Frederic Boulton at the controls of the first full-size Phonic Disc Score Plotter, ca 1872 ( Source: Boulton Instrument Workshop Archives):
Sound Art
The Institute has a long history of supporting research and presentation of contemporary sound art in projects ranging from installations such as the QR Anthology, co-produced with Poetry Gabriola and the Xenographic Society, to multi-channel soundscape installations at HIVE, the 2022 and 2023 Forest Fest Sound Symposia, online and as part of various film and video projects.
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​One of the focal points of the Institute's acousmatic research are alternate and legacy sound recording and production technologies, some of which have only recently been discovered, notably various prototypes of Augmented Wire Recorders — apparently created locally and based on the Telegraphone recording system invented by Valdemar Poulsen in 1898. Fortunately, some of these experimental recorders are still functional, and are currently being field-tested by some of the institute's audio specialists.
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Gabriola Island: A Pioneering
Environment for Sound Art and
Acousmatic Experimentation
Even more astounding perhaps, is the 'Phonic Disc Crystal Lattice Composition and Recording System — an invention that uses a crystal matrix to encode sound and may have been invented as early as the late 1860s — contemporary with Thomas Edison's prototype wax cylinder recorders, and predating the invention of the synthesizer by more than fifty years.
An archival collection of phonic discs and algorithmic scoring sheets, along with at least two functional devices was recently discovered at the long abandoned Boulton Instrument Workshop. It is still uncertain whether the technology was actually developed on the island, or whether it was brought there by the Boulton settler family. To date, no other examples of this unique method of creating and capturing audio information has been discovered in Canada.
Based on the stock of sound files that could be recovered, it appears that phonic discs were used as an early form of opto-mechanical sound creation and storage technology, which was remarkable in several respects: It used an algorithmic form of programming, possibly derived from the work of Wilhelm Leibnitz ( there is some evidence of correspondence on the topic between Leibnitz and Fergus Boulton during the 1860s )
encoded on resin-infused hemp paper 'score sheets'. It is also the first known system that allows for stereophonic as well as monophonic sound reproduction.
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The institute is currently working toward the creation of a searchable sonic archive and database that will make these documents available for the first time to researchers and to the public.
Feature Exhibition
The Phonic Disc
Crystal Lattice Composition System
August 1 to December 31, 2025
In the latter half of the 19th century — an era marked by the industrial revolution and the birth of modern sound recording — a little-known but extraordinary invention briefly surfaced in scientific and artistic circles: the Crystal Lattice Phonic Disc System (CLPDS). Preceding the phonograph’s commercial triumph yet largely overshadowed by it, the CLPDS was a pioneering attempt to capture and manipulate sound using the internal architecture of crystalline materials rather than wax or mechanical grooves.
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Developed in part by experimental physicists exploring the emerging field of crystallography, the system employed highly polished quartz discs whose internal lattice structures were sensitive to vibrational imprinting. When exposed to ambient sound under controlled conditions, the molecular bonds within the crystal would undergo minute yet stable deformations — effectively encoding sound at a microscopic level. Specialized playback devices, typically involving focused beams of light or precision mechanical styluses, would then interpret these distortions and convert them back into audible form.
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The implications for both science and art were profound. Naturalists could capture the soundscapes of forests, oceans, and industrial cities with unprecedented fidelity, preserving entire sonic environments for future study. Meanwhile, composers and avant-garde thinkers began to recognize the CLPDS as more than a recording tool: the visual patterns within the deformed lattice could be read as a form of graphic score, suggesting new approaches to composition. By carefully altering the crystalline structure — through mechanical pressure, chemical treatment, or light refraction — artists could shape sound as though sculpting a physical object.
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Although the phonograph ultimately proved more commercially viable, the CLPDS occupies a fascinating place in the history of acoustic technology, hinting at a 19th-century vision of sound as both a preserved artifact and a malleable artistic material, blurring the line between listening and composing in a truly modern way.
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White Heart Public House, ca. 1907
From a preliminary survey of the recordings, it appears that they were used primarily to record social events on Gabriola island and the surrounding area, such as the weekly White Hart Public House meetings, musical events, i.e. mainly house concerts, and notably the earliest recordings of natural soundscapes, including the first known attempts at underwater sound recordings.
As wire recordings were limited in length by the material properties of the magnetic alloy used, in quality by the considerable amount of induction-induced cross-talk between adjacent spools, and in longevity due to factors such as corrosion, the remaining recordings offer only brief but nevertheless tantalizing glimpses into the sonic world of Gabriola island and the surrounding area during the very early 1900s. Despite some of their shortcomings, they constitute a trove of historical and ecological information and insoiration, and we are very pleased to offer some examples here.
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House Concert, Degnen Bay, ca. 1902
Whale Song (?), ca. 1912
Prototype Phonic Disc Score Plotter, ca. 1869.
Photo: Boulton Archive
Various Models of Single Channel Phonic Disc Players, ca 1871 ( Source: Boulton Instrument Workshop Archives):
From the Special Collection :
Phonic Disc Aleatory Score Sheets
Experimental Sound Art and Early Generative Composition
Above: Examples of Single Channel Phonic Disc Algorithmic Score Sheets, Hemp Paper, 29cm x 11.5cm, ca 1882
( Source: Boulton Family Private Archive )
An important part of the Phonic Disc System was the invention of a system that allowed acousmatic scores to be created and archived on sheets of rosin-infused hemp paper. Only a handful of photographs of these 'plotters' remain, but no actual devices. These sheets allowed composers to compose specific sequences, or alternately to specify sonic material from which the device could select, either at random or based on predetermined patterns, an acousmatic composition of ca. 3 minutes duration. Depending on the phonic disc device used, scores could be monophonic or stereophonic — another remarkable step forward given the time of its invention.
Above: Dual Channel Phonic Disc Aleatory Sheet, SN'1',QNT—1369 ( DuDolce)
Rosin-impregnated Hemp Paper, 29cm x 11.5cm, ca 1880, Improvisational!
( Source: Boulton Family Private Archive )
Acousmatic Project
Rural Radio and Musique Meta-Concréte
Rural Radio, Diffusion of a Meta-Concréte Reading and Composition based on Kurt Schwitters' Ursonate from Augmented Wire Recordings e
Two Recodings of 'Fümms' by augmented Wire Recorders ( Source: Boulton Instrument Workshop Archives):
[Re] 'Capturing' the Rural 'Soundscape'
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