Encompassing more than a century, music created through the use of diverse artificial audio technologies faces loss: of written documents, of musical scores, of instruments, machines and devices, of functional electronic components, of techniques and of a sense of the necessity which drove musicians to use a particular technology in a given context. In turn, the loss of documents leads to misunderstanding or oblivion. Today's electroacoustic music studies offer ways to remedy the danger of loss.

Projects are emerging that reflect the growing concern with preservation and access to our electroacoustic heritage. In today's context it is difficult to find the huge financial means needed to facilitate a durable and efficient response to this problem. Some accessible objectives and projects are presented here which could be developed by the electroacoustic community. For a long time people have been concerned about the importance of the electroacoustic domain; the concern should now include the urgency of preservation.

Challenging the usual acceptance of electroacoustics as a distinct field of its own, this article leads the reader through a series of paths to show the extent to which concerns and techniques of electroacoustics are shared with other musical and artistic disciplines. It continues with a similar questioning of the usual interpretation of analysis by examining the variety of aims, methods, and characteristics of analytical methods, and encourages an increased awareness on the part of all analysts to appreciate where their own work is situated within the field. Typical concerns of electroacoustics, such as the design of timbral structures, gestures and textures are discussed within the realm of parametric analysis, but allusion is also made to other approaches which examine style and context. Disciplines from perception to semiotics are shown to have relevance for further development of adequate analytical tools. The author does not advocate one particular approach, but rather attempts to demonstrate the vastness and intricacy of the field. The conclusion is that analysis of electroacoustics could both contribute to, and benefit from, analysis in other areas of music and art.

This paper is the first step in thesolution of the problem of finite completion of comma-free codes.We show that every finite comma-free code is included in afinite comma-free code of particular kind, which we called, for lack of a better term, canonical comma-free code. Certainly, finite maximal comma-free codesare always canonical. The final step of the solution which consistsin proving further that every canonical comma-free code is completedto a finite maximal comma-free code, is intended to be published in a forthcomingpaper.

This paper illustrates the early period of electroacoustic music in Japan through an intensive examination of the source materials for historiography and analytical study, trying to illuminate the reception of Western techniques by Japanese composers, examining the rudiments of their original creative ideas. An extensive list of Japanese works with information about their accessible manuscripts, literature and available recordings is provided. All quotations from the articles or interviews in Japanese have also been translated into English by the author of this paper, unless otherwise stated. The graphic transcriptions presented in this paper have been produced by the author employing computerised spectrum analysis. The aim of this paper is to provide resources for further investigation into this topic, particularly for concerned researchers in other language regions than Japanese.

The majority of composers and scholars in the field of electroacoustic and computer music address their attention to the problem of achieving satisfactory relationships between new technological instrumentalities and the very sense of music making. Reflections concerning the relationships between the use of digital technologies and musical expression have assumed an increasingly important role, since they provide interpretative codes of composers' works and assume an explanatory function during the presentation of new musical pieces. Focusing on the interaction between cognitive environments, emotive dimensions and communicative set-up, this paper intends to propose an analysis of some theoretical statements, which regard the relationships between scientific innovations and the evolutionary tendencies of technologically based music.

We study the complexity of the infinite word uβ associated with theRényi expansion of 1 in an irrational base β > 1.When β is the golden ratio, this is the well known Fibonacci word,which is Sturmian, and of complexity C(n) = n + 1.For β such thatdβ(1) = t1t2...tm is finite we provide a simple description ofthe structure of special factors of the word uβ . When tm =1we show thatC(n) = (m - 1)n + 1. In the cases when t1 = t2 = ... tm-1 ort1 > max{t2,...,tm-1 } we show that the first differenceof the complexity function C(n + 1) - C(n ) takes value in{m - 1,m} for every n, and consequently we determine thecomplexity of uβ . We show thatuβ is an Arnoux-Rauzy sequence if and only ifdβ(1) = tt...t1. On the example ofβ = 1 + 2cos(2π/7), solution of X3 = 2X2 + X - 1, we illustratethat the structure of special factors is more complicated fordβ (1) infinite eventually periodic.The complexity for this word is equal to 2n+1.

Initially a result of talking heads, followed by the arrival of telephony and the gramophone, the use of artificial vocality within musical composition is becoming more and more common as different laboratories acquire devices enabling the manipulation of sound. Following Pierre Schaeffer's first experiments in Paris, many composers became interested in the expressive resources of the mechanical voice, the results of which are now present in a large corpus of electroacoustic works. By its very nature, artificial vocality establishes a new link between the vocal quality of a sound event (its vocality) and technology (its artificiality) within this type of music.

How then, can the musicologist study artificial vocality and the works in which it is used? Which tools should be used? What makes the analysis of artificial vocality so specific? Is it possible to create new tools for the analysis of artificial vocality within electroacoustic music?

In the search for answers to these questions, many difficulties present themselves. The first concerns the modes of representation and the methods used to analyse artificial vocality. On top of this, real reflection is needed concerning the disparity of technological tools used in analysis and the need for the application of a certain methodology in order to classify them. The starting point will be the establishment of a typology. Finally, the idea of being able to compare different representations of the same work using sophisticated tools will open the way to the discovery of new analytical approaches. Seeking freedom from the relative blindness caused by the over-specialisation and rigidity of technological tools is now an urgent necessity, particularly when considering artificial vocality.

‘Signed Listening’ is a project that was initiated by Ircam in the spring of 2003. Its goal is to develop computer tools that permit an expanded listening – whether it be for musical analysis, for composition or simply for its own sake with no specific goal in mind (via stereo or computer). This article will briefly present some hypotheses and objectives of the project, and how it touches issues relating, in particular, to electroacoustic music, as well as presenting examples taken from the early stages of our research.

This paper investigates one possible model of reversible computations, animportant paradigm in the context of quantum computing. Introduced byBennett, a reversible pebble game is anabstraction of reversible computation that allows to examine the space andtime complexity of various classes of problems. We present a techniquefor proving lower and upper bounds on time and space complexity for severaltypes of graphs. Using this technique we show that the time needed toachieve optimal space for chain topology is Ω(nlgn) for infinitelymany n and we discusstime-space trade-offs for chain. Further we show a tight optimalspace bound for the binary tree of height h of the form h + Θ(lg*h)and discuss space complexity for the butterfly. These results give anevidence that reversible computations need more resources than standardcomputations. We also show an upper bound on time and space complexity ofthe reversible pebble game based on the time and space complexity of thestandard pebble game, regardless of the topology of the graph.

A catalyst for the thinking in this paper is the way in which the concentrated direct audition of materials central to the process of electroacoustic composition can, in conjunction with powerful tools for the deconstruction and synthesis of sounds, influence the nature of musical relationships that are formed.

At any moment in the history of a particular culture, there exists a dominant paradigm, an idea in the air, that expresses the way the world works. These paradigms are general and their manifestations are interdisciplinary, first expressed as structures, relationships and processes in the avant gardes of all fields, then gradually accepted as a norm by almost everyone.

When, in 1998, I began my research into the analysis of electroacoustic music, analysis and representation were two distinct disciplines. One was an integral part of music research and the other was just a possible option for publication.

This paper introduces the ElectroAcoustic Resource Site project (EARS), taking a tripartite approach: first outlining the project's philosophy, then reporting on work-to-date and finishing with a discussion of the project's ambitions and aims.

The project's aim is the development of a dynamic, multi-lingual, international, publicly available Internet-based bibliographical resource designed to enhance the scholarly infrastructure of electroacoustic music studies, in particular, the musicology of electroacoustic music. Through the use of hypertext structures and linking systems the site will help to contextualise specific research within the broad field of electroacoustic music studies, as well as making helpful links between related areas/items of scholarship. The project aspires to assist access to current, past and evolving areas of scholarship and will attempt to redress certain imbalances in the ease of access to areas of research within the field. The project will strive to conceive of electroacoustic music in its widest possible sense, acknowledge the interdisciplinary nature of the field, and aspire to the greatest possible breadth and inclusiveness. The EARS project is coordinated by an international consortium, is directed by the authors and can be found at http://www.mti.dmu.ac.uk/EARS