Small-scale gesture

I regard a small-scale gesture as the expression of energy materialised through gesture into a distinct source-bonded, transformed, or synthesised sound. I also see it as an entity that the composer can conceive or further alter, responding to structural needs of the work that arise during the process of contextualisation. The following discussion examines the sounds’ spectromorphological pertinences as well as their structural significance in the works in the folio, both of which were established, poietically, using this tripartite approach.

Structure and energy models

Morphologies and motion trajectories inherent in sounds based on energy models are not only natural structuring agents, but are also inspiring in diverse ways. For example, the forceful impetus of the attack in a percussion/resonance can announce the beginning of a work. It can cleave a work into sections and subdivide or punctuate sections. Additionally, it can function as an antiphonal element and, therefore, initiate new directions in the course of a work or prepare for the introduction of new material. The resonance part can serve as a foundation out of which other sounds emerge and evolve as the resonance abates. Many percussion/resonances occur in Ether. For example, a transformed percussive attack introduces the piece and its ensuing resonance slowly yields to other sound-shapes. Variations of this potent sound transformation, made with filtration, pitch shift and spatialisation transformation techniques, occur at 56”, 3’52”, 5’02”, and 8’39” in the piece, where they announce new material or transitions. Additionally, softer attacks and resonances subdivide these sections.

Swells

The energy model referred to as fluidity serves as a paradigm from which I conceive types of swells. These sounds are characterised by brief, internal energy surges that coalesce in a sponge-like form and can protrude above, below or through the existing sounding flow towards the listener. Although swells can range from the source-bonded to the synthetic, they often appear to have no attributable cause. Nevertheless, this indeterminate and highly malleable nature allows a swell to function as a gelatinously pliant type of punctuation that can drape, underpin, or otherwise be embedded in a sound world. Swells can be seen as ‘transparent’ carriers of structure by virtue of their discrete nature. They can gently push a sonic topology forward in time, help to shape

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or steer a musical idea, aid in the definition and development of a musical context, or propel one section into another. Moreover, the extreme elasticity inherent in swells serves not only a wide range of structural functions, but also renders swells particularly apt to sustain metaphorical construction. An example of such a dual purpose occurs in the first movement of Les Forges de l’Invisible at 3’58”, where a swell can be heard (sound example 3.1 on track 47, from 3’57”to4’12”).105 _{From a structural perspective,} the upward spectral shift in the swell on channels one and two ‘lifts’ the multi-channel gestural dialogue, uniformly, to a higher pitch-plane. However, on a metaphorical level, the slight, upward-moving spectral motion could appear as a spatial shift, beyond the substance of the piece, toward a higher altitude. The ensuing sound world in the work, replete with transparent, shimmering, and iterative gestural forms, could, as a result of the swell, be imagined as the sounding equivalent of an elevated and rarefied atmospheric state such as the night sky as witnessed through a telescope.106

Swirls and rotations

The form of a swirl or a rotation is archetypal in human history, hence, the justification for disassociating the following discussion from ones that examine the relationship between structure and energy models.107 _{An archetype is defined as a fundamental, and} it can take numerous external shapes, and hence have numerous and even contrasting roles. For this reason, I consider swirls and rotations to be multi-functional. They can, like swells, aid in delineating a musical context, elaborate it or nudge one context into another. However, in contrast with swells, rotations and spirals have a more concise spatial and spectral trajectory in lieu of a sudden general energetic onset. Further, the three-dimensionality often found in a swirl or rotation allows it to ‘reach’ into the foreground and/or background in addition to its trajectory across the stereo axis as it develops over time, giving to it an added thrust. Such finely etched attributes provide swirls and rotations with the impetus to introduce new sections in a work. An example occurs in Neon at 4’45”, (sound 3.2 on track 48, from 4’42” to 4’49”) where a small- scale rotation ushers in a new sound world. In addition, swirls and rotations fulfil not only structural roles that aid context, but can also be lynchpins in figure-ground

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Sound examples from the multichannel works in the folio are provided in two formats: (1) two sets of eight flat AIFF mono audio files on the DVD-ROM (one set of files for all multichannel sound examples and one set of files for Ether multichannel sound examples, which permits the Ether examples to be heard with the Ether loudspeaker placement scheme) in which the multichannel sound examples are placed in the order they are discussed in the thesis; and (2) a stereo reduction of the multichannel sound examples on Audio Compact Disc 2 containing the stereo sound examples.

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I conceive the structure of a work before and during the compositional act. However, at times the metaphorical value intrinsic to structure only becomes clear retrospective to the compositional act, as it was in this case.

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In Jungian psychology, an archetype is an image from the collective unconscious, an inherited memory. Archetypes “[…] emerge in the individual psyche through dreams and visions” (Berry, 2000: 23).

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relationships. Furthermore, they can facilitate or inhibit temporal flow, and can also appear in large-scale formats as meta-sounds.108 _{Finally, swirls and rotations may have} multiple structural functions within the same piece. The extensive flexibility offered by these archetypal figures thus permits structure to be constructed in an organic way.