Prosthesis or Extension?

After establishing what pedals generate for me, I now turn to the question of how I relate to them as both performer and composer.

The key lies in distinguishing between electronics as prosthesis or extension of the body (instrument) or the mind (composition).

A prosthesis implies compensation — replacing something that’s missing. For example, a “freeze” pedal compensates for the guitar’s lack of long sustain. Reverb compensates for the guitar’s lack of natural resonance. These are sonic prosthetics that fill structural gaps in the instrument — or even conceptual ones, like simulating the sound of another instrument.

“Technologies of sound act as cognitive extensions, allowing performers to reach beyond their own physical and conceptual limitations.”
— Elaine Chew, Music and Cognition: New Perspectives (2004)

In compositional terms, prostheses become subtler. They don’t just realize an idea — they help generate it. For example, they might:

• help imagine sounds that are otherwise difficult to conceive;

• support or replace cognitive functions like remembering complex patterns or managing structural decisions.

   

Also notation software like Sibelius, in this sense, is a cognitive prosthesis.

“Tools used in composition are never neutral — they guide, constrain, and sometimes even suggest the content. A compositional prosthesis does not merely extend the mind; it reframes it.”

— Arne Eigenfeldt, “Composing with Intelligent Agents,” Computer Music Journal (2015)

This is where the idea of extension becomes harder to define. An extension enhances an existing function — it amplifies, rather than replaces. The sound is not just processed — it is transformed into the thought process itself, into the performance and the performer.

In this sense, generative pedals are true extensions: they don’t compensate for lack — they amplify both strengths and weaknesses, reconfiguring the input into a new dance of possibilities. Take this simplified example: 

a young guitarist wants to sound powerful and cool, so he buys an overdrive pedal. But if the notes and the intention aren’t there, the solo won’t work. In that case, the pedal is a prosthesis — a stand-in for something lacking. Later, the same guitarist falls in love with a generative delay. He wants to combine his rock instinct with the unpredictability of echoes and feedback. The result, without deep study, is often chaotic — but this chaotic result now extends his practice, his sound, and his thinking. In both cases, pedals amplify or substitute something — but always starting from human awareness and choice. There’s always a degree of the unknown — and the human controls how the tool is used.

As of today, have my musical attempts to escape really stopped? The answer is clearly a strong “no,” and I feel this pull to move toward other forms of musical and artistic expression.
Throughout my academic music education, my vision was always about becoming a modern jazz guitarist—that was the goal: intense study and then, if you're lucky, gigs.

But I’ve always felt really limited by that vision of myself. I didn’t want to believe that, in becoming enlightened, the only shadow I cast was just that.

I truly believe my artistic and human value goes way beyond my personal experience in the academic jazz world (which has definitely been tainted by difficult situations and questionable people).

I feel like my shadow can reflect more shades of who I

really am.

Now, the question I’m asking myself is: which

of those shades represents me the most today? And which one should I focus on to finally find home?

 To me, home means being in a space that accepts and values me. It means sharing, searching, working, and also feeling lightness.

Whatever I am or want to become, it needs to lead me in that direction. I don’t want to feel trapped in a box that I don’t belong to anymore, where my artistic vision isn’t supported the way it should be.

Working with other people and their ideas inevitably leads to compromise and limitation — but it’s exactly this that makes collaboration exciting. The same principle applies to effects: they introduce limits that paradoxically enable creativity. They help me not to get lost in the ocean of infinite possibilities, but instead allow me to drift inside a lake where I can still see the distant shore.

In this sense, I consider pedals to be tools of creative limitation — and they fit perfectly with the broader definition of musical tool I’ve developed throughout this research. 

But how does someone else’s idea — the designer’s, the engineer’s — fit into this framework?  The answer is that creative limitation, in this context, is always guided by an external idea that still leaves space for personal growth. Two sides of the same coin — playing with another version of myself.

My own input is digested and processed by someone else’s idea (the pedal) and sent back to me — amplified, modified, destroyed, or transformed. What fascinates me is that the input remains mine, but returns with an attempt at fidelityand a human effort toward personality — like someone giving their opinion without worrying too much about how closely it resembles the original.

“Performers… negotiate prosthetic devices (microphones, loudspeakers, pedals, sensors)… interacting with invisible chamber music partners.”
— Elizabeth McNutt, “Performing Electroacoustic Music: A Wider View of Interactivity,” Organised Sound, Vol. 8, No. 3 (2003)

Understanding the Other Myself

This quote by McNutt leads to a deeper reflection on how pedals influence me — and their role in relation to the instrument. The term most commonly used is “effect,” but I find it insufficient.

“Effect” suggests something additive — a flavor layered on top of the original sound without altering its essence. These are what I call additive effects, which maintain a clear connection to the original signal. A classic example: reverb. It supports and enhances the original gesture without fully reshaping it. But not all pedals should be reduced to simple additives. If that’s the goal, then you must use them sparingly — otherwise the sound becomes diluted.

On the opposite end are what I call generative pedals — those with the following characteristics:

• they embody a clear human musical idea;

• they oscillate between faithful reproduction and radical transformation;

• they create a sense of interaction with an invisible performer;

• they contain a degree of uncontrollability, making them feel alive and autonomous.

  
  

“In electronic music, sound transformation is not a side effect. It becomes the gesture itself.”
— Michel Chion, Guide To Sound Objects (1983)

Most modern pedals blend both additive and generative elements. But their effectiveness lies in knowing how to alternate between them. Leaving a generative pedal always on can overwhelm the texture — just as too much reverb can make things blurry.

Once again, this leads to a form of sonic organization, pushing the performer into a hybrid space between composition and performance.

As an improviser,

I used pedals 

As a performer, 

I am a guitarist. 

CONVERSATION W/ MY FUTURE SELF 

C: Who are you now? 

C: I'm the same as you, but I found my musical identity.

C: Are you sure? Tell me, what's your identity. 

C: I don't have a specific one. I'm floating between names, languages, limits and arts. 

C: mmm, so you didn't find anything. Great! 

C: Actually the opposite, we found everything! You see, you are struggling so hard to fit a role that you couldn't accomplish just because you thought that music and art it's a fixed box. What's the sense in this quest? 

C: There is a sense? I'm just trying to define myself, to fit a box that I really want to fit. Isn't this enough? 

C: Yes, but... did you manage to? 

C: Not yet. Maybe because I have fear of letting myself go into unknown musical territories or maybe because I see other people happy in their boxes and I wanto to fit into them too.

C: I know so well the feeling and It's natural for you now to grow into something. I just did the same path you're doing and when you let all these fears go, you'll navigate into something and that something defines your identiy, your home. But moving it is connected to time. We are musicians anyways, aren't we used to deal with Time? 

C: Ok ok thanks, but when is it coming? 

C: I don't know, I didn't arrived yet. I'm happily waiting. 

As a guitarist,

I am an improviser 

As I use pedals,

I play with myself

Do I need tools to improvise? 

What am I using for improvising?

What's improvisation for me?  

What's happening with other players?

“The painter Rothko said that the reason he painted was because he was still uncertain about what art is. That's why I compose. I still don't know what music is.”

— Morton Feldman, Give My Regards to Eighth Street (2000)

"A musical identity is not static but is constantly evolving by nature. Musicians reject the notion of identifying with a single, narrow and confined view of themselves, often weaving together multiple threads to construct their own distinctly personal musical identities."
— Nigel R. Thomson, Benjamin J. Harwood, and Lucy Green, “Musical identities and music education: Crossing the divide,” British Journal of Music Education, 2023.

 After introducing them to the ideas behind the method—its origins, reasons, and guiding parameters—we began by simply playing together to break the ice. I documented portions of these sessions through audio and video recordings, capturing spontaneous interactions that offered valuable insights into how the system functioned in a real-time, social context.

Rather than presenting isolated concepts or a single analytical idea, I chose to design hybrid pieces—improvisational frameworks that fused together several analyses. In doing so, I intentionally combined different parameters to foster a sense of narrative and development. For example, I avoided pairing two fragments that centered solely on "melody." Instead, I sought combinations that hinted at compositional structure—those that required a process of selection and organization. The idea was to generate interplay between interpretive freedom and pre-existing constraints.

I think this is the definition that most closely resembles the feeling of “home” I have at this moment in my development. Embracing this definition gives me the peace of mind needed to open different doors, because it is my sensitivity that builds the entire narrative behind a piece of work.

Over the years, I have increasingly taken refuge in this definition, feeling orphaned from that of "jazz guitarist," and I have found affirmation and satisfaction in working towards a personal language. The compositional vein has always been stronger in me than the performative one, but what I lacked—and what I now believe is the true challenge of the composer—were the tools that could give me the agility to move between different contexts without being locked into a specific ensemble or musical language.

For example, I used to write for big band within established codes—voicings that work, harmonic structures that ensure sonic stability—but all of this always led to results that were flat. Stylistically correct, yes, but flat. And most importantly, they did not reflect my thinking or my language.

Now that I’m actively stepping away from predetermined limits and languages, I find myself feeling as though I lack the necessary tools to work—those physical tools of the composer, like the ruler, hammer, and planer of a craftsman. Tools designed for different contexts, objects, and timelines. But above all, tools whose existence is shaped by memory—years of refinement, of challenges overcome and needs resolved, always with the same tools, but with minds that were always different and creative.

I feel I’m still learning how to work as a composer, because I don’t believe it’s the same as being a performer. It requires a different kind of listening—a peripheral, not a laser-focused one.

“The composer works through a perceptual, not conceptual process. He perceives, he selects, he combines [...].”
— Stravinsky, An Autobiography (1962)

I find this quote by Stravinsky fascinating, because it captures the essence of being a composer: using the tools we have at hand along with a deeply human ability to perceive.

I am drawn to the craftsmanship of composition, to the possibility of reflecting, of working with time and process.

To compose is, for me, to make use of my artistic creativity beyond the boundaries of genre, instrument, or tradition. It is about consciously applying techniques, methods, and systems—studied, tested, and refined—to express myself fully.
In this compositional practice, listening, both to the material and to myself, becomes a form of perception.

The connection between composition and improvisation, in my experience, lies precisely in the notion of perception—a word rooted in the Latin percipere, meaning "to grasp completely," and implying both effort and attentiveness. Whether improvising or composing, I am fundamentally engaging in acts of perception:

           I want to perceive while improvising

           I want to perceive while composing. 

How do I start to perceive?  

How Improvising is changing me? 

While I was working on this research, I was also involved in several parallel projects. Even though the influence of this work was initially passive, it gradually began to surface—both in my role as a performer and as a composer. Here, I present three examples that illustrate how the ideas developed through this research have echoed across a broader creative spectrum.

The first, as already mentioned, is the piece for Big Band entitled "Futura," written for a concert held at Jazzcampus Basel in June 2025. I chose this composition as an example because it reveals how the system I developed proved useful as a source of inspiration, even as it collided with other compositional tools and processes. The outcome was something different from the research itself, yet it retained a clear and vital connection to its source.

The initial concept for "Futura" was based on an interest in employing a compositional structure inspired by the first movement of Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms. Having such a compelling framework in which to operate, what I needed was a body of concrete material with which to begin. The influence of fragment analysis here functioned as a unified block: I recognized in many of the fragments recurring elements—loops, repetitions, circular gestures—that resonated strongly with Stravinsky’s stylistic language. There was no direct or literal transposition of materials from the research into this piece. Rather, I believe that the ferment of reflection during those days of composition led to a natural transference of concepts, parameters, and sensibilities. This mode of thinking became the underlying structure upon which the entire piece was built.

This example is meaningful to me because it reveals something important: I cannot fully isolate myself from the tools and knowledge I’ve absorbed over time—those I choose to explore or those that have already shaped me. The creative seed may have emerged from the language of fragments, but it was cultivated and carried forward by other tools—ones that may not have been directly referenced in this research, but that nonetheless form part of my wider musical identity. No matter how strongly I try to define myself within a single method or creative approach, experiences like this remind me that musical fundamentalism has serious limitations. I am the sum of all the creative practices I’ve engaged with, and this research is now part of that sum.

You can click the pdf and scroll through the score of "Futura" and perhaps recognize elements—particularly in the type of notation—that reflect the parameters and illustrations described earlier in this document. Good luck! 

Building a  REPOSITORY OF SOUNDS

This is sonic exploration. Just sit there with what I have in that moment. After few sessions I asked myself if what I was doing had some potential and if so, how can I discover it? I write here a list of few questions that can help me calm down about panicking around the actual realisation: 

- How creative I feel within the sound? 

- Why I think those sounds are interesing? 

- Am in control of the material? 

- Can I see any immediate aspect of musical organization? Such as orchestration, instruments playing that, analytical analysis or else? And if not, it's still valuable material. 

- How can I stay in one sound and explore it thoroughly? 

The concept behind this phase is to collect few sounds that can answer those questions and touch few others parameters that can help me in the next analysis one. From an early stage of this moment, I recognized the clear distinction between a generative sound (i.e. something that has, for my view , fundamentals charateristics of musical understanding, which it means: FORM and CONTROL) and a submersive sound, something that can stay at the bottom, being a bed for other things (for example non-pitch sound such as plucked strings before the bridge, scratches, punching the guitar etc.) 

A good starting sound should display clear charateristics of these two sounds and, a good composition, should present a balance between these two sides. 

                                                              TAKING SPACE  ---------------- GIVING SPACE 

"I improvise and find myself in the middle of a complexity beyond my ability to grasp. I am flying. I try to recreate that moment, using my memory... I must accept that I can only find back 70% of the complexity. 70% may be enough... The missing 30% is the space within which your body has room to develop."Jonathan Burrows - Handbook

This idea resonates deeply with my practice. When translating improvisation into composition, I must accept the incompleteness of what is retained. It is within that missing 30% that new meaning, new structure, and new music can arise. From the outset of this project, I intentionally worked with minimal musical material: simple riffs, short loops, and repetitive gestures across the fretboard. This "serial looper" approach, which I have long gravitated toward even before this research, became the aesthetic foundation for the entire process. It created the conditions for listening to a single idea in depth, rather than generating multiple ideas without direction. Such an approach presupposes a level of internal organization, even if unconsciously applied. I often asked myself: what would have happened if I had begun instead with a fully formed piece, or a familiar structure? That too could be a future iteration of this research — a different starting point, no more or less valid.

What Is a Musical Tool?

Pierre Schaeffer said:

“Any device that enables the production of a varied collection of sound objects, while maintaining a perceptible causal relationship with the source, can be considered a musical tool.”
— Pierre Schaeffer, Traité des objets musicaux (1966)

 

In my own experience as a composer, I’m constantly working with tools like this—whether they’re physical devices or more abstract ideas. What makes them "tools" is that they stay connected, in some way, to their origin. That origin might be mechanical (like a pedal), conceptual (like a chord or a scale), or even visual or emotional. It could be a painting, a memory, a feeling—anything that sparks sound and can still be traced in the final result.

A scale is a tool. So is a chord, a pedal point, a certain structure or shape, or even a mental image. What they all have in common is this: they have a thread running through them—a thread that can be stretched, twisted, broken, burned, or reshaped however you want. But even after all that, something of the original source still remains.

A lot of these tools come from systems with clear rules and structures. But in my case, the tools I use are often much more personal and intuitive. And that raises a big question:

How do you share something with others that’s so rooted in your own inner world?

Musicologist Hans Heinrich Eggebrecht once said that music is like “thinking without concepts” (Denken ohne Begriff). It’s a kind of understanding that doesn’t follow strict logic, but still makes sense—it communicates, it resonates. This really fits with my way of composing, especially when I’m not starting from a theory or a system, but from a feeling or a sound I can’t quite explain.

The tools I develop come out of that in-between space:
between freedom and structure, between improvising and shaping, between intuition and form. That tension is where my music is born

TOOLS 

Analysis is a composer Tool!

“Analysis is itself a kind of performance, a way of engaging with music that generates meaning through interpretation.”
— Lawrence Kramer, Classical Music and Postmodern Knowledge (University of California Press, 1995), p. 16.

In its most traditional sense, musical analysis seeks to reveal the structure of a piece: its harmonic organization, formal architecture, rhythmic systems, and thematic development. From this perspective, analysis is a tool that enables us to understand how a work functions, identifying the mechanisms that give it coherence or expressive power. Mi affascina però pensare all' analisi come qualcosa che lasci una traccia di creatività far from being a neutral or purely objective act. Analyzing music always implies a position: a point of view shaped by aesthetic preferences, cultural frameworks, historical knowledge, and personal experience.

This creative dimension becomes especially evident when the music under scrutiny resists easy categorization—such as in improvised, experimental, or electronically mediated works. In these contexts, analysis becomes less about revealing a hidden code and more about constructing a narrative of understanding. For composers like Pierre Boulez, analysis was intimately linked to composition itself—an act of reverse-engineering sound to uncover formal possibilities:

“Analysis is creation in reverse.”
— Pierre Boulez, in Orientations (1986)

This is how analysis becomes another tool—this time dedicated to attention and detail, a way of connecting not only to structure but to sound itself. After all, how useful would an analysis be if reduced to chord symbols and the identification of motives or rules? Creative stagnation is always a human choice, not a property of the material, which wants to speak to us as a witness of the same sensations experienced by the composer. 

Within the framework of my own research, analysis does not aim to produce definitive knowledge, but rather to articulate why certain sounds feel necessary—why they “stick,” resist erasure, or invite transformation and how can I describe them in the most honest and open way.
Analysis, here, is both reflective and projective: it reflects on what has already happened (in improvisation) while at the same time proposing new trajectories for what these fragments could become. Thus, to do analysis is not simply to answer the question “how does this work?”, but to ask:
“What can this sound become if I listen to it again, differently?”

“Research is useful so long as I know it’s research and don’t start thinking it’s the finished work. Sometimes it’s better to put down the research and get on with the piece.” (Burrows, 2010, p. 43)

If don't kwow what music is and who I am, I need to search it

Loose ends and unsolved problems 

While these positive aspects shaped much of the experience, I also encountered concrete challenges. One was the desire to produce more musical material and engage more fully with the analytical processes, in order to arrive at a more refined and less raw outcome. Much of my time was devoted to building the system itself rather than fully exploring it, and I now wish I had spent more time becoming familiar with it in practice.

Another issue relates to my role as a performer. Over time, my focus shifted toward other artistic dimensions, and I set aside regular practice of my instrument outside of the context of this specific language. I now wonder: if I had maintained a more serious and consistent approach to both improvisational and traditional study, would the results have been more refined from the start? I believe that my insecurity as a performer played a significant role at the beginning of this research, and to some extent, this feeling lingered even as I worked to transform it through the process.

From a compositional standpoint, I still struggle with the immediacy of moving from an analyzed fragment to something present and active. I suspect this comes, in part, from an internal hesitation and self-judgment around how I apply the method—something that still disrupts the flow of the work at times.

From the perspective of my collaborators, a recurring difficulty was how to explain the system clearly—without reducing it to “just do whatever you want, try to follow along, but it’s okay either way.” There was also the challenge of minimizing the immediate impression that the visual elements were graphic scores in the traditional sense. I see now that I need to refine my ability to introduce the system in a more musically-oriented way from the very beginning. Bringing someone into your world takes time, care, and patience.

From an interdisciplinary standpoint, I would have liked to explore the method further in collaborations with other art forms, including contexts where I wasn’t the one performing—just to see how others might interpret and engage with it.

Selecting the Fragments

Choosing the fragments during this research turned out to be one of the most revealing and important parts of the whole composition process. It wasn’t just about deciding what sounded good or not—it was more about listening deeply to the improvisations, noticing the parts that didn’t immediately make me want to throw them away.

I didn’t pick these fragments because they felt finished. I picked them because they kept pulling my attention—because there was something about them that didn’t let go. This way of working really reminds me of what György Ligeti talks about with musical microstructures. In pieces like Atmosphères or Continuum, he doesn’t build music through a clear narrative but through textures that slowly shift and evolve. As he put it:

“My goal was to obtain musical expression not as a succession of events, but as a single sound image in transformation.”
— György Ligeti, Ligeti in Conversation (1983)

Ligeti’s approach helped me see my own process more clearly. I wasn’t looking for traditional musical ideas—I was looking for small-scale material: loops, gestures, textures—fragments that carried a kind of sensitivity or energy. They weren’t meant to be complete on their own but could grow into something depending on where I placed them later.

It’s worth saying that this reflection came after the fact. When I started, I didn’t have a clear compositional plan. I wanted to keep things open and exploratory—to let things happen without immediately trying to frame them as “pieces.” So Ligeti’s method became more of a model I could look back to or maybe apply later on, in the next cycle of work.

Most importantly, selecting fragments isn’t just passive—it’s already part of composing. Every time I chose something, I was making a decision that was aesthetic, emotional, and performative all at once. Now and then, I’d find a fragment that felt surprisingly whole—like a tiny, self-contained world. One example is the fragment Textures + Breathing ideas (which you’ll see later in this document). That one had a natural flow to it, a form and transition that just kind of happened, almost magically.

Those moments reminded me of what Morton Feldman once said:

“Sometimes a short piece is enough. I never had the need to say something longer than it is.”
— Morton Feldman, Essays (1985)

 

It was a good reminder that something can feel complete without being long or developed. Sometimes it’s about how focused or dense the material is. Just a few seconds of sound can hold a whole world inside.

So, in the end, picking fragments wasn’t just a way to organize improvisations—it became a way of thinking musically through listening. Each selected moment became a kind of tool or lens through which a new piece could be imagined. Not fixed, not final—but full of potential.

The goal of this analysis wasn’t to create something fixed—it was to find something flexible, something that could grow with me over time. But I noticed that at some point, I started trying to control everything too much. I wanted to compose with pedals in a way where I always knew exactly what was going to happen. Basically, I was aiming for the kind of setup where you press a button and everything just works.

But that approach turned out to be a dead end. It felt dry, uninspired—more about trying to avoid risk than actually creating something meaningful. That’s when I realized there’s a big difference between a preset and a concept.

Presets—whether they’re factory settings on a pedal, formal templates, stylistic habits, or familiar gestures—give you instant results. They’re useful, sure, but they often skip over the most important part of making music: listening, thinking, making choices. Like Brian Eno said:

“Presets are the musical equivalent of clichés. They relieve you of the responsibility of having to listen to what you’re doing.”
— Brian Eno, A Year with Swollen Appendices (1996)

When you rely on presets without questioning them, you miss the chance to ask:
Why this sound? Why here? Why now?

A concept is something else entirely. It doesn’t just give you a sound—it gives you a way of thinking. The music starts to reflect on itself, not just exist. That said, presets aren’t evil. Because they’re immediate and familiar, they can help you out of moments of doubt or confusion. Sometimes, not thinking too much is actually helpful. But if presets are shortcuts, concepts are slow burners—they come out of repetition, testing, failing, and paying attention.

A concept isn’t a sound or a structure on its own—it’s more like a question that guides you.
What if I only use three words?
What happens if I play for two hours using the same three notes?
What if I create a piece made entirely of non-linear loops?

These are starting points. But on their own, they don’t mean much—they need context, experience, and personal connection to really become useful. That’s what made this whole research meaningful to me: I wasn’t just pulling ideas from some shared musical toolkit. I was creating tools based on my experience. In a way, I became the tool.

This goes back to what Pierre Schaeffer said:

“Any device that enables the production of a varied collection of sound objects, while maintaining a perceptible causal relationship with the source, can be considered a musical tool.”

I’ve basically become that device—something that generates sound material while staying meaningfully connected to its source: me. That’s what “make it yours” means here. Except in this case, it works the other way around—it starts from the subject (me) and moves outward to the object (the music).

One example is a fragment I called Textures + Breathing Ideas. After listening back to it a few times, I noticed a kind of elastic, breathing rhythm in the sound—something that came from the machine’s own limitations. This wasn’t something I had planned or saved as a preset. It was something I noticed, pulled out, and turned into a concept. It became a tool I could use again, in other ways.

That way of working is close to how Iannis Xenakis thought about composing:

“To compose is to imagine, to project, to invent worlds of sound—not to repeat inherited ones.”
— Iannis Xenakis, Formalized Music (1971)

That’s also why I never saw this project as a simple “transcription” of my improvisations. Especially once I started using effects pedals, it became something more speculative, more exploratory. And interestingly, even in the moment of improvising, I was already composing—I just wasn’t fully aware of it yet.

Another example is how I used the Chase Bliss Habit pedal. Instead of relying on its built-in looping presets, I treated it more like a collaborator. I let it surprise me, push me in new directions. Over time, I started to notice recurring behaviors—certain ways the loops would interact—and I pulled those out as ideas I could use elsewhere. So the presets weren’t the goal—they were the spark for something new.

That’s really the heart of it: the point isn’t to find the “perfect” setup or sound. It’s about learning how to listen, how to pull ideas out of what you’re doing, and how to build systems that can evolve.

Presets give you answers you never asked for.
Concepts help you ask better questions.

Possibilities for Future Iterations

I’ve reflected at length on the potential future directions for this project. As mentioned earlier in the research, a tool remains a tool: I can choose to use it, or not. Years might pass before I feel the need to return to it—but I carry the awareness that I built it, and that it is now part of my creative vocabulary. In other contexts, I’d be curious to explore how the same method might work in pedagogical environments, especially with young students. I believe the system could offer a way to introduce creative thinking that begins with self-listening and with discovering what resonates personally. The system is also highly adaptable to workshops or group classes, especially due to the immediacy of the graphic component, which is accessible to almost anyone.

My extended reflection on pedals also made me think this framework could be applied in collaboration with pedal manufacturers—to co-develop tools that are more human, responsive, and open to creative exploration.

From a compositional perspective, the issue of notation is something that could be further developed and refined. It would be interesting to look toward other disciplines for inspiration: how dancers annotate gesture in choreography, how visual designers sketch interactions, or how contemporary composers create hybrid systems. Adapting the notational strategies of this project depending on the context is, I believe, one of the key ways to increase its flexibility and long-term applicability.

ANALYSIS 

Why Words and Visuals?

As a composer, my primary goal is always to strive for communicative clarity within the complexity of the work I propose. There is nothing more disheartening than seeing my work misunderstood when, to me, it feels entirely transparent. This led me to reflect deeply on the notation system I should adopt to convey this process of analysis—aware that it needed to be as simple, spontaneous, and action-oriented as possible. I considered three main approaches:

1. Traditional Notation: While precise, this method would have been too limiting. This type of work demands room for personal interpretation, and traditional systems often constrain that. I also considered more contemporary systems, as used by many modern composers, but these typically require lengthy explanations and an artistic framework to support them—diminishing immediacy and becoming overly cumbersome.

   
   

2. Verbal Notation: Words are clear, easily understood, and communicate almost instantly with performers. That’s why I chose words that were not only immediate but also rooted in a shared musical vocabulary, even accessible to a child just starting out. At the same time, the inherent vagueness of words like "volume" invites creative interpretation: the performer is free to explore what such a word means in relation to their own instrument and ideas. When combined with other terms, the potential permutations become endless—amplifying the creative space.

   
   

3. Visual Notation: However, when words are placed in sequence—one after the other—they often imply hierarchy or chronology, introducing unwanted friction between transitions. What I needed was another layer, a medium that could express both the free interaction of parameters and provide an immediate visual understanding. That led me to the use of simple graphic illustrations. These act as diagrams—conceptual containers where parameters like melody, counterpoint, and register can interact along fluid axes. These aren’t strict Cartesian systems (some drawings feature displaced or multiple axes), but serve as flexible spaces in which various musical elements coexist and influence one another.

   
   

Take the example of the first drawing below : the parameter "melody" describes a clear musical action. It can interact with "counterpoint" placed above (suggesting a higher register), or with "bass" below (implying a lower one). But this isn’t fixed: the melody may roam freely, conscious of the potential for interaction with other parameters. This logic applies to all variables, creating a labyrinth of creative potential.

As composer Cornelius Cardew notes in Treatise:

“Notation is a way of making people move. It is a way of setting people into motion in particular directions.”

These illustrations are not meant to be interpreted as graphic scores with predetermined sequences constructed by the composer. Rather, as Cardew suggests, they are tools to activate movement—of ideas, feelings, intuitions, and possibilities—in particular directions, though never a single one. Like musical fragments, these drawings are suggestive, incomplete, and open-ended. They function as visual translations of my conceptual vocabulary—articulating ideas such as flow, breath, emphasis, and hesitation that are difficult to capture with conventional notation.

 Ultimately, they are not roadmaps, but landscape

Melody

Form

Echoes

Form

Groove

Pulse/Groove