscribe, leave a review, and pass it on so more people can act with us.

Field Recording 19

Constructed by DJ Potter

Locus Stream

The Locus Sonus Stream Project offers a worldwide network of "open mics" that permanently stream local soundscapes to a dedicated server. The resulting live audio is used in a large variety of artistic projects. The microphones are installed and maintained by volunteer participants. The nearest source to Brown University is currently in Leverett, Massachusetts, and is operated by Mike Bullock and Linda Gale Aubry at Ears In Space.
 Listen to the Leverett, MA, Live Stream

The Full Concept Unification Installation Tape