Beijing based musician and poet, Yan Jun, displays in a series of videos the development of his sonic practice. Part of his creative process involves self isolation in his studio space, a space where he hosts bi-monthly concerts, and he now likes to incorporate the use of the body within his performances.

Starting with a background of field recording and electronic music, Yan Jun displays his earlier performances. A table is set up with a range of electronic equipment, cables clearly in view. The audience is invited to take a look at the table; there are speakers facing upwards, their vibrations manipulated by Jun. Even from his earlier works, Jun can be clearly seen to have a likeness for incorporating the audience within his performance. Jun tells us the that the direct translation of “electronic music” in Chinese would be “table music”- appropriate, considering the set up displayed by Jun.

Although Jun’s development of his practice is highly interesting, his explanation of “dirty electronics” is what stuck with me most. The concept of “dirty electronics” encapsulates any artist’s nightmare- a poor sound / monitoring system. I have a recent unpleasant experience with this. At my most prolific DJ gig to date, I was playing the second room, designed to be a quieter atmosphere than the rest of the club. I didn’t want to sacrifice my artistic integrity by adapting to the crowd, especially as I had prepared a vinyl set, and only had what I had planned with me. Mixing vinyl, hearing is the most vital skill, as if I cannot hear properly, the mix will be muddy and out of sync, and unfortunately for me, the monitoring system was significantly poor. So how do we go about dealing with poor speakers and monitoring systems? Jun’s practice allows him to adapt to the given environment, adopting improvisation as a tool. Through improvisation, an artist can adjust their performance to any environment, which would eliminate fears of going against one’s artistic integrity as it is a part of it. Though my sonic practices are very different to Jun’s, I can learn from him to be able to become more comfortable in a performance setting.