Motion, Music, Mediation: Bridging Tradition and Technology in Swedish Folk Dance-Music

Olof Misgeld

This exhibition presents an investigation into the folk music and dance practice polska, involving a group of Swedish folk musicians and dancers. The investigation employs optical motion capture (mocap) to explore interactive music and dance performances and create innovative artistic expressions by merging traditional practices with contemporary media technology. As a musician working closely with the dancers he plays for, the author explores ways to mediate dance through the sonification and visualisation of movement data. The focus is on the fundamental connection between sound and movement in this performance practice, particularly showcased in the project's centrepiece, Dancing Dots. Documentations of this and other works included in the exhibition present live music and dance with sonic and visual displays derived from mocap data, asking how such multi-modal mediations can facilitate understanding of the interplay between movement and music and open new avenues for artistic expression in this folk music practice. The use of optical motion capture is contextualised as a means of mediating music-dance through narrow streams of movement data, and the exposition introduces a web tool for accessible sonification of folk dance. The exposition applies music and dance theoretical concepts in designing the movement mediations, examines their relevance in an artistic context, and grounds the results in a practice-based understanding of the rhythmic/metric framework of the Swedish polska. Download Accessible PDF

1. Music–Dance

Play

Articulate

Listen

Keep at it

Seek resonance

and relaxation

Re-consider Re-take Repeat

Keep on Repeating

Articulate beats

Create swing

balanced

relaxed shifts.

Lift, let go

with balance.

With dancers

Pendle

Release

Jump

Fall

Throw Catch

negotiate within the framework,

the tune,

the dance,

the turning,

the turn-taking,

the side-by-side,

the polska.

‘Å så hej’

Find togetherness in time!

Find being in a conversation!

Become embedded in each other’s listening!

Articulate

Listen

4. Sonify

Map sound parameters to movement variables

Code digital sound generators

Select variables: position, dimension, velocity, acceleration, speed…

Explore:

>Try Windlike to speed of feet...

>Try Blipp Blopp to downward velocity...

>Try Overtones to svikt...

>Reverse the order and re-try!

Listen

Truncate

Tune

Scroll

Probe

Scan

Patterns

Articulations

Rhythms

Beats

Feel

Sections

Phrasings

Play with sounds

Move with sounds

….

Try Windlike to the speed of feet, try Blipp Blopp to downward velocity, Try Overtones to svikt.

…. Reverse

Play - Listen - Move

Re-select - Re-map

Re-consider

Adjust

Repeat

Save, Re-save,

SaveSave, Super-Save

Export, Re-export

Write, Over-write

Arrange exported sonifications into sound-scapes

5. Perform:

Book a room, engage co-performers, technician and invite the audience!

Place chairs in a circle.

Display animations of marker movements in pixel light tubes.

Re-play arranged sonifications in loudspeakers.

Reach from the core of the practice.

Feel sounds as agency to move

move — arms, fingers, bow, feet, guts.

Spine — stretch, Shoulders — release.

Watch

Listen Play

Move Dance

Recognise

Question

Tap into the moving bodies. .-.-.-.-.-

Tap into the sonic patterns. .-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Tap into the visual patterns .-.-.-.-.-.-

Tap Tap and Re-tap

Align and Reorient

Negotiate, Interpret

Re-select, Re-map

Re-consider

Tap tap

Switch attention

between

prerecorded

and live movements

and

Back again

Play sparsely

Listen

Articulate

Improvise

Go a bit wild

Roam around

…

Repeat

Play

Listen

Suggest

Articulate

Respond

Listen

Repeat

3. Visualise.

Plot markers

Connect to stick-figure matrix.

Select lines, dots, tails…

Animate.

Consider the emerging

Traces , pulsations

Signifiers, Patterns: Circles, Dots

Reductions, Movements, Stars, Dancing

Abstractions, Flowers…

Watch

Listen

Play with

Move with

2. In the mocap studio

Monitor

cameras

and microphones.

Put on mocap suits,

place markers on bodies, fiddle,

velcro shoes and hats.

Cover postures:

limbs, joints, left, right,

up, down,

T-pose

Record

<—>

Perform

<—>

Rate

<—>

Discuss

<—>

Repeat

****

Review takes

Mark, Select, Label

Re-label

Process data

Fill gaps, smoothen, remove outliers, compute derivatives, reduce framerate

Export — three columns for each dimension, one row for each fraction of time

****

← Acknowledgements and References

Introduction →

Appendix: Score for a Mediated Polska

This text articulates my experiences performing various parts of the project and serves as an additional entrance to the research. It narrates the process of engaging in mediated interactions between music and dance in fragments of texts visually interleaved with images and animations.

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