Peopled 'noise maps' a non-starter

It was never going to be easy for Caliban to show the goofy Trinculo and Stefano round his native island. The place was strange, not least since it was in the habit of conjuring up bizarre tunes and sounds out of thin air. "Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises," Caliban reassured his reluctant guests, "sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not." It was probably his finest moment.

The Malta Environment and Planning Authority, on the other hand, seems to be rather less charmed. As reported in Friday's The Times, it is currently working on a set of 'noise maps' that "will reflect the measurement of ambient noise in strategic locations around the Maltese islands". This involves "noise experts" using "specialised monitoring equipment". By 2011, the isle will be "fully compliant" with the European Noise Directive.

Excellent idea on the face of it. No one likes noise, to put it mildly. Its presence can make the difference between a tolerable and not-so-tolerable existence. Our harmony depends on, among other things, the right balance of sound. Silence can be terrible, and so can noise. If Mepa can help us work that one out, Austin Walker is more a private jet than an expensive car.

Except Mepa won't. Nothing to do with the popular (and false, as I see it) belief that the authority can never get anything right. The reason in this case is somewhat more specific, and has to do with noise itself. Quite simply, noise is not really about decibels. Nor can it be scientifically measured using specialised monitoring equipment.

The definition of noise is about as elusive as it gets. The best I can come up with is 'sound gone wrong in one or more ways'.

First, there is a right time and place for sound. The sweetest Mozart sonata will probably sound like noise if played to the neighbours in the middle of the night, or by a deejay in a club.

The second thing that matters is rhythm. A persistent hum, no matter how gentle, can drive people nuts - but so can erratic sounds that follow no understandable pattern.

There are other things like tonality and such, well understood by composers. Around the end of Bartók's Bluebeard's Castle, the music cascades into a mess of atonal sounds. Bartók uses the shift from sound to noise to signify the collapse of Bluebeard's peace. In film, Hitchcock's 'shower scene' from Psycho is probably the best known example.

Decibels may or may not form part of this elaborate constitution. Back to our club, people inside will call it music while those outside will call it noise. But it's the same loudness we're talking about. Likewise, what to many is 'noisy' car exhaust is actually music to others. There are as many clips of exhaust noise on Youtube as there are pay-per-hearing whines in a Maltese hotel room.

What I'm saying is that noise is the sounds we dislike. It follows that to measure noise, one would actually have to measure dislikes. In other words, the cultural meaning of sounds. Let me illustrate the point using two examples.

Take vuvuzelas. Both loved and maligned, it's what people say about them that intrigues me. The debate centres on two issues. First, whether or not they're part of African tradition. There seems to be a consensus that an affirmative would make them sound, a negative noise.

Second, traditional or not, many appear upset that they have replaced the chants and sounds of football support with a monotonous and meaningless drone. The tacit implication is that Europe produces sound while Africa produces noise. So much for decibels.

Another useful example is fireworks. An enterprising student of mine has just finished writing a thesis on anatomy. Nothing to do with medicine - her work involved dissecting sound, so to speak, for its underlying cultural meanings.

Yet again, views differ. Dilettanti will talk of sounds and sweet airs that give the isle its identity. What I might hear as a bang turns out to have its own rhythm and duration. There is apparently a standard of sonic quality that tells a well-made petard from a shoddy one. Mustaċċuni (masters of their art) make sound, the rest make noise.

What's doubly fascinating in this case is that the Caliban metaphor cuts both ways. For it is precisely as primitive, undisciplined, too-much-hair-on-chest louts that people who dislike fireworks imagine the dilettanti. The noise (to them) of a petard summons visions of a Malta unable to shake off its Mediterranean legacy and join a Europe where sound is strictly regulated.

It should be clear at this point why I said that 'noise maps' based on background decibels or whatever are a non-starter.

Those in doubt might want to have a go at measuring (scientifically of course, and using specialised monitoring equipment) the aesthetics of exhaust noise, standards of African traditions, and concepts of hair on chest (not too closely on the last one, subject may bite). For it is those attributions - not decibels - that result in 'noise'.

The missing ingredient in all this is the social factor. There are as many noise maps as there are people, or at least groups. Lest readers think I'm after a consultancy on noise, I'm not really. Expensive, or noisy for that matter, cars are not me.

mafalzon@hotmail.com