A silver gelatin dry plate glass negative in landscape format.

Country Always

Caring for Country

A Corner of the Empire

The Garden Palace

Sepia photograph of the Technological Museum and a cow in the foreground

The Holding Pen

The Agricultural Hall

Sepia photograph of the Technological College and Museum in Broken Hill

Regional Networks

Across New South Wales

A Museum of Doing

Technological Museum

Colour photograph of red corrugated iron building from a high vantage point

Transforming the Tramsheds

Powerhouse Stage 1 and the Harwood Building

A Symbol in Time

Sydney Observatory

Powerhouse Museum, Stage 2 exterior from high angle, city skyline in background

Ongoing Transformations

Powerhouse Ultimo

Blurred image from film with museum object number

Applied Arts and Sciences

Defining the terms in the 21st century

Figures of humans and objects overlayed.

Museum Folk

Sounding the Collection

Powerhouse Renewal

Artist Xin Liu floating with arm outstretched against a black background. She wears a full-length grey body suit with long sleeves with bare feet and hands.

Sydney Science Festival

Across Sydney10—17 Aug
Shadows cast by the Powerhouse Parramatta exoskeleton on concrete

Exoskeleton

Powerhouse Parramatta

A woman stands on stage in front of a large audience. She has her left hand raised in the air and a microphone in her right hand. The audience are holding their phones up recording the woman.

Blak Powerhouse

Powerhouse x We Are Warriors

Slider thumb2023
Stories

Museum Folk

Sounding the Collection
Ableton x Powerhouse Music with Salamanda
Figures of humans and objects overlayed.

To launch the Sounding the Collection sample pack from Powerhouse and Ableton, Salamanda, Jonnine and SOLLYY were commissioned to demonstrate how these sounds can be reimagined into music.

Salamanda is a Seoul-based electronic music Produce/DJ duo comprised of Uman (Sala and Tetsuby (Manda). Influence by 20th century minimalism, Salamanda's music is characterised by distinctive patterns and harmonies.

I thought it was a project that is similar with our slogan – every sound and noise can become music. So, while I usually choose samples for music production intuitively, this time I focused on listening to and selecting samples with small details.
Yetsuby (Manda)

Interview

I used ‘The Speaking Picture Book’ sample. It kind of sounded like a toy or very cute, and I used it as a background for vocals and percussion. So, I used this sample in two different ways and I think that was one of the fun parts I had during making this track.
Uman Therma (Sala)
Dark red book with child reading.
Object No. H7407
'The Speaking Picture Book'
Samples with texture, like bird cage mechanical, were interesting as they were sharp. I created rhythm using warping and panning.
Yetsuby (Manda)
Bird in a cage
Object No. A4208
Bird in a Cage Automation, Paris
We mostly put every sample into sampler. For this track I made a lot of percussion elements, so I put them in samplers and then gave them delays and reverb. The Toy Drummer Bear sample I used sounded kind of like a glass sound, like a clinking sound. I really love turning samples into that kind of percussion sound.
Uman Therma (Sala)
The song uses the theme of the Cerberus, which was a half-sunken ship near where I grew up, and I wanted to write a whimsical pop song. The genre would be under underwater pop.
Drummer toy bear
Object No. 85/2575-29
'Drummer Bear' clockwork operated toy
My first thought was to preserve this melody line while working on the track. But in the end, I decided to chop this sample and put it into a sampler. Then we composed our own melody. When I listen to the sample as a whole it makes me to take a trip to the past. But when I chopped it up and listened it makes me feel mysterious, which led me to develop it into a folk-inspired melody and chord progression.
Yetsuby (Manda)
Photo album with heavy leather cover, and cream cardboard pages printed in gold with polychrome floral borders.
Object No. H5397
Photo album with built in music box.
The sample music box felt mysterious and exotic, like a simple folk song.
Yetsuby (Manda)
Three black metal tuning forks laid flat in a row.
Object No. H5150
'Philharmonic Continental Society of Arts' tuning forks made by John Walker

Museum Folk – Salamanda

Used Samples

In their track Museum Folk, Salamanda used samples from eight objects in the Powerhouse collection. Here are the remainder, not listed above:

Pedestrian button with upward arrow atop.
1/3
Object No. 87/234
Traffic light pedestrian crossing buttons
Japanese lantern clock
Glycine hipsida (Soy Bean) botancial specimen

Artist

Salamanda is a Seoul-based electronic music Produce/DJ duo comprised of Uman (Sala and Tetsuby (Manda). Influence by 20th century minimalism, Salamanda's music is characterised by distinctive patterns and harmonies.

Sounding the Collection x Ableton Cover Image

Sample Pack

Download

Sounding the Collection sample pack from Ableton for free and read more about the Ableton Project.

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Creative Commons

Non-commercial with Attribution and Attribution Share-Alike licenses. Both require attribution and have limited restrictions. Attribution should be given as Powerhouse.

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Sounding the Collection

From an automaton bird cage, and an art deco clock to toy robots, tuning forks and steam engines, Sounding the Collection is a sonic archive from Powerhouse that brings objects sitting silent in the collection to audition.

The archive hosts over 100 recordings designed to be shared publicly inviting artistic interpretation and collaboration into the sonic archive. These recordings allow musicians, researchers, and sound designers globally to repurpose and interpret them via a ‘sample pack’ – potentially finding their way into sonic identities, movie soundtracks, foley, pop songs, and sound installations.

Powerhouse is working to fold sonic archives and sonic interpretation of the collection’s material culture. In addition to Sounding the Collection, the museum is host to a range of projects that activate and listens closely to its objects. This includes the Oscillations podcast series, collaborations with Research Fellows, and performances with collection instruments.

Powerhouse Collection

Powerhouse is custodian to more than half a million objects of national and international significance and is considered one of the finest and most diverse collections in Australia.

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Research Scholars

Powerhouse Museum operates an annual program to support research of the collection, museum practice, learning and public outcomes.

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