This dissertation provides the conceptual and aesthetic background of the compositions composed throughout the course of my doctoral studies. I will introduce Korean philosophies and aesthetics and then expand upon these elements to demonstrate how they have influenced my approach to music composition. Furthermore, I will demonstrate how I intertwine the use of colour and Korean philosophies. Chapter 1 delineates the elements of Korean philosophies and aesthetics that have influenced my musical language. The chapter focuses on how the Korean handcraft art Jogakbo and the Korean philosophies of Yin-Yang, Ohang and Meak are related to each other. Additionally, I examine the origin and structure of Jogakbo, with a particular focus upon the key variables of shape and colour. The examination of Jogakbo causes me to establish how form and structure are linked in Jogakbo, and then how I apply this form and structure to my composition. Furthermore, I will describe how the aesthetics of Yin-yang, Ohang and Jogakbo form the core of my musical language by examining the function and unplanned approach to the different coloured scraps of material in Jogakbo. Drawing upon this examination, I describe how I have taken the colours from these scraps to form the colours in my music. In relation to this, I investigate the musical techniques of spectral composers, with an emphasis on musical colour, looking at specific composers’ techniques and establishing how they have influenced my own compositional techniques. Finally, I will discuss the role of the philosophy of Maek generating linearity on the horizontal structure of music. Chapter 2 discusses individual portfolio pieces composed throughout the doctoral course chronologically. I will demonstrate how selected Korean philosophies, aesthetics, and the techniques of Jogakbo have gradually evolved to play a larger role in the composition of my pieces. In particular, the colours used in Jogakbo and the philosophy of Ohang play a more direct role in creating the structure and form of the pieces composed in late course. In the conclusion, the research throughout my doctoral course has been summarised, and limitations and other challenges reached while applying the research to my compositional process are examined. Finally, the conclusion ends with a discussion of potential directions to further this research.

This thesis builds a conceptual framework that enables the creation of synergetic audiovisual works which is “fundamental to the nature of complex interactive dynamic sound and light systems and their resulting forms.”1 Utilising electroacoustic Schaefferian principles and applying them to a new media, I propose that objects can be established synergistically as an audiovisual whole, greater than the sum of their parts. The portfolio develops several tools to aid the creation of the video stream and they are further explored to allow for real-time parametric mapped audio and video manipulations. Throughout the portfolio the concept of an associative audiovisual tripartition is created and refined, thus allowing for the exploration of the media as well as a discursive approach to the auditory and visual streams. The set of works offered in this portfolio aims to raise the video medium from mere visual commentary to an audiovisual stream within a new synergetic audiovisual media. This portfolio comprises seven audiovisual compositions for digital media and a written commentary that describes the aesthetic concerns, technical features, and compositional approaches addressed in the portfolio as a whole and in each work in particular. The pieces are submitted on USB Flash drive and optical media, along with accompanying software patches. Compositions are organised as follows: Sketches. Duration: 7 minutes and 38 seconds. Mutations. Duration: 11 minutes and 24 seconds. Evolution. Duration: 11 minutes and 53 seconds. Emergence. Duration: 6 minutes and 26 seconds. Insomnia. Duration: 5 minutes and 5 seconds. Xpressions. Duration: 7 minutes and 19 seconds. Ut infinitio quod ultra. Duration: 13 minutes.

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The commentary investigates Japanese aesthetics of space, silence and emptiness - ma and mu - that informed my compositional practice during the research period 2012 - 2015. The portfolio comprises text compositions and sound installations in which forms of micro events and sustained events are employed. Throughout, the emphasis is on my personal engagement with, and manifestation of emptiness that concerns a particular model of listening and perception. Chapter 1 discusses six primary research areas: ma and mu, material, text, form, listening and perception. Firstly, I introduce ma and mu by examining noh culture and Zeami's teaching of senu hima (where there is no-action) in the context of my personal approaches to music. The following subjects are then used to contextualise my PhD practice by means of examples from various composers and visual artists. Here, these particular and enigmatic concepts are explored through Japanese art as well as Western contemporary works by Alvin Lucier, Eliane Radigue and those of the Wandelweiser collective. Part 2 provides contextual commentaries on selected compositions from the portfolio that mostly articulate my aesthetics in relation to the topics covered in Chapter 1. koso koso addresses my methodologies to investigate the essence of senu hima, followed by treow that discusses my approach to materials and the importance of space. I move on to grade two and grade two extended in order to examine text scores, and then, look into Espèces d'espaces 03 and 04 as examples of musical forms that I employ. Finally, listening and perception are investigated through the compositions gnome and con.de.structuring. Throughout, I describe how my works explore emptiness as a result of my particular emphasis on listening over composing.

This commentary and portfolio of works documents my compositional research into algorithmically driven synthesis and feedback systems. The foundation on which all my work rests consists of self-reference, feedback, emergent properties and algorithmically mediated interaction. Feedback is the lowest common denominator in this process and is for me an essential part of evolution and life and provides a means to create organic sonic forms that generate complex behaviours and phenomena. The predominant approach taken to realise such behaviours is by means of sound synthesis. The preference for sound synthesis is also a means by which compositional elements can interact with each other in a purely sonic manner. To me working with synthesis is like working with organic and living material instead of piling static sounds on top of, or next to each other. In order to work with complex synthesis in an intuitive and direct way I have investigated and developed new methods to control the large number parameters required. To achieve this my main tool has been algorithmically mediated interaction in combination with simple input devices such as a joystick. When sound files are utilised in a piece they are means to engender a way of working that is outside of my comfort zone. This ‘painting oneself into a corner’ is an important practical and aesthetic choice and is demonstrated in a number of documented instances in the creative portfolio. Even though a large part of my work consists of solo work my main source of inspiration comes from working with other people whether it is performing, composing, rehearsing, or building sound installations. All the collaborations I have been part of have been of great importance for me but I have chosen to discuss those that have been significant in the development of my aesthetics, my performance and studio set-up as well as my working methods.

Harmonic Horizons presents my research regarding the structuring of harmonic material in my music written between 2011 and 2013. The selected work, the oratorio Johannes Uppenbarelse, illustrates how I have established and developed my harmonic language and how this is implemented chordally, melodically and structurally. The goal of this research is the development of my strategy to create a new kind of functional harmony, which utilises notions of relative consonance and dissonance within its own defined boundaries.

This thesis delineates the theoretical and conceptual background of the compositions that constitute the accompanying portfolio. Underlying principles regarding structure, materials and aesthetic decisions are outlined with special focus on their relationships with certain philosophical and scientific concepts. The thesis endeavours to demonstrate an active critique of identity and fixity within compositional practice and thought. It does this by defining and consequently applying the concept of non-identity – understood as continuous non-fixity structure – as a compositional principle. This involves a certain exploration of separation and inseparability, as well as instability and stability within and between these strata: structure, physicality and sound. The concept of nonidentity is essentially accumulative, meaning it gradually incorporates more and more concepts (such as nonlinearity, pure movement/difference, desiring-machines, etc.), which consequently become active within the compositions. This means that the identity and fixity critique gradually gains strength and breadth as the thesis progresses and eventually affects all aspects of my compositional thought, i.e. each compositional element (ranging from instrumental material to form) becomes subjected to the nonlinear, de-territorial, non-fixed and continuous character of non-identity. This results in a new perspective on what structure in music can mean and a new definition of the relationships between conductor, score and performers, as well as their individual function. Each chapter corresponds to a year of research, thus the thesis follows the investigation according to its chronological development. Throughout the thesis, the discussions are mainly contextualized through the philosophy of Deleuze, Bergson and Laruelle, as well as with examples from contemporary music compositions.

This thesis outlines a new compositional grammar for my recent compositional practice as demonstrated by the collection of original musical work supplied in the accompanying folio of compositions, itself collectively titled the churches of lalibela. The grammar here outlined and explored presents developments in compositional procedure resulting from re-considering acts of musical transformation in terms of erosion and encrustation. Within the terminologies of this thesis, erosion and encrustation are understood as classes of compositional action (applied to musical materials) defined by operations of erasure/removal and addition/accrual respectively. Using examples from the visual arts as a mechanism for discussion, the thesis develops a wider conceptual understanding of these terms, allowing them to be considered no longer as opposites but as intertwined mechanisms mutually achieving a state of material distortion. A compositional scenario is thus derived in which the sonic surface of a given instance of a composition can be understood as being comprised of the debris resulting from such processes. To develop an understanding of this scenario, the thesis further explores ideas concerning ambiguity of material definition and the role such ambiguity can play in relation to material comparison within the experience of a musical discourse. As such, the grammar here derived can be said to exposit a preoccupation with comparison of material debris of different classes and/or degrees of distortion within the listening experience. The thesis also explores the nature and function of material consistency with regard to definition, illustrating the difference between two terms with a notion of consistency achieved through inconsistency.

This research advances the current state of knowledge in the field of early tape music both empirically and methodologically. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the impact that the electronic medium exerted in the musical thinking of Roberto Gerhard, one of the most outspoken, prolific and influential composers in the Spanish diaspora whose musical legacy, for the most part unknown, is a major landmark in the early history of electroacoustic music.1 Gerhard’s personal tape collection, one of the largest historical archives of its kind reported in the literature, is exceptional for both its antiquity (50+-year-old tapes) and its abundance of production materials. Through the digitisation and analysis of the composer’s tape collection this research argues that the empirical study of audio documents sets out a basis for a broader understanding of textual processes. More specifically, the research demonstrates that the reconstruction of works based on magnetic tape sketches is a powerful method to advance the understanding of early tape music. This research also examines Gerhard’s sound compositions in relation to the post-war context in which they were composed. Finally, this research presents performance documentation that proposes an approach to the electroacoustic music repertoire in which creativity is not at odds with rigor and critical discernment demonstrating that archival study can be closely aligned to the concept of re-enactment.

This commentary presents the research and ideas underlying the submitted portfolio of compositions. The core of the portfolio is the exploration of composition and performance methods for transforming traditional vocal folk music using the tools and aesthetics of contemporary electroacoustic and experimental music. The process also led to a wider compositional enquiry into the connections between language and music, between technology and performance, and between scores, encryption and performance. Additionally, extended voice techniques, audio processing, information theory and encryption form a set of nodes that have expressed themselves in various combinations resulting in a portfolio that includes vocal and instrumental, electroacoustic and acoustic music. The submitted works have been created employing bespoke use of technology, selfimposed restriction on real-time voice performance and applying encryption methodology to music and text. This commentary examines the submitted works from three perspectives: the use of voice, of language and of technology. It also discusses the music in the context of perceptual and cognitive discourses about the nature of voice.