A two-month deep-listening sound installation by Phil Coy

sixty beats per minute transforms St George’s Church in Ramsgate into a musical instrument and time machine. An array of microphones amplify theBenjamin Vulliamy 1829 turret clock to form a live multi-channel surround sound installation inside the church. Tuned to the resonant frequency of the architectureand matching the tempo of our heart at rest, sixty beats per minute uses a beat known to raise consciousness to create a deep listening experience. A large LED screen mounted on a scaffold at the centre of the church displays timecode running at the same tempo as the church’s turret clock. As the timecode reaches six minutes it swaps direction and starts to rewind, indicating that the sounds from the previous six minutes are now being played back in reverse. This creates a live feedback loop between digital and analogue time, that uses the church’s architecture and raised turret to magnify the sonic landscape of Ramsgate. This site-sensitive looped reversal and repetition oftimeruns continuously, suggesting a sound score to a film without images.

Opening times: 12 – 5 pm Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays

Launch: 3 May 4 – 6pm

Closing performance Sunday 29th June: Phil Coy invites local music producer and UK dub legend Adrian Sherwood and friends to hijack sixty beats per minute. They will perform a new composition and live dub remix that breaks down the mechanics of the clocks regimented beat.

More details:

St George’s Church is a prominent feature of Ramsgate’s skyline thanks to its architecturally unique tower that acts as both mechanical Turret Clock, displaying the time to viewpoints across Ramsgate, and as a Lantern Tower, built to aid navigation in the English Channel. When constructed, these technologies signified a fundamental change in the world’s consumption of time. Populations were no longer attuned to the rhythms of the sun and the seasons but instead forced to keep pace with time dealt by a mechanical clock. In the 200 years since the introduction of clock towers our relationship to time is ever more sequenced, reaching fever pitch in the always on world of global surveillance capitalism.

An intrinsic element to sixty beats per minute is the live 24/7 relay of the 1829 Vulliamy turret clock – a unique working example of the celebrated horologist’s technological skill with a rich mechanical sound. For users in search of authentic analogue rhythm, this live audio stream offers an ambient aid to mediation in an angst-ridden world.

Tune in at sixtybeatsperminute.info

Phil Coy has exhibited nationally and internationally including: Matt’s Gallery; South London Gallery; Royal Observatory Greenwich Planetarium; York Art Gallery; FACT, Liverpool; Whitechapel Gallery, London; Eastside Projects, Birmingham; BFI London Film Festival; Focal Point Gallery, Southend; Loop, Barcelona; Volt, Bergen, Norway; Whitstable Biennale; Ferens Art Gallery, Hull; Aldeburgh Music festival; Artprojx Cinema, New York; Institute of Contemporary Art, London; Cornerhouse, Manchester: Chatham Historic Dockyard, Kent. A resident of Ramsgate for 10 years, sixty beats per minute is one of his most ambitious site-sensitive sound installations to date. Also exploring our perception of time, but through the lens of solar time, his exhibition sometimes i see ghosts is currently on at Front Room until 12 April 2025.

sixty beats per minute is supported by a series of workshops with local teenage musicians run by Pie Factory devised around the core relationship between time and music. 

Adrian Sherwood is a pioneer of the Dub sound tape delay techniques and has developed a cult-like following via his experiments in reggae, punk, post-punk and bass music. As the founder of the fiercely independent On-U Sound label he has brought the attention to artists like New Age Steppers, African Head Charge, Dub Syndicate, Creation Rebel and Tackhead.

sixty beats per minute has been commissioned and organised by Art and Christianity and St George’s Ramsgate.

Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Also with support from the Diocese of Canterbury and the Parish of St George’s Ramsgate