The ever-increasing focus on sound in recent creative practices has ideological implications and seems to reframe and problematise ontological perspectives on music. Today it is possible to contrast notions of music as identical with sound (as in the discursive framework of ‘audio culture’) with artistic practices where sound and music are not at all identical, and the usually implicit hierarchy between them is probably twisted. This article discusses such matters from a methodological position that weaves together issues usually discussed in different areas of concern: it understands ecologically informed notions of sound and auditory experience as strictly intertwined with critical and inventive attitudes on technology, particularly as their intertwining is elaborated through performative practices. It suggests that, in music as well as in sound art, what we hear as sound and in sound is the dynamics of an ecology of situated and mediated actions, as a process that binds together (1) human beings (practitioners and listeners, their auditory inclinations), (2) technical agencies (the domain where means and ends are dialectically negotiated as practitioners strive to achieve a certain freedom in action across the public space of technological mediations and delegations) and (3) the environment (the physical and cultural context where sound-making and listening practices take place). The general idea is that the manners by which we shape up our relationship to sound and appropriate the technical mediations involved in working with it, are of biopolitical relevance for social endeavours that might (still) be ‘music’

At a time when tape music, which obviated the need for performers by eliminating interpretation after composition, was becoming the dominant paradigm for electronic music, John Cage, motivated by his inchoate aesthetic of indeterminacy, radically reimagined electronic music that ‘treats machines as things to perform with’. In the 1950s and 1960s, Cage employed electronic technologies in place of musical instruments in concert music, but also reframed the creation of tape music by following a score to be a performative act. Although Cage idealised a liberal approach to performance practice and maintained a modernist, utilitarian attitude towards technological progress, his actions and scores reflect allegiance to the ‘work concept’ (Goehr 1992). Twenty-first-century performers of Cage’s electronic music are challenged to address the seemingly paradoxical imperatives of technological progressivism and creative interpretation with fidelity to a work embodied in a score. This article discusses efforts to reconcile these forces in contemporary realisations using the interactive technologies of three of Cage’s classic electronic works. The development of interactive performance interfaces in response to musical requirements of a score is presented as an important but overlooked model for the development of new interfaces for musical expression.

As Jonty Harrison himself acknowledges, a significant body of acousmatic music exists which has, directly or indirectly, challenged aspects of the Schaefferian theory from which acousmatic music first developed (Harrison 1995). Few pieces, however, have so clearly and deliberately confronted Schaeffer’s notion of the ‘sound object’ as Harrison’s Unsound Objects. Harrison does more than merely reject Schaeffer’s definition of the sound object through the use of expanded compositional strategies. Rather, he both employs Schaeffer’s methodology and subverts it, systematically demonstrating the potential and the limitations of Schaeffer’s epoché and its product, the sound object. The result is what might be aptly termed the ‘unsound object’: a sonic entity which both demonstrates and defies Schaeffer’s ideals, and exemplifies the rich ambiguities which can arise from the compositional exploitation of referentiality and association, in addition to the intrinsic, morphological characteristics emphasised within Schaeffer’s reduced listening. Throughout his engagement with Schaefferian theory, however, Harrison never abandons the fundamental musical radicalism at the heart of Schaeffer’s project: positing ‘concrete sound material’, rather than ‘abstract concept’, as the basis for the language of electroacoustic music (Chion 1983: 37).

Bayle’s aesthetic radicalism is based on a conception of a living space in which there is not an opposition of an inner space to an outer space. This idea will be discussed by looking at the morphology creation, temporal evolution and sound spatiality on François Bayle’s works. Sound events as ‘images-of-sounds’ are characterised by a philosophy of dynamic production and energy transformation which creates a space in movement. However, the organisation of time structure in Bayle’s works can be divided into three categories (discrete time, time based on independent moments and circular time) corresponding to three periods of his creative life. We can conclude that this organisation led him to realise how important the active behaviour of the listener is for the construction of space. As a result, the spatial experience does not create a constructed space but rather a subjective one in which the listener is a resonant subject with the space surrounding him.

Following Edgard Varèse’s influential lectures – translated and documented in ‘The Liberation of Sound’ – electroacoustic music has spawned many different styles and genres. His argument was for composers to follow their imagination and not be bound to the constraints of musical notation. This, arguably, was one of the catalysts for the emergence of electroacoustic musical works. With past and recent technological advancement, the varieties of genres and styles within electroacoustic music have only expanded, challenging the notion of how one could analyse such works. It is therefore unsurprising that there is no general consensus on analytical methodologies. But for an art form that celebrates all musical possibilities should the analysis of such musics be constraint to a set number of formalised analytical methodologies?

Rather than propose a new all-encompassing methodology, this article will argue for a universal approach to electroacoustic music analysis and the liberation of sound analysis. The concept of an analytical community (a community that accepts multiple analyses whilst encouraging practitioners to find new and innovative ways to analyse such works) will be raised as a means to address the issues facing electroacoustic music analysis, using the OREMA (Online Repository for Electroacoustic Music Analysis) project as an example of such an initiative.

Space is a concept central to music. Particular spaces can be seen as the enablers and analogues of social configurations for music-making. Thus, for example, concert halls, clubs or cathedrals determine significant aspects of the social and auditory presence of heard music, in terms of concepts such as proximity, separation, resonance, silence, community. Recording technologies have forced us to reconsider musical space as a much more complex phenomenon, including the possible presence of imaginary spaces. Bearing in mind Henri Lefebvre’s assertion that space must be ‘produced’, and starting from Pierre Schaeffer’s notion of spatial development, this article considers the ‘materiality’ of space and the implications of such materiality for thinking about music and sound. Taking the recent reconstruction of the Denman exponential horn at the British Science Museum as an emblem, in relation to the recent resurgence of interest in historic sound recording practices, space is considered in relation to current discussions of material culture.

This article explores a particular perspective, shared across various contemporary musical currents, that focuses on sound itself as a complex entity. Through the analysis of certain fundamental musical elements and sonic characteristics, this study develops a new method for comparing different genres characterised by a similar approach to sound. Using the benefits of audio, spectra and score examinations, this strategy is applied to post-spectralist and minimalist compositions (e.g. G. F. Haas, B. Lang, R. Nova, G. Verrando), as well as glitch, electronic and basic-channel style pieces (Pan Sonic, R. Ikeda, Raime). Nine musical attributes are identified that help trace a new outlook on various currents in today’s music. The study’s contribution lies in its revealing of a shared musical perspective between different artistic practices, and in the establishment of new connections between pieces that belong to unrelated contexts.

The role of spatial design in music has become more prominent in recent years, mostly because of the affordability of powerful software and hardware tools. Although spatial audio tools are widely used nowadays in studios and concert halls, there are only few examples of robust and comfortable wearable sound systems with a suitable acoustic response. A wireless body-worn loudspeaker prototype featuring original costume elements, a hybrid full-range loudspeaker array and an improved acoustic response was designed and implemented. The size, shape and acoustic performance of the prototype was optimised using data gathered from anechoic measurements and interviews with performers and audiences. Future developments of this project will consider the implementation of an extended multi-channel performance platform to explore sonic and spatial relationships created by several wearable devices on stage synchronised with a multi-loudspeaker diffusion system.

The one-man band is a highly performative musical practice which combines visual spectacle and musical production. As digital and electronic technologies play an increasingly important role in our lives and change the ways in which music is produced, performed and consumed, the traditional one-man band with a bass drum on his back and cymbals between his knees provides an interesting model through which to examine both our relationship with technology and the importance of embodiment and visual spectacle in developing and maintaining audience/performer relationships. Furthermore, for digital performance artists, the model of the traditional one-man band can provide interesting inspiration for new works.