Reworking Environmental Sound Composition
Thomas Voyce · 2012
Many and practices that use environmental sound as a source for acousmatic composition make use of a particular production model in the creation of musical compositions: a composer records material in the field, these materials are later manipulated in the studio and re?presented to an audience through loudspeakers. Such a model promotes a specific and often problematic relationship between the audience, the materials of composition and the composer. Through the manipulation and arrangement of materials, can create a sense of narrative or discourse in their works, where a relationship between the composer and the materials can be established. Musical meaning constructed on this basis can, in principle, be transmitted to a listener. While the success of such a transmission is arguable, attempting to understand the composers presentation becomes the primary focus of a listeners engagement with the work, and in the process, other forms of engagement, such as spatio?and spectromorphological appreciation (Smally 1986) and more personal, subject?driven engagements, become secondary or absent altogether. With a production model that employs live electronics in situ, where a single?take recording of this event becomes the object of a listener’ engagement, other aspects of environmental sound composition can be explored, by both composer and audience alike.