Assignment 1a

Before doing this part of the assignment, I have probably never paid attention to what it sounds like in a coffee shop. That seems so strange to me, because coffee shops are practically my adopted homes, because coffee is what keeps me ticking. But as soon as we walked into Starbucks, before we even asked permission to record the sounds, I was all of a sudden awakened to a plethora of incredibly interesting noises that I have taken for granted for years. All of a sudden the blending of ice, the squishing of syrup, the sound of coffee brewing, the loud hum of the steamer, were now not just annoying conversation interrupters, but individual fascinating noises that had a life of their own. I immediately started thinking of what each noise sounded like, how it could be applied as a sound effect in a film. The syrup sounded like stepping in squishy mud, or even like guts splattering. The harder I listened, more subtle sounds came to life that are not quite as obvious. The sound of shifting in a chair, the slurping of coffee, the noise of a straw moving in a plastic cup, and the tapping of feet were all a part of this cafe orchestra that has I have always had a deaf ear to, but has nonetheless been present every day in every Starbucks coffee shop.