Composition as Commentary: Voice and Poetry in Electroacoustic Music

Edmund Hunt

Exposition

Composition as Commentary: Voice and Poetry in Electroacoustic Music (2020)

Edmund Hunt

open exposition

About this exposition

What is the role of a spoken or sung text in an electroacoustic composition? Does it represent anachronism, assigning the role of communication to the voice and thereby depriving more abstract electroacoustic material of its rhetorical force? Does the disembodied, electroacoustic voice distance the audience from the communicative power of the words that are heard? Although Simon Emmerson argued that the disembodied human voice in acousmatic music can often seem frustrating, this sense of disembodiment might be turned to the composer’s advantage, as the basis of a methodology for creative practice. In the process of developing a methodology to address questions of text, language, voice, and electroacoustic technology, I created two musical compositions. Both works used the untranslated words of an enigmatic Old English poem, ‘Wulf and Eadwacer’. At first glance, the idea of using a text in an obscure or ancient language that carries little or no semantic meaning for the listeners might raise further questions. Is this a deliberate attempt at obfuscation, hiding the paucity of the composer’s ideas behind a veneer of archaism or even naive exoticism? As my investigation progressed, I began to envisage the process of electroacoustic composition as a type of non-linguistic commentary on a text. Rather than hindering the listener’s understanding of a composition inspired by literature, the electroacoustic voice might help to reveal different interpretations of a text, allowing multiple ideas and identities to be heard.

type	research exposition
keywords	composition, contemporary music, electroacoustic music, voice, voice and electronics, composition process, composition as research, Old English, literature, vocality, Music and performing arts 2021
date	16/07/2020
published	16/07/2020
last modified	16/03/2023
status	published
share status	private
affiliation	Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, Birmingham City University
copyright	Edmund Hunt 2020
license	CC BY-NC-ND
language	English
url	https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/643189/643190
doi	https://doi.org/10.22501/jar.643189
published in	Journal for Artistic Research, Birmingham City University: Faculty of Arts, Design and Media
portal issue	20. 20
connected to	Birmingham City University: Faculty of Arts, Design and Media

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name	stage set-up
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name	Vocal Samples on Logic
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name	Wulf and Eadwacer text video
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name	Preliminary analysis of the metre of wulf and eadwacer 6
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name	Preliminary analysis of alliteration revised
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name	Footnote for alliteration
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name	We Are Apart High Res June 2020
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name	samples of speech or song 4
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name	granular example of speech or song 4
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name	sounds of indefinite pitch
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name	samples of speech or song revised
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name	granular samples of speech or song revised
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name	rapid material of indefinite pitch large
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name	rapid material of indefinite pitch small
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name	upper partials 1
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name	upper partials 2
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name	upper partials emerging from A440
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name	material within rectangular box repeated many times
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name	boxed material lasts for 5 seconds
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name	wavy continuation line
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name	chords formed from combinations of upper partials
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name	boxed text is spoken for the duration of the continuation line
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Composition as Commentary: Voice and Poetry in Electroacoustic Music (2020)

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