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ERGODYNAMICS AND A SEMIOTICS OF INSTRUMENTAL COMPOSITION

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 December 2018

Thor Magnusson
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Abstract

This article examines the techno-philosophical aspects of how we create and understand musical systems in twenty-first century computational media. Arguing that processor-based media have exploded the compositional language of new music, the article proposes a set of concepts that might help us navigate this new space of instrumental possibilities. The term ‘ergodynamics’ – and related concepts – is proposed as a useful concept when describing the phenomenological, historical and aesthetic aspects of musical instruments, as well as a lens for looking at new compositional practices that can be defined as being either ‘idiomatic’ or ‘supra-instrumental’. The article explores the difference in composing for acoustic, electronic and digital instruments, and suggests that new musical practice can be characterised by a move from composing work to inventing systems.

Type
RESEARCH ARTICLES
Information
Tempo , Volume 73 , Issue 287 , January 2019 , pp. 41 - 51
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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Footnotes

The author was supported by the AHRC-funded Sonic Writing project (AH/N00194X/1) in this research. Further information can be found here: www.sonicwriting.org

References

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2 See, for example, Duns Scotus: Philosophical Writings, translated by Wolter, Allan B., OFM, (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1987)Google Scholar.

3 I have written about affordances and constraints in musical instruments elsewhere, see Thor Magnusson, ‘Designing Constraints: Composing and Performing with Digital Musical Systems’, in Computer Music Journal 34/4 (2010), pp. 62–73.

4 Hendrix was clearly not the first guitarist to explore and use feedback, but he can be said to have popularised the technique.

5 Magnusson, Thor, ‘Ergomimesis: Towards a Language Describing Instrumental Transductions’, in Proceedings of Live Interfaces Conference (Porto: University of Porto, 2019)Google Scholar.

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21 I explore this further in Magnusson, Thor, ‘Sound and Music in Networked Media’, in The Routledge Companion for Sound Studies (London: Routledge, forthcoming 2019)Google Scholar.

22 I deliberately prefer the word ‘musician’ to terms such as composers, producers, designers, performers or instrumentalists.

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28 Creating a sensor glove in the 1980s required access to well-equipped research labs like STEIM, but today a £25 microchip computer can be ordered online and tutorial videos followed in how to program and solder it into a unique musical system.