Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Design, Sound And Compositional Aesthetic: The Grand Piano In Late Eighteenth-Century London And Vienna, Izaac Masters

Theses : Honours

During the late eighteenth century, the piano was the dominant musical instrument for musical composition, performance and instrument making. There were many innovations in the design, sound and touch of the piano, fuelling the emergence of a large body of idiomatic repertoire. Two distinct traditions of piano design emerged at the same time during the late eighteenth century, one in England and the other in Austria. The focal points of these traditions were, respectively, London and Vienna where resident composers in each of these locations wrote for the instruments made in these cities. Traditions of grand piano design in London …

Adapting Barbershop Harmony For The Saxophone Quartet, Jonathon Astbury

Theses : Honours

Barbershop harmony refers to a unique style of arrangement and performance for voice that is strictly in four parts and acapella. There is much untapped potential in this close harmonic genre that could be explored in instruments other than the human voice. This paper set out to explore and establish a method of arranging and performing music of the barbershop style for the saxophone quartet. To achieve this transference of the style from voices to saxophones, the harmonic conventions and arranging rules of barbershop from the existing literature were established, along with a review of the literature pertaining to effective …

Exploring And Reapplying Wayne Krantz’S Method Of Constructing The Album Greenwich Mean, Christian A. Meares

Theses : Honours

Praised for his non-traditional approach to improvised music, his idiosyncratic chordal voicings and strong sense of time, Wayne Krantz has become a touchstone in modern jazz and a unique voice on the guitar. In 1999, Krantz self-released Greenwich Mean, an album comprising of small vignettes spliced together from a year’s worth of recorded live improvisation from his weekly residency gig at the esteemed 55 Bar in New York’s Greenwich Village. This album marks a fundamental shift in Krantz’s approach to composition from through-composed works to smaller, novel arrangements with a strong emphasis on group improvisation.

Using a practice-led research …

The Solo Piano Sonatas Of Cipriani Potter (1792-1871): An Analysis, Reappraisal, And Historical Performance, Jordan Proctor

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The solo piano sonatas (Op. 1, 3, and 4) of once eminent English pianist/composer Cipriani Potter (1792-1871) are a collection of works that have for the most part fallen into obscurity. Potter produced three such sonatas in his lifetime, each at approximately the same time during his educational trip to Vienna between 1817 and 1818. Potter was much celebrated in his own time as a virtuoso pianist, teacher, and eventual principal at the Royal Academy of Music, and as an editor of the works of Mozart and Beethoven amongst others. This study examines Potter’s sonatas in light of both modern …

Title Page

Sound Scripts

No abstract provided.

Editorial Introduction: Circuits Of Art And Communication In The Twenty-First Century, Jonathan W. Marshall

Sound Scripts

A founding editor of Sound Scripts, Jonathan W. Marshall, introduces the essays that follow in volume six of the journal, taking the reader through a tour of informatic exchanges, truths and falsehoods.

Contents Page

Sound Scripts

No abstract provided.

Copyright Page

Sound Scripts

No abstract provided.

Sonic Ventures In Post-Truth Surrealism: Raudelunas, The Rev. Fred Lane, And Lsd: Huxley’S Last Trip, Anne Lebaron

Sound Scripts

In the arena of contemporary music and performance, truthiness—a fuzzy-edged concept linking “truth” and “post-truth”—provides a malleable framework for examining how musicians and musical communities are confronting, reacting to, or embodying belief systems grounded in deception. Does the notion of authenticity embrace deliberate falsifications? In an attempt to answer such questions, I will offer examples of performers, writers, and artists cavorting along the truthiness bridge.

From The Phenomenal Sublime To Critical Play: Sonic Approaches To Engagement At The 13th Totally Huge New Music Festival, Jonathan W. Marshall

Sound Scripts

The thirteen Tura Totally Huge Festival of New Music was held in Perth, 19-29 Oct 2017. The Festival included numerous performances, residencies and workshops, as well as the Totally Huge New Music Festival Conference, 26 Oct 2017. The following article provides a critical overview of key performances within the Festival. The 2017 Festival was particularly notable for immersive works which offered what one might call phenomenal experiences, particularly Michael Pisaro’s A Wave and Waves and DCC: Glitch by Kouhei Harada, Mitsuaki Matsumoto and Shohei Sasagawa. A Wave and Waves and DCC: Glitch harnessed the fully embodied and located experience of …

Fake It ‘Til You Make It: The Virtual Orchestra In New Electronic Music, Michael Terren

Sound Scripts

This paper describes a variety of audio technologies under the neologism “the virtual orchestra,” their relationship with neoliberal capitalism, and four electronic music works that utilise these technologies to highlight this relationship. The virtual orchestra comprises digital technologies that emulate orchestral performances, ranging from the ersatz sounds of General MIDI in the 1990s (often used in computer game soundtracks), to orchestral sample libraries, which can be virtually indiscernible from a well-recorded orchestral performance. It is suggested that the virtual orchestra emerged as part of a cultural movement that privileges individualism and control, and that this has precedence in the structure …

Musical Interpretation In Improvised Human-Machine Performance, Benjamin Carey

Sound Scripts

The development of interactive performance systems is an active area of research in the field of live electronic music. Whilst various models and metaphors of interactivity have been proposed in the literature, the engagement of these systems in improvised performance remains under-researched. This paper explores the notion of musical interpretation in improvised human-machine performance practice from the perspective of a performer-developer. Through a consideration of the notion of the musical text, these creative artefacts and the performance practices they engender are situated within the context of interpretive musical practice. I argue that musical performances with these software systems may be …

Action Music 2 [Score], Erik Griswold

Sound Scripts

Sheet music to Action Music 2

Composer-Performer Collaboration In The Development Of Kinabuhi | Kamatayon For Percussion And Electronics, Louise Devenish, Stuart James

Sound Scripts

This paper provides an outline of the collaborative approach taken in the creation of electroacoustic percussion work Kinabuhi | Kamatayon (2015) by Stuart James for performance by Louise Devenish. Written for eleven Indonesian bossed gongs and electronics, the work involved creative and systematic exploration of various percussive and electronic techniques with the primary aim of re-contextualising these instruments. This paper offers an overview of the collaboration process with percussionist Louise Devenish and how these techniques were used in the work. This includes discussion of the performance practices developed and a suitable notation system for effectively executing these compositional ideas.

Action Music And Action Painting In The Twenty-First Century, Erik Griswold

Sound Scripts

The painter Jackson Pollock reputedly claimed, “I am nature,” while George W. Bush saw himself as “a gut player. I play by instincts.” Donald Trump echoed these sentiments, insisting he was “a very instinctual person, but my instinct turns out to be right.” But can these instincts be put to good use? Perhaps one solution lies in channelling these forces into more creative endeavours, transforming the masculinist approach of Pollock into a more collaborative and joyous action in music. “Action Music” (2013) and “Action Music 2” (2017) are two compositions of mine in which I have employed both in-the-moment improvisation …

The Uncanon: Radical Forgetting And Free Improvisation, Hannah Reardon-Smith

Sound Scripts

In the first decades of the twenty-first century, the canon narrative within Western Art Music continues to resist the critical deconstructions by feminists and the New Musicology. Its stronghold over the way we talk about musical styles and position our practice is so great that even when we do away with the score and the figure of the composer and improvise freely, we find ourselves still trapped within a logic of canon that pushes certain artists’ contributions to the margins. Emphatically free improvisation implies a conscious attempt to forget our musical training and heritage, and subsequently our musical “families”: style, …

Silences [Score], Sage J. Harlow

Sound Scripts

The piece consists of nine (or ten) sections alternating between free and scored; the scored sections all consist of silences of different qualities asking the players to explore ways to facilitate the scored silences. In composing with scored silences, the piece attempts to challenge the idea of silence as a transcendental signifier (or of signifying nothing) and seeks to question the assumption that a piece can convey particular experiences for an audience—silences, in particular, can evoke vastly different responses in people experiencing the ‘same thing’. In this sense, one might read the piece as ‘impossible’ and/or an exploration of the …

The Semi-Autonomous Rock Music Of The Stones, Darren Jorgensen

Sound Scripts

The Flying Nun record the Dunedin Double (1982) is credited with having identified Dunedin as a place where independent, garage style rock and roll was thriving in the early 1980s. Of the four acts on the double album, The Stones would have the shortest life as a band. Apart from their place on the Dunedin Double, The Stones would only release one 12” EP, Another Disc Another Dollar. This essay looks at the place of this EP in both Dunedin’s history of independent rock and its place in the wider history of rock too. The Stones were at first glance …

Addressing Climate Change Scepticism Through The Sonic Arts, Cissi Tsang

Sound Scripts

This paper discusses the continued denial of climate change despite overwhelming scientific evidence and agreement, through viewing climate change as a “hyperobject”—that is, a concept of such massive temporal and spatial dimensions that it defies traditional understanding. One of the challenges of the scientific community is to combat such scepticism through new ways of framing information, and the sonic arts offers an alternative presentation of truth through its ability to create emotional and narrative rapport, and also humanise esoteric information. This paper will focus on various methods of communicating climate change data aurally—such as sonification of data, and ecoacoustic methods …

Wild Swans By Elena Kats-Chernin: The Journey From The Australian Ballet To The Uk Dance Charts, Helen Rusak

Sound Scripts

In 2003 composer Elena Kats-Chernin collaborated with choreographer Meryl Tankard to produce Wild Swans, a ballet based upon the theme of Hans Christian Anderson’s enduring tale evoking the sufferings of Eliza’s fate to save her brothers from the evil curse of their stepmother. It resulted in a score rich with a wide range of musical sources underscoring a tableaux of dance and images beautifully evocative of the tale. The work was premiered by the Australian Ballet at the Sydney Opera House on 29 April 2003. This paper looks at the unexpected journey that one of the musical movements from the …

Art As Truth: The Post-Truth Reception Of Hamilton (2015) And The New Prince (2017), Cecilia Sun

Sound Scripts

No abstract provided.

Everything In Its Place: A Conceptual Framework For Anti-Music, Nicole L. Carroll

Sound Scripts

In this paper I describe my live performance practice utilising bespoke synthesisers and controllers. I address the conceptual approach and processes in the context of esoteric systems and give a technical description of the instruments. I situate my work in the context of Victorian Spiritualism and magic ritual. Following their precedent, I amalgamate systems and esoteric concepts to meet the goals of transformation and connecting to unknown forces, designing hybrid systems that allow me to approach a performance as an automatic mediumship process. I work primarily with NASA’s lunar orbital data, W.B. Yeats’ esoteric system detailed in A Vision (1937), …

Performance Practice In Hungarian Folk Music And Its Relationship To The Style Hongrois, Teresa Vinci

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This study investigates style and performance practice within the oral traditions of Hungarian folk music, and explores intersections with the nineteenth-century idiom style hongrois. Interviews, lessons, and workshops were undertaken as part of a practice-based immersive research experience, and comparisons with the style hongrois made via analysis of scores and recordings of Jeno Hubay (1858-1937). The research strives towards an ‘Historically Informed Performance’ specific to these styles, and explores how they can inform each other. Findings are presented through a dissertation and a CD recording “Never Far Away…” comprising the researcher’s violin performance as leader of an Hungarian folk …

The Composer, The Musicologist, His Wife, And Her Lover: On Lacan’S Relevance To Music, Thomas Reiner

Directions of New Music

This paper asks what it is to write about music. When we ask students or colleagues to write about music are we asking them to describe music structurally, or to cope with music’s ever-shifting signifieds? The paper attempts to answer this question by clarifying the relationship between composition, musicology, and music “itself” by way of a Lacanian reading of Peter Greenaway's film The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover. Lacan’s existential concepts of the Imaginary, the Symbolic, and the Real are first introduced in relation to music with reference to music by Hans Werner Henze, Lady Gaga, …

Drumming Up The Future: Musical Creativity And Drum Circles As A Vehicle For Personal And Social Change, And For Improved Wellbeing Amongst Women In A Pre-Release Facility, Nanna Faulkner

Theses : Honours

Some arts programmes have used drum-circle techniques with the aim of facilitating personal and social change. These include those developed by Arthur Hull in the USA (Hull & Marie, 2014) and Drumbeat projects in Australia (Martin, Wood, Tasker & Coletsis, 2014). There is, however, limited research in the field and none that focuses explicitly on females in pre-release detention facilities. In exploring a range of creative drumcircle activities, informed by theories and practices from music therapy, community music settings and arts programmes in prisons, the present study examines the impact of participation in a ten-week drumming project upon women’s senses …

Copyright Page

Sound Scripts

No abstract provided.

Title Page

Sound Scripts

No abstract provided.

Contents Page, Tos Mahoney

Sound Scripts

No abstract provided.

Contributor Biographies

Sound Scripts

No abstract provided.

Tectonic: A Networked, Generative And Interactive, Conducting Environment For Ipad, Lindsay R. Vickery Dr, Stuart James

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

This paper describes the concept, implementation and context of Tectonic: Rodinia for four realtime composer-conductoors and ensemble. In this work, an addition to the reqertoire of the Decibel Scoreplayer, iPads art networked together using the bonjour protocol to manage connectivity over the network. Unlike previous Scoreplayer works, Rodinia combines "conductor view" control interfaces, "performer view" notation interfaces and an "audience view" overview interface, separately identified by manual connection and yet mutually interactive. Notation is communicated to an ensemble via scores independently generated in realtime in each "performer view" and amalgamated schematically in the :audience view" interface. Interaction in the work …