Hold Fast Remix from M E Shenefiel on Vimeo.

I was listening to some Pandora yesterday and the station kept playing those funky, jazzy remixes with spoken word throughout.  Maybe I’m still lingering on the rhythms of Langston Hughes and Blue Balliett’s Hold Fast, but I kept stirring that around in my head.  In the middle of the night I woke up with this idea of creating reading remixes.

Similar to a book trailer, a reading remix could be used to promote a favorite book.  Key words, ideas, and phrases could be remixed with audio loops, and possibly images to create a composition that enhances the book and engages a prospective reader.  Students could work individually or in groups to promote a book club book.  For classroom novels, you could have different groups find quotes and phrases for different themes throughout the book.  The challenge is selecting the words and music and deciding how to manipulate the tracks so that the end product is aesthetically representative of the writing.

Admittedly there is not a lot to look at in the sample remix above.  When I created this earlier, I was more focused on finding and manipulating the words and music than the visual appeal.  Other images could have easily been added.  That’s one of the benefits to a project like this… there is all kinds of room for flexibility.

Has anyone else done something like this before?  What types of advice do you have for starting a project like this?