Temporal Forces in Electroacoustic Music
Pablo Garcia-Valenzuela, Centro de Ciencia Aplicada · 2006
This paper addresses the idea of musical discourse from the perspective of temporal forces of organization based on Jonathan D. Kramer’s research in musical time (Kramer, 1988). It also addresses rhythm in its non-metric or non-pulse-based form (Meyer and Cooper, 1960) and presents it as an organizational force that deserves consideration in electroacoustic music (Garcia-Valenzuela, 2003). In this way, a series of concepts that serve as general analytical tools are defined and put forward, which in turn allow us to create relevant terminologies in electroacoustic music. Examples are given throughout using short musical sections. Finally, and arguably a further aspect of musical time, a powerful aesthetic issue that may weigh on any analytical or terminological approach to electroacoustic music is introduced: that of sonic surrealism. Jonathan D. Kramer’s (Kramer, 1988) ideas of musical time are mainly based on instrumental music. The main concepts that govern Kramer’s species of musical time are ‘linearity’ and ‘nonlinearity’. Linearity is defined as “the determination of some characteristic(s) of music in accordance with implications that arise from earlier events of the piece”; nonlinearity as “the determination of some characteristic(s) of music in accordance with implications that arise from principles or tendencies governing an entire piece or section” (Kramer 1988, p.20). These terms, it must be said, create negative reactions in scientists, who argue that linearity and nonlinearity are well defined concepts in physics and mathematics that do not match Kramer’s definitions. However, it is not in our purpose to rename them, at least not for now, but to use the ideas. In electroacoustic music, which is normally based on the qualitative aspect of sound, we employ different material to compose. But does this mean we use different temporal forces of organization as well? Certainly we do not often find rhythmic and/or melodic structures in electroacoustic music but we do find durational proportions, non-pulsebased rhythms and other relational strategies of organization.