In this contribution to the twentieth anniversary issue of Organised Sound, I first recall the reasons for dedicating a periodical to organised sound which I mentioned in my answer to inquiries from Cambridge University Press before the journal existed. The digital era is still in its infancy and it will permit a host of new ways to organise sound. I suggest in particular the development of an intimate relationship between acoustic and digital sounds; the extension of structural notations of sound and music and their exploitation for novel musical transformation; the amplification of the use of functions and combinations of functions. I evoke some issues discussed in Organised Sound, elaborating in more detail some problematic topics: analysis and reconstruction of computer music, live electronic music performance, perception of musical sound and sensory aesthetics.

Vector base amplitude panning (VBAP) is a new method for soundscape creation. It generalises the pair-wise panning paradigm to the triplet-wise panning paradigm, which can be used in three-dimensional loudspeaker setups. Similar soundscapes can be created with differing numbers of loudspeakers in different positions. The VBAP implementation in Csound synthesis software presented in this paper is a powerful tool for producing generic soundscapes. Virtual sources are positioned by defining the virtual source directions as (azimuth, elevation) pairs; the loudspeaker setup is defined in the initial settings. Virtual sources can be moved in three different ways: they can be moved along a polyline between specified directions, angular velocities can be applied to them, or their directions can be controlled arbitrarily.

This article discusses the role of electroacoustic music practice in the context of human–robot interaction (HRI), illustrated by the first author’s work creating the sonic language of interactive robotic artwork Diamandini. It starts with a discussion of the role of sound in social robotics and surveys various notable conceptual approaches to robot sound. The central thesis of the article is that electroacoustic music can provide a valuable source of aesthetic considerations and creative practice for the creation of richer and more refined sonic HRIs by giving practitioners new ways to create believable sounding objects, to convey fiction, agency and animacy, and to communicate causality in auditory feedback. To demonstrate this, the authors describe the rationale for treating robot sound design as a compositional process and discuss the implications of the endeavour’s non-linear and site-specific nature. These considerations are illustrated using sound examples and design decisions made throughout the creation process of the robotic artwork. The authors conclude with observations on how the compositional process is affected by this particular application context.

This article discusses space and interactivity in relation to some of the author's compositions for performers and computer. It outlines approaches to musical space relevant to those works arising from the realms of acousmatic, instrumental/acoustic and soundscape composition, and explores the conflict arising when a variety of listening practices are employed by the spectator-listener. This conflict challenges the perceived boundaries that differentiate genres, and also challenges the significance of existing ‘instrumental’ definitions of interactive computer music to the author's work. The author's approach to investigating this issue through composition is discussed, using two pieces as examples: Words on the streets are these (2001), an interactive installation, and Still Life (2002), a concert piece for string quartet and live electroacoustics. Technical and aesthetic aspects are outlined, specifically in relation to the experience of the spectator-listener. The overall aim is to emphasise the importance of considering spatial issues in composing interactive music, and to examine how the interplay of spatial concepts might be explored in practice.

Sonic narratives on fixed media can take many forms. We may find complexly nuanced sound productions that rely on a broad range of implied and/or culturally shared non-verbal cues to convey a narrative progression. But we also frequently find creative productions centred upon the human voice, much like traditional storytelling but presented in the wider variety of performed, captured, or constructed contexts enabled by technology. In those productions, human voice without a visible physical source will represent, if only in the historic sense, the essence of the acousmatic – an unseen speaker addressing assembled listeners. And, although precise listener responses to that unseen voice will certainly vary, we typically respond quite strongly when directly addressed by another human voice. What are some of the attributes of voice that can trigger those strong responses? And, more pragmatically, what questions should composers consider as we attempt to harness that power for our own creative ends? In this article, we raise some of those questions for consideration, with the hope that readers – particularly those who are also sonic creators – will seek to answer them through their own creative practice.

This short article presents the author’s ideas about different score formats for instrumental performers of mixed electroacoustic music. Following a trajectory from initial understanding through effective rehearsal and ending in performance, different score formats are discussed. Each is based on and addresses performers’ needs and improves documentation and transmission of the composer’s intentions and the performer’s contribution. The author bases these suggestions on her experience as a performer/commissioner and composer of new mixed electroacoustic works, many of which are collaborative creations.

This article provides four viewpoints on the narratives of space, allowing us to think about possible relations between sites and sounds and reflecting on how places might tell stories, or how practitioners embed themselves in a place in order to shape cultural, social and/or political narratives through the use of sound. I propose four viewpoints that investigate the relationship between sites and sounds, where narratives are shaped and made through the exploration of specific sonic activities. These are: sonic narrative of space, sonic activism, sonic preservation and sonic participatory action.

I examine each of these ideas, initially focusing in more detail on the first viewpoint, which provides the context for discussing and analysing a recent site-specific music improvisation project entitled ‘Museum City’, a work that aligns most closely with my proposal for a ‘sonic narrative of space’, while also bearing aspects of each of the other proposed viewpoints.

The work ‘Museum City’ by Pedro Rebelo, Franziska Schroeder, Ricardo Jacinto and André Cepeda specifically enables me to reflect on how derelict and/or transitional spaces might be re-examined through the use of sound, particularly by means of live music improvisation. The spaces examined as part of ‘Museum City’ constitute either deserted sites or sites about to undergo changes in their architectural layout, their use and sonic make-up. The practice in ‘Museum City’ was born out of a performative engagement with(in) those sites, but specifically out of an intimate listening relationship by three improvisers situated within those spaces.

The theoretical grounding for this article is situated within a wider context of practising and cognising musical spatiality, as proposed by Georgina Born (2013), particularly her proposition for three distinct lineages that provide an understanding of space in/and music. Born’s third lineage, which links more closely with practices of sound art and challenges a Euclidean orientation of pitch and timbre space, makes way for a heightened consideration of listening and ‘the place’ of sound. This lineage is particularly crucial for my discussion, since it positions music in relation to social experiences and the everyday, which the work ‘Museum City’ endeavoured to embrace.

This article presents a multimodal exploratory study aimed at searching for evidence that can guide us in the adoption and/or improvement of appropriate theoretical–methodological approaches for studying the role of the spatiality/spatialisation of sound and the cognitive/affective empathic processes involved in the acousmatic experience. For this purpose, controlled listening sessions were conducted in which fragments of different loudspeaker music were presented. The subjects reported their emotional experience and the degree of familiarity they assigned to each sound fragment. Specific questions for the acousmatic fragments inquire into the potential relationships between the sound stimulus and the emotion declared by the subjects. From these experiences, qualitative reports were obtained through a semi-structured interview, and electrodermal activity (EDA) logs were recorded in parallel for an intended group. Based on these results, it is argued that spatiality might be linked to a complex cognitive–affective response from the listeners and emerges as a distinctive element of the meaning that the listeners ascribe to their acousmatic musical experience.

This article reports on a study to identify the new sonic challenges and opportunities for live coders, computer musicians and sonic artists using MIRLCa, a live-coding environment powered by an artificial intelligence (AI) system. MIRLCa works as a customisable worldwide sampler, with sounds retrieved from the collective online Creative Commons (CC) database Freesound. The live-coding environment was developed in SuperCollider by the author in conversation with the live-coding community through a series of workshops and by observing its use by 16 live coders, including the author, in work-in-progress sessions, impromptu performances and concerts. This article presents a qualitative analysis of the workshops, work-in-progress sessions and performances. The findings identify (1) the advantages and disadvantages, and (2) the different compositional strategies that result from manipulating a digital sampler of online CC sounds in live coding. A prominent advantage of using sound samples in live coding is its low-entry access suitable for music improvisation. The article concludes by highlighting future directions relevant to performance, composition, musicology and education.

This article aims to elaborate Horacio Vaggione’s theoretical approach towards electronic music composition and his understanding of the musical structure, and to discuss how some of his key concepts come into presence during the compositional experience of temporality. Following the introduction of object-oriented composition and musical networks, I will discuss the concept of morphology alongside an investigation of how these ideas relate to temporality. In addition to this inquiry, I will briefly explore the possibilities of an ontological discussion on Vaggione’s compositional mindset and how his temporal perspective differs from some of his colleagues.

Urban Portrait: Thessaloniki is a sonic art installation by this author, presented at the Lansdown Centre for Electronic Arts of Middlesex University, London, in May 2008. This article constitutes an exploration of sonic representation of the experience of place as a central element of the work. The term psychosonography is introduced to encapsulate the described method and references to its supporting concepts. Urban Portrait is about representation of experienced locality, as well as the emergence of relationships among a collection of such localities through their sonic embodiments. Ultimately, it takes the form of the sonic equivalent of a psychogeographical map, to be navigated by aural means.

There has been an extraordinary amount of interest in sound spatialisation in recent years. The volume of work in this area has pushed many international organisations to feature sound spatialisation as a theme for conferences and publications, and Organised Sound is probably overdue in having a thematic issue based upon aspects of sound in space. This issue of Organised Sound contains many different views of space. We have included articles about spatialisation techniques, our understanding of sound spatialisation, composition, performance and spaces inside music as well as the spaces and environments where music can exist, including virtual spaces.

Within the context of discussing contemporary music the European tendency to overvalue abstraction is questioned. The use of environmental sounds in electroacoustic music is highlighted as an example of the questionable value of abstraction. Attention is then focused on a recent Truax composition, Powers of Two (1995) as a work of electroacoustic music theatre. The historical musical and poetic references, as well as the sound sources adopted for the work, are discussed, and placed within the human framework of relationship embodied in the piece. A concluding section summarises the work as an attempt to create a contemporary myth from historical sources, and as a dramatic expression employing electroacoustic forces.

The author has written articles and papers on the possibilities of differentiated spaces in the composition of electroacoustic music (Emmerson 1994, 1998). He extends this into a more practical discussion on the spaces used for the presentation of electroacoustic music (acousmatic music and ‘live electronic’ music), sound installations and other sonic art. The move into more informal ‘club’ environments is not without controversy. The ‘sampling’ approach to the very act of listening and ‘consuming’ sonic art has challenged traditional concert hall presentation. This paper brings various possibilities into plans (at once conceptual but also intended to have practical application) for a multi-space ‘Sound House’: a centre for the performance of the sonic arts. This centre is socially embedded within interpersonal human interaction and is not to be found in the current performance possibilities of the Internet – though it may be connected to others of its kind through this means.

We present a novel efficient algorithm for scaling the frequency content of an audio signal by any desired factor in the range 0.5 (minus one octave) to 2.0 (plus one octave) enabling a recording to be played in any desired key without affecting the tempo. The algorithm uses an adaptive overlap-add (AOLA) technique to realise the desired frequency scaling without affecting the duration. Informal listening tests show output quality equal to that of a conventional overlap-add algorithm used in many commercially available systems, but offering significant computational saving relative to that algorithm. The algorithm can also be used to simultaneously change both the tempo and key of a recording.

KYKLOS, an algorithmic composition program, is presented here. It generalises musical scales for use in composition as well as in performance. The sonic output of the system is referred to as polymodal music since it consists of four independent voices playing ‘synthetic modes’. KYKLOS is suitable for computer-assisted composition because it generates MIDI files which can be altered later by the composer. It can equally well be used in live performance for dynamic modification of parameters enabling realtime musical control.