Undergraduate honors paper--Mount Holyoke College, 2009. Program in Film Studies. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 121-123). Filmography: leaves 119-121.

Étude sur la collaboration et la participation active d’un saxophoniste-chercheur avec plusieurs compositeurs dans la création musicale mixte. Les musiques mixtes combinent un performeur jouant d’un instrument acoustique qui interagit avec des outils électroniques et informatiques, se faisant entendre par des hauts-parleurs. Nous comprenons la participation comme des multiples échanges humains intégrant l’écoute, l’instrument acoustique, l’électronique et les dernières technologies numériques dans la musique. Notre méthodologie s’est nourrie des sciences cognitives, de la systémique, de la recherche-action intégrale et systémique, de la cybernétique de second ordre, de l’opérationnel et de l’émergence contextuelle. Notre démarche propose une réflexion autour de quelques bouleversements de l’écoute musicale au XXe siècle et l’étude des musiques mixtes contemporaines sous le biais de l’approche multi-échelle. Nous faisons partie de notre objet d’étude tout en le modifiant dans un processus dynamique. Quelles connaissances musicales émergent de ces échanges de compétences et peuvent en être élargies grâce à cette rétroaction (feedback) multiple, en boucle créative ? Ces questions, avec nos sources de première main et l’inclusion du compositeur en tant qu’interprète ont fait émerger notre concept d’interprétation musicale participative. Nous proposons que l’analyse de nos propres collaborations peut apporter une connaissance originale sur les pièces musicales mixtes en question et développer une sorte de plasticité dans le faire musical. Comme démonstration, des morceaux ont été créées pendant nos recherches et sont analysées sous cette approche. / This research is about the collaboration of a saxophonist-researcher with several composers in electro acoustic music with saxophones. Mixed music combines a performer playing acoustic instruments (traditional or not) interacting with digital and electronics means of all sort of operations, time scales and technical configurations, diffused by loudspeakers. We understand participation in our case as human exchanges in musical digital environments, and as the creation of new links that didn’t exist before. Our research proposes a reflection on listening approaches through the XXst century and studying mixed music through the multi scale approach. The saxophonist gives a contribution, that enhance a creative perspective for each musical piece that influence the composers’ work. Which techniques and which musical knowledge can be exchanged and enlarged thanks to this multiple feedback ? The work on first sources, the competence exchanges between musicians during the many steps of their process of collaborative work construct what we call participatory interpretation in new music. In some aspects we get close to the integral and systemic action-research, since we take part in our study objet, and we modify it in a dynamic process. We propose that the analysis of the musical pieces from our collaborations can bring forth an original knowledge about them and enhance musical creativity. Participatory interpretation optimizes the musical results and explore new mixed “composable” spaces. As a demonstration, some pieces are though analyzed under this participatory perspective. Our research leads to a conclusion towards the idea of plasticity in music making.

This thesis offers a technically informed examination of Plato's pervasive, though not innocent, use of musical theory, practice and musical concepts more generally within the ambitious ethical project outlined in many of his dialogues: fostering the ‘excellence' of the soul. Starting from Republic 3, Chapter 1 will focus specifically on music stricto sensu in order to assess Plato's interpretation of the basic ‘building blocks' of musical performances, creating a core repertoire of musical concepts that will prepare the way to analyse Plato's use of musical terms or categories in areas that, at first sight, do not appear to be immediately connected to this art, such as politics, ethics and psychology. Chapter 2 examines a selection of passages from Laws 2 concerning the concept of musical beauty and its role in ethical education, demonstrating how Plato's definition is far from being moralistic and, instead, pays close attention to the technical performative aspects of dramatic musical representations. Chapter 3 looks first at the harmonic characterisation of the two central virtues of the ideal city, sophrosyne and dikaiosyne, showing how their musical depictions are not purely metaphoric: on the contrary, Plato exploited their cultural implications to emphasise the characteristics and the functions of these virtues in the ideal constitution. The second half of Chapter 3 analyses the Platonic portrayal of musical παρανομία, studying both its educational and psychological repercussions in the dialogue and in relations to contemporary Athenian musical practices. Chapter 4 looks at how different types of music may be used to create an inner harmonic order of passions in the soul in different contexts: the musical-mimetic education outlined in the Republic, the musical enhancement of the psychological energies in the members of the Chorus of Dionysus in the Laws, and finally the role of the aulos in the Symposium.