Commissioned by Bradford Mela in partnership with the Mumbai Festival, Craig Vear’s soundscape performance Superfield (Mumbai), will receive its world premiere in York on Thursday, the day of annual festivities to mark the anniversary of the first Indian passenger train service. Craig, an Arts Council England Fellowship winner, will take the NRM audience’s imagination on a journey to the streets of Mumbai with a live mix of the sounds he recorded there in January, as CHARLES HUTCHINSON reports.

How did the idea for Superfield (Mumbai) come about?

“It was actually my ‘partner in crime’ for the project, Ben Pugh, producer of Sight Sonic digital arts festival and Bradford Mela, who was inspired to commission the piece after returning from a trip to Mumbai and hearing the wealth of street sounds. I had worked with him previously on the public premiere of Antarctica at the Music Research Centre in York University, so he got in touch and the rest, as they say, is history.”

What lengths did you go to capture the sounds of India?

“Mumbai is an amazing place, a culture a million miles away from England: busy and noisy; a constant cacophony of cars, crowds, horns and people. The streets full of the stench of death, poverty and illness, alongside overcrowded slums, beggars, and naked babies asleep in gutters.

“But this is what I noticed only on the first day, after which my western eyes faded and I began to see tolerance, faith, hope and respect; a coexistence between race, money, religions, colours and caste. The over-arching quality was of human industry, and making the best of their ‘lot’ in life.

“The slums weren’t the places of hell they first appeared, communities existed and commerce was taking place (albeit not necessarily rupee-based), food was grown alongside their shacks, and inside, every home had a shrine, the cleanest of cooking pots and smiling faces.”

Did the recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai affect the recording process?

“I was sensitive to the fact that the nation was on high alert after the Mumbai terrorist activities. It would have been difficult to whip out my large microphone array and pistol grip without attracting unwanted attention either from the authorities or the public. So the bulk of the recordings were made using ‘Cold War-style’ covert earpiece microphones. These highly sensitive microphones look like walkman headphones so are barely noticeable – or so you would think. Ironically, Mumbai doesn’t have an iPod culture, so as the only guy walking around with headphones in I did attract some attention – not ideal when you are trying to capture the natural ambient sounds.”

What will impart the sense of Mumbai to the audience assembled around speakers at the NRM’s Eastern Gate?

“The audience is invited to sit in low-level lighting and listen – hopefully with their eyes closed. People often create a visual response to aural stimuli, so I’m hoping the noisy street scenes of Mumbai will make them picture the places we visited through sound. I’m interested in the ‘mental seeing’ that sound and music can evoke, if one is free to let the ‘mind’s ear’ rather than the eye wander.”

Why have you chosen the National Railway Museum as the venue for the world premiere?

“Throughout the development of this piece Ben and I were aware of many serendipitous occurrences. The kernel of the idea was discussed with Ben during the technical production week for York Theatre Royal’s performance of The Railway Children’ at the NRM, for which I designed the sound and Ben was the project manager.

“However, the biggest one was that the NRM was creating an India festival and that there was a ‘Mumbai day’ on roughly the date we were looking to premiere the piece. April 16 marks the annual festivities for the anniversary of the first Indian passenger train service, so during the day in the Museum children are decorating a real locomotive with garlands, and in the evening the grown-ups will be able to take a mental trip down the streets of the Indian capital with the world premiere.”

* Superfield (Mumbai), world premiere, National Railway Museum, York, Thursday, 7pm. Tickets: £5, concessions £3, on 01904 685724.

* Craig Vear is providing the music or sound design for three York Theatre Royal productions: the Youth Theatre’s Pericles, running in The Studio this week; Donald Freed’s The White Crow, May 1 to 23; and the revival of The Railway Children at the National Railway Museum, July 23 to September 5.