Thinking and sounding are two terms which complicate one another, hence this thesis follows two trajectories each of which make an original contribution to knowledge. Part 1 (thinking sound) proposes to reground composition away from historically authoritative humanist models, instead suggesting a biopsychosocial approach for a post-acousmatic music. I elaborate a set of models and key concepts, chiefly an eliminativist account of the listener-sound relation; neurocognitively discrete musical domains and dimensions of the Kmatrix; model-based reasoning through a Reception-Interpretation-Action helix; and, mentalizing listening stances based upon dual-process cognition models. This is combined with an art-activist stance where composition is concerned with the effects that a sonic artobject exerts in its vicinity. I propose composition as experimentally concerned with generating new epistemic things through a process of assemblage and heterogeneous engineering. Part 2 (sounding thinking) discusses fixed and live compositions which initiated and respond to my proposed approach. In my practice, I focus on the disruption of specific aesthetic regimens to bring listening into attentional focus, engaging the specificity of the mnemonic traces that sound leaves. The pieces are largely concerned with sonic cultures related to Islam and the MENASA region.

This project presents a model of expanded musical form. Arguing that music’s expanded field is a field of experiences, rather than of discrete things, it sets out an approach to composition that centres not on the creation of aesthetic works, but on supporting an aesthetic attitude. Integrating theory and practice, this research endeavours to give definition to an attitude that apprehends music as experience. Under this attitude, the perceiver assumes no distance from the perceived as she produces the content of her musical experience in and through her dynamic bodily interactivity. This project comprises a thesis and four ephemeral performance sound installations. The thesis sets out the terms of music’s expanded condition, drawing upon a range of disciplines – artistic, aesthetic, philosophical – to chart the pluralistic, indeterminate, open-ended structure of the expanded field. The performance sound installations explored the operations of expanded artistic practice, critiquing conceptual, ideological, and institutional terms of music and sound installation to foreground the productivity of the perceiver. In both theory and practice, this research contests the concept of “sound art” as a distinct category. It makes the case that expanded musical form is not a break with the musical past, but its background made focal. It proposes that the presence, physicality, and place in which expanded musical form consists are music’s always presupposed foundation.

Pianist and composer Alexander Scriabin (1872-1915) is regarded as one of the most unique and important innovators of the early modernist Russian school. His search for new and more complex sonorities – as well as his evolving belief in the role that his music would play in the spiritual future of society – led to experimentation with octatonic, whole-tone and bi-tonal harmonic and melodic patterns, most clearly demonstrated in the formation of the mystic chord. The extra-musical significance of these sonic explorations are related by Scriabin in the unusual descriptions found in the scores of his late piano music, which suggest that the musical content is closely connected to Scriabin’s own very individual philosophical belief system. There has already been research in this area, connecting the music of the late piano sonatas with Mystic Russian Symbolism, as well as Scriabin’s orchestral Prometheus Op. 60 with the occultism and mysticism of Theosophy. My contribution in this regard lies in a detailed, practice-led research project based on the interpretation of the score instructions found in the Sixth Piano Sonata, Op. 62, in which I connect aspects of the music to a detailed study of the philosophical content of Scriabin’s unfinished libretto to the Prefatory Act and the Theosophy-inspired concept of the resulting Mysterium. In doing so I suggest how these score descriptions may be interpreted and put into practice, based on such research findings. This complex process of performative interpretation employs multiple methodologies including score analysis, factual research relating to biographical and historical context, critical recording analysis and ongoing self reflection. Crucially, practice is used throughout to judge the validity and relevance of analytical and research findings, as well as a means of research in itself, in which new ideas have been discovered through the act of live performance. The value of first-person research is presented in a wider musicological and performance context, through which it is argued that such practice-led research has the potential to lead to a more inclusive and open research environment.

This research project has explored the relationship between sound and sculpture, looking particularly at how sound can become sculptural. A sound sculpture is defined in this project as a sound-only entity, which explicitly extends sound’s physical and spatial aspects to take on the role of a physical, visual sculpture. In this research, this is achieved by the use of otoacoustic emissions. There is a lack of music and sound art material that actively intends to utilise the creative potential of otoacoustic emissions. This portfolio of works explores the bodily sensation of otoacoustic emissions and importantly, the agency the audience/listener has on changing their own perception and experience of the sound through their movement choices around an installation space. This novel application of otoacoustic emissions is what the author terms ‘otokinetic shaping’. This goes beyond that of the visual sculptural paradigm by introducing an element of audience participation and control. The pieces are created in a manner in which they are a collaboration between the artist and the audience, with the audience having more creative control than the artist on the work’s sound, structure and duration. The works also examine creative themes such as minimalism and indeterminacy controlled by computer algorithms as a method of extending the already limited decisions made in the creative and compositional process by the artist.

This portfolio charts my development as a composer during a period of three years. The works it contains are all acousmatic; they investigate sonic material through articulation and gesture, and place emphasis on spatial movement through both stereophony and multi-channel environments. The portfolio is written as a personal journey, with minimal reference to academic thinking, exploring the development of my techniques when composing acousmatic music. At the root of my compositional work is the examination and analysis of recorded sounds; these are extrapolated from musical phrases and gestural movement, which form the basis of my musical language. The nine pieces of the portfolio thus explore, emphasise and develop the distinct properties of the recorded source sounds, deriving from them articulated phrasing and gesture which are developed to give sound objects the ability to move in a stereo or multi-channel space with expressive force and sonic clarity. There is also a strong use of the qualities and characteristics of the human voice in my work, particularly in the spectral domain – formant and resonant filtering processes are used in the pieces in this portfolio to enhance the organic nature of concrete, real-world sounds. The combination of spatialisation, gesture and phrasing, with appropriate signal processing for the sound materials, form the basis of the nine works presented here.

Charles Nicholson (1795-1837) was one of the most important figures in the evolution of the flute. His influence on the design of the Boehm flute is widely acknowledged. However, the contribution he made as a catalyst for developments in flute performance practice in early nineteenth-century England, is not. Such was Nicholson’s reputation for variety of tone in his playing, that the term ‘Nicholsonian effect’ was coined. This research examines the tone of the flute, and uniquely places it within the context of the interrelationship between performance, pedagogy and flute-design in Nicholson’s work. Tone manipulation emerges as a crucial feature of the style with particular importance attached to three things: tone-colour, ‘vibration’ and the glide. The resulting tone variation constitutes the essence of the style. Research in this field is lacking, and has established only broader performing contexts. This research represents the first detailed study of the form and function of tone-colour, ‘vibration’ and the glide within early nineteenth-century English flute performance practice. An original ‘Nicholson’s “Improved” flute’ has been used to inform the research throughout this study. It will also be used to apply the research in the recital which forms the other half of my PhD submission.

This portfolio consists of a series of acousmatic compositions presented in stereophonic and multichannel formats. The works in this portfolio reflect a variety of different compositional approaches undertaken during a period of time between 2010-2013. In this compositional research particular emphasis is given to the use of diverse sonic materials and their relationship in the exploration of acousmatic composition, along with discussion of important underlying principles and ideas, such as evocation, topos, mood and emotional states, anamnesis and catharsis. In addition, a secondary part of this compositional research uses text and voice within a musical context while still assimilating the aforementioned notions. Furthermore, this commentary reveals the compositional process in general by detailing its formation. Each piece is then individually discussed in order to outline the compositional objectives in relation to the key subjects of investigation.

This thesis comprises a portfolio of acousmatic compositions which explore the evocation of emotion and the expression of meaning in electroacoustic music. These works, created and developed in the Electroacoustic Music Studios of the University of Birmingham, embrace both stereo and multichannel formats. In the accompanying Commentary, I also discuss compositional procedures and provide some analytical notes on each work, along with an outline of my own personal development as an electroacoustic composer during the period of the PhD programme.

This portfolio of 19 compositions includes several short commissions intended to reach new listeners and address issues of sustainability and copyright. Two of the pieces are studio works, one of which makes use of field recordings and SuperCollider and the other of which is almost entirely analogue synthesis. Three pieces are performance works. One is a combination of live realisation and gestural control, designed to play in front of an audience of hackers. One is an N-channel work, designed for live realisation on the BEAST system. The last is an excerpt of live analogue synthesiser improvisation, using SuperCollider to manage panning. Some of the above pieces use glitches as an aesthetic choice. The last two pieces are written for BiLE, a laptop ensemble which follows the organisational model of The Hub. I developed a software library, BiLETools, for solving problems related to group laptop performance. Both BiLE pieces use live sampling, one of percussion. The other uses voice and is intended to be a live Text Sound work and is the second act of a laptop opera, The Death of Stockhausen.

Commentary Scores: 1 After Haydn’s ‘Farewell’ 2 She Solus 3 Two Pieces for clarinet and piano 4 Wings … dreams 5 Piano Symphony