Visual Music Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Becoming commercially available in the mid 1960s, video quickly became integral to the intense experimentalism of New York City's music and art scenes. The medium was able to record image and sound at the same time, which allowed... more

Becoming commercially available in the mid 1960s, video quickly became integral to the intense experimentalism of New York City's music and art scenes. The medium was able to record image and sound at the same time, which allowed composers to visualize their music and artists to sound their images. But as well as creating unprecedented forms of audiovisuality, video work also producedinteractive spaces that questioned conventional habits of music and art consumption. This book explores the first decade of creative video work, focusing on the ways in which video technology was used to dissolve the boundaries between art and music.

This essay traces the theorization of interwar animation through period analogies with painting and dance, paying special attention to the valorization of concepts such as dematerialization and embodiment, which metaphors of visual music... more

This essay traces the theorization of interwar animation through period analogies with painting and dance, paying special attention to the valorization of concepts such as dematerialization and embodiment, which metaphors of visual music and physical kinesthesis were used to promote. Beginning in 1919, and exemplified by her feature-length film Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed (1926), Lotte Reiniger directed numerous silhouette films animated in an ornate style that embraced decorative materiality. This aesthetic set her in uneasy relation to the avant-garde, whose strenuous attempts to distance abstraction from ornament took the form of absolute film, and were screened together at the Absolute film Matinee of 1925. However, their claims for aesthetic integrity were staked on territory these artists largely had in common. By adopting a feminist approach that examines networks of collaboration, publication, and artistic production in Weimar Berlin, this essay reveals Reiniger as an early proponent of haptic cinema in interwar Europe and one of animation's earliest and most perceptive theorists.

George Herbert is widely celebrated for both his musical verse and for his patterned lyrics; but how might we critically engage with these two strands of his lyric technique? This article places George Herbert’s playful lyric poetic in... more

George Herbert is widely celebrated for both his musical verse and for his patterned lyrics; but how might we critically engage with these two strands of his lyric technique? This article places George Herbert’s playful lyric poetic in the context of Stuart Masque culture. While these extravagant, secular entertainments are an unusual context against which to set Herbert’s more modest devotional poetic, it argues that Herbert – whose extended family was closely involved in the staging and production of these court events – cannot have been ignorant of this seventeenth-century cultural phenomenon. Building on a contemporary understanding of music as mathematical proportion, this article examines the ways in which the masque ‘staged’ ideas of harmony, in its perspectival sets and in its geometrically choreographed dances. Masque culture offers a rich and particularly vivid contemporary expression of the possibilities of interdisciplinary expression; in turn, it presents a new perspective on Herbert's visually- and aurally-rich lyric performance.

This is the catalogue for Jack Ox's exhibition of her 800 Square foot visualization of Kurt Schwitters' Ursonate at the Muzeum Sztuki in Lodz, Poland. The exhibition occurred in conjunction with the first large Schwitters exhibition in... more

This is the catalogue for Jack Ox's exhibition of her 800 Square foot visualization of Kurt Schwitters' Ursonate at the Muzeum Sztuki in Lodz, Poland. The exhibition occurred in conjunction with the first large Schwitters exhibition in Poland, with graphically matching catalogues. It covers such topics as intermedia and includes phonetic analyses etc of the Schwittters's sound-poem. Authors include The exhibition was sponsored by the German government in 2004.

MuVi5 is the fifth edition of Visual Music dedicated videos – following upon MuVi (Granada, 2007), MuVi2 (Granada, 2009), MuVi3 (Almeria, 2012) and MuVi4 (Alcalá la Real, Jaén, 2015) – an event that completes the Fifth International... more

MuVi5 is the fifth edition of Visual Music dedicated videos – following upon MuVi (Granada, 2007), MuVi2
(Granada, 2009), MuVi3 (Almeria, 2012) and MuVi4 (Alcalá la Real, Jaén, 2015) – an event that
completes the Fifth International Conference Sinestesia: Ciencia y Arte, which took place at Alcalá la Real,
Jaén (Convento Capuchinos) and the “Victoria Eugenia” Conservatory of Music of Granada, in Spain, from
May 18th to 21th.This is a collection of kinetic works in visual, audiovisual, or interactive fields, from artists,
musicians, designers, and performers, designed on music. Alongside the videos from professionals are also
works produced in the academic field, presented by professors, or directly by university students, academies
of fine arts, and music conservatories. The catalog contains an extensive selection of photographs and videos
submitted by participants whose home countries are European, including England (London), Hungary (Pécs),
Ireland (Dublin), Italy (Milan), Poland (Warsaw), and Spain (Granada, Girona), as well as outside of Europe,
including China (Hong Kong), New Zealand (Auckland), and the USA (Alabama, Massachusetts, Oregon).
Links included about 100 minutes of online video.

Bratislava-based art historian and curator Daniel Grúň researches the legacy of the neo-avant-garde movements of Central Europe. In his essay, he begins by analysing the work Vodná hudba (Water Music), a now-legendary musical happening... more

Bratislava-based art historian and curator Daniel Grúň researches the legacy of the neo-avant-garde movements of Central Europe. In his essay, he begins by analysing the work Vodná hudba (Water Music), a now-legendary musical happening created by the Slovak artist Milan Adamčiak (1946 - 2017) and two others in a Bratislava swimming pool in 1970.
Grúň goes on to explore the archival material associated with this and
other works by Adamčiak, paying particular attention to the modes
and strategies of documentation (and their political context) as
well as to the interdependence of documentary/notational formats
and artistic forms. Among other things, Adamčiak’s art provides Grúň
with a case study for discussing the complex questions related to the
“performativity” of documentation and the reasons for the selfhistoricization of Central European neo-avant-garde artists.

Films can be related to discrete or multiple positions along a continuum from clarity to obscurity, from the recognizable, pictorial and concrete, to the undefined, ambiguous, symbolic and abstract. This thesis discusses examples of films... more

Films can be related to discrete or multiple positions along a continuum from
clarity to obscurity, from the recognizable, pictorial and concrete, to the
undefined, ambiguous, symbolic and abstract. This thesis discusses examples of
films that in their rendition of light, color, moving image, sound and story
successfully combine both abstract and concrete forms and treatments. These
films work within an intersection between clarity and obscurity, in so doing they
productively engage with the tension between audience and authorial produced
content. These works span high and low art in early to present day cinematic
forms. Visual Music is one contemporary film form that could give equal
prominence to abstract and concrete forms. The current and future development
of film in live performance contexts suggest the most fertile ground for further
developing a form of film that productively engages concrete and abstract forms.

A tin box belonged to the artist’s mother becomes animated for a movie based on Greek traditional children’s songs and acts as an intermission between two performances of a talking doll, and as an interpretation of the music instruments... more

A tin box belonged to the artist’s mother becomes animated for a movie based on Greek traditional children’s songs and acts as an intermission between two performances of a talking doll, and as an interpretation of the music instruments and their improvisation into animation. Old super 8 footage from the artist’s archive runs during the animation.

This paper explores the evolution of visual music throughout the years, from theories on music and colour in the classical antiquity, to today’s contemporary visual techniques. The various definitions of visual music are discussed, and a... more

This paper explores the evolution of visual music throughout the years, from theories on music and colour in the classical antiquity, to today’s contemporary visual techniques. The various definitions of visual music are discussed, and a brief summary of how the term came to be used, is given. An overview of this recurring idea of visual music throughout the different aspects of abstract art is also considered. A historical timeline of the growth of visual music is presented, highlighting some of the most renowned pioneers in visual music, their theories and inventions. The development of the technology involved in the advancement of visual music and their contributions to music videos, cinematic films and live audiovisual performances of nowadays, are also researched.

Este livro apresenta pesquisas recentes realizadas no Brasil sobre o Cinema de Animação e suas interfaces com outras linguagens artísticas, especialmente com as artes digitais. Na primeira parte – Histórias da Animação – os capítulos... more

Este livro apresenta pesquisas recentes realizadas no Brasil sobre o Cinema de Animação e suas interfaces com outras linguagens artísticas, especialmente com as artes digitais. Na primeira parte – Histórias da Animação – os capítulos percorrem aspectos históricos, como o relato do animador Marcos Magalhães sobre sua experiência como coordenador do primeiro Núcleo de Animação do Brasil em 1985, no Centro Técnico Audiovisual da Embrafilme, CTAV – RJ, até a criação do Festival Anima Mundi; ou a relação histórica entre animação e documentário presente em filmes pioneiros como The Sinking of the Lusitania (1918) do cartunista estadunidense Winsor McCay; ou ainda, Super Drags (2018), primeira animação original Netflix totalmente brasileira que é abordada no contexto do mercado de nicho. A segunda parte – Processos e Técnicas – traz artigo sobre o Movimento criativo na animação de personagem, tema ainda pouco abordado pela pesquisa científica no país; sobre a singularidade gráfica no desenho do animador Marcelo Marão e sobre um percurso histórico e procedimentos sobre filmes criados diretamente na película, dentre outros textos. Na terceira parte - Poéticas Tecnológicas – o artista visual Henrique Roscoe compartilha estratégias para produção de trabalhos audiovisuais ao vivo em que modos de fazer da Visual Music e da Arte Generativa estão presentes. A Arte Computacional Botânica e algumas relações entre dança, música e audiovisual são propostas nos últimos capítulos. Procura-se desta forma contribuir para a animação expandida, abrindo perspectivas e impulsionando novas pesquisas na área.

Norman McLaren was one of the pioneers of Visual Music, having produced dozens of films in this area since the 1930s. McLaren is also one of the artists in Visual Music with a greater variety of aesthetic ideas about synchronization... more

Norman McLaren was one of the pioneers of Visual Music, having produced dozens of films in this area since the 1930s. McLaren is also one of the artists in Visual Music with a greater variety of aesthetic ideas about synchronization between sound and image, expressed in quite diverse ways in his vast filmography. The artist has worked with both abstract images and figurative film footage using various techniques for the production of his films like: cameraless animation, direct painting on the film, stop motion, etc. Perhaps the most important aspect of his work is the creative audiovisual relationships that McLaren made, going beyond a mere visualization of music, reaching transmedia relations between sound and image, where the pair constitutes an inseparable unity. This synchronization goes from direct correspondences where each sound corresponds to an image, until relations where what matters is the sensation that the audiovisual set causes in the spectator, in which the artist uses more sophisticated creative strategies, in an expanded and fluid way, where the elements maintain a dialogical, but not explicit relation. In this paper, we will try to systematize some of the aesthetic solutions used in his work, with emphasis on his film 'Begone Dull Care', demonstrating the broad creative potential of the artist. This film will be specifically addressed as an example for a deeper analysis of the insertion of each visual element and its relation to sound. The aesthetic aspects of his work will be analyzed mainly based on the systematization made by Kandinsky in his books 'Point and Line to Plane' (KANDINSKY, 1977), and 'Concerning the Spiritual in Art' (KANDINSKY, 1997), as well as authors such as Tom DeWitt and Brian Evans, who performed analyzes of Visual Music works under an aesthetic approach. Kandinsky spoke about the power of shape and color, where each element would have the potential to cause a different sensation in the viewer through its internal resonance. He carried out in his works an analysis of the sounds and of what each of them suggests, besides possible relations between color, shape and sound. Our analysis will also be based on texts left by McLaren that deal with technical and artistic issues developed by him in his works. Norman McLaren was responsible for some of the most inspiring and important animations in the twentieth century, created using his own techniques and perfecting some invented by other

The development of the use of computers and software in art from the Fifties to the present is explained. As general aspects of the history of computer art an interface model and three dominant modes to use computational processes... more

The development of the use of computers and software in art from the Fifties to the present is explained. As general aspects of the history of computer art an interface model and three dominant modes to use computational processes (generative, modular, hypertextual) are presented. The "History of Computer Art" features examples of early developments in media like cybernetic sculptures, computer graphics and animation (including music videos and demos), video and computer games, reactive installations, virtual reality, evolutionary art and net art. The functions of relevant art works are explained more detailed than usual in such histories.
The second edition for the Book on Demand (Lulu.com, 2020) includes an update of chapter II.1.1 (first edition 2014, see above in "Papers" the PDF of the HTML version).
Book on Demand printed by Lulu.com (available via International Distributors): URL: https://www.lulu.com/en/en/shop/thomas-dreher/history-of-computer-art/hardcover/product-qg94d2.html

If the medium of cinema is born of the addition of temporality to images, new trends in digital art such as architectural mapping video projection, audiovisual (A/V) performance, and new forms of immersive scenography are adding the... more

If the medium of cinema is born of the addition of temporality to images, new trends in digital art such as
architectural mapping video projection, audiovisual (A/V) performance, and new forms of immersive
scenography are adding the spatial dimension to the moving image. The latest innovations in the area of digital
arts are the result of an acceleration of a trend that can be historically identified through the multiple
manifestations of universal expositions. Today’s digital explosion is in fact a consequence of the
democratization of instruments that control light, sound, and images through increasingly sophisticated
interfaces. Avant-garde artistic approaches, with their constant push toward the dematerialization of artwork,
have merged with scenographic spatialization technologies. This merger of worlds has led to new A/V
performance productions that reveal the emergence of a new language, namely that of audiovisual
spatialization. This language leverages the creative potential of new audiovisual instruments by combining
sound and light waves with the spatial component. This paper will address this new approach based on analysis
of multiple case studies.

A critical commentary that presents and contextualizes a film and video making practice spanning three decades. It locates a contemporary visual music practice within current and emerging critical and theoretical contexts and tracks back... more

Since 1976 my paintings have been formulated through a set of visual equivalents employed effectively to "translate" a composition written in the aural "language" of music into a visual "language". The musical vocabulary used by the... more

Since 1976 my paintings have been formulated through a set of visual equivalents employed effectively to "translate" a composition written in the aural "language" of music into a visual "language". The musical vocabulary used by the composer is put into a new vocabulary, one that uses visual images instead of sounds. However, the original structure of the piece is retained along with the meaning. Not only do I, as a painter, function in a way similar to an orchestra conductor, but I am also the creator of the visual language. My activity could be described as a re-orchestration, followed by a visual performance. The actual act of painting produces a work which expresses feeling-- mine and the composer's --but is structured by a mathematical system.

An analysis of the relationship between music and its visual representation. How do images express the subtext of music? Can they better convey the message by visually representing it? A discourse on the phenomenological side of... more

An analysis of the relationship between music and its visual representation. How do images express the subtext of music? Can they better convey the message by visually representing it? A discourse on the phenomenological side of audio-visual, together with a historical background of the practice.

The better quality pdf is downloadible from here: "http://www.leoalmanac.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/LEAVol19No3-Mailman.pdf
Through recent artistic practices and technology of interactive systems for music, composition and improvisation have more and more blended and interconnected with each other – a sui generis situation now called comprovisation. The concept of comprovisation applies equally well to the spontaneous generation and manipulation of computer graphics, especially as such graphics are systematically coordinated audio-visually, while being subject to spontaneous manipulation by a performer.
This is explained in terms of the Fluxations and FluxNoisations Human Body Interfaces, interactive dance systems that generate music and graphics spontaneously in response to hand and body movement. They enable spontaneous expressive shaping of coherent complexity and variety. Thus a multi-layered multimodal experience arises. The aesthetic experience of this multimedia spectacle relates to experiences of various prior music and visual art of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, as well as to hypothetical physical realities. Thus a kind of cybernetic phenomenology of art is pursued and enacted through an embodied cybersynthesis of art with simulated alternate reality. Call it a pragmatic speculative realism, an adventurous technoetic ‘what if.’ As compared to more traditional forms of improvisation, the opportunities for risk-taking and aesthetic exploration rise to a new level of uncertainty, as the reactions of the improviser simultaneously draw from and target both visual and aural modalities, such that the intentions toward each fuse together."

This thesis explores the phenomenon of teaching and learning of western music theory within university level education. The teaching and learning of western music theory concerns an intangible medium, which can pose difficulties in its... more

This thesis explores the phenomenon of teaching and learning of western music theory within university level education. The teaching and learning of western music theory concerns an intangible medium, which can pose difficulties in its understanding. Western music theory is multifaceted and pluralistic in nature, with its learning hinging upon the interpretation of individuals situated within particular musical cultures. This being said, the subject also contains historical and sociocultural structures that define particular approaches to music. Due to this interpretative nature of music, a divergent educational approach is required rather than one that is convergent.
Adopting a hermeneutical phenomenological stance stemming from a constructivist epistemology, the current study uses an autoethnography as central to its examination. Expanding around this central inquiry is a student survey and investigations to current pedagogical approaches adopted in western music theory teaching and learning. Also building from the central autoethnographical exposition, a section of this thesis is dedicated to visualising the structures inherent to western music theory. This has been done in order to devise visual approaches to the teaching and learning of a subject that contains very abstract and intangible concepts, which are often difficult to describe in words. The last section of the current study tethers concepts from all prior chapters to make pedagogical suggestions based upon its research. Such suggestions aim toward a learner-centred, visual approach to western music theory structures. On the other side of the pedagogical coin, the multitudes of musical interpretations can be facilitated through the concept of musical thought, which is unpacked and explored throughout this volume.
This thesis aims to provide teachers and learners with a visualised approach to the teaching and learning of western music theory. The current study also aims to contextualise the reader with understandings of the nature of music and hence musical thought. This volume has been made with supporting materials that do not aim to induce a dogmatic approach, rather outlining a divergent approach as a means of teaching and learning western music theory.

Introductory overview of New Zealand artists who began working in film and video between 1970 and 1985, following their work up to 2010 and beyond. This piece was originally titled A Place Near Here and published in Illusions #35. It... more

Introductory overview of New Zealand artists who began working in film and video between 1970 and 1985, following their work up to 2010 and beyond. This piece was originally titled A Place Near Here and published in Illusions #35. It has been significantly updated since then. Back issues of Illusions are available from PO Box 6476, Marion Square, Wellington, New Zealand.

Late in his career, John Cage often recalled his brief interaction with German abstract animator Oskar Fischinger in 1937 as the primary impetus for his early percussion works. Further examination of this connection reveals an important... more

Late in his career, John Cage often recalled his brief interaction with German abstract animator Oskar Fischinger in 1937 as the primary impetus for his early percussion works. Further examination of this connection reveals an important technological foundation to Cage's call for the expansion of musical resources. Fischinger's experiments with film phonography (the manipulation of the optical portion of sound film to synthesize sounds) mirrored contemporaneous refinements in recording and synthesis technology of electron beam tubes for film and television. New documentation on Cage's early career in Los Angeles, including research Cage conducted for his father John Cage, Sr.'s patents, explain his interest in these technologies. Finally, an examination of the sources of Cage's 1940 essay “The Future of Music: Credo” reveals the extent of Cage's knowledge of early sound synthesis and recording technologies and presents a more nuanced understanding of the historical relevance and origins of this document.

Surveys and contextualizes recent New Zealand artists' cinema by genre including, Landscape, Psychodrama, Identity Politics, Visual Music, Installed & Expanded Cinemas, and Animation. Touches on aspects of Asian and Western philosophy... more

Video art is often considered a visual genre. But the electromagnetic basis of the video format enabled sound and image to be recorded and projected simultaneously in an easy, portable way. As a result, the medium could produce a live... more

Video art is often considered a visual genre. But the electromagnetic basis of the video format enabled sound and image to be recorded and projected simultaneously in an easy, portable way. As a result, the medium could produce a live form of audiovisual synergy rarely possible before. As earlier chapters in this volume point out, attempts to capture temporal elements in the static arts proliferated as the twentieth century progressed, with movement and transient fluidity becoming prominent themes for many Impressionists, Cubists, and those involved with Orphism, Vorticism, and Synchronism. And yet Karin v. Maur has argued that in many cases, the governing force was not simply time but, rather, musicalized time: "Never before in the numerous programs and manifestos of the avant-garde did there appear so many temporal concepts, such as rhythm, dynamics, speed, and simultaneity, or musical terms such as cadence, dissonance, polyphony, etc., proving the existence of a close link between the temporalization tendencies in art and the reception of musical phenomena." 1 Film technology provided a significant boost to the possibility of "musicalized time" as it enabled the static image to burst into life, a leap into temporalization that manifested itself most clearly in the early visual-music films of Oskar Fischinger and Hans Richter and the mid-century experimentation of Californian visual-music artists

Digital technologies have converged with digital forms and integrally affected developments in art, music, design, film and literature. Visual communication is undergoing a profound transformation as new technologies continually challenge... more

Digital technologies have converged with digital forms and integrally affected developments in art, music, design, film and literature. Visual communication is undergoing a profound transformation as new technologies continually challenge the way images and things are produced. The problem issued in this study is on the inadequacy of learning visual communication design with the traditional method because of the democratization of desktop digital technology in recent learning environment. While this research combines the qualitative and quantitative approach, the quantitative part is less than qualitative ; this qualitative study used visual data collection, particularly sketches drawn by participants. Quantitative approach was used in compiling and categorizing data Primary data gathering technique is through participant observation, which means researcher took place during data gathering. Nevertheless, it is a challenge to explore and to discover whether the increase in music and graphics in contemporary era of digitalization, can enhance the essentials of creative design through the analogy between music expressions and graphics elements. This study tends to offer an alternative learning environment and approach in graphic design fundamental study by using music for stimulation. This research will lead to provide morphology of visual language of music and visual expression, particularly in the study of lines and its composition.

Ruggero Vasari was a vital figure in the history of Futurism and played a key role in the movement’s relations with Central and Eastern Europe. The specific interplay between his artistic identity as an Italian Futurist on one hand and... more

Ruggero Vasari was a vital figure in the history of Futurism and played a key role in the movement’s relations with Central and Eastern Europe. The specific interplay between his artistic identity as an Italian Futurist on one hand and his predominantly European professional contacts and career on the other offers a symptomatic ensemble of elements that might help the historian when reassessing theoretical definitions of the avant-garde and its international modes of operation. This essay attempts to offer a more exacting explanation of what were the coordinates of Futurism at play
in these international settings and in Vasari’s work itself. In this sense, it analyses the international alliances which he established in the1920s with several artists and intellectuals in the German capital at the time, such as Ivan Puni, Karlis Zale, Viktor Shklovsky and Viking Eggeling. It retraces the way in which Vasari’s conception of radical art and his attitude of stylistic ecumenism succeeded in attracting to Futurism artists who, often as a result of their condition as political exiles, rejected the more overtly politicized tenets of Constructivism. It concludes by outlining the repercussions that this large avant-garde network had on the fate of Vasari’s own activity as a dramatist.

This article describes the intersection of Media Archaeology and Visual Music in my artistic practice that repurposes obsolete devices to investigate new connections between light and sound. I revive and hack tools from our analogue past:... more

This article describes the intersection of Media Archaeology and Visual Music in my artistic practice that repurposes obsolete devices to investigate new connections between light and sound. I revive and hack tools from our analogue past: oscilloscopes, early game consoles, and lasers. I am attracted to their aesthetic difference from the ubiquitous digital projections: fluid beam movement, vibrant light, infinite resolution, absence of frame rate, and line-based image. The premise behind all my work is the synthesis of both image and sound from the same signal. This strong connection envelopes the audience in synchronous audiovisual information that reveals underlying geometric properties of sound. In this text I describe the practice and the aesthetic potentials connected to few analog and digital hybridized systems to generate new sonic and visual experiences.

Resumen Abstract El antivídeo es un tipo de vídeo musical que huye del lenguaje visual heredero de la publicidad. Se trata de un producto de difícil clasificación que se encuentra a mitad de camino entre la producción artística, el... more

Resumen Abstract El antivídeo es un tipo de vídeo musical que huye del lenguaje visual heredero de la publicidad. Se trata de un producto de difícil clasificación que se encuentra a mitad de camino entre la producción artística, el marketing y la resistencia anti comercial. La falta de una definición que ancle su significado y la necesidad de un análisis que permita conocer sus orígenes y motivaciones lo ha convertido en una de las variables del videoclip menos estudiado hasta la fecha. El término nunca ha llegado a estar muy extendido, quizá porque estas piezas, al ser poco emitidas por televisión no han llegado a ser muy populares. Esta investigación busca definir el término y estudiar cuáles han sido las motivaciones que han llevado a la aparición de esta modalidad de vídeo musical y conocer así sus posibles variables. Anti-video is a music-video genre that rejects the language of mainstream advertising. It resides in a space difficult to define, somewhere between artistic production, marketing, and anti-commercial resistance. A singular anti-video definition would anchor its meaning and legitimize its need for analysis, both of which would allow its origins to be better known. But in the absence of simple classifications, anti-video has been studied little to date. Perhaps because these pieces have been rarely broadcast on TV, the term anti-video has never become widespread or popular. This investigation seeks to define anti-video and explore the motivations that have resulted in the emergence of this category of music video and to identify its possible variations.

Trevor Wishart is an electroacoustic composer who obtained his PhD at the University of York in 1973 . books On Sonic Art (1984 and 1996) and Audible Design (1994), which present his ideas about sound treatment, perception and... more

Trevor Wishart is an electroacoustic composer who obtained his PhD at the University of York in 1973 . books On Sonic Art (1984 and 1996) and Audible Design (1994), which present his ideas about sound treatment, perception and composition. All of the theories and ideas I talk about here are related to my research as a graduate student in music and musicology, entitled Sound identification, listening strategy and narrativity in Trevor Wishart’s Journey into Space – Agentization, objectization and narrativizations (translated from the French: Identification sonore, stratégie d’écoute et narrativité dans Journey into Space de Trevor Wishart – Agentisation, objétisation et narrativisations). The present essay is mainly the transcription of an interview with Wishart himself, in which we talked about Journey into Space, sound identification (“landscape”), voice (both recorded and improvised), symbolism and narrativity. I will add some comments and ideas throughout the essay; these will deal with music and meaning, the main subject of JMM, as well as with my own research on electroacoustic narrativity.