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Current Research in Systematic Musicology
Luísa Correia Castilho Rui Dias José Francisco Pinho Editors
Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology Research, Education and Practice
Current Research in Systematic Musicology Volume 10
Series Editors Rolf Bader, Musikwissenschaftliches Institut, Universität Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany Marc Leman, University of Ghent, Ghent, Belgium Rolf-Inge Godoy, Blindern, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
The series covers recent research, hot topics, and trends in Systematic Musicology. Following the highly interdisciplinary nature of the field, the publications connect different views upon musical topics and problems with the field’s multiple methodology, theoretical background, and models. It fuses experimental findings, computational models, psychological and neurocognitive research, and ethnic and urban field work into an understanding of music and its features. It also supports a pro-active view on the field, suggesting hard- and software solutions, new musical instruments and instrument controls, content systems, or patents in the field of music. Its aim is to proceed in the over 100 years international and interdisciplinary tradition of Systematic Musicology by presenting current research and new ideas next to review papers and conceptual outlooks. It is open for thematic volumes, monographs, and conference proceedings. The series therefore covers the core of Systematic Musicology, - Musical Acoustics, which covers the whole range of instrument building and improvement, Musical Signal Processing and Music Information Retrieval, models of acoustical systems, Sound and Studio Production, Room Acoustics, Soundscapes and Sound Design, Music Production software, and all aspects of music tone production. It also covers applications like the design of synthesizers, tone, rhythm, or timbre models based on sound, gaming, or streaming and distribution of music via global networks. • Music Psychology, both in its psychoacoustic and neurocognitive as well as in its performance and action sense, which also includes musical gesture research, models and findings in music therapy, forensic music psychology as used in legal cases, neurocognitive modeling and experimental investigations of the auditory pathway, or synaesthetic and multimodal perception. It also covers ideas and basic concepts of perception and music psychology and global models of music and action. • Music Ethnology in terms of Comparative Musicology, as the search for universals in music by comparing the music of ethnic groups and social structures, including endemic music all over the world, popular music as distributed via global media, art music of ethnic groups, or ethnographic findings in modern urban spaces. Furthermore, the series covers all neighbouring topics of Systematic Musicology.
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/11684
Luísa Correia Castilho · Rui Dias · José Francisco Pinho Editors
Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology Research, Education and Practice
Editors Luísa Correia Castilho School of Applied Arts of the Polytechnic Institute of Castelo Branco Escola Superior de Artes Aplicadas Castelo Branco, Portugal
Rui Dias School of Applied Arts of the Polytechnic Institute of Castelo Branco Escola Superior de Artes Aplicadas Castelo Branco, Portugal
José Francisco Pinho School of Applied Arts of the Polytechnic Institute of Castelo Branco Escola Superior de Artes Aplicadas Castelo Branco, Portugal
ISSN 2196-6966 ISSN 2196-6974 (electronic) Current Research in Systematic Musicology ISBN 978-3-030-78450-8 ISBN 978-3-030-78451-5 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
Preface
The book Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology: Research, Education and Practice is the result of an invitation addressed to authors who stood out for their quality and relevance to the music research community, from their contributions at EIMAD 2020—7th Research Meeting in Music, Arts and Design, held on May 14 and 15, 2020, and published in the book Advances in Design, Music and Arts (Raposo et al, Springer, 2021, ISBN 978-3-030-55699-0). The book consists of a collection of independent essays which contribute to knowledge in the area of music and sound, providing new perspectives on research and contributing to the advancement of scientific, academic and practical knowledge. It is worth noting the richness and variety of perspectives of these contributions that make this book appealing for musicians, researchers, educators and all who are interested in the areas of music and sound in its multiple strands. As a result of the research, of multiple methodologies and reflection, it was possible to identify a clearer and broader view of the presence and role of music and sound in culture, education and society. The book’s chapters are organized into three parts: 1. 2. 3.
Musicology Music and Sound Creation and Technology Music Education and Intersection Areas
The first part, Musicology, begins with a systematic study, featuring music for the Semana Santa by Manuel de Tares, a seventeenth-century Portuguese composer. There follows a proposal for a cross between musicology and practical music using Fantasia No 2 à Travers sans Basse, by Telemann, as a proposal for interpretation and analysis aiming at the arrangement and realization of the structural intentions of a composer, reflected in the performance of the interpreter and mediated for the public. The next three chapters are dedicated to studies of musical iconography. The first presents a descriptive and interpretative analysis of the musical motives identified in the panel of S. Rosendo, in the Church of São Vitorioso, Braga, in Portugal. The question of what constituted and what reveals the nature of the portraits of male and female musicians in Portuguese paintings from the eighteenth and nineteenth v
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centuries is what is proposed in the fourth chapter, in addition to the presentation of an inventory with more than a hundred portraits of amateur and professional musicians, painted by Portuguese painters. To conclude the part, the theme of the portrait is revisited, but in less common representations (or genuinely improbable) due to the support chosen or to the style of representation. Having as its motto the centenary of the birth of Amália Rodrigues (1920–1999), the chapter aims to map some of the most unlikely representations (sugar packages, in the streets, in metro stations) of the fado singer over the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and proceed to its iconographic and iconological analysis. The second part, Music and Sound Creation and Technology, is composed of eight chapters. The first three chapters are dedicated to music creation and the following five chapters deal with music technology, sound analysis, acoustics and psychoacoustics. The sixth chapter begins with the presentation of MicroSonic Spaces, an interactive multimedia installation in which visitors can interact with a generative sonic and musical environment, created by an ecosystem of artificial creatures. The seventh chapter describes “Plantorumori‚” an ongoing research project relating music and plants and presenting several conceptual, technical and artistical concerns of “musicking” with plants. In the next chapter, the author presents a reflection on music composition paradigms and a perspective over different approaches that foster a growing connection between music and the real world. Following, a thorough analysis of the acoustic and psychoacoustic factors that can influence loudness perception in a musical context, relating physical properties and musical dynamics, as well as regarding common perception and hearing problems associated with loudness. In the tenth chapter, the authors present an in-depth review of computational methods for the representation and similarity computation of musical rhythms, focusing on the machine understating of rhythm, in the symbolic and sub-symbolic domains. The next chapter describes a highly precise computational model for onset detection in the performance of the Maracatu de Baque Solto, by incorporating explicit knowledge of Maracatu playing to provide a more accurate annotation of note onset positions, over manual annotation. The twelfth chapter presents a 3D scanning method for the analysis and measurement of geometrical and acoustical features of Timbila wooden xylophones, as well as a physical model for the synthetic reconstruction of the Timbila sound that can be used in multimedia and virtual reality applications. The last chapter of this part proposes the development of harmonious sound alarms for healthcare spaces that were designed considering psychoacoustic and musical knowledge. The different topics dealt with in the third part, Music Education and Intersection Areas, are presented in the eight chapters. The first five chapters are dedicated to issues related to music and education; the next two chapters address issues in the field of human health; and the part ends with a discussion on the relationships between design and music. The fourteenth chapter presents a case study on the musical training that General Primary Education teachers receive at Palencia’s Faculty of Education, University of Valladolid (Spain). The author discusses some “tension points” on the initial training of teachers. In the fifteenth chapter, the authors discuss the use of
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music as a factor of personal and social transformation. And, they present two social research projects that are currently being developed in two Spanish autonomous communities. In the sixteenth chapter, the author points out that in the context of arts education in Portugal music education is not accessed with equity by all children and “remains in a peripheral position in the curricular structure.” In the seventeenth chapter, the authors carry out a research to determine the relevance of implementing a holistic approach in music teaching. They summarize that despite the weaknesses of the research, the results obtained seem to reinforce the value of a holistic approach to children music education. In the eighteenth chapter, the author focuses on analyzing the ten letters published by Carl Czerny on the art of playing the piano. The letter was a kind of innovative tool that helped the teaching and learning of practical and theoretical musical elements, while underlining the importance of choosing the right repertoire. The nineteenth chapter reviews the concept of transdisciplinarity in the context of a complex world with increasing crisis. The author formulates a central question: Why is music not massively used in health institutions if music reaches so many dimensions of living things? In the twentieth chapter, the authors present a process in order to develop a musical instrument that can be used in music therapy. There are two starting points: Music therapy helps with various diseases (and a musical instrument is an essential element), and it is still a lack of proper instruments and solutions more focused on therapy. The last chapter aims to elucidate the relationships between design and music, appealing to the conceptual metaphor debate. The metaphor an artwork is an organism (discussed regarding the String Quartet op. 7 composition process by Arnold Schoenberg) is the link among different heterogeneous practices as design and music. Castelo Branco, Portugal
Luísa Correia Castilho Rui Dias José Francisco Pinho
Contents
Musicology The Music for the Holy Week of Manuel de Tavares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Luísa Correia Castilho Telemann’s Fantasia No 2 à Travers Sans Basse: Compositional Intentions, Performance Characteristics and Audio Footprint Signal Processing Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sofia B. Dias and Leontios J. Hadjileontiadis
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The Sounds of the Baroque Tiles. An Iconographic Itinerary of St. Victor’s Church, Braga, Portugal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Elisa Lessa and Helena Brandão
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Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portuguese Paintings from the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sónia Duarte
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Amália Rodrigues in 2020—Mapping Some Ingenuously Improbable Portraits of the Fado Diva . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Luzia Aurora Rocha
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Music and Sound Creation and Technology MicroSonic Spaces: Towards an Autonomous Ecosystem of Virtual Sonic Agents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 Rui Dias Musicking with Plants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 Filipe Lopes and Paulo M. Rodrigues Composition as Artistic Device . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 Diogo Alvim Sound Intensity and Loudness of Musical Tones . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169 Carlos dos Santos-Luiz ix
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A Review of Musical Rhythm Representation and (Dis)similarity in Symbolic and Audio Domains . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 Diogo Cocharro, Gilberto Bernardes, Gonçalo Bernardo, and Cláudio Lemos On the Use of Automatic Onset Detection for the Analysis of Maracatu de Baque Solto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209 João Fonseca, Magdalena Fuentes, Filippo Bonini Baraldi, and Matthew E. P. Davies 3D Modeling Techniques for the Characterization and Sound Synthesis of Timbila Bars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227 Vincent Debut and Eduardo Oliveira Reducing Annoyance of Healthcare Soundscapes with Harmonious Alarms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251 Frederico Pereira, Rui Marques, Joana Vieira, and Guilherme Campos Music Education and Intersection Areas The Music Training of General Primary Education Teachers: A Case Study at a Spanish University . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275 Yurima Blanco-García and Alicia Peñalba Artistic Music Projects and Their Educational, Cultural and Social Relevance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293 Alberto Cabedo-Mas, Noemy Berbel-Gómez, and Maravillas Díaz-Gómez The Peripheral Curriculum: Music Education as a Way of Transformation and Social Justice in Children’s Lives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307 Maria Helena Vieira A Holistic and Multidisciplinary Approach to Children Music Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315 António João César and Luísa Correia Castilho Teaching Piano Through Letters: An Innovative Educational Tool by Carl Czerny . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 333 Giovanna Carugno Transtherapy of Music as a Benefit Beyond Ears and Senses . . . . . . . . . . . 347 Hermes de Andrade Júnior and Tamar Prouse de Andrade Development of a Musical Instrument to Apply to Music Therapy . . . . . . 361 Beatriz Nunes, Inês Rodrigues, and Adriano Pinho Notes on the Relationships Between Design and Music . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 379 Washington Morales Maciel
Musicology
The Music for the Holy Week of Manuel de Tavares Luísa Correia Castilho
Abstract Manuel de Tavares (c. 1585–1638), was a Portuguese composer, born in Portalegre, who accomplished his professional career as Chapel Master in several Spanish cathedrals, Baeza (1609–1612), Murcia (1612–1631), Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (1631–1638) and Cuenca (1638), left a legacy of 28 compositions. Almost a third of his surviving work is for the Holy Week, which includes various musicliturgical genres such as: Passion, Lesson, Improperia and Hymn. In this chapter, it is proposed to characterize this set of compositions and carry out a study of their characteristics according to the following parameters: description of sources, the musical contents and their normative framework; analysis of the macro-formal structure, counterpoint texture, types of writing, the use of the modality, metric punctuation and clauses, thematic and motive materials and the expressive relationship between text and music.
1 Manuel de Tavares’s Life Manuel de Tavares was probably born in Portalegre, Portugal, in 1585, according to musical historiography, although, as yet, no birth certificate was found to confirm the date. He was supposedly a choir boy and disciple of António Ferro in the Cathedral of Portalegre. As a choir boy, he must have been expected to own a good voice, know how to read, and learn plainchant and polyphony, as he would have been required to officiate in church during religious services, namely Mass and Office (Martins, 1997).1 Manuel de Tavares studied under António Ferro, who in turn had been a disciple of the great master of the cloister of Évora, Manuel Mendes. Therefore, L. Correia Castilho (B) Escola Superior de Artes Aplicadas, Instituto Politécnico de Castelo Branco, Castelo Branco, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] CESEM, Lisbon, Portugal 1
As evidenced by the Regiment of the Church, Choir and Cathedral of Portalegre, from 1560, in Martins (1997), p. 55.
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_1
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Antonio Ferro was presumably a good teacher of music education, who must have provided the young Manuel de Tavares with the theoretical and practical foundations he needed for his future craft as a composer, as well as for the prestigious positions he was to achieve in Spain. The first precise known date of his professional career is as a Chapel Master in the Andalusian city of Baeza, Spain, in 1609. In that year he would have been around 24 years of age, a probable age for his first job as the most important musical employee of a church. He settled down in this city with other family members, also dedicated to music, namely the organist Francisco de Tavares. Manuel de Tavares was at the service of this cathedral at least from 1609 to 1612,2 when he moved to Murcia Cathedral in Spain to occupy the same position as Chapel Master (Redondo, 2012). He resided in this city for almost twenty years, until he departed it in order to occupy the same position in the Cathedral of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, in the Canary Islands, Spain. In these Cathedrals the main duties of the chapel master were to compose for the various rubrics of the Office and Mass, teach choir boys, rehearse singers and instrumentalists and direct all musicians (Cavallé, 1991; Redondo, 2012; Torre, 1997). When he arrived in the Canary Islands in 1631, he was accompanied by his family: his wife Ana Manuel and his son Nicolau Tavares, who he was raising for the office of Chapel Master. According to Hernández (2002), Manuel de Tavares was the master who consolidated the polychoral style in the cathedral of Las Palmas, to which he made a great professional contribution. For a salary of 300 ducats a year, he enrolled the help of his son Nicholau, thus opening up expectations for his future regarding his succession when he passed away or retired. Thus, tasks that were formerly entrusted to several people were taken over by Manuel de Tavares, such as teaching plainchant and polyphony to the choir boys, composing, rehearsing and assembling Vilancicos for Christmas, Twelfth Night and Corpus Christi, organizing dances and theatrical colloquiums at Corpus Christi celebrations, selecting new members for the chapel, teaching singing to minor chaplains, and rehearsing with instrumentalists. In many of these tasks, Nicolau Tavares, who did not belong to the cathedral’s staff, helped his father. This aroused envy and complaints from some of the musicians. The dispute culminated in September 1633, when two singers, in the absence of the Master, rose up against the master’s son and violently mistreated him with insults, for which they were harshly reprimanded by Chapter (Torre, 1997). Since this was one among many disputes, Nicolau decided that his future would not be among that hostile group of musicians and, as he was already professionally trained and old enough to take a position as Chapel Master, he began to look for work in the Peninsula, until he managed to obtain a post in Cadiz, in the summer of 1637. The economic stability of Nicolau having been established left Manuel de Tavares at ease to return to the Peninsula from the Canaries, as he had always wished. He was to be eventually hired by the Cathedral of Cuenca, after several months of negotiation. This Cathedral had been searching in vain for a famous master since it had dismissed
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Books of Autos Capitulares the Year 1611–1616, archives of the Cathedral of Baeza, Fol. 29.
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Vicente Garcia on the 6th of April 1634, and Manuel de Tavares took possession of the position in September 1638 (Millán, 1988; Stevenson, 1982, 1992). However, perhaps because of the change of airs or the trip itself, Manuel fell seriously ill and died a few days later on the 13th October. Only a few days later, on the 16th October, his wife Ana Manuel also died, leaving their son Nicolau in a very delicate situation. He already had his own family, a wife and children. Now he had to make room in his home for the other children of the couple, his brothers and sisters. However, the Chapter hired Nicolau, while Chapel Master in Cádiz, to come and take on the same position in Cuenca Cathedral, with a considerable salary, since he was considered an exceptional master. One can thus sense that his father and teacher, Manuel de Tavares, had also been a great pedagogue, in a distinct pedagogical line started in the Cathedral of Évora by Manuel Mendes (Millán, 1988).3
2 Description of Sources Almost one third of the music pieces by Manuel de Tavares that have survived is destined for the Holy Week, which includes various musical-liturgical genres such as: Passion, Lesson, Improperia and Hymn. His manuscripts are mainly in the cathedral of Baeza, but also in that of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. In the Cathedral of Baeza, where he was in service at the beginning of his career (1609–1612), a series of his compositions are to be found in a facistol book, with quota M 4, manuscript volume, 0.43 × 0.29 × 0.05 m, bound in cardboard and lined in metal-edged leather. It contains 112 folios, with ten pentagrams per page, front and back. Pentagrams, music and lyrics are etched in brown. The manuscript, copied in the middle of the eighteenth century, contains music pieces by several other composers linked to the Cathedral of Baeza: Diego Fernández Garzón, Juan Fernández Garzón, Esteban Alvarez, Juan Ruiz Ramírez and Mateo Núñez (Cavallé, 1991) (Table 1). The music pieces are the following: • Fol. 22v a 24r: Gloria, laus et honor, for 4 voices (S A T B4 ); • Fol. 24v a 26r: Israel es tu rex, for 4 voices (2S A T); • [Fol. 26v a 37r: Dominica Palmarum, a quatro [Paixão segundo S. Mateus] for 4 voices + 2 voices (SATB + ST)]5 ; • Fol. 44v a 53r: Lamentatio prima in secunda nocte [De Lamentatione Jeremias Prophetas], for 5 voices (S A 2 T B); • [Fol. 53v a 58r: Feria Sexta in paraceve, a quatro, [Paixão segundo S. João] for 4 voices + 2 voices (SATB + SA)]6 ; • Fol. 58v a 59r: Popule meus, a quatro, for 4 voices (S A T B); 3
Actas Capitulares, Diocesan Archives of Cuenca, f. 43v e 117. The abbreviations of the voices used in this text are the usual S (Soprano), A (Alto), T (Tenor), B (Bass). 5 Sometimes the S and T make divisi. 6 Sometimes the S and A make divisi. 4
6 Table 1 Genre and title of music pieces for the Holy Week
L. Correia Castilho Genre
Title
The Passion of the Christ
Passion according to St. John at 4–6 Verse of St. John’s Passion: Jesus Nazarenus a 4 Verse of St. John’s Passion: Partiti sunt a 4 Verse of St. Lucas Passion: Sprevit autem a 4 Passion According to Matthew at 4-64-6
Lesson
De Lamentacione Jeremias Prophetae a 5
Improperia (Reproaches)
Popule meus a 4 Hagios o Theos a 8 (incomplete)
Hymn
Gloria, laus et honor a 4 Vs 1 Israel es tu rex a 4
• Fol. 59v a 60r: Hagio, A 8, chorus 2º, for 4 voices (SATB) fo the 2nd choir.7 The composer’s remaining works for the Holy Week at Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Cathedral are in a manuscript, bound in cardboard and lined in dark leather, with quota B/XI-1, with dimensions of 0.43 × 0.29 × 0.04 m. It contains 55 folios, with a variable number of pentagrams etched on each page, front and back, done in several inks, the notation being also in several inks. The manuscript was copied at the end of the seventeenth century by Diego Durón (Hernandez, 1978), Master of the Chapel of Las Palmas Cathedral between 1676 and 1731. Between folios 13 and 55 there are four passions of Melchor Cabello. Tavares added three verses, with music for four male voices (AATB): two of the verses for the Passion of St. John and one for the Passion of St. Luke. The verse for St. Luke corresponds to the text “Sprevit autem illum Herod… et remisit ad pilatum” and is in folios 45v-46r. The verses for St. John’s Passion correspond to the inscription “Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum”, found in folios 51v-52r, and “Partiti sunt vestienta… miserunt sortem” is to be found in folios 53v and 54r. These last two verses have basso continuo, which according to Hernandez (1978) was added by Diego Durón after the book was compiled. What is certain is that the accompaniment appears under the Bass part, in a musical writing of smaller dimensions. Generally, in these two groups of music pieces for the Holy Week, authorship is signalled at the top, at the beginning of each music piece, either on the left page or on the right page and in different writing type: Mtro. Tavares, M. Tavarez, M. Tabares, manuel de tabares, Manuel de Tavares, Tavares, Tabares. The vocal distribution being 7
Continuation of the previous work, however this second part is the eight voices and the first choir is missing.
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very varied, the following combinations appear in the four voices: SATB, SSAT, AATB; five voices: SATTB; and six voices: SSAATB, SSATTB. For the precise determination of the tessitura, the three clefs, G, C and F, are used in their common presentations: G in the second line, C in the first, second, third and fourth lines, and F in the third and fourth lines. For each of the voices there are two possibilities of writing clefs, in the case of soprano, alto and tenor, or three possibilities in the case of bass and accompaniment. The soprano can be found in the C Clef in the first line or in the G-Clef in the second; the contralto in the C Clef in the second or third lines; the tenor in the C Clef in the third or fourth lines; and finally the bass and the accompaniment in the C Clef in the fourth line or F in the third and fourth lines. These various possibilities of arrangement on the musical score are directly related to the technique of writing in chiavette, used in polyphony in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (Rubio, 1956). According to the practices of the time, there are two possible combinations of clefs, one being the chiavi naturali (high clefs) and the other the chiavi transportte (low clefs), both possibilities being found in the music of Manuel de Tavares, with the following distribution: o o
Low keys: C1, C3, C4 or F4 High keys: G2, C2, C3 and C4 or F3.
Regarding the arrangement of voices in the facistol’s books, there is generally the principle, current at the time, of alternating the voices between the two pages of the open book, in descending order of their tessituras, but there are also some exceptions to this rule. In the four-voiced compositions with the SATB arrangement, the Soprano and the Contralto are placed at the top, the first on the left and the second on the right (considering that the book is open), and the Tenor and the Bass are at the bottom, respectively on the left and right, which corresponds to the most common option; with the arrangement of the AATB voices, on the left page there are A1 and T, respectively at the top and bottom, on the right page, A2 is at the top and B is at the bottom; with the arrangement of the SSAT voices, S1 and S2 are at the top respectively at the left and right, T is at the bottom of S1 on the left page and A is on the right page under S2. The five voice compositions (SATTB) on the left page are from top to bottom S, T1 and the first part of B, while on the right page there are from top to bottom A, T2 and the second part of B. In the six voice compositions (SSAATB) the Sopranos appear at the top, the Altos in the middle and the Tenor and Bass in the lower part. Arrangement of the voices: 4 voices
5 voices
S T
S T B (1/2)
A B
A T
A T B (1/2)
A B
S T
S A
6 voices
S A T
S A B
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L. Correia Castilho
The diatonic organisation characteristic of the modal system is respected, however a B flat can be used in the key signature to indicate a transposition to the lower fifth of the original mode. There is a liberal use of changes, almost all corresponding to the use of the sharps, in the notes F, C, and more rarely in G, and of the flat in the notes B and E. There are several measurement signs used and the type of proportion between the values of the figures can be ternary or binary, although the latter is in greater quantity. The measurement signs which appear in the compositions are: tempus imperfectum cum prolatione imperfecta, represented by “c” and its diminutio simplex, represented by “Z”. The ligatures used are small in number and clearly readable, which is in accordance with the conventions of the time in which it was written. Apel (1953) thus refers to the episodic use of ligatures in musical texts: “In the sixteenth century they gradually disappear and only a few of the simplest forms survive until the middle of the seventeenth century” (p. 88).The text is sometimes incorrectly written and its application to singing often suffers from some vagueness. The usual signs of repetition of words or passages, such as.ij. or.y, are used. Often only the first words of each section appear at the bass. Usually the first letter of the text is carefully drawn with an illumination.
3 The Genres of Liturgical Music and the Description of Musical Contents Within the annual liturgical cycle, the Holy Week assumes a particular importance in Christianity. In this period, and in parallel with the liturgical forms of the lessons and their respective responsorial psalms, the improperia and processional songs, the music of the Passion of the Christ has always played an important role. As such, the narration of the Passion of the Christ represents the culmination of the liturgy of the Holy Week (Cardoso, 2001). The text on which any Passion of the Christ is based is the biblical story of the death and resurrection of the Christ, with its dramatic action: a narrated part (Evangelist, Chronicler), the words and textual replies of individual characters (such as Christ, Pilatus, St. Peter) and the shouting from the crowd (such as Jews, soldiers). From the eleventh to the twelfth centuries onwards, the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were linked to the calendar of the Passion. They were integrated respectively into Palm Sunday Mass, Holy Tuesday Mass and Ash Wednesday Mass, as well as in the syntax of Good Friday (Cardoso, 1998). According to Cardoso (1998), the “Caeremoniale Episcoprum, mandado codificar por Clemente VIII (1592–1605), no seguimento das normas litúrgicas do Concílio de Trento, apresenta uma versão da cerimónia da Paixão que se tornou modelo para a igreja universal”8 (p. 101). This genre of liturgical music is perhaps the one that offers more 8
Translation: Caeremoniale Episcoprum, which Pope Clement VIII (1592–1605) had codified, following the liturgical norms of the Council of Trent, presents a version of the Passion of the Christ ceremony that has become staple for the Church as a whole.
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possibilities of musical dramatization, because of the differentiation between indirect speech, for the Chronicler, and direct speech for the individual and collective characters. There are several categories within the polyphonic Passion of the Christ: • The Proemium which is a generic introductory phrase that applies to the four versions of the Passion of the Christ, with the difference only of the name of the respective Evangelist: Passio Domini Nostri Jesu Christi secundum [Mathaeum, Marcum, Lucam, Johannem]Il illo tempore… • Text of the Passion, to indicate the music corresponding to the narrative discourse, commonly identified as the role of the Chronicler (C). • Verses of the Passion, which focus on phrases taken from the liturgical song of the Passion to be spoken by either the Chronicler (C) or the Christ (+). – Sayings of the Christ, corresponding to the polyphonic verses spoken by the Christ. – Different sayings, corresponding to the polyphonic verses of narrative discourse and of the Christ himself. • Bradados of Passion, corresponding to the sayings of the Passion characters, with the exception of those of the Christ, including the sayings of singular characters and also the sayings of the crowd, or of a group of characters. • Turbae a subspecies of the Bradados, which refers to the singing of phrases attributed by the Evangelists to groups of people involved in the Passion of Christ, such as the disciples, the Jews, the soldiers, etc. (Cardoso, 1998). The Passion of the Christ texts provided polyphonic composers with powerful recitation possibilities, given the texts’ profound emotional impact. However, composers were strongly conditioned by the centuries-old conventions of Passion Songs that were melodic and modal. These put a strong emphasis on adopting a melodic model, in which the recitative note by the tenor had to correspond to the repercussa of the accentus’ Psalm tone for each of the three traditional Passion singers (the Christ, the Chronicler and singular or collective characters). In the case of Spain there were two main traditions for this melodic model or cantus passionis, one in Aragon (the north-western region of the Iberian Peninsula) and the other in Castilla (the central region of the Peninsula). In the case of the region of Castilla, which is the one under scrutiny, the tradition of the recitation of the cantus passionis, also known as cantus toledano, can be followed through handwritten and printed sources. There are two forms of musical fixation of the same version: the Toledo manuscripts with the tenors e, g, c ; and the Escorial manuscripts with f/d, a, c /d (Fischer, 2001; Gonzalez Valle, 1992; Turner, 2000). The latter is the one Tavares uses in the two Passions of Baeza. This model was to influence polyphonic interpretations of the Passion throughout the seventeenth century in the geographical area of Castile.
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Of Manuel de Tavares’ five music pieces, two are complete and three display interpolations of new verses in Passions composed by Melchor Cabello. All fall into the category of Turbae of the Passion of the Christ or parts relating to the crowd, which from the sixteenth century began to be composed in polyphony. The form of execution was usually the responsorial, in which there was alternation between plainchant and polyphony. The two Turbae of the Passion of the Christ coming from the Cathedral of Baeza, one according to St. John (E-BAE M4 Fol. 53v-58r) and the other according to St. Matthew (E-BAE M4 Fol. 26v-37r) present some interesting characteristic profiles: • They present the same Polyphonic Proemium9 ; • In addition to the recitations of the collective characters, the Passion of the Christ according to St. Matthew includes parts of verses spoken by the Chronicler; • There are no phrases spoken by individual characters (Bradados); • Although they are for four voices, some verses are for five and for six voices; • The first two verses, which have the same text as the Passion according to St. John (Jesum Nazarenum), also contain the same music… The fact that Manuel de Tavares includes spoken verses by the chronicler is in line with the practice of his contemporaries. According to several scholars of the subject it is a typically Spanish characteristic. Thus, according to Gonzales Valle (1992), certain verses of the Passion of the Christ belonging to the Chronicler’s part already stand out in monodic sources: either because only these passages are neumated, while the others are not, or because when all the parts appear with neumes, they present melismas. In the polyphonic tradition, it is precisely these verses that are included in the polyphonic composition, while the others are not. This tendency to highlight certain passages of the Passion of the Christ, may be accounted for as the desire to keep alive the memory of the penitential character of the Mozarabic liturgy (Gonzales Valle, 1992). One of the new ways Manuel de Tavares explored in order to highlight these words was to increase the texture of one or two voices, plus a soprano or plus a soprano and a tenor. In the music pieces in which he made interpolations, these were originally verses from the Turbae of the Passion of the Christ and some verses with sayings of the Chronicler, to which he added more verses about what the Chronicler said. The Passion of the Christ according to St. John, whose original title is Feria Sexta in parasceve, is for four voices (SATB), with one or two more voices (SA) in certain parts. The first sentence corresponds to the Proemium, the introductory elocution of the liturgical passage of the Passion Song: Passio Domini nostri Jesu Christe secundo Joannem. In illo tempore. All other sentences correspond to the collective characters of the Gospel of the Passion according to St. John (Jn 18:1-40, and 19:142) corresponding to the Turba. It is sung in the “Liturgical Action of the Passion” of Good Friday, before the reading of the Gospel (Cardoso, 1998). 9
All polyphonic voices are similar, not just one. According to Cardoso (1998, p. 287), although this may not be common, it also appears in examples where polyphony is used only in the Turbae or even in Bradados.
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The Passion according to St. Matthew, whose original title is Dominica Palmarum, is for four voices (SATB) with one or two more voices (ST) in certain parts. The first sentence corresponds to the Proem, the introductory elocution of the liturgical passage of the Passion Song: Passio Domini nostri Jesu Christe secundo Matthaeum. In illo tempore. All other phrases correspond to the collective characters of the Gospel of the Passion according to St. Matthew (Mt. 26:1-75, and 27:1-66) corresponding to the Turbas, except the phrases “Flevit amare”, “Voce magna dicens”, “Emisit spiritum” and “Contra sepulcrum” which are verses spoken by the chronicler. They are sung on Palm Sunday Mass before the Gospel reading (Cardoso, 1998). Jesus Nazarenus and Partiti sunt are for four voices (AATB and Bass continuo, being interpolations in a passion according to St. John by Melchor Cabello. The texts correspond to verses spoken by the chronicler of the Gospel of the Passion according to St. John. They are sung in the “Liturgical Action of the Passion” on Good Friday, before the reading of the Gospel. Sprevit autem is for four voices, and is also an interpolation in a musical piece by Melchor Cabello of a Passion according to St. Luke. The text corresponds to a verse said by the chronicler of the Gospel of the Passion according to St. Luke. It is sung on Ash Wednesday Mass before the reading of the Gospel. A Lesson is a formal reading of a text, taken from the Scriptures, in a liturgical service. The most frequent cases of lessons for which Iberian Peninsula sixteenthcentury composers wrote music were those of the Office of the Dead and the Lamentations of Holy Week. However, the way they treated each one of them was very distinct (Rubio, 1983). The former, as in the improperia, generally adopted a homophonic style, with some melodic ornamentation in cadential points or to highlight a word when its content or intention required it. As to the composition of the Lamentations, the imitative style was the dominant resource although sometimes there was a combination of both. These are called the three readings of the first nocturne of the Sacred Triduum Matins. They are based on the lamentations of the prophet Jeremiah, who mourns the destruction of Jerusalem, which the Church applies metaphorically to the death of Jesus. Each verse is preceded by letters of the Hebrew alphabet, which the Latin tradition of the Vulgate maintained and then integrated into the liturgy. Since the Middle Ages, the letters were more ornate than the texts of the verses. As in the psalms, the original Gregorian themes, or in Spain’s case of the tonus lamentationis, known as “tom toledano”, are latent in these pieces, but not always with the same evidence (Sol, 2016; Torrente, 2016). A similar situation occurs in the Lamentation of Manuel de Tavares, since it seems to engender a tonal type -G-c1. Jeremiah’s Lamentation is for five voices (SATTB) and is part of the first lesson, of the first nocturne, of the Good Friday Matins Morning Office. The Popule meus is for four voices (SATB) and appears in the verse of the first part of the Good Friday Adoration of the Cross Improperia, and also in the refrain of the second part, alternating with the nine verses “Ego…”. Hagios o Theos is the continuation of Popule meus. This is for four voices and it is complete; but when it passes to the second part with eight voices, the first chorus is missing. The text is in the Acclamations of the Trisagio (Sanctus), which consists of a triple deprecation, each
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sentence with the Greek text Hagios, followed by the Latin equivalent, proclaimed in the first part of the Improperia. The Hymn is one of the oldest poetic forms. The term was used in ancient Greece and Rome to designate a poem in honour of a God. At the beginning of the Christian period the term was often used to refer to a song of praise or laud to God. As for the Latin Hymn, it is a strophic composition, sung in the Divine Office, with a poetic text and a predominantly syllabic melody. Hymns differ from psalms in that they are organised in stanzas, whereas the latter are in non-metric verses (Reese, 1989). From the middle of the sixteenth century, instead of composing for all the stanzas of a hymn, it became customary to compose only for a few separate stanzas. When this happened, the other stanzas were performed in plainchant alternating with polyphony. The cantus firmus would be present in one of the voices, usually the tenor’s or the soprano’s. Sometimes the same hymn composition would use different cantus firmus for different stanzas (Nosow, 2001). This is the case of the hymn Gloria, laus et honor, where the chorus is for SATB and is in mode I transposed to G, and its verse is for SSAT and is in mode X transposed to D. The text is attributed to Theodulphus, bishop of Orléans († 821) and is in the Processional Hymn Gloria, laus et honor Deo which is performed before re-entry into the church during the Palm Procession.
4 Counterpoint Texture, Types of Writing, and Macro-formal Structure This group is mainly composed of musical pieces for four voices with three types of textures: a first type of four equal voices (SATB) a cappella, and arranged for voce piena10 ; another type that explores the upper ambitus of SSAT textures, and a third type that favours a slightly deeper AATB scope. The a cappella vocal style belongs to the archetype elaborated until the middle of the sixteenth century and it will last through the seventeenth century, designated by the Italians as stile antico (Bukofzer, 2002). In the plot of the musical counterpoint, the components of each of the Soprano-Tenor (S-T) and Contralto-Bass (A-B) voice pairs report between the corresponding ambits the distance of an octave approximately and the inputs of the voices normally occur at the distance of a fifth interval. The corresponding four-voice voices of texture seem at first to perform equivalent tasks in the presentation of the thematic-motivic material and its counterpoint treatment, according to the respective ecclesiastical mode. Normally it is the pair S and T that retains the preponderance in the display of melodic themes and motifs, but the pair A and B perform an analogous function, albeit in a thematically subservient arrangement. This modal hierarchy fosters a certain structural symmetry of the whole. The voice of the bass reveals a behaviour quite similar to that of the other voices with regard to the imitative 10
That is, four vocal lines, in which each voice corresponds to approximately one octave, whose tessituras unfold and intersect in order to reach a range of approximately 2.5 octaves. Cf. (Meier, 1988, pp. 53–60).
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counterpoint. However, a different behaviour from the other voices is repeatedly recognised on the bass, as part of the logic of polyphonic construction, which gives it a less intervening role at the counterpoint level, serving instead as the conduction of the harmonic movement of the other voices, defining the progressions of the chords involved. In the compositions with the SSAT texture, the Tenor has an identical role to that of the Bass, sometimes more intervening at the contrapuntal level, sometimes as a harmonic support, defining the progressions of the chords involved (Table 2). In the music piece for five voices, Lamentation by Jeremiah, the texture SATB is increased by another Tenor. Throughout the composition there are contrasts of textures through the reduction of one of the voices, sometimes suppressing a Tenor, or the Bass. In the case of a hymn, which is also for five voices, the situation is different because it has to do with the characteristics and execution of the Hymns. In the case of the Hymn Gloria, laus et honor the refrain is for SATB, but its verse Israel es tu rex is already for SSAT. The two music pieces being for six voices, to the texture SATB in one composition is added one more Soprano and one Alto, and to the other one more Soprano and one Tenor. In fact, these compositions referring to Table 2 Voices, clefs, modes, sections Title
Voices
N.º VV
Clef
Key-sign
Modes
Sections
Nr.º Comp
Passion SATB+S2+A2 according to S. John
6
High
b
VIII transposed into C
14
186
Vs St. John Passion: Jesus Nazarenus
AATB+BC
4
Low
–
X
1
30
Vs St. John AATB+BC Passion: Partiti sunt a
4
Low
–
X
2
47
Vs St. Lucas Passion: Sprevit autem
4
Low
–
X
3
62
Passion SATB+S2+T2 according to S. Matthew
6
High
b
I transposed 25 into G
420
De Lamentacione Jeremias Prophetae
SATTB
5
Low
b
II transposed into G
12
404
Popule meusa
SATB
4
High
–
IX
1
39
Gloria, laus et honor a
SATB
4
High
b
I transposed into G
3
79
Vs 1 Israel es tu rex
SSAT
4
High
b
X transposed into D
2
65
AATB
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Fig. 1 Jeremiah’s Lamentation (c. 295–308)
the Passions are for four voices, in which in some sections one, or two voices make divisi. Thus, throughout these two musical pieces there is a great contrast of textures through the reduction or increase of voices, creating sections for three, four, five and six voices. Thus, the plot of musical counterpoint in musical pieces for five and six voices is identical to those for four voices. The following example shows what was said about the behaviour of the bass voice. In the first part, its role is essentially melodic-thematic, while in the second part it assumes a generalized reinforcement of harmonic support of the texture (Fig. 1). As for the counterpoint11 texture of these musical pieces, there is a great predominance of the imitative counterpoint, representing 50.1% of the metric units, that is, half of its average length, which corresponds to the situation inherited from the Mannerist polyphonic tradition. Homophony, with 26% of the bars, and free counterpoint, with 23.9% of the bars, occupy the remaining the other half. Thus, in the music for the Holy Week of Manuel de Tavares, imitation constitutes the basis of the polyphonic discourse, alternating with sections of homophony or free counterpoint, aimed at obtaining effects of variation and contrast. As for their macro-formal structure, the two Passions of Baeza stand out for the structure of their rather extensive and complex liturgical texts. From the point of view
11
The following assumptions were taken into account when classifying the various types of counterpoint writing: (a) (b)
(c)
Free counterpoint: textures that do not consist of imitation or homophony/homorhythm. Imitation: strict or canonical imitation, which consists of the presentation of a theme or motif in several voices, either in real or tonal imitation; free imitation in which an incomplete or unequal presentation of the theme or motif is given. Homophony: presupposes the equality of rhythmic values in all voices, but may include situations in which there is some configuration, especially in cadential places. Homophony can be free, or they can be in polychoral imitation.
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of the principles of formal organisation, they make moderate use of the motet-form,12 constituting forms modelled on the liturgical structure of the texts. As far as their external form is concerned, they are compositions of great dimensions, especially the Passion according to St. Matthew, with 420 metric units, and that of St. John, with 186. As for the internal sectioning, the characteristics of the corresponding texts result in a much higher number of sections than any of the author’s other compositions. The Passion according to St. Matthew has 25 sections and the Passion according to St. John has 14 sections. The other passions are interpolations in a work of another composer, and it is only natural that their sectioning is limited to from one section, in the case of Jesus Nazarenus, to three sections, in the Sprevit autem. Jeremiah’s Lamentation, like the Passions, makes a moderate use of the moteticstyle,13 consisting of 404 metric units, in twelve sections. However, it presents a more complex structure, as there is a recurring theme that appears throughout the piece. Its formal structure is as follows:
A1 – A 2 – A 3 – B – A – C – D – E – A – F – G – H Popule meus, which has only one section, uses the strophic form. The hymns resort to the mototec-style. Gloria, laus et honor presents the text of the first two stanzas treated in the scheme of a double motet or motet in two parts. The first stanza, written in the mode I (authentic D transposed to G), has three sections; the second stanza, Israel es tu rex, written in the mode X (A plagal transposed to D), has two sections.14 12
Polyphonic music was governed, above all, by one of the most predominant principles of formal organization of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, which was called the formal motetic principle or motetic style. This, according to Wolff (2001), emerged as a division of the ecclesiastical style and was categorised as a style of composition derived from the traditional polyphonic language, especially Palestrina and its tradition, and was applied to genres other than Motet, such as Mass, psalms, lessons, antiphons, hymns, songs, etc. Gonzalez Valle (1992) also refers to the motor style in the following terms: “Las Pasiones polifónicas españolas han sido elaboradas de diversos modos…Junto a estas encontramos otras, en las que esa técnica se entremezcla con la del motete, es decir, donde el contrapunto simple, o nota contra nota, alterna con el compuesto o imitativo” (p. 92). Further describes: “ Las pasiones de Guerrero tienden al estilo motético. No me refiero aquí a la “Pasión-motete”, es decir, todo el texto compuesto como un motete, sino al estilo técnico-compositivo “ (p. 105). Thus, it was characterised by the constant melodic flow of the various voices, in an uninterrupted succession of the sound discourse, and the author went so far as to state that there is nothing more opposed to true polyphonic art than a piece with a series of passages limited by their respective cadence and separated from each other by a silence, even if it is very brief. As such, the conduction of the voices must be such that, while some of them make a cadence, the others continue their movement, that is, the entries of each of the voices and the ends of the sentences must alternate. All this contributes to the formal balance of discourse at the level of composition as a whole (Rubio, 1983; Torrente, 2016). 13 According to Massenkeil (2001) stylistically the Lamentations are similar to the motet. 14 We find this hymn treated in a similar way by several composers, for example in Francisco Ximeno, Maestro of the Albarracin Chapel. CF. Obras de la Capilla de la Catedral de Albarracin (Teruel) de los siglos XVII y XVIII, estudio y transcripción de Muneta (1986) «Polifonía Aragonesa» (vol. III, p. 13) Zaragoza: Institución Fernando el Católico.
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5 The Use of the Modality Manuel de Tavares’ music naturally fits into the concept of the modal system of the late Renaissance, as it extended into the sixteenth century and early seventeenth century, but already taking into account the expansion of this system proposed by Glareano.15 This aspect concerns the musical style of Tavares’s work, as the “new” modes are widely used, in five of the eight musical pieces in this collection, corresponding to a percentage of 62.5%. However, in modes other than A and C, there is also modal hybridism, by introducing heterodox procedures, consequently extending a series of rules underlying the theory of the modal counterpoint, which results in the coexistence of elements linked to tradition with other more modernising ones. These leaks affect particularly the voices’ ambitus, being often excessive, in the exploitation of cadences foreign to the chosen mode and in the application of chromaticism. The Passion according to St. Matthew is in Mode I transposed to G and the Passion according to St. John is in Mode VIII transposed to C. Both have a surplus scope in one or several voices. This is not surprising since these compositions are part of the first decades of the seventeenth century, after a hot debate about the balance of practice and theory. Practice was in favour of a more sensorial nature of music, while theory viewed the conception of music as the result of rational rules and the praxis/theory debate is present in the musical pieces. In this sense the mixing and comixing of modes is used in both Passions, and there is even a curious case because, as pointed above, they are in different modes. However, the Proem is exactly the same. Thus, in the Passion according to St. John it begins in Mode I (Authentic D) transposed to the G, as in St. Mark’s, and then takes the modality of its composition which is in Mode VIII (Plagal G) transposed to C. The musical piece in which co-mixing of modes is most evident is in the Hymn Gloria, laus et Honor, which is in Mode I transposed to G. However, the verse Israel es tu rex contrasts decisively with it, for it is in Mode X transposed to D. Thus the same musical piece exhibits the use of “new” modes side by side with more traditional ones. This collection of musical pieces also evidences a predilection for so-called “minor”16 modes, which probably is due to expressive intentions suggested by the texts. Since these musical pieces are intended for periods of penance and mourning in the context of the liturgical year, it is easier to understand this choice of so-called “minor” modes. Zarlino found that the use of initial Minor Third was particularly well suited to texts in which the content contained some references to ideas of humility or 15 It was with his musical piece composed in 1547, entitled Dodecachordon, that this theorist carried out the definitive codification of modes, extending the eight traditional modes to twelve. Thus, the new modes of A (aeolian) and C (Ionian) received their theoretical consecration, since they were progressively adopted in polyphonic praxis, tending towards an evolutionary process, which would ultimately lead to the prefiguration of the modern major and minor tonalities. The vulgarization of these two modes would also lead to the effect of the gradual dissolution of the intervallic patterns characteristic of the eight older ecclesiastical modes. 16 Minor modes are those whose first third is minor.
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humiliation, of prostration or of veneration of a superior entity.17 It should be noted that for the Holy Week repertoire, Tavares uses the “minor” modes in 87.5% of the works.
6 Metric Punctuation and Clauses In the seventeenth century, metric punctuation was achieved through cadences.18 In counterpoint theory this process resulted from the formation and resolution of dissonances in a nucleus of two melodic lines.19 There was a horizontal perspective in formation of the clause, in which the textures, consisting of overlapping sentences, were structured in a melodic logic. In the horizontal conception of polyphonic discourse, melodic events result from the combination of two independent parts of melodies. According to Meier (1988)20 the basic cadential morphology is as follows: cantizans clausula, with the melodic movement I-VII-I or I-VII#-I; tenorizans clausula, with the movement II-I or II-III; altizans clausula, with the movement IV-III or IV-V; bassizans clause with the movement V-I. These clauses may appear in any voice with the exception of bassizans.21 An analysis of the various clausulae in each of the polyphonic pieces of Tavares’s work evidences a system that tends to incorporate the various types of clauses. In addition to the counterpoint clauses, there are clauses whose principle of constitution differs from the first ones, in particular because they assumed a vertical logic in which the deepest part of the texture had a dominant function. These clauses, of harmonic denomination, advance sound aggregates vertically, independent of the formation and resolution of dissonances. Although these harmonic clauses were not contemplated with any explicit formulation by the various theoretical treatises, the harmonic and vertical component of the cadential progressions became more and more present and conscious in the musical praxis as the seventeenth century progressed.22 17
Zarlino (1573). Intitvtioni Harmoniche (III Parte, Cap. 71, f. 341–342). Venetia: Francesco de i Francschi Senefe. 18 The term clausula was used in most Iberian sources but also, according to Meier (1988), by Germanic authors, although cadenza or cadenza was used in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as a synonym, mainly by Italian authors. 19 Zarlino (1573). Intitvtioni Harmoniche (libro III, cap. 51, fol 148–149 [248-249]); Bermudo (1555). Declaración de instrumentos musicales (libro V, cap. 7 a 29, fols 123–136). Osuna: Juan de León. [Edición facsímil por Macario Santiago Kastner (Kassel, 1957)]; Santa María (1565). Libro llamado Arte de tañer fantasia (pp. 62–67). Valladolid: Francisco Fernández de Córdoba. 20 Meier (1988): I parte, Cap. 4º, pp. 89–99. 21 In the case of some musical pieces by Tavares in which the Tenor is the deepest voice of texture, the bassizans clause appears in this voice. 22 The typology adopted was that used by Lopes (1996). A Missa “Pro Defunctis” na Escola de Manuel Mendes. Dissertação de Mestrado. Lisboa: Universidade Nova de Lisboa. CF. Castilho (2009). As obras de Manuel de Tavares e o desenvolvimento da policoralidade portuguesa do século
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The main types of clause are briefly explained below: • Clausula Vera (II → I) is characterised by the counterpointing and convergent movement of two voices, carried out by cantizans (I-VII-I) and tenorizans (II-I), cantizans in a higher voice than tenorizans. Given the absence of the basizans clause, it is often the case that the tenorizans clause appears in the Bass. • Clausula Vera (V → I) includes a reinforcement of I granted by the deeper vocal part of the texture, by means of a V-I movement, when this part is not itself holder of II. That is, the one that combines the cantizans and tenorizans formulas with a basizans clause, i.e. the I reinforcement granted by the deeper vocal part of the texture, by means of the V-I movement. This clausula configuration gives a greater resting effect and a greater conclusive force. • Other possible configurations of the Vera clausula are: the inverted (VINV), incomplete (VINC) and modified (VMOD) variant, all of which can be cumulative. In the case of the inverted variant, the tenorizans clause (II-I) appears in a higher voice than the cantizans clause (I-VII-I), which appears in a lower voice. In the incomplete variant, one of the degrees VII or II resolves for another other than I. In this sense, instead of the octave, another consonance, perfect or imperfect, is reached. However, the most common configuration is the non-resolution to I of the tenorizans formula (II-I). In this way, the replacement of movement II-I by II-III is achieved, the conclusion instead of a perfect consonance is achieved by an imperfect consonance. In a modified clausula Vera the dissonance between I and II is omitted, through the joint articulation of VII and II, in the upper position of the tactus, attesting to the propensity of the polyphonists for the vertical articulation of musical writing components within the clauses. • The Phrygia Clause, also known as the “clause in mi (E)”, is characterised by a progression of half-tone in the penultimate and last notes of the tenorizans clause (II-I), while at the same time forming the clause cantizans a one-tone interval (I-VII-I). • The Plagal Clause is generally characterized by the melodic movement IV-I, in the deeper part of the texture, and can also, but less frequently, have the melodic movement VII-I, at the same time as the formation and resolution of a dissonance through the delay of the 3rd by the 4th degree. This delay is performed simultaneously with the deeper part of the texture and differs from its homonymous harmonic because it has the same delay. • The Harmonic clause is generally characterized by having homorhythmic movements of chordal and vertical type in the last two phases of the clause, to the detriment of a linear, horizontal movement. Thus, in these last two phases, the cantizans formula (VII-I) and the tenorizans formula (II-I or II-III) are performed simultaneously.
XVII. Tese de Doutoramento. Évora: Universidade de Évora; Castilho (2010). «A pontuação métrica e semântica na música polifónica: cláusula e plano cadencial». Convergências, nº 5. Retrouved in Internet: < http://convergencias.esart.ipcb.pt >.
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• The extended harmonic clause has two fundamental characteristics: it expresses a dissonance mechanism and the duration of the tactus is twice that of the vera counterpoint clause. The auditory result of these clauses has an intense and conclusive effect in that they prolong the resolution of the dissonance by delay. Thus, it is the only category of harmonic clauses which can contain a structure of training and resolution of dissonance. • The plagal harmonic clause manifests itself by containing in the penultimate and last notes the following characteristics: progression of homorhythmic chords, absence of dissonance and, in the deeper part of the musical texture, movement IV-I. In contrast to its homonymous counterpoint, the clause is carried out independently of the formation and resolution of dissonance, so it does not present the characteristic delay of the 3rd by the 4th degree (Table 3). In Tavares’s work in general, the use of harmonic clauses is much higher, generally around 60%, when compared to counterpoint clauses, with only 40%. In musical pieces composed for the Holy Week, in clear contrast to other nuclei of musical pieces, the counterpoint clauses have a much higher percentage, 62.5%, than the harmonic clauses, which are left at 37.5%. This is perhaps because it was a time of penance when there was no experimentation with new languages, and composers remained more faithful to the legacies of tradition. Thus, in descending order of use of the clauses in the musical pieces for the Holy Week: first there is the vera (41.7%), followed by the harmonica (20.8%), the plagal (18.8%), the plagal harmonica (16.7%) and the phrygian (2.1%), there being no phrygian harmonica clauses. However, with regard to the counterpoint clauses, the proportion of the vera clause in general, independent of its specific typologies, shows, as already mentioned, that Manuel de Tavares uses it in 41.7% of the compositions, of which those using the II → I movement make up 18.3%, while those using the V → I movement make up 81.7%, which is more than fourfold. The use of the V → I movement on the Bass gives a proto-harmonic effect of conclusive leap. The musical examples found in the compositions document an adjusted application of the various cadence types described above, through arrangement in sections of texts with different degrees of syntactic-grammatical punctuation. The composer shows a great ability to handle a proliferation of diverse cadence types and to provide Table 3 Type, number and percentage of clauses
TYpe of clause Vera Phrigia
Nr.
%
60
41.7
3
2.1
Plagal
27
18.8
Harmonic
30
20.8
Plagal Harmonic
24
16.7
Total
144
100
Contrapuntal
90
62.5
Harmonic
54
37.5
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Fig. 2 Para-cadence movements (Jesus Nazarenus, c. 15–21)
for them a greater or lesser range of music-textual articulation. While this mastery constitutes a tribute to the Mannerist polyphonic tradition, it also expresses a musical language that applies the cadence plan to the text’s semantic expression. This expressiveness is further emphasises by Manuel de Tavares through some specificities, as presented below. Para-cadence movements are characterised by an uneven articulation between the melodic design of the clause and the text. Thus, the term of the sentence, of the hemistich, or of the word, does not coincide with the term of the clause, giving rise to the continuation of polyphonic discourse. In most cases these situations occur mainly in the most melismatic syllables of the text, as can be seen from the example below. The frequency with which it is used reveals the intention of the composer to produce an expressive role by disconnecting himself from the formal plane of the musical-textual articulation of discourse (Fig. 2). In transgression to the tactus principle, Manuel de Tavares generates a cadential complex with exceptionally short duration, creating an acceleration induced by the figuration of the minimum clause, which refers the rhythmic organization to the prolatio level. In this case the syncope is equal to half of the tactus and the resolution equal to one quarter of the tactus, as shown in Fig. 3. In Jeremiah’s Lamentation there is a very particular prolonged harmonic clause, since the melodic voice cantizans, instead of following its normal course of I-VII-I, do I-VII-III, provokes in turn a diminished fourth melodic, as can be seen in Fig. 4. Another situation, also peculiar, is found in Passion according to St. Matthew, where a plagal ornament is added to a vera clause, as in the example of Fig. 5. This happens twice in this work, once in bar 54 and once in 104.
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Fig. 3 St. John’s Passion -C. 139–144 Fig. 4 Jeremia´h’s Lamentation (c. 17–20)
Fig. 5 Matheus Passion (51–54)
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7 Thematic and Motive Materials Melody is one of the most relevant dimensions of polyphonic music, thus it is important to explore its nature and outline in order to contribute to a better understanding of Manuel de Tavares’ stylistic positioning. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries melodic invention was regulated by a series of factors and not by the composer’s creativity alone. These factors could be aesthetic, liturgical or technical: one had to take into account whether the functional and ceremonial characteristics of the musical piece were those of a composition of religious or profane music; in the case of liturgical music pre-existing melodies were often used; and according to the stylistic conventions of the time the academic rules of counterpoint could be applied more or less strictly (Ringer, 2001). As the basic pillar of the vocal polyphony of that time, melody was achieved through the perfect balance and equivalence between the voices, i.e. none predominated over the others. The musical discourse was characterized by the predominance of the linear-horizontal matrix, that is, by the path of the several simultaneous melodic lines, which were planned in the system of the twelve ecclesiastical modes. The movement of voices and intervals was conditioned by various restrictive rules which intended to illustrate the ecclesiastical mode that governed music, while at the same time intending to ensure scrupulous control of dissonance (Bukofzer, 2002). Many compositions by Manuel de Tavares display melodic themes and motifs whose profile is clearly based on the modal scale of their mode. One can cite, among other cases, Jeremiah’s Lamentation, in which in the exordium the Tenor 2 configures a plagal theme, from Mode II (D plagal) transposed to G (Fig. 6). In other compositions or moments it happens that the melodic themes or motifs leave a modal structure to penetrate a typically triadic and tonal cut. This is because at the beginning of the seventeenth century the model of the modal polyphonic tradition begins to incorporate an increasing number of deviations and irregularities in relation to the rules of counterpoint. Treatment of the melodic-thematic materials started to be based on other dimensions of the music, such as the harmonic relationship between the Bass, which affirms the triadic-harmonic movement, and the voices with a more prominent melodic role. This has implied deviations from traditional rules mainly at the level of melodic movement and dissonance resolution. These deviations from the modal structure are seen in the themes or motifs, which are characterized by melodic motifs of scales, arpeggios, jumps, or chromaticisms, as for example in the Lamentation by Jeremiah (Fig. 7). Polyphonists often took themes for their musical compositions from the Gregorian or other repertoires. It was with these themes, which they combined with personal invention that they concocted their creations. The latter were no less original, nor
Fig. 6 Jeremiah’s Lamentation, c. 1–9
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Fig. 7 Jeremiah’s Lamentation c. 175–180
Fig. 8 a Top: excerpt from the tonus passionis toledano (Turner, 2000); b bottom: excerpt from Manuel de Tavares
Fig. 9 a Top: excerpt from the tonus passionis toledano (Turner, 2000); b bottom: excerpt from Tavares
less expressive than those based on new invented material (Rubio, 1983). The five Passions and Jeremiah’s Lamentation are based on some pre-existing thematicmotive material, taken from the Toledan tonus passionis or the Toledan tonus lamentationes. Sometimes this material is continuously and clearly evident, while atother times the cantus firmus contains many notes strange to the model, and others in which it is interrupted and melodically transformed. As an example, see two examples of the Passion according to St. Matthew with different degrees of correlation (Figs. 8 and 9). In the hymn Gloria, laus et honor the composer uses at least the first verse of the universal melody for this hymn,23 but transposed a 4th above, as can be seen in Fig. 10. It is the soprano that takes it as cantus firmus, but it does not appear 23
Cf. d’ Alvarenga (2002, pp. 94–97). Where the author presents the comparison of paradigmatic melodic types of Gloria, laus et honor, from the most significant Portuguese sources. He also
24
L. Correia Castilho
Fig. 10 Top: Gloria, laus et honor de Manuel de Tavares; bottom: universal melody
in the first bars. The other voices containing motifs with paraphrased excerpts of this melody appear at the beginning, thus playing a basic organic role that launches the subsequent motivational development, which is followed in imitation and whose responses may be real or tonal, i.e. transposed to a different interval pattern. After the first verse the cantus firmus departs from the universal melody.
8 The Expressive Relationship Between Text and Music From a semantic and rhetorical point of view, the polyphonic music of Manuel de Tavares is a kind of repertoire that integrates the Mannerist aesthetic sensibility of the late sixteenth century and early seventeenth century. Composers had an expressive concern and respect for the text, i.e., they adapted the music to the meaning of the words, expressing the strength of each different emotion. Thus, driven by a desire to serve the words of the text effectively and in detail, they used a technique of illustration24 or musical symbolism through which extra musical relations were used in composition, such as melodic and rhythmic configuration, chromatisms, dissonances, melismas on certain syllables, false relations, ornaments, contrasts introduced in the counterpoint texture, etc. The following are a list of examples where this happens: In the Passion according to St. Mark the words descende de cruce (descend from a cross) are displayed in a motif, consisting of a melodic-rhythmic figuration with a descending outline. In the same musical piece, in the phrase, which appears states that the presence of the universal melody, or a variant of it, in a polyphonic version is almost certainly an indication of origin in Spain. 24 Illustration or musical symbolism also some authors call madrigalism or word-painting. . CF. Tim Carter, «Word-painting », in Stanley Sadie, ed, The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2ª Ed, London, 2001, vol. 27., p. 563 and following.
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at two different moments, et in tridium reaedificare illud, the word «tridium»is is . highlighted with a rhythmic cell suggesting the number three: In both Passions, the search for change and contrasts is particularly noticeable, directly reinforcing the ideas of the text, accentuating certain statements of singular drama on the part of the characters. The two pieces are for four voices, and from time to time there are one or two voices that make divisi, the composer thus playing, with its increment or reduction depending on the text. Thus, for example, in the Passion according to St. John, the only phrase for six voices is “Ave, Rex Judaeorum”, in imitation, extolling the soldiers’ shouts of scorn. The same phrase in the Passion according to St. Matthew is also augmented by one more voice, remaining at five, but presented in free counterpoint. The word «Judaeorum» contains a series of melisms, which accentuates its emotional power in the context. In the same piece, the phrases, “Flevit amare” (He cried bitterly) and “Emisit spiritum” (Rendered the spirit), are the only ones that contain passages for six voices, both in imitation, with several repetitions, which also accentuates their emotional charge. The reduction of voices to three is also contemplated in both compositions. In the Passion according to St. Matthew it happens twice, once with the phrase «Hic dixit possum destroere templu Dei et in triduum reaedificare illud», which reinforces the number three, using a panoply of counterpoint resources to render the concept of building up; and the other phrase «Sine videamus na veniat Elias liberans eum» conveys the idea of expectation. It is obvious that the musical illustration of the content of the text is not always done by identical means in both Passions. For example, for similar texts in which the collective exclamations of the angry population are illustrated, such as Crucify Him, in the Passion according to St. John, where the phrase is «Crucify, crucify eum», the first word is treated in homophony, while the other two are in free counterpoint, possibly to underline the image of the increasingly agitated crowd. In the Passion according to St. Matthew the word «Crucifigatur», repeated in two different sections, is treated in homophony, but the first is for four voices, while the second is for five, which also suggests that the population is more agitated or shouting louder and louder. Another suggestive example of text-music interconnection is the phrase «Voce magna dicens» (Crying out loud), from the Passion according to St. Matthew, which is contained in thirty-three bars, persistently repeated in imitation, and raising voices to a higher pitch. The verse of the hymn Israel es tu Rex displays intense melisms associated with the words «Rex» and «Davidis», in contrast to the rest of the much more syllabic text. Quite expressive are the melodic jumps associated with certain words used as an effective resource for illustrating the text. These motifs are often accompanied by chromaticism and false relationships. Some of these resources are listed as examples: in Jeremiah’s Lamentation, the motif with the words «dissipate murum», uses intervals of 5th, 6th, and 8th (Fig. 11). The word «et illusit», from Sprevit autem, contains jumps of the 4th diminished (Fig. 12).
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Fig. 11 Lamentação de Jeremias, c.64–69
Fig. 12 Sprevit autem, c. 26–35
Another interesting resource of textual illustration lies in the following example: there is a voice that uses chromatic accidents in the first part of a sentence, while in the second part there is another voice. This can be seen in Jeremiah’s Lamentation, with the phrase «non inverunt visionem a Domino». The Bass uses the chromatic accidents In the first part, while in the second part it is the Alto (Fig. 13). A resource to which Manuel de Tavares recurred often is the inclusion of more or less voices depending on the content of the text. One can observe this, among other examples, in the following: In Jeremiah’s Lamentation the verse «Defecerunt prae lacrimis oculi mei, conturbata sunt viscera mea», corresponding to section F, is for four voices, instead of the five for which the piece is built. On the other hand, the increment of voices is also used to reinforce the semantic content of the text.
Fig. 13 Lamentação de Jeremias, c.246–259
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9 Conclusion The liturgical domain of the texts chosen by Manuel de Tavares shows that he respected the ecclesiastical deliberations resulting from the various sessions of the Council of Trent. These led to a process of codification of the Roman liturgy which resulted in two imposed publications, which appeared in the pontificate of Pius V: the Roman Missal and Breviary. Manuel de Tavares’s work is thus part of the various trends sustained in the first half of the seventeenth century. With regard to the liturgy, there is compliance with the post-Tridentine model, and with regard to aesthetic sensitivity, there is adherence to the Mannerist predilection for texts with a marked emotional charge. As for its counterpoint language, which is already significantly progressive, there are both traces of a more traditional character and we come across characteristics developed in modal and polyphonic-counterpoint language. As such, it may be concluded that Tavares, with his profound understanding of counterpoint, remained faithful to the legacies of tradition, while he also profusely explored archetypes of a new emerging language, thus creating a complex and original synthesis from the stylistic-formal point of view.
References Alvarenga, J. P. (2002). Estudos de Musicologia. Colibri/Centro de História da Arte da Universidade de Évora. Apel, W. (1953). The notation of polyphonic music (5ª ed.). The Medieval Academy of America. Bukofzer, M. F. (2002). La música en la época barroca: De Monteverdi a Bach. Alianza Música, Alianza Editorial. Cardoso, J. M. P. (1998). O Canto Litúrgico da Paixão em Portugal nos Séculos XVI e XVII. Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra, tese de Doutoramento. Cardoso, J. M. P. (2001). Do Som que Chegou ao Novo Mundo: A Paixão Portuguesa. In R. V. Nery (Coord.), A Música no Brasil Colonial – Colóquio Internacional/Lisboa 2000. Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. Carreras, J. J., & Fenlon, I. (Eds.). (2013). Polychoralities: Music, identity and power in Italy, Spain and the New World. DeMusica (Vol. 19). Edition Reichenberger. Carver, A. F. (1981). Polychoral music: A Venetian phenomenon. Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association, 198, 1–24. Cavalle, P. J. (1991). La Música en Jaen. Diputación Provincial de Jaen. Castilho. L. C. (2010). «A pontuação métrica e semântica na música polifónica: cláusula e plano cadencial». Convergências, n°5. Disponível na Internet: http://convergencias.esart.ipcb.pt. Castilho, M. L. F. S. C. C. (2009). As obras de Manuel Tavares e o desenvolvimento da Policoralidade na polifonia Portuguesa do século XVII (Tese de Doutoramento). Évora: Universidade de Évora. Chevrot, G. (1957). A Santa Missa. Editorial Aster.
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Fischer, K. (2001). Passion. In S. Sadie (Ed.), The new grove dictionary of music and musicians (2ª ed, Vol. 19, pp. 200–211). Macmillian Publishers Ltd. Gonzalez Valle, J. V. (1992). La tradicion del canto liturgico de la passion en España. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Hernándes, L. S. (1978). Las Pasiones Polifonicas Tradicionales en la Catedral de Las Palmas. Revista de Musicologia I(1–2), 234–240. Hernándes, L. S. (2002). Una Obra para la Copla de Ministriles de la Catedral de Las Palmas de Nicolás Tavares de Oliveira (ca. 1614–1647). Revista de Musicologia XXV, 129–142. López-Calo, J. (1983). Historia de la música española: 3.Siglo XVII. Alianza Música, Alianza Editorial. Martins, A. P. S. (1997). O Cabido da Sé de Portalegre: Achegas para a sua história. Cabido da Sé de Portalegre. Massenkeil, G. (2001). Lamentations. In Sadie (Ed.), The new grove dictionary of music and musicians (2ª ed., Vol. 14, pp. 188–190). Macmillian Publishers Ltd. Meier, B. (1988). The modes of classical vocal polyphony (Described According to the Sources). Broude Brothers. Millán, M. M. (1988). Historia Musical de la Catedral de Cuenca. Diputación Provincial de Cuenca. Nery, R. V. (1990). The music manuscripts in the library of King D: João IV of Portugal (1604– 1656): A study of Iberian music repertoire in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. University of Texas, Tese de Doutoramento. Nosow, R. (2001). Hymn. In S. Sadie (Ed.), The new grove dictionary of music and musicians (2ª ed., Vol. 12, pp. 17–35). Macmillian Publishers Ltd. Oliveira, F. M. (1996). As Seis Missas “Ab initio ante saeculo creata sum” do Liber Tertius Missarum de Frei Manuel Cardoso. Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, dissertação de Mestrado. Redondo, C. P. (2012). Musica y Musicos En La Catedral de Murcia: 1600–1750. Actividad musical postridentina en el entorno catedralicio murciano. Editorial Académica Española. Reese, G. (1989). La música en la Edad Media. Alianza Música. Hoppin, R. H. (1991). La Música Medieval. Ediciones Akal. Ringer, A. L. (2001). Melody. In S. Sadie (Ed). The new grove dictionary of music and musicians (2ª ed., Vol. 16, pp. 363–371). Macmillian Publishers Ltd. Rubio, S. (1956). La Polifonia Clásica. El Escorial: Biblioteca La Ciudad de Dios, 3. Rubio, S. (1983). La Polifonia Clásica (3ª ed). Biblioteca La Ciudad de Dios. Real Monasterio de El Escorial. Lopes, R. C. (1996). A Missa “Pro Defunctis” na Escola de Manuel Mendes. Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, dissertação de Mestrado. Sol, M. (2016). La tradición monódica hispana en las lamentaciones polifónicas del Renacimiento en España. Revista de Musicologia. Sociedad Española de Musicología (SEDEM). Stein, L. K. (1987). Accompaniment and Continuo in Spanish Baroque Music. In España en la Música de Occidente (Vol. I). Actas del Congreso Internacional en Salamanca. Stevenson, R. (1982). Antologia de Polifonia Portuguesa: 1490–1680. In R. Stevenson, L. P. Leal, & M. Morais (Eds.), Série Portugaliae Musica (Vol. XXIX). Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. Stevenson, R. (1992). La música en las Catedrales Españolas del siglo de Oro. Alianza Editorial. Torre, L. (1997). Documentos sobre la música en la Catedral de Las Palmas (1621–1640). El Museo Canario. Torrente, Á. (Ed.). (2016). Historia de la música en España e Hispanoamérica. Volumen 3: La música en el siglo XVII. Fondo de Cultura Económica de España. Touralt, P. (1996). História Concisa da Igreja. Biblioteca da História. Publicações Europa-América.
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Turner, B. (2000). The Toledo Passion: The Passion of Our Lord according to Matthew: In the custom and chant of Toledo Cathedral, circa 1600. Hispaniae Cantica Sacra (HCS 2, pp. ii–vi). Vanderbeek & Imrie. Wolff, C. (2001). Motet. In S. Sadie (Ed.), The new grove dictionary of music and musicians (2ª ed., Vol. 17, pp. 190–227). Macmillian Publishers Ltd.
Telemann’s Fantasia No 2 à Travers Sans Basse: Compositional Intentions, Performance Characteristics and Audio Footprint Signal Processing Analysis Sofia B. Dias and Leontios J. Hadjileontiadis
Abstract In this chapter, a bilateral approach is applied to Telemann’s music, combining information both from the music analysis domain and transformation techniques of the sound signal. The Telemann’s Fantasia No 2 à Travers sans Basse is used as the paradigm basis and its characteristics that relate with the melodic and harmonic projection (music analysis axis) are seen through the perspectives of dynamics, pitch, timbre, similarity, novelty, chroma and predicted emotional impact, and the way they affect the micro-macrostructure of the piece, resulting in the final sound output (advanced signal processing axis). Two recordings from eminent flutists [Kuijken (flute traverso); Rampal (modern flute)] provided the audio data. The proposed approach could serve as an alternative handling of the sound ontologies, aiming at the optimum arrangement and realization of the structural intentions of a composer, as reflected in the interpretation of the performer and mediated to the audience.
S. B. Dias (B) CIPER, Faculdade de Motricidade Humana, Universidade de Lisboa, 1499-002 Cruz Quebrada, Lisbon, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] L. J. Hadjileontiadis Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Khalifa University of Science and Technology, P.O. BOX 127788, Abu Dhabi, UAE Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece L. J. Hadjileontiadis e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_2
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1 Introduction One of the most prolific composers in history (at least in terms of surviving oeuvre) is George Philipp Telemann (14 March 1681–25 June 1767) and he was acknowledged by his contemporaries to be one of the leading German composers of that time. Being a flautist himself, he became one of the most important composers for flute and he was the only composer of his time to write fugues and a French overture for flute solo. In particular, his set of 12 Fantasias for flute solo [12 Fantaisies à Travers, sans Basse, TWV 40:2–13, 1727/8-publ. 1732/33 (Brown, n.d.; Kuyjken, 1987; Zohn, 2008)] left a clear footprint in the music repertoire, similar to the one of J. S. Bach’s “Well Tempered Clavier” for keyboard instruments. Despite the believes by the eighteenth century composers about the flute incapability to perform alone due to its inability to create and sustain harmony (Brown, n.d.), Telemann explored the potential of flute, setting the Fantasias as one of the most representative eighteenth century work in the repertoire for flute solo. As a flutist, Telemann incorporated in his Fantasias power elements of Rhetoric of his era, by effectively using the affective potentiality of each key within the construction of the whole set, producing a desired effect to the sonic space. Moreover, tempo alterations add to this, since a fast movement is followed by a slower one, and viceversa. In fact, by writing each Fantasia in a different tonality (ascending from A major through A minor, B minor, Bb major, C major, D minor, D major, E minor, E major, F# minor and G major to G minor), he applies a cyclic, almost encyclopedic presentation of the key sequence, so to increase the emotional variance across the whole set. Furthermore, the pedagogical importance of the 12 Fantasias is notable, as they are suitable both to beginners, as well as to professional flutists. This is profound into the structural information that Telemann encrypts behind his music score, which facilitates the comprehension of his intention and guides the performance of the whole piece. In this vein, this work aims at identifying the flow from Telemann’s compositional ideas to performance qualities and auditory footprint. Stemming from the previous work of Dias and Hadjileontiadis (2018), where the first movement (M1-Prelude) from the Fantasia No 2 à Travers sans Basse was used as a working paradigm, all movements (M1–M4) of Fantasia No 2 are analyzed here to holistically show the potentiality behind the proposed approach. Moreover, two performances of the Prelude are analyzed, one using flute traverso (performed by Barthold Kuijken) and another that uses modern flute (performed by Jean-Pierre Rampal). Advanced signal processing techniques are applied to the selected audio recordings, in order to provide a tangible space for the compositional and performance qualities to be further clarified. The latter, pave the way for further deepening in the music of Telemann and, in more general, to the Baroque music.
Telemann’s Fantasia No 2 à Travers Sans Basse: Compositional …
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2 The Research Focus The main research question explored in this chapter relates with the information flow that starts from the composer’s site, who expresses his intentions about the final music output creating the music score. However, as expected, what is notated on the score has to be processed by the performer’s interpretation and expression, embedded in the performance, delivering the music (as a final audio stimulus) to the audience. Since Telemann’s music is written for flute traverso, apart from the differences in the idiosyncrasy, skills and style of performance, the core element of the shifting from the flute traverso to the modern flute sets another facet of analysis in this work. Finally, since the audio output encapsulates the compositional and performance characteristics across time, a dynamic analysis is performed across the structural elements, both at each movement level and the whole Fantasia No 2, unfolding micro-, meso- and macro-resolution characteristics along with predicted emotional impact.
3 Methodology The proposed research was realized via two methodological axes, i.e., Axis 1: Music analysis of the Fantasia No 2, including brief description of the implicit harmonies and compound lines, along with and the harmonic and melodic environment; Axis 2: Advanced signal processing analysis of the audio signals from the two performances (i.e., flute traverso and modern flute), including dynamics analysis (envelope structure); timbral analysis (attack, slope, brightness); pitch analysis (main pitch distribution across time); similarity analysis (similarity in spectral characteristics); novelty analysis (temporal succession of moments, each characterized by particular musical properties); chromagram analysis (self-organizing map projection of chromagram); and emotional analysis (activity, valence, and tension space). For the Axis 1, the music analysis of Fantasia by Da Silva (2012) is adopted and followed as a basis to build upon the interpretation of Axis 2 analysis results. With regard to the latter, the analysis was based upon the following approaches: Dynamics analysis: For the long-term evolution of the signal, expressing the change of dynamics across the time duration, a signal segmentation at 1-s successive windows and the normalized across segments envelope were used here. For a smooth estimation of the signal envelope, a full-wave rectification, followed by a low-pass auto-regressive filter and a down-sampling with a rate of 16 were employed. Timbral analysis: This relates with the attack characteristics, i.e., attack time and the attack slope (as a ratio between the magnitude difference at the beginning and the ending of the attack period, and the corresponding time difference). Moreover, the brightness, i.e., the amount of spectral energy above a specific cut-off frequency ( f cuto f f ) (Juslin, 2000), is also estimated.
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Pitch analysis: The pitch is estimated via the autocorrelation function of the audio signal across the segments, keeping the most prominent peaks at each segment. Similarity analysis: The structural features within a piece of music have been visualized with a self-similarity matrix (Foote et al., 2002), a matrix that shows the degree of similarity between different parts of a musical piece. Let denote a vector representing any musical feature at instant i. The self-similarity matrix M = (m i j ) is defined as m i j = s(vi , v j ),
(1)
where s denotes any similarity measure. By definition, the matrix is symmetrical across its diagonal. Usually, a distance measure is adopted as a similarity measure of the representation vectors. The later could be derived from spectral-based parameterizations, linear prediction, Mel-Frequency Cepstral Coefficient (MFCC)1 or psychoacoustic considerations. A simple measure is the Euclidian distance in the parameter space. In addition, useful metric is the scalar product of the vectors (internal product). This will be large if the vectors are both large and similarly oriented. To remove the dependence on magnitude (and hence energy, given our features), the product can be normalized to give the cosine of the angle between the parameter vectors. The cosine measure ensures that windows with low energy, such as those containing silence, can still yield a large similarity score, which is generally desirable and is given below: si j =
→ → v j> 4.5, exhibiting the highest value (around 7) very close to the end of the piece, where both the tension and activity are significantly reduced. The latter shows more engagement with the character of the Prelude, building an atmosphere that could establish the Telemann’s music language and transmit a positive and calm approach at the end, as a kind of memory of the previous and anticipation of the new to come in Fugue. In the latter (Fig. 10b) more similar evolution of the three emotional dimension is seen among the two interpretations, whereas more noticeable differences are seen in the other two movements (M3-Fig. 10c and M4-Fig. 10d). Finally, Fig. 11a–d depict the 3D-distribution of the three emotional dimensions (activity, valence and tension) of Fig. 10, for each of the four movements (M1–M4) audio signals, respectively, from the interpretation by Kuijken (pink squares) and Rampal (green circles). As it is seen from Fig. 11, in all M1–M4 movements, there is a distinct difference in the location of the concentration at the 3D emotional space between Kuijken’s and Rampal’s interpretations. Moreover, in Rampal’s case, there is a higher variance across the valence axis compared to the Kuijken’s one at M1 (Fig. 11a) and M4 (Fig. 11d), whereas at M2 (Fig. 11b) and M3 (Fig. 11c), both interpretations are similarly distributed across the valence axis. In all movements, the mean distribution is mostly concentrated at middle towards low values of valence and activity, yet medium to high values of tension, all converging to higher values at M4 (Fig. 11d), almost in both interpretations, apparently due to the finalization of the whole piece. In fact, this is anticipated by the expression characterizations that Telemann gives to each movement (Prelude-introduction of the compositional space with more controlled emotions; Fugue-focus on technical complexity for vertical (polyphonic) extension within more cognitive than emotional stimuli; Adagio-slow, more esoteric; and Allegro-more vivid and rigorous).
6 Conclusive Remarks Telemann’s Fantasia No 2 was able to expose the Baroque style through the flute and managed to provide the basis for the bilateral approach explored in this paper, i.e., the music analysis and the advanced signal processing one. The identified structural characteristics at the score level impose different qualities at the auditory level that reveal Telemann’s intentions, as they are materialized via the two different interpretations by eminent performers of flute traverso and modern flute, respectively. The goal
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M2 (Fugue)
(a) M3 (Adagio)
(b) M4 (Allegro)
(c)
(d)
Fig. 11 The 3D-distribution a–d of the three emotional dimensions (activity, valence and tension) of Fig. 15, for each of the four movements (M1–M4) audio signals, respectively, from the interpretation by Kuijken (pink squares) and Rampal (green circles)
was to realize how the compositional intentions are transformed in a language that is mostly understood by the musicians and, at the same time, are codified in the audio signal that reaches the listener in a way, which reveals their full spectrum. To achieve this, many levels of analysis were employed, including duration, dynamics, pitch, timbre, self-similarity, novelty, chroma and predicted emotional impact. This concept allowed for the examination of the micro/macro-structural events of the Fantasia No 2 in a time-dependent representation, following, thus, the dynamic flow of the music in parallel to the changes in the modeling parameters explored here. This could also be extended across all 12 Fantasias at an even more macroscopic approach of Telemann’s oeuvre for flute. The bilateral perspective introduced in this chapter addresses the need for more efficient approaches of the compositional thinking and intensions through the analysis of both the music score and the audio output. As the latter is the one that directly reaches the audience, perhaps this spherical perspective could bridge the compositional intentions reflected in the abstract forms of homogeneity, discontinuity, correlation, with the actual musical content.
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References Brown, R. (n.d.). Telemann Fantasias: A feat of ingenuity and inspiration. Available at: http://www. rachelbrownflute.com/telemann-fantasias.html Da Silva, A. C. P. (2012). A performance guide to three of Telemann’s 12 fantasias for flute without bass, based on the study of the compound melodies. Doctoral Dissertation, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Dias, S. B, & Hadjileontiadis, L. J. (2018). From Telemann’s compositional ideas to performance qualities and audio footprint signal processing analysis. The paradigm of Telemann’s Prelude from Fantasia Nº 2 à Travers sans Basse. Convergências - Revista de Investigação e Ensino das Artes, vol. XI (21), Retrieved from http://convergencias.ipcb.pt Eerola, T., Lartillot, O., & Toiviainen, P. (2009). Prediction of multidimensional emotional ratings in music from audio using multivariate regression models. In International conference on music information retrieval, Kobe. Foote, J., Cooper, M., & Nam, U. (2002). Audio retrieval by rhythmic similarity. In Proceedings of the 3rd international conference on music information retrieval, Paris. Available at http://www. ismir.net/proceedings/ Juslin, P. N. (2000). Cue utilization in communication of emotion in music performance: Relating performance to perception. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and PerforMance, 26(6), 1797–1813. Kuyjken, B. (1987). Georg Philipp Telemann, 12 Fantasias for Flute. Breitkopf & Härtel. Porter, A., Bull, C., & Pyle, D. (2008). Telemann: 12 Fantasias for Flute without bass. A study guide with amy porter. DVD produced by Mike Wilkinson. Duderstadt Media Center. Schulenberg, D. (2008). Music of the Baroque (p. 249). Oxford University Press. Toiviainen, P., & Krumhansl, C. L. (2003). Measuring and modeling real-time responses to music: The dynamics of tonality induction. Perception, 32(6), 741–766. Zohn, S. (2008). Music for a mixed taste: Style, genre and meaning in Telemann’s instrumental works (p. 337). Oxford University Press.
The Sounds of the Baroque Tiles. An Iconographic Itinerary of St. Victor’s Church, Braga, Portugal Elisa Lessa and Helena Brandão
Abstract The interior tiles of St. Victor’s Church, from the seventeenth century, includes four panels and a fragment of tiles that present musical motifs associated with different contexts. The coating was ordered and sponsored by Archbishop D. Luís de Sousa (1637–1690), who also defined the respective iconographic program carried out by one of the most renowned tile painters in Lisbon, the Spaniard Gabriel del Barco (1648–c. 1701), although art historians recognize the potential artistic influence of other individuals, not yet identified. The study presents a descriptive and interpretative analysis of the musical motives identified in the panel of St. Rosendo, which integrates the most monumental pictorial set of local hagiography in Portugal.
1 Introduction Azulejo, is a Portuguese word originating from the Arabic term az-zuleij which designates a ceramic plate of little thickness, normally square. The tile pieces were used to coat architectural works, applied both inside and outside, and exposing allegorical, religious and historical episodes and scenes. This type of tile covering began to be used at the turn of the 15th in Portugal. Initially the tiles were imported from Spain and later manufactured locally, both in Portugal itself as well as parts of the old empire from which it simultaneously absorbs a great influence (Guerra, 2010: 16). The art of tiles would transcend its purely decorative and utilitarian function, becoming one of the most expressive artistic forms of Portuguese culture. Portugal then became the European country where the tile achieved enormous development, presenting the most original and functional forms of use (Meco, 1985: 5). In the last quarter of the seventeenth century, painting in blue and white tones became increasingly important, in such a way that it ended up almost completely dominating national tile production, which at that time was focused in Lisbon and remained so for half a century (Carvalho & Silva, 2016: 33). In fact, the Portuguese production of tiles, from the end E. Lessa (B) · H. Brandão CEHUM-GIARTES, Universidade do Minho, Braga, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_3
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of the seventeenth century and the beginning of the eighteenth century, marked the true development and golden era of tiles in Portugal. Polychromatic decoration gave way to dichromatic decoration due to the influence that Chinese porcelain, Dutch tiles and the bicolor of engravings that circulated in Europe, exerted on Portuguese painters. In addition to this change in the color palette used by painters, it is also worth mentioning the change that occurred in the very status of tile painting, which, instead of being considered a simple craft, became established as an art in itself.
2 St. Victor’s Church and the Martyrdom of Its Patron St. Victor’s church located in the parish of São Victor in the municipality of Braga, was built by Braga archbishop, D. Luís de Sousa (1637–1690). The construction dates from 1686, but the consecration of the building took place only after the death of D. Luís, by Archbishop D. João de Sousa (1696–1703), on March 19, 1698. The building was sponsored by D. Luís de Sousa, who sought to be actively involved in the work, hiring one of the greatest architects of the time, the military engineer Miguel de Lescole, established in Viana do Castelo, as well as renowned master masons, from Porto and Maia, Pascoal Fernandes and Estêvão Moreira, and1 the carver Domingos Lopes, also from Porto, to make the altarpiece. The Archbishop also revealed his active participation in defining the respective iconographic program based on the narratives of the Ecclesiastical History of Braga’s Archbishops written by D. Rodrigo da Cunha [Historia Ecclesiastica dos Arcebispos de Braga, e dos Santos, e Varoes ilustres que florescerão neste Arcebispado, Braga, 1634 (vol. I) and 1635 (vol. II)]. Inspired by D. Rodrigo da Cunha’s book, D. Luís de Sousa selected twenty Minho saints, noting that some of these saints were also archbishops of Braga. Their lives are represented on the tiles of the Church’s nave, showing them at the time of their martyrdom or performing miracles. The saints are identified by phylacteries, sometimes held by angels such as St. Paterno, St. Gonçalo, St. Senhorinha, St. Rosendo, St. Marciana, St. Cucufate, St. Asciclo, St. Félix Torcato, St. Basilio, St. Leodecísio, St. Narciso, St. Profuturo, St. Liberata, St. Marinha, St. Quitéria, St. Eufémia, St. Ausberto, St. Salomão, St. Tolobeu and St. Frei Gil. The greatest emphasis is given to the patron of the Church, to whom the entire covering of the main chapel is dedicated, in which the observer can follow the narrative of the martyrdom of St. Victor through a set of tile panels. Two grand panels portray St. Victor refusing to worship the goddess Ceres. This refusal led him to be tried by the governor of the city, Sérgio, as represented in another panel, which is located on the side of the Epistle, or the upper plane of the wall. Faced with the 1
Portugal’s history was marked by a brief period of significant commercial and, above all, cultural exchanges between the Netherlands and Portugal. The time frame that goes from the last quarter of the seventeenth century to the first of the eighteenth century corresponds, in the History of Portuguese Art, to an important period that witnessed a great export of Dutch tiles to Portugal of great rigor and technical quality. The painting style used was the blue over white background painting, which will certainly have influenced Portuguese production.
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reaction of the Saint, who reinforced his belief in the Christian faith, the governor ordered him to be tied to a tree and tortured. The first phase of his martyrdom is represented in another narrower section, where one soldier arrests St. Victor, while another prepares instruments of torture. An angel appears in heaven, holding a wreath, reinforcing Saint Victor’s union with the Christian faith. Another panel, also narrow, represents the prolongation and intensification of the Saint’s torture. The final stage of his martyrdom, with his beheading, is represented on the panel at the top of the wall on the side of the Gospel. Finally, St. Victor ascends to Heaven, an episode illustrated in the triumphal arch, where there are also several angels, one of whom holds a palm and the other the crown.2 Two other small panels located at the access to the pulpits illustrate two other important moments in the Saint’s history. The first episode was when the Martyr’s body is abandoned in a field to be devoured by animals (then, during the night, Christians buried him near the place he was his martyred). The second occurred at the time of Archbishop D. Agostinho de Jesus (1537–1609), when the stone was removed from the tomb of St. Victor and they realized that it still contained the blood of his martyrdom. While the exterior of the Church of St. Victor is characterized by the sobriety of its decoration, the interior stands out for the monumentality of its tile covering that completely covers the walls. This church is the first and only example in Portugal of an iconographic program of grandiose dimensions entirely dedicated to local saints. The iconological analysis of the tile covering of St. Victor’ Church has already been carried out by Rosário Salema de Carvalho and Libório Manuel Silva.3 The authorship of this extraordinary set of tiles is attributed to the Spaniard Gabriel del Barco (Siguença, 1648–Lisbon, c. 1701), one of the most representative painters of the first phase of the national production of blue and white tiles. Gabriel del Barco’s work is part of the so-called Transition Period, a period from about 1675 to 1700 that laid the foundations and for the golden period of Portuguese tiles, the Masters Cycle (c. 1725). Although the collaboration of “other hands” not yet identified by art historians is recognized in this set of tiles, the work is generally attributed to the figure of Gabriel del Barco, with the following arguments: (…) The quick and almost “impressionistic” treatment of his brushstrokes, the very drawn faces, the disproportion (…) and the perspective problems of this master who preferred expression over the correctness of the drawing (…)4
Gabriel del Barco’s signature (abbreviated to “G.B.”) was identified on the tile panel that represents one of the episodes in the life of Saint Victor located on the wall of the main chapel on the side of the Gospel (Flor et al., 2014: 102). This artist was one of the most significant tile painters of the late seventeenth century in Portugal. 2
For a detailed description and analysis of the scenes that represent the life of São Victor, the scenes associated with other saints and their association with the literary source that is the source of these representations, see Carvalho and Silva (2017). 3 See Rosário Salema de Carvalho e Libório Manuel Silva “A Igreja de São Victor” in Azulejos/Maravilhas de Portugal. Vila Nova de Famalicão: Centro Atlântico, 2017. 4 Carvalho and Silva (2017: 99).
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Born in Siguença (Spain), in 1648, Barco settled in Lisbon in 1669, remaining in the Portuguese capital until the end of his life. It is thought that in the first years of his career in Portugal he dedicated himself to painting ceilings and oil painting, but this phase of his activity remains unknown. The first tile work that he signed dates from 1689 (main chapel of the Church of the Convent of Nossa Senhora do Espinheiro, Évora), considering, therefore, that the beginning of his activity as a tile painter dates back to the late 1680s. Although his career was relatively short (just over ten years), Barco produced an average of two to three works per year, revealing that he had a good workshop and an enormous work capacity considering the grand dimensions of many of his panels (Carvalho & Silva, 2017: 10).
3 The Musical Representations in the Tile Covering The musical representations appear in the panels dedicated to St. Victor, St. Eufémia, to the rise of St. Rosendo and also in a fragment in the sacristy in which a musician angel is represented. The main chapel’s iconographic program, as already stated, is dedicated to the patron of the church. Going through the nave on the right side, there is a panel, dedicated to St. Eufémia, whose iconographic representation is not entirely visible because it is partly hidden by the historical organ. This panel shows the appearance of the body of St. Eufémia to a little shepherdess and her father. Although the text does not mention any musical instrument, Gabriel del Barco chose to illustrate an aerophone in the pastor’s hand. Luzia Rocha, in her doctoral dissertation (2011) presents a section on the tile panels of St. Victor’s Church dedicated to her patron and St. Eufémia, however, does not address the panel that represents the rise of St. Rosendo or the fragment found in the sacristy which features a musician angel who strums a small diatonic harp with one hand.
4 Musical Motives Represented in the Panel Dedicated to St. Rosendo Upon entering the church, we come across the triumphal arch where several musician angels are found, some of which are significantly hidden due to the gilded pelmet that was placed there in the twentieth century. This fact prevents a complete reading of the pictorial representation, and it is not possible to verify whether other angels are represented playing instruments or even singing (Fig. 1). Pre-iconographic description5 5
The analysis of musical representations follows the three stages systematized by Erwin Panofsky: A pre-iconographic description in which one tries to identify and understand the artistic motives
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Fig. 1 Triumphal arch located in the nave of St. Victor’s Church (http://juntasvictor.pt)
In this panel it is possible to observe several clouds and angels with a serene and contemplative posture. However, only the heads or half of the bodies are visible. It is possible to identify at least five musician angels who play musical instruments. On the right side there are two chordophones (one rubbed and the other fingered) and on the opposite side two chordophones with bow. It is also possible to observe the tubes of a keybord aerophone. Iconographic analysis The phylactery displayed by two angels with the inscription “S. Rosendo” indicates that the tile panel of the triumphal arch represents an episode in the life history of this saint. Through the narrative written by D. Rodrigo da Cunha it appears that the theme of this coating is the Ascension of St. Rosendo. However, his iconographic reading
that make up the representation; iconographic analysis itself and a third stage of iconographic interpretation in a deeper sense in which the intrinsic meaning or content of the work is understood (Panofsky, 1972: 3–17).
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Fig. 2 Ascension of St. Rosendo. Detail of the phylactery (Brandão, 2019)
is not possible to fully observe due to the gilded pelmet placed at the beginning of the twentieth century, in the years 1905–1906 (Fig. 2).6 The episode of St. Rosendo’s life is narrated by D. Rodrigo da Cunha in a chapter dedicated to his cousin St. Senhorinha: While [St. Senhorinha] was one night in the Choir in prayer with his sisters, he saw by Divine revelation that the soul of his relative, St. Rosendo, was going to enjoy the eternal bliss, taken by the hands of Angels, who with music celebrated his glory.7
The text justifies the presence of musician angels in the figurative painting of the tile covering. They were probably made by a collaborator of Gabriel del Barco and not by the artist (Carvalho, 2012: 143). However, the iconographic sources used to represent the instruments are still unknown. It is possible to observe the representation of five instruments. Probably a positive organ, a viola da braccio, a viola da gamba, a harp and a violone. However, it was only possible to analyse the last two in more detail, since only a small part of the other instruments can be visualized (Figs. 3 and 4). The chordophone rubbed by a bow represented on the right side of the triumphal arch appears to be a viola da braccio (alto). Due to the pelmet, it is only possible to observe the volute, six tuning pegs, the neck with three visible frets, three strings 6
Carvalho and Silva (2017), op. cit., p. 13. Cunha (1634) Primeira parte da Historia Ecclesiastica dos Arcebispos de Braga, e dos Santos, e Varoes illustres, que florescerão neste Arcebispado. Braga: p. 456.
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Fig. 3 Ascension of St. Rosendo. Details of the musician angels: organ (left) and violone (right); (Brandão, 2019)
Fig. 4 Ascension of St. Rosendo. Details of the musician angels viola da braccio (?) and harp (Brandão, 2019)
and a small part of the harmonic soundboard. Slightly below this instrument we find an angel that plays a harp of triangular configuration, a diatonic model consisting of about 26 strings. (It is not possible to see the number of strings in full). It is a model before the end of the sixteenth century and, due to its dimensions, after the fourteenth century. Its upper corner is very pointed and doesn’t match to the rounded
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shape that appears in other representations. The resonance box structure also does not correspond to medieval models because it is not represented in a more voluminous way. The strings appear to be randomly attached to the console. The instrument represented does not reflect the painter’s musical reality (seventeenth century), but neither does it obey the characteristics that the instrument had in previous centuries. The artist would not have had great knowledge about this instrument, having represented it in a simplified/stylized way, painting only the basic aspects that allow the observer to quickly associate this representation with a harp. On the opposite side, there are seven tubes of an organ that form a single row, being arranged according to the organization of the manual (not visible). Below the organist angel we find another musician angel who plays a violone. Above the organ tubes, you can see a small part of the body of another rubbed chordophone that could be a viola da gamba. However, it is not possible to understand for sure which instrument is represented. The violone appears in the Renaissance as a complement to the violas family. This chordophone was in force from the mid-sixteenth century to the mid-seventeenth century and is considered the direct precursor of the double bass. Today there are only rare examples of this instrument (Munrow 1976: 88). Historically, the term “violone” has several meanings: originally, since the 1530s, it has been used to name any viola. In the Baroque period, both Corelli and Handel used it to refer to the cello. Its meaning became even more confused when, from 1660 until the eighteenth century, the term was regularly used to designate the double bass (Fig. 5).8 Some details of the violone represented in the triumphal arch are identical to Michael Praetorius’s illustration, namely the configuration, and the decorative shape of the volute, the “f” openings, although designed with little care; the frets which, however, do not have the same number in relation to the Praetorius’s violone.9 However, the instrument has another characteristics that do not seem to correspond to reality. This violone has no easel and the standard presents a fanciful shape when compared to that of Praetorius’ engraving. The arm’s instrument is too short, with only three frets. Although in the Baroque the violone normally had six strings, sometimes a seventh string was added.10 The way the musician angel’s right hand holds the bow appears to correspond to reality (the bow is held from below). However, in the iconographic representations of the time, the musician places only his thumb at the top of the bow and the remaining fingers at the bottom. In this representation, the way in which the bow is held does not seem to correspond to reality as it does not allow sufficient support for its handling (Fig. 6).
8
Tharald Borgir, et al. “Violone” in Grove Music Online. Praetorius (1619) Syntagma Musicum. Tomus Secundus: De Organographia. Wolfenbüttel. 10 See Munrow (1976) Instruments of the Middle Ages and Renaissance. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 9
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Fig. 5 Michael Praetorius Syntagma Musicum.Tomus Secundus: De Organographia (Wolfenbüttel, 1619). Violone’s representation on the tile panel (Brandão, 2019)
Fig. 6 Ascention of de St. Rosendo. Violone details (Brandão, 2019)
5 Conclusions The Church of S. Victor and, in particular, its tile panels are an example of the aesthetic taste marked by the exuberant decorative elements represented in an extraordinary set of tiles and carvings with exceptional musical iconography. Its tile covering
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presents an enormous wealth of representation of musical instruments namely chordophones, aerophones, idiophones and membranophones, which appear associated with different environments and contexts. Most of the analysed instruments have representational problems. The painter’s aim does not seem to have been the authentic representation of musical instruments, much less the musical reality of his time. In fact, this coating could hardly represent the musical reality of the late seventeenth century, since the painter used, in most cases, engravings from the previous century. Furthermore the ceramic painting of his time was executed à la prima and for that reason “There was no place for regrets” (Carvalho & Silva, 2016: 35). The identification of the engravings used by the painter Gabriel del Barco are yet to be fully clarified. In order to answer all the questions posed regarding the Ascension of St. Rosendo panel and the possible symbolic meanings of the number of strings presented by the violone and viola da braccio, it would be necessary to read the tile panel in full. Perhaps one day the gilded woodcarving of the triumphal arch of St. Victor Church can be removed and the tile panel of St. Rosendo’s Ascension will once again be admired.
References Borgir, T., et al. “Violone” in Grove Music Online. https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com Carvalho, R. S. (2012). A pintura do azulejo em Portugal [1675–1725]. Autorias e biografias – um novo paradigma. Tese de doutoramento em História da Arte. Universidade de Lisboa: Faculdade de Letras – Departamento de História. Carvalho, R. S. S., & Silva, L. M. (2016). Azulejo em/in Braga: O largo tempo do Barroco. Centro Atlântico. Carvalho, R. S. S., & Silva, L. M. (2017). “A Igreja de São Victor” Azulejos/Maravilhas de Portugal. Centro Atlântico. Flor, P., et al. (2014). Grande Panorama de Lisboa em azulejo: Novos contributos para a fixação da data, encomenda e autoria. Revista de História da Arte, 11. Guerra, A. F. M. (2010). O Azulejo de fachada na freguesia de Santo Ildefonso Séculos XIX e XX. Relatório de estágio para a obtenção do grau de Mestre em História da Arte Portuguesa. Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto. Departamento de Ciências e Técnicas do Património, 2010. Meco, J. (1985). Azulejaria Portuguesa. Bertrand Editora. Munrow, D. (1976). Instruments of the middle ages and Renaissance. Oxford University Press/Music Department Panofsky, E. (1972). Studies in iconology/humanistic themes in the art of the Renaissance. Icon Editions. Rocha, L. (2011). O motivo musical na azulejaria portuguesa da primeira metade do século XVIII, dissertação de doutoramento em Ciências Musicais Históricas. Universidade Nova de Lisboa: Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas.
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Documentary Sources Cunha, D. R. (1634) Primeira parte da Historia Ecclesiastica dos Arcebispos de Braga, e dos Santos, e Varoes illustres, que florescerão neste Arcebispado. Braga. Praetorius, M. (1619). Syntagma Musicum Tomus Secundus: De Organographia. Wolfenbüttel.
Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portuguese Paintings from the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries Sónia Duarte
Abstract This investigation is about concrete portraits (not crypto-portraits) of male and female musicians by Portuguese painters, since Vieira Lusitano to Sequeira, Columbano, Emília Braga and Malhoa. A portrait is the presence of an absence. A synonym of affectivity, propaganda, social prestige and power, it perpetuates the memory of the person portrayed, with more or less verisimilitude. The first Western treatise on portraiture was written in Portugal in 1549: the dialogue Do Tirar polo Natural, by Francisco de Holanda (1517/18–84). Given this feat, one might expect a number of portraits of musicians by national artists and workshops to have reached us throughout the centuries. However, Holanda’s treatise lists a series of precepts that can help explain the dearth of male and female portraits of Portuguese musicians in the following centuries: “Let the excellent painter (…) paint very few people, carefully selected”. Individual and collective, from public or private collections, the theme of the musician’s portrait is marginally considered or even ignored by the art historians. What constitutes the nature of these Portuguese portraits? What they reveal to us? In the end of the chapter, we present an inventory with more than half a hundred of portraits of male and female amateur and professional musicians from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries painted by national painters.
S. Duarte (B) ARTIS—Instituto de História da Arte da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] CESEM—Centro de Estudos de Sociologia e Estética Musical da Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal FCT—Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I. P., Lisboa, Portugal © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_4
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1 Portraits and Self-portraits in Portugal in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries: An Overview A portrait is the presence of an absence. A synonym of affectivity, propaganda, social prestige and power, it perpetuates the memory of the person portrayed, with more or less verisimilitude (França, 2010). The first Western treatise on portraiture was written in Portugal in 1549: the dialogue Do Tirar polo Natural, by Francisco de Holanda (1517/18–84). Given this feat, one might expect a number of effigies, portraits and self-portraits by national artists and workshops to have reached us throughout the centuries. However, Holanda’s treatise lists a series of precepts that can help explain the dearth of portraits of Portuguese painters and musicians in the following centuries: “Let the excellent painter (…) paint very few people, carefully selected” (Holanda, 1984 [1549]: 14). From the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, there are self-portraits by artists, some of which hypothetical, as David Huguet, Francisco de Holanda, Fernão Gomes, Giraldo Fernandes do Prado, Pedro Nunes, António de Oliveira Bernardes, or D. Félix Machado da Silva Castro e Vasconcelos, the first Count of Amares. Many of them are crypto-portraits or non-portraits—images based on iconographic elements that bear no relation to the person portrayed—from Portuguese public and private collections. It is the case of the depiction of saints in the Old Testament, eschatological and hagiographical iconography relating to King David or Saint Cecilia; of classical gods and deities, such as Orpheus or Eros; of concerts with angel musicians, evoking the theme of divine music; of an archdevil playing signal instruments in eschatological subjects; of soldiers playing aerophones on Via Crucis themes; of the anthropomorphic figures featured in mural painting, playing fanciful instruments or dancing; of the shepherds included in christological depictions, playing flutes, tambourines, adufe or bagpipes in oil paintings on canvas by Bento Coelho da Silveira (ca. 1620–1708), Manuel de Freitas Padrão (act. 1676-ca. 1739) or Domingos Teixeira Barreto (?-1807). Other cases of crypto-portraits are the figuration of amateur musicians, like the ones taking part in a procession in Guimarães painted by Portuguese-Swiss Augusto Roquemont (Museu Nacional Soares dos Reis); shepherds playing flute by Silva Porto (private collection) or Leonel Marques Pereira (Museu Nacional Soares dos Reis); mythological subjects by Veloso Salgado (Museu do Chiado); and many unidentified musicians by José Malhoa. Lastly, beggars and blind musicians in festivals of villages painted de visu or idealized, by the painter so-called Morgado de Setúbal (1752–1809) who painted a black boy played a side drum and a old man with a bagpipe copied from engravings (Museu de Setúbal) and three others (Museu de Évora); by Luís Pereira de Meneses (1817–78); Miguel Ângelo Lupi (1826–83) [1]; José Rodrigues (1828–87) (França, 1990: 271); Leonel Marques Pereira (Idem 269); Carlos Reis (1863–1940); Sousa Pinto; or the Spanish painter who had Portuguese nationality since 1874, Veloso Salgado (1864–1945). In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, on the other hand, self-portraits by artists—individual or collective, with or without their working tools—are more frequent. It is worth highlighting those of Vieira Lusitano (1699–1783), João Glama
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Strobërle (ca. 1708–92), Vieira Portuense (1765–1805), Pedro Alexandrino de Carvalho (1729–1810), José Teixeira Barreto (1782–1810), José de Almeida Furtado, dito O Gata (1778–1831), José da Cunha Taborda (1766–1836), Domingos Sequeira (1768–1837), Augusto Roquemont (1804–52), João Cristino da Silva (1829–77), José Ferreira Chaves (1838–99), Henrique Pousão (1859–84), António Manuel da Fonseca (1796–1890), Leonel Marques Pereira (1828–92), Francisco José Resende (1825–93), Silva Porto (1850–93), Marques de Oliveira (1853–1927), Columbano Bordalo Pinheiro (1857–1929), José Malhoa (1855–1933), or Ernesto Ferreira Condeixa (1858–1933), as well as the notable self-portrait of Portuguese-Chilean Aurélia de Sousa (1866–1922), from the same period, painted in 1882: a feminine, intimate, stern and enigmatic portrait, with a “a light blue stare that structures the entire composition” (França, 2000: 20) (Fig. 1). Another example, which is not a self-portrait, but the depiction of a female painter performing her art, was painted around 1807 and shows Gabriella Maria Ignazia Asinari painting her husband, D. Rodrigo de Sousa Coutinho, 1st Count of Linhares (Fig. 2). The moment seen in this picture, from a private collection, was captured by Domingos Sequeira: standing in front of her canvas, placed on an easel, the student is painting the portrait of her husband, and looks at her master as though awaiting further instructions [2]. Fig. 1 Self-portrait, 1882, Aurélia de Sousa; oil on canvas; 45 × 36 cm; Museu Nacional Soares dos Reis
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Fig. 2 The Counts of Linhares: D. Gabriella Maria Ignazia Asinari, dei Marchesi di San Marzano, painting her husband, D. Rodrigo de Sousa Coutinho, eighteenth century, Domingos Sequeira; oil on canvas; 95 × 74 cm; private collection
2 Group Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portugal in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries Portraits of male and female musicians in Portuguese painting from the eighteenth century are extremely rare. The political and economic circumstances, the market and the artistic commissions, and the moderate prestige enjoyed by artists at the time, along with iconoclastic tendencies, the lack of inventories and studies and their dispersion among private collections have contributed to this result. From the first half of the nineteenth century, the emergence of an influential intellectual elite, validated not by an inherited status but by its education, individual skill and attendance of certain milieus, associated with new social habits, led to a revitalization of portraiture. Group portraits often consist in intimate depictions of soirées and families. A domestic painting with a lively nature, ascribed to Gaspare Traversi (ca. 1732–70), depicts one such soirée with a musician next to his pupil: the Princess Maria Bárbara playing the harpsichord in front of Domenico Scarlatti (Gonçalves, 2013) [3]. An unusually large The Wedding Masquerade by José Conrado Roza, son of the painter Domingos da Rosa, depicts exotic, dwarfish figures with black skin, demonstrating the triangular relationships between Europe, Africa and the Americas. This picture, commissioned by Princess Maria Francisca Benedita, herself an accomplished musician, shows a wedding procession whose members lived in the Belém Estate (AA. VV., 2018), two of them—D. Ana and Sebastião—are playing musical instruments: tambourine and recorder (Fig. 3). Moreover, Domingos Sequeira painted a harp recital, a moment of everyday intimacy of aristocracy (like the serenades) (AA. VV., 2018: 205). Columbano often paints this theme: one Soirée with singers and a piano played by her friend and painter
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Fig. 3 The Wedding Masquerade (detail), 1788, José Conrado Roza; Musée du Nouveau Monde, La Rochelle
Artur Loureiro, and a wooden transverse flute (for Columbano to play?) placed on top of papers on the chair (Fig. 4); an study and the painting entitled An Amateur Concert (1882), featuring a group of singers accompanied by a pianist. In my studio, Columbano painted a self-portrait with lyre-guitar, as he was an amateur musician (Lapa, 1994:124–25). In one of four oil paintings on wood, Carlos Reis, while still a student, represented a Soirée with a male singer accompanied by a female figure playing an upright piano and one singer (Fig. 5). Traces of these social gatherings are also found in many private homes with a scenes related to music and dance (Duarte, 2018) [4]. Fig. 4 Soirée, 1882, Columbano; private collection; Soirée, 1880, Carlos Reis; Museu do Chiado, Lisbon
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Fig. 5 Soirée, 1882, Columbano; private collection; Soirée, 1880, Carlos Reis; Museu do Chiado, Lisbon
3 Individual Portraits and Effigies of Professional and Amateur Musicians in Portugal Traditionally attributed to painter João Glama Ströberle (ca. 1708–92), who worked in the city of Porto, it is a curious painting from the collection of sculptor Teixeira Lopes, where a young infant D. Pedro Carlos de Bourbon and Bragança (1786– 1812), son of D. Gabriel de Bourbon and Saxony (music student of the famous Vicent Martín y Soler), playing cavaquinho. Following the misfortune of his parents’ death in November 1788, D. Pedro Carlos would come to Portugal to grandparents house (which justifies its presence in a Portuguese collection). The portrait presents an idealized background with a source (symbol of life) flanked by a lady holding a flower (purity) and a dog’s paw (fidelity). Another painting of D. Carlos show the little strikes a side drum through a wooden stick (Fig. 6). D. José, Príncipe da Beira (1761–88) appears in two oil on canvas of natural dimensions by Miguel António do Amaral (ca. 1710–80). One at the State Hermitage commissioned by the Empress Catherine II for her portrait gallery at the Chesminsky Palace, ca. 1773 (Fig. 7). Another, from the collection of the Palácio Nacional de Queluz, summer residence of the royal family, dated from 1774, according to the inscription: “Michael Antonius Fecit, ann.1774”. Among the attributes inherent to Sciences, Arts and Letters, there are musical instruments such as the lyre, trumpet, transverse flute, two kettledrums and an open book with legible musical notation (Duarte, 2018) (Fig. 8). Another working portrait of an artist belonging to Lisbon’s elite, linked to the Baron of Sobral, was painted by an unknown artist. It shows an erudite, academic and virtuous man, proficient in the Arts and Letters: elegantly dressed, with a rectangular brooch on his chest surrounded by precious stones, a chain with a clock key and two small bells around his waist. He is preparing the tobacco in a box and in front of him lies a silver holder contains sharpened pieces of chalk, the medium essential to draw Cupid sculpted by Mars, a clear allusion to the theme of love such as bust of Venus. Might this be a wedding portrait, intended as a gift to a bride or an absent family? The list of attributes is completed by a bookcase with almost fifty books, among which
Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portuguese Paintings … Fig. 6 D. Pedro Carlos (Palácio Nacional de Queluz); D. José I, Príncipe das Beiras (State Hermitage); D. José, Príncipe das Beiras (Palácio Nacional de Queluz)
Fig. 7 D. Pedro Carlos (Palácio Nacional de Queluz); D. José I, Príncipe das Beiras (State Hermitage); D. José, Príncipe das Beiras (Palácio Nacional de Queluz)
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Fig. 8 D. Pedro Carlos (Palácio Nacional de Queluz); D. José I, Príncipe das Beiras (State Hermitage); D. José, Príncipe das Beiras (Palácio Nacional de Queluz)
“ARTE DA PINTURA”, by Filipe Nunes (?), as indicated on the spine. Furthermore, the picture also includes a sheet of paper with minutely drawn musical notation and a transverse flute made of wood, ivory and tin, divided into four sections, with six holes and a key. The musical sheet corresponds to the instrumental section of a march or hymn in E minor, starts with an anacrusis and was left unfinished (Figs. 9 and 10), whilst the musician is most probably one of the amateur transverse flute players who lived in Lisbon and gave domestic and spontaneous performances. This painting is an allusion to good education and sensitivity and it is coeval with the flutes produced by the Haupt and Silva families. We found some individual portraits in public collections with a specific typology. For example, each of the six portrayed at the Museu Nacional da Música: halflengths, elegantly dressed with jewels and medals, erudite and serious (almost severe) face. The oldest one by Henrique José da Silva (1772–1834)—inscription: “H. J. S.ª Pint 1814”—is the portrait of the pianist and composer João Domingos Bomtempo, elegantly dressed with two seals at the waist and in front of a piano and a blank sheet, show us the insignia of the Order of Christ [5]; other, around ca. 1840, with the Italian violinist Vicenzo Tito Mazzoni (1799–1870), who worked in Lisbon (just like the family a century before); another hypothetically by Lisbon painter Francisco António Silva Oeirense (1797–1845) with the conductor and teacher Francisco António Norberto dos Santos Pinto (1815–60), around 1845 – inscription: “8.ª Abertura/Pª Grande Orchestra/Composta e Dedicada/a Francisco Liszt/p[or] F. A. N. S. Pinto/Lxª/1845”; the unfinished portrait of composer and pianist João Guilherme Bell Daddi (1813–87), who, in February 1845, played with Liszt in Teatro Nacional de São Carlos the Fantasy opus 12 by Sigismond Thalberg, called Fortuné François; another
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Fig. 9 Portrait of a man of Baron of Sobral family, ca. 1810, unknown author; private collection. Transcription (excerpt)
Fig. 10 Portrait of a man of Baron of Sobral family, ca. 1810, unknown author; private collection. Transcription (excerpt)
painted in 28th August 1885 by Emília Adelaide Xavier dos Santos e Silva Braga (Occidente 1893) granddaughter of the famous awarded musician and composer Manuel Inocêncio Liberato dos Santos Carvalho e Silva (1802–87), who receive the Boisselot of Liszt, by Queen Maria I, and distinctions of Order of Christ, Order of Santiago de Espada and Order of Our Lady of the Conception of Vila Viçosa, as we see on the portrait. The individual portrait of the Portuguese-Brazilian Artur Napoleão dos Santos (1843–1925) presented as a composer and pianist, with your own exercises book with the inscription “12 (…) Artistiques (…) NAPOLEAM” maybe the famous “Douse Etudes Artistiques”, Opus 43, ca. 1870, and probably the date of that painting. Lastly, the portraits of the organist and composer Marcos Portugal (Figs. 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 and 19). Furthermore, many prominent figures of Portuguese society and intelligentsia with musical instruments are very ordinary on paintings and drawings of other painter: Columbano [6]. For instance, the piano: in Difficult excerpt, a portrait from 1883 that represents Manuel Gustavo Bordalo Pinheiro, an amateur pianist and flutist, nephew of the painter Columbano, who struggles with the difficulty of reading a score at
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Fig. 11 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
first sight (the notation is not noticeable) (Lapa, 2007: 138–39). In a painting called Soirée Maria Alves Ribeiro plays the piano [7] and in another in private collection, too, Artur Loureiro plays the piano in a painting called The amateur concert (Lapa, 2007: 96). We found many paintings about the Fado—the National Song—and the Portuguese Guitar by José Malhoa, Constantino Fernandes (Pereira, 2017: 59), Francis Smith or Eduardo Moura (Duarte, 2014). The most well-known painting is one of the versions of Fado by José Malhoa, with Lisbon hooligan and guitarist Amâncio Augusto Esteves and his lover Adelaide Facada, a prostitute from the Alfama neighbourhood (Henriques, 2004; Saldanha, 2012; Pereira, 2017) (Fig. 20).
4 Portraits of Female Musicians in Portuguese Painting: Amateurs and Muses Although music was one of the main female pastimes, as documented in letters, poetical eulogies or coeval iconographies where women are seen playing instruments or teaching other women in the comfort of their homes, the news about female musicians are scarce. The first female artist in Western art history known to have
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Fig. 12 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
Fig. 13 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
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Fig. 14 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
Fig. 15 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
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Fig. 16 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
Fig. 17 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
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Fig. 18 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
Fig. 19 Male portraits of nineteenth century in Lisbon. Museu Nacional da Música: Bomtempo; Mazzoni; Santos Pinto; Daddi; Liberato dos Santos; Artur Napoleão. From other collections: Marcos Portugal in Paços do Concelho; Marcos Portugal and Bomtempo in Conservatório Nacional
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Fig. 20 Fado, 1910, José Malhoa; Museu da Cidade de Lisboa
painted her self-portrait is the Flemish Caterina van Hemessen, who is also the painter of the first portrait of a female musician, dating from 1548. This picture, on display at the Wallraf-Richartz Museum, is thought to represent her sister Cristina van Hemessen, an amateur musician, playing a virginal [8]. Among Portugal’s life-size portraits from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, it is worth highlighting that of D. Maria Ana Francisca Josefa (1736–1813), the daughter of D. José I, from the collection of the Palácio Nacional de Queluz. Painted by Vieira Lusitano, the 17-year-old princess is standing next to a harpsichord and appears to be devoted to music and painting (harpshichord and the book with instrumental notation and unreadable signature) (Fig. 21). Other paintings are dated from the mid-eighteenth century. One of D. Constança de Portugal, who lived in the outskirts of Lisbon and married in 1736 the 15th Lord of the Majorat of Oliveira, is depicted in a painting from a private collection as a highly cultivated woman with singing skills (Sousa, 2006: 152). Next to her, an open music book bears the title Cantata A voce sola de soprano [sic] (Fig. 22). In addition, two portraits of D. Mariana Victória (1718–81), a keen musician, reading a handwritten musical sheet (Fig. 23) and another in Lisbon Academy of Sciences with a lyre (Fig. 25). In a half-length portrait, D. Carlota Joaquina (1775–1830), Spanish princess and Queen of Portugal, exhibits several jewels and insignia, including a medallion with a miniature portrait of her husband, Prince D. João. The picture also includes attributes related to the Arts, such as a music sheet placed on a table, of which only the beginning of the composition is visible, and part of a keyboard (Fig. 24). In a portrait thought to depict a member of family of the poet D. Leonor de Almeida Portugal Lorena e Lencastre, the 4th Marquise of Alorna (also known as Alcipe)—a remarkable painter, musician and poet—wears a painted medallion on her chest, with the effigy of her husband and parents, and holds a small lyre on her left hand, which evokes the art of composition. The portable lyre, a chordophone that
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Fig. 21 Female portraits: D. Maria Ana Francisca Josefa of Bragança, ca. 1751; D. Constança de Portugal da Gama, 1749; D. Mariana Victória, ca. 1740; D. Carlota Joaquina, ca. 1806
Fig. 22 Female portraits: D. Maria Ana Francisca Josefa of Bragança, ca. 1751; D. Constança de Portugal da Gama, 1749; D. Mariana Victória, ca. 1740; D. Carlota Joaquina, ca. 1806
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Fig. 23 Female portraits: D. Maria Ana Francisca Josefa of Bragança, ca. 1751; D. Constança de Portugal da Gama, 1749; D. Mariana Victória, ca. 1740; D. Carlota Joaquina, ca. 1806
Fig. 24 Female portraits: D. Maria Ana Francisca Josefa of Bragança, ca. 1751; D. Constança de Portugal da Gama, 1749; D. Mariana Victória, ca. 1740; D. Carlota Joaquina, ca. 1806
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Fig. 25 Female portraits: D. Mariana Victória; unidentified family member of Alcipe; Francisca Possolo da Costa; D. Maria Joana do Amaral; Luísa Todi and Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges Espada
represents harmony, is used to accompany the text, but also alludes to strength and seduction, as in the mythological episode evoking the construction of the walls of Thebes to the sound of a lyre (the myth of Amphion, the inventor of music). Orpheus also sang and played a lyre (nature as a whole would stop to listen and every creature followed him, for his art had the power to subdue and appease the wildest beasts) (Fig. 26). Another painting of that tipology is the portrait of the poet and playwright Francisca Possolo da Costa (1783–1838), called Francília Pastora do Tejo, painted in the first half of nineteenth century by the Portuguese painter Bento Dufourcq [9]. The attributes are: lyre with four chords and a laurel wreath and a book (Fig. 27) [10]. Sold at an auction in the Palácio do Correio Velho, the allegorical wedding portrait of D. Maria Joana Pais [Paes] do Amaral (1779–1859), the 1st Viscountess of Alverca (2nd Countess of Anadia) by marriage to her cousin José de Sá Pereira, as mentioned in the caption, shows D. Maria fingering a fanciful lyre (symbol of marital harmony), ca. 1816. On a table, a book with instrumental music alludes to Erato’s allegory (Fig. 28). In a portrait from the Museu Nacional da Música, ascribed to the circle of Vigée Le Brun and identified as an apotheose, or tribute after the death, of the opera singer Luísa Rosa de Aguiar, best known as Luísa Todi (1753–1833), the latter is depicted with a laurel wreath, attribute of Apollo and by extension an attribute of the poets that means superiority and virtu. Here, the female person plays a lyre, as a Muse of Music (Fig. 29) [11].
Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portuguese Paintings … Fig. 26 Female portraits: D. Mariana Victória; unidentified family member of Alcipe; Francisca Possolo da Costa; D. Maria Joana do Amaral; Luísa Todi and Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges Espada
Fig. 27 Female portraits: D. Mariana Victória; unidentified family member of Alcipe; Francisca Possolo da Costa; D. Maria Joana do Amaral; Luísa Todi and Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges Espada
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80 Fig. 28 Female portraits: D. Mariana Victória; unidentified family member of Alcipe; Francisca Possolo da Costa; D. Maria Joana do Amaral; Luísa Todi and Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges Espada
Fig. 29 Female portraits: D. Mariana Victória; unidentified family member of Alcipe; Francisca Possolo da Costa; D. Maria Joana do Amaral; Luísa Todi and Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges Espada
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D. Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges Espada is depicted in a wedding portrait painted together with that of her husband, the rich industrialist João Xavier Potsch (the son of a coppersmith engaged by the Portuguese Royal House). The painting dates from 1815, the year when the wedding took place, in Lisbon [12] (D. Gertrudes is not wearing a wedding ring). In her Lisbon property, Quinta do Carmo, no longer used as a house, the ballroom, the music room and the dining room are still decorated with frescos relating to music and dancing, along with a piano by the English workshop Collard & Collard, evoking the musical soirées that were once held there. D. Gertrudes is wearing a French-style evening gown and her hair is bound up with ribbons and bows. Her left hand holds a fan and her right hand a book and two sheets with instrumental music. Standing next to her harpsichord, she looks at us, proud of her status and erudition (Fig. 30). Finally, children also play music. The portrait of D. Mariana Benedita Victória de Sequeira painted by her father, Domingos Sequeira, around 1822–23 it is an intimate and affectionate portrait, of which there are at least three preparatory sketches. Sequeira exhibits his daughter as an erudite and skilful musician. Seated at the pianoforte, the 10-year-old girl is interrupted by the observer, whom she looks at, but remains nonetheless engrossed in her music, which denotes a complete mastery of her instrument (Fig. 31) [11]. Finally, the portrait of Maria Luísa Relvas, the firstborn daughter of the politician, music lover and violinist José Relvas (as it proves José Malhoa in a painting of 1898 in the same collection of Casa dos Patudos). It was painted by José Malhoa and shows the 13-year old girl in 1896, which was to be the last year of her life. She is holding the violin produced in several workshops in Portugal, among which that of the Sanhudo family (Fig. 32) [12]. Fig. 30 Female portraits: D. Mariana Victória; unidentified family member of Alcipe; Francisca Possolo da Costa; D. Maria Joana do Amaral; Luísa Todi and Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges Espada
82 Fig. 31 Portraits of D. Mariana Benedita Sequeira, 1822–23, Domingos Sequeira; Maria Luísa de Loureiro Relvas, 1896, José Mahoa; Casa dos Patudos
Fig. 32 Portraits of D. Mariana Benedita Sequeira, 1822–23, Domingos Sequeira; Maria Luísa de Loureiro Relvas, 1896, José Mahoa; Casa dos Patudos
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5 Conclusions This investigation was about concrete portraits (not crypto-portraits in processions or festivals in the small villages painted by Morgado de Setúbal, August Roquemont, José Rodrigues, Leonel Marques Pereira, and many others). It is not an exhaustive list but it is the first inventory of portraits of male and female musicians in Portugal—professional and amateurs—from Baroque, Rococo, Neoclassicism, Romantism, Realism and Naturalism with more than half a hundred in private and public collections, since Vieira Lusitano to Sequeira, Columbano, Emília Braga and Malhoa. As we saw, in the last decades of 18th and first decades of the nineteenth century, Portugal saw a revaluation of the painted portrait. If in the eighteenth century it was still painted using engraved models, in the 19th portrait is realistic and have new commissioners: the bourgeoisie who wants to capture the essence of the personality and the painters who needed is own financial sufficiency. The typology: full-body figuration gives way to half-body figurations, focusing more on face expression; attributes like books or musical instruments are evident, objects that translate civility, sociability and new entertainments. Women are almost invariably portrayed with musical sheets or books related to singing and keyboard instruments (spinet/virginal, harpsichord, pianoforte and lyre), while men are usually associated with the art of composition and a more diverse set of instruments. Moreover, women appear in active portraits, within domestic settings, whereas men pose for the portrait and wear military and honorary insignia—of the Order of Christ or the Immaculate Conception of Vila Viçosa—attesting to their rising social status. The portraits of women are scarce and, unfortunately, there is no record in Portuguese painting of self-portraits such as the ones by Sofonisba Anguissola, Lavinia Fontana and in those times Angelica Kauffmann, artists who have represented themselves as painters and as musicians. In short, portraits, in its various forms—individual or collective, full-face, half-length or three-quarter, ostentatious or allegorical—aimed to simulate the presence of what is absent, exalting and evoking it. In doing so, they provide us with important clues to understand Portugal’s musical history. Marginally considered or even ignored by the art historians, most of the attention is focused on the identification of the sitter, dating or discover the authorship of paintings. Male are virtuosi because they playing and compose and the female are virtuosi too because they playing in domestic place in a symbolic manner. The portrait is power. The portrait is a lie.
6 Attachments Individual and group portraits of male and female amateur and professional musicians from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries painted by national painters.
D. José, Príncipe da Beira
Mozambican musicians: D. Ana and Sebastião
Luísa Todi
Portrait of D. José, Príncipe da Beira (PNQ 960)
Wedding Masquerade (MNM.1983.7.1)
Allegorical portrait of Luísa Todi (MNM 0898)
Ca 1789
1788
1774
1773
Musée du Nouveau Monde
Palácio Nacional de Queluz
State Hermitage
Palácio Nacional de Queluz
Private collection
Palácio das Necessidades
Academia das Ciências, Lisbon
Location
Circle of Vigée Museu Le Brun Nacional da Música
José Conrado Rosa
Miguel António do Amaral
Miguel António do Amaral
D. José, Príncipe da Beira
Portrait of D. José, Príncipe da Beira (G-4430)
Ca. 1751
Vieira Lusitano
Unknown
D. Maria Ana Francisca Josefa de Bragança
Ca. 1740
Unknown
Portrait of D. Maria Ana Francisca Josefa de Bragança (PNQ 961)
D. Mariana Victória de Bourbon
Portrait of D. Mariana Victória de Bourbon (–)
Ca. 1740
Authorship
Unknown
D. Mariana Victória de Bourbon
Portrait of D. Mariana Victória de Bourbon (–)
Date
Portrait of D D. Constança de 1749 Constança de Portugal Portugal da da Gama (–) Gama
Person
Title (inventory number)
Oil on canvas (–)
Oil on canvas (–)
Oil on canvas (–)
Materials (dimensions)
Oil on canvas (–)
–
–
Sousa (2008: 172)
–
–
Bibliography
Lyre
Flute, tambourine
Oil on canvas (78.8 × 61.7 cm)
Oil on canvas (270 × 190 cm)
(continued)
Trindade (1999)
AA.VV (2018): 321
Lyre, transverse flute, Oil on canvas – kettledrums, (114 × 91 cm) instrumental, music book, aerophone
Tranverse flute, music book
Harpshichord, legible Oil on canvas music book (148 × 104 cm)
Singing music book
Singing music book
Lyre
Instrument(s)/music elements
84 S. Duarte
D. Pedro Carlos Ca. 1790 de Bourbon and Bragança
Marcos Portugal
Unidentified
Unidentified
D. Carlota Joaquina
Unidentified
D. Francisca de Paula Possolo da Costa
Portrait of D. Pedro Carlos (PNQ 253A)
Portrait of Marcos Portugal (–)
Portrait of a family member of Alcipe (–)
The Fado guitarist (MCM 5214)
Portrait of D. Carlota Joaquina (41,367)
Portrait of a man (–)
Portrait of D. Francisca de Paula Possolo da Costa (–)
First half of nineteenth century
Ca. 1810
Ca. 1806
Ca. 1800
Ca. 1800
Ca 1790
D. Pedro Carlos Ca. 1790 de Bourbon and Bragança
Portrait of the litle princesses (–)
Date
Person
Title (inventory number)
(continued)
Bento Dufourcq
Unknown
Unknown
Morgado de Setúbal
Unknown
Unknown
João Glama Strobërle (?)
João Glama Strobërle
Authorship
Private collection
Private collection
Palácio Nacional da Ajuda
Museu Carlos Machado
Private collection
Conservatório Nacional
Palácio Nacional de Queluz
Casa-Museu Teixeira Lopes
Location
Lyre
Legible sheet music, tranverse flute
Harpsichord (?), legible sheet music
Portuguese guitar
Lyre
–
Side drum and stick
Cavaquinho
Instrument(s)/music elements
Oil on canvas (–)
Oil on canvas (102.5 × 82 cm)
Oil on canvas (92.5 × 74 cm)
Oil on canvas (96 × 114.5 cm)
Oil on canvas (–)
Oil on canvas (–)
Oil on canvas (82.5 × 58 cm)
Oil on canvas (–)
Materials (dimensions)
(continued)
Costa (1841: 116)
–
Telles (2015)
–
–
–
–
–
Bibliography
Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portuguese Paintings … 85
Person
Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges
D. Maria Joana Pais do Amaral
Unidentified
João Domingos Bomtempo
D. Mariana Benedita Victória de Sequeira
Marcos Portugal
Vincenzo Tito Mazzoni
Francisco António Norberto dos Santos Pinto
Title (inventory number)
Portrait of D. Gertrudes Leonor Hedwiges (–)
Portrait of D. Maria Joana Pais do Amaral (–)
Harp recital (inv. 1667 Pint)
Portrait of João Domingos Bomtempo (inv. MNM 1067)
Portrait of D. Mariana Benedita Victória de Sequeira (1086 Pint)
Portrait of the composer Marcos Portugal (–)
Portrait of Vincenzo Tito Mazzoni (MNM 0893)
Portrait of Francisco António Norberto dos Santos Pinto (MNM 0900)
(continued)
1845
Ca. 1840
Ca. 1830
1822/ 23
1814
Ca. 1810–20
Ca. 1816
Ca. 1815
Date
Francisco António Silva Oeirense (?)
Unknown
Unknown
Domingos Sequeira
Henrique José da Silva
Domingos Sequeira
Unknown
Unknown
Authorship
Museu Nacional da Música
Museu Nacional da Música
Paços do Concelho, Lisbon
Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga
Museu Nacional da Música
Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga
Private collection
Private collection
Location
Legible sheet music
Violin and bow
–
Pianoforte, illegible sheet music
Pianoforte, sheet without music
Harp
Lyre, legible sheet music
Harpsichord, legible sheet music
Instrument(s)/music elements
Oil on canvas (37.8 × 30.5 cm)
Oil on canvas (79 × 67 cm)
Oil on canvas (–)
Oil on canvas (85 × 65 cm)
Oil on canvas (87 × 65 cm)
Oil on canvas (20 × 21.5 cm)
Oil on canvas (–)
Oil on canvas (94 × 76 cm)
Materials (dimensions)
(continued)
Trindade (1999)
Trindade (1999)
–
AA.VV (2018)
Trindade (1999)
AA. VV (2018: 205)
Telles (2015)
–
Bibliography
86 S. Duarte
Amália de Sá (?) Ca. 1860
Artur Napoleão do Santos
Maria Alves Ribeiro; Emília Carlota Scheper Fassio; Amélia Bordalo Pinheiro
Francisco Xavier Mingoni
João Domingos Bomtempo
The two sisters (–)
Portrait of Artur Napoleão do Santos (MNM 0901)
Soirée (EXT204154)
Portrait of Francisco Xavier Mingoni
Portrait of João Domingos Bomtempo (–)
1881
1881
1880
Ca. 1870
1845
João Guilherme Bell Daddi
Portrait of João Guilherme Bell Daddi (MNM 1069)
Date
Person
Title (inventory number)
(continued)
José Malhoa
José Malhoa
Columbano
Unknown
José Ferreira Chaves
Unknown
Authorship
Conservatório Nacional
Conservatório Nacional
Private collection / Museu Nacional de Arte Contemporânea
Museu Nacional da Música
Museu Nacional de Arte Contemporânea
Museu Nacional da Música
Location
Oil on canvas (100.5 × 83.5 cm)
Oil on canvas (–)
Oil on canvas (64.5 × 48.7 cm)
Materials (dimensions)
–
–
Oil on canvas
Oil on canvas
Piano, illegible sheet Oil on canvas music, singing, a bell (29 × 46 cm) of an aerophone
Piano, legible sheet music
Piano, illegible sheet music
–
Instrument(s)/music elements
(continued)
Saldanha (2012)
Saldanha (2012)
Lapa (2007: 84–85), Elias (2011: 272–273)
Trindade (1999)
–
Trindade (1999)
Bibliography
Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portuguese Paintings … 87
Manuel Gustavo Bordalo Pinheiro
Columbano
Manuel 1885 Inocêncio Liberato dos Santos Carvalho e Silva
Difficult excerpt (CMAG 928)
In my studio (2442)
Portrait of Manuel Inocêncio Liberato dos Santos Carvalho e Silva (MNM 1068)
Carlos Reis
1886
Soirée (3268)
Unidentified
José Malhoa
Emília Adelaide Xavier dos Santos e Silva Braga
Columbano
Columbano
Columbano
Authorship
The black musicians of Five unidentified 1886 S. George (–) musicians
1884
1883
1882
Maria Augusta Bordalo Pinheiro; Carlo Felici Figari; Adolfo Greno; Josefa Greno; Artur Loureiro
The amateur concert [Soirée chez lui] (498)
Date
Person
Title (inventory number)
(continued) Instrument(s)/music elements Oil on canvas (220 × 300 cm)
Materials (dimensions)
Two trumpets, fife, two side drums
–
Lyre-guitar
Oil on canvas (41 × 60 cm)
Oil on canvas (69.8 × 53.7 cm)
Oil on wood (38 × 68.5 cm)
Museu Municipal de Piano, illegible piano Oil on wood Torres Novas sheet music (50.5 × 110.5 cm)
Private collection
Museu Nacional da Música
Museu Grão Vasco
Casa-Museu Piano, illegible piano Oil on wood Anastácio Gonçalves sheet music (25 × 30 cm)
Museu do Chiado - Piano, illegible Museu Nacional de singing sheet, Arte Contemporânea illegible piano sheet, transverse flute
Location
(continued)
Santos (2004: 329)
Saldanha (2012)
Trindade (1999)
Lapa (2007: 124–125)
Lapa (2007)
Lapa (2007: 98–101)
Bibliography
88 S. Duarte
Maria Luísa de Loureiro Relvas
Portrait of Maria Luísa de Loureiro Relvas (–)
1903
Johann Sebastian Bach
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Robert Schumann
Portrait of J. S. Bach (MNM 1066)
Portrait of W. A. Mozart (MNM 1065)
Portrait of R. Schumann (MNM 1064)
1903
1903
1898
José Relvas playing the José Relvas violin (–)
1896
José Malhoa
José Malhoa
José Malhoa
José Malhoa
José Malhoa
Emília dos Santos Braga
Unidentified
Lady tuning a mandolin (–)
1893
Veloso Salgado
Portrait of the António Teixeira 1889 sculptor Teixeira Lopes Lopes [in the workshop in Paris] (–)
Authorship Veloso Salgado
Julieta Hirsch
Lady in white [retratos (1477)
Date 1887
Person
Title (inventory number)
(continued) Instrument(s)/music elements
Museu Nacional da Música
Museu Nacional da Música
Museu Nacional da Música
Santos (1999: 140), França (1988), Lapa (1994)
Bibliography
Oil on canvas (–)
Occidente (1893, 530: 204)
Oil on Santos (1999: canvas (228 × 140) 167 cm)
Oil on canvas (77 × 54.5 cm)
Materials (dimensions)
–
–
–
Oil on canvas (58.5 × 44.5 cm)
Oil on canvas (58.5 × 44.5 cm)
Oil on canvas (58.5 × 44.5 cm)
Pastel on paper (–)
(continued)
Trindade (1999)
Trindade (1999)
Trindade (1999)
Saldanha (2001)
Violin and bow, stand Oil on canvas Saldanha and illegible sheet (118 × 86 cm) (2001) music
Mandolin
Portuguese guitar
Casa dos Patudos Violin and bow, – Museu de Alpiarça illegible sheet music
Casa dos Patudos – Museu se Alpiarça
Private collection
Casa-Museu Teixeira Lopes
Museu Nacional de Piano, illegible sheet Arte Contemporânea music, stand (inv. 1477)
Location
Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portuguese Paintings … 89
Ludwig van Beethoven
Unidentified
Amâncio 1909 Augusto Esteves
Amâncio 1909 Augusto Esteves
Amâncio 1910 Augusto Esteves
The Apotheosis of Beethoven (MNM 1053)
Interior of a village tavern (–)
Fado (study) (–)
Fado (–)
Fado (–)
1909
1903
1903
J. Brahms
Portrait of Brahms (MNM 1063)
Date
Person
Title (inventory number)
(continued)
José Malhoa
José Malhoa
José Malhoa
Eduardo A. Moura
José Malhoa
José Malhoa
Authorship
Portuguese guitar
Portuguese guitar
Portuguese guitar
Piano, illegible sheet music
–
Instrument(s)/music elements
Museu da Cidade de Portuguese Lisboa guitar
Private collection
Private collection
Museu Nacional Soares dos Reis
Museu Nacional da Música
Museu Nacional da Música
Location
Pereira (2017: 50)
Duarte (2014)
Trindade (1999)
Trindade (1999)
Bibliography
Oil on canvas (151 × 186 cm)
Pereira (2017: 55)
Oil on canvas Pereira (2017: (86 × 107 cm) 54)
Oil on canvas (49 × 65 cm)
Oil on wood (34 × 28.6 cm)
Oil on canvas (366 × 235 cm)
Oil on canvas (58.5 × 44.5 cm)
Materials (dimensions)
90 S. Duarte
Portraits of Male and Female Musicians in Portuguese Paintings …
91
Notes [1] [2]
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]
[8] [9]
Especially watercolors. There is another portrait by Domingos Sequeira with this subject, in a private collection, ca. 1794. That typology of portrait evokes pictures such as Bernardino Campi painting the portrait of Sofonisba Anguissola, painted by Anguissola in 1559. See Gómez, LR (2019) Historia de dos pintoras: Sofonisba Anguissola e Lavinia Fontana. Museo del Prado, Madrid: 102–103. Concerto is one painting by Gaspare Traversi (ca. 1732–70) in the collection of Casa-Museu Anselmo Braamcamp Freire (inv. MMS/005484 BF) with the figuration of Princess Maria Bárbara de Bragança in the harpsichord, Domenico Scarlatti and D. Fernando VI. José de Sousa Carvalho’s residence in the Alentejo, there are several canvases show dance and music scenes, including the rehearsal of a quartet study practice: one plays a double bass (rabecão grande), another plays two kettledrums, a third one, with his back turned, a bassoon, and the last one a small bass drum (Duarte, 2018). In May 1835 he was director of the Conservatório de Música of Lisbon and that portrait serves as a model for another painted by José Malhoa, for the great hall of that School, in 1881. See between Columbano’s drawings: A fifia [one flutist: M. Gustavao Bordalo Pinheiro?; female pianist an male cellist], 1884; The guitarist, ca. 1887; Gaspar da Viola, ca. 1887, etc. See also in paintings hypothetical portraits: The priest in the village in the pedestrian for the Folar, ca. 1840; Waltz invitation, 1880; and six larges decoratives oil in canvas painted in partnership with Pereira Júnior, in 1891, for two private collections (Count of Valenças, Luís Leite Pereira Jardim, and Hotel da Lapa). See some group portraits of Portuguese painted by foreigners. For example, D. Pedro de Sousa Holstein, 1st Duke of Palmela, and his Family by Ferdinand Krumholz (1810–78), ca. 1847, in a private collection. During a stay in Portugal between 1844 and 1847, at the invitation of the kings D. Maria II and his consort D. Fernando II, the Austrian portraitist painted kings and dukes, and the Duke of Palmela. This life-size scene takes place in the music room of the residence of the Dukes of Palmela—the eminent diplomat (leaning against the piano) and his wife, D. Eugénia Francisca Teles da Gama (the first figure on the left)—who are listening to their third daughter, D. Teresa Maria da Conceição de Sousa Holstein (1823–85), Countess of Alcáçovas by marriage to D. Caetano de Sales, playing the piano (Urbano, 2008; França, 2010: 63–64). See the image in Gómez (2019) Historia de dos pintoras: Sofonisba Anguissola e Lavinia Fontana. Museo del Prado, Madrid: 42. Married in April of 1813 with the industrialist and merchant João Baptista Ângelo da Costa (1781–1830), this is a double portrait.
92
[10]
[11]
[12] [13]
[14]
S. Duarte
The presence of lyre is ordinary between poets (composer of poems). See, for example, the engraving portrait of poet and dramaturge José Maria da Costa e Silva (1788–1854) from an original by Maurício José do Carmo Sendim, in 1832, in the collection of Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal. There are more allegories painted in Portugal. See, for example, the cryptoportrait and Music Allegory by Vieira Portuense, in the collection of Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga. ANTT, Registo Geral de Mercês de D. Maria I, liv.9 (2), f. 34 [12.05.1780]; Castelo Branco (1982) Obras completes. Vol. 14. Livraria Lello, Porto: 676. In the same museum there are five preparatory drawings for that painting. Other paintings show us the importance and recurrence of the piano in female education in the beginning of the twentieth century. See, for example, The Letter, a painting sold by Sotheby’s (New York) in June 2008, signed by Portuguese painter Sousa Pinto. Sometimes children play a musical instrument made of garbage to scare the sparrows in the fields. See the crypto-portrait Scaring sparrows by José Malhoa, 1904, in a private collection (Henriques, 2004: 73–74).
Acknowledgements Thanks to ARTIS, FCT, Cabral Moncada Leilões, Palácio do Correio Velho, Veritas Art Auctioneers, Museu Nacional de Arte Contemporânea – Museu do Chiado, Museu Nacional da Música, Casa-Museu Anselmo Braamcamp Freire, Casa dos Patudos – Museu de Aliparça, Manuel Pedro Ferreira and Florence Gétreau.
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Holanda, F. (1984 [1549]). Do Tirar polo Natural. Livros Horizonte. Lapa, P. (2007). Columbano Bordalo Pinheiro (1874–1900). Museu do Chiado. Lapa, P. (1994). Museu do Chiado: Arte Portuguesa (1850–1950). Museu do Chiado. Macedo, D. (1952). Columbano (pp. 64–66). ARTis. Mercês, F.A. (Ed.) O Ocidente: revista ilustrada de Portugal e do estrangeiro. Nr. 530, 11 de Setembro de 1893. Pereira, S. (Org.). (2017). Outros Fados - Imagens Musicais. Museu do Fado. Saldanha, N. (2012). José Malhoa—1855–1933: Catálogo Raisonné. SCRIBE. Saldanha, N. (2001). José Malhoa – Na colecção de José Relvas. Casa-Museu dos Patudos. Santos, D. G. (2004). Obras de Carlos Reis no Museu Municipal de Torres Novas Testemunhos da permanência de um gosto. Revista Da Faculdade De Letras Da Universidade Do Porto, Porto, i, Série, III, 317–338. Santos, R. A. & Tavares, C. A. (1999). Veloso Salgado: 1864–1945. Lisboa: Instituto Português de Museus. Silva, R. H. (Org.). (1993). Silva Porto (1850–1893). Exposição comemorativa do centenária da sua morte. Museu Nacional de Soares dos Reis. Sousa, G. V. (2006). A joalharia em Portugal 1750–1825. Civilização Editora. Sousa, G. V. (2008). Jóias, retratos e a iconografia das elites portuguesas de Oitocentos. Revista De História Da Arte, 5, 259–271. Telles, P. (2015). Retrato entre baionetas (Vol. 1). Universidade de Évora. Urbano, P. (2008). A Casa Palmela. Livros Horizonte.
Amália Rodrigues in 2020—Mapping Some Ingenuously Improbable Portraits of the Fado Diva Luzia Aurora Rocha
Abstract How have female musicians been represented in art through history? Which media have been favoured for these representations? These two questions are currently of pivotal interest to researchers in the field of musical iconography. Little attention has however been paid to more unusual representations (including the ingenuously improbable), such as those that are irreverent in terms of medium or style. Often ignored by the academic community because they are perceived as ‘lesser’ art-forms, these representations can enjoy enormous popularity and wide, even mass, exposure. Amália Rodrigues (1920–1999) was an artist who was the subject of this kind of representation. In the centenary year of her birth, this article aims to map some improbable representations of the fado singer during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, and to analyse their iconography and iconology. Sugar packets, street walls and metro stations all exhibit Amália and seek to express her essence, her emotion and her song.
1 Musical Iconography and the Art of Representing Female Musicians Iconography is a field of study which explores themes represented in the visual arts and their significance. It considers a vast number of themes relating to music, and these have expanded considerably as the academic discipline has evolved from the end of the nineteenth century to the present day. Musical iconography has devoted attention to the representation of musicians; professional and amateur, male and This work is funded by national funding through the FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P., under the ‘Norma Transitória’ [DL 57/2016/CP1453/CT0086]. The review was undertaken with the support of CESEM – Centro de Estudos de Sociologia e Est´etica Musical at the University NOVA FCSH, UID/EAT/00693/2020, with the financial support of FCT through national funds. L. A. Rocha (B) CESEM/NOVA FCSH, Lisbon, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_5
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female, classical and popular. What has changed over time has been the viewpoint of the researcher, who now no longer only considers works judged to have status in the canons of art history, but also gives equal attention to artistic creations that are more informal and improbable, whether in medium or style, and investigates them using artistic criteria. Women have had roles in art as muses, patrons, collectors, fans and interpreters. In music they can be instrumentalists, composers or singers. For centuries, they have struggled to claim a legitimate place as artists viewed on the same level as their male counterparts. This difficulty has lessened with time, but the discrepancies, whether in the quantity of work they are able to produce, the remuneration they receive or the artistic prestige they are afforded, unfortunately continue to exist. A key aspect of the art of representing musicians is the single representation in portrait form. Florence Gétreau notes: L’un des thèmes de l’iconographie musicale est bien sûr la représentation du musicien, qu’il soit instrumentiste, mais aussi chanteur, voire danseur s’accompagnant d’un instrument. Beaucoup d’effigies de musiciens ont été commandées pour un usage familial et de société (le portrait en musicien étant plus vivant que le portrait sans accessoire) ou dans un but de représentation (le grand interprète, le prince, le mécène aiment se montrer avec l’emblème de leur art). Selon les époques et les pays, le portrait connaît des variantes nombreuses dont on peut tracer une sorte de typologie (portrait intime, portrait d’apparat, portrait officiel etc.). Celle des musiciens s’inscrit bien sûr dans cette histoire largement codifiée. (…) Les portraits de musiciens identifies peuvent représenter aussi bien des musiciens amateurs que des professionnels de grande renommée (Gétreau, 2009: 21).
Portraits were painted of women to preserve their image for posterity in a way that emphasised their personal and artistic legacy. Images of female musicians can be seen in pre-historic and ancient civilisations: examples include the three women on the Tomb of Nakht in Thebes in ancient Egypt and representations of the poetess Sappho on vases from Vari in ancient Greece.1 The number of representations since then makes selection difficult. For this study, the self-portrait by Marietta Robusti2 (La Tintoretta) will be considered first, as an example of an image of an amateur female musician. An apprentice in the painting workshop of her father, who was known as Tintoretto, Marietta Robusti gained access to a male artistic world at a time when convention allowed women to learn to paint but relegated their works to the private, domestic sphere. Though she was recognised for her skill at portraiture, and painting was her primary occupation, Marietta represented herself as an instrumentalist, with a madrigal and a musical score in her hand, emphasising the importance of music to her education and life. Music, which she practised as an amateur, was the activity La Tintoretta chose to reference in her immortalisation of herself (Fig. 1).
1
Such as the example dated c. 440–430 BC in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens, no. 1260. 2 Marietta Robusti (1554–1590), an Italian painter of the late Renaissance, also an instrumentalist and singer, was the daughter of the Venetian painter Jacopo Robusti, known as Tintoretto.
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Fig. 1 Marietta Robusti (La Tintoretta), Self-portrait with madrigal, ca. 1580, oil on canvas, Uffizi Gallery, public domain (https://fr.wikipedia. org/wiki/Femme_artiste#/ media/Fichier:Autoritratto_ dela_tintoretta_alla_spinetta. jpg)
Exemplifying the internationally-acclaimed professional female musician we have a portrait of Luisa Todi.3 According to Cristina Fernandes, Todi was ‘the most famous Portuguese singer in the history of music and the protagonist of an impressive international career that led her to perform on the principal European stages and at the royal courts of France, Prussia, Russia and Spain.’ She rivalled ‘other singing stars (like the ‘castrato’ Luigi Marchesi)’ (Fernandes, 2010). Painted in 1785 by a woman, Élizabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun (1755–1842), this portrait represents Luisa Todi during the mature phase of her career. She wears a crown of laurels and is playing a stylised lyre. In thus representing her as Apollo, the god who teaches the Art of Music and trains the muses, Vigée Le Brun elevates Luisa Todi to the ranks of the gods and of artistic immortality. The portrait is a simple but elegant, refined and expressive representation (Fig. 2). 3
The daughter of Ana Joaquina de Almeida and music teacher Manuel José de Aguiar, she was born in Setúbal on 9 January 1753 and died in Lisbon on 1 October 1833. She was baptised Luísa Rosa de Aguiar. She married the Neapolitan Francesco Saverio Todi on July 1769. During the first phase of her artistic journey she worked in spoken word theatre, before taking a musical direction as a mezzosoprano. In Portugal she performed in theatres including Teatro do Bairro Alto (Lisbon), Teatro do Corpo da Guarda (Oporto), Teatro da Rua dos Condes (Lisbon) and Real Casa Pia (Lisbon). The Todis left Portugal in1777, and for the next 22 years Luísa built a major international career, preforming in private recitals and public concerts in various cities, including London (King’s Theatre), Paris (Concerts Spirituels), Vienna and other Austrian cities, Berlin and other German cities, St. Petersburg and Moscow (in the service of Catherine the Great), Madrid and Naples (Teatro di San Carlo). Source: http://cvc.instituto-camoes.pt/pessoas/luisa-todi.html#.X48 ICEJKiqA [Accessed 21 October 2020].
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Fig. 2 Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun, Luísa Todi, oil on canvas, Museu da Música, Lisbon, Portugal, public domain (https://pt.wik ipedia.org/wiki/Lu%C3% ADsa_Todi#/media/Fic heiro:Madame_Lebrun_-_ Lu%C3%ADsa_Todi.png)
An example of an imaginative portrait is that of Maria Severa Onofriana (1820– 1846), part of a mural4 called ‘Fado Vadio’.5 Embraced by an anonymous male 4
This mural contains numerous references to the musical genre of fado as well as to symbols characteristic of Lisbon and Portuguese tradition, particularly those native to that particular area of the city. Painted in February 2012 on the walls of an old building (EPUL) owned by the Lisbon municipal council, it was the result of an interesting co-operative process that united a residents’ association, which secured sponsorship from the paint company CIN, the local authority of the area (who donated the spray paints) and the artists, who created it in 24 consecutive hours. See Rocha, Luzia Aurora and Beatriz Carvalho, ‘Arte urbana e iconografia musical…’ [urban art and musical iconography], pp.145 and 149. 5 Fado, the genre of music depicted in the mural, is defined by Rui Vieira Nery in the Encyclopedia of Twentieth Century Music in Portugal as ‘a style of popular urban song which evolved in Lisbon from the second third of the nineteenth century. During the 1890s it developed alongside the Coimbra songs, but in the transition to the twentieth century the two traditions display distinct aesthetic and contextual characteristics and in the course of the two decades that followed they become completely independent’ (Nery 2010, 433). On the origins of fado, Vieira Nery also says ‘The first instances of the use of the word ‘fado’ applied explicitly to a musical phenomenon appear in descriptions by foreign travellers and essayists in the first decades of the nineteenth century (Balbi, Freycinet, Pohl, Schlichthorst, Weech) and refer to a dance with black singers which developed in colonial Brazil, danced by couples in a popular rural context, involving occasional physical contact between the dancers, and similar to other Afro-Brazilian dances of the late eighteenth century, in particular the lundum (…). Fado, therefore, with its associations and original context belonging to slaves and freed slaves, became connected with the lowest social strata of the urban proletariat, and emerged initially in Lisbon’s poorest neighbourhoods (…). (Nery 2010, 434).
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singer depicted in black and white, the youthful Maria Severa is semi-clad (or seminaked), with the body of a voluptuous mermaid, and stands out in bright red, pink and yellow. She has long, thick black hair, wears fishnet stockings (showing a tattoo on her thigh) and high heels, and holds a cigarette in her mouth and a wine glass in her hand. Beside her is a plate with a sardine on it (the symbol of Lisbon and its June street festival), which here assumes a phallic form, in an illusion to her loves, her lovers and her beauty6 (Fig. 3).
2 Amália Rodrigues and her Ingenuously Improbable Portraits Discussion of Maria Severa Onofriana leads us on to her most famous successor, Amália Rodrigues.7 Despite the many differences between them, both women are giants in the history of fado. Amália Rodrigues was born in the summer of 1920 and died on 6 October 1999. This girl of humble origins grew into a beautiful, elegant woman and an artist of genius, a universally-recognised diva, icon, symbol 6
Maria Severa Onofriana was born on 26 July 1820 on Rua da Madragoa (now Rua Vicente Borga nº33), where her mother owned a bar. She was the daughter of Severo Manuel de Sousa of S. Nicolau in Santarém and Ana Gertrudes of Portalegre. Severa died very young: the register of deaths listed her death on 30 November 1846 at Rua do Capelão, apopleptic and without sacrament, 26 years old and single. Miguel Queriol, in an article published in the newspaper ‘O Popular’, makes the following comments about her: ‘If I remember rightly, she was a slender, elegant girl, with a dark mane of hair, and an air of resourcefulness about her, yet without overstepping the privilege afforded by her status with regard to those who favoured her. She dressed cleanly and correctly, rising above the disgrace of the class to which poverty rather than vice had constrained her, and by her modesty showed herself to be ill-suited to the social milieu in which she found herself.’ Maria Severa Onofriana, known as ‘Severa’, became an icon amongst the first fado singers in the Lisbon neighbourhood of Mouraria through her loves and the fados she sang, played and danced. Her popularity stemmed largely from her amorous relation with the Count of Vimioso, D. Francisco de Paula Portugal e Castro, which made her a renowned figure and gave her access to greater prestige and opportunities to perform before a young public drawn from the Portuguese social and intellectual elite. In Mouraria, on the Rua do Capelão, is the Largo da Severa, where the singer’s former house bears a sign reading ‘Casa da Severa’. On the pavement is the design of a guitar created in Portuguese cobble stones. The house has a plaque which says ‘In this house lived Maria Severa Onofriana, considered at the time the sublime expression of fado, who died on 30/11/1846 at 26 years of age/Lisbon 3/6/89’. The plaque was unveiled by Amália Rodrigues, at the same time as that dedicated to Fernando Maurício. Source: Museu do Fado: URL: https://www. museudofado.pt/index.php/fado/personalidade/severa [Accessed 22 October 2020]. 7 Many writers have explored links between Maria Severa and Amália Rodrigues. Cristina Rodrigues, depicting Amália as ‘Severa Reincarnated’, writes: “(…) Villaret said one day to Amália that he saw in her the chrysalis of Severa. The prophecy came true when, having rejected through fear an invitation from Amélia Rey Colaço to play the lead in a National Theatre production of A Severa, the drama by Júlio Dantas first performed in 1901, Amália later accepted the challenge when persuaded by the entrepreneur Vasco Morgado Santos Carvalho, the director of the piece. Amália was acclaimed by the crowds who saw the performances between March and May 1955. The cast also included the young Paulo Renato, Ruy de Carvalho and Armando Cortez (…).” (Vieira, 2008: 78).
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Fig. 3 Colectivo de artistas (Nuno Saraiva, Hugo Makarov, Mário Belém, Pedro Soares Neves, UAT and Vanessa Teodoro. Nuno Saraiva is an ilustrator. Hugo Makarov is a tattoo artist who occasionally works in urban art. Mário Belém is a graphic designer trained at the Lisbon art school Ar.Co, who worked for various companies before going freelance. Pedro Soares Neves is an urban designer with a multidisciplinary academic background and a postgraduate degree in architecture. He specialises in participatory methodologies and informal pictorial appropriation and spontaneity in public spaces. UAT stands for União Artistas do Trancão. Vanessa Teodoro is a graphic designer), Maria Severa, mural painting, Escadinhas de S. Cristóvão, Lisbon, Portugal, © Luzia Aurora Rocha
and myth. Artists in various genres have created works from her image. In terms of musical iconography, the name ‘Amália’ immediately evokes a rich and unique repository of imagery in various media. Some of the portraits of Amália Rodrigues are significant works of art history, often studied by academics. These include the superb oil paintings by Pedro Leitão8 (1946, the first official portrait), Eduardo Malta9 8
Pedro Leitão (1922–2009) was born in Lisbon, where he had a workshop and house in the neighbourhood of Lapa. He was a celebrated portraitist. He had a strong connection with Brazil, specifically Rio de Janeiro. 9 Eduardo Malta (1900–1967) was Portuguese painter and illustrator well-known for his portraits. He painted personalities including Teixeira de Pascoaes, Aquilino Ribeiro, Augusto de Castro, Juan Belmonte, Manuel dos Santos, Amália Rodrigues, Oliveira Salazar, Cardeal Cerejeira and Getúlio Vargas. He was a controversial director of the Museu Nacional de Arte Contemporânea (1959–1967)
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(1949), Maluda10 (1966), Jacinto Luís11 (1982) and Enric Ribó.12 This study will explore other examples, notable for their use of the innovative and unexpected, in order to map the improbable and ingenious in the history of representations of Amália Rodrigues. In 2009,13 Tugaland Multimedia Editions, in association with the Fado Museum, the Amália Rodrigues Foundation, the newspaper Público and the Berardo Collection Museum,14 produced a collection that showed Amália in the period from 1945 to 1961, before her decisive artistic encounter with Alain Oulman. The set of twelve books and accompanying CDs, published by Público, was arranged in twelve themes, considered to have guided Amália’s musical and poetic choices: passion, jealousy, abandonment, nostalgia, fate, tradition, stages, chords, grace, the world, Lisbon and regrets. The texts were written by Rui Vieira Nery and Vasco Graça Moura.15 The collection encompasses three quarters of the fado diva’s discography, with 135 songs recorded between 1945 and 1959. The first example of art representing Amália to be analysed here was created as a companion piece to this collection. It is entitled ‘Amália Nossa’ [Our Amália], and consists of a series of twelve designs which were printed on packets of sugar.16 The originality of the work resides not so much in the portraits themselves, which use the same iconography as the covers of the book and CD collection, but in the chosen medium of sugar packets. According to the AICC,17 80% of Portuguese people consume coffee daily, preferring it in the form of espresso. The association also reports that while in the rest of Europe only 20% of coffee consumption occurs outside the home, in Portugal the tendency is reversed, because of his open opposition to modernist art. On 31 May 1958 he was decorated as an official of the Military Order of Santiago d’Espada. 10 Maria de Lourdes Ribeiro (1934–1999), known as Maluda, was born in the state of Pangim in Goa, then a Portuguese colony. From 1948 she lived in Lourenço Marques (now Maputo), where she began to paint. Together with four other painters, she formed a group called ‘The Independents.’ She received a grant from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, an institution in which she would later exhibit. She was awarded the Bordalo Pinheiro Prize and was thanked by the Portuguese president Jorge Sampaio through a Grande-Oficial of the Order of Infante D. Henrique. 11 Jacinto Luís was born in 1954 and moved to Paris in 1964. He produced his first drawings and paintings in 1969. From 1971 to 1975 he received grants from the Italian government to attend the Academia das Artes in Rome. He received a grant from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in Paris in 1982–1983. He exhibited in Portugal, France, the USA, Columbia, Belgium, Sweden and Spain. He is represented in various public and private collections. 12 Catalan artist. 13 Year which marked the tenth anniversary of the death of Amália Rodrigues. 14 This was the context for the temporary exhibition Amália. Coração Independente [Amália, Independent Spirit], which ran from 06/10/2009 to 31/01/2010, a partnership between the Berardo Collection Museum, the EDP Foundation, the Amália Rodrigues Foundation, the National Theatre Museum and Valentim de Carvalho. A catalogue was published with the same title. 15 Rui Vieira Nery contextualises the work of the singer in her time and produces a track by track listening guide for the CDs, while Vasco Graça Moura offers a formal analysis of the musical repertoire. 16 Packed by Tate & Lyle and distributed by Delta Cafés. 17 The AICC, Associação Industrial e Comercial do Café [Industrial and Commercial Coffee Association] is an association of coffee roasters: http://aicc.pt/projecto/ [Accessed 24 October 2020].
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with 80% of people consuming it in public spaces. The public reach of these images on their unexpected medium was therefore one that few artworks in Portugal achieve (Fig. 4).
Fig. 4 Artists’ Collective (‘Passion’ illustrated by Pedro Brito; ‘jealousy’ illustrated by Inês Casais; ‘abandonment’ illustrated by Jimi; ‘nostalgia’ illustrated by João Moreno; ‘fate’ illustrated by Daniel Lima; ‘tradition’ illustrated by Fernando Martins; ‘stages’ illustrated by João Fazenda; ‘chords’ illustrated by André Carrilho; ‘grace’ illustrated by Maria João Worm; ‘world’ illustrated by Nuno Saraiva; ‘Lisbon’ illustrated by Vasco Gargalo; ‘live’ illustrated by Patrícia Romão), Amália Nossa, sugar packets, 1999, Delta Cafés/Público
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The collection shows portraits of Amália created in the style of each individual artist, but based on older iconography. In ‘World’ by Nuno Saraiva,18 Amália is shown in a costume she wore in Rio de Janeiro for the performance that was her first great success in Brazil, Numa Aldeia Portuguesa [In a Portuguese Village] (1944).19 Saraiva’s image is a tracing of that which appeared on the cover of the publication Vida Mundial Ilustrada in 1945.20 It is interesting to note that although often represented with a Portuguese guitar, Amália did not play any musical instrument (Figs. 5 and 6). The illustration by Pedro Brito for the theme of ‘passion’ is a re-interpretation of the photograph by Augusto Cabrita (1923–1993) that was used as the cover for the LP ‘Fado Português’ in 1965 (Figs. 7 and 8). ‘Abandonment’, illustrated by Jimi, is based on a photograph of Amália which appeared on the cover of the magazine Eva in April 1950 (Figs. 9 and 10). Some details of the images as they appeared on the covers of the CDs and books were lost in the transition to the rectangular format of the sugar packet. In the illustration by André Carrilho for ‘chords’, some meaning is lost because the Portuguese guitar is no longer visible on the left hand side. ‘Abandonment’ by Jimi, instead of a red and green background, has only green, meaning the symbolism of using the main colours of the Portuguese flag is lost. The illustration for ‘tradition’ by Fernando Martins loses several significant elements: the boat, the swallows, the bulls, the pitchfork, the pair of folkloric dancers, the street fish seller and the Portuguese guitar. All are symbols that connect Amália with an image of ‘Portugalidade’ [‘Portugality’, the nationalistic concept created by the ‘Estado Novo’ regime].21 The sugar packet series also departs from the book and CD covers by giving the illustration for ‘regrets’ by Patrícia Romão the alternative title of ‘live’. Another portrait of Amália Rodrigues appears outside nº1 Travessa das Torres, in Funchal on the island of Madeira. The work by Gabriel Motta (2011), a fado singer and urban artist, is part of the ‘Projecto Arte Portas Abertas’22 [Open Doors Art Project], and is an example of contemporary urban art taking its inspiration from the 18
Nuno Saraiva (1969-) is an illustrator, cartoonist, graphic novelist and Portuguese teacher. He currently works freelance for the newspapers Público and Expresso and on a voluntary basis for the community magazine Rosa Maria – o jornal da Mouraria. 19 According to the information on the web page of the Amália Rodrigues Foundation, in 1944 Amália performed for four months at the Copacabana Casino in the play ‘Numa Aldeia Portuguesa’, created especially for her. Her biography refers to the performances as ‘such a great success that she went on to return often to the country.’ URL: https://amaliarodrigues.pt/amalia/amalia-no-tea tro/ [Accessed 24 October 2020]. 20 Vida Mundial Ilustrada, Lisbon, nº238, 6 December 1945. ‘Amália Rodrigues in Brazil’ (cover) / News about Amália! The fado star triumphs in Brazil.’ Source: Amália Rodrigues: a vida é um longo adeus [Amália Rodrigues: life is a long goodbye], blog by Jorge Muchagato for Centenário [2020]. URL: https://amaliarodriguescentenario.wordpress.com/2018/07/26/rio-de-janeiro-1945amalia-aquela-rapariga-nervosa-como-um-vime-que-nao-nasceu-para-o-fado-porque-foi-o-fadoque-nasceu-para-ela/ [Accessed 24 October 2020]. 21 On the subject of ‘Portugality’ see Luzia Rocha and Beatriz Carvalho (2020), p. 142. 22 This is a project to open the doors of the city of Funchal to art and culture. These are real, not virtual doorways, forgotten, abandoned or ruined, that have been given a new life. The interventions
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Fig. 5 Comparison between the illustration by Nuno Saraiva and the cover of the publication Vida Mundial Ilustrada, © Jorge Muchagato
fado diva. Amália is depicted with her eyes closed. She is drawn in black, with a white face that illuminates the portrait and a white background framing her. The only other colours are the bright red of her lips (the singer often wore bright lipstick) and the gold of her earrings and the Portuguese guitar that appears in front of her. Part of the building’s structure—the door jamb and lintel—forms a frame for this street portrait (Fig. 11). At the Lisbon airport metro station,23 the cartoonist António Antunes has used humour to create a unique gallery of portraits. He represents 53 personalities, in 52 images,24 using laser-cut stone: black and white marble encrusted in Lisbon limestone. The artist told the newspaper Público that the caricatures of Carlos Paredes, Vieira da Silva and Amália Rodrigues were the most difficult to create, because he include visual arts of all sorts including painting, sculpture, photography and video, as well as writing and music. URL: https://www.arteportasabertas.com/pt/-info.html [Accessed 24 October 2020]. 23 Inaugurated on 17 July 2012. 24 Including Gago Coutinho and Sacadura Cabral (who appear together), Fernando Pessoa, Amália Rodrigues, Eusébio, Carlos Lopes, Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso, Sá Carneiro, Paula Rego, Mário Cesariny, Duarte Pacheco, Carlos Paredes, Raul Solnado, David Mourão-Ferreira, Sophia de Mello Breyner, Maria João Pires, Zé Povinho and Vergílio Ferreira.
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Fig. 6 Comparison between the illustration by Nuno Saraiva and the cover of the publication Vida Mundial Ilustrada, © Jorge Muchagato
had to ‘find a route that was not already too well-travelled.’25 Antunes’ caricatured portrait of Amália is unique in terms of medium, location and the way the diva is represented. The artistic work, in black and white, emphasises physical aspects of the singer’s femininity (hair, lips, hands, elegant figure) as well as her artistry (the exquisite gowns that she always wore on stage). The cartoon-style treatment produces an exaggeratedly pointed nose and a theatrical pose, eyes closed and head tilted upwards. Another interesting aspect of this caricature is that it shows Amália during the final phase of her career, at a more advanced age, around the time when she performed at the Lisbon Coliseum for the European Capital of Culture in 1994 (Figs. 12 and 13). In discussing the genre of caricature, it would be impossible not to mention Bordallo Pinheiro.26 His collection of figurines of Portuguese and international 25
Interview by Romana Borja-Santos. URL: https://www.publico.pt/2012/07/16/local/noticia/fer nando-pessoa-amalia-e-eusebio-presentes-na-estacao-de-metro-do-aeroporto-1555188 [Accessed 25 October 2020]. 26 The Fábrica de Faianças das Caldas was founded on 30 June 1884 by Raphael Bordallo Pinheiro (1846–1905) and his brother Feliciano. Raphael is one of the most important personalities in nineteenth century Portuguese culture. He brought to caricature and artistic ceramics a quality and popularity they had never enjoyed before. His work as a ceramicist earned him gold medals at international exhibitions (Madrid, Antwerp, Paris and St. Louis in the USA) for pieces of enormous technical virtuosity, artistic quality and creativity. He produced items including tiles, panels,
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Fig. 7 Comparison between the illustration by Pedro Brito and the cover of the LP ‘Fado Português’ (Image taken from Joaquim Viera (2008), ‘Fotobiografias do Século XX: Amália Rodrigues’ [‘Twentieth Century Photo Biographies; Amália Rodrigues’], p. 120.)
Fig. 8 Comparison between the illustration by Pedro Brito and the cover of the LP ‘Fado Português’ (Image taken from Joaquim Viera (2008), ‘Fotobiografias do Século XX: Amália Rodrigues’ [‘Twentieth Century Photo Biographies; Amália Rodrigues’], p. 120.)
pots, table centrepieces, Toby jugs, washbasins, plates, perfume bottles, pitchers, vases and giant animals. He created characters including ‘Zé Povinho’, ‘Maria da Paciência’, the Maid of Caldas, the policeman, the priest taking snuff and the sacristy with an incense burner in his hands. He exhibited in Brazil, in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, where he presented his majestic Beethoven vase.
Amália Rodrigues in 2020—Mapping Some Ingenuously … Fig. 9 Comparison between the illustration by Jimi and the cover of the magazine Eva in April 1950 (Image taken from Joaquim Viera (2008), ‘Fotobiografias do Século XX: Amália Rodrigues’ [‘Twentieth Century Photo Biographies; Amália Rodrigues’], p. 85.)
Fig. 10 Comparison between the illustration by Jimi and the cover of the magazine Eva in April 1950 (Image taken from Joaquim Viera (2008), ‘Fotobiografias do Século XX: Amália Rodrigues’ [‘Twentieth Century Photo Biographies; Amália Rodrigues’], p. 85.)
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Fig. 11 The three phases of painting of the portrait of Amália Rodrigues, Gabriel Motta (Taken from: https://www.arteportasabertas.com/pt/artistas/199-gabriel-motta-tdt1.html) Fig. 12 António Antunes, Retrato de Amália Rodrigues na estação de metro Aeroporto, [Portrait of Amália Rodrigues at the Lisbon airport metro station] Lisboa, © Luzia Rocha
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Fig. 13 Photograph of Amália Rodrigues at the Coliseum in 1994 (Image taken from Vieira, 2008, p. 188.)
personalities, ‘Os Figurões’, includes a representation of Amália. Dressed in black with a silver shawl around her shoulders, she is depicted in the act of singing, with eyes closed and an expression of emotional anguish on her face. The real originality of the representation is Amália’s guitar: the instrument has the peg box of a Portuguese guitar but its body is a red heart, perhaps Amália’s own heart broken free from her chest. The piece recalls the lyrics of the fado song Gaivota,27 made famous by Amália: (…) what perfect heart, which beats in my breast (…)’. As Bordallo Pinheiro company says, the listener to Amália is listening to a voice from the heart (Fig. 14): If our country had a name it would be Amália. Never, before or after her, has anyone expressed our sorrows (and some of our joys too) so perfectly. If fado is Portugal’s soul, Amália is her flag. No pantheon could be big enough to hold her genius and her mystery: to give her rightful homage, a new one should be constructed for her alone, out of all of the windows in Lisbon, gazing on the Tagus. We, along with all her admirers from other nations, when listening to Amália, are listening to the voice of the heart.28
27
Lyrics by Alexandre O’Neill, music by Alain Oulman. Source: Bordallo Pinheiro. URL: https://pt.bordallopinheiro.com/figur%C3%A3o-am%C3% A1lia-rodrigues [Accessed 29 October 2020]. 28
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Fig. 14 Amália Rodrigues from the collection ‘Os Figurões’. © Bordallo Pinheiro Company (https:// pt.bordallopinheiro.com/ figur%C3%A3o-am%C3% A1lia-rodrigues [Accessed 29 October 2020])
The popular ceramic sardines are also made by the Bordallo Pinheiro company. The sardine went from being the meal of the poor to becoming the symbol of modern Lisbon and its traditional festivals, in particular the June street festival of Santo António. Rapahel Bordallo Pinheiro himself used to make them in a naturalistic style. Today, designers create them in a more abstract styles, like that of the ‘Amália’ sardine by Nuno Miguel Martins. A young Amália appears in black and white with arresting red lips and a troubled facial expression, that of ‘a very Portuguese way of feeling.’ The artist considers Amália as belonging as much to Portugal as the sardine does, but also to the whole world. The design includes text taken from the title of a fado song, ‘Nem às paredes confesso’ [I won’t confess, even to the walls] composed by Artur Ribeiro (1924–1982) and sung by various artists including Amália Rodrigues. A new design to appear this year is a sardine called ‘Amália Sempre’ [Amália Forever’] by Ana Gomes. It contrasts with Martins’ design by representing the singer in the act of singing and in the final phase of her career. Bright colours are chosen, including red for the singer’s lips, but not as bright as that used in Martins’ design, and a golden peg box for the Portuguese guitar. The peg box appears at the top of the image in the background, like a tiara crowning the singer on the centenary of her birth (Figs. 15 and 16). For the last ten years, a competition run by the EGAC29 has led to thousands of sardine designs being created by Portuguese and international artists. In this year of Amália’s centenary year, the competition’s honourable mentions included an Amália 29
EGEAC—Empresa de Gestão de Equipamentos e Animação Cultural, Câmara Municipal de Lisboa [Company for the Management of Cultural Materials and Events, Lisbon Municipal Authority].
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Fig. 15 Sardine – ‘Amália’ and sardine – ‘Amália Sempre’ (1920–2020). © Bordallo Pinheiro Company (https://pt.bordallopinheiro. com/am%C3%A1lia e [Accessed 29 October 2020])
sardine by the designer Ana Leite from Felgueiras. Amália is dressed in black and wears a melancholy expression. She is draped over a Portuguese guitar, playing it with thin, almost spectral fingers, while roses wind themselves around her. It is as if she is hearing the sound of the guitar as the sound of her own soul. Woman and guitar, representation of femininity and symbol of Portugal, are one (Fig. 17). An unusual and unexpected medium in which to represent Amália, very much in keeping with pandemic-focussed life in 2020, is the face mask. Obligatory in an ever-increasing number of settings, this protective measure against the COVID-19 virus has become as familiar an everyday object as a wallet or a set of house keys. A post on the social network Facebook advertises a face mask called ‘The Queen of Fado, Amália Rodrigues’. Decorated with an old photograph of the singer, which has been digitally inverted, the mask is sold by TeeChip, a printing service that allows members of the public to create and sell designs online (TeeChip Pro). The Amália Rodrigues mask continues to be advertised on Facebook but can no longer be found on TeeChip: it was removed because of copyright violation (Figs. 18 and 19).
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Fig. 16 Sardine – ‘Amália’ and sardine – ‘Amália Sempre’ (1920–2020). © Bordallo Pinheiro Company (https://pt.bordallopinheiro.com/am%C3%A1lia e [Accessed 29 October 2020])
Fig. 17 Ana Leite, Sardinha – O que nos (en)canta, [What we love/sing] EGEAC Competition 2020 (http://www.egeac.pt/sardinhas-vencedoras/ [Accessed 29 October 2020])
Amália Rodrigues in 2020—Mapping Some Ingenuously … Fig. 18 ‘The Queen of Fado’ face mask (Foto copyright, Luzia Rocha)
Fig. 19 Photograph of Amália Rodrigues (Image taken from Vieira, 2008, 83)
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3 Conclusion The representation of female musicians through history has followed the same course as that of their male counterparts, but with far fewer examples. This is a result of the numerous barriers to professional recognition experienced by women to this day. The artists’ choice of media corresponds to the aesthetics of their period, with oil painting still predominant. However new media and new methods of representation are being employed with more and more originality. This article has mapped a few of these. In numerous formats, including photography, painting (murals and oil painting), sculpture, illustration, cartooning and urban art, Portuguese and international artists have risen to the challenge of representing Amália in innovative ways. The fado singer has fed, and continues to feed, a great many imaginations. These ingenuously improbable images allow us to ‘hear’ her voice; to see her is to hear her. Amália has been described as expressing the Portuguese people as a whole, and as the female heteronym of Portugal (Viera 2008: 9). In the celebrations for the centenary of her birth, (re)viewing images of Amália makes her feel ever more present. Presenting new readings of her representations enables us to understand her better and shows that she still has plenty to say. Past and present become routes towards the future, with musical iconography the compass that allows us to trace new paths through our studies of the diva of fado.
Bibliography Almeida, M. J., Luísa Todi. Centro de Estudos de Teatro, s.d. http://cvc.instituto-camoes.pt/pessoas/ luisa-todi.html#.X48ICEJKiqA Brito, M. C. (1989). Opera in Portugal in the eighteenth century. Cambridge University Press. Fernandes, C. (2010, November 11). Luísa Todi: a cantora de todos os séculos. Público, 11. https://www.publico.pt/2010/11/11/culturaipsilon/noticia/luisa-todi-a-cantora-de-todos-osseculos-269406 Gétreau, F. (2009). Voir la Musique – Les sujets musicaux dans les oeuvres d’art du XVI e au XX e siècle. Moreau, M. (1989). Cantores de Ópera Portugueses (Vol. I). Livraria Bertrand. Nery, R. (Coord. e notas). (1999). Amália Rodrigues – Amália Nossa: A Primeira Época de Ouro (Vol. 12). Tugaland – Público. Nery, R. (2010). Fado. In Enciclopédia da Música em Portugal no Século XX (Vol. 2, pp. 433–434). Círculo de Leitores. Panofsky, E. (1983). Meaning in the visual arts. University of Chicago Press. Pommier, E. (1998). Théories du portrait. Gallimard. Rocha, L. A. B. C. (2020). Arte urbana e iconografia musical: o caso das ruas de Lisboa. In A. Dias, L. Sousa, & L. Rocha (Eds.), Iconografia Musical – Temas Portugueses (pp. 139–150). CESEMNOVA FCSH. Available at: https://cesem.fcsh.unl.pt/en/2020/05/08/nova-edicao-do-nucleo-deiconografia-musical-do-cesem/ Salmen, W. G. (1982–1984). Musiker im Porträt (Vol. 5). C.H. Beck. Sebass, T. (1999–2000). Giorgiones und Tizians fantasie mit Musik. Bilder zum künstlerischen Lebensgefühl der Renaissance. Imago musicae XVI/XVII, 25–60.
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Sebass, T. (2001). Iconography. In S. Sadie (Ed.), The new grove dictionary of music and musicians (pp. 54–71). Macmillan University Press. Sebass, T. (2002). I cinque quadri della Venere con musicista di Tiziano. In F. Zannoni (Ed.) Il far musica, la scenografia, le feste. Scritti sull’iconografia musicale (pp. 21–33). Roma. Vieira, J. (Coord.). (2008). Fotobiografias Século XX: Amália Rodrigues. Temas e Debates. https://www.ebiografia.com/luis_fernando_verissimo/ https://expresso.pt/cultura/2015-08-02-Os-puzzles-do-Andre https://pontofinalmacau.wordpress.com/2015/03/16/sou-um-criador-de-imagens/ http://bloguedebd.blogspot.com/2019/11/ http://museudaimprensa.pt/index.php?go=noticias&paged=3&indexcat=7 https://blitz.pt/principal/update/2019-10-05-Celebrar-Amalia-20-anos-depois.-Dos-cartoons-acasa-de-ferias-do-Porto-ao-Funchal https://www.publico.pt/2020/06/01/p3/noticia/santos-populares-eis-sardinhas-escaparam-confin amento-1918909
Music and Sound Creation and Technology
MicroSonic Spaces: Towards an Autonomous Ecosystem of Virtual Sonic Agents Rui Dias
Abstract MicroSonic Spaces is an interactive audiovisual installation that explores the concept of the creation of live ecosystems of autonomous agents as a non-linear interactive sound and music composition system. This is an ongoing conceptual and artistic research project that evolves with each new presentation. This article introduces the concept and presents a report of the two initial versions of the installation, that were exhibited in Castelo Branco and Aveiro, Portugal, in 2016 and 2018. The base concepts for the original version will be presented, as well as the main developments in the second version.
1 Introduction MicroSonic Spaces is a generative and interactive audiovisual installation, based on the idea of a virtual ecosystem of autonomous agents that generate sound as they live, move and interact with other agents and with the user. Musically, the interactive installation format is explored as a dynamic meta-compositional system, combining conventional music concepts and sound generation parameters, with the non-linear nature of this format. This work was initially inspired by Marvin Minsky’s The Society of Mind (1985), and works by John McCormack (2001, 2003), Peter Beyls (2007), Mikhail Malt (2001), Eduardo R. Miranda (2002, 2003), and Arne Eigenfeldt (2009, 2011), among others. Some of my previous related work developed in this area include the installations “Little Life (talking)” presented at ESMAE, Porto in 2005, “Little Life (talking) b”, in ACERT-Tondela in 2007, and “Urban Algae Folly Extended” in GNRation, Braga, 2016.1 R. Dias (B) Escola Superior de Artes Aplicadas, Instituto Politécnico de Castelo Branco, Castelo Branco, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] 1
Further information about these projects can be found at http://ruidias.pt
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_6
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Computer-based artificial ecosystems incorporate knowledge from areas of study such as artificial intelligence, artificial life, interactive systems, algorithmic composition, computational creativity and musical metacreation (Pasquier, 2016). Such systems can adopt metaphors from the natural world, such as the concept of a life cycle, comprising birth, growth and death, as well as behaviors, individual traces and social interaction. When endowed with sound properties, the evolution of these ecosystems creates a collective dynamic soundscape which is dependent on the identities and behaviors of the individual agents, as well as their actions and interactions with the other agents and their environment. MicroSonic Spaces was initially developed in 2016 and presented in Castelo Branco, Portugal, in October the same year. Since its initial presentation, two subsequent versions were developed and exhibited in Aveiro and Braga, respectively in February and September 2018. This article introduces the main concepts and concerns in the creation of the installation, and presents the first and second versions, respectively in Castelo Branco and Aveiro. A third exhibition of the installation was created and exhibited at the “Noite Branca” 2018 art festival, in Braga (Portugal). This version introduced several new developments, including genetic algorithms, to explore notions of heredity, mating, and selection, to foster the autonomous development of new complex layers, and new sonic and musical possibilities. This version will be best described in a dedicated publication.
2 Concept The creation and development of MicroSonic Spaces were driven by three main underlying ideas that guided most of the decisions made throughout the process, leading to the current format. The first idea is the concept of an evolutionary artificial life ecosystem, constituted of autonomous agents or entities, which have a sonic identity, that create a dynamic sonic environment as they live, evolve and interact with the others and the environment. As mentioned above, artificial life ecosystems are computer systems inspired by natural life ecosystems, that to some extent can emulate the general notions and aspects of life and social behaviors, or can create their own reality, by defining their own set of rules and conditions. As there is no direct control over the individuals or the environment, a degree of unpredictability is expected and desirable, as the evolution of this type of system can potentially lead to very different outcomes. Depending on the functional, experimental or artistic context for which this type of system is created for, its properties have to be fine-tuned, by defining and setting the rules and conditions of all the elements of the system. In MicroSonic Spaces, the system comprises a planar, bi-dimensional virtual space where several artificial creature-like entities are born, live, move and die, while interacting with the others, and with the environment. This artificial life is associated with the creation of a sonic and musical environment, where all the “creatures” implement a set of sound-related parameters and rules that constitute their own
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unique sonic identity. The collective existence and evolution of all the individual entities in this virtual world, creates a sonic environment that evolves and develops over time. The second idea relates to the compositional approach to the non-linear installation format. Coming from the linear composition space of traditional acoustic, electronic and electroacoustic concert music, I’ve always regarded the non-linear character of the installation format as an exciting compositional challenge. Although we can find musical concepts and parameters that can be translated to the installation format, several common procedures regarding aspects like phrasing, form, motivic development or harmonic progression can become difficult challenges or may even be completely displaced and ineffective. In the particular case of this installation, this compositional approach can be especially challenging, as the autonomous and evolutionary nature of this ecosystem may be incompatible with the direct control over the sound and musical parameters. The choice of these parameters to be implemented, as well as the type of control over them need to be planned at a meta level, implemented as part of the individual traces of each species, and as part of the environment where they live. All the components of this living system have to be designed and planned in order to potentiate the emergence of sonically or musically rich results, as a part of the natural life of the system, and not imposed over it. I consider this to be a dynamic meta-compositional system, where all the sound and musical ideas have to be planned from a meta-level perspective. Rather than directly controlling the parameters, the sonic properties have to be embedded in the rule system that defines the behavior of each species and the environment, which then produce the sonic and music results as the system evolves. The third idea regards interactivity, exploring how such systems can accommodate external control or interference, to allow visitors to interact with the installation. Although the concept of an autonomous system doesn’t necessarily imply interactivity with external elements, it can contribute in a significant way to explore the dynamic properties of the system, both at the level of the social interaction and behavior of the agents, and at the sonic and musical level, exploring the installation as a dynamic music system. Also, I find very appealing to explore audience participation as a way to create a more immersive experience for the installation visitor. The quality and range of the interaction, however, has to cope with the artificial life of the ecosystem without being too disruptive. Rather than controlling the system in a parametric approach, the user interferes with the ecosystem, by interacting with the agents, altering or influencing some aspects of their behavior up to a certain level, but not such that could significantly unbalance the ecosystem. This is significant to the relation of the human to the system, which I find somewhat reminiscent of Joel Chadabe’s concept of “interactive composing” (Chadabe, 1984). These three main ideas were combined and managed in a way to potentiate the emergence of an interesting and coherent work, as well as an interesting and engaging experience for the visitors. The creation of an interactive multimedia artwork is especially prone to be misguided by the superficial immediacy of attractive graphics or interactive device.
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An important consideration was also that the system has to exist regardless of user interaction. As mentioned, the interaction influences the ecosystem, but it evolves and generates life and sound even if there are no visitors. Also, the interactive installation format has its own requirements and idiosyncrasies, significantly different from the isolated components like the graphics or music. Since the early experiments of interactive computer systems, pioneer Myron Krueger (1977) referred to this issue, stating that “The visual responses should not be judged as art nor the sounds as music. The only aesthetic concern is the quality of the interaction”. Krueger goes on saying that “The beauty of the visual and aural response is secondary. Response is the medium!”. This idea, although may not apply to every type of context where an interactive system may be used, it certainly applies to the interactive artwork. The different components that constitute the installation should be planned in the way they best convey the main concepts of the installation, and potentiate the best experience for the visitor, complementing and contributing for the overall work.
3 Technology The installation comprises an interactive sound engine, interactive graphics and user input device. The interactive graphics system was developed in C++ using the OpenFrameworks2 toolkit and the sound generation and processing engine was developed in the MaxMSP3 graphical programming environment. The user interaction interface uses a Leap Motion4 infrared sensor. The image is projected onto a white screen using a video projector. The physical configuration of the installation is not binded to a single configuration. As will be described below, the two versions here described used different configurations, mainly by having the screen position in a frontal position, in the presentation of Castelo Branco, and in a horizontal, table-like position in Aveiro.
3.1 Graphics The graphics consist of a two-dimensional image, with the virtual space corresponding to the entire area of the projection. Each type of object is designed using simple geometric shapes, mostly circles and lines. The graphics are essentially intended as symbolic and representative of the ecosystem element’s states and behaviors, and not necessarily as graphical design objects.
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https://openframeworks.cc, accessed January 12nd, 2021. https://cycling74.com, accessed January 12nd, 2021. 4 https://www.ultraleap.com/product/leap-motion-controller, accessed March 3rd, 2021. 3
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3.2 Sound setup The sound system uses four independent audio channels and four speakers. In the original version, the purpose of the four speakers was to create two independent stereo sound images to create a separation between foreground and background sounds. The second version used the four speakers positioned around the installation area, corresponding to the four corners of the screen. This layout created an immersive bidimensional sonic plane, corresponding to the bidimensional position of the graphic elements in the image.
3.3 User Interaction The type and degree of control that the visitors should have in this installation was particularly challenging. As explained before, interaction should be effective in engaging the user, but not so much as to unbalance the ecosystem. Throughout the development of all the versions of the installation, several tests were made using different strategies and devices for user input, including a touchpad, a Kinect sensor, and an infrared flashlight. The Leap Motion sensor (Fig. 1) proved to be the best option regarding precision, control and stability, over the other options tested. This sensor is extremely effective and precise, providing the best solution for this installation. Its use is extremely simple and intuitive, and the response of the hand tracking algorithm is almost immediate. The tracking that was used for the installation was the three-dimensional position of one hand (the sensor can detect two hands). The use of the position to control parameters of the installation will be explained in each version below. Fig. 1 The leap motion sensor
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4 Sound Design The interactive sound system was devised in three different branches, that compose the whole sound and music design of the installation. The three branches are: (1) the sound of the autonomous life of all the creatures of the ecosystem; (2) the sound resulting from user interaction, and (3) the background sounds. This separation is due to significant differences in the way how the constituting elements of the installation behave.
4.1 Autonomous life The first relates to the sound of the autonomous ecosystem, comprising all the sounds originated from each individual entity as well as their activity and interactions within the system. Each type of entity has a set of sound properties, and each individual entity has its own settings. The sound of the entities as well as the sound of their actions were designed to be as sharp and clear as possible, in order to be clearly understood while the ecosystem evolves. The synthesis techniques used for this layer were frequency modulation (FM) synthesis, and granular synthesis.
4.2 Interaction The way the sound responds to user interaction is very important to the overall feel and engagement of the user. As with the physical properties and rules, the sound properties of each element in the system were planned to account for parameters to be triggered or affected by the user. The strategies and parameters for the two versions of the installation changed significantly. While in the first version, the sound parameters were affected in a global, statistic approach, in the second version, the sound resulting from the interaction relates directly to the sound properties of each individual creature that is being “touched”.
4.3 Background sound The background layer was planned as an independent element altogether. Although it was designed to complement and fit the sound design aesthetics of the ecosystem, it is actually not directly influenced by it. The reasons for this are both aesthetical and practical. As the sound of the entities had to be clear and prominent to clearly sonify their traces, evolution and interactions with the environment and with the users, the
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background sound needed to have an opposing character. Unlike the entities’ sounds, the background sound layer is mainly low pitched, diffused and continuous. The background sound also attends to a different, external function. This layer is important to present and define the installation space. I find very interesting and important to create a sonic presence that immerses the visitors as soon as they enter the installation space (and depending on the volume, maybe even before entering the space). This presence also immediately presents the character of the installation, in a way similar to how background music contributes to a given movie scene, or maybe even related to the function of the overture in an opera. Additionally, because all other sounds of the installation are dependent on the evolution of the ecosystem or the user interaction, both of which are somewhat unpredictable, it was important to have an independent layer that can provide a continuous and safe way to guarantee that the installation never gets completely silent.
5 Exhibitions This section presents the two initial versions of this installation, that correspond to two exhibitions, in Castelo Branco and Aveiro, in October 2016 and February 2018, respectively. Although both versions share a common concept and main elements, there are significant conceptual and technical differences that will be described in each corresponding section.
5.1 Castelo Branco MicroSonic Spaces was initially created for the first edition of the “Castelo de Artes” arts festival, from September to November 2016, , in Castelo Branco, in the village of S. Vicente da Beira.
5.1.1
Setup
The setup for this presentation included a vertical frontal projection, and a console with the leap motion sensor in a frontal position relative to the screen, where the visitors could interact with the installation (Fig. 2). The four speakers of the quadraphonic sound system were placed at ground level, as two stereo fronts in different depths. This setup was planned to create two different sound planes, separating the ecosystem’s “creatures” sound events, in the frontal plane close to the visitors, and a second plane, in the back of the room next to the screen, with the environment’s background sounds.
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Fig. 2 The setup used in the edition of Castelo Branco
5.1.2
Ecossystem
There are two species of virtual “creatures” who live in this ecosystem (Fig. 3). The more abundant ones, simply named “microbes”, are represented by small grey circles with different sizes. There are two types of microbes that have basically the same properties and behaviors, but interact differently with the second species. One type is represented by a filled circle, while the second type is represented by an empty, hollow circle. The microbes are mostly static, but they can move sporadically, according to a simple probabilistic mechanism that assigns a very small chance—around 1%—to move in a short burst in a random direction. The microbe’s grey color gets brighter,
Fig. 3 A frame of the ecosystem in the original version in Castelo Branco
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near white, when this movement occurs, and a short noisy burst of sound is triggered. Multiplied by hundreds, these sporadic individual movements and sounds create a subtle but constant, restless, collective life. The second species were named the “hoarders”, and can be seen in Fig. 3 as white concentric lines inside light grey circles. These creatures move in a straight line in a random direction, but their speed is dependent on the number of microbes they have nearby. The hoarders do not have a graphical representation. On their own, they are basically invisible. However, when they are close enough to a microbe, a white line appears, connecting them. The range that they can “see” a microbe is represented by the radius of the grey circle around them. By connecting to microbes, the radius of their visibility area widens, and their speed increases, moving faster as they are connected to more microbes. As the microbes do not wrap around the edges of the screen, the hoarders tend to slow down abruptly near the edges. There are always ten hoarders present in the ecossystem. However, sometimes they may not have any microbes nearby, so they seem to have disappeared.
5.1.3
Interaction
The interaction by the visitors with the installation is accomplished using the Leap Motion sensor. As mentioned before, the main concern with user interaction is that it should be effective, bur shouldn’t be too disruptive as to unbalance the ecosystem. The main strategy adopted for the interaction is that the user interferes with the environment but has no direct control over the parameters or rules. By waving one hand over the sensor, the user will influence the environment by energizing the microbes. The horizontal axis (x) and front-back (z) position of the hand correspond to the x and y coordinates on the screen, while the proximity to the sensor in the vertical axis (y) controls the amount of energy transmitted to the microbes. When energized, the microbes gain an orange color and gain speed, quickly moving faster in random directions, and thus away from the user. Although the user has no direct effect on the hoarders, they are affected by the movement of the microbes.
5.1.4
Sound
The two species have their own distinct sounds, as well as the background. The installation space was situated in a small building very near a church. The bells of this church played very often. As this might be somewhat disruptive, I decided to adapt the sound design concept to include that sound, so when the bell was playing, it sounded as a part of the installation. The sound of the church bell was recorded and used as a source for two custom-made granular synthesizers, that generated the sound for the background of the installation and for the sound of the microbes. The background sound is a constant drone-like sound that changes subtly according to the activity level of the users, so that the background gets more active when there is more activity from the user. The sound of the microbes is heard very
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softly while they move autonomously, but they get louder and brighter as they get energized by the user. This sound is the more responsive to the user interaction with the installation. The sound of the hoarders has a quite different character from the microbes. While the microbes are very noise-like sound, the hoarders’ sound is tuned and constant. Their sound engine uses a simple subtractive synthesis model, with a pulse wave and low-pass filter. Each of the ten hoarders is assigned a frequency which is in direct harmonic relation with the background drone fundamental tone. Their position in the stereo image corresponds to their position in the horizontal axis.
5.2 MicroSonic Spaces AV The second presentation of the installation took place at the “Teatro Aveirense”, between February 16th–25th 2018, in the city of Aveiro, Portugal. The work was commissioned for the electroacoustic music festival “Aveiro Síntese“, by Arte no Tempo, with the support of DGArtes and Aveiro City Hall. This version of the installation, entitled “MicroSonic Spaces AV”, had several developments since the original one.
5.2.1
Setup
A different setup was used, placing the image in a table-like horizontal position, with the projector hanging above the space, projecting the image downwards (Fig. 4).
Fig. 4 Setup in Aveiro
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Fig. 5 Visitors interacting with the installation in Aveiro. (Note: the image on the screen is not actually white. This is an illusion caused by the camera due to the high contrast between the screen and the darkened room.) With kind permission by Diana Ferreira
This setup allowed a greater proximity of the visitors around the image, and thus a greater engagement with the evolution of the system. The sensor was positioned in the middle position of one of the sides, and although only one person at a time could interact with the installation, the fact that the other visitors were very close, around the screen, permitted everyone to be more aware of the actions and reactions of the ecosystem’s elements (Fig. 5).
5.2.2
Ecossystem
The graphics suffered some overall aesthetic modifications that included blur effects using openGL shaders, to create a more diffuse and organic image, and to create a sense of depth, using different blur levels. The background became more active, by changing its color very slowly while affecting global parameters. The metaphor for this behavior could be that of the seasons of the ear, where the environment changes as a whole. This change affects the sound parameters of the environment, affecting the notes used by the creatures, as will be explained below. The microbes changed significantly, gathering traces from both the microbes and the hoarders of the previous version. Their color changed to black, but the major differences are in their behavior. In this version, the movement of the microbes is determined by their size, which in turn is dependent on the number of microbes nearby. This behavior creates a tendency for the creation of clusters, while the microbes gather. But as they reach a certain number of neighbors, they explode and die, forming
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Fig. 6 The ecosystem image of the installation in Aveiro
the yellow circles that can be seen in the lower region in Figure 6. These explosions play a new pitched sound and fade out slowly. A second type of object, the blue circles that can be seen above, are always visible and move freely throughout the environment. These creatures have no sound but are able to energize the microbes when they get very close, acting like destabilizers, so that the ecosystem is never static.
5.2.3
Interaction
The interaction using the leap motion sensor is similar to the previous installation, by energizing the microbes. However, the sonic response is quite different. Unlike the original version, where the movements of the microbes triggered random grains of noisy sound created from the bell recording, in this version each microbe is assigned its own pitch when it is born. When the visitor interacting with the installation waves a hand over a microbe, the sound of the microbe is heard, while it moves away from the hand.
5.2.4
Sound
The sound of the microbes in this version uses an FM synthesis model, designed for this purpose. The explosions will also trigger the dying microbe’s pitch, but in a lower octave range. The position of the hand tracked by the sensor is indicated by a white, translucid circle in the image, to make more visible and controllable the position of the hand. All the pitched sounds of the environment were coordinated in
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order to obtain a coherent musical result. There is a global harmonic structure that is used across all the sound events. This harmonic structure is “conducted” by the environment’s slow change of background color, that modify the available notes when the color changes. The procedure for the mapping of the notes of a global changing harmony was based on the procedures used in the implementation of MyJazzBand (Dias, 2017, 2018), and particularly in the solo instruments and piano mapping (Dias et al., 2014). The background sound was altered to detach even further from the creatures’ sounds. It became darker, more diffuse and low-pitched. Also, due to processing needs, it was fully pre-composed, exported as a long audio file, and simply played back in the MaxMSP patch.
6 Conclusions This chapter presented the concept, main ideas and features of MicroSonic Spaces, an audiovisual installation that presents the concept of a virtual ecosystem of artificial entities, in which the planning and implementation of the rules, properties and boundaries of all the elements included a sound design and musical perspective. The choices made in the creation of the environment and the species were the result of several tests and attempts at creating a balanced ecosystem that can sustain life and continuous activity. Due to the fact that these projects were created as public installations, some compromises were necessary in the definition of the rules and environmental factors, to restrict the boundaries of the creatures’ actions and the interaction with the environment and the other species, in order to achieve a more or less constant state and configuration of the ecosystem, during the exhibitions. Although the initial version presented most of the main concepts and ideas that motivated this project, each new version introduced new ideas that improved the conceptual definition of the project. Namely, the introduction of an individual pitch for each microbe in the version of Aveiro, fosters the idea of an individual profile, which reinforces the idea of artificial life with a sonic identity. The fact that this sonic identity can be listened to when the user interacts with it, creates an interesting new role for the interactivity, that in a way resembles that of a musical instrument. Albeit the prominence of the graphical form of this installation, I consider MicroSonic Spaces to be mainly a sound and musical installation, as the main significant resulting events are sonic, as if the life cycle, behavior and evolution of the living artificial agents exist for a sonic purpose. From a musical and compositional perspective, there are still numerous possibilities and parameters to address in the creation of a complex, deeper musical context, but it seems clear that this format creates an interesting and engaging challenge to explore, both conceptually and artistically. Acknowledgments This project was supported by the “Castelo de Artes” Festival (Castelo Branco) and “Aveiro Síntese” music festival (Aveiro). I would like to thank Dr. Carlos Semedo and Dr. Vitor Louro, in Castelo Branco, and Diana Ferreira and David Costa in Aveiro, for their help and support.
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References Beyls, P. (2007). Interaction and self-organisation in a society of musical agents. Proceedings of ECAL 2007 Workshop on Music and Artificial Life, Lisbon. Chadabe, J. (1984). Interactive composing. Computer Music Journal, 8(1), 22–27. Dias, R., Guedes, C., Marques, T. (2014). “A computer-mediated Interface for Jazz Piano Comping”. 40th international computer music conference, ICMC 2014, Joint with the 11th sound and music computing conference, SMC 2014—Music technology meets philosophy: From digital echos to virtual ethos, Athens, Greece. Dias, R. (2017). ”MyJazzBand”—An interactive virtual jazz band. Proceedings of the 13th international Symposium on CMMR, Matosinhos, Portugal. Dias, R. (2018). “Interfacing jazz: A study in computer-mediated jazz music creation and performance”. Doctoral dissertation. Doctoral Program in Digital Media. Porto, Portugal. Eigenfeldt, A. (2009). A realtime generative music system using autonomous melody, harmony, and rhythm agents. 12th generative art conference GA2009, pp. 67–76. Eigenfeldt, A., Pasquier, P. (2011). A sonic eco-system of self-organising musical agents. In: Di Chio, C. et al. (Ed.) applications of evolutionary computation. EvoApplications 2011. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 6625. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-20520-0_29 Krueger, M. W. (1977). Responsive environments. AFIPS 46 National computer conference Proceedings (pp. 423–433). AFIPS Press. Malt, M. (2001). Growing an artificial musical society. ALMMA 2001, Workshop on artificial life models for musical applications, sixth european conference on artificial life. McCormack, J. (2001). Eden: An evolutionary sonic ecosystem. In J. Kelemen, P. Sosik (Eds.) Advances in artificial life, Proceedings of the 6th European conference (ECAL), 10–14 September 2001, LNCS Vol. 2159, Springer, ISSN: 0302-9743, 2001, pp. 133–142. McCormack, J. (2003) Evolving sonic ecosystems. In: A. Adamatzky (Ed), The International Journal of Systems & Cybernetics—Kybernetes, Vol. 32, Issue ½. Miranda, E. R. (2002). Sounds of artificial life. In: Proceedings of the 4th conference on Creativity & cognition (C&C ’02). Association for Computing Machinery (pp. 173–177). https://doi.org/ 10.1145/581710.581736 Miranda, Eduardo R. (2003). On the evolution of music in a society of self-taught digital creatures. Digital Creativity, 14(1), 29–42. https://doi.org/10.1076/digc.14.1.29.8812 Mynsky, Marvin. (1985). The society of mind (p. 9780671657130). Simon and Schuster. Pasquier, P., Eigenfeldt, A., Bown, O., & Dubnov, S. (2016). An introduction to musical metacreation. Computers in Entertainment, 14(2), Article 2, December. https://doi.org/10.1145/293 0672
Musicking with Plants Filipe Lopes and Paulo M. Rodrigues
Abstract In this paper we discuss our work and research related to music, humans and plants. We attempt to put our endeavours in a large historical and technological perspective as well as sharing our own creative journey motivated by an interest in connecting with plants through music making. We deliberately use the term “musicking” to create a context where our work can be meaningfully understood, and we present case studies—elicitors—to discuss and communicate our activities and creative processes.
Prologue. The term “musicking” became part of the vocabulary of, at least, certain parts of the academic world, highlighting the dynamic, interactive, communicational, relational nature of a very complex phenomenon known to be of great importance for the human species, Music. The use of “musicking” is a clear acknowledgement of the idea that music is above all a process and not an object (Small, 1998). As far as we are aware, Small did not consider the idea of “musicking” as a way to relate humans and plants, but we believe that following that path could lead to better communicate our journey of discovery.
1 Rooting Ideas In the last few decades there has been a growing feeling of concern for nature due to the increasingly obvious evidence of the deterioration of the natural world. From rich and industrialized societies to local communities in developing countries, there F. Lopes (B) CIPEM/INET-md, ESMAD, uniMAD, Porto, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] P. M. Rodrigues INET-md, Universidade de Aveiro, Aveiro, Portugal © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_7
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are numerous voices expressing a state of “detunement” between humans, other living beings and our planet. In the case of the so-called developed countries, this feeling arises as a consequence of the scientific community’s effort to show that the human being is an integral part of nature and that the survival of both is interconnected, and, above all, because of the immediate impact that the news from the media and the political, social, artistic and educational action of countless people (from social networks to school, families and institutions) have on people. The alert message reaches more and more people, increasingly often and more vehemently through social networks,1 news, the media, school activities and the programming of cultural institutions and means of entertainment.2 All these highly diversified initiatives lead us to realize that the balance of nature (and therefore all of humanity) is undoubtedly in danger. The pioneering work of organizations like Green Peace finds resonances in current numerous initiatives and associations around the world, which have been working and intervening in local communities in order to draw attention to aspects such as renewable energy, recycling, food waste, pollution, preservation of biodiversity, among others. New approaches to the production of food and energy, more environmentally sustainable, have become increasingly popular, which demonstrates a positive attitude change of societies towards the preservation of nature and the environment. We know, however, that such positive attitudes face numerous obstacles and that important political decisions, such as the climate goals established in world forums, end up not being fulfilled. There is, therefore, a long way to go to establish a consistent, fruitful and balanced relationship between humans, nature and our planet. The artistic community, all over the world, has been aware of these phenomena. The representation of life in paintings or music, be it the nature-observed-felt-lived by artists in their real existence or the various “staging” of still life, seems to have given way (or at least coexist) with the need to include life itself in the artistic discourses. Art movements such as “land art”, “environmental art” or “bio art” started to deal with life and nature, not only as a “subject” but also as a “medium”, or “matter”, i.e. the “canvas” where ideas are expressed and the “means” used to do so, either a garden, a mountain, a forest, a rabbit, a bacterium, a butterfly, a seaweed. The realization that art and science are part of a whole driven by human creativity has been reinstated after centuries of “divergent evolution” that led to their compartmentalization.3 Institutions and individuals have been gradually opening their physical and mental “windows” for the possibility of collaboration between artists and scientists, allowing ideas, means and technologies previously confined to the laboratory, gallery or concert hall “to move freely” between the various territories. DNA 1
See, for example, the images shared during pandemic of clean canals in Venice, blue sky in Beijing, contaminating the imagination of people all over the world with the idea that nature “breathed” and sent a warning to humanity. We know, however, that publications of this kind can be fake news. 2 As a mere example, it should be noticed that David Attenborough´s latest documentaries are available on popular platforms such as Netflix. 3 Although not directly related to our work but related to the discussion about Art and Science, the famous lecture by C. P. Snow, “The Two Cultures”, in 1959, addresses in an interesting manner Art’s and Science split and its consequences.
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is no longer “owned” by scientists, just like the singing of birds, whales or volcanoes. Instead of rivals in a race to capture the “truth” about nature, both artists and scientists should be considered as creators of healthy stimulus to develop everyone’s ideas about what is the world around us, in what way it affects us, how we affect it. In addition, over the past few years, many of the technological resources that were previously accessible only to scientists and artists based in institutions or laboratories have become widely accessible, whether in the field of biology, electronics or music. In this way, more than ever it is possible to investigate, create, question and involve not only specialists but also the lay person in experiments (e.g. laboratory experiments, musical experiments). Obviously, the motivation and focus of attention of scientists and artists working in bio art or any other area that deals with nature as matter (for example at the level of sound) may not be the concern for the degradation of the Anthropocene but, for instance, the intrinsic challenge of creativity. But the fact is that placing “life” at the centre of “action”, removing it from an external plane intended for “figuration” to place it on the “stage” or making it a “canvas”, has an effect on the perception we have about ourselves, about the immense power we have to change the natural world around us, that is, it leads to a question about the essence of what it means to be human, of our relationship with nature. What should we reason about Alba, the fluorescent rabbit created by Eduardo Kac in 2000? It is in this perspective of questioning that we face our work with plants. The idea that plants are immobile and consequently passive has recently been widely questioned in light of new knowledge (Mancuso & Viola, 2016), especially if one interprets such knowledge in light of a philosophy that does not start from the assumption of the unequivocal superiority of human beings, but rather from the realization that life on the planet manifests itself in very different ways, resulting from long processes of evolution, adaptation and balance between all living beings. The individual and social life of plants is, in fact, extraordinary. See, for example, that it is now recognized that plants communicate with each other through chemical signals for mutual benefit, whether under or above ground, react and adapt to environmental changes, organize collectively, have strategies for exceptional survival and resilience that allow them to overcome the supposed disadvantage of immobility, develop complex and sophisticated collaborative relationships with other living organisms that result in the possibility of everyone’s survival (Gorzelak et al., 2015). These arguments, and several other, obvious but often neglected, challenge the idea inculcated in humans that plants are “inferior” beings and relativize the animals’ exclusivity in terms of memory, learning and cognition. These aspects, discussed in greater depth by the philosopher Laura Ruggles (2017), are for us inspirers and instigators to the creation of artistic projects that bring together music, humans and plants. It is not our purpose to prove any cognitive theory about plants, but to dance with them just as scientists dance with ideas of what is going on inside a black hole. We join the communities that see in the Arts the potential to generate new forms of emotional bonds with nature and (Jackobson & Monroe, 2007), thus, create personal and ontological understandings about and with the natural world that are potentially more transforming of our attitude towards plants and nature than just rigorous scientific linguistic communication.
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2 Music and Plants Plants have been present in the artistic world since immemorial times and the particular case of music is not an exception. The distinction between popular, traditional or classical certainly does not segregate plants. Translating plants features (e.g. their morphology, pattern of growth) into organizing principles for music creation with “real musical instruments” was, in the past, the closest possible musical relationship between plants and humans, besides the obvious way, that is, as a source of inspiration. Classical music is fertile in examples that acknowledge trees and flowers (e.g. The Four Seasons by Vivaldi; Waltz of the Flowers by Tchaikovsky; Flower Duet in Delibe´s Lakmé; several lieder by Schubert and Schumman, and songs by Fauré, Borodin or Britten). Plants, flowers and fruits, real and symbolic, can be found in many traditional cultural manifestations all over de world where music plays an important role, from the lotus flower of Hindu and Buddhist complex ceremonies to the simple traditional songs of many countries, including Portugal, where aromatic herbs, carnations, roses, violets, oranges and pomegranate seem to have flourished and survived for many years. Even the recent world of urban pop/rock music has found in plants and flowers the sources that allow words and melodies to evolve into more complex song structures (e.g. Strawberry Fields Forever by the Beatles). A quick search reveals that roses, not strawberries, seem to be a favourite theme. By the late 50’s a new trend about music and plants started to emerge based on the widespread idea that plant growth could be influenced by the human voice and music. Singing and talking to plants have certainly been part of daily gardening routines of many plant lovers,4 even if many others, including the scientific community, regard it as an eccentricity. The fact is, however, that the idea had made its way to the music world and instrumental music started to be created and recorded. One can easily find many recording and music albums made for plants based on the assumption that plants respond to music and that sound would influence the plant´s growth and health. Music to Grow Plants (1970) by Dr. George Milstein and Corelli-Jacobs is one such example; Green sounds: music for your plants, released in 1974, features music played by Steve Hall, Tim Wallace and Doran Damitz. Molly Roth’s record Plant Talk (1976) features the voice of Molly talking to plants, as if they listened to it. In the same year, Mort Garson’s Mother Earth’s Plantasia (1976), a timeless album, was also released. Possibly influenced by this trend, a few people among the scientific community started to investigate or, rather, attempting to validate the empirical knowledge alleged by those eccentric plant lovers and musicians. In recent years a number of studies have been published about the influence of different genres of music in the growth of 4
The documentary Music with plants, plants with Music (Tavares & Lopes, 2017) reports the musical and educational work developed by the first author during one school year in public schools, music schools, kindergarten and nursing homes. Some people living alone at those nursing homes confessed that they talk to plants as if the plants were their friends and companions. Retrieved January 28, 2021, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTKUcmsG_7c&t=3s.
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several plants, clamming that there is scientific evidence supporting the hypothesis (Sharma et al., 2015; Chowdhury & Gupta, 2015; Rachieru et al, 2017; Creath & Schwarz, 2004; Popescu & Mocanu, 2013; Chivukula & Ramaswamy, 2014). The evidence is, however, rather weak, frequently biased by a generic conception of music divided into basic categories (e.g. rock, classical, indian) that seem to reflect opinions and tastes rather than an objective sound-related or musically-based categorization of the stimuli that was applied. Furthermore, no explanation has been produced about the processes that could be involved in the response to music. Listening, in the sense of what humans and many animals do, is not surely something that plants can do, as they do not possess the organs and nervous structures that support it. There is, however, evidence that plants respond to sound and suggestions have been made that maybe plants even use sound to communicate (Cate, 2013; Gagliano, 2013; Gagliano et al., 2012a, 2012b; Khait et al., 2019; Mishra et al., 2016). Whether or not sound is a possibility for humans to interact with plants remains to be seen but it is quite unlikely that our own notions of “music”, deeply shaped by human cultural experiences, will be adequate to build this sound-based communication. Perhaps we should look at the previously mentioned attempts of establishing musical communication with plants as reflections of our deep need to connect with nature5 by means other than verbal language. The book The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tomnkins and Christopher Bird, comprised several articles of people discussing their relationship with plants, including one by the notorious Cleve Baxter,6 tells stories of plants being sentient and emotionally responsive to human actions (Tomnkins & Bird, 1974). That book, together with the unconventional idea of making music for plants, somewhat reviving mysticism and alchemy narratives, strengthened among people an imaginary of plants having emotions and consciousness.7 Words such as intelligence, consciousness and emotions seem to be difficult to accept by humans when referring to plants, however, there are strong arguments towards accepting a different view (Calvo et al., 2020; Gagliano, 2015) and certainly this is the time to do it. It is certainly with this view in mind that we can better understand a recent performance held for an audience of plants. In 2020, due to the pandemic of Covid 19, and as an homage to the many people who suffered and died due to the virus, Barcelona held a concert at the Grand Teatre del Liceu, planned by Eugenio Ampudoa,8 in which the hall was filled with hundreds plants each one placed in a seat. The ensemble played Puccini’s “Crisantemi” to the silent but live green audience. In that concert plants fulfilled the role of a live audience, an essential requirement for any performing musician as it gives 5
The biophilia theory, suggested by Edward Wilson, asserts the existence of “a fundamental, genetically based human need and propensity to affiliate with life and lifelike processes” (Kahn, 1997, p. 1). 6 Cleve Baxter, using a lie-detector machine connected to a plant, stated that a plant had reacted to his thoughts. His experiment and claims gave rise to many discussions. 7 Retrieved December 30, 2020, from https://www.nytimes.com/1973/12/30/archives/the-secretlife-of-plants-by-peter-tompkins-and-christopher-bird.html. 8 Retrieved January 10, 2021, from https://www.liceubarcelona.cat/en/artist-eugenio-ampudia-ina ugurates-activity-liceu-concert-2292-plants.
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meaning and intention to his/her work. Even with recordings it is possible that this aspect of sharing (in this case postponed) might be one of the main rewards he/she aims to obtain, as for many musicians the “sound” is not enough. In the Barcelona concert the plants were perhaps substitutes, real or symbolic, of the many humans that have died and therefore they were being used to remember those that could no longer attend the performances of their ensemble. But it is possible also that they were there by they own right as living beings opening a channel of communication to the musicians on the stage, therefore allowing music to be played. Without them there would be just sound. Nobody will never know whether or not the plant audience enjoyed the music or even perceived the sounds, but the event certainly made people think and feel, both the performers and other people that read it in the news. The plants, therefore, exerted a deep impact upon those that became acquainted with the idea, in a sharp example of how they seem to communicate with us or to enable us to communicate with ourselves. Another interesting trend, emerging early in the second half of the twentieth century, was the use of plants to perform music. John Cage, during the 70’s, presented two famous pieces which included plants: Child of a Tree (1975) and Branches (1976). These pieces worked by amplifying plants and their leaves with contact microphones.9 The latter has become an iconic piece that might have inspired other artists worldwide, as the Portuguese sound-sculptor/performer João Ricardo de Barros Oliveira,10 although we are not certain if this is the case, as João Ricardo has his own very independent, idiosyncratic approach to musical creation. One important aspect of both these pieces concerns the need of “touching” the plant in order to produce sound, thus, involving a corporal proximity between performer and plant which helps to develop a certain intimacy and a kind of embodied connectivity between performer and plant. This can be interpreted also as an attempt to renew what was once a close relationship between humans and plants in what regards to music making. Other people choose to overcome the invisibility of plants (Balas & Momsen, 2014) with more “intimate” and expressive ideas, as it happens in the concerts by The Vegetable Orchestra.11 In the industrialized era we live in, musical instruments are easily available: for the most part of musicians, professional or amateur, the most common approach to have his/her own instrument is to purchase it from a shop. It was not certainly the case when the first musical instruments started to be developed. Even today, or at least in a recent past, it is possible to see that in traditional cultures building a musical instrument was regarded as an important part of life, an activity that served not only the purpose of possessing the means to play music but had profound spiritual meaning. Let us tell you a story told to us by an African instrument builder. African drums are regarded as part of the identity of families and homes. When a new family, new 9
Retrieved December 30, 2020, from https://johncage.org/pp/John-Cage-Work-Detail.cfm?work_I D=34. 10 Retrieved January 4, 2021, from https://www.lixoluxo.com/cactus-sonorus/ 11 Retrieved January 5, 2021, from https://www.vegetableorchestra.org.
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home, would be started, a new drum would have to be made (i.e. not bought, ordered or commissioned to someone else). The making of a drum involved going to the forest, observing and choosing a tree, cutting it, hollow it, in a lengthy and laborious process that was based on the notion that the tree is a living being with whom one would have to feel in “resonance” (as well as with the entire forest). The remaining parts of the tree would be used in the making of the home and, of course, the animal that would have to be sacrificed to provide the skin for the new drum would also be eaten. Looking at this from a westernized point of view, one may say that “primitive” cultures had a deep sense of economy of resources and a holistic vision of what means to be human and therefore dependent on others and the environment. In this complex and balanced scheme, one may say that drums were regard as means to allow the celebration of a relationship with nature and powerful reminders of the voices one needs to listen to in order to live in balance with the world. Many instruments of traditional cultures look “primitive” in the sense that one clearly sees the natural origin of the plants and animals that were used to make them. This is the case of the drums that have animal skins as drumheads, but also logdrums, (i.e. hollow trunks of trees, sometimes with impressive sizes, as in the Pacific islands) didgeridoos (i.e. trunks or branches hollowed by termites, as in the Aboriginal culture of Australia), rainsticks (made of sundried cacti, as in the indigenous cultures of present-day southcentral and Chile and southwestern Argentina) or flutes (made of branches from softwood trees or bamboo, as in China and India). One may say, of course, that this “primitive look” is only the consequence of the lack of technology and as soon as new technology allows this link with nature is lost, as if man would like to deny its origins and prove himself as a superior entity. A different but interesting case concerning plants, humans and intimacy is that of gum leaf music, i.e. the music one makes by blowing leaves captured from trees. This is an indigenous musical practice which “illustrates the existence of a close relationship between musician and plant in the Australian Aboriginal societies of which Western philosophy has little awareness” (Ryan, 2013). It seems interesting to look at these examples when thinking about music and plants since indigenous people have been living in the nature for centuries, hence, accumulating an empirical knowledge about nature far beyond the reality of the common modern man. A person from the Kaluli tribe,12 while talking about birds with Steven Feld, a famous anthropologist which lived with the Kaluli for several months, said the following: “to you they are birds, to me they are voices in the forest” (Feld, 2012, p. 45). As Feld reports, it’s not just a matter of integrating things or uniting them, things are part of the “whole” and so a human, a tree or an animal communicates and articulates among “the whole” in a natural way. In other societies, such as some of the indigenous peoples of the Western Amazon, plants are regarded as carriers of the voices from spirits, having the ability to teach a specific type of songs to shamanic apprentices which later use them in ceremonies
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The Kaluli is a tribe living in the rain forest at Papua New Guinea.
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and healing treatments involving ayahuasca.13 Ayuaska, a powerful psychoactive brew made with plants, is a well-known aspect of the far more deep and complex relationship that these people have with the exuberant plant world they live in. The work of Christina Callicott combines elements of anthropology and plant biology to propose that the acquisition of the song elements mentioned above is a form of inter-species communication in which the apprentice intercepts and interprets the phytochemical signals inherent in plant communicative processes (Callicot, 2013). In the second half of the twentieth century, increasingly sophisticated technology, especially digital, paved new ways for artists to engage with plants. The use of sensors allowed to retrieve features that before could only be observed or felt, thus, making it possible, for instance, to use audio and images to “translate” such measurements. Approaches to plants as interfaces or as musical instruments, as described earlier with John Cage, increased significantly with the advent of computers, sensors and accessible programming software (e.g. Processing, Pure Data, Arduino).14 Living plants became interfaces for human–computer interaction, which prompted fresh approaches on plants as sensitive beings while also strengthening the “imaginary plant life” sparked by the musicians mentioned earlier. The work Interactive Plant Growing (1992) by Christa Sommerer and Laurent Mignonneau, although not directly related to music performance, was a pioneer work within this trend of creating imaginary plants that would have organic dialogues with human beings. Nowadays, it is common to see, and quick to implement, projects built with the Makey Makey or Playton interfaces using plants to trigger audio files,15 .16 When using computers (i.e. programming), one is able to mimic the growth pattern of plants17 to produce musical generative systems as well as to implement sonification18 strategies using data collected by sensors.19 Midi Sprout,20 or its recent upgrade Plant Wave, as well Plant Choir,21 are nowadays accessible and “ready-to-use” technology to acquire bio-signals from plants, translating them directly to midi and/or (generative) music. Such approaches, while directly related to the plant’s inner life, rely on a “numeric approach to describe reality”. This kind of approach, however, is quite different from an approach like the ones by aboriginal people where the ontological intimacy and the physical contact with plants seems to be a vital aspect of the “interaction”. In recent years, interestingly, we have seen the growth of projects, like the 13
During the vietnam war, American troupes produced and played audio tapes which featured strange sounds and altered voices to install a sense of fear among the vietnamese soldiers. https:// en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Wandering_Soul_(Vietnam_War). Retrieved January 15, 2021. 14 In the essay The Art of Human to Plant Interaction, from 2015, Sommerer, Mignonneau and Weil cover the main aspects of this trend and their technological approaches. 15 E.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcVImBOM1Cw. Retrieved January 6, 2021. 16 E.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYkkC0xp-N0. Retrieved January 19, 2021. 17 E.g. L-Systems. 18 Sonification refers to using non-speech audio to convey information related to specific data. 19 To get an overview of sensors used with plant, please check (Lopes & Rodrigues, 2020). 20 Retrieved January 4, 2021, from https://www.midisprout.com. 21 Retrieved January 4, 2021, from https://plantchoir.com.
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ones by Leslie Garcia22 or Milecce,23 based on sonification strategies that encourage people to touch and feel the plants in order to generate music inside a particular sonic space. In the context of these types of “musical plant-ecosystems”, computers serve the purpose of retrieving signals which become sound but have a relatively small importance when it comes to “visibility”. In Portugal, Cláudia Martinho has been creating sound installations related to plants and biofeedback, engaging the audience to reach and feel the plants, while also bringing aspects of the aural architecture to her creative process.24 Overall, nowadays there are many accessible technological options that allow for a diverse and rigorous inspection of the plant’s life. It is possible to create an ecosystem of interconnected sensors (e.g. luminosity, humidity, air quality) that, connected to the internet, allows one to remotely monitor and visualize in real time aspects of the environment where the plants are living. Such possibilities open up the opportunity of creating digital, interactive and shared (i.e. accessible to anyone online) musical systems. However, we ask ourselves: are these technologies really capable of revealing the “plant’s music”? Will the current technological and computer achievements be able to reveal any “truth”, “reality” or a poetics that does not simply mirror itself? Aren´t we just using those technologies to retrieve numbers and then create abstractions and concepts that we colonize with music that we like? We strive to induce an empirical sense of equality and union between plants and music and, consequently, a real and unified ontological experience. In other words, it is not just a matter of making technology invisible to give prominence to the plant itself or the other way around, but instead to envision technology as an integral and fundamental part of the entire system in such a way to create a “wholeness”.25 We feel it renders a musical poetic that, if for nothing else, serves to offer us and the audience an illusion and the dream of a unified connection with nature.
3 Interlude Our work related to music and nature has addressed three areas that we try to associate: music education, new technologies and performance. This was not the result of a conscious decision, but something that emerged in our practices, both individually and together. The first author got his PhD by studying the relationship between music and space and by creating compositions in which the soundscape and the acoustics are structuring elements (Lopes & Guedes, 2020). As head of the educational service of the Matosinhos Jazz Orchestra, in the academic year of 2017, he started a project called Música com Plantas, Plantas com Música (Music with Plants, Plants with Music) that would serve as inspiration for later works that include music, plants and 22
Retrieved January 2, 2021, from http://interspecifics.cc/work/pulsum-plantae-2012/. Retrieved January 2, 2021, from https://www.mileece.is. 24 Retrieved January 3, 2021, from https://claudiamartinho.net/?p=68. 25 Here resonates the idea of cybernetics and telematics cultivated by artists like Roy Ascott. 23
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computer technologies (Lêdo et al., 2019; Lopes & Ferreira, 2017). The musical and compositional practices that emerged from that project were very interesting, namely: the “creative help” that the plants brought to the practice of improvised music, whether that improvisation was idiomatic (e.g. blues) or not; the leverage of active listening practices (e.g. sound leaves in the wind) and the encouragement of tangible contact with plants in the classroom. The second author has developed a set of works with the aim of “tuning people, birds and flowers”, i.e. artistic and educational experiences that promote awareness of the other and the fragility of the World that we inherit. Theatrical pieces like NOAH (2017) or Orizuro (2019) are examples of this, as well as installations like Metamorphosis (2017) and Gamelão de Porcelana e Cristal (2011), or more complex projects like Mil Pássaros (2020), Opus Tutti (2011) or GermInArte (2019). Some experiments carried out in contexts such as the gardens of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation or the Parque da Devesa in Vila Nova de Famalicão seek to explore an idea of “total work of art” in which Nature is simultaneously scenery and character, interpreter and audience, in deep communion with the human element. Together, the authors have developed musical work targeted for music teachers and where the soundscape, as proposed by Schafer (1977), and the natural space has a relevant role.
4 Our Work, so Far Our particular work can be described as the search for an unmeasurable and empirical equilibrium to establish a shared musical space between us and the plants, hence, our two main questions: Do plants make music? How do we make music with plants? Talking about music and plants makes us (re)reflect, first of all, on what we mean by Music. Over the years we have attempted, unsuccessfully, to find a definition of Music that could encompass all definitions that we were taught or came across, and, above all, our own personal experiences. Adding plants to an already complex picture probably does not make things clearer but it certainly fosters our imagination. Plants have inhabited our planet for millions of years, long before the animal kingdom. This fact, together with the postulate that all known cultures make music, opens the door to the possibility of some intrinsic relationship between music, plants and humans. The suggestion that plants make music is strange to most people for two good reasons: we do not see plants producing sound deliberately and, above all, we take music as an exclusively human phenomenon with a set of practices that we usually ascribe to music making (e.g. performances, improvisations, etc.). Playing music with plants would imply an active involvement of both humans and plants, and, to the best of our knowledge, that has never been witnessed. We can, however, imagine a broader notion about Music and in that case imagine that if the Music we know and make derives from a creation of the much older plant kingdom it would necessarily have to precede the self-conscious and autobiographical human, that is, the humans would not have created Music. In that case, the humans would have only discovered it in the fabric and modus operandi of nature. This is off course a
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very speculative idea, even more than what has been suggested about the existence of music in the animal world, in particular among birds—the work of David Rothenberg being a particular source of inspiration for us (Rothenberg, 2005). If, on the other hand, Music is an invention of humans, be it a by-product of language, as Steven Pinker said,26 or something inscribed and vital in our biology,27 the search for “plant music” is a path of faith that does not aspire to any particular outcome but instead takes joy in a walk without an end. In any case, we can say with some certainty that the music we know originated and was influenced by the surrounding natural environment and by the acoustic circumstance.28 While it is hard to say that the tempered tuning system arises due to some type of contact with plants, it’s not unreasonable to think that basic sound manifestations such as singing, dancing or playing instruments have been influenced by contact with nature (e.g. making a flute out of a bone) and with plants (e.g. gum leaf music). Plants certainly produce sounds and react to sound, as mentioned before, but we tend to imagine that they are not capable of intentional behaviours which means that the idea of plants playing music looks very remote. Plants have, however, caused us, the authors, to enter new paths in our music making practices in a way that differs from what can be called “inspiration”. In other words, they acted as initiators or elicitors of musical discourses, provoking us to find “new music” and create performative environments that seem to emanate from a dialogue between people and plants. Plantorumori is the project in which we have been working on musical creation with plants, both from a theoretical and a practical point of view (i.e. performances). Our main goal is to develop a hybrid system merging plants, electronics and sound performance. Plantorumori is part of a larger research project named Xperimus which studies experimental musical practices in Portugal.29 Plantorumori’s first phase included the technological and musical experimentation under the motto “explore the idea that art, music in particular, might have biological roots related to the need to communicate and be in tune with others.” (Lopes& Rodrigues, 2020). This path has led us to discover many interesting aspects about the inner life of plants as well as their “social” life, the immense music production related to nature and plants and, finally, get acquainted with a wide range of technologies to use to make music with plants.30
26
For more detail, please see the chapter “The Music Instinct” in Daniel Levitin’s book This is your Brain on Music (2007). 27 For more detail, please see the article “The artification hypothesis and its relevance to cognitive science, evolutionary aesthetics, and neuroaesthetics” (2009). 28 Wallace Sabine stated that the music developed in the open space (e.g. savanna) was mainly rhythmical due to the lack of reverberation. On the other hand, the music that flourished in closed spaces is imminently more melodic and harmonic due to the influence of reverberation (Prior, 2007). 29 Retrieved November 13, 2021, from http://www.inetmd.pt/index.php/en/investigacao/projects/ 9642.experimentation.in.music.in.portuguese.culture.history.contexts.and.practices-in-the-20thand-21st-centuries. 30 For a detailed description about this phase, see (Lopes & Rodrigues, 2020).
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In the following paragraphs we will describe open processes, identified as Elicitors, which we devised since we started Plantorumori. They are not regarded as “compositions”, in the meaning of stable, predictable configurations of sounds but as processes that can mingle and be initiate or ceased at any time during performance, that is, processes which we are conscious, but which are not premeditated. For this very reason, it is not a matter of “interpreting” scores or a priori instructions with beginning, middle and end, but triggering musical gestures that, according to people, musicians, plants, aural architecture and soundscape, will flourish in an improvised free flow. One last remark needs to be added to better understand the elicitors we will describe: in our musical performance experiments we have invited other musicians to join in with their instruments as well as using ourselves a variety of sound resources that includes musical instruments (e.g. piano, guitar, synthesizers) and sound-making objects (e.g. prepared loudspeakers,31 crystal bowls, medals), and the plants themselves. In these contexts we do not regard ourselves as instrument players but as “plant soundscapers”.
5 Elicitor #1: Visuals Generated from Plant Physiological Signals The use of graphical and/or animated scores is already a solid established practice within the experimental music context. Some well-known compilation of these scores includes Notations (1969) by John Cage and more recently, in 2009, the compilation Notation 21 (2009) by Theresa Sauer.32 In our experiments we have used Plant SpikerBox33 technology to auscultate plant physiological signals in real time, visualizing them in a tablet and deriving musical gestures from them.
6 Elicitor #2: Visuals Generated from Plant Imaginary From previous projects we inherited the idea of “plantitura” (planta + partitura, i.e. plant + score) a graphical score composition inspired in plants or using plants, created for each performance. The ancient japanese practice of arranging flowers and branches in order to give them life, known as Ikebana, resonates in the idea of “plantitura” (Fig. 1). 31
By “prepared speaker”, we mean speakers that have their cone filled with various sound objects (e.g. bells, coins, leaves, paper). The cone, when excited with electricity, moves which makes the sound objects in its cone shock, producing a myriad of sounds. 32 It is beyond the scope of this paper to describe the practices and theories that encompass the musical interpretation of graphic and / or animated scores. A good source of contemporary practices can be found at https://animatednotation.com. Retrieved January 11, 2021. 33 Retrieved January 10, 2021, from https://backyardbrains.com/products/plantspikerbox.
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Fig. 1 Plantitura example created by a kindergarten class
Fig. 2 A POLISphone based on Gulbenkian’s garden
Together with graphical scores, animated scores and “plantituras”, we also have been using POLISphone (Lopes & Rodrigues, 2014; Lopes et al., 2016), a software that allows the use of original images and sounds to create a digital musical instrument (Fig. 2).34
34
Retrieved January 11, 2021, from https://filipelopes.net/polisphone.
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Fig. 3 A photo of our plants at 9:00 am
Fig. 4 A photo of our plants at 2:00 pm
Still in the context of this elicitor, we have been using the photography technique of time-lapse to register the movement produced by our plants during the day. These images lead to short animations that can be used as scores (Figs. 3, 4 and 5).
7 Elicitor #3: Sonification of Plant Physiological Signs In the context of experimental music, sonification practices continue to flourish, aided by the current diversity and accessibility of sensors as well as the “data and communication potential” of the internet.35 In our work we have used sensors that 35
It is beyond the scope of this paper to discuss in detail the practices and theories about sonification. For more information, see https://smartech.gatech.edu/handle/1853/49750. Retrieved January 11, 2021.
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Fig. 5 A thermal image of a leaf
Fig. 6 “The Seed”—first experiment
are sensitive to the environment (e.g. levels of light, sound and aspects of air quality, levels of soil humidity) to modulate the frequency of oscillators or/and the volume of audio samples. Within the context of the Plantorumori project (described below) we conceived “The Seed”. It comprises a set of plants and several sensors that, in turn, are connected to the internet (i.e. a webpage). On the webpage of “The Seed”, the visitor can download text files filled with the information collected by these sensors over time and can also visualize their current activity (Fig. 6).36
36
At the moment, due to the covid 19 pandemic, the page that hosted “The Seed” is disabled. For the purposes of “example”, you can see the version that was online during March 2019: https://fil ipelopes.net/plantorumori. Retrieved January 11, 2021.
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Fig. 7 The authors performing with plants
Some of the aspects that we are interested in exploring with these signals, and with others that are also erratic (e.g. microvoltages in the leaves), is their “expressive” potential to generate drones and modulate synthesis parameters and/or audio effects (e.g. delay lines), thus, taking advantage of the “surprise” that these signals can bring to a performance.
8 Elicitor #4: Touching the Plant The amplification of plants, with contact microphones or conventional microphones, is a very concrete way, in the Schaefferian sense, of making music with plants. Exploring its sonic possibilities based on a “reduced listening” bias, promotes an active connection with the plant. In our practice we have used contact microphones as if they were “brushes” to touch and gently feel the plant. The sound that results from this process is sometimes modified by audio effects such as delay, reverb or pitch shift. Our practice also features physical touch on plants as a way to trigger certain audio samples, through interfaces such as Makey-Makey, or as a way to excite “prepared speakers”. We also inherited from other projects the idea of “plant painting”, which consists of the definition of a gestural vocabulary, like the original “sound painting”37 but, in this case, involving touching plants to signal certain musical gestures to the ensemble (Fig. 7).
37
Retrieved December 11, 2021, from http://www.soundpainting.com/soundpainting/.
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9 Elicitor #5: Morphology of Plants and Their Name/Words This Elicitor, for example, includes mapping the number of leaves to a given melodic and/or rhythmic sequence, among other possibilities. It also includes the possibility of mapping each letter of the plant’s name to a melodic and/or rhythmic sequence,38 as well as using the words and names as “raw sonic material” to sing or to perform using human voice.
10 Elicitor #6: Creation of Imaginary Soundscapes from Aspects of Plant Growth This Elicitor is the basis of a set of recent experiences with groups of people exploring the acoustic and visual characteristics of a large and reverberant garage. The possibility of root growth being accompanied by the emission of short sounds that would act as probes that would direct the growth of roots in the search for water and nutrients served as a starting point for musical creation in space.
11 Our Work, in the Near Future The Covid 19 pandemic interrupted the workflow as well as all the planned experiments, namely new musical performances. Soon, we will have “The Seed” again available online and ready to serve as a “bridge” between the audience, musicians and the plants. At the moment, being able to make music in real time with plants, leveraged by the research presented in this paper, is our main desire, so that we can bring to life our intuitions. Strictly from a technological point of view, however, we look forward to expand our past experiences by bringing to our “world” the technology of artificial intelligence, namely the Wekinator39 software or libraries such as TensorFlow,40 as they will allow us to analyse patterns (e.g. plant movement over months) and generate new types of “elicitors”.
38
The BACH motif is well known in the musical world, that is, a melodic sequence of 4 notes derived from the letters B A C H. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BACH_motif. Retrieved December 15, 2021. 39 Retrieved January 2, 2021, from http://www.wekinator.org. 40 Retrieved January 2, 2021, from https://www.tensorflow.org.
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12 Conclusions As far as Music is concerned, we are still dominated by the paradigm of Music as a product or commodity (“complex, humanly-produced, expressive sound, engaged with through listening because of its capacity to elicit emotional responses, produced—composed and performed—by the few and consumed—listened to— by the many”) rather than a process (an optimal medium to communicate and share aspects of the human essence that are difficult or impossible to verbalize, for managing situations of social uncertainty, situations where cooperation, reciprocity, commitment and trust cannot be taken for granted). The western view of Music as a particular case of anthrophony has been challenged several times, both by composers such as Cage or ethnomusicologists such as Feld, but not yet to the extent of producing a new vision of a “common language” capable of connecting humans and other bio-sensitive entities. We still apply models of musical performance inherited from instrumental music, more or less experimental but certainly made with and mostly for humans. This may mean, at this moment, an inevitability: there is no way of knowing what plant music is (because we still can’t hear it) or how to make music with plants other than a sympathetic, even if wide-range, imposition of our cultural models. How to do the opposite, if possible, remains a mystery, so we take this research as a wonderful way to discuss “What Is Music?” and not exactly to “advance or expand the state of the art” about Music. Our ambition, nevertheless, is not only platonic, in the sense that we believe that there is certainly a hidden music of plants. We think that our journey-narrative about music with plants will intrinsically give us, and our audience, an important ontological understanding and connection to nature. Although we cannot say that there isn’t “plant music”, to do so we would have to be plants ourselves, we can create music fuelled by our musical bias but illuminated by the platonic idea of plant music. It matters that such music becomes significant, signifier, embedded in a context and way of making music with plants that is self-justifying, that is, a human-plant-music context that renders its own language, music and forms of understanding. We really want to devise an illusive, performative and experimental musical environments in order to convince whoever enters such environments that the Music emanates from people and plants. We believe, therefore, that it is possible and important to make credible the absurd. Acknowledgements This research was funded by the project “Experimentation in music in Portuguese culture: History, contexts and practices in the 20th and 21st centuries”, co-financed by the European Union, through the Operational Programme Competitiveness and Internationalization, in its ERDF component, and by national funds, through the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology. The authors would also like to thank CIPEM/INET-md, ESMAD/P.Porto, University of Aveiro and Companhia de Música Teatral.
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References Balas, B., & Momsen, J. L. (2014). Attention “blinks” differently for plants and animals. CBE—Life Sciences Education 13(3), 437–443 Callicott, C. (2013). Interspecies communication in the Western Amazon: Music as a form of conversation between plants and people. European Journal of Ecopsychology, 4(1), 32–43. Calvo, P., Gagliano, M., Souza, G. M., & Trewavas, A. (2020). Plants are intelligent, here’s how. Annals of Botany, 125(1), 11–28. Cate, C. (2013). Acoustic communication in plants: Do the woods really sing? Behavioral Ecology, 24(4), 799–800. Chivukula, V., & Ramaswamy, S. (2014). Effect of different types of music on Rosa chinensis plants. International Journal of Environmental Science and Development, 5(5), 431. Chowdhury, A. R., & Gupta, A. (2015). Effect of music on plants–an overview. International Journal of Integrative Sciences, Innovation and Technology, 4(6), 30–34. Creath, K., & Schwartz, G. E. (2004). Measuring effects of music, noise, and healing energy using a seed germination bioassay. The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, 10(1), 113–122. Feld, S. (2012). Sound and sentiment: Birds, weeping, poetics, and song in kaluli expression. (3rd ed.). Duke University. Gagliano, M. (2013). Green symphonies: A call for studies on acoustic communication in plants. Behavioral Ecology, 24(4), 789–796. Gagliano, M. (2015). In a green frame of mind: Perspectives on the behavioural ecology and cognitive nature of plants. AoB Plants, 7. Gagliano, M., Grimonprez, M., Depczynski, M., & Renton, M. (2017). Tuned in: Plant roots use sound to locate water. Oecologia, 184(1), 151–160. Gagliano, M., Mancuso, S., & Robert, D. (2012). Towards understanding plant bioacoustics. Trends in Plant Science, 17(6), 323–325. Gagliano, M., Renton, M., Duvdevani, N., Timmins, M., & Mancuso, S. (2012). Out of sight but not out of mind: Alternative means of communication in plants. PLoS One, 7(5), e37382. Gorzelak, M. A., Asay, A. K., Pickles, B. J., & Simard, S. W. (2015). Inter-plant communication through mycorrhizal networks mediates complex adaptive behaviour in plant communities. AoB Plants, 7. Jacobson, S. K., & Monroe, M. C. (2007). Promoting conservation through the arts: Outreach for hearts and minds. Conservation Biology, 21(1), 7–10. Khait, I., Obolski, U., Yovel, Y., & Hadany, L. (2019, August). Sound perception in plants. In: Seminars in cell & developmental biology (Vol. 92, pp. 134–138). Academic Press. Lêdo, R., Penha, R., Lopes, F. (2019). Music with plants: Cultivating bonds between grade-schoolers and nature through sound design. Consciosness reframed—Sentient States: Bio-mind and the Techno Culture (pp. 68–69). Lopes, F., & Guedes, C. (2020). Composing music with a space. Perspectives of New Music, 58(1), 5–22. https://doi.org/10.7757/persnewmusi.58.1.0005 Lopes, F., Ferreira, R. (2017). Cant(a)eiro: A program for music creation in schools. X International Research in Music Education Conference, (pp. 66–67) Bath-Spa University (UK). Lopes, F., Rodrigues, P. (2014). POLISphone, creating and performing with a flexible soundmap. In Proceedings da International Computer Music Conference & Sound and Music Computer Conference, (pp. 1719–1724). Athens, Greece. Lopes, F., Rodrigues, P. M. (2020). Plantorumori—First report. Proceedings international conference on live interfaces, (pp. 49–55). Lopes, F., Rodrigues, P. M., Rodrigues, H. (2016). Paisagem sonora: Pensamentos POLISphónicos. In: H. Rodrigues, P. Rodrigues, & P. M. Rodrigues (Eds.) Ecos de opus tutti (pp. 145–171). Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian. Mancuso, S., & Viola, A. (2016). Verde brilhante—A sensibilidade e a inteligência das plantas (1st ed.). (I. Canhoto, Trans.) Gradiva.
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Composition as Artistic Device Diogo Alvim
Abstract In this essay I elaborate on different approaches to music composition that show movements of expansion of the music discipline towards the real, lived world. These happen through mechanisms that incorporate what are usually considered extra-musical elements into the musical work. From programme music, to musique concrète, soundscape composition and more recent artistic manifestations that reflect attempts to mean outside the work, this article traverses notions such as autonomy, relational and conceptual music, expansion of the field, and the dispositif to understand how these mechanisms operate. Finally, I will reflect on an artistic device for music creation, that may work as an interface between work and world, giving some examples of my own work.
1 Introduction The composer sits at a desk to write a new composition. On the desk, nothing but a blank piece of paper. The composer tries to conceive a first gesture knowing it will compromise the whole work, and so it needs to be right, to make sense. But no ideas come to mind. This situation reports a classical image associated with the creative process of composers, writers, artists in general, many times referred to as the blank page syndrome. The blank of the page is seen here as a vacuum, void of any reference, meaning or form, from which nothing emanates. It portraits an idealized setting for a specific form of work framed within a larger labour and social structure, a set of institutional codes. In this frame, the blank page will be filled with the help of several possible sources of inspiration. Whether external (a literary source, a fiction, a specific situation) or internal (emotional experiences, personal histories, unconscious D. Alvim (B) CESEM - Centro de Estudos em Sociologia e Estética Musical (Centre for the Study of Sociology and Aesthetics of Music), Faculty of Social and Human Sciences, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_8
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manifestations), the notion of inspiration has its own history that evokes different processes of creative force sustained by an input, something that stimulates. But I want to use this situation as a starting point to elaborate on this relation between what is within the page (the work) and outside (the world) and how this setting assumes a polarity between work and world sustained by pre-determined codes that condition our listening. The traditional work of music composition has tended, since the eighteenth century, to cultivate a separation between what is outside and inside the frame of the work. This exclusion of the real world from the work, has, I believe, contributed to an exclusion of the work from a meaningful position in the world, by creating a parallel discourse conveniently apart of any real implications. There is a growing acknowledgement today that art is never independent of the context of its production and reception. Discussions around autonomy, that is, that art refers to nothing but itself, have been losing strength to a surge of art practices that deliberately seek to relate art and life, or art and world. But it is only recently that this discussion has been the focus of attention in important centres of musical production and academia. Ideas such as absolute music are only now being buried under a profusion of practices that explore different levels of articulation between real-world phenomena and sound, while criticizing a “significant portion of New Music thought and compositional praxis [that] exhibit an excessive inward focus, relying on sounds and musical morphologies discovered and developed by composers from previous generations” (Llach, 2018: 53). In this essay, I will elaborate on different manifestations of this process that relate world and musical work in ways that question processes of autonomy. Furthermore, I will reflect on different artistic approaches with the intention to outline an artistic research path and to develop methodologies that will allow different articulations to be made between music and world.
2 The Paper Exercise
There is no such thing as an empty space or an empty time. There is always something to see, something to hear. (Cage, 1961: 7).
The blank page is never void. Even if we ignore the staves in the case of music paper, it has a materiality, a texture, a shape, a way of reflecting the light, etc. This reflection already reveals a relation with external conditions (light) that dynamically affects our perception of this paper. Its form and scale determine a specific contact with the objects surrounding it, including our own body. The paper itself contains a history embedded in its material that points to many different branches of human culture, and therefore we cannot say the paper is a void. There are many aspects of this “blank page” situation that are left out, and thus a certain prescription in the act of composing is exposed. There is a protocol that determines the limits of this act, the boundaries of the discipline and of the object. Of course we cannot equate the work
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to the object ‘sheet of paper’ (though it has not been uncommon to value the score as the musical work itself), but it is enlightening to engage in a cognitive process parallel to the one that took place with minimalist sculpture in the 1960’s. The better new work takes relationships out of the work and makes them a function of space, light, and the viewer’s field of vision. The object is but one of the terms in the newer aesthetic. It is in some way more reflexive because one’s awareness of oneself existing in the same space as the work is stronger than in previous work, with its many internal relationships (Morris, 1995: 15).
The acknowledgement of these external relationships were to change sculpture through what was later termed the expanded field (Krauss 1979). Morris signaled the expanded situation of the work by recognizing a network of operations put in motion by certain objects within the space of (around) the work in relation with the viewer. We can argue those operations already existed in earlier sculpture, as well as behind this struggle to find inspiration to fill the blank page, but they were negated by a protocol of procedures that dictate what is internal and external, included and excluded (of the work, of the practice). It is this protocol, this behavioral code that has so many times been questioned, subverted and transformed in different artistic domains, and that has been resisting in many musical practices and concert listening etiquette until recently. There is an exercise I like to try with my students that plays with this situation and proposes an expansion (if modest) of the musical field. I present a blank piece of paper from which they are asked to create music. Not in which, but from which. This exercise is based on Georges Self’s exercise “Trancription”: Issue each student with a sheet of paper. Ask them to fold their paper in half and carefully crease it down the centre, and then tear the paper along the fold. Have the group been aware of the sounds that were made? Three distinct sounds of folding, creasing and tearing? Or were they expecting to write, and more concerned about finding their pens? Inform the group that the pieces are to be used as musical instruments… (Self, 1974: 19).
Self’s exercise finishes with the transcription of the sound made with the paper into traditional instruments. But even before that, it points to a break, not only with the traditional music protocol, but with the paper protocol as well. The paper is not a blank page to be written on, it is a material to create sound. And thus we can go further than creasing and tearing, and explore other sonic possibilities with other gestures, different papers, and of course, with microphones. As soon as we open the possibilities, students come up with questions and ideas about which papers to use—what type of paper? Can it be a paper cup? A paper box? Can it be written, can I read it? There are always other layers of possibilities that come up in this process by engaging with the piece of paper as an actual material for composition. This opens new semantic possibilities that inform the composition. The paper is not a musical material, but in a way it becomes one. It is a compositional subject, it establishes a musical programme.
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3 Music with a Programme
Properly speaking, … programme music is music with a programme (Scruton, 2001).
Programme music offered a way to connect music to extra-musical ideas, by defining an external narrative that musical materials would depict or represent. Some composers would argue it allowed them to draw inspiration from different sources and thus renew musical material. A strategy to fill in the void of the blank page. The term was coined by Liszt in 1855, and refers to music of a narrative or descriptive kind, or even “all music that attempts to represent extra-musical concepts without resort to sung words” (Scruton, 2001). The concept came from Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique, and his idea that “The outline of the instrumental drama, which lacks the help of words, needs to be explained in advance” and that the “distribution of the programme to the audience at concerts … is indispensable for a complete understanding of the dramatic outline of the work” (cited in Taruskin 2010: 321). There are several implications in this idea, the most relevant, perhaps, being that music is not able to fully convey the composer’s intended message. This points to the problem of representation. The term ‘programme music’ came to be applied not only to music with a story but also to music designed to represent a character (Strauss’s Don Juan and Don Quixote) or to describe a scene or phenomenon (Debussy’s La mer). What is common to all these is the attempt to ‘represent’ objects in music (Scruton, 2001).
But these representations worked with idealized, subjective associations between ideas and sounds, through a literary text, for example. It is for this reason that programme notes had to be handed out, allowing those arbitrary relations to be known beforehand, and thus condition listening in the intended way. Programme music became a widespread idea in the nineteenth century, and a strong contestant to absolute music where the ‘specifically musical composer’,… places value only on ‘using material’… a ‘formalist’, a ‘mere musician’, who is ‘capable of nothing better or cleverer than to use, propagate, arrange, and occasionally develop that which has already been achieved by others.’ The composer of program music, by contrast, is a ‘tone-poet’ who draws on ever-new sources of inspiration (Bonds 2014: 210, citing Liszt).
The extra-musical references or ideas were understood by the composer of programme music as a lever towards creativity and a way to guide the listener “to a state of transcendence” (Bonds 2014: 214), that the self-contained, absolute music could not. Nevertheless, we could argue that the opposition between programme and absolute music did not overcome the problem of autonomy—both worked on a level detached from the real world. If the extra-musical ideas were understood as ways to enhance the musical experience, they operated at the expense of bringing the attention away from the object or its expanded situation. The programme aimed not at the concrete real-world experience of the work, but at another narrative, parallel, perhaps conveniently distant.
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4 Absolute Zero The apparent impossibility to create clear, objective relations between ideas and sound contributed to take absolute music to become “the dominant idea of art music in the Twentieth Century, because it was almost impossible for composers to compose with any other aesthetic material than sounds produced by acoustic instruments” (Lehmann, 2020). Absolute music, a romantic notion well absorbed into later modernist ideals, assumed a relation to the world through analogy—where “the structure of pure instrumental music reflected the structure of the Universe” (ibid.). This would be the perfect alibi to remove the composer-genius from any responsibility regarding worldly matters such as the production, distribution or reception of the work, so strongly determined and sustained by the musical institutions such as academias, orchestras and publishers. The absolute New Music work simply obeys the laws of material progress and is immune to any contamination by elements outside the fortified walls of its field. But how innocent were composers of absolute music? How autonomous can a work of art be? We could question the efficacy of this detachment by analysing the motivations behind the construction of the boundaries that define the work, the discipline, or the institution. In the period after the Second World War, for example, material autonomy, as part of the ideal of absolute music, was favoured by Western composers as a way to guarantee ethical autonomy. “Freed from the distasteful servitude of politics, composers embraced the aesthetics of absolute music as never before, for it offered them the prospect of a truly cosmopolitan art, one that transcended national boundaries and ideological differences” (Bonds 2014: 297). This was a reaction to “Eastern bloc regimes [that] denounced as ‘formalist’ any art that was not socially engaged” (ibid.). But this ‘formalism’ nevertheless ended up serving Western ideologies of purity and individual freedom during the Cold War (ibid.). As much as an artist may refuse to say anything about the world, how far can their work and work process remain neutral, uncompromised?
5 Concrete Sounds, Abstract Music It is not until the invention of electroacoustic music that composers were able to create music that could, through recording technologies, clearly refer to something beyond itself and open a new chapter in the discussion of autonomy. Sounds could evoke other things not musical, and potentiate a less arbitrary field of associations as in previous representation attempts, a clearer indication of ideas. But even with the many possibilities of the new sound technologies, there was resistance to an opening up of sound as reference. Musique Concrète, that started as an art that used concrete sounds from the concrete world to create music, soon focused on the exhaustive study of the timbral qualities of these captured sound objects, excluding any reference to cause or source,
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and thus reducing its potential meaning. Pierre Schaeffer’s sound objects are indeed reified reductions of a larger sonic reality that is much more complex and difficult to classify. That’s why they require a reduced listening. [Schaeffer’s] insistence on reduced listening means that musique concrète was intended to refine and accelerate the development of a primarily timbral discourse which had already had a long history within western music… If the search for source or cause is to be bracketed out then the field of play of such timbral music is made much richer by the materials of musique concrète but is in principle not changed in its aesthetic aims (Emmerson 2007: 6).
What was a sign of a shift towards the concrete, gave in to the irresistible aesthetic delights of the abstract once more, the detached, the uncompromised. By working the sound object as an abstract entity, the listener experiences a richer sonic field, the blank page is filled with new timbres and sonic gestures. The field of play becomes richer, but not expanded. The ambition turned towards the knowledge and categorization of the sound object as a whole new vocabulary for music. To do that it would be important for Schaeffer to remove not only sound from its context, but context from sound. “Musique concrète requires, in its move to auditory experience and the electronic potential of found sounds, from the acousmatic to the sound object, a suppression of context” (LaBelle, 2006: 31). This would allow the suppression of any identifiable source, and the absence of recognizable references in listening. It is ironic that, in the end, there was nothing concrete in Musique concrète. In fact, it extended an autonomous conception of music by abstracting from it any possible reference. Nevertheless, this polarised contest between the purely timbral qualities of sound and its potential signification was an Achilles’ heal from the start, since listening cannot be so easily reduced, as it is always embedded in a specific context, it evokes and induces. As many sound musicians, sound artists and scholars have been showing since, sounds cannot be reduced to objects, sounds are events, not something that is, but something that happens, communicates and affects. But this extension into recorded sound acted as a Trojan horse containing another world altogether—one which Schaeffer did not accept—where the temptation to refer to things apparently outside ‘music’ would be hard to resist. … We can go even further perhaps risking the assertion: sounds inevitably have associations. So perhaps while the ‘source/cause’ search might be suspended, the ‘association’ of the sound … is certainly not. (Emmerson 2007: 6).
These associations are to a great extent subjective and thus meaning is not something a composer can fully control. Context conditions listening, and listening conditions meaning. The way sounds are exposed acts on the way we listen to them, and thus the construction of meaning starts to expand from the object to the relation between object and listener. The bracketing out of sonic source or cause might be a matter of discipline protocol, one that we choose to engage with in order to determine the aesthetic field of play of music, or even the semantic field of our listening. But with the possibilities offered by recorded sound, the brackets had been breached.
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6 Real World Sounds There are a few examples of a voluntary expansion of the sonic reach in instrumental music in the Twentieth Century. Russolo, Satie and Cage experimented with different types of breaches where some form of relation between sound and context would be established. But it is Cage that takes this mission further. For in this new music nothing takes place but sounds: those that are notated and those that are not. Those that are not notated appear in the written music as silences, opening the doors of the music to the sounds that happen to be in the environment. This openness exists in the fields of modern sculpture and architecture. The glass houses of Mies van der Rohe reflect their environment, presenting to the eye images of clouds, trees, or grass, according to the situation (Cage, 1961: 7–8).
Cage’s 4 33” is still a landmark for exposing our cultural boundaries that enclose music as a discipline. Here, the brackets are reversed and the world is included in the work as we inadvertently listen to the everyday. This gesture would have an effect on many artists since then. One of those artists was Luc Ferrari that, having worked with Schaeffer, would develop an alternative route to musique concrète, and succumb to the irresistible world of sonic associations. Musique concrète was a kind of abstractisation [sic] of sound—we didn’t want to know its origin, its causality… Whereas here I wanted you to recognize causality—it was traffic noise, it wasn’t just to make music with but to say: this is traffic noise! [Laughs.] Cage’s influence, perhaps (Ferrari and Warburton 1998).
Ferrari met Cage at the Darmstadt courses in 1958 and this encounter would bring about the motivation needed to break with Schaefferian thought. His Presque Rien nº1 became a landmark in electroacoustic music bringing to the studio what 4 33” had brought to the concert hall—the mundane and the everyday. But while Cage invited the public to listen to the world between the notes, Ferrari would compose from his recordings, and invite listeners to engage with specific references he established through sound. Presque Rien No. 1 from 1970 caused a slight rift in the GRM studios through its reference to the real as autobiographical narrative rather than sonic material, as insistence on the source as opposed to an abstracted imaginary (LaBelle, 2006: 31).
At the same time Luc Ferrari was exploring sound as referent, composers at Simon Fraser University were developing research around Murray Schafer’s notion of the Soundscape. This research lead to a wide variety of concepts, practices and disciplines. From acoustic ecology, to soundscape composition, soundwalks, field recording, and so many other forms of phonography, the soundscape is not a stable concept, as it keeps developing and branching out, but has become a field of inquiry about the environment and our relation to it through listening. Soundscape Composition is a widespread practice today that oscillates between a more acousmatic approach, and a more referential one, where listening is conducted towards some aspect of the world. The relevance here is the development of compositional techniques that depend on the listener’s “recognizability of the source material”
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and “knowledge of the environmental and psychological context” to “complete the network of meaning ascribed to the music” (Truax, 1996: 63). In this line of thought, Barry Truax has recently expanded his notion of Soundscape Composition towards an idea of “context-based composition”, “where real-world contexts inform the design and composition of aurally based work at every level, that is, in the materials, their organisation, and ultimately the work’s placement within cultural contexts” (Truax, 2017: 1). This seems to establish further the expansion of a field of play beyond the musical or sonic object, particularly in the field of electroacoustic compositional practice. Here, musical materials are not notes or sound objects, but extracts from the concrete world, recognizable and evocative, integrated in a complex and distributed network of relations that condition and affect listening. In his proposal, Truax identifies the precedence of Katherine Norman’s Real World Music and her three modes of listening—referential, reflective and contextual—that he categorizes respectively as objective, subjective and communication approaches (ibid.). If a first strong wave of breaking the autonomy of the work came with the development of recording technologies, enabling sounds to refer to real things or events, sound art and experimental music brought into the sonic domain new approaches that were also in operation in the visual arts and performance practices. For a long time excluded from the classical music institutions, there is a wider recognition today of the contributions of many other musics, multimedia crossings, sound installations and a great variety of sonic experiments, to the development of a richer sonic culture. This larger field unveiled different vectors of interaction with real word experience and everyday life that would stress the detachment of the classical and the New Music traditions. Sound installations exposed the space and the presence of the listener, multimedia works crossed between media and disciplines, and experimental music performances explored non intentionality, the physicality of sound, and focused on “the time and place in which it occurs”, revealing a “non-fictional music” that would “speak to our interaction with the world” (Gottschalk, 2016: 4). A music that “does not suggest ‘other worlds’, but instead strengthens relations with this world” (ibid.).
7 Relations and Concepts Moving progressively away from dichotomies such as popular and classical music, or low and high culture, music has been further transformed by digital technologies, becoming more accessible, more democratic, more diverse. “The more art music becomes accessible, the more it loses its elite status” (Lehmann, 2020). Harry Lehmann, in a much discussed book published in German in 2012 (with a French translation in 2017), argued that the digital revolution has been expanding the possibilities of music creation within a new paradigm, where composers are not so much concerned about finding new sounds anymore, but on finding new modes of relation between music and ideas, resulting in what he called relational music.
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Distancing himself from Nicola Bourriaud’s notion of relational aesthetics (Bourriaud, 2002), where some kind of relation between aesthetic and social processes take place, Lehmann’s more “broader” notion points to “the set of relationships that music weaves with what normally is not part of it: images, actions, words” (Lehmann, 2017: 2724). Lehmann takes these ideas further pointing to the end of material progress, and the emergence of a new aesthetics—of musical Gehalt, or content as perceived. With the digital revolution, and the consequent weakening of institutions, musical creation becomes more dispersed and democratic. Composers are more free to work with cheaper, more accessible tools, and conceive new and different programmes for their music, bypassing many of the constraints imposed by traditional institutions. Drawing from Foucault’s concept of the dispositif (the device or apparatus), Lehmann analyses New Music institutions as power forces that determine the boundaries of knowledge, a formal manifestation of the protocol mentioned above. Quoting a much quoted Foucault interview, the dispositif is a “system of relations”, a thoroughly heterogeneous ensemble consisting of discourses, institutions, architectural forms, regulatory decisions, laws, administrative measures, scientific statements, philosophical and moral philanthropic propositions—in short, the said as much as the unsaid (Foucault 1980: 194).
Moreover, dispositifs are also devices of power that shape thinking, feelings, behaviours and the actions of actors in a social field” (Lehmann, 2017: 78). If academia, orchestras, concert halls and their etiquettes, are all part of a system of relations, a dispositif , we can argue that there was already a strong connection between world and work, because the boundaries of the musical work, or the musical discipline relate to those larger structures of power in play outside the strict musical field. By containing the content of the work, these institutions both legitimize and crystallize the work. They give it strength, hold it in place, but hamper any movement of expansion or relation beyond its well-established boundaries. The apparent autonomy and freedom of absolute music is therefore an illusion, as it is hostage to the perpetuation of institutionalized discourses. However, “device-oriented analyzes have emancipatory potential, provided they show not only reality but also historically formed power relations, the fact that they are constituted and contingent” (ibid.). Lehmann’s arguments have been very much debated, but have brought a significant contribution to the discussion about the possible ways of relating music and ideas, expanding the semantic reach of music. If, he argues, on one hand, after Cage and Lachenman, material progress has exhausted itself, on the other hand the digital revolution weakened institutions by transforming the dispositif . This allowed composers to expand beyond the established boundaries and find new alternatives to the progress of New Music by creating relations and inserting concepts in musical discourse. Concepts, Lehmann argues, have always been present in music, but New Music institutions strongly resisted their acknowledgment, and the idea of an “authentic music remains pure instrumental music, and a concept represents to it something extramusical” (Lehmann, 2017: 2495). However “when, on the other hand, a clearer
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deinstitutionalization of contemporary music is achieved, the time for musical concepts will have come”. His discourse accompanies the practice of composers that are part of what has recently been called New Conceptualism, where “the focus on music’s potential to function as a signifier, to evoke additional meaning, and to convey a particular content is an important aspect for many composers” (Ciciliani, 2017: 30). We can argue that any musical composition already has a strong conceptual dimension, for example, in the application and manipulation of musical concepts such as a note, a chord, a serial tone row, etc. Such abstract elements are conceptual entities, indeed reductions of a larger sonic field, but internal to the musical field. Thus, perhaps it is more relevant to discuss, not if concepts are part of the musical field, but how they can operate both intra and extra, and therefore question and transform its boundaries. Different manifestations of conceptual music have been much discussed and criticized (see for example Erwin, 2016 and Iddon, 2016). We can argue that “all sorts of conceptualism in music rest on the invocation of additional meanings that certain materials carry” (Ciciliani, 2017: 30), but I believe that what is relevant is not if the music is conceptual, not if musical material changes from the technical operations with sounds to clever operations with meanings, but how concepts operate in favour of a meaningful musical experience. How they contribute to a dispositif that relates sounds and meanings, regardless of them being intra- or extra-musical, and how in fact they expand the relations towards social processes. This resonates with Brian Holmes, who recognizes an “urgent need for an articulation of aesthetics and thinking… or for what might be called a cognitive creativity” (Holmes, 2006: 413). I’ll come back to the idea of the extra-musical with Holmes, but before that I want to expand on the notion of the dispositif as a tool for the creative process and the basis for an articulation with the world.
8 The Artistic Device Lehmann speaks of Foucault’s dispositif as the power system exercised by the institutions that conditions the musical production. This is a fundamental and urgent perspective, if very much resisted by the musical institutions themselves for obvious reasons. But we can read the dispositif in a wider frame that becomes instrumental to understand and even undermine crystallized forces. The dispositif also constitutes the way the musician occupies the stage, the electroacoustic apparatus, the thought process of composition, concert behavioral norms, etc., and therefore it is a potential instrument—a device—to analyze, recognize, and deconstruct power within the creative process. The device, as Foucault says, is the system of relations between all its heterogeneous elements. But it is also the singular instance where those relations break down, reorganize themselves, turn to other purposes (Holmes, 2006: 414).
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Brian Holmes, in a much referenced text of 2006, takes Foucault’s dispositif to this broader field, by analysing not only how it operates within the art world but also within art works. [T]he articulation of heterogeneous elements that constitutes the device is used for many purposes at once; and it’s precisely this multiplicity of purpose that is guided or managed in accordance with a strategy dictated by a need, by a structural imperative (Holmes, 2006: 413).
The device can be used as an instrument of artistic creation, critical analysis and perpetual transformation by articulating between elements that lie inside and outside the work. If used in music creation, it becomes instrumental to a musical practice that decodes its own boundaries and the models of social operations that condition it. A device that allows the musical discipline to comprehend the world, while opening not just to the extramusical, but to the extradisciplinary, a term Brian Holmes develops from Foucault once more. What we have is the exact operation of the very device that Foucault describes, the panopticon, which consists in internalising the disciplinary force, so it no longer weighs upon you in the outside world because it weighs upon you in your own world. They don’t have to lock the door anymore, because the bars are in your head. That means they can be displaced, moved, recombined … This society… in which all sorts of passages from one discipline to the other are completely possible and in fact carried out all the time, and yet in which the force of the discipline remains extremely strong (Holmes, 2010).
The extramusical, what is outside the discipline, outside the institutional field of play, can be understood in terms of what is not supposed to be considered in listening (think of Cage), and in composing—everyday sounds, images, scientific data, certain concepts and behavioral codes, etc. I am not arguing that musicians should play within other disciplines, outside the musical field, rather that we may conceive a device that operates on a level higher than the walls between the disciplines and to allow transposition and confrontation as an attempt to transform the initial discipline, to end its isolation, to open up new possibilities of expression, analysis, cooperation and commitment. This back-and-forth movement, or rather, this transformative spiral, is the operative principle of what I will be calling extradisciplinary investigations (Holmes, 2007: 2).
An artistic device in music, allows the musical work to open to the extra, dissolving the question of autonomy. It potentiates a deeper experience of sound and music through the implication of ideas, concepts, indicating, referring, evoking and provoking, where meaning is constructed not in the (musical) object, but in its relations to the world. The object itself has not become less important. It has merely become less self -important (Morris, 1995: 17).
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9 Expanded Practices There are many examples today of practices that, in different ways, engage with elements that could be considered extramusical, and expand the musical field of play. The reference to Krauss has recently been picked up in the European art musical domain by Marko Ciciliani, where many forms of expansion have been identified and explored in a gathering of expanded composers in the 2016 summer course at Darmstadt (Ciciliani, 2017). There is something absurd in this seemingly overdue transgression of the boundaries of absolute music in one of the institutions most responsible for promoting musical autonomy after World War II. But even if it sounds as if Darmstadt suddenly opened up to experimental music—Cicilliani considers this a relatively young development (ibid.: 24), this is a strong sign of the institutional weakening referred above, and an important step towards acknowledging the role of experimental practices in opening the frame of the institutionalized musical object to the world. Ciciliani’s expanded field of music is understood as transgression in terms of aesthetic disciplines, medias and practices (dance, theatre, video, etc.), by artists to whom “sound alone is no longer sufficient to express their musical ideas” (ibid.). Focusing on “music as a practice that allows the inclusion of non-sonic elements”, Ciciliani identifies three criteria that operate this expanse: intertextuality, physicality and modes of listening/ economy of attention. If this echoes some of the notions mentioned above, it also resonates with other thesis of sound-art that have been claiming the relational dimension of sound for a while now (for example Labelle, 2006, and Kim-Cohen, 2009). Thus, we can identify different standpoints and strategies to expand musical practice. From multidisciplinary, conceptual, relational, referential, contextual or expanded, many artists are re-orienting music creation towards finding new modes of relations with the world, facing “outward and relate to elements of contemporary culture and society” (Llach, 2018), in strategies that point in the direction of the design of artistic devices. My interest is not so much in identifying or promoting expansion per se, but to understand and develop the mechanisms of intertextuality, interference and transformation between work and world that disturb stable notions of objects, works and disciplines. Thus, a deliberate confrontation of the disciplines which may likely already be operative within yourself, can be something quite interesting because it will open up some realms of the social unconscious which are maintained strongly by this disciplinary operations (Holmes, 2010).
In the practice-based research I developed for my PhD (Alvim, 2016), through a confrontation between music and architectural practice, I arrived at a notion of musical programme that indicated the dispositif : Composing can be an exercise of programming by framing, and the margins [of the work, where the frame lies] are the permeable site that provides the compositional material, converting context into content, allowing the world to leak into the work (Alvim, 2018: 8).
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The musical programme (making the parallel with the architectural programme) could be a way to frame what the work is about, what it concerns, or indicates, not so much symbols or fictions, but the site, its materials, a situation, a context, its historic implications and potentialities. Through the programme, music generates a specific field of play that may include what might have been extra-musical elements, and listening becomes an experience that relates, or involves the lived world. As I argued, “the composer is an architect: not an organiser of form, but a planner of situations, an instigator of events, designing and orchestrating conditions towards a relational creativity that is not a reflection of society, but a project of sociality” (ibid.). The artistic device therefore is an approach that responds to this ambition. It resolves an inconsistency of the programme, that oscillated between an instrument of control (imposing an intended message) and an open indication of concern or context, where listening may wander freely. The device can be an instrument that articulates different levels of the work’s ontology, establishes open and unpredictable situations, allowing a constant renewal of connections between concepts, sounds, listeners and world. “To think about the device as a concept and methodology would be… to think about the dynamic processes, beyond the work, closed in itself … to think of its impact on reality and the possibility of transforming it in a very concrete way” (Rykner 2019: 5). If a programme points, suggests, delimitates, a device opens, relates, and operates in real-time and in real-world. My PhD focused on how architectural thought and practice can inform musical composition. Architectural practice as a model for composition broadened my practice by articulating it with different notions of materiality, site, drawing, programme and use, allowing for an expanded compositional field that includes elements previously excluded from the musical process. Composition needn’t be an inward-looking solitary activity. It can encompass, like architectural practice, a wider scope of activities and concerns that, I believe, give the composer a possibility for a more consequential place in society. Moreover, in almost fifteen years of collaborating with artists from other disciplines, I experimented with work models from different areas of knowledge ranging from visual and installation art, to performance art, dance and theatre, film and other experimental forms. This allowed for a continuous practice of musical creation that dialogues with extramusical elements and nurtured a motivation to explore further the strategies and methodologies that can articulate music and what we may call a real-world experience (the concrete, the everyday, the intersubjective, the situated). More recently I have been trying to apply these principles through a series of works that I called Desk Job. They are live performances, where a specific context or situation is analysed to inform the composition, and integrated in the work to enhance the listening experience. The title comes from the idea of the traditional practice of the composer, as that of the architect, that works at a desk—sketching, planning (programming), projecting an action in the future. The desk embodies an idea of a solitary work, intellectual, detached from the world. It is where the blank paper sits, waiting to be filled with lines and little black dots. The composer projects ideas of sound in a private, creative operation. But here, that projection becomes
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performative, and deferred time becomes real time, subverting traditional concert modes. Three main works were already developed under this series and all explore compositional methodologies that involve the experience of the specific situation, creating a dynamic relation between experienced sound and real world. They consist of a common device that includes a desk, and a camera that projects on a wall or another surface what is happening on the desk. That includes a computer and a few controllers, but also an amplified board (with a couple of contact microphones) where things can be written, drawn or touched, and sounded. For each iteration of the work, the device is further developed as a response to the specific situation, to include compositional and performative operations, actions, behaviours. The actions of composing, drawing, listening and reacting, sounding and improvising, become public, shared in a presentation setting that is not so much a concert, but an exposition. The processes that generate the sound are part of the work, affecting the listening through new possibilities of associations. The first piece, Da Tradução1 (On Translation), was presented at an art gallery in Lisbon in 2016. It took its name from an essay by Paul Ricouer and proposed a translation of the gesture of writing and drawing into sound. I selected a few graphic and verbal scores from a few composers from the 60 s and 70 s, and instead of interpreting them, I played these scores by drawing them on the amplified board. The sound of the pen that reconstituted these scores was not their intended output, but became a different musical material that negotiated with them. The perception of these sounds was bound with the content of the scores creating new readings, expectations, contradictions. The second piece, 1/5002 (2017) is a performance / installation that established a relationship with the city of Lisbon sustained by a reduction in scale. Based on a network that connected various points of the city through sound, the piece proposed a listening situation in which the sound spatialization refers to the broad geographical context of the city. Sounds live-streamed from several remote and distant places, converged in a space that represented the city on a 1/500 scale (the loudspeakers were positioned in the relative locations). These sounds were processed using parameters developed on a map, set on a table (the desk) and projected on a wall. The installation was manipulated at various times, accumulating processes that related the sound to the distances between the locations. Finally, Material Music3 was presented at the CNEAI (in Pantin, outside Paris) that same year, and was created from an installation by the artist Ramiro Guerreiro (Portable Structures for Potential Gatherings), with which it interacted. The installation was the basis for a sound composition that played with the materials used by the artist. Material Music emphasized the tactile, haptic dimension of sound, using physical materials as musical materials. The device engaged the audience in
1
http://www.diogoalvim.com/portfolio/trabalho-de-mesa/ http://www.diogoalvim.com/portfolio/1500/ 3 http://www.diogoalvim.com/portfolio/material-music/ 2
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an interior space of play framed by the installation structure that was sounded by the performance. In these works, sounds become charged with relational potential, not in a symbolic subjective way, but concrete, experiential. The artistic device of the Desk Job, tried to open a creative arena where the framed situation provides the materials and suggests the forms and gestures for musical creation. The device is mutable and adapts to each specific situation while at the same time configuring the work in its openness and permeability. The device presents itself as a way of fragmentation, contamination and dissemination of meaning; it shuffles the boundaries and disturbs representation allowing these to open to the confusing real that does not adapt well to any type of imposed scores (Rykner 2019: 45).
10 Conclusion In this text I tried to map different movements of expansion in musical works reflecting on the different processes that connect them to the real, lived world. My goal is not to argue for the same ambition as the avant-garde that “intends the abolition of the autonomous art by which it means that art is to be integrated into the praxis of life” (Bürger, 1984: 54), for it would either dissolve art in the world, or require a fully radical revolution of life itself. And although that may sound appealing, bourgeois art has demonstrated many times how it falls short of achieving that goal, and ends up feeding a system of consumer aesthetics that betrays any revolutionary project. Instead, I want to investigate mechanisms of articulation between musical creation and world, that may expand the semantic reach of a work, setting in motion transformative operations that allow it to play on a more meaningful field, and find a more consequent place in the world. What emerges from this kind of practice is a new definition of art as a mobile laboratory and experimental theatre for the investigation and instigation of social and cultural change (Holmes, 2006: 412).
In Desk Job, the blank page on the composer’s desk is not a neutral void. It already reflects the world, while providing a point of tangency, a surface of agency between extramusical ideas and performance, between sounds and the world. The sounds that emanate from the desk work carry a content that condition the listening of the work towards the outside, where it claims its field. It is the device that creates the interface between the work and the world, between us and the work, and in the end, between us and the world (it allows the work to open to the complexity of the world) (Rykner 2019: 45).
The artistic device as a method for musical creation, is a catalyst for a process of cognitive creativity, and might facilitate a potential space for alternative narratives, a wider programme that effectively constructs meaningful experiences, with a transformative potential. Not representational, as the device “allows to leave the exclusively symbolic level” (Rykner 2019: 40), but present, concrete. By letting the real-world into the work, the work might find a better place in the real-world.
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References Alvim, D. (2016). Music through architecture—Contributions to an expanded practice in composition. [Unpublished doctoral dissertation]. Queen’s University Belfast. http://www.diogoalvim. com/phd/ Alvim, D. (2018). As the world leaks into the work: Composition and architecture. Organised Sound, 23(1), 51–60. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1355771817000279 Bonds, M. E. (2014). Absolute music: The history of an idea. Oxford University Press. Bourriaud, N. (2002). Relational aesthetics. Les Presses du réel. Bürger, P. (1984). Theory of the avant-garde. Manchester University Press. Cage, J. (1961). Silence: Lectures and writings. Wesleyan University Press. Ciciliani, M. (2017). Music in the expanded field—On recent approaches to interdisciplinary composition. In Darmstädter Beiträge zur Neuen Musik, ed. Rebhahn, Michael und Thomas Schäfer: 24, Schott. Emmerson, S. (2007). Living electronic music. Taylor & Francis. Erwin, M. (2016). Here comes newer despair: An aesthetic primer for the new conceptualism of Johannes Kreidler”. Tempo, 70(278), 5–15. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0040298216000292 Ferrari, L., Warburton, D. (1998). Interwiew by Dan Warburton. http://www.paristransatlantic.com/ magazine/interviews/ferrari.html. Accessed 17 Jan 2021. Foucault, M., & Gordon, C. (1980). Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings, 1972–1977. Pantheon Books. Gottschalk, J. (2016). Experimental music since 1970. Bloomsbury Publishing. Holmes, B. (2006). The artistic device, or, the articulation of collective speech. Ephemera, 6(4), 411–432. Holmes, B. (2007). Extradisciplinary Investigations. Towards a New Critique of Institutions. In https://transversal.at/transversal/0106/holmes/en. Accessed 17 Jan 2021. Holmes, B. (2010). The artistic device, Lecture at the Brian Holmes symposium at Van Abbe Museum. https://youtu.be/L6EoCVeu1UU. Accessed 17 Jan 2021. Iddon, M. (2016). Outsourcing progress: On conceptual music. Tempo, 70(275), 36–49. Kim-Cohen, S. (2009). In the blink of an ear: Toward a non-cochlear sonic art. Continuum. Krauss, R. (1979). Sculpture in the expanded field. October, Vol. 8. (Spring, 1979), 30–44. LaBelle, B. (2006). Background noise: Perspectives on sound art. Continuum. Lehmann, H. (2017). La Révolution digitale dans la musique: Une philosophie de la musique. Allia [Kindle ebook. Numbers indicate kindle location. My translation]. Lehmann, H. (2020). A reflexive notion of music. Zoom Lecture at CONTRASTS, 26. International festival of contemporary music lviv, 2th of October 2020. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= FvKyXOQOHCc&t=833s. Accessed 17 Jan 2021. Llach, F. (2018). Multidisciplinarity and reference as a solution to inward-focused approaches in music composition. Tempo, 72(286), 53–63. Cambridge University Press. doi:https://doi.org/10. 1017/S0040298218000359. Morris, R. (1995). Continuous project altered daily: The writings of Robert Morris. MIT Press. Rykner, A. (2019). Nota sobre o dispositivo. Edições Afrontamento. Self, G. (1974). Make a new sound. Universal Edition. Scruton, R. (2001). Programme music. Grove music online. Oxford University Press. https://doi. org/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.22394. Accessed 12 Sep 2015. Taruskin, R. (2010). Oxford history of western music: Vol. 35—Music in the nineteenth century. Oxford University Press. Truax, B. (1996). Soundscape, acoustic communication and environmental sound composition. Contemporary Music Review, 15(1–2), 49–65. Truax, B. (2017). Editorial, Organised sound. Cambridge University Press, 22(1), 1–3. https://doi. org/10.1017/S1355771816000285.
Sound Intensity and Loudness of Musical Tones Carlos dos Santos-Luiz
Abstract Psychoacoustics, as an integral part of neuroscience, is the science that studies the correlation between acoustic stimuli and perceived sensation. In neuroscience, importance is given to the higher functions that occur in the brain, namely in the cerebral cortex. Among the subjective qualities that allow us to describe musical sound, we find pitch, loudness and timbre. Loudness variations are important in musical performance, making it more exciting. Musical dynamics is prescribed in the score through dynamic markings (from pp to ff ). The present chapter aims to analyse the relationship between loudness and certain physical parameters, as well as other factors, which can influence loudness perception. Loudness depends mainly on sound intensity (in dB SPL) and corresponds to the perceptual correlate of this physical parameter. However, it also depends on other variables such as frequency, spectrum/spectral bandwidth, duration, context (e.g., room acoustics), and personal factors (e.g., hearing loss). Transformation of the physical sound intensity sensation into loudness perception will only be completed in the auditory cortex.
1 Introduction Sound, being part of our daily lives, allows us to live in a very diverse sound environment (Howard & Angus, 2017; Rossing et al., 2002). Sounds can be produced by humans, animals, machines and natural causes. Generally, sounds associated with music and speech are desirable, while others, such as noise, are not (Rossing et al., 2002). However, in certain situations, noise can be considered a musical sound. Within the scope of the artistic movement called Futurism, Russolo declared a series of ideas in the manifesto L’arte dei rumori (1913). By proposing the use of noise from machines and factories as a musical sound, he built the “intonarumori” machines (noise-intoners) (Griffiths, 1994; Waterhouse, 1980). Composers influenced by futuristic ideas were, for example, Honegger, with the orchestral work Pacific 231 (1923), C. dos Santos-Luiz (B) School of Education At Coimbra Polytechnic, Portugal & CIPEM/INET-md, Porto, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_9
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and Varèse (Griffiths, 1994). The movement led to concrete music and electronic music (Waterhouse, 1980). In the study of a sound communication chain, there is a set of systems that physicists identify as follows: source, medium and receptor (Roederer, 2008). In the case of a musical performance in a concert hall, these systems correspond to the production of sound/music by the performer and their instrument, the propagation of sound through the air of the concert hall, and the listener, who listens to the music (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Roederer, 2008). When we refer to sound, it can have a physical or psychophysical significance. The first refers to the sound source and the propagation of the sound, and the second to its hearing/sensation (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Henrique, 2014; Yost, 2006). Therefore, the word sound can describe a wave motion in elastic media such as air or other, referring to a stimulus. It can also describe the perception of sound, as a result of excitation of the auditory system (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015). As for the first stage of the musical communication chain, let us start by mentioning that among the most common sound sources we find vibrating bodies. Musical instruments have vibratory motion as a sound generator. We refer, for example, to the string of string instruments, the air column of wind instruments or the membrane of some percussion instruments (Backus, 1977; Campbell & Greated, 2001; Gough, 2014; Henrique, 2014; Rossing et al., 2002). The next stage of the communication chain focuses on the propagation of sound operated by the medium. Usually, air is the medium we use to listen (Henrique, 2014; Roederer, 2008). When a sound source vibrates (e.g., plucking the string), a train of pulses is created that will travel along the medium through the alternation of compressions and rarefactions of the air molecules, which is called the sound wave (Backus, 1977; Campbell & Greated, 2001; Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Henrique, 2014). Air compressions and rarefactions correspond to pressure fluctuations in relation to atmospheric pressure and this range of pressure variation is called sound pressure (Backus, 1977; Henrique, 2014). That is to say, sound waves are considered pressure waves (Henrique, 2014). The last stage of the communication chain is associated with the reception/perception of sound (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Roederer, 2008). As the sound, and their physical parameters, are processed in the auditory periphery and in the central auditory nervous system, which includes the auditory cortex (Bear et al., 2008; Warren, 2008; Yost, 2006), psychoacoustics and neuroscience assume special relevance. Psychoacoustics or psychological acoustics allow us to explain how we perceive sound (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Howard & Angus, 2017; Rasch & Plomp, 1999; Roederer, 2008; Ziemer, 2020), whereas neuroscience studies “the functions of the neural system linking the information received from environment and body with the full cognitive, emotional, and behavioral output. (…) The main system under study is, obviously, the brain” (Roederer, 2008, p. 12). Musical tone can be described by three subjective qualities, i.e., pitch, loudness and timbre, which establish dependency with physical quantities of sound (Heller, 2013; Roederer, 2008; Rossing et al., 2002). The aim of this chapter is to analyse the relationship between loudness and the physical parameters of sound pressure,
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frequency and spectrum, and also the hearing status (hearing loss), given the relevance of these factors in the perceived loudness of the musical tones. The relationship between physical sound intensity, perceived loudness, and neural activity in the auditory cortex and subcortical auditory regions will also be reported. This study will be based on physical acoustic, psychoacoustic, neuroscience, and musicology.
2 Auditory Sensitivity 2.1 Area of Audibility In the context of auditory perception, let us start by mentioning the sensitivity of the human auditory system in relation to frequency and intensity. Among the loudest audible sounds that can induce pain to the ear and the softest sounds that we can hear, there is an intensity ratio of about 1012 . The intensity range, on the decibel scale, is about 120 dB (0 a 120 dB) (Oxenham, 2013; Rossing et al., 2002). In the range of audible frequencies, we have a frequency ratio of approximately 103 between the lowest and highest frequencies, a frequency range of 20 Hz–20 kHz. In total, the range is between nine and ten octaves (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Rossing et al., 2002). From the combination of frequency and intensity values of pure tones, two curves arise, the threshold of hearing and the threshold of pain, which delimit the extremes of our hearing area (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Ziemer, 2020). The threshold of hearing curve represents the minimum just audible intensity over the frequency range, and the threshold of pain curve, at the other extreme, represents the maximum intensity supported by the ear, also over the frequency range (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Henrique, 2014; Roederer, 2008; Yost, 2006). The most sensitive frequency range is between 2 Hz and 5 kHz, and below and above this range there are areas of less auditory sensitivity, becoming more accentuated below 40 Hz as well as above 10 kHz (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Ziemer, 2020). Beyond the limits of audible sounds (20 kHz), there are infrasounds and ultrasounds, both with frequencies not perceived by humans (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Henrique, 2014; Rossing et al., 2002). Both speech and music use only part of the hearing area. In speech, the intensity range is about 42 dB and the frequency range is between 170 Hz and 4 kHz, approximately (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Henrique, 2014). In speech we do not have sounds that are too soft or loud in intensity, nor extremely low or high frequency sounds (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015). The area of audibility of music is greater than that of speech. Regarding music, the intensity range is around 75 dB and the frequency
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range is between 50 Hz and 10 kHz,1 roughly (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Henrique, 2014).
2.2 Just-Noticeable Difference in Intensity Psychophysics allows us to determine the minimum value of change of a physical parameter (the stimulus) that causes a noticeable variation in the sensation of it (Just Noticeable Difference—JND or Difference Limen—DL), as in the case of intensity and frequency (Roederer, 2008; Rossing et al., 2002; Yost, 2006). We can judge two stimuli as being equal if the difference between them is smaller than the JND (Rossing et al., 2002). In an analysis of the intensity discrimination of various sounds, the just noticeable change in amplitude was found to depend on the signal (pure tone or broadband noise), as well as on its frequency and amplitude (Howard & Angus, 2017). Regarding broadband noise, the sensitivity of the auditory system has a value of 0.5 to 1 dB, for sound levels of about 20 to 100 dB (Howard & Angus, 2017; Yost, 2006). To find the JND, Weber’s law is used, which, based on the Weber fraction (S/S), states that the minimum perceptible difference related to intensity (I ) is proportional to intensity (I). This implies that I /I = constant (Oxenham, 2013; Yost, 2006). As for pure tones, the results are different and depend a lot on amplitude and frequency. Discrimination improves as the sound level rises (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Howard & Angus, 2017; Yost, 2006). Therefore, Yost (2006) reports that the Weber fraction does not apply strictly to pure tones. In conclusion, “it seems that amplitude- or level-processing in hearing is based on an element, the size of which is about 1 dB” (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007, p. 175). In everyday life, contrary to what happens in the laboratory, it is not easy to perceive a 1 dB change in sound level (Fischetti, 2003; Moore, 2014). Moore (2014) indicates 3 dB as easily perceived, which is equivalent to doubling or dividing the intensity by two.
3 Relationship Between Loudness and Physical Parameters Loudness “is an auditory measure of perception and can essentially be defined as the perceived intensity of a sound” (Schmidt et al., 2020, p. 1). In musical performance, this generally refers to the levels of dynamic markings (pp, p, mp, mf , f and ff ) (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Oxenham, 2013; Patterson, 1974), as well as the balance that must exist between musicians in a musical ensemble (e.g., choir and orchestra) (Howard & Angus, 2017). 1
Above 10 kHz, most musical instruments produce little sound, and what is produced in this region is due to noises resulting from the scraping of the bow on the strings, pressing the keys on keyboard instruments, among others (Backus, 1977).
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Loudness correlates mainly with physical sound pressure (or physical sound intensity) (Oxenham, 2013; Rossing et al., 2002; Schneider, 2018a). As a subjective characteristic of sound, loudness depends on other physical parameters in addition to sound intensity. Therefore, its dependence is associated with frequency and spectrum/spectral bandwidth (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Hall et al., 2001; Howard & Angus, 2017; Röhl et al., 2011; Rossing et al., 2002), and duration (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Oxenham, 2013; Röhl et al., 2011; Rossing et al., 2002). Other factors that can influence the loudness judgment are the context in which the sound is found (e.g., other tones simultaneously, and room acoustics) (Howard & Angus, 2017; Meyer, 2009; Oxenham, 2013; Schmidt et al., 2020; Schneider, 2018b; von Ruschkowski, 2013; Winckel, 1962), and personal factors (hearing status and personality traits) (Uppenkamp & Röhl, 2014).
3.1 Loudness and Sound Pressure Sound pressure is related to the sound power,2 which is radiated by the source, and to the sound intensity3 (Rossing et al., 2002). The sound intensity range of the human auditory system that we mentioned above is quite large, with the strongest sound that can induce pain being about 1 billion times louder than the weakest sound capable of being audible (Oxenham, 2013; Rossing et al., 2002). Because of this, it is more practical to use a logarithmic scale4 − the decibel scale (dB)—to describe the sound level, between approximately 0 and 120 dB (Henrique, 2014; Oxenham, 2013; Roederer, 2008; Ziemer, 2020). Decibel values are close to the way the loudness of sounds is heard (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015). It is within the scope of the decibel scale that we find the dynamic markings used by musicians, between pianissimo and fortissimo (Campbell & Greated, 2001). Since our ears are sensitive to pressure variations, it is more convenient to use pressure, rather than intensity, when measuring the amplitude of a sound (Henrique, 2014; Howard & Angus, 2017). This parameter is called sound pressure and corresponds to the rms5 pressure at a given point in a sound wave (Backus, 1977; Howard & Angus, 2017). As the variations in air pressure are extremely small in relation to atmospheric pressure, the minimum amplitude of sound pressure is approximately 2 × 10−5 N/m2 or Pa (20 µPa) and corresponds to the threshold of hearing at 1 kHz; the pressure amplitude about 1 million times greater than the threshold of hearing is 2
Sound power (or acoustic) is the sound energy radiated per unit of time by a sound source (e.g. musical instrument) (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Henrique, 2014). 3 Sound intensity (or acoustic) is the power per unit area carried by a sound wave in a certain direction (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Howard & Angus, 2017; Rossing et al., 2002). 4 One of the reasons for using logarithmic scales is associated with the evidence that our ear responds (auditory perception) in a logarithmic and not linear way (Henrique, 2014; Ziemer, 2020). 5 The rms (root mean square) sound pressure corresponds to a 1/√2(= 0.707) × (peak sound pressure) (Backus, 1977).
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about 20 Pa, and corresponds to the threshold of pain (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Henrique, 2014; Howard & Angus, 2017; Rossing et al., 2002). Knowing that the sound intensity is proportional to the square of the sound pressure (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Howard & Angus, 2017; Rossing et al., 2002), we can describe the latter in terms of sound pressure level (SPL or L p ) (Roederer, 2008). The SPL is defined by the expression S P L = 20 log( p/ p0 ), whose acoustic reference pressure value is p0 = 2 × 10−5 Pa. There is a similar expression for the sound intensity level (SIL or L I ), i.e., S I L = 10 log(I /I0 )6 , whose reference intensity value is I0 = 10−12 W/m2 (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Howard & Angus, 2017; Roederer, 2008; Rossing et al., 2002). The SPL and SIL values are approximately equal (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Howard & Angus, 2017; Roederer, 2008) when referring to a progressive wave, without reflection (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Howard & Angus, 2017). Therefore, they are simply called sound level7 (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Rossing et al., 2002). As examples of sound levels, Henrique (2014) reports the following cases: recording studio (30 dB); library (40 dB); normal conversation (60 dB); urban traffic (70 dB); symphony orchestra in tutti (100 dB); and rock concert with amplification (110/120 dB). Sound levels are measured using a sound-level meter (Henrique, 2014; Rossing et al., 2002). We can find 0 dB in an anechoic chamber (Gough, 2014). In certain contexts, it is interesting to notice the sound level resulting from the combination of several sound sources. In many situations, the existence of several sources is due to an ensemble of musical instruments or their sound reflections in the room (Howard & Angus, 2017). In the case of two or more different musical instruments, the waveforms produced are different at different frequencies. The sources are not coherent.8 Even if the instruments play in unison, we are in the situation of a combination (or sum) of incoherent sound sources, because the differences continue to appear (Fischetti, 2003; Howard & Angus, 2017). If we add two incoherent sound sources, for example, each with 80 dB, we will have a total of 83 dB (Rossing et al., 2002). Thus, whenever we double the number of sources at the same level (this corresponds to doubling the intensity of a source), the sound level increases by 3 dB (Backus, 1977; Fischetti, 2003). That is, we have the same 3 dB increase when we have two violins instead of one or 200 instead of 100 (Fischetti, 2003). When we combine sound sources of equal sound level, as we cannot add the sound levels, we 6
As the sound intensity corresponds to the power per unit area, it relates to the sound power expressed in decibels, i.e., the sound power level (SWL or LW) (Howard & Angus, 2017). The SWL is defined as the sound power radiated by a source in all directions, whose expression is SW L = 10 log(w/w0 ) and the reference power value is W0 = 10−12 (Henrique, 2014; Howard & Angus, 2017). The SWL should not be confused with the SIL, since the first refers to the sound source and the second to the sound at a given point (Rossing et al., 2002). 7 In more accurate measurements, a distinction will have to be made between the two types of levels (e.g. in an auditorium, due to reflections) (Backus, 1977; Rossing et al., 2002). 8 Incoherent sources are independent, uncorrelated, and without a constant phase relationship. Coherent sources, with a constant phase relationship, can lead to destructive or constructive interference. Incoherent sources correspond to the more general case (Breazeale & McPherson, 2014; Fischetti, 2003; Howard & Angus, 2017).
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first convert the dB to W/m2 , then we add the intensities, and finally, convert the result to dB (Backus, 1977; Rossing et al., 2002). For example, if we have a violin playing at 50 dB, the sound level of three violins playing simultaneously at the same level is 54.8 dB (Rossing et al., 2002). In another case, ten sound sources of the same level cause an increase of 10 dB. If the sound levels are different, we can use the same type of calculation. When two singers sing simultaneously, at 69 and 71 dB, the sound level is 73.1 dB (Howard & Angus, 2017).
3.1.1
Musical Dynamics
In musical performance, it is possible to print expressivity through loudness variations. Composers use signs in the scores in order to give musicians relative (not absolute) indications of loudness (Kosta et al., 2018; Meyer, 2009; Rossing et al., 2002). The loudness signals of musical sounds are indicated by means of dynamic markings, whose series can, in general, range from pp (pianissimo—very quiet) to ff (fortissimo—very loud) (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Howard & Angus, 2017; Oxenham, 2013; Patterson, 1974). This series can vary and be extended from ppp (pianississimo—extremely quiet) to fff (fortississimo—extremely loud) (Campbell & Greated, 2001; von Ruschkowski, 2013) or more, considering the periods of music history (Thiemel, 2001). The range of sound level used in musical practice and performance is called dynamic range (Rossing et al., 2002). Dynamics began to be used explicitly as a means of musical expression from approximately 1600. However, in the Baroque period, dynamic markings occurred only sporadically. In the middle of the eighteenth century, with the symphony and the sonata, the dynamics came up with a different concept. In the Classical style, this is associated with the characteristic climax, such as the dynamic contrasts in C.P.E. Bach, Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven. In the nineteenth century, dynamic markings with extreme values appeared, with composers having to give more indications in their scores. Berlioz will have been the first composer to use ffff . As an example of works, we can refer to Requiem Mass, by Verdi (ppppp appears for the first time) (Thiemel, 2001), and Symphony No. 6, Pathétique, by Tchaikovsky (ffff , in a tutti in 3rd movement, and pppppp, in a bassoon solo in the 1st movement). This wider dynamic range will have contributed to the orchestra’s growth in the Romantic period (Campbell & Greated, 2001). Additionally, it was in the middle of the nineteenth century that a major reform took place in relation to the construction of musical instruments, i.e., the strings were rebuilt, some woods were redesigned with the Boehm system, and the trumpets and horns started to have valves. In general, instruments acquired a greater volume of sound (Westrup & Zaslaw, 1980). Regarding the twentieth century, “dynamics came to be seen as one of the fundamental parameters of composition which function interdependently to create musical meaning and structure” (Thiemel, 2001, para. 1). It should be noted, however, that only in the works of each composer, or in certain periods of history, should the dynamic signs be considered identical (Thiemel, 2001).
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Despite our ability to infer sound level differences between two consecutive sounds (JND), we are less able to classify sound levels (Oxenham, 2013). Campbell and Greated (2001) drew attention to the possibility of disagreement between musicians when trying to associate, for a pure sound of 1 kHz, a dynamic marking at different intensities. This possibility justifies the different correspondences that we find between dynamic markings and sound intensity levels (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Henrique, 2014). As an example of scale of musical dynamic levels, we report some correlations presented by Campbell and Greated (2001), because it comprises a wide series of dynamic markings (from ppp to fff ), which is as follows: ppp (30 dB); pp (40 dB); mp (60 dB); mf (70 dB); ff (90 dB); and fff (100 dB). One step up or down on the scale of musical dynamic levels corresponds to about 10 dB. Therefore, it should be noted that the numbers now indicated should be taken as illustrative and not as exact (Backus, 1977). Rasch and Plomp (1999) state that it is not possible to have the same degree of precision when judging musical loudness, in relation to the judgments we make with pitch. The physical parameter of sound intensity is not so easily controlled, since there may be variations in certain aspects (e.g., in sound production, and in the fixed and variable acoustic conditions of a room). That is, “in all the stages on the road from sound production to sound perception, sound pressure level is liable to be altered whereas frequency is not” (p. 101). Winckel (1962), in a study on the acoustic quality of concert halls, found that the dynamic range of orchestral music was roughly between 45 and 95 dB. The lower and upper limits of the dynamic range depend on the characteristics of the room. The study was conducted during a tour with the Cleveland Orchestra, for 15 rooms, and the musical repertoire was often the same, with works from the Classical, Romantic and twentieth century periods.
3.1.2
Hearing Problems in Musicians
Although the range of audible frequencies is generally between 20 Hz and 20 kHz, we can find considerable differences between people (Howard & Angus, 2017; Rossing et al., 2002). Hearing sensitivity in early childhood can reach up to 20 kHz but, throughout life, this upper limit gradually decreases. The loss of sensitivity to the higher frequencies with age is called presbycusis (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Howard & Angus, 2017). Other factors can induce hearing loss, such as exposure to very high sound levels, particularly in professional activities. Among various professions, musicians (Couth et al., 2020; Di Stadio, 2017; Di Stadio et al., 2018; Emmerich et al., 2008; Jansen et al., 2009; Lie et al., 2016; Pawlaczyk-Łuszczy´nska et al., 2011) and music instructors (Crawford et al., 2021) may be subject to noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL). Hearing loss, among other consequences, can affect musicians’ performance negatively (Couth et al., 2020; Sataloff, 1991), as well as being detrimental to the career of music instructors (Crawford et al., 2021). The systematic review by Lie et al. (2016) on occupational noise exposure and hearing in working life, concluded that rock/jazz musicians have a more pronounced
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degree of hearing loss than classical musicians. In line with these results, the literature review by Di Stadio (2017) and the systematic review by Di Stadio et al. (2018), focusing specifically on the hearing problems of professional musicians, report that a hearing loss prevails in pop/rock musicians compared to classical musicians. Referring to the hearing loss in musicians in symphony orchestras, the study by Jansen et al. (2009) indicates that although most musicians have normal hearing, their audiograms have notches at a frequency of 6 kHz, which is associated with NIHL. Moreover, hearing loss is greater than expected for age. In the same context, the study by Emmerich et al. (2008) shows a hearing loss of 15 dB or even higher, with permanent hearing threshold shifts, in a considerable percentage of musicians. The results of Pawlaczyk-Łuszczy´nska et al. (2013) are in line with those of Jansen et al. (2009) and Emmerich et al. (2008). In the professional context of musicians from different musical genres (pop/rock music and classical music), Di Stadio et al. (2018) report that hearing loss had a greater impact on the high frequencies of 3, 4, and 6 kHz. In addition, pop/rock musicians showed a mainly symmetric hearing loss while classical musicians’ hearing loss was predominantly asymmetric. The studies by Lie et al. (2016) and Di Stadio et al. (2018) also report other types of hearing problems in musicians. Hearing complaints are tinnitus9 (Couth et al., 2020; Di Stadio, 2017; Di Stadio et al., 2018; Emmerich et al., 2008; Jansen et al., 2009), hyperacusis (Couth et al., 2020; Di Stadio, 2017; Di Stadio et al., 2018; Jansen et al., 2009) and diplacusis (Di Stadio, 2017; Di Stadio et al., 2018; Jansen et al., 2009). With regard to the manifestation of these hearing problems in professional pop/rock and classical musicians, tinnitus is distributed in a very similar way between the two groups, and diplacusis manifests itself more in classical musicians (Di Stadio et al., 2018). Considering the type of musical instrument, and in a decreasing order of number of cases, hearing loss was found in professional string instrument musicians (instruments of the violin family), percussion instruments, brass instruments, double bass,10 electric guitar, piano, and flute (Di Stadio et al., 2018). The study by PawlaczykŁuszczy´nska et al. (2011) reports that the instruments representing the highest risk of inducing hearing loss (above 20%) to professional orchestral musicians are brass instruments (horn, trumpet and tuba) and percussion. In musicians from three German orchestras, Emmerich et al. (2008) indicate a greater hearing loss in string and brass players. Among the violinists of one of the orchestras, greater hearing loss was found in the left ear, in the frequency of 4 kHz, in the group of musicians aged between 40 and 49 years old. For music instructors, those associated with brass instruments and conducting are at risk for NIHL (Crawford et al., 2021).
9
Tinnitus is a disorder in which a person hears ringing in the absence of a physical sound source (Yost, 2006). 10 Here, the double bass is placed separately from the violin family, because it is not strictly considered as the bass member of that family (Campbell & Greated, 2001).
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3.2 Loudness Level: Phons Normally, sounds with high sound levels also sound louder. However, this does not always happen (Rossing et al., 2002), because the loudness of a sound depends a lot on the frequency (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Oxenham, 2013; Rossing et al., 2002). Tones of different frequency, but with the same SPL, generally sound with different loudness. The SPL is not a measure of loudness that makes it possible to conveniently compare tones of different frequencies. Therefore, the loudness level magnitude is introduced (Roederer, 2008). Fletcher and Munson (1933) determined the equal-loudness level contours for pure sounds. The contours reflect the sensitivity of the ear according to the resonance effects of the outer ear (external auditory channel), with the first resonance frequency about 3.5 kHz (Heller, 2013; Howard & Angus, 2017; Roederer, 2008; Rossing et al., 2002), and the second resonance frequency about 13 kHz (Howard & Angus, 2017; Rossing et al., 2002). The contours also show the insensitivity of the ear to sounds of low frequency, especially at low sound levels (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Heller, 2013; Roederer, 2008; Rossing et al., 2002). The equal-loudness level contours are recommended by the International Standards Organization (ISO, 2003) and are identical to those of Fletcher and Munson (Rossing et al., 2002). The loudness level unit is the phon (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Rossing et al., 2002; Yost, 2006), and the “phon value of a sound is the dB SPL value of a 1-kHz tone that is judged to have the same loudness as the sound” (Oxenham, 2013, p. 6). The phons scale has a range of 0 to 120 phons, approximately. The basic principle is that all sounds (different frequencies) on the same contour provide the same loudness (Henrique, 2014). For example, two tones, 1 kHz and 20 Hz, sound equally loud at 30 phons, if they have 30 and 88 dB, respectively (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015). Although the phon is an arbitrary unit, the equal-loudness level contours have practical application (Oxenham, 2013; Rossing et al., 2002). Because loudness varies with frequency, the phons scale allows us to better understand the correspondences between dynamic markings and sound intensity levels in the sequence reported above. Thus, we include loudness levels in that sequence. According to Campbell and Greated (2001), the correspondences are: ppp (30 dB; 30 phons); pp (40 dB; 40 phons); mp (60 dB; 60 phons); mf (70 dB; 70 phons); ff (90 dB; 90 phons); and fff (100 dB; 100 phons). For example, if a pure tone of 1 kHz with 60 dB has a loudness approximate to the dynamic sign mp, a pure tone of any frequency (pitch) with a loudness level of 60 phons will also correspond to mp. There are other situations in which knowledge of perceived loudness is important (Oxenham, 2013). For this, the sound level meter is used, which measures the SPL with the weighted frequency, giving us an approximate result. The purpose of weighting is to have a frequency response identical to that of the ear, amplifying some frequencies and attenuating others (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Howard & Angus, 2017). It should also be noted that complex sounds (like musical tones) are made up of various components of pure tones (Campbell & Greated, 2001). Therefore,
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the sound level meter usually has three frequency weighting networks (dB-A, dB-B, and dB-C). The dB-A weighting is based on the weak sensitivity of the ear at low frequencies of low SPL, whose response is equivalent to the contour of 40 phons. The dB-C weighting, for very intense sounds, allows an almost constant amplification (Henrique, 2014; Rossing et al., 2002). Sound level measurements normally use dB-A weighting (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Howard & Angus, 2017; Rossing et al., 2002), specifically in music concerts (Oxenham, 2013; Rossing et al., 2002) and in ambient noise assessment (Henrique, 2014; Rossing et al., 2002; Yost, 2006). Despite this measurement, the dB-C weighting should also be measured, because it emphasizes sounds of low frequency (Rossing et al., 2002). Another aspect that we can associate with equal-loudness level contours is the quality of reproduced music. As the ear is less sensitive to sounds of low frequency at low sound levels, reproduced music requires volume control/loudness compensation, because the frequency response will be different if the music is heard at low or high levels. At high frequencies there are also deviations, but they are not so noticeable (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Fierro et al., 2019). Without loudness compensation, the frequencies would seem unbalanced and the music with a different timbre (Fierro et al., 2019; Howard & Angus, 2017). Many of the loudness controls, however, do not have satisfactory solutions (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Howard & Angus, 2017). Therefore, knowing that several aspects can affect the volume control configuration, from loudspeakers, power amplifiers and even the acoustic conditions of the room, “the system must be calibrated and the loudness control must adaptively vary the frequency response relative to level at the listener” (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015, p. 48).
3.2.1
Loudness Scale: Sone
The loudness level is still considered a physical parameter (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Roederer, 2008), and is positioned “between sensation and physical values” (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007, p. 203). Although the phon unit is useful, it does not reflect our perception of loudness (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Roederer, 2008). The subjective loudness of a tone is not proportional to its loudness level (in phons). For example, a tone that has a loudness level of 80 phons does not sound twice as much as a tone of 40 phons (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Moore, 2014). After several studies, it was agreed that loudness doubles when the SPL increases 10 dB (Stevens, 1955). In practice, “ten instruments playing a given note at the same LL are judged to sound only twice as loud as one of the instruments playing alone!” (Roederer, 2008, p. 99). The unit of subjective loudness is the sone (loudness scale of sones). A sone is the loudness (not loudness level) of a 1 kHz tone at 40 dB (loudness level of 40 phons) (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Stevens, 1936, 1955). Approximately, and for the 1 kHz tone, 2 sones (50 dB or 50 phons) sound twice as loud than 1 sone (40 dB or 40 phons), 4 sones (60 dB or 60 phons) sound twice as much as 2 sones, 8 sones (70 dB or 70 phons) sound twice as much as 4 sones, and so on (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Oxenham, 2013; Schneider, 2018a).
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Campbell and Greated (2001) concluded that, “at least for isolated pure tones, the phon scale of loudness level is more directly related to musical practice than the sone scale” (p. 117).
3.3 Loudness of Complex Tones After observing the dependence of loudness as a function of sound pressure and frequency, we will address its relationship with the sound spectrum. Regarding real sounds, which consist of several frequency components, the perception of loudness will depend on whether the components are within one or several critical bands (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Howard & Angus, 2017). The critical band11 is part of a psychoacoustic principle underlying the perception of music in terms of the subjective qualities of pitch, loudness and timbre (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Howard & Angus, 2017; Röhl et al., 2011; Rossing et al., 2002). Knowing that loudness increases as bandwidth also increases, broadband sounds (e.g., jet aircraft) sound louder than narrowband noise or pure tones of equal SPL (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Heller, 2013; Rossing et al., 2002; Zwicker et al., 1957). In relation to complex tones of musical instruments, Schneider (2018b) refers to three loud sounds (of cello, bell, and crash cymbal) as being broadband signals. Through musical tones (notes A5 and F1), Campbell and Greated (2001) exemplify how loudness can be estimated. Considering the note A5 (880 Hz) only with the first two harmonics (880 and 1760 Hz) of equal intensity of 60 dB (loudness of 4 sones each), the total loudness would be 8 sones (loudness level of 70 phons). Each component is in a different critical band. As the components are 880 Hz apart, in this frequency range the difference corresponds to about four times the critical bandwidth. It is also assumed that masking is insignificant between harmonics at this intensity level. Now, we consider the note F1 (43.651 Hz) with only harmonics 4 and 5 (about 175 and 218 Hz, respectively) of equal intensity (60 dB, a loudness level of 60 phons) and both in the same critical band. In this case, we can add the individual intensities (or double the intensity of one of the components), corresponding to an increase of 3 dB, i.e., to a total intensity level of 63 dB (loudness level of 63 phons). In the cochlea, and in this second case, all energy will be converted into nerve 11
Each frequency component of a complex sound gives rise to a wave that travels along the basilar membrane (BM), causing a displacement (maximum amplitude) at a particular place, depending on the frequency itself. This place covers a range of frequencies that are above and below the stimulus frequency, a range called critical band (Backus, 1977; Howard & Angus, 2017). The range of audible frequencies covers around 24 critical bands and the region of each one on the BM is about 1.3 mm long (Scharf, 1970). Another important concept is that of critical bandwidth, which corresponds to the frequency bandwidth from which the loudness increases according to the bandwidth (Rossing et al., 2002). Investigation shows that the critical bandwidth depends on the centre frequency, increasing considerably in the higher frequencies (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Howard & Angus, 2017). Note, however, that the width of the critical bands varies with the type of experiment performed (Rossing et al., 2002).
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impulses, using practically the same nerve fibres. In the first case, as the energy is found in more than one critical band, since the two tones have a frequency separation that is higher than the critical bandwidth, different sets of nerve fibres will be activated, leading to a consequent increase in loudness. Therefore, loudness increases as the frequency separation between two sounds increases (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Roederer, 2008). This happens within the scope of loudness summation12 (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Howard & Angus, 2017; Roederer, 2008; Röhl et al., 2011; Zwicker et al., 1957). Röhl et al. (2011) reported that perceived loudness is associated with spectral loudness summation for higher bandwidth. In the specific case of music, which considers broadband signals, the energy will be distributed among several critical bands. Regarding the perception of the loudness of music, one might think that the total energy resulting from the critical bands could “evoke a sensation of loudness somehow proportional to the energy input and in particular to the excitation pattern corresponding to BM motion (displacement, velocity, acceleration)” (Schneider, 2018b, p. 732).
4 Processing in the Peripheral and Central Auditory Nervous System Sound and music are processed in the ascending auditory pathway, from the cochlea to the auditory cortex (Warren, 2008). In the peripheral auditory nervous system, namely in the auditory nerve, the firing rates of the nerve fibres may reflect the coding of the characteristics of the sound (e.g., frequency and intensity) performed in the inner ear (Schneider, 2018a; Yost, 2006). In the case of intensity, this will be done in two interrelated ways. The coding is due to the firing rate of neurons (Bear et al., 2008; Fettiplace, 2002; Yost, 2006), as well as the number of neurons that are active (Bear et al., 2008; Yost, 2006). Specifically, in a vibration with a greater amplitude of the BM due to a more intense stimulus, the axons that establish synapses with the hair cells increase in firing rate (Bear et al., 2008). On the other hand, stimuli of higher intensity produce movements in the BM that will propagate over greater distances, leading to activation of a higher number of hair cells (Bear et al., 2008; Teich & Lachs, 1979; Yost, 2006). Therefore, the sound volume will be associated with the number and rate of firing of auditory nerve neurons (Bear et al., 2008; Yost, 2006), among other factors (Schneider, 2018b). The sound parameters, in addition to being encoded in the auditory periphery, are also processed in subsequent stages in the central auditory system (Bear et al., 2008; Schneider, 2018a; Yost, 2006). In relation to the sound intensity (expressed in dB SPL), there is an increase in brain activity when the SPL also increases (Behler & Uppenkamp, 2016). We refer to the regions of the ascending auditory pathway, 12
Röhl et al. (2011) refer to spectral loudness summation as “for a certain range of bandwidths, it is known that the perceived loudness of sounds increases with increasing bandwidth even if the sound pressure level remains constant” (p. 1483).
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such as the inferior colliculus (IC), in the brainstem, and the medial geniculate body (MGB), in the thalamus (Behler & Uppenkamp, 2016; Röhl & Uppenkamp, 2012; Sigalovsky & Melcher, 2006), and of the auditory cortex (AC) (Behler & Uppenkamp, 2016, 2020; Hall et al., 2001; Röhl & Uppenkamp, 2012; Uppenkamp & Röhl, 2014; Weder et al., 2020). Behler and Uppenkamp (2016) report that few studies have investigated the relationship between brain activity and loudness perception. Thus, these authors analysed the relation between sound intensity, loudness and brain activity at various stages of the human central auditory system (brainstem, thalamic and cortical regions), in order to increase knowledge about the neural representation of sound intensity and perceived loudness. The findings are as follows: (a) brain activity increases in these stages with sound intensity; (b) at the cortical level, and in both hemispheres, responses with sound intensity are more expressive in the posterior medial parts of Heschl’s gyrus (HG), which is followed by central HG and Planum temporale; (c) although the relationship between SPL and loudness is strong, their neural representations in the regions analysed are different. Behler and Uppenkamp conclude that, in general, the “fMRI activation in several regions within auditory cortex as well as in certain stages of the ascending auditory pathway might be more a direct linear reflection of perceived loudness rather than of physical sound intensity” (p. 187). The findings of several studies (Behler & Uppenkamp, 2016, 2020; Hall et al., 2001; Röhl & Uppenkamp, 2012; Schmidt et al., 2020; Weder et al., 2020) are in line with the result that indicates that AC activation is more related to perceived loudness than to sound intensity. Within the scope of the analyses carried out in these studies, in Behler and Uppenkamp (2016), for example, a narrowband noise was used, in contrast to Hall et al. (2001), who used a pure tone (300 Hz) and a complex periodic tone (f0 = 150 Hz nineteen more harmonics). In this study, the authors quantified, in extent and magnitude, the activation in the superior temporal gyrus (with the primary and secondary areas of the auditory cortex). They concluded that the sound level, for the pure tone, had a small effect on the extent of activation, but not in relation to the complex periodic tone. As for the response magnitude, the effect was significant for both types of sounds. Still regarding the magnitude, the complex periodic tone produced a greater activation than the pure tone, with the bandwidth having a greater influence than the sound level in the activation pattern. In the relationship between intensity and loudness, it was possible to verify the importance of the bandwidth difference in the perception of loudness. The extent and magnitude correlate significantly with the loudness level (in phons), but not with the sound level (in SPL).
5 Conclusion Loudness is a psychoacoustic attribute that plays an important role in the perception of sound and corresponds to the perceptual correlate of physical sound intensity (usually expressed in dB SPL). However, there are other variables that influence the
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perception of loudness (Behler & Uppenkamp, 2016). We refer to physical parameters (frequency, spectrum/spectral bandwidth, and duration) (Fastl & Zwicker, 2007; Oxenham, 2013; Rossing et al., 2002), context effects (Meyer, 2009; Oxenham, 2013; Schmidt et al., 2020), and personal factors (e.g., hearing loss) (Uppenkamp & Röhl, 2014). Musical performance and listening occur within the scope of audibility. The area of audibility is delimited by the hearing and pain thresholds, with music having a wider hearing area than speech (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Henrique, 2014; Rossing et al., 2002). As human auditory perception follows logarithmic relationships, there are logarithmic scales for sound intensity and frequency. The decibel scale (dB) falls between 0 and 120 dB, and the frequency range between approximately 20 Hz and 20 kHz (Everest & Pohlmann, 2015; Rossing et al., 2002; Ziemer, 2020). The variations in loudness through dynamic markings, within a wide dynamic range, give greater liveliness to musical performance (Rossing et al., 2002; Thiemel, 2001; Winckel, 1962). However, the limits of the dynamic range depend on the context. The acoustic characteristics of the room are very important, such as noise level and sound diffusion (Meyer, 2009; Winckel, 1962). Considering a background level of 40 dB, the dynamic range for orchestral music will be between 45 and 95 dB, in order to have the dynamic marking of pianissimo (Winckel, 1962). Thus, the scale of musical dynamic levels (for a pure tone of 1 kHz), between pp (40 dB) and fff (100 dB), with a sound level range about 60 dB, has a more or less direct correspondence with the overall sound levels used in the orchestral environment. The sound levels found in the individual practice of musical instruments will be different, with it being difficult to have a close relationship between sound levels in dB (or phons) and the respective dynamic markings. In this case, the dynamic ranges will be compressed (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Meyer, 2009; Patterson, 1974; Rossing et al., 2002; Weinzierl et al., 2018). In both cases, it should be noted that in the act of playing the instruments, musicians make a flexible interpretation of dynamic markings (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Kosta et al., 2014, 2018), which will be associated with various contextual factors (e.g., location of dynamic markings in the score, type of instrument, individual musical practice or orchestral, and room acoustics) (Campbell & Greated, 2001; Kosta et al., 2014, 2018; Weinzierl et al., 2018; Winckel, 1962). In the career of a professional musician, good hearing is very important. However, in addition to presbycusis and other leisure activities, the exposure of musicians to musical noise may cause hearing deficits (Emmerich et al., 2008). Overall, the systematic reviews by Lie et al. (2016) and Di Stadio et al. (2018) and the literature review by Di Stadio (2017), addressing hearing problems in musicians, indicate that pop/rock/jazz musicians have a higher prevalence of hearing loss than classical musicians. In a total of 2078 professional musicians (of which 1359 play classical music and 719 pop/rock), Di Stadio (2017) indicates a prevalence of hearing loss of 57% in pop/rock musicians versus 43% in classical musicians. Other hearing problems that may be related to each other or to hearing loss are tinnitus, hyperacusis and diplacusis (Di Stadio et al., 2018; Jansen et al., 2009). Di Stadio et al. (2018) report that of these three disorders, tinnitus is the most prevalent among professional
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musicians, with a very similar distribution among musicians of the pop/rock and classical genres. The lower prevalence of hearing loss by classical professionals in relation to pop/rock musicians, will be due to the characteristics of different musical genres (Di Stadio, 2017; Di Stadio et al., 2018). In the case of pop/rock musicians, the magnitude of the sound level will be more important (pop/rock music >95 dB vs. classical music 1, the impact force increases with compression and high-frequency modes will be increasingly excited, leading to sounds of brighter timbral qualities. Also the harder the contact stiffness, the shorter the contact time and the wider the frequency range of the response. Within such a framework, the impact force is thus given by:
b fcn (t) = −K c w ⊥ (t) − ξ ⊥ (r c , t) fcn (t) = 0
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where w ⊥ (t) = w(t) · e⊥ and ξ ⊥ (r c , t) = ξ (r c , t) · e⊥ are the motions of the mallet and the bar in the direction normal to the contact surface respectively. In a modal description, when the mallet and the bar are in contact, Eq. (13) becomes N b y x z fcn (t) = −K c w ⊥ (t) − qn (t) ϕnx (r c )e⊥ + ϕny (r c )e⊥ + ϕnz (r c )e⊥
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x z , e⊥ , e⊥ ). The form of Eq. (14) shows that the contact nonlinearity with e⊥ = (e⊥ not only distributes the impact energy across all the modes but also couples all the directions of the bar motion, even those that are not excited initially. Apart its compactness, Hertz’s theory remains a crude representation of the real interaction dynamics. Strictly speaking, it cannot be applied to dynamical problems for which the contact force evolves with time, but a quasi-static approximation, as considered here, is a pragmatic approach commonly used in music acoustics (Chaigne & Kergomard, 2016).
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6.4 Numerical Results The set of Eqs. (4), (5), (8), (9), (11) and (13) represents the essential physics of the bar dynamics, that can be integrated over time from given initial conditions in order to simulate its vibratory motion. For the time-step integration, we used the central difference scheme of the Newmark’s family of methods (Gerardin & Rixen, 2015). Here, the main numerical difficulty comes from the short duration of the contact which requires a small time-step t for stable and accurate computations. For the presented simulations, we adopted a time step of 10−6 s, and assumed all modal displacements and velocities to be nil initially, except the initial velocity of the mallet v0 . Struck excitations were simulated by considering a mallet of mass m M =10 g and assuming a contact stiffness of K c = 107 N/m1.5 between the bar and mallet. The bar modal basis included modes up to 20 kHz, which is enough to ensure convergence in relation to the contact stiffness. The input modal frequencies, modal masses and modeshapes stem from the FE modal computations, for which the first six modal frequencies were substituted by their values identified experimentally. Modal damping were estimated from a fitting procedure using the identified values but excluding the first torsional modes, resulting in values ranging from 0.3 to 3 %. For each supporting fixture, we consider values of stiffness and dissipation of 104 N/m and 3 Ns/m respectively, equally distributed among three flexible-dissipative supports located uniformly on each nodal lines of the fundamental mode. This results in frequencies of about 50 Hz for the flexible bar/chord system. Figure 11 shows results obtained when considering the bar impacted at its center with velocity v0 = 1 ms−1 , which is a configuration intended to reproduce a typical excitation by player. It shows the time history response of the bar displacement in the three directions of motion, where the initial transient and the rapid decay of the vibration are evident, with some superimposed low-frequency oscillations due to the influence of the supports. As one would expect, although the impact energy is given in a single direction, the vibration of the bar is effectively three dimensional. Notice however that the relative amplitudes of motion in the x-y plane are small compared to the vertical component thus confirming the common hypothesis in music acoustics of neglecting in-plane motions for percussion bar instruments. Clearly, this simplification is also reinforced by the fact that coupling with the air essentially occurs through the vertical motions so that motions in the x-y plane are likely to have small consequences on the produced sound. The plot in Fig. 12 presents results stemming from several simulations obtained by varying the impact point. It is a plot of the modal energy of the first eight flexible modes in relation to the total energy of the bar. It shows the selective excitation of the partials depending on the locations of the nodes/anti-nodes of the modeshapes and of the contact point. In comparison to bar models accounting for beam modes only, note the gradual excitation of the torsional modes as the impact point moves away from the symmetry axis, because of the 3D modeling of the bar vibrations. Musically, this leads to clear audible changes in the sound radiated, starting with a
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well defined sound dominated by its fundamental mode at the center and ending with a richer but thinner sound close to the edges of the bar. Figure 13 then shows the components of the bar velocity spectra obtained by considering different directions of the impact velocity. By changing the components of the initial velocity vector of the mallet, we simulated normal impacts on each face of the bar, all given close to its bottom-left corner. Again, since the modeshapes are three dimensional, the three components of motion are always excited whatever the direction of impact . Note however the different distributions of the input energy among the three components that will result in different timbral characteristics for the sound radiated. If impacting the bar along the x-direction mainly excites the higher order modes, note that the fundamental mode, which involves motions in the z direction mainly, is slightly excited. Looking at the relative amplitudes between the excited overtones, one understands that the corresponding sound will be perceived thinner and brighter compared to a strike given in the z direction. Figure 14 then illustrates the influence of the nonlinearity of the contact by modifying the strength of the impact, which is known to be highly relevant from the perceptual viewpoint (Poirot et al. 2019). The cases of weak, medium and stronger excitations are considered by testing increasing impact velocities of 0.5, 1 and 1.5 ms−1 . We present the velocity spectra of the bar normalized to their maximum value in order to emphasize the differences in frequency contents. If a weak excitation favors the low-order modes and results in a gentle sound, the main difference observed here occurs for the third mode which becomes more prominent in the global vibration as the impact velocity increases, and that could influence the perceived pitch of the bar.
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Finally, we present in Fig. 15 an attempt to compare the synthesis model at hand with measurements obtained during impact tests. Of course, such a comparison has several limitations, mainly regarding the unmeasured striking parameters that could make the comparison discutable. Based on the force value measured by the miniature hammer, we tentatively adjust the velocity and contact stiffness of the excitation, resulting in values of 1 ms−1 and K c = 107 N/m1.5 when considering a mallet mass of 1.5 g. Looking at Fig. 15, the comparison of the two spectrograms shows a fair agreement for the intensity and damping behavior of the excited frequencies. In particular, the decay of the second overtone is well reproduced by our model, reinforcing the explanation given in Sect. 4 about the influence of the bar supports in the increase of modal damping observed for the first torsional mode.
7 Conclusions In this paper, we developed a non-destructive technique in order to assess the geometrical and acoustical features of Timbila wooden xylophones. Based on 3D scanning measurements, the technique provides faithful virtual models of the bars and allows systematic analysis of their geometry with high accuracy, as well as of their vibrational properties. A specific slicing algorithm was developed for contour extraction and successfully implemented in order to highlight the precise design of the bar undercut that appears useful to investigate the tuning practice of Timbila makers. Combining the scan data with FE modeling and vibration analysis techniques, we
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also analysed the relative tuning of each bar, checked the musical scale of the instrument and identified its reference pitch. By comparison with modal data obtained by experimental identification techniques, our preliminary FE modeling proved to be accurate on predicting the modal frequencies of the most important musical (vertical transverse) modes but failed with the other modes. The main reason is to be found in the very crude model for the wood, which ignores its orthotropic behavior. This is a practical problem which remains the most urgent aspect to include in our future approach. Given the limitations of current data for the wood species Mwenje, attempts will be made by using values found in the literature for similar wood species and/or by investigating the anisotropy of Mwenje through measurements carried out on specimen samples. Regarding the sound synthesis physical model, our main efforts are currently being put in the introduction of the bar/resonator interaction and will be followed by including the acoustic radiation of both the bar and resonator. Finally, other important task for future work will be the application of the proposed methodology to the collection of historical Timbila xylophones of the National Museum of Ethnology of Lisbon in order to virtually share this unique collection and promote Timbila music and instrument making. Acknowledgements The authors thank José Vieira Antunes from the Centro de Ciências e Tecnologias Nucleares of Instituto Superior Técnico for lending equipments for experiments. We also acknowledge supports from the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT) under the Grant Research Project PTDC/ART-PER/32568/2017 and the Norma Transitória Grant No. DL 57/2016/CP1453/CT0007.
References Adrien, J. M. (1991). The missing link: Modal synthesis. In G. DePoli, A. Picalli, & C. Roads (Eds.), Representations of musical sounds. MIT Press. Aramaki, M., Baillères, H., Brancheriau, L., Kronland-Martinet, R., & Ystad, S. (2007). Sound quality assessment of wood for xylophone bars. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 121, 2407–2420. Baer F. P., et al. (2018). Wooden musical instruments different forms of knowledge (pages 171–188). Cité de la Musique - Philharmonie de Paris, Paris. Bestle, P., Eberhard, P., & Hanss, M. (2017). Musical instruments—Sound synthesis of virtual idiophones. Journal of Sound and Vibration, 395, 187–200. Bissinger, G. (2008). Structural acoustics of good and bad violins. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 124, 1764–1773. Bork, I., Chaigne, A., Trebuchet, L.-C., Kosfelder, M., & Pillot, D. (1999). Comparison between modal analysis and finite element modelling of a marimba bar. Acustica Acta united with Acustica, 85, 258–266. Chaigne, A., & Kergomard, J. (2016). Acoustics of musical instruments. Springer. Chaigne, A., & Doutaut, V. (1996). Numerical simulations of xylophones: I time-domain modeling of the vibrating bars. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 101, 539–557. Debut, V., Carvalho, M., & Antunes, J. (2016a). Objective estimation of the tuning features of historical carillons. Applied Acoustics, 101, 78–90. Debut, V., Carvalho, M., Figueiredo, E., Antunes, J., & Silva, R. (2016b). The sound of bronze: Virtual resurrection of a broken medieval bell. Journal of Cultural Heritage, 19, 544–554.
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Debut, V., Carvalho, M., Soares, F., & Antunes, J. (2018). Reverse engineering techniques for investigating the vibro-acoustics of historical bells. In Applied condition monitoring advances in acoustics and vibration II (pp. 218–226). Springer International Publishing. Dos Santos, J. (1609). Varia historia de cousas notaveis do oriente. Evora: Convento de S. Domingos de Evora : por Manoel de Lira impressor. Gerardin, M., & Rixen, D. J. (2015). Mechanical vibrations: Theory and application to structural dynamics. Wiley. Green, D. W., Winandy, J. E., & Kretschmann, D. E. (1999). Mechanical properties of wood. Wood handbook: Wood as an engineering material, chapter 4. USDA Forest Service, Forest Products Laboratory, Madison, WI. Henrique, L. (2004). Concepção e caracterização de instrumentos musicais de láminas utilizando técnicas de modelação e optimização (PhD thesis). NOVA/FCSH. Henrique, L., & Antunes, J. (2003). Optimal designs and physical modeling of mallet percussion instruments. Acta Acustica united with Acustica, 89, 948–963. Juang, J. (1994). Applied system identification. PTR Prentice-Hall Inc. Plant Resources. (2020). Plant resources of tropical Africa. Poirot, S., Bilbao, S., Ystad, S., Aramaki, M., & Kronland-Martinet, R. (2019). On the influence of non-linear phenomena on perceived interactions in percussive instruments. In International Symposium on Computer Music Multidisciplinary Research (pages 629–640). Pyrkosz, M. A. (2013). Reverse engineering the structural and acoustic behavior of a stradivari violin (Ph.D thesis). Michigan Technological University. Soares, F., Antunes, J., & Debut, V. (2021). Multi-modal tuning of vibrating bars with simplified undercuts using an evolutionary optimization algorithm. Applied Acoustics, 173 Sodini, N., Dreossi, D., Chen, R., Fioravanti, M., Giordano, A., Herrestal, P., et al. (2012). Noninvasive microstructural analysis of bowed stringed instruments with synchrotron radiation x-ray microtomography. Journal of Cultural Heritage, 13, S44–S49. Sun, Z., Rodà, A., Whiting, E., Faresin, E., & Salemi, G. (2020). 3D virtual reconstruction and sound simulation of an ancient roman brass musical instrument. In M. Rauterberg (Ed.), Culture and computing, (pp. 267–280). Springer International Publishing. Teukolsky, S. A., Vetterling, W. T., Press, W. H., & Flannery, B. P. (2007). Numerical recipes: The art of scientific computing. Cambridge University Press. Tracey, H. (1948). Chopi Musicians. Their music, poetry, and instruments. Oxford University Press. Warneke, N. (2014). Non destructive and multidisciplinary methods for the identification of African xylophones in portuguese collection. COST Action WOOD MUSICK: Technical report.
Reducing Annoyance of Healthcare Soundscapes with Harmonious Alarms Frederico Pereira, Rui Marques, Joana Vieira, and Guilherme Campos
Abstract Recent research and amendments to standards have called for a paradigm shift when designing for healthcare spaces. While these are currently populated with melodic, hard to learn alarms and other noise sources, the benefits of harmonious alarms inside healing soundscapes seem promising for patients. We propose alarms for the Temperature IEC 60601-1-8 category which were designed considering psychoacoustic and musical knowledge. Effort was made to abide by design recommendations while including new information such as the direction change of the vital sign being monitored (increasing or decreasing), and also manipulating harmonicity to trigger certain emotional percepts. Relevant human factors and organizational factors are discussed, as the consequences of having carefully curated, generative healing soundscapes still need to be researched from a patient, healthcare professional and organizational perspective.
F. Pereira (B) · R. Marques · J. Vieira CCG: Centre for Computer Graphics, Guimarães, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] R. Marques e-mail: [email protected] J. Vieira e-mail: [email protected] J. Vieira Ergonomics & Human Factors Group, ALGORITMI Research Centre, University of Minho, Guimarães, Portugal CIAUD Research Centre for Architecture Urbanism and Design, Lisbon School of Architecture, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal G. Campos Department of Electronics, Telecom and Informatics (DETI)/IEETA, University of Aveiro, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_13
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1 Introduction “It robs the industrious man of his time; it annoys the musical man by its intolerable badness; it irritates the invalid; deprives the patient, who at great inconvenience has visited London for the best medical advice, (…), and it destroys the time and the energies of all the intellectual classes of society by its continual interruptions of their pursuits” (Public Domain Review, 2020). These are the vociferous words of Charles Babbage, co-inventor of the first mechanical computer, written in 1864. The polymath has witnessed the birth of noise with the advent of machinery and the industrial revolution, after millennia of silence (Schafer, 1977). In the meantime, we have gone through three more technological and social revolutions, and are currently living under the fourth one, privileging automation and smart technology. The increment in technology and machinery, and consequently noise, has only but increased, and hospitals and healthcare facilities are not an exception (BuschVishniac, 2019; Busch-Vishniac et al., 2005). Healthcare facilities, especially the intensive care units, now face a difficult dilemma, which is using technology to ensure the patient’s safe recovery, knowing that this technology might hinder the patients’ and clinician’s wellbeing (Birdja & Özcan, 2019). Intrinsic to the environment experience in healthcare facilities are the sounds emitted by medical devices. A wide variety of these medical devices are used throughout Intensive Care Units (ICU’s), recovery and operating rooms, tasked with monitoring physiological conditions of patients. These devices are intended to measure and, visually and/or aurally communicate on a patient’s condition to nearby healthcare staff. Some devices emit sound as a continuous monitoring tool for staff, while others use sounds only as alarms. As an example, pulse oximetry is continuously monitored, and the pitch and speed of the sound provide information regarding the oxygen saturation values of the patients, as well as their heart rate. The monitoring sound is continuous and different from the alarm sound. Infusion pumps on the other hand, may work silently, and only emit an alarm once they detect a kinked catheter or an occlusion. When the monitored parameters of a patient are within a certain range of values, the device can emit no sound, or it can emit a monitoring sound. However, when crossing predefined thresholds, different sounds are emitted so to alert nearby healthcare workers on the status change. Ever since 2012, auditory alarms have been listed as one of the ten main technology hazards inside hospitals by ECRI Institute1 (ECRI Institute, 2019). One of the major causes of the problem is that there are too many alarm sounds (Block, 2008; Thangavelu et al., 2014), and in the clinical environment, the problem is intensified due to the use of equipment from different manufacturers, which place increased demands on the clinical staff who use and trust the alarms (Casey et al., 2018). The use of sound to communicate important information to healthcare workers has many advantages, and is therefore a widely employed form of machine-human communication. Benefits include allowing listeners to move without the need to 1
ECRI Institute is a non-profit organization that establishes best practices to improve patient care using applied scientific research in healthcare.
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keep the device in their visual field, more compliance to auditory warnings over visual warnings (Edworthy & Hards, 1999), attraction of attention regardless of the listener’s current activity (Edworthy & Stanton, 1995), rapid communication and localizable emitting source in the room space. However, most design decisions come with their own set of disadvantages, and the use of sound as a communication tool has the immediate consequence of contributing to the general perception of noise inside a healthcare facility. A study led by the Beryl Institute (Madaras & Apps, 2012) has categorized the primary sources of noise in a hospital after interviews with professionals from 241 U.S. hospitals. Physiological monitoring alarms are thought to contribute with as much as 25% to hospital noise. Both healthcare professionals and patients face auditory alarms as a necessary hindrance which affects not only their mental health and professional capabilities (Busch-Vishniac, 2019; Institute, 2013), but which also affects the patients’ effective recovery (Birdja & Özcan, 2019; Ecophon, 2018) simply by being exposed to the stressful auditory soundscapes generated by medical devices. Noise induced annoyance in these environments is the result of a vicious cycle, where not only physical properties of emitted sounds and architectural features take part, but also the subjective perception and emotions that may result from it. Noise is a hindrance for good communication, may it be between humans, or human machine. Noise is noted as the main cause of desensitization of medical staff to alarm sounds leading to alarm fatigue (Edworthy, 2013; Kristensen et al., 2016; Simpson & Lyndon, 2019), missed and misinterpreted information, louder voice conversations, louder telephone rings, televisions, among others, in a reaction akin to the Lombard effect [2],2 whereby in order to overcome communication noise, a noisier environment is generated. The cycle only leads to stress, frustration, and fatigue, contributing to an overall inefficiency with potentially serious consequences. Noise in healthcare facilities is a major source of complaints, from patients, staff, and visitors (Hravnak et al., 2018; Lorenz et al., 2017). It is therefore of utmost importance that these alarm sounds are clearly understood and discriminated against other sound sources that contribute to the soundscape, such as chatter, trolleys, HVAC systems, doors, lighting, cleaning machines, among others (Madaras & Apps, 2012). With a multitude of concurrent sound sources, staff, patients and visitors may quite easily become annoyed at the resulting cacophony. Therefore, efforts to mitigate an annoying soundscape should be considered at the sound design stage. Recently, scientific studies and projects (Birdja & Özcan, 2019; Özcan et al., 2018) have been defending and proposing positive soundscapes for these environments, demonstrating that sounds from nature or harmonic music can have positive effects on health (Rueb, 2019). The current state of healthcare soundscapes may well represent an inhuman environment, “when, as today, environmental sound reaches such proportions that human vocal sounds are masked or overwhelmed, we have produced an inhuman environment. When sounds are forced on the ear which
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The involuntary tendency of speakers to increase their voice when speaking in loud noise to enhance the audibility of their voice.
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may endanger it physically or debilitate it psychologically, we have produced an inhuman environment” (Schafer, 1977).
1.1 Designing Positive Healthcare Soundscapes The soundscape, or sonic environment, can deeply affect the patient experience. This perceptual construct is grounded in the relation between acoustic environment, resulting from physical phenomena, and its perception, resulting in the soundscape it generates (ISO 12913-1:2014). Only by knowing the acoustic environment can we have the resources to improve the orchestration of the soundscape (Schafer, 1977). In recent years there has been an effort to investigate how healthcare facilities’ soundscape affects patients’ recovery time, dignity and, overall well-being of patients and professionals alike (Ecophon, 2018). Inside a hospital environment, hearing becomes more important and relevant to a patient because the visual environment is dull and boring (Spence & Keller, 2019). Electronic musician, composer and author Yoko Sen has been a prominent voice in drawing attention to this systemic problem, pointing out that healthcare facilities’ soundscapes are closer to noise than to melodic sounds, provoking annoyance, and negatively affecting patient experience (Sen & Sen, 2020). Sen summarizes the issue with a question: “What is the last sound you wish to hear before you die?” (Sen, 2016a), adding that most surely would not be a concoction of harsh sounding beeps (Sen, 2016b). The issue is not limited to the above mentioned metaphoric extreme scenario, it is present at all times during a patient’s stay. Past investigations have reported on the longer recovery times and health risks on patients’ exposure to unsuited noise levels (Buxton et al., 2012; Science Daily, 2012). Sleep deprivation affects the immune system, directly affecting mortality rates in hospitals. This means that uncontrolled hospital noise can be directly considered as dangerous. In search of solutions, Sen’s efforts suggest acting on biological processes through exposure to soothing sounds, like composed melodies and soft sounding textures, transforming the sonic space towards a healing environment. The concept involves as much of architectural features as sensory factors, of which the soundscape is paramount (Stichler, 2001). Several studies have pointed to benefits of the use of music in care of hospital patients, as to induce a reduction of anxiety and stress (Drahota et al., 2012). Then, it makes sense that in the transformation towards a healing environment should be a paradigm shift in the sound design of equipment alarms, embracing the role of music in healing, promoting an interdisciplinary approach to the process (Weymann, 2018). Sound design of medical equipment alarms had until recently been almost completely overlooked, with Antti Ikonen from Aalto University (Ikonen, 2017) suggesting that since these are not consumer products, traditionally, attractiveness was set aside, with the main intent being as loud as necessary whilst reducing production expense. Additionally, there is a technical legacy where these devices have commonly used very simple piezo speakers, which although robust, small and
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cheap, offer limited scope for sound design. This trend is now changing, and patients are more and more considered as consumers or guests. As such, their stay is a curated journey with the goal of providing them a good experience (Spence & Keller, 2019). Research shows that hospitals with a better patient experience do better financially (Trzeciak et al., 2016). In fact, some hospitals are putting great efforts into reducing their noise levels or even designing healing soundscapes (Rueb, 2019; De Ruiter, 2015). The New Children’s Hospital in Helsinki partnered with Aalto University, created a series of ambient soundscapes (International Sound Awards, 2019). Each floor represents a theme such as ocean, jungle or forest. All spaces are designed to make children comfortable, while imagining they are in another place filled with natural sounds and smooth instruments. Brian Eno is known to have designed a quiet room in the Montefiore hospital (Brown, 2013) that soothed and calmed patients with what he called functional music. Similarly, the project Sonic Environments for Healing used generative music systems to improve the atmosphere of hospital waiting rooms (Lazarevic, 2015). Also MacDonald and Schlesinger (2018) created a device that would control music in the operating room by integrating it with the vital signs from the anesthesia monitor. This device would automatically reduce the volume of the music whenever it detected critical events such as a slowing heart rate, reduced oxygen saturation or blood pressure, in order to allow the team to better communicate and concentrate on the patient. More recently, the Critical Alarms Lab at the University of Delft has developed the CareTunes project (Bogers, 2018), aiming at a melodic representation of the patient’s physiological signals. A device transcribes a patient’s vital signs into songs that sound like electronic dance music. Drums represent the heartbeat, guitar for oxygen saturation and piano for blood pressure. When a patient is stable, the tune is harmonious, but it becomes dissonant when a patient’s status changes for the worse, thus calling for a caregiver’s attention.
1.2 Aim This chapter focuses on the sound design of medical device ‘alarm’ sounds relating to patient status. We propose to characterize the surprisingly distant relation between music and alarm design; select good practices and design guidelines from literature; and to create our own set of harmonious alarms.
2 Current Clinical Auditory Alarms and Guidelines 2.1 IEC 60601-1-8 Clinical Alarm Design Guidelines The global medical device standard IEC 60601-1-8 published in 2006, and corresponding amendments (2012 and 2020) were developed by the IEC (International
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Electrotechnical Commission) Technical Committee 62, “Electrical equipment in medical practice”, Subcommittee (SC) 62A, “Common aspects of electrical equipment used in medical practice” (ANSI/AAMI/ IEC 2013, viii). The document is set out to include general requirements, tests, and guidance for alarm systems in medical electrical equipment and medical electrical systems (Edworthy et al., 2013). The IEC’s 2006 and 2012 proposed alarms were an improvement to the design requirements existing at the time, as they standardized important design recommendations. However, the research that ensued proved they were not without issues, and still left plenty of space for improvement, especially concerning their learnability (Wee & Sanderson, 2008). The general guidelines were mostly focused on basic functionality, and little consideration was given to hearing science and insight from musical perception that may be drawn from the musicology’s vast body of knowledge (Atyeo & Sanderson, 2015; Edworthy et al., 2017; Foley et al., 2020). The IEC 60601-1-8 (2006 and 2012) proposes eight alarm categories, each consisting of three musical notes for medium priority and five musical notes for high priority, forming a distinct melody for each alarm. Although the melodies differ between alarms’ categories, they have the same rhythm, identical timbre, they are all in the key of C major and they all start in the C note, leading to very little acoustic variation and heterogeneity between them. Figure 1 represents the IEC 60601-1-8 melodic variations for alarms of medium priority (Gillard & Schutz, 2016). Within each priority level, the IEC alarms have the same length, the same rhythm and span a narrow pitch range (262–523 Hz or C4–C5)—characteristics likely contributing to problems in learning and retention (Gillard & Schutz, 2016). A problem repeatedly identified in the IEC guidelines compliant alarms, was not only the fact that they were in the same key but also of identical timbre, where the only sound aspect that served as a reference to differentiate which category they belong to was its melody alternation. The recent 2020 IEC 60601-1-8 amendment seeks to alleviate the aforementioned issues by introducing dramatic changes such as differentiation of each category by use of auditory icons. An auditory icon takes advantage of the already existing and familiar association between a sound and its source. The meaning of these sounds rarely needs to be learned, as they are based on previous experiences. In this case, different auditory icons are used for different clinical category functions. For example, the sound of a breath is used for the Ventilation category, a whistling kettle for the Temperature category, the sound of pills shaking inside a plastic box for the Drug Administration category, among others. The current amendment also devised an initial auditory pointer representing the degree of urgency, going from low, to medium and high priority. Nevertheless, these initial pointers are very similar to the older 2006 IEC 60601-1-8 standard sounds, with little temporal harmonic variation. Their most salient percepts include the alternation of pitch (lowest for low priority and highest for high priority), and the number of times the note repeats over time, to discriminate urgency. The new approach results in sounds with much more temporal variation at the rhythmic level, with the hope of increasing learning capacity and detectability (Bennett et al., 2019), which, from previous results, seems promising (Edworthy et al., 2017).
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Fig. 1 Melodic sequences for the medium priority eight alarm categories of the IEC 60601-1-8 standard (2006 and 2012 update). Adapted from Gillard & Schutz (2016)
Although the updated alarm design guidelines have been validated for a significant improvement in the memorization and interpretation of alarms, additional examination is necessary to consolidate its advantages, especially in real scenarios, considering their inherent workload and mental stress are hard to replicate in simulated clinical environments. As an example, the recent update has yet to be evaluated for annoyance, an issue that might reveal itself only after long hours of professional healthcare work (Foley et al., 2020).
2.2 Alarms and Musical Cognition At no surprise for musicians, alarms abiding to pre-2020 IEC 60601-1-8 design guidelines become confusing in their identification, result in hearing and alarm fatigue (Simpson & Lyndon, 2019) and consequently carried a high degree of annoyance
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(Atyeo & Sanderson, 2015; Foley et al., 2020; Wee & Sanderson, 2008). The distance between musical knowledge and alarm design becomes reinforced when comparing musicians and non-musicians’ populations learning clinical alarms. Pre-2020 IEC 60601-1-8 alarms were better recalled by participants with at least 1 year of musical training (Sanderson et al., 2006; Wee & Sanderson, 2008). Foley et al. (2020) add that musicians do better in pitch discrimination tasks, concluding that pitch and melody discrimination is highly dependent on musical aptitude. Importantly, there does not seem to be detection differences in harmonics between musicians and non-musicians (McPherson et al., 2020) as reported for pitch and melody. The authors of the study, however, point to methodological artifacts which might have conditioned the results. They raise important questions regarding the western music training which does not commonly ask musicians to hear in the presence of stationary noise, as was requested during the experiment. In fact, hearing a harmonic sound among similar sounds may require different strategies than hearing a harmonic sound in noise. The authors claim there might be musicianship advantages in the first situation but not in the latter. Music cognition aims at applying cognitive science methods to musical issues, and the reported differences between populations are serious enough to motivate a deeper study of what both cognitive science and music can teach us, to design more democratic alarms. For an increased recognition of melodies, music cognition literature suggests attending to the Cohort Theory of spoken word identification. The theory has been originally proposed in 1980, by Marsen-Wilson and Tyler (1980), proposing that at the start of a sound, the brain engages in memory searching for possible combinations for the melody that may follow; the possible combinations are eliminated as the sound progresses, until a match is found. Pitch contour has been identified as having a major role in melody recognition and memorization, with melody similarity ratings predominantly based on pitch contour, content and note patterns (Ahlbak, 2007; Gillard & Schutz, 2016). The fact that the newly proposed alarms’ categories are represented with auditory icons somehow alleviates previous performance, recognition, and learnability problems (McNeer et al., 2018). However, new questions emerge while designing within this paradigm. What is the best sound to use for each situation? Which sound will trigger the intended reaction and performance without irritating or polluting the soundscape? The answer depends on a diverse range of factors such as, on the listener’s culture, age, current cognitive load, task at hand, the nature of the source, among others. There is evidence of a general trend in preference however, where people tend to find naturally occurring sounds most pleasant. The sound of moving water in multiple forms (drops, streams, ocean waves, rain), wind, or even animal sounds (birds, other people) were all sound categories for which listeners displayed a preference (Brown, 2012). It is worth noting that the use of auditory icons to represent alarms categories leaves the opportunity to employ melodic sequences as another type of information carrier. Melodic sequences can provide some recognition and memorization of conveyed information, but caution must be taken, as if overlaid with other melodic sequences they may become difficult to isolate and recognize.
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The use of identical timbre for alarms may pose an obstacle to its efficiency, as different timbres ease recognition and discrimination between sound sources (Gillard & Schutz, 2016; Wee & Sanderson, 2008). Timbre is a complex subjective characteristic of sound that allows us to differentiate two or more sounds of equal pitch and intensity. Timbral variation can be obtained in the most diverse ways through the manipulation of properties for a synthesized sound, such as amplitude and frequency dynamics, spectral energy distribution, degree of inharmonicity of the partials and frequency (Houtsma et al., 1987). It can be said that timbre is one of the main percepts leading to a very high identification rate, even for very brief sounds and from different sound sources (Darwin, 1971; Hall & Grose, 1988; Iverson, 1995; Moore & Gockel, 2012). As it turns out, in an orchestral performance, an ordinary person without musical training can easily distinguish wind instruments, strings and percussion by their timbre (Schellenberg et al., 1999; Suied, et al., 2014).
2.3 Annoyance Sound annoyance has been studied by several authors, and it has revealed to be a complex phenomenon. Various sound properties have been identified as affecting annoyance, namely, the time envelope of harmonics (Sreetharan et al., 2018), and the sharpness and roughness percepts (Fastl, 1997; Terhardt & Stoll 1981). We understand by time envelope of harmonics the shape of the harmonic energy variation over time. It is a major dimension of timbre. Harmonics are the result of energy at integer multiples of the fundamental frequency, that is, for example, in a musical instrument when excited by an external force, it does not produce only one fundamental frequency, but a series of multiple integer frequencies of the fundamental frequency exhibiting complex time patterns. It is crucial that sound alarm induced annoyance is considered at the sound design stage, as at later stages, annoyance mitigation may prove extremely difficult. Figure 2 shows the harmonic composition of an 2006 IEC 60601-1-8 medium priority Power Down (equipment failure) alarm, where static harmonics are visible over time, a feature imparting a somehow unnatural and less pleasant sound to hear. This consequence is pointed by Foley et. al (2020), where the authors expose that over centuries, musicians have avoided simple, static sounds, while honing techniques and crafting instruments that resulted in temporally complex and harmonious sounds. All other 2006 IEC 60601-1-8 alarm categories are designed according to this example.
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Fig. 2 Spectrogram of a Medium priority Equipment failure alarm complying to IEC 60601-1-8 2006. The harmonic energy have a plateau on the time dimension
3 Harmonious Sound Design Although the recently updated alarm design guidelines have been validated for a significant improvement in the learnability and recognizability of alarms, some aspects may deserve efforts for improvement.
3.1 Lessons Learned from Music The use of auditory icons, note pulses and sequences grant an opportunity for manipulation towards the concept of ‘healing environment’ based on lessons rescued from a long history of music making.
3.1.1
Melody
In investigations on the emotional effect of sound rhythm and melody, a number of experiments have shown that listeners had a prevalence to report positive, peaceful emotions when exposed to simple melodies and regular rhythms, in contrast, excitement, anger and sadness feelings were associated to sounds with more melodic variation and less rhythmic stability (Crozier, 1974; Imberty, 1974; Vitz, 1966). Investigating on perception and cognition of melody, Narmour (1990) suggests that universal principles govern listeners’ melodic expectancies, identifying two main
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principles: registral direction and intervallic difference. Registral direction, indicates that small intervals imply a sequence maintaining its direction, on the other hand, larger intervals hint at a directional change. For intervallic difference, small intervals imply a subsequent interval of similar size (within 2 or 3 semitones), while larger intervals suggest a following interval of at least 3 or 4 semitones smaller. These principles have been empirically corroborated by other researchers’ studies, as Krumhansl (1995), supporting the power of the implicative principles on listeners’ expectation of melody progression, even when unfamiliar with it. (dos Santos, 2012)
3.1.2
Pitch
There is supporting evidence indicating that pitch has a role in the perception of emotion in music. Compositions with a wide pitch range are perceived as unpredictable, conveying a high degree of arousal, while in the case of a reduced pitch range, melodies are simpler to process, not being as effective in evoking arousal feelings. In music, the general expectation of listeners is that of a fairly reduced pitch range, causing positive and calming feelings (Narmour, 1990, 1991; Thompson et al., 1997).
3.1.3
Harmony
One of the areas in which harmony preferences have already been measured and modelled rigorously is on theory of formation of musical chords—a combination of notes played at the same time. It has been consolidated for thousands of years that certain combinations of notes are more agreeable than others, even though combinations may vary according to culture (McDermott et al., 2010). The distinction between consonance and dissonance is fundamental to Western music. Consonance is defined by musical intervals that have a pleasant or harmonious effect on the listener. As in the case of the fundamental note and its octave, having a 1:2 ratio, which means that the frequency of an octave is twice the fundamental. This interval is called unison and is generally pleasing. Another range that gives the listener a pleasant feeling is a perfect fifth note which has a 3:2 ratio. These two intervals constitute the first milestone in the evolution of the tone system. In contrast, dissonance is the quality of a musical interval that does not have a pleasant or harmonious effect on the listener. Such is the example of the tritone (6 semitones), which has a complex frequency ratio of 45:32. The intervals between adjacent notes mainly produce dissonance. Examination of scores and scales indicate that in classical music, compositions tend to deliberately embrace consonance, and that the Western diatonic scale might have emerged from the tendency to maximize the number of possible combinations of consonant notes. Nonetheless dissonance is also used frequently, it plays an important role in composition and is often used to create musical tense moments (McDermott et al., 2010). A study by Oelman & Laeng (2008), found four harmonic intervals that were assessed for emotional significance by listeners (2nd
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major, 3rd major, 4th perfect and 5th perfect). The researchers found that adjectives frequently employed for interval descriptions included “dissatisfied”, “sad”, “irritating” and “active” for 2nd major, while for a 3rd major description of “calmness”, “enjoyable” and “happy” were given. As for the 4th perfect, elicitations included “vigorous”, “robust” and, again, “dissatisfied”. For the 5th perfect, adjectives as “clear”, “defined” and “serious” were used.
3.2 Harmonizing Auditory Icons One way to harmonize alarms is to use consonant chords. To do this, sound designers can take advantage of manipulation akin to a cartonization of the auditory icons. This process may be achieved through physical modelling synthesis techniques (i.e., simulating the propagation of acoustic energy through an object model), an approach based on the use of real-time mathematical simulations or real-world event models. The resonances obtained by this type of synthesis may be modulated in order to obtain consonant chords. Another possibility to make an icon more harmonious while adding a layer of extra information, is to modulate the resonances to generate a melodic variation over its duration. For example, a stepped melody of ascending or descending ramp to indicate the ascent or descent of monitored temperature. We can also increase the dissonance in this melody in order to create tension, as to communicate higher degrees of urgency/priorities. Upon analysis of the issues and improvement opportunities described throughout this chapter, the authors set out to design an alarm as a proposal including hearing science and musical derived principles. The proposal attends to a greater detectability and recognition through timbre, melodic sequences for provision of extra status information, and overall improved harmony in order to reduce noise induced annoyance. It should be noted that alarm annoyance not only results from an annoying sound, but as well from the frustration of poor detectability and recognition. These alarm proposals are represented in Figs. 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 where spectrograms were generated to show frequencies energy over time, and harmonic composition. All of the sound examples were synthesized using Max/Msp software (cycling74) through application of mathematical models of physical modelling developed by Ircam (Modalys; SDT), customized by the authors so to accommodate desired synthesis routines for the intended sounds. Figures 3 and 4 relate to the Priority pointers that sound before the auditory icon. Unlike the 2020 IEC 60601-1-8 standard alarms, the proposed priority pointers have harmonic variation in time. Figure 3 is a medium priority pointer, and Fig. 4 is a high priority pointer. Figure 5 represents a Temperature category auditory icon designed according to the IEC 60601-1-8 2020 amendment guidelines, with an added rising melody layer. This melody layer is a design option that is not contemplated on the standard.
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Fig. 3 Spectrogram of a Medium Priority Pointer. Harmonic Composition f0 = D4, f2 = D5, f3 = F#5, f4 = D6, f5 = F#6 with 150 ms pulse duration, and 25 ms inter pulse interval (IPI). Constant repetition occurs three times
Fig. 4 Spectrogram of a High Priority Pointer. Harmonious composition f0 = A4, f2 = A5, f3 = E5, f4 = A6, f5 = E6, with 75 ms pulse duration and 25 ms inter pulse interval (IPI). The rhythmic pattern is syncopated with 75 ms pauses
In this case, it serves to inform that the Temperature values are increasing. This representation does not include the Priority Pointer. Figures 6 and 7 represent the same Temperature alarm, with the Priority Pointers. Figure 6 in Medium Priority and Fig. 7 is High Priority.
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Fig. 5 Spectrogram of a Temperature category Auditory icon with rising melody
Fig. 6 Spectrogram of a complete Temperature alarm, including Medium Priority Pointer, and auditory icon overlaid with an increasing melody
The harmonization of the auditory icons was achieved with the cartonization of the sounds. We used the formation of major chords and chose the F key (F3-349 Hz, A3-440 Hz, C4-523 Hz, F4-698 Hz). The resulting sound examples can be divided into three important aspects: (1) priority identification by using a first small musical note (2) category recognition by using an appropriate auditory icon; and (3) the direction of the monitored vital signal values, whether they are increasing or decreasing, through the use of a melodic sequence. Priorities can be presented as low (not represented), medium (Fig. 3) and high (Fig. 4), the alarm categories according to the IEC 60601-1-8 are eight
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Fig. 7 Spectrogram of a complete Temperature alarm, including High priority pointer, an auditory icon and the increasing melody layer
(Power Down, Cardiovascular, Perfusion, Drug administration, Oxygen, Ventilation, Temperature and General), and the direction of registered values can be increasing or decreasing. The Priority aspect was designed taking into account the time envelope of harmonics (Sreetharan et al., 2018and sharpness (Fastl, 1997; Terhardt & Stoll, 1981). The choice of intervals to create a harmonization considered their capacity on influencing subjective perception, as reported in Sect. 3.1. The major 3rd was used expecting to trigger calm, pleasing, bright, hopeful, and happy emotions for the Medium priority alarm. A perfect 5th was applied for the High Priority alarm, expecting to evoke clear, definite, inflexible, and serious emotions (Oelmann & Laeng, 2008). At the rhythmic level, the Priorities differ accordingly. For Medium Priority (Fig. 3), the rhythm is simple, constant with longer timed musical notes. The Medium Priority alarm has as it harmonic composition f0 = D4, f2 = D5, f3 = F#5, f4 = D6, f5 = F#6 with 150 ms duration of each pulse and with a 25 ms inter pulse interval (IPI). It constantly repeats three times. For High Priority (Fig. 4) the rhythm is more complex, irregular and with shorter-timed musical notes. Its harmonious composition includes f0 =A4, f2 = A5, f3 = E5, f4 = A6, f5 = E6 with a 75 ms pulse duration and 25 ms inter pulse interval (IPI). The rhythmic pattern is syncopated with 75 ms pauses. The relation between harmonic composition and emotions needs to be further validated with listening tests. For category recognition we use auditory icons as recommended in the 2020 IEC 60601-1-8 amendment. User listening tests by the authors are underway to catalog which of a set of auditory icons are better associated with each category. As an example, one of possible auditory icons for the Temperature category set is the sound of boiling water in a kettle, while releasing pressure. Auditory icons were previously selected through a categorization exercise with healthcare professionals.
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For the direction of the monitored vital signs values we implemented a melodic line conveying an increase or decrease of values based on sequence expectancy as described by (Narmour, 1990). According to the author, the listener is able to foresee the direction of the melody even before it ends, that is, whether it is going to evoke and increase or decrease. For these melodies, intervals of two and one semitones were used. For our Temperature use-case, a pentatonic of F major was used for the rising Temperature on a Medium Priority alarm, and a pentatonic of F minor for the case of a High Priority alarm. Rhythmically, the sequence is syncopated. The proposed Temperature alarm is grounded on design guidelines rescued from reported music knowledge and psychoacoustics. Its effectiveness and subjective evaluation by human listeners needs to be further researched in experimental settings.
4 Discussion and Conclusion In this chapter we made a brief overview of the consequences of technology and equipment in healthcare settings, with particular focus on clinical auditory alarms. The history of alarm design is long, starting in the 1980’s with Paterson designing alarms for civil aircraft (Patterson, 1982). The paradigm of using melodic alarms with different priorities was applied throughout several different application settings, namely healthcare. Up until very recently, the IEC 60601-1-8 provided design guidelines based on the assumption that humans would be able to associate different clinical function categories to different melodies (Block, 2008). The assumption did not consider several cognitive limitations, and the result was a large number of alarms, very similar in structure, and very hard to learn. Later studies have shown that they were in fact very hard to memorize, and that musicians were better at learning them than non-musicians. These results led the standard to a much needed update which was released in late 2020. The update includes major design guidelines changes, being the most dramatic one dropping melodies as category differentiators. Taking advantage of years of psychoacoustic studies and knowledge, the new alarms should be designed using auditory icons. Auditory icons are everyday sounds that trigger stored knowledge that most humans have. The sound of a screeching tyre means that a car is braking nearby. The sound of a heartbeat means that a heart is beating, and the sound of rattling pills means that it is medicine time. These sounds accelerate recognition, and are structurally and temporally heterogeneous, making them easier to learn (Edworthy et al., 2017). The new design guidelines are an evident improvement to the healthcare professional’s training and day to day activities. But they set ground for new questions. Which auditory icons should be used for a given category? What are the long-term consequences of using everyday sounds as sounds representing critical events and situations? Zooming out from clinical alarms, we have dedicated a section to understanding how hospitals, researchers and musicians are facing the design of a sound space as a whole, naming them healing soundscapes. The positive effect a carefully designed
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and generated soundscape can have of patients and healthcare professionals seems promising. It obviously affects alarm design, and how they can be embedded in that environment and still obtain the response action they expect from professionals. A recent paper by Foley et al. (2020), and previous studies (Gillard & Schutz, 2016; Schutz, 2018) make an intriguing point, further demonstrating that there is more to alarm design than meets the eye. Alarm design and music have been surprisingly apart on the course of alarm design history, and important percepts are yet to be tested, such as annoyance, and how harmonicity and other variables affect it. The question of what music knowledge could teach alarm designers was briefly analysed, and results from studies on harmony, pitch and harmony were reported. Having all that on account, we have proposed to design an harmonious alarm that would trigger certain subjective percepts, such as the perception of urgency, and would not annoy the listener. Having as use-case the challenging Temperature category, we have designed according to the new IEC 60601-1-8 standard an alarm that would (1) inform of the priority of the situation, (2) inform the clinical category and (3) inform the direction of the monitored vital sign value. Importantly, the third function of informing the direction of the sound is not stated on the IEC recommendation, but after interviews with healthcare professionals we have understood it as an important layer to add to the alarm. We have thus designed Medium and High Priority alarms, with the values of Temperature increasing. Validation studies by the team of authors are underway, both for the final selection of auditory icons (comprehension and association to a referent) and for the annoyance rating of the alarms. The design of harmonic alarms and healing soundscapes does not come without its human factors challenges, and it may even be considered too radical of a change when compared with our current noisy healthcare soundscape. We are aware that the positive results of soothing, healing sound spaces are experimental, laboratorial sometimes. Could the trade-off between patient well-being and staff alertness be impossible to balance? Could the best healing soundscape be one with no auditory alarms at all? We have described the benefits of better alarms and soundscapes, but the transition between different alarms from different manufacturers to a unison of equipment and humans may take longer than expected. In the meantime, will hospitals need to set for a middle ground where “older” alarms coexist with new ones? What impact and consequences will new and better alarms have on the noise floor, will they add more noise to noisy conditions? And what impact will that have on the patients and professionals? Additionally, most of the reported knowledge regards western research and western musical preferences. It would be very enriching to understand what soothes and comforts non-western patients and what alerts non-western healthcare professionals. Considering the identification advantages of musicians with melodic alarms, another open question regards how harmonicity is interpreted by musicians. While no reported differences were found in detecting harmonies among noise (McPherson et al. 2020), would we still find musician advantages in detecting harmonies within an harmonious soundscape?
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Taken together, it seems that after designing an alarm as a piece of music, the research questions that ensue regard human, architectural and organizational factors. Complex socio technical settings like hospitals are hard places to implement changes. Here, everything is a system, and every change should be considered as a variable affecting a complex system. For this reason, further multidisciplinary research is needed. Joint efforts from musicians, psychologists, acousticians, healthcare and human-factors professionals, designers and many others are necessary to achieve an acoustically healthy place, a hospital as a safe haven. The true acoustic designer must thoroughly understand the environment he is tackling; he must have training in acoustics, psychology, sociology, music, and a great deal more besides, as the occasion demands. There are no schools where such training is possible, but their creation cannot long be delayed, for as the soundscape slumps into a lo-fi state, the wired background music promoters are already commandeering acoustic design as a bellezza business. (Schafer, 1977)
Acknowledgements This paper is dedicated to the memory of Professor Jorge Almeida Santos. The presented work is part of the project PATERSON—Prototyping medical acoustic environments for the design of new auditory warning signals, supported by the Portuguese Government through FCT—Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (grant ref. PTDC/PSI-GER/EEAELC/112137/2009), co-funded by COMPETE2020 under the PT2020 program, and supported by FEDER and FCT within the R&D Units Project Scope: UIDB/00319/2020.’
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Music Education and Intersection Areas
The Music Training of General Primary Education Teachers: A Case Study at a Spanish University Yurima Blanco-García and Alicia Peñalba
Abstract This chapter presents a case study on the musical training that General Primary Education teachers receive at Palencia’s Faculty of Education, University of Valladolid (Spain). This training constitutes the common academic offer on the subject of Music for the future Primary teachers. The methodology is based on the case studies (Stake, 2010) and its intention is to learn the singularities of the case by describing the context, the analysis of documents and the gathering of data (directly observing classes, interviewing students and music teaching staff). The Atlas.ti software is used to analyze the data and the theoretical triangulation and the investigators. It analyzes aspects like the profile of the student body and the teaching staff, the balance between the musical contents and the didactic content, the use of ICTs, the development of creativity, the autonomy and the presence of diverse music and cultures. It concludes that the teaching of music does not seem sufficient to implement its knowledge in Primary classrooms. Factors such as the overwhelming number of students, the use of non-specific classrooms or the lack of quality music references present tension points on this initial training.
1 Introduction The musical training received by the general teachers in Spain produces a great academic interest, for it encompass the whole of the academic offer acquired by all the teachers during their university studies. This training is common to all the Primary Education Teacher Bachelors’ program, whether it is the general teachers or to those who will later pursue the Musical Education mention. While midst of the educational reformation Spain’s general education is undergoing, it is suitable to know how the future teachers in the field of music are being trained and in what measure this training is adapted to the needs and demands of the educational and social reality. Y. Blanco-García (B) · A. Peñalba University of Valladolid, Valladolid, Spain e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_14
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During several decades the general teacher’s musical training has been oriented towards a very theoretical musical education, that revolves around reading music, unattached to classroom’s real needs. The hardship in understanding the musical language by an untrained student body has influenced the subject of Music and made it feared, not enjoyed and, in some occasions, rejected. With the opening of a new university bachelor degrees—conceived as part of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) around 1999—the competencies of the musical subjects, that the general teaching students must receive, have changed: they have adapted to the real professional needs of these future teachers and, therefore, have adapted too to the demands of society and the economy of knowledge. Despite this adaptation, nowadays musical training remains wanting (Blanco Garcia & Peñalba, 2020). Considering the case study as an investigation of a singular reality, of a particularity (Simons, 2011), in this chapter we address the training of Primary Education general teachers in the Faculty of Education of a Spanish public university (anonymous). This Campus trains general teachers exclusively (some of the students follow the double Bachelor degree on Early Childhood and Primary Education), therefore the mention on Musical Education is not included in the educational offering. The syllabus for the Primary Education Teacher Bachelors’ program has 240 university credits, and is a four-year program; the one being analysed here includes two mandatory Music subjects: Fundamentals and Didactic Strategies in Musical Education (FDSME) and Artistic Creation, Visual and Musical Culture (ACVMC). The present paper starts by describing the context where the training of the future teachers takes place. In the case demarcation there is an analysis of aspects such as: the student body’s profile, as well as the teaching staff’s, the classroom as a learning space and the particularities of Musical teaching. The series of questions presented seek to deepen the knowledge in this educative reality, among other things: the equilibrium between the didactic or the musical content, the use of the information communication technologies (ITCs), the development of creativity, the students’ autonomy and responsibility and the presence of music belonging to diverse cultures and time periods. This study frames a national investigation project “Teacher training and music in the knowledge” (Profmus, 2017) which’s objective is to examine the training of teachers in the subject of music, through the analysis of the syllabuses, life histories, case studies during initial training, second cycle training and permanent training of the Music teacher; all of which provides a context in the realities presented by the current education and society.
1.1 Methodology The investigation of case studies is approached from an interpretative paradigm perspective, for it recognizes the complexity and the multidimensionality of social situations. The interpretative approach, in which the goal of an investigation is not
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to make predictions, but to understand the phenomenon and the implication of those taking part in it, as Denzin and Lincoln (2000, p. 3) state: Qualitative research is a situated activity that locales the observer in the world. […] This means that qualitative research involves an interpretive, natural settings, attempting to make sense of, or interpret, phenomena in terms of the meanings people bring to them.
Qualitative investigations emphasize the comprehension of socio-educational phenomenon, more than in its explanation and the design of the investigation is emerging (Stake, 2010), which is to say that it is being constructed while the investigation advances. It is holistic, contextual, participative and emphatic (Stake, 1995). The investigator keeps in direct contact with the implicated people, taking part in the studied reality. The data collection technique associated with the qualitative methodology provides information on the concrete situations and contexts, allowing an exhaustive description and recreating the sensation of knowing the case (Bresler & Ardichivili, 2002). In this study direct observation, interviews and document revision have been used. The first one allows to obtain information about the subtle elements that take place in the teaching-learning context, in more depth than the ones obtainable form teaching guides, audit plans or interviews. These non-participating observations have been registered in observation diaries. Semi-structured interviews have been applied to the prior mentioned subjects teaching staff and to a group of students in these subjects. These have been registered in audio format and transcribed for their subsequent analysis. Lastly, documents such as degree’s verification memories, teaching guides and other classroom documents. All data has been transcribed and integrated into the software ATLAS.ti (version 8). The data is then reduced and codified, later the data is clustered until superior categories emerge and relations are established. A data triangulation has been made using different data collection strategies (observations, interviewing and document analysis). An investigators’ triangulation has also been done, for, in this case, the information has been discussed by two investigators. Finally, a theoretical triangulation is done (Denzin & Lincoln, 2000) that consists in the use of different theoretical perspectives to analyse the same data pool. The observations about both mandatory subjects in the syllabus: Fundamentals and Didactic Strategies in Musical Education (FDSME) and Artistic Creation, Visual and Musical Culture (ACVMC). In the case of FDSME there has been 2 sessions of classroom observations (there was no access to any other class) and one formative session (visit, and student body performance, to the Tyl Tyl theatrical company), there were 7 interviews to the student and the analysis to the subject’s educational programme. Regarding ACVMC, 5 observation sessions took place, one interview to the professor, 5 interviews to student and the document analysis to the subject’s educational programme. Finally, the emerging categories where used both for the analysis phase and for the presentation of the results, reduced to abbreviations throughout the text, these are: student interviews and corresponding consecutive number (S.I. 1, 2, 3, etc.); professor interview (P.I.): observation’s diary and the related date (example: O.D. 24-9-2019).
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2 The Context Palencia’s Faculty of Education belongs to the so known “peripheral campuses” of the University of Valladolid. Said campuses are characterised for being in a city other than the University’s headquarters, and they are normally smaller centres, with less student. The teaching staff is constituted by a scarce number of professors (only one at present), and some tenured University Lecturers, tenured Education College teachers, Hired Doctors, Assistant Professors and Associates. The Music area is comprised by one tenured University Lecturer, two Associated Professors, one of which is a doctor and a certified Assistant Professor. The percentage of Associated Professors in the Faculty is very high and a great part of the teaching falls upon their shoulders. Palencia’s Faculty of Education has been training teachers for over 160 years and for the last two decades it has also trained Social Educators. It has been a Faculty since the year 2015, for until that moment it had the category of College. From the organization point of view, the dean’s team is constituted by one dean, an academic secretary, the Internships and University Extensions’ vice dean, the Academic Planning and Institutional Relations’ vice dean, and the Students’ vice dean. The centres’ operation is organized around Commissions that meet themselves periodically, independently to the meetings of the Faculty’s Board. In addition to these there are the committees comprising the teachers, students and graduate students of each of the Degrees offered by the Faculty. The Faculty’s regulation was passed by the Government Council’s Permanent Commission, during the session of the 14th of March 2014, that regulates the working of the government’s governing bodies. La Yutera’s Campus is located in the outskirts of the city of Palencia, where the old Yute fabric was, now a rehabilitated building with classroom, meeting rooms, computer rooms, offices, music classrooms, gym and Psychomotor education rooms, reprography, cafeteria, public parking lot, library and study lounge. It is placed in a natural environment, close to parks and the Carrion river that goes through the city.
2.1 Degree Offering At Palencia’s Faculty of Education offers Degrees in Early Childhood Education, Primary Education and Social Education. The Early Childhood teachers are responsible for the first school and, though the 0–3 and 3–6-years old cycles are not mandatory education, a great percentage of children between 3 and 6 years are in schools. The Faculty offers a path for integration from the first courses and a specialization in both fields where its investigation has focused: initiation to Foreign language (English) — being one of the few centres in Spain where a Mention in English Language is offered—; and since the school year 2014–2015, a Mention in Artistic Expression and Communication and Motility, a fundamental area of practical work with children in stage.
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Primary Education teachers are in charge of the basic and mandatory teaching to those between 6 and 12 years of age. The focus is put in the areas of experience and expression and in transversal subjects that complete the official curriculum for this educational sage that needs both general teachers and tutors. Specialist teachers convey subjects such as Music, Physical Education and English. Palencia’s Faculty of Education allows teachers to specialize through two mentions: The Mention on Physical Education and the Mention on Foreign Language (English). There is an offer too in the innovative working line as a specialist worker: the specific training that requires the teaching staff responsible for the bilingual teaching (in accordance with the European regulation CLIL/AICLE). Another modality offered since the school year 2013/14 is the Combined Studies Programme in Early Childhood and Primary Education. Said degree allows students to obtain a double degree in five school years. Lastly, the Social Educator is responsible for generating a more welcoming social context. Given the complexity and diversity of the current society there is a need for/in Education professionals who can anticipate the social and educational demands and who can work in contexts of social exclusion, community development, citizenship participation, international cooperation and social and community attention, either in orientation teams or in the educative system. To this we add the particularity of belonging to an Autonomous Community with an elevated adult population who need training throughout their life.
2.2 Master Studies The Faculty of Education also includes a Generic Module of the Secondary Mandatory Education and High school, Vocational Training and Foreign Language Teacher Master. They are currently working on the creation of a syllabus for an Educational and Socio-community Intervention master’s degree.
2.3 Practicum Every degree contemplates mandatory internships in its syllabus, that take place in facilities outside the University, whether in Early Childhood Education centres or Primary Schools or in institutions that contemplate and need the competencies of Social Educators. The Faculty has a broad net of partner institutions.
2.4 Internationalisation From the teaching internationalisation point of view, the Faculty has a net of agreements with different Spanish, European, U.S. and Oversees Universities with whom
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there is an existing agreement within the Mobility Program. There are agreements with Germany, France, Italy, Norway, the Netherlands, Portugal, the United Kingdom and Turkey in particular.
2.5 University Extension The offer in activities from the University Extension, as responsible for the society’s cultural development in which its inserted, includes: (1) “Afternoons of Education at la Yuntera” (A proposal related to all three Degrees, some in the form of seminars and others carried out in specific occasions, organized when purposed by the teaching staff, by the students or by different institutions. This is a novel initiative, praised and recognized by all as a step forward towards educational innovation and lifelong education): (2) “Weaving knowledge: a Social Investigation permanent seminar” (it conveys all the educative and social investigation experiences to help the analysis and the intervention in the working environment, by initiating a process open to the exchange of ideas, based in the transdisciplinary study); (3) “Edu Fab-Lab” (a laboratory dedicated to the production, investigation and diffusion of educational and cultural projects. It explores the forms of collaborative experimentation and learning, with the intention of articulating the productions of the university world with the experiences in the professional sphere and the educational industry).
3 The Case: Training General Teachers at Palencia’s Faculty of Education 3.1 The Students The profile of the university’s students has changed in the last decades. An increase in the access of young people to Superior Education can be appreciated as well as a greater diversification in social affiliation (Rodriguez Espina, 2015). From the generational point of view, classrooms are, primarily, constituted by what it is called “generation Y ” or “millennials”, which is to say, those born between the 1980s and the 2000s, they are defined by the use of digital technologies, mobile devices and the instant communication through social networks. Nevertheless, during the last decades Teaching Degrees studies have shown a growing number of students outside this age frame. In particular at Palencia’s Faculty of Education, one may find in any course older people that come from the working world or previous studies that allow them to validate them to the current degrees. A question of interest in this section is related to the students’ previous musical training. The students reflect a very scarce information or life experiences related to
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previous stages. Based on their answers, they considered that they have received to scarce information in the Primary and Secondary school stages: I had Music in the 1st and 2nd years of Middle school, then I had no other training in that field. I don’t believe it was adequate, we simply listened to some classical music melodies and learnt songs to play with the flute, in my opinion, the Music that is taught isn’t too useful, the subject should be presented in a different way. (S.I. 8)
Regarding the access profile to Superior Education there are five identified ways to access, from which the most representative is the one corresponding to the High school Evaluation to Access University (EBAU in its Spanish acronym). Other ways include systems before EBAU, such as education cycles from LOGSE and LOE, High school and Selectividad. Regarding the origin, most of them live in the city of Palencia, followed closely by Valladolid (the closest province to the Palentine capital), a smaller number of students from close by municipalities or other towns either belonging to the Autonomous Community or not. As a part of the Erasmus programme, an alumnus comes from Università degli Studi di Urbino Carlo Bo (Italy). Homogeneity is however appreciated among the students. As specified by the teachers, getting to know the students’ profile is important to establish the most effective way of communicating in the classroom, distinguishing some particularities as references for the classroom and knowing their motivation towards toe subject: In the first class I always ask them to introduce themselves and tell me what their relationship with music has been […] well, there are some with ballet, dance, others who have studied piano, solfeggio, others are monitors, others sing… Almost all of them have experience with children, but more from the point of view of sport, some play the guitar, some give dance classes, some play the bass. […] Very few have ever been taught at a music school, either out of interest or because their parents have bought them a guitar… There have been exceptions, there is one who plays the dulzaina and is a musician who goes to the villages, he is part of a company… Another who plays the saxophone and so on, but well, that’s more or less the average. (P.I.)
The question about do they relate to music is understood by the students solely in the sense of playing a musical instrument or singing. To note among the ACVMC students: guitars (2), Ukulele (1), bass (1), Saxophone, drums (1), violin (1), piano (1), singing (1) and coral practice (2). One student has had Solfa classes in her village. It is also standing out the non-recognition of a training in the subject of Music in the previous educational stages. They can barely remember the previous experiences, except for two female students that remember performing in the school coral and even, one student, got self-defined as “arrhythmic”, while talking about her going through music class in Primary School. As a distinctive case, there was one outstanding student because of his vocal interpretation abilities at beatboxing (S.I. 1). It significant that the students can’t relate its interaction with music as a living fact and consubstantial to their musical consuming habits. Most move actively in a musical environment, whether it is through music reproduction (in the car, in mass media, YouTube channels and other platforms where they can stream music), daily
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activities, while exercising, among others, either individually (though headphones or when using music to concentrate a study) or in social spaces. In general, they consider themselves sceptic towards the question, as if music were a distant place and is only accessible to those who possess the interest, the knowledge and the aptitudes for it. The grade of interest for the subject of FDSME seems volatile, on one side, some answers leads to a dismissal on the value of the professional orientation towards another speciality, Corporal Expression Didactics in this case: Personally, on the subject of music, if you can then get the Mention, I think it’s fine to get some general notions… I am particularly interested in corporal expression rather than music, because I don’t see it as useful. It is also because I am personally not interested in it, I am convinced I am not going to pursue a career in Music, but anyway, it is fine to have some basic notions. (S.I. 2)
Nevertheless, they show a bigger compromise while taking part of preprofessional activities in the non-formal education scope. A great part of the students has served as leisure time monitor for children or are working in sport entertainment with groups of children (primarily football or handball) In a smaller scale, a part of the group is balancing their studies with tutoring children and another part declares not taking part in any activity outside their Degree studies.
3.2 The Teaching Staffs The teachers are combining teaching at a university level with other professional activities. In both cases they work as teachers: one as a singing teacher and the other as a piano and Degree and Master teacher at a private University. Their experience in the Primary Teacher Degree and, specially, teaching the subjects that are being analysed, comprises four years. This shows a stability and continuity in the project/syllabus knowledge and the experience in class, which can contribute to the quality in the teaching process. Regarding their musical training, they both possess qualifications from the Advance Conservatory of Music, one in Singing and the other in Musicology. Regarding their professional experience, the FDSME teacher possesses an extensive experience as a lyrical singer and choir director. This artistic activity is complemented with her collaboration in the socio-educative areas and cultural institutions and her work as a teacher in the Dramatical Art College of Castilla y León. The experience of the teacher in ACVMC is related with the artistic teaching, either in Conservatories or in informal education centres. Doubtlessly, all the formative, teaching, artistic and investigation experiences form the teachers contribute to a better quality and a transfer of knowledge in their classroom application. During the interview, the ACVMC teacher considered she had a good training to teach this subject, despite when asked what field would she like to get more training on she makes a special remark in her interest in receiving a broader educational and technological training:
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Well, I would like to have more training in pedagogical methods applied to music […] The whole subject of technology is quite interesting for me and I am not very familiar with it. […] So I know what I want to use it for, but I don’t know about these technologies, these software, how to interact with them… and I would like to do it, I have it as something to do, something pending, but I need time myself. (P.I.)
The students consider that the teaching staff has a good training to convey the lessons. As a student puts it “I think yes, truly the teaching staff that conveys the lessons is very qualified” (S.I. 9).
3.3 The Music Classroom as a Place of Learning The music classroom is a place of 100m2 and is exclusively used to teach music. There are two parts separated by a projecting screen. School musical instruments ready to be used can be found in the back part. The classroom has another space where the chairs with an incorporated table are distributed, set out in a circle, so that the students can see each other when they intervene (O.D. All the sessions except for 15-10-19 that was taken to another classroom). The centre of the room is left open for practical activities that require movement. There are two computers a desktop and a laptop. Said computers have internet connexion and specific sound software such as Cubase. There are school musical instruments such as small wooden percussion ones (wood block, claves, guiro, temple-blocks or castanets) or metal ones (triangle, jingle bells, rattles, rattlesnakes and bells); instruments with plates (xylophones and metallophones); tambour, tambourines, kettledrum, snare, djembes, baschet structure, popular instruments (guitar, harmonica); claims of various types, sound mobiles, boomwhakers, glasses, harmonic tubes and a vertical piano, among others. There is also a recompilation of sounding bodies organized using F. Delalande (1995) proposed categories. In addition to this, there are also printed materials (scores, musicograms, diagrams, bibliography); songs (lullaby, nursery rhymes, popular, from the world, of cultured music, of popular music and different style auditions); audio-visual; stories (musical, interactive and to voice). There are also a series of not specifically musical materials but that are used in some activities: cloth, paperboard, puppets, coloured salts, paints, coloured chalk. The classroom has a small annexed room where students can record sounds, practice a part of a musical piece or experiment with a table of light, as can be seen in the next image (Fig. 1). The music classroom is common to all the subjects in this area, which renders impossible its availability at all times. When it comes to FDSME, its classes take place in another classroom for general teaching (classroom A-18) Since it is set with tables the beginning time is spent in putting the furniture aside and in opening the central space for the practical activities (O.D. 14-10-2019). It has a computer (with internet access), an audio and video player and a screen to amplify it. In the
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Fig. 1 Listening activity with the light table
observed sessions there were no musical instruments used, but the content arose from the activities related to the voice and the body, as well as from the viewing of audio-visual examples. It isn’t the ideal space for a music class, for there are no sonorous bodies or instruments there that are needed to exemplify, accompany or realize compositions in the classroom; neither is the excess of furniture adequate for the realization of choreographies or other activities that require movement. Despite the rooms being spacious, the groups of both subjects are quite numerous, which makes the development of activities involving movement and that need of displacement difficult. The theoretical classes are very overcrowded—during the 2019–2020 school year, 72 students enrolled the Primary Education Teacher Bachelors’ program in FDSME and 57 in ACVMC—and a lack of concentration and general rumble is perceived in the classroom that makes the work in it complicated (O.D. 24-9-2019: O.D. 8-10-19).
3.4 Teaching The Primary Education Teacher Bachelors’ program that is offered in Palencia (University of Valladolid, 2010) only includes two already mentioned Music subjects in the syllabus—FDSME and ACVMC—respectively taught in during the first term of the 2nd and 3rd year. Both are mandatory, and belong to the didactic and disciplinary module and, regarding the credits, FDSME has 6 ECTS, while ACVMC has 4ECTS, this last subject is shared with the Arts Expression area.
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The basic competencies that sustain both subjects are related to the requisites of the Orden ECI/3857/2007 Act, form the 27th of December (Spain, Ministry of Education and Science, 2007). Regarding the specific competencies, it is based in two main axes: (1) Understanding the principles that contribute to the cultural, personal and social education from the art’s perspective: (2) Manage the teaching-learning processes and the musical, art and visual education fields, that promote positive and creative activities orientated to an active and permanent participation in these artistic expression forms. According to these last competencies its development entails to know the Art subject syllabus for schools; acquiring resources to enhance participation in the musical and art activities inside and outside the school; and to develop and evaluate the syllabus content with proper teaching resources (University of Valladolid, 2020). While FDSME is oriented to develop the specific objectives and contents of the musical training, ACVMC seems to be more oriented towards the Artistic Education aspects, as a reflection of its affiliation to the mandatory teaching of the Art and Visual area. Nevertheless, both show a synergy with the contents of the syllabus in force in Primary Education (Spain. Ministry of Education, 2014) and it offers didactic resources and strategies for its application in the classrooms.
4 Results 4.1 Is the Musical Training Enough? One of the main questions emerging from the data analysis is in what measures are the subjects of music guaranteeing the needed competencies, abilities and knowledge to become a Primary Education teacher. Is the training of a general teacher enough or, on the contrary, is it insufficient and a broader deepening is needed? The analysis of the documentation shows that the contents and the way of evaluating it are routed towards the acquisition of the competencies. However, while the subject of FDSME is taught during the term and has 87 h of teaching, ACVMC only has 20 h, concentrated in the 8 first weeks of the term. Although the first is focused in a broader technical and musical expression training, the other subject is focused towards the creative development and the comprehension of the music and the audio-visual languages. In the second, a great number of the training activities revolve around the use of music as a tool more that around the study of it from a technical point of view (O.D. 24-9-19; O.D.22-10-19). The teaching relates directly the contests of the learning activities with the Primary Education syllabus (O.D. 1-10-19). Concerning the first subject, the students are divided with their assessment. Some consider that the training is basic and enough. You’ve got the tools, they have given you the tools, whether you use them or not, that’s up to you. (S.I. 1)
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I don’t think the Music I’ve learnt in Primary and Secondary school is worth much (right now, I only remember the notes to one melody that I learnt by heart for a flute exam), however, the subjects I have had in University have added some more. (S.I. 8)
However, other students consider that to be able to make a proper musical intervention in the classroom a longer training time would be necessary. And they question mainly the multimedia classes. I believe that the Music subjects that we’ve had in University have provided us a low percentage of knowledge to become primary teachers, it isn’t enough. I don’t think they should be taken off all together, but that they should be taught in another way, with smaller groups, because one can work better. (S.I. 8)
The teaching staff considers that the training would improve with more hours. Nevertheless, considering the subject of FDSME is complete and gives more depth, and the subject of ACVMC is scarce, while well-designed and useful (P.I. 1). FDSME’s teaching staff’s point of view agrees that the subject’s scarce time is insufficient to train general teachers. Some limitations lead to the number of students and, therefore, the impossibility of working in a more individual and systematic way. The teacher’s opinion is that “it’s impossible to cover” everything that the training of a general teacher’s training comprises in this subject, therefore the objective is to “open little windows” for their personal and professional development in the Primary classroom.
4.2 Didactic Content versus Theoretical Content: Where Is the Balance? It is important to ask oneself: Do the music subject provide a relevant role to the musical contents in opposition to the educational ones? In the study context the students are asked about this relation. Precisely because of their condition as general teachers, the students agree with the fact that the didactic component should have more weight than the musical one: “Since we are pursuing a Bachelor in Education, then music should be more didactic” (S.I. 1). However, the impressions on the developing of the subject shown an equilibrium between both components or even a bigger weight in music: “[We have received] a bit more of musical content, but I believe that it’s more or less balanced” (S.I. 5). In the FDSME class the teacher shows an interest towards both contents. Looking at the didactic aspect, her discourse meets the reflection on the conducted activities, how they would adapt to a primary class, how to present different development levels for the practical exercises, in sump, its possible pedagogical application. Nevertheless, the technical-musical content takes the centre stage or, at least, the students need a greater weight in the didactics: “I believe it’s the other way around. There should be more didactics, at a University level, because later on you can train yourself more on the musical subject (S.I. 5)”.
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With reference to the weight of the technical musical or didactic training, it is interesting to ask how does this subject work regarding the musical training in the previous years. Besides this fragmentation in learning and practice in school music, it is positive that the students attribute a novel character to the received content: “I don’t remember being taught any of this when I receiving music class in Primary. I think they’re new things, because all the things we did here in class I had never done before” (S.I. 4).
4.3 Technology as a Mediator in the Learning Musical Process The use of technologies is especially important in the subject of ACVMC. The projects the students conduct need access to the information and the digital and technological means that allow them to develop three group projects. Taking the first project as an example, the creation of a soundscape (Schafer, 2013), they could not go without these resources: a recorder to record the selected sounds (normally they use their own smartphone); a software for music editing (Audacity is the most commonly used); access to google maps to mark the geographical spaces; the Microsoft office program to elaborate the project’s presentation and a music player to play the audio in class (O.D. 24-9-19). In the classes, the ICTs are used as a support resource to screen the slides and to show the audio-visual examples. The Moodle platform is used as a base to fill the bibliography in, the class presentations, the exchange of information, as well as the submission and assessment of activities. Nevertheless, the students perceive the presence of the ICTs in the classroom as superfluous: “There is too much (presence), for example the singing videos that you can see on the internet and in social media” (S.I. 9). Their criteria demand a greater presence of the musical practice in class and fewer contents based in audio-visual examples. We use the ICTs a lot, to listen to melody pieces, to watch videos, to create content (soundscapes)… Nowadays they play a very important role, but it is also used to use instruments, our bodies, school materials… To feel the rhythms, the melodies in another way, as to feel that it is true that you are creating and listening to something real. (S.I. 8)
Certainly, the ACVMC class bases most of its methodology in master classes, where audio-visual resources are commonly used to expose content. However, most of the weight from the ICTs is observed in competencies that the students develop to carry the class practices out or the projects both individually and in groups. Meanwhile, the subjects or FDSME also uses the visualization of examples as a part of the teaching method in the classroom. The student’s response the link between the ICTs and the musical education they receive from the subject is perceived as wanting: “No, nothing at all… It’s only used to play videos on the internet, but to carry out projects with the ICTs, no, nothing!” (S.I. 7).
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4.4 Are Students Trained in Creativity? Both subjects of music in the Primary Education Teacher Bachelors’ program are designed in different ways. FDSME is oriented towards basic musical training, while ACVMC is projected to develop the interdisciplinary competencies with visual an art education. In this sense, the second subject seem more oriented towards the creative processes. The reference pedagogical models used in the classroom are based in some creative pedagogue such as R. Murray Schafer. There has been observed several activities to develop creativity in the classroom, such as the creation of soundscapes based on images (O.D. 24-9-2019), the creation of landscapes based on different subjects (O.D. 1-10-2019), the art creation with music using a table of light (O.D. 15-10-2019), or the creation of a musical story with Chinese shadows (O.D.22-10-2019). In this sense the students perceive the interdisciplinary situation, from a creative point of view, as an enrichment: “It’s a very important point that the music can be worked in an interdisciplinary way with other subjects […] in enriches the students and allows them to experiment, to promote their creativity” (S.I. 9). One of the most creative projects of this subject is the production of a short audiovisual film that integrates every acquired competency in the subject and that also allows to relate the musical and the art aspects: “The projects that we make in groups made a lot of sense, since we had to see our creative side, our visual side (images and videos) and the musical side” (S.I. 8). The perception of the teacher is that the creative competencies are oriented, not to teach music in a creative way, but to develop the creativity while using music as a tool: Not for them to be music teachers, because that’s not the idea […] but so that they can do something with their phone in their classrooms or to create something with them. Or also something with their voice […] so that they can make their own improvisations. Or do something altogether, with corporal percussions. (P.I.)
The subject of FDSME, while oriented towards a sufficient technical and didactic music training, the also present creative activities. An example of it are the sessions dedicated to the sound exploration with the body, in this case, the corporal percussion accompaniment (O.D. 14-10-2019). Besides the creativity, there is also a need for organization, team work, autonomy, the exploration of the body as an instrument and synchronization There are several combinations that are admitted such as had games, snaps, percussion on the thighs or different dispositions (sitting, standing, in a line, using chairs, etc.). The class is divided in two roles, for each team is in charge of observing one of the groups and then, represent with non-conventional graphs the “composition” they have observed. It is a mix process of interpretation-creation and, on the other side, coding-decoding of the sound choreography. However, in this kind of activities there is an attitude of inhibition from the students that can be observed, which, in fact produces some low-quality presentations. Precisely it is one of the teacher’s pointed out objectives in this type of practices: “To lose inhibitions”, “see oneself in another”, “walking in a Primary
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school student’s shoes” (O.D. 21-10-2019). The creative activities and the musical interpretation in the classroom need a compromise and an active implication by the students. For this it is important to overcome shyness and understand these practices as learning exercises that prepares them to carry out your work as a teacher. Besides the good designing, the lack of time in the subject and the overcrowding in the groups causes that, sometimes, some creative activities are developed superficially only. In the session where the light tables where used to create an art form, inspired by music, the activity was only perceived as an anecdotal experience (O.D 15-10-2019). It would be necessary to present different listening activities, with more reduced groups, with a clearer teaching intention, so that this practice could have a deeper impact in the students.
4.5 Autonomy and Responsibility The evaluation activities are presented in the subject as a part of the realization of group work projects. ACVMC’s final project is based on the great communicative and formative capacity of the audio-visual means, searching to comprehend how they function and their pedagogic capacities in order to use these languages properly in the schools. The project consists in the production of a video made out of images and sounds/music that exposes or analyses a current topic from a critic point of view. It’s important that all the group members make a previous reflection on the topic, in order not to fall into a matter that is anecdotal, superficial or without judgement. They elaborate a rubric that, in the subject of Music, it includes the capacity of experimenting with the meanings of music and image; that the used music presents the maximum amount of function regarding the image and the mastery of the concept they worked on in the subject, among other things. The knowledge of the rubric promotes responsibility and autonomy in a way. The groups must debate, make decisions, organize themselves, design a temporality and give form to a final project. The teacher underlines different competencies that they develop during the project, whom promote autonomous, critical and responsible work. It is however perceived a lack of follow-up on this project during the course and, specially, a lack of feedback that it is however present in other projects. Students submit their audio-visual project once the course is over, they don’t get to know what their colleges have submitted, and they only receive a final grade. The teacher establishes that she is reformulating this, but she considers that in eight weeks of course it is difficult to organize it otherwise. The students value continuous evaluation as a way of adapting the teaching personally: “I think that continuous evaluation is very good, where you can penalize the teaching of each student based on his or her possibilities. Through exercises, practices and team work” (S.I. 9).
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4.6 Beyond the Occidental Cultured Music One of the problems presented nowadays musical education is that it is still pinned to the tradition of occidental classical cultured music, an in this sense, it leaves aside other cultural music that doubtlessly contribute to widen the concept of music and the possibilities that it offers to understand other cultures, other creative languages and other forms of art. In this sense, the subject of ACVMC draws upon many musical languages. Besides the mentioned soundscape and the use of sonorous bodies for musical creation, it uses the referent of contemporary music, world music and popular music. The students mark this idea: “Yes we’ve heard a bit of everything and I think that it’s very good to get familiar with the different styles of music that exist” (S.I. 10). The teacher also refers to it: Yes, I always try to put examples of other cultures. For example, one of the examples of the use of the voice in Inuit singing. Or when I play one of Murray Schafer’s works, that is also occidental culture, but it belongs, lets say, to the high area of Montreal in Canada. Or when we play some African music, or also a contemporary theme. We played some musical things form the second part of the XX century form Pierre Henry. ¡Ah! When we do the project about silence I play the one of John Cage. Also, try to keep not just a geographical opening but also of times. (P.I.)
5 Conclusions The teaching of mandatory subject for general teachers does not seem sufficient for the student body to have a training with which to implement their practice in the Primary Education classroom. It needs to include the training options in the artistic education area and, specifically, musical, as a part of a more humanistic syllabus (Aróstegui, 2006). Nevertheless, they are basic, and they address different and complementary issues: technical music and audio-visual creative aspects. The students’ perception over the balance between didactic or properly technical-musical content seems in even. The larger groups and the use of non-specific classrooms is a handicap for the teaching quality and practice. The use of technologies is perceived in occasions as too intensive, and some students would value more the practical work with instruments or with their body. In a way, the overcrowding of the groups pushes to use the ICTs in that sense. There is an opening towards creativity in the concept of music that can be observed. Broadening these notions in the classrooms is fundamental, but an important lack is perceived in the quality musical references in the student body. They make us question ourselves about in what means do “other music” have to be included when there is a “more convenient music syllabus”. In any case, the time that the subjects have does not seem sufficient to give the necessary referents and the necessity of designing a new autonomous study plan beyond the classroom is presented, to boost the university’s musical life and to offer tools for lifelong learning.
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The case study doesn’t attempt to generalize (Simons, 2011), however, the data collected in the present study shows a specially interesting reality to understand other essential questions about the articulation of the syllabus, to know the innovative teaching techniques, to acknowledge the tension points and the need of an academic order, of resources or suggested medium- and long-term training practices that contribute to a better musical training of our general teachers. Acknowledgements This work is part of the R&D project EDU2017-84782 “Teacher training and music in the knowledge” (Profmus, 2017), financed by the Ministry of Industry, Economy and Competitiveness, State Programme for the Promotion of Scientific and Technical Research of Excellence.
References Aróstegui, J. L. (2006). La formación del profesorado en Educación Musical ante la Convergencia Europea en Enseñanzas Universitarias. Revista de Educación, 341, 829–844. https://sede.educac ion.gob.es/publiventa/d/24279/19/0 Blanco Garcia. Y., & Peñalba, A. (2020). La formación de futuros docentes de música en las universidades de Castilla y León: creatividad, ciudadanía y aprendizaje permanente como claves del cambio educativo. Revista electrónica de LEEME, 46, 166–186. http://dx.doi.org/10.7203/ LEEME.46.17756 Bresler, L., & Ardichivili, A. (2002). International research in education: Experiences, theory and practice. Peter Lang. Delalande, F. (1995). La música es un juego de niños. Ricordi. Denzin, N. K., & Lincoln, Y. S. (2000). Handbook of qualitative research. Sage. http://www.ama zon.co.uk/SAGE-Handbook-Qualitative-Research/dp/1412974178 España. Ministerio de Educación, C. y D. (2014). Real Decreto 126/2014, de 28 de febrero, por el que se establece el currículo básico de la Educación Primaria. Boletín Oficial Del Estado, 52, 1 de marzo. https://www.boe.es/buscar/pdf/2014/BOE-A-2014-2222-consolidado.pdf España. Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia. (2007). Orden ECI/3857/2007, de 27 de diciembre, por la que se establecen los requisitos para la verificación de los títulos universitarios oficiales que habiliten para el ejercicio de la profesión de Maestro en Educación Primaria. Boletín Oficial Del Estado, 312, 27 de diciembre, 53747 a 53750. Profmus. (2017). Teacher training and music in the knowledge. R&D project EDU2017-84782 Project report financed by the Ministry of Industry, Economy and Competitiveness, Spain. http:// profmus.ugr.es/ Rodríguez Espinar, S. (2015). Los estudiantes universitarios de hoy: una visión multinivel. Los estudiantes universitarios de hoy: una visión multinivel. REDU. Revista de Docencia Universitaria, 13(2), 91–124. https://doi.org/10.4995/redu.2015.5440 Schafer, R. M. (2013). El paisaje sonoro y la afinación del mundo. Intermedio Editores. Simons, H. (2011). El estudio de caso: Teoría y práctica. Ediciones Morata. Stake, R. (1995). The art of case study research. Sage. Stake, R. (2010). Qualitative research: Studying how things work. Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling. Guildford Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107415324.004 Universidad de Valladolid. (2010). Memoria de plan de estudios del Título de Grado Maestro -o Maestra- en Educación Primaria por la Universidad de Valladolid. http://educaci7-cp189.wor dpresstemporal.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/MemoriaPRIMARIA-2.pdf Universidad de Valladolid. (2020). Proyecto/Guía docente de la asignatura Creación Artística y Cultura Visual y Musical. Curso 2019/20. https://alojamientos.uva.es/guia_docente/uploads/ 2019/552/40585/1/Documento.pdf
Artistic Music Projects and Their Educational, Cultural and Social Relevance Alberto Cabedo-Mas, Noemy Berbel-Gómez, and Maravillas Díaz-Gómez
Abstract This chapter reflects on the use of music to offer children and young people opportunities for effective social and cultural integration into their communities. Throughout the text we will discuss the aims and challenges of community music today and we will also explore different programs to review their power for social and personal transformation, highlighting the possibilities of art and music making for social transformation beyond the classroom. We will discuss some examples in which music education has been used as a service for the community. Finally, the text gives voice to two ongoing research projects funded by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain. They are social projects with artistic aims and pedagogical nature that are currently being developed in two Spanish autonomous communities. By exploring these projects the chapter concludes reinforcing that some experiences with art, through creative processes of active participation, are capable of contributing to the construction of a social fabric that reinforces the neighborhood, the educational and cultural contexts, while at the same time consolidates music and art didactics adapted to current social challenges.
A. Cabedo-Mas Universitat Jaume I, Castellón de la Plana, Spain e-mail: [email protected] N. Berbel-Gómez Universitat de les Illes Balears, Palma, Spain e-mail: [email protected] M. Díaz-Gómez (B) Universidad del País Vasco, Leioa, Spain e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_15
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1 Introduction In March 2006, Viseu (Portugal) was the location for a meeting between the presidents1 of three renowned international associations with a firm commitment to education through art. These associations were the International Society for Music Education (ISME, www.isme.org), the International Society for Education through Art (InSEA, www.insea.org) and the International Drama Theatre and Education Association (IDEA, www.idea.org). The purpose of this meeting was to define an integrated strategy that could respond to “a critical moment in human history: social fragmentation, a dominant global culture of competition, endemic urban and ecological violence, and the marginalization of key educational and cultural languages of transformation”. Each organisation, in its respective sphere of reference—music education, education through art, and drama, theatre and education—provides invaluable support and stimulation for all educators with a concern for constructing knowledge. Their mission is to contribute to improving the quality of education in the arts and, therefore, the general education of children and young people throughout the world. The outcome of this meeting was a joint declaration that would establish a global alliance for arts education “based on principled and sustained dialogue […] aimed to accelerate the implementation of arts education policies internationally”. The declaration called on UNESCO to meet its responsibilities to place arts education at the heart of “a world agenda for sustainable human development and social transformation” (Joint Declaration, Viseu, Portugal, 4 March 2006).2 In addition, the Road Map for Arts Education was drawn up as a consequence of discussions and reflections within the frame of the First World Conference on Arts Education held in Lisbon (Portugal) from 6 to 9 March in the same year. The resulting document focuses on the strategies required to introduce and promote arts education in the learning environment and to meet students’ needs for creativity and cultural awareness in the twenty-first century. The road map aims to guarantee the human right to education and cultural participation, to improve the quality of education, and to promote the expression of cultural diversity. Other considerations of note are the introduction of the arts in all school curricula, as well as in non-formal education.3 The Second World Conference on Arts Education was held four years later in Seoul (Republic of Korea), from 25 to 28 May 2010. The outcome of this conference was the “Seoul Agenda: Goals for the Development of Arts Education”, which calls on UNESCO member states, civil society, professional organisations and communities to recognise its ruling goals: GOAL 1:
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Ensure that arts education is accessible as a fundamental and sustainable component of a high quality renewal of education.
Gary McPherson (president of ISME) Douglas Boughton (former president of InSEA) and Dan Baron Cohen (president of IDEA). 2 http://insea.org/sites/default/files/uploads/zzz/Joint_Declaration_2006.pdf. 3 http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CLT/CLT/pdf/Arts_Edu_Roa dMap_es.pdf.
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Assure that arts education activities and programmes are of a high quality in conception and delivery. Apply arts education principles and practices to contribute to resolving the social and cultural challenges facing today’s world.
Following the Second World Conference on Arts Education, the UNESCO General Conference of 2011 proclaimed an International Arts Education Week to be held annually each May. It was marked for the first time in May 2012, in the UNESCO headquarters and all member countries were invited to join this initiative, which attracted participation from artists, educators, researchers, NGO representatives and international associations. In her address, Irina Bokova, the DirectorGeneral of UNESCO, told attendees that “Arts education is a key to training generations capable of reinventing the world that they have inherited. It supports the vitality of cultural identities by emphasizing their links with other cultures, thus contributing to the construction of a shared heritage. It helps to form tolerant and dynamic citizens for our globalizing world”. As well as the valuable UNESCO reports, a broad literature grounded in empirical evidence testifies to the importance of art and culture in education and its direct relationship with human development, which it achieves by promoting cultural diversity, intercultural dialogue and social cohesion. Knowledge about the arts and their practical application in the classroom provides us with unique perspectives on a wide variety of subjects and proposals that might not be acquired in other areas of learning. Furthermore, as Maravillas Díaz (2014, p. 17, our translation) notes, “It is an unequivocal error to consider that the only active agent in education is the educator. The teacher acts as a mediator between society, the community, the family, educational policies, teaching curricula and study programmes”; high quality arts education cannot be rooted solely in the classroom, but must involve coordination between formal and non-formal education and at the same time it requires multiple cultural environments and spaces.
2 Community Music Initiatives in Education A clear engagement with the concept of music education committed to the principles set down in the UNESCO goals, and that is also, as Díaz (2014) states, dedicated to coordinating actions in formal and non-formal education environments by opening up educational and cultural spaces outside the school, involves adopting initiatives that take community music-making into account. Adopting and adapting educational models that embrace artistic initiatives with and from the community can be a way of ensuring accessible and democratic music education that is committed to reality and oriented to improving social well-being and harmonious coexistence among people. Community Music activities do more than involve participants in music-making; they provide opportunities to construct personal and communal expressions of artistic, social, political, and cultural concerns. Community Music activities do more than pursue musical excellence and
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innovation; they can contribute to the development of economic regeneration and can enhance the quality of life for communities. Community Music activities encourage and empower participants to become agents for extending and developing music in their communities. In all these ways Community Music activities can complement, interface with, and extend formal music education structures. (International Society for Music Education, 2021)
The above extract defines the vision of the International Society for Music Education’s (ISME) Community Music Activity Commission (CMA). The ISME understands community music as an essential channel for music education that demands the attention of educators in the twenty-first century. The notion of community music comes from the idea of community arts, directly linked to the concept of local communities, which spring from art-related actions, intended for civil society and undertaken by members of a community of participating citizens. In his book Community, Art and the State: Storming the Citadels, the artist Owen Kelly (1984, p. 1) defines community arts as “a general term for a group of cultural activities which the practitioners recognise as having common features but whose precise boundaries remain undrawn”. The educator Lee Higgins, in turn, argues that community music is based on the principle that everybody has the right and the ability to make, create and enjoy their own music and, in doing so, to participate in the musical and creative life of their communities. The concept of community art and with it, community music, did not appear in general artistic discourse until the 1960s. The term was first coined in the United Kingdom, against a background of growing cultural diversity resulting from post-war immigration to the country and burgeoning civil society anti-establishment protests. However, some authors argue that evidence of community arts initiatives can be found as early as the nineteenth century (Comte and Forrest, 2012). Community arts challenge the distribution of cultural resources, and more significantly, the legitimacy of institutions that claim to judge what has artistic merit and what does not. This widespread idea provoked a fiercely defensive response from the art establishment, which argued that community art was simply “bad art”. The art establishment’s discourse on community arts always centred on artistic quality, not the art itself, and the battle was over who had the right to determine its value(s). When it rejected a work on artistic grounds, the institutional art world was not only attempting to defend certain ideas about art, but also its own authority as the judge of its value. In this context, numerous authors from the fields of ethnomusicology and education have studied musical discourses, but without uncoupling them from the communities in which they were produced (see, for example, Christopher Small [1977], Margaret Mead [1970], Martí [1995]). Today the field of community music is closely linked to education. From a pedagogical perspective, the main purpose of community music is to construct spaces for participation where initiatives to improve the lives of individuals and communities are generated through artistic creation and practice. It is therefore not only education for music but also education through music; and every community initiative is fully aware of the importance of striking the right balance between these two positions.
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Community music aims to generate collective actions in which artistic experience is shared among all members, thereby deconstructing outdated notions that only those who know about art can or should create it, and promoting access to everyone who wants to enjoy it. It could be said that socio-musical projects offer an ideal setting for engendering new open pedagogies in music education (returning to the pedagogical discourses of the mid-twentieth century), and ensuring that new sectors of the population gain access to music education. Group music making is understood as an artistic tool, but also a means of fostering social cohesion. Making music together can generate a sense of belonging to a group, firstly because the pursuit of musical purpose, of artistic excellence, combines efforts towards a common objective and opens up an infinite number of communication channels between those who participate and create music together. Secondly, as thinkers like Hegel have argued, music can be a means through which we transmit emotions, since music is a language of feelings, charged with expressiveness (Hormigos Ruiz, 2008, pp. 186–187, 209). And thirdly, music is part of our aesthetic dimension and our cultural heritage, which is why we can identify with it; moreover, the experience of making music can help us discover that we are both equal and different. The educational task of community music in this context must strive to ensure that diversity means difference and not inequality. Education cannot exist with its back to society. The reality of education, formal and non-formal, is that we must face the social challenges in our environment. We now understand that conceptual learning is only one part of education, and that educational spaces must ensure that people learn to live together, through a critical and compassionate lens. Today, music education, through the individuals concerned about learning and teaching music, is faithful to these principles, and in consequence, myriad fascinating initiatives are emerging from very different perspectives that give real meaning to the notion of artistic music projects and their educational, cultural and social relevance. The structure of the International Society for Music Education is based on a series of working commissions corresponding to the main streams of contemporary music education. One of these specific commissions, as mentioned above, is the ISME Commission on Community Music Activity, which together with the other comissions, holds its biennial meeting a few days before each ISEM World Conference. Perhaps one of the most relevant examples of socio-musical initiatives at an international level is the philosophy of El Sistema Nacional de Orquestas y Coros Juveniles e Infantiles de Venezuela (National Network of Youth and Children’s Orchestras of Venezuela, or El Sistema) and, even more so, the programmes deriving from this initiative that have been adapted in numerous and varied geographical and social contexts, each with their own individual character. The ISME has its own El Sistema Special Interest Group, an international forum of music educators and researchers who meet to debate not only the principles of the Venezuelan El Sistema, but also how they are adapted to each of the scenarios in which El Sistema-inspired projects have been undertaken. Its present convener is the researcher Andrea Creech, and its members include professionals such as Geoff Baker and Richard Hallam from the
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UK, Magali Kleber from Brazil, Graça Mota from Portugal and Eva Saether from Sweden. In addition, the number of conferences, seminars, meetings and other encounters on the question of community music is also rising. One example is the Social Impact of Music Making (SIMM), whose SIMM-posium has been held in different places such as London (UK), Porto (Portugal), Bogotá (Colombia) or Brussels (Belgium), among others. Another specialised community music centre is the International Centre for Community Music in the UK, led by Lee Higgins, professor and former president of the ISME between 2016 and 2018; there is even a Musicians without Borders, which although not on the same scale as Doctors or Reporters without Borders, is a growing movement. Community initiatives with social implications now occupy a significant place in the educational sphere. While this is undoubtedly a relevant subject, it requires careful and conscientious study. To this end it is crucial to start with a solid research base from which to rigorously analyse the educational practices and the effects these initiatives have on the participants, whether they be the immediate beneficiaries of the programme, educators or society in general. Although information is available on the subject, and valuable books and articles have published highly significant results, much remains to be explored in this field, and researchers should be encouraged to share their findings with the larger scientific community. Only in this way can we move towards increasingly robust and efficient models. Sharing does not imply simply publishing promotional reports describing these actions and initiatives; rather, it means scrutinising what is actually happening at the heart of these socio-musical initiatives in order to observe their real effects (even if they do not always meet expectations), question what each initiative specifically sets out to do, and encourage exchanges with other professionals to foster mutual learning. In sum, sharing means allowing ourselves to interrogate our own educational practices.
3 Collaboration and Cooperation Relationships. Research and Shared Benefits of Knowledge: Artistic Music Projects As a result of the UNESCO proposals, and in accordance with the ideas expounded above, which reflect our activity as educators with a desire to respond to today’s educational challenges, we presented two projects that have now been approved and funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness. Both projects run for three years, from January 2018 to December 2020. At the time of writing these projects are still ongoing and we have no final results as yet; however, we are able to report on a wide range of proposals and encouraging outcomes that confirm we are working in the right direction and motivate us to continue. In describing the projects below, we respond to three questions that we consider crucial to their philosophy.
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3.1 R&D&i Project Re-inhabiting the Neighbourhood: Processes of Transformation and Empowerment Between University-School-Society Through Artistic Practices. UniESocied-Art This project starts from the hypothesis that experiences with art, through creative processes of active participation, can help to construct a social network that strengthens the neighbourhood, educational and cultural fabric. Its contribution to social transformation and citizen empowerment is pursued through three objectives: to design an artistic transdisciplinary socio-educational intervention programme based on the interconnections between university, school and community; to implement this programme in a disadvantaged marginalised neighbourhood (Nou LlevantSoledat Sud, Palma, Spain); and to evaluate the implementation of the programme and its impact on the educational, artistic, social and cultural environment.
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Situation at the Start of the Project, What Changes Are Desired and Who They Will Affect
The research project ‘Re-Inhabiting the Neighbourhood: Processes of Transformation and Empowerment between University-School-Society through Artistic Practices. UniESocied-Art’ draws on learning gained through the experiences of the Grupo de Investigación en Arte y Educación (GRAiE, Research Group in Arts and Education) and its Laboratorio de Música y Arte (Mus&Art LAB), affiliated to the Universitat de les Illes Balears (UIB). This learning has grown out of joint projects between the university, schools and the local area, based on artistic practices and taking a transdisciplinary approach. The direct contact with artists and experts capable of transmitting their working practices to children and future primary and secondary school teachers is particularly noteworthy. A joint evaluation of two of the previous programmes carried out with all the stakeholders involved exposed the educational, cultural and social needs that we aim to address through the present R&D&i project. The interdisciplinary research team is made up of researchers from the areas of education, human geography, music, the plastic and visual arts, design, philology and drama, architecture, and educational technology at the Universitat de les Illes Balears and other local and national institutions. International researchers from three Portuguese institutions also participate, namely, CIPEM/INET-md (Centro de Investigação em Etnomusicologia—estudos de Música e Dança) at the Politécnico do Porto; Universidade de Évora; and the Instituto Politécnico de Castelo Branco— Escola Superior de Artes Aplicadas. The project has the support and express interest of the Balearic Islands Regional Government’s Department of Education and University, Palma City Council, Mallorca Island Council, primary and secondary schools in the neighbourhood where the project takes place, neighbourhood associations, the Krekovic Museum and the Faculty of Education (UIB).
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The project aims to generate a working structure that can respond to the needs identified and demonstrate ways and action strategies through which the potential of art can be exploited to develop transformative and empowering practices. Our proposal is to work through artistic practice and transdisciplinarity, and to adopt a horizontal collaborative operational structure involving all the stakeholders (teachers, artists, students, neighbours and student teachers, among others). New forms of socio-educational intervention are explored that are able to transform the school and its relationship with its immediate environment—the neighbourhood—and society in general. Only by intervening in the specific environment of the neighbourhood, through immersion in the territory and participatory artistic practices, can multifaceted visions be generated that are able to stimulate the reflective processes necessary to help improve the community in its diversity and its wealth of identity. For this reason, the present study is grounded in the conviction that artistic practice, transdisciplinarity and collaboration can be powerful tools to motivate processes of educational innovation in initial teacher training and in social transformation in disadvantaged marginalised contexts. The setting for the present education programme is one of the most rundown districts of Palma, located on the edge of the city: Nou Llevant-Soledat Sud. This district is undergoing a process of social and urban transformation, and the reality facing its population is both complex and problematic, which presents major challenges to the project. The project has two spheres of action: one in the teacher training degree at the university, and the other in the schools in the Nou Llevant-Soledat Sud neighbourhood. Direct work in the schools and intervention in the student teachers’ initial training are both required to ensure that future primary school teachers’ learning experiences are based in real contexts. To this end the school and the university need to join forces to design open, flexible and collaborative educational spaces within this context. As Jiménez (2011) points out, the school’s position as the only site of learning has been eroded, since children and young people have access to information through a whole range of more diverse media. The challenges facing formal education today call for a reappraisal of the current educational institution and a new type of educational practice. There is growing awareness in art education of the important role it can play in the formal education system, since both professional circles and life in general demand creativity, and the ability to transform, adapt, innovate and develop skills for communicating and acting in translocal, culturally diverse contexts.
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Expected Achievements and Who Is Likely to Benefit
This research aims to achieve outcomes that have an impact on the community through art, on the crosscutting competencies of future teachers, on the students’ competencies, and on the university-school-society relationship. These outcomes will have a direct effect in educational, artistic, social and cultural spheres in Palma. Interventions to transfer the project outcomes will focus on spreading the impact at
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a broader national and international level by suggesting strategies to implement the results. The research objectives led to a methodological approach that in this case provides in-depth detailed information about the situation in the neighbourhood, its residents and the school students involved in order to propose educational solutions. These solutions include improving coordination among the stakeholders—university, school, neighbourhood community, artists and technicians—so as to raise the sense of belonging and citizen empowerment among children and adolescents, and provide educators with valuable resources. At the scientific-technical-artistic level, the research team will publish results demonstrating the changes effected both in the physical settings and territories, and in the learning acquired to empower those who live there. This area of work makes a valuable contribution to present society in Spain, where stigmatised neighbourhoods are still to be found. The social integration of our local communities must be fostered in order to gradually achieve the development and well-being of all. And in this endeavour, art is a powerful driver of social transformation.
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Participation of the Education Community in Carrying Out and Evaluating the Project
All the artistic-educational interventions are the result of the collaboration and cooperation between university students, primary and secondary school students, coordinators and/or artists/experts, cultural associations and residents, to generate knowledge that is shared in multiple directions. Our work is based on research methodology grounded in the arts in which contributions from the stakeholders involved in the evaluation play a useful part. The present project is doubly ambitious since in aiming to develop collaborative practices between art and education, a new agent is added to the complexity of the relational strategies between artists and teachers—namely, future educators, the teacher training students. In the frame of participatory action research and following a horizontal approach, the various stakeholders participate in the design, implementation and evaluation of each artistic-educational action in the programme. The primary school students and the university students will work together on sessions in the open space of the neighbourhood, in the primary and secondary schools and in the Mus&Art LAB (UIB) on the university campus. New technologies play an instrumental role in the project by providing tools for knowledge about the district and in visualisations through geolocated maps, virtual reality, QR codes and so forth. The public display of this R&D&i project is a vital part of the intervention as it socialises both the process and its outcomes. To this end, the project will be made visible through exhibitions staged throughout its duration. The school students will design and produce the final exhibition of the educational material developed in the various activities, which will be shown in the Krekovic Museum. Augmented reality, computer programming and the design and creation
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of an interactive 3D model of the neighbourhood will be used to create a new representation of the neighbourhood integrating the artistic interventions undertaken; a re-presentation that emerges from a new gaze, a collaborative reflection and at the same time an interactive and audiovisual artistic experience (Berbel-Gómez et al., 2019).
3.2 R&D&i Project Multidimensional Analysis of the Socio-Educational Impact of Community Music Initiatives and Service Learning in the School: The MUSIQUEM Programme The main aim of the MUSIQUEM programme is to exploit the opportunities music offers as a channel for communication, positive coexistence and intercultural understanding. This initiative aims to support educators, in direct collaboration with teaching professionals from art, music and corporal education and artists in residence in the classroom, with tools that promote the education of values both inside and outside the classroom through service learning projects and community music activities undertaken in formal and informal educational settings.
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Situation at the Start of the Project, What Changes Are Desired and Who They Will Affect
The project originated with the creation of a new research group made up of members from the fields of music education and pedagogy at the Universidad Jaume I de Castelló (Spain), entitled Arte, Educación y Sociedad (Art, Education and Society, EDARSO), and which has spawned various projects on the subject with distinct pedagogical and research approaches. Within this frame, the Musiquem!: Haciendo música comunitaria en las escuelas (Let’s music! Making community music in schools) initiative is based on two firm convictions: first, that everyone must be given the chance to develop their artistic skills, and second, that the role of arts education must be continuously interrogated, as this is the only way to advance towards a holistic education which prepares individuals to live and get along with others in the twenty-first century. One of the main challenges to current music education is how to integrate the cultural and musical diversity that educators face in their environments (Green, 2009). While it must not be forgotten that the key focus of music education should be to facilitate knowledge about music, make music and actively listen to music, it is equally important to promote experiences in which music is an element of inclusion towards diversity and that can enhance harmonious coexistence. At the same time music should be pursued as a bridge between the school and its surrounding community.
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Through Musiquem, children are given the resources to help them develop their social, communication and relational skills. Making music is thus combined with education in values to strengthen the connection between the school community and its immediate reality. To this end, the aim of the Musiquem programme is to create an orchestra in a primary school in the city of Castelló in which the students participate by playing musical instruments (violins and cellos), aided by the joint efforts of the school’s teachers and the involvement of specialist musicians (violinists and cellists). The primary school is located in the centre of the city and the school’s community is largely made up of families with scarce economic resources, from diverse cultural backgrounds and in some cases at extreme risk of social exclusion. Although the school is not sited in the typically disadvantaged neighbourhoods on the edge of the city, its image has been questioned in recent years and it has been threatened with closure. Improving this image is therefore one of the challenges the programme aims to tackle. By forming school music groups, Musiquem hopes to foster the democratisation of artistic-music practice in contexts where such knowledge and experiences are not accessible to everyone. The school’s active participation with the community, with people from other diverse realities, and in exposing the potential of working collectively are therefore motivated through community endeavours in shared musicmaking spaces.
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Expected Achievements and Who Is Likely to Benefit
The first aim is to promote music education among third to sixth grade primary school students through playing musical instruments. Their artistic expression and the development of their social, communication and relational skills will also be stimulated by their participation in the orchestra. Secondly, continuing professional development for teachers is also provided through collaborative work with artists in residence in the school’s classrooms. A third objective is to encourage community participation in school projects by building collaborative links between the school and its surroundings (the neighbourhood), for which service-learning methodology is used. This helps to revitalise the culture of the environment in which the students live and, therefore, increase the visibility of both the school and the community. To this end, the project is promoted and brought into the community through concerts, seminars, meetings, open days and other activities and performances. The project involves seventy students from the third, fourth and fifth grades of primary school, aged between eight and eleven years old, who are expected to be among the main beneficiaries. Additionally, the project hopes to define effective collaborative teaching models between educators and artists in residence that will enrich both the professional development of the music teachers and the educational abilities of the musicians and artists (Cabedo-Mas et al., 2019). At the same time opportunities are being opened up for collaboration with other musicians and visual artists participating in the project, Castelló city council, other national organisations involved in community music projects, the city’s conservatory and music schools in
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the area, and civic, social and cultural associations and centres in the neighbourhood (senior citizens’ day centre, the museum, commercial establishments, neighbourhood associations, etc.).
3.2.3
Participation of the Education Community in Carrying Out and Evaluating the Project
To date, various studies have analysed educational community art programmes, but most of them do not carry out a systematic rigorous evaluation of the benefits deriving from them (Dillon, 2006). Our three-year project engages with the whole primary school community and incorporates a method for evaluating the programme (Cronbach et al., 1980; Pérez Juste, 2006). Various techniques are used to gather information with which to analyse a series of dimensions across the educational community (students, teachers, families and community). One of the main strengths of our study is the systematic evaluation of all these dimensions on three separate occasions (at the beginning, during the second year and at the end the programme), thereby providing an objective assessment of the programme’s impact. The interdisciplinary Musiquem team’s members include the school’s teaching staff—teachers and the school’s management team—and the research team from the Universidad Jaume I, also interdisciplinary and made up of professionals working in music education, pedagogy, corporal expression and service learning. The musicians in residence, a key element in the process of designing and implementing the programme, are active members of the research project and as such, participate in both the educational and research aspects of the project, collaborating on the research design and approach, gathering and analysing the data, and evaluating the results. Finally, as this project is framed within the participatory action-research model (Kemmis & McTaggart, 1988), students, teachers and the education community are encouraged to actively intervene in designing and evaluating the programme. It is crucially important that once the research ends, the educational community take control of the project and explore ways of continuing with it. The continued experience gained over the two years will enable the teachers to revitalise the musicmaking sessions. The musical instruments will remain in the school’s possession, and at the same time, it is hoped that the programme will help to raise awareness of the importance of art in education, as well as improve the image of the school and the community, with the result that more families will enrol their children in the school. If the number of children enrolled in the school increases, the previous threats of closure may dissipate, and the school may serve as a model for similar educational programmes in other educational institutions. At the same time, the sustainability of the project will facilitate longitudinal studies that could have significant results in the field of education. Finally, it is important to highlight that these ongoing projects contribute directly to solving the social and cultural problems facing today’s world, the reason behind
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UNESCO’s promotion of artistic musical education in formal and non-formal environments that help to bring about the necessary renewal in today’s education systems. Acknowledgements This research was financed by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, the State Research Agency (AEI) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) through the projects Re-Inhabiting the Neighbourhood: Processes of Transformation and Empowerment between University-School-Society through Artistic Practices. UniESocied-Art (MINECO/AEI/ERDF, EU) and Multidimensional analysis of the socio-educational impact of community music initiatives and service learning in the school: the MUSIQUEM programme . The study also received funding from the Universitat Jaume I through the project Analysis of classroom practices and their impact on socio-educational variables of students in musical spaces. A study from an inclusive intercultural perspective (UJI-B201-16).
References Berbel-Gómez, N., Jaume-Adrover, M., Bermúdez de Castro, J. J., & Díaz-Gómez, M. (2019). Contribution of artistic and musical instructional materials to the improvement, exploration and appreciation of the neighbourhood Nou Llevant-Soledat Sud in Palma. Paper presented at ME & DM Symposium/Simposio Internacional de Educación Musical y Materiales Didácticos. Universidad de Santiago, Santiago de Compostela, 24–25 January 2019. Cabedo-Mas, A., Puerto-Sánchez, M. J., Macián-González, R., & Moliner-Miravet, L. (2019, January 24–25). Making music to investigate our neighbourhood: the Musiquem programme. Paper presented at ME & DM Symposium/Simposio Internacional de Educación Musical y Materiales Didácticos. Universidad de Santiago, Santiago de Compostela. Comte, M. & Forrest, D. (2012). Community arts in Australia: an overview», in Comte, M. (Ed.) Community Arts. Melbourne. Australian Scholarly, pp. 1-9. Cronbach, L. J., Ambron, S. R., Dornbusch, S. M., Hess, R. D., Hornik, R. C., Phillips, D. C., Walker, D. E., & Weiner, S. S. (1980). Toward reform of program evaluation. Jossey-Bass. Díaz, M. (2014). Enseñar música en el siglo XXI. En Andrea Giráldez (coord.). Didáctica de la música en primaria. Síntesis. Dillon, S. (2006). Assessing the positive influence of music activities in community development programs. Music Education Research, 8(2), 267–280. Green, L. (2009). Significado musical y reproducción social: Defensa de la recuperación de la autonomía. In D. K. Lines (Ed.), La educación musical para el nuevo milenio (pp. 103–121). Ediciones Morata. Hormigos Ruiz, J. (2008): Música y sociedad. Análisis sociológico de la cultura musical de la posmodernidad. Madrid. Fundación Autor. International Society for Music Education (2021). Community Music Activity Comission. Retrieved 15 June 2021 from https://www.isme.org/our-work/commissions-forum/community-music-act ivity-commission-cma Jiménez, L. (2011). Políticas educativas y educación y educación artística. In L. Jiménez, I. Aguirre, & L. Pimentel (Eds.). Educación artística, cultura y ciudadanía (pp. 107–114). Fundación Santillana. Kelly, O. (1984). Community, Art and the State: Storming the Citadels. London. Comedia Publishing Group.
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Kemmis, S., & McTaggart, R. (1988). Cómo planificar la Investigación-Acción [The action research planner]. Laertes. Pérez Yuste, R. (2006). Evaluación de programas educativos. La Muralla.
The Peripheral Curriculum: Music Education as a Way of Transformation and Social Justice in Children’s Lives Maria Helena Vieira
Abstract At the root of public education is the concept of equal access to learning for all citizens, no matter what their social background might be. Public school is, therefore, the center that attracts those that society left in the margins, bringing them closer to a path of equity and justice. Music education, within the spectrum of arts education in Portugal, is far from being offered on a basis of equal access and remains in a peripheral position in the curricular structure despite an apparently complex educational organization. It is undeniable that there has been progress in the past 40 years; between 2008 and 2010, specifically, the number of students in the specialized branch of music education increased 70%, from 17,282 to 29,645 (Feliciano, 2010, p. 2); this, in turn, meant, for instance, that more students started to have access to learning how to play music instruments. However, it is also undeniable that not only that number is in fact insignificant in the national panorama, but also that things have gotten worse at various levels after 2010. This article reflects upon the philosophical reasons for the specific structure of the Portuguese system of music education and aims at questioning the roots of inequality in children’s access to music learning in Portugal.
1 Introduction: About Equality The idea that public education should offer equal opportunities for learning to all citizens is at the root of the concept of public education itself. The foundations for this equalitarian perspective may be found in different theoretical and religious principles, as Formosinho and Araújo summarized so well: This work is funded by Portuguese National Funds through FCT—Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia - within CIEC (Child Studies Research Center of Minho University) with reference nr. UID/CED/00317/2019. M. Helena Vieira (B) Child Studies Research Center (CIEC), Institute of Education of Minho University, Braga, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_16
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The philosophical foundations of equality are related to the Kantian belief in the rationality of respect for all people; a more utilitarian perspective defends that treating people as equals is the best way to maximize happiness. The religious point of view of Christians considers equality a consequence of humans being sons and daughters of God, while Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man, in 1791 gives a historical justification for equality: “the whole history of creation and traditional narrative (…) agree in establishing that (…) all men are created equal and have the same natural rights” (…). In fact, all of these are versions of a moral motivation to achieve equality, in the name of which political leaders should move from the recognition of moral equality to the effective creation of some type of equality in the lives of those governed (…). Helvetius explains that the causes for inequality (…) result from chance, that is, from different opportunities of education, and that it is possible to “model a plan” of public education that should diminish them (…). According to him, the key or solution is, therefore, in the “good” common organization of men and in the power of education. (Formosinho & Araújo, 2007, p. 308 (AT)1 )
Although Formosinho and Araújo (2007, pp. 308–310) underline that there is a great difference between equality and administrative standardization, they do call attention for the need to provide countries with “equalitarian measures of educational policy” (p. 309). They mention the fact that even when formal access to education is guaranteed to all, there are still differences in the quality of the buildings, of the equipment, and of the educational and human resources. For this reason, however, it seems that most of the concerns about the dangers of creating standardized systems of education (that do not fit the variety and richness of the population, of their qualities, desires and ambitions) should vanish in face of the facts of reality: administrative standardization is never capable of eroding the differences between the human beings involved in the processes of education; therefore, the most standardized system will always be confronted with the qualitative differences between teachers, schools, buildings, resources, cultural traditions of specific regions, a.s.o. In a word, the fear of standardizing should never be an obstacle to the fight for equality and democratization. The (today) obvious truth that all people should learn how to read should not be doubted on the grounds that students should not all read the same authors, or read them at the same time. Being able to read, period, is more important. First things should come first. The basic imperatives for public education deserve, therefore, full attention. Relativistic points of view, such as Walzer’s (1999, p. 19) do not seem adequate for the provision of basic principles of educational equality. Walzer defends that the principles of justice are plural in themselves and in their form. He believes that different social goods should be distributed for different reasons, through different procedures and by different agents. He also believes that all these differences are a result of the understanding of the social goods themselves, an understanding that is the inevitable product of a particular historical and cultural moment. Therefore, he advocates that there has never been a unique criterion (or a unique group of interrelated criterions) for any distribution. Merit, qualification, lineage, blood, friendship, need, free interchange, political loyalty, democratic decision: all these have occurred, according to Walzer, amongst with other factors, in difficult coexistence, and invoked by different competing groups (p. 18). 1
(AT)—Author’s translation.
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At the opposite end of this perspective the author of this article considers that there should be coherence between legislated equality of rights and public education. In that sense, the perspective of “universalism” of John Rawls (1993), according to which it is, in fact, possible to describe “minimum principles of justice” in any sphere (despite the differences pointed out by Walzer) emerges as most significant and predictably relevant in terms of social impact. These “minimum principles of justice” may be found, according to Rawls, if one starts out by dialogue and accordance between free, well-informed and responsible people. It is possible to define a minimum profile of individual dignity (economic, educational and cultural dignity, among others), a profile that no social structure should disrespect. It is in the light of this universal and humanist perspective, and in the light of the belief that music education is a right and a basic need of all citizens (and not a luxury) that music education should be developed in public schools. In fact, as Licínio Lima (2000, p. 71) pointed out, it is imperative to understand that the organization of the educational system is itself a means of justice and democratization or, on the opposite, a means of injustice and limitation of the access to culture: [i]t is necessary not to ignore that the organization and the administration of educational organizations becomes, immediately, implicit pedagogy (and hidden curriculum); that exercise, which is not neutral or instrumental, promotes values, organizes and regulates a social context in which one socializes and becomes socialized, in which rules are produced and reproduced, and in which powers are exerted. Therefore, it is a very demanding action in political and ethical terms, particularly from the moment that we demand that it promote the democratic potential, the potential for autonomy and citizenship, for tolerance and respect for human rights […]. (AT)
Artistic and music education are referred to in Portuguese educational legislation as a universal right of all citizens. However, the fact that music education is traditionally seen by governments as a “relative priority” (that is to say, a right of all citizens—as mentioned in Law-Decree 344/90—but a secondary right as it seems— as the difficulties in access to it suggest) has possibly slowed down the advocacy for the right to music learning. In fact, the first level of culture should probably be survival. The Portuguese philosopher Agostinho da Silva seems to have understood this well, when he was working as secretary of state culture in Santa Catarina (Brasil), where he stopped subsidizing artists in order to create training workshops for the poor and illiterate. However, today more than ever before, it is understood that arts can also be leverage for economy and employment (apart from their intrinsic value). Placing art in the arena of dispute of a radical theory of justice, as Young proposed (1990) seems, therefore, to be outdated, if not in practice, at least in political discourse. Reducing justice to the “distributive paradigm” of equal rights seems inappropriate, according to Young; justice should be alert to differences among people. Cultural differences are among those differences. In this respect, the perspective of the rights to culture and arts education as a right of “oppressed minorities” emerges as necessary but also as outdated. Necessary from the point of view of curricular practices (since many citizens do not have access yet to the works of Bach, Brueghel, Emanuel Nunes or Lempicka in the same way they have access to the works of
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Camões, Pessoa, Cervantes or Shakespeare); outdated, however, because the political discourse assumes music education as an absolute universal right, independently from personal or cultural characteristics of citizens. The problem is, therefore, one of political nature, and of law enforcement. To consider the right to culture and to arts education as a right of “certain minorities” (even, as in Portugal, when designated as “specialized” or “vocational”, in conservatories and academies) may perpetuate a “minority” (or “minor”) vision of the role and value of culture and art in society. It might also legitimate differences in rights at a level in which the “minimum principles of justice”, in Rawlsian terms, have not yet been achieved. Young is aware of that risk, of the possibility of the affirmation of the differences leading to the confirmation and even reinforcement or exclusion of those differences. For that reason he affirms that “cultural and democratic pluralism demands a dual system of rights: a broader system of rights that are the same for everyone, and a more specific system of policies concerning the rights of specific groups” (1990, p. 174). This article is focused on the rights that are or should be the same for everyone, in what music education is concerned.
2 About Repertoire and Participation, Music Listening and Music Making The branching of the Portuguese educational system in a generic system of music education (basic and secondary schools that all citizens attend) and a specialized system (conservatories, academies and professional music schools) has created two very different groups of citizens: one group that is able to play instruments, read notation, play and sing music together, and even (in some cases) compose music, and another group that has been taught mostly to merely listen, appreciate and sometimes comment on the music they listen to. The reasons for this division, according to Vieira (2014, pp. 61–71) go back to Baumgarten’s Aesthetica (1750) and to a perspective of aesthetics that started to focus on the “theory of taste” and on what should be sociologically “acceptable”, instead of on the subject’s personal experience of art and art making. In his Critique of Aesthetic Judgement Kant, in fact, alerted for this problem of severing the artistic object from the subject who apprehends it. From this point on music stopped being learned as a language is learned (and in collaborative and friendly social contexts) and started being learned almost exclusively through mimesis and repetition (in competitive and specialized educational systems). This breaking point in the history of music education was a result of rationalistic Illuminism and generated a cult of repertoires (of the “acceptable canon”, of the worshiped “work of art” that is to be perpetuated and enshrined) instead of the development of a functional perspective on the use of music as “language” or autonomous ability of aesthetic communication. On the other hand, educational systems that are subdivided in so-called “generic” or “general” subsystems and “specialized” subsystems usually tend to attribute music
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listening and music appreciation to the former and music making to the latter. The great challenge in music education today seems to be the move from the cult of repertoires (the listening of repertoires in the generic systems or the performing of repertoires in the specialized systems) to the ability to use the music language in a functional way through active participation. The center of music learning is music making (as the most relevant pedagogues have pointed out); therefore, music listening, music appreciation or music reproducing, important as they might be, remain in the margins of the learning phenomenon. The process of democratization of the access to music education in Portugal has developed mostly through two curricular strategies since the 1980’s (Vieira, 2011): the “articulated system of education” (Portuguese: “Regime Articulado”) and the “cultural enrichment activities program” (Portuguese: Actividades de Enriquecimento Curricular or AEC). The “articulated system of education” was first promoted in 1983 (Law-Decree 310/83, Art. 6, nr.1) in order to reinforce the connections between the general and the specialized schools, particularly in what the students’ attendance was concerned. The “articulated system” allows the student to study in both schools (dividing the school schedule between the so-called “regular subjects” in the general school and music subjects in the conservatory or academy), and it represented a great increase in the number of students in conservatories and academies up to today. (In fact, this articulated attendance regime is presently growing, although slowly, and many conservatories are reaching new general schools with their projects). It also represented a clear improvement in terms of expansion of specialized music teaching and instrumental music teaching towards the sphere of the general schools. This means that more students started to have access to the study of music instruments and this fact is quite visible in Portuguese society today. The university music degrees and music education degrees are receiving a remarkable affluence of candidates as a result of this expansion of the specialized music education system through the articulated regime of student attendance with the general schools. This desirable approximation between the generic and the specialized branches of music education has been studied by Pacheco (2008) in the case study Masters’ research project “Music Education in Articulated Attendance at the Vale do Sousa Conservatory: Vocational or Generic Function?” (AT). Articulated attendance is seen in this case study as an optimal way to foster democratization of music education under the present circumstances in the country. The “cultural enrichment activities program”, on the other hand, as a music education democratization strategy, emerged tentatively in the Basic Law of the Educational System (Law-Decree 46/86), (Portuguese: Lei de Bases do Sistema Educativo”), and evolved through the years, under different legislative improvements, up to its effective creation with Despacho 12591/2006 (Ferreira, 2009); however their optional nature in the curriculum and their identification with the general schools traditional pedagogical strategies has not generated the same interest in the students and their parents. The concept underlying these “cultural enrichment activities” was the offer of “extra” artistic education, sports or foreign languages to the students in the general
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schools. The legislation instructed, for instance, that the students must continue to attend music in their regular generalist classes with the general and/or the specialized teacher, but also have access to optional music classes in the context of the “cultural enrichment activities”, usually after school hours. Ferreira (2009) has concluded that the optional and leisure nature of these activities, alongside the fact that they tended to replace the regular compulsory music instruction in the general schools has in fact led to a decrease in the presence of music activities and music education in the schools, thus constituting a step back in the democratization process. In a word, the 1980s and the 1990s have witnessed both improvements and failures in the process of democratizing music education, and of making a consistent and systematic music education curriculum more open to all students in the country.
3 About the Democratization of Music Education Through Instrumental Music Despite the ever-increasing number of students enrolling in conservatories and academies under the “articulated system”, particularly after Despacho 12591/2006, the fact is that the majority of students only has access to the music education offered in the general schools which is taught by a generalist teacher. Despite the dilution of differences between music education in the general schools and in specialized schools due to the increasing similarities in teacher training degrees for the different branches of music education (Law-Decree 79/2014), the fact is that teachers still tend to conform to the generic or the specialized branches and adjust their teaching strategies and pedagogical goals according to different ideals of education and different programmed social purposes. Despite the issuing of laws that encompass all branches of artistic education and try to promote the aesthetic education of all citizens, aptitude detection, and the democratization of artistic performance practices (such as Law-Decree 310/83, Law-Decree 344/90 and Law-Decree 6/2001), the fact is that the pedagogical practices in music education classes in the general schools remain quite different from the pedagogical practices in music classes in conservatories and academies. This is awkwardly so also at the elementary school level: general schools provide “general music education” (focused mostly on aesthetic contemplation and criticism as well as on knowledge “about” music) and specialized schools provide “specialized music education” (focused on vocal and instrumental competitive performance, even at an early age). This fact contradicts the traditional concept of “specialization” itself: in other school subjects specialization is a natural autonomous choice and a consequence of a few years of study and vocational pondering and counseling (Vieira, 2008, 2014). In music, children can officially choose specialization (or have someone choose for them) as early as 6 years old, when they can enroll in a conservatory or official academy, if selected for one of the few vacancies. This, of course, bears no relation with children’s music aptitudes and their detection. However, it shows that the specialized system of music education is built upon
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an innate perspective of talent, a perspective that has been justifying the attempt to minister a specialized training as soon as possible to the supposedly talented children. Brito and Vieira (2017) have studied the shortcomings of the specialized music education school network in Portugal and the types of student selection promoted in specialized schools. The results show that the quest for innate talent seems to be undermining the specialized system’s expansion and the process of democratization of access to music education itself. The major difference between music education in general schools and in specialized schools can be found in instrumental learning. General schools rely on the paradigm of aesthetic education (Reimer, 1989); specialized schools are focused mostly on performance (Elliott, 1995). General schools promote aesthetic contemplation of the work of art, aesthetic understanding of an outside object; specialized schools promote the production of the work of art itself, aesthetic creativity and the embodiment of the art piece. The concept of music as a sort of “external body of knowledge” than can be understood and appreciated by everyone without actually learning how to play, sing, read or compose music should be rejected on the premises of philosophical incongruence and, ultimately, social inequality. Children don’t go to school to learn how to recite poetry before learning how to master their own native language; they don’t go to school to watch sports activities and to learn about them. When music education systems, subsystems or schools teach children to only memorize or “recite” music instead of promoting its functional use they are privileging “product” over “process”, “past” over “present”, “object” over “subject”, and they are forcing music to remain in the periphery of the curriculum.
References Brito, H., & Vieira, M. H. (2017). Once upon a time there was a maltese cat who played the piano and spoke french: An overview of Portuguese music education student selection process in public specialized music schools. Revista de Estudios e Investigación en Psicología y Educación, 4, 134–139. Elliott, D. J. (1995). Music matters. A new philosophy of music education. Oxford University Press. Feliciano, P. (2010, Abril). Reforma: Mais alunos no ensino especializado de música. In Boletim dos Professores nº 18: Ensino Artístico Especializado de Música (pp. 2–3). Ministério da Educação. Ferreira, S. R. (2009). Implicações educativas das práticas informais no contexto das Actividades de Enriquecimento Curricular. O projecto artístico Grande Bichofonia (Unpublished Master Thesis). Mestrado em Estudos da Criança, Especialidade de Educação Musical. Universidade do Minho, Instituto de Estudos da Criança. Formosinho & Araújo (2007). Anônimo do século XX. A construção da pedagogia burocrática. In Formosinho, Kishimoto, & Pinazza (Org.). Pedagogia(s) da Infância. Construindo o Futuro (pp. 293–328). Artmed Editora. Lima, L. (2000). Organização escolar e democracia radical. Paulo Freire e a governação democrática da escola pública. São Paulo: Editora Cortez. Pacheco, A. J. (2008). O ensino da música em regime articulado no Conservatório do Vale do Sousa: função vocacional ou genérica? (Unpublished Master Thesis). Mestrado em Estudos da Criança, Especialidade de Educação Musical. Universidade do Minho, Instituto de Estudos da Criança.
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Rawls, J. (1993). Uma teoria da justiça. Presença. Reimer, B. (1989). A philosophy of music education. Prentice-Hall. Vieira, M. H. (2008). The Portuguese system of music education. Teacher training challenges. In Local and global perspectives on change in teacher education international yearbook on teacher education. Proceedings of the 53rd World Assembly of the International Council on Education for Teaching, pp. 639–646. Vieira, M. H. (2011). Instrumental group teaching. An agenda for democracy in Portuguese Music Education. In Proceedings from the 15th Biennial of the International Study Association on Teachers and Teaching: Back to the Future. Legacies, continuities and changes in educational policy, practice and research, pp. 796–801. Braga, Universidade do Minho, 4–8 Julho. Vieira, M. H. (2014). Educação musical para todos: por uma política de participação no ensino da música. In M. H. Vieira & A. Cachada (Coord.) (Pensar a Música II, pp. 61–85). Sociedade Musical de Guimarães e Universidade do Minho. Walzer, M. (1999). As esferas da justiça. Em defesa do pluralismo e da igualdade. Editorial Presença. Young, I. (1990). Justice and the politics of difference. Princeton University Press.
Legislative References [2014] Law-Decree 79/2014 of May 14th (regulates teacher training qualifications for pre-school, basic and secondary education). [2006] Despacho 12591/2006 of June 16th (creates the Cultural Enrichment Activities; this Law was later replaced by Despacho 14460/2008). [2001] Law-Decree 6/2001 of January 18th (reorganizes the Basic Education Curriculum and defines the main competences to be developed). [1990] Law-Decree 344/90 of November 1990 (Regulates artistic education in pre-school, school and extra-school levels). [1986] Law-Decree 46/86 of October 14th (Basic Law of the Educational System). [1983] Law-Decree 310/83 of July 1st (Regulates the Teaching of Music, Drama and Dance).
A Holistic and Multidisciplinary Approach to Children Music Education António João César and Luísa Correia Castilho
Abstract The idea for the development of an action research methodology work about the possibilities of implementing a holistic approach in music teaching is the result not only of the indispensable academic reflection, but also of the professional experience of the authors as researchers and teachers in the area of music teaching. The following research questions (1 and 2) and objectives (3 and 4) were addressed: (1) how to implement a holistic and multidisciplinary music didactic within the scope of musical training classes at elementary education level? (2) how effective and relevant is the implementation of a holistic and multidisciplinary music didactic within the scope of musical training classes at elementary education level? (3) to adapt, create and implement a diverse set of exercises and procedures potentially conducive to a teaching-learning experience based on a holistic and multidisciplinary setting; (4) to evaluate the effectiveness of these exercises and procedures, taking into account, inter alia, students learning progression and motivation. Although the small number of students participating in this work doesn’t allow any kind of scientific generalization of the research outcome achieved, the data obtained seems to reinforce the effectiveness of holistic procedures, especially in terms of students’ interest and motivation.
1 Introduction This article was written following an action research methodology project implemented with a musical training class (4th grade elementary education level) in Castro Verde section of the Regional Conservatory of Baixo Alentejo (a private specialized music education school, located in the southern interior of Portugal). The class was composed by nine students, four boys and five girls, aged between nine and ten years A. J. César (B) · L. Correia Castilho Escola Superior de Artes Aplicadas, Instituto Politécnico de Castelo Branco, Castelo Branco, Portugal L. Correia Castilho e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_17
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old. All students were enrolled in three disciplines—musical training, ensemble and instrument (one student enrolled in flute, two students enrolled in guitar, one student enrolled in percussion, one student enrolled in piano, one student enrolled in trumpet and three students enrolled in violin). According to our previous academic and professional experience, we considered that a substantial part of the musical literature published during the early twenty-first century in Portugal aimed at elementary music education level students, as well as many of the traditional methods of teaching music, produced insufficient results, especially in terms of motivation, involvement and knowledge acquisition. Actively seeking to understand how students learn, we have developed and implemented a diversified set of exercises and routines. In an attempt to promote students’ interest, attention and involvement, we have created metaphors and interconnections between various areas of knowledge, namely literature, painting, history, physical education, sciences and mathematics. The musical exercises conceived, ended up activating different forms of knowledge and abilities other than those strictly related to musical training. The results achieved were absolutely encouraging. In this article we present the resulting work, leveraging this theorico-practical reflection as a fundamental pillar for the consolidation of our previous teachinglearning experiences, continuing to develop new methodological approaches, as well as an updated and problematizing professional self-awareness.
2 Problematic and Objectives In the context of the problematic proposed in this study, we sought to investigate the following research questions: (1) how to implement a holistic and multidisciplinary music didactic within the scope of musical training classes at elementary education level? (2) how effective and relevant is the implementation of a holistic and multidisciplinary music didactic within the scope of musical training classes at elementary education level? In order to address the research questions presented, the following research objectives were formulated: (1) to adapt, create and implement a diverse set of exercises and procedures potentially conducive to a teaching-learning experience based on a holistic and multidisciplinary setting; (2) to evaluate the effectiveness of these exercises and procedures, taking into account, inter alia, students learning progression and motivation.
3 Traditional Education vs. Holistic Education What sets apart an educational model considered to be “traditional” from another one considered to be “holistic”? What are their intrinsic characteristics? What are their advantages and disadvantages? Although there is no unanimous academical opinion
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regarding this matter, we will briefly present some lines of thought highlighting some aspects that seems to us as being broadly consensual within the scientific community.
3.1 Traditional Education There is no simple and exhaustive definition of what can be considered a traditional education model. In any case, according to Cook (2004), there are three lines of thought often used to theoretically frame traditional teaching models—cognitive psychology, behaviorism and constructivism—as well as some structural characteristics commonly present in most institutions associated with educational traditional models, namely: (1) the adoption of a teaching-learning model centered on the teacher; (2) the curriculum based on isolated disciplines; and (3) the basic importance given to knowledge measurement through evaluation tests. According to Hirsch (2001), traditional education systems are also characterized by: (1) establishing same academic objectives for all children; (2) focusing on activities developed in classroom, mainly around academic, organizational and disciplinary issues; (3) using much of lesson time in teaching and learning specific tasks; and (4) frequently evaluation of students’ performance. According to Newby et al. (2000), cognitive psychology was a major influence in the establishment of traditional education philosophical principles. In this sense, there is an approach that the author designates as an informational perspective—an educational standpoint that conceives teaching-learning process as a gradual increase of knowledge memorized by the student. Within the scope of this approach, we find, then, a school that is dedicated mainly to increase or change the body of knowledge stored in student’s memory. Thus, the main responsibility of the educator becomes then to create conditions that help the student to receive, encode and decode information (Newby et al., 2000). Therefore, the teacher role consists especially in that of a predetermined curriculum creator or implementer. This curriculum is processed a posteriori by the student practically in the same way a mechanized and cold computer processes any given set of data. Hence, the teacher usually assumes an information manager role, establishing connections between subjects and helping the student in the retrieval process of memorized information. Still, according to Newby et al. (2000), the main responsibility of the student in the context of the educational informational perspective is to actively synthesize information through the use of cognitive supports provided and developed by the educational system or by itself. In short, the informational perspective stands for that, according to Cook (2004), the student’s brain is conceived as a kind of computer, capable of being programmed, where the information is then processed. It is a rigid and teacher-centered mechanistic model, which delegates total responsibility on the teacher for the contents’ organization, completely excluding learners from that process. Another significant theoretical influence framing traditional educational models is, according to Cook (2004), behaviourism. According to this perspective, the purpose of the educational system will then be to modify students’ behaviours. The
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behavioural model stands that the teacher must control all dimensions of the teachinglearning process, establishing, inter alia, the educational objectives and guiding students towards objectives fulfilment. In the context of a behavioural perspective, the teacher main responsibility should be, then, to organize classes enhancing and maximizing students’ content learning processes, with special emphasis on the establishment by the teacher of concrete learning objectives to be achieved by students. Within the lines established by this model all knowledge begins and ends in the teacher. According to Newby et al. (2000), a behavioural perspective of education assumes that the environment presents an antecedent (A) that stimulates behaviour (B) and, in turn, it is followed up by certain consequences (C) which determines, then, whether the behaviour is repeated or not. According to this principle, the behavioural theory argues that learning occurs when the student behaves consistently according to new models learned. This process is called modelling—the reinforcement of successive approaches, having an end to a certain desired behaviour, that is, the installation of new responses through positive reinforcement. According to behavioural perspectives, the modelling process allows teachers to gradually change learners’ behaviour until the learning goal is finally achieved. Here, again, students have an obvious passive role since the teacher alone determines the educational objectives to be achieved, as well as the didactic strategies to be followed. According to Cook (2004), constructivism contributed also significantly to the academic framing of traditional educational models, possibly being one of the theoretical frameworks that most closely relates to the holistic models. According to Newby et al (2000), constructivists argue that knowledge is a construction that is born through the subject’s experience, and it can be gained in countless ways, namely through the interaction of the student with objects, situations or other students. Also, according to Newby et al (2000), constructivist perspectives on education argue that learning is determined by a set of complex interactions between student’s a priori knowledge, its social context and the problems to be solved. Thus, the role of the teacher will then be mainly to present the student a set of situations that allows one to gain experience and build, consequently, new forms of knowledge. Although through this approach the student acquires knowledge based on problem-solving and realistic teaching-learning situations, it still remains a teacher-centered approach, since in the end it is up to the teacher to create the aforementioned problems and teaching-learning situations. Eric Donald Hirsch, one of the main traditional educational models advocates, affirms that schools with better results tend to favour, for example, the learning of contents such as phonetics, the memorization of the multiplication table and the use of standardized tests (Hirsch, 1999). He also stands for that schools who achieve better results regarding equity among their students are those who implement conservative methodologies based on a demanding curriculum and on the disciplined repetition of concepts, examples and practical problems. According to Hirsch (1999), traditional educational models favour the success of all students, regardless their socio-economic contexts of provenance. The author also argues that all children should go through an educational system that compels them to sit, stop and listen carefully, seeking, thus, to memorize information transmitted by the teacher (Hirsch, 1997). Regarding the
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importance attributed by traditional educational models to evaluation tests, Hirsch (1999) argues that standardized tests are one of the most valid tools that exist to measure concepts such as justice and excellence in education. Finally, Hirsch (1996) defends the curricular structuring of educational models in independent disciplines. For the author the competences that he considers essential are, namely, the abilities to read, to write, to communicate, to learn, to analyse, to understand and to manipulate mathematical symbols, competences that psychologists consider to be specific of a given domain. Therefore, a traditional educational model that, on one hand, provides a detailed curricular guideline and, on the other hand, allows the student to concentrate exclusively on the specificities of a given subject, will then be, according to Hirsch’s view, of an extreme importance to student’s success.
3.2 Holistic Education According to Kovalik and Olsen (2002), the principles inherent to holistic educational models are not new. Several educators have developed and applied a varied set of strategies and methodologies that we can consider close to the holistic principles. However, they have done so generally in a very intuitive way, without any kind of scientific support. According to Miller (1990), holistic education is not a new orthodoxy, but rather a rich and varied set of educational perspectives that underlines the unique creativity and uniqueness inherent to any individual or community. According to Cook (2004), the main theoretical and philosophical bases of holistic education can be found since the eighteenth century Rousseau’s theories to the midtwentieth century Dewey’s perspectives. During the 1980s, Rousseau and Dewey’s ideas began, according to Miller (1991), to gain the contours of a coherent theoretical movement, conveyed mainly through intellectuals from various fields of knowledge such as psychotherapy, medicine, physics, biology, religion, philosophy, economics and political theory. According to Miller (1990), it is widely accepted by the scientific community that the reality of things can only be known with some degree of uncertainty and, above all, through the intersection of multiple and complementary perspectives. Consequently, Miller (1990) seeks to apply a scientific basis to the holistic belief that the best form of teaching-learning is the one which establishes connections between the educational curriculum and the surrounding world outside the school. According to Cook (2004), holistic educational models simultaneously invite both advocates of traditional educational models and advocates of various reformist lines in the field of educational policies to change their theoretical perspective from a fragmented curriculum view to another one that takes into account all students’ needs. What are, then, the main characteristics of holistic educational models? According to Cook (2004), there is no consensus among researchers and teachers about a single set of characteristics that can universally define a holistic educational model. In any case, the author points out three aspects that he considers mostly consensual: (1) the focus on a globalizing perspective of the child, involving the student as a whole
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(mind and body) in the teaching-learning process; (2) the concept that all aspects of reality are related and interconnected, and, therefore, should be presented in an integrated—not fragmented—way; and (3) the transformation of students’ reasoning models from a fragmented logic to a perspective in which interrelations between all aspects of reality are seen in a globalizing, self-conscious and emotionally active way. According to Miller (1991), holistic educational models do not emphasize curricular determination of facts or skills that adults should teach to children. Instead, they focus mainly on the establishment of teaching-learning communities in which the student is stimulated to develop an engaged, creative and inquisitive perspective towards the world around. Thus, a holistic education system is not particularly concerned with cultural literacy. Above all, it tries to promote a healthy attitude of curiosity that allows the student to continuous learn autonomously throughout life and in any context. The objective of this model is mainly to help the students not only to deepen their self-awareness, but also their knowledge of society and the world around them, understanding their interconnections. For Gibson and Peterson (2001), holistic education models are also characterized by emphasizing an attitude of seeking knowledge through experimentation and test of ideas, establishing, in this sense, an environment that privileges a certain degree of freedom, permeated with passion and joy. In this way, the importance of diversity in holistic education systems is clear. According to Flake (1993), there is a huge diversity among educators and this is considered an advantage since any ecological system that presents strong rates of diversity inherently enhances a certain degree of stability. Thus, as opposed to what usually happens in the rigid teacher centered traditional models, one of the greatest attractions of holistic teaching models are the focus on the child and, consequently, the hindering of any kind of previous teaching-learning style formatting. In the absence of the need to follow up on a rigid, inflexible and predetermined curriculum, the educator who operates within the principles of a holistic teaching system gains, thus, an enormous freedom to create meaningful contents and associations in a flexible and functional way. There is a clear agenda inherent to holistic education philosophy. According to Miller (1990), holistic teaching models cannot, by themselves, solve the problems of our contemporaneity. However, together with other essential changes, they can be absolutely instrumental in confronting a certain alienation which, in Miller’s opinion (1990), is largely caused by the fragmentation of knowledge, individuals and society, being their intrinsic organic relationships often ignored. Also, according to Miller (1993), holistic teaching models are characterized by intellectually based knowledge on a diverse set of critical, inquisitive, comprehensive, flexible and creative approaches, thus allowing the teacher to help the student to find the most favorable teaching-learning path.
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3.3 Traditional Education Holistic Critique According to Gibson and Peterson (2001), the criticism presented by holistic educators to traditional educational models are based mainly on the following points: (1) lack of interconnection between school, families and communities; (2) persistence in the adoption of disjointed, purposeless and boring didactic strategies, many times disconnected from real life, as well as from students’ own family and social experiences; (3) the need to implement more democratic and inclusive decision-making processes, involving more actively the whole school community, both students, families, teachers and non-teaching staff; (4) the segregation of students with differentiated learning styles, often including them inadequately in programs for students with special educational needs; and (5) the lack of awareness for school social and political context, particularly the growing inequality between different schools and communities, as well as the constant pressures to carry out standardized tests that, according to the author, divide students, families, communities and education professionals according to “race” criteria, socio-economic status and aptitude. In traditional educational models the measurement of knowledge through tests often assumes an absolutely central and structuring role. According to Clark (1991), these models strongly contributed to the development of test teaching-based systems that emphasises types of knowledge that can easily be demonstrated and quantified. Consequently, a teaching-learning approach based mainly on the implementation of evaluation tests has a considerable influence on class activities, overwhelmingly predetermining and controlling the knowledge teachers transmit to students, often misusing and reducing concepts such as understanding, wisdom, joy of learning and thinking to measurable behaviours such as writing, reciting, identifying, enumerating, comparing or differentiating. Therefore, an educational system based mainly on tests may eventually eliminate all knowledge that cannot be categorized or reduced to multiple choice answers or any other objective measurement modality. According to Sorokin (2000), traditional educational models’ main functions have been to “dump” predefined content on students, as well as to model their behaviours in a certain way. In traditional educational models, teacher assumes the teachinglearning process central role. On the contrary, the holistic models, argue that the centrality should be repositioned on the student, leaving up to the teacher the task of facilitating the knowledge acquisition process and not so much the task of transmitting predefined contents. Thus, it is clear that traditional educational curricular models are not, as a general rule, conceived regarding students’ individual expectations. Instead, they emphasise the conformation of teaching-learning processes to a trending homogenizing line of action in which the test-based evaluation systems are conceived somehow as a corollary of supposed rigor and effectiveness. According to Gibson and Peterson (2001), this standardized testing-based system ends up annihilating what they believe should be the main goal of any honest educational system—the idea that it is possible to understand and transform our world.
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According to holistic educators, another problem with traditional educational models lies in the excessive emphasis placed on memorizing simple and decontextualized facts. According to Anderson (1991), although many teachers recognize the pertinence and the need to create a dynamic and active teaching-learning context, the memorization of facts continues to play a major role in many didactic approaches. This procedure may, in the author’s opinion, be directly related to the standardized testing system. For holistic educators the facts should be taught, but always interconnected and in articulation with other ideas and facts, so that the student can perceive and appreciate the complexity of the whole. The holistic criticism of traditional educational systems also points out the finger to a certain degree of narrowing down not only the knowledge, but the students’ personality as well, thus, leading to serious consequences in their adult life. According to Kessler (1993), an increasing number of teachers recognize that students’ personal growth based exclusively on a formal academic educational path, necessarily entails flaws in his development both as an individual as well as a member of society. The academic performance itself, as well as his human relations, self-esteem and the character of the student are all affected when the complexity of the person as a whole is neglected in the educational process. Instead, the holistic educator seeks to educate the student as a whole, modifying the way of thinking so that one can develop tools allowing to solve new problems in future contexts, in a dynamic, autonomous and creative way. Holistic educators consider also that, from a sociological standpoint, traditional educational models, on the contrary to what academics such as Eric Donald Hirsch claim, do not promote social equity. Although a school is supposed to be an educational institution preparing all students, traditional educational systems end up conditioning, according to Cook (2004), their future social roles. In Bourdieu (2000) theories, traditional educational systems help perpetuate the pre-established social order, strongly promoting the social reproduction of previous structures. Finally, what solutions do holistic models advocates in order to solve traditional educational models’ problems? A truly holistic restructuring of education would be absolutely profound, redesigning virtually every aspect of traditional educational systems. According to Miller (1991), almost all traditional educational systems assumptions would certainly be altered, namely the main objectives, the curricular contents, the architecture of the classroom, the architecture of the school, as well as the roles of students, teachers and school administrators. Also, according to the perspectives expressed by Miller (1991), it is necessary to point out that the changes holistic educators advocate do not resemble anything else tried before by previous educational movements. These changes—resulting from previous research into the nature of intelligence, thought and teaching-learning processes—would be in their essence structural to the whole educational system, and are based on a substantially different set of philosophical principles and scientific paradigms than those on which traditional educational models are based on.
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4 Holistic Oriented Didactic Intervention Towards the achievement of the first proposed research objective—to adapt, create and implement a diverse set of exercises and procedures potentially conducive to a teaching-learning experience based on a holistic and multidisciplinary setting—the activity “Os Sabichões” was conceived, programmed and implemented: a cooperative game with computer support, digital projection and sonorization in which all students participate, trying to discover pairs of “musical heroes”—diverse performers and composers, of both genders (male and female), regarding various historical eras, nationalities and musical styles, hidden behind eighteen numbered cards displayed sequentially on the digital board (Fig. 1). Each “musical hero” is always associated with a musical work (Fig. 2) and a “musical challenge” (Fig. 3). The results achieved with this activity were excellent and were accompanied by a sharp increase in all parameters observed in the class while the project was implemented, namely students’ interest, motivation and involvement. In the design and implementation of the activity “Os Sabichões” the following points were taken into account: (1) the holistic approach to lesson planning; (2) classroom space management; (3) student-teacher relationship dynamics; and (4) curriculum dynamics. With regard to the first point—the holistic approach to lesson planning—it was necessary to solve a curious problem: how to fit into the conventional lesson plans, usually formatted in a rigid and homogenizing way, a lesson structured according to a holistic teaching philosophy that seeks to be flexible and respectful towards both students, teachers and educational communities heterogeneity? We recall now the aforementioned perspective of Sorokin (2000), considering that the main functions of traditional educational models have been, above all, to “dump” predefined contents
Fig. 1 “Os Sabichões” initial game screen with 18 visible cards
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Fig. 2 Game screen associated with the audition of Mozart’s Serenade in G major, K. 525, Eine kleine Nachtmusik, one of “Os Sabichões” game’s exercises
Fig. 3 Game screen associated with an excerpt from the “musical challenge” proposed in one of “Os Sabichões” game’s exercises
on the students, as well as to model, in a certain way, their behaviors, contrary to what is advocated by the holistic models considering that the centrality should be repositioned on the student, whereas the teacher should, above all, to facilitate the acquisition of knowledge and not so much to behave like a curriculum transmitter.
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Although in this work we have achieved the necessary leeway to implement some holistic teaching models characteristics, it is also true that it was developed and implemented within an educational context mostly based on assumptions and practices somehow associated to traditional education systems, namely: (1) the adoption of a teacher centred educational model; (2) the curriculum structured in isolated disciplines; (3) the basic importance given to the measurement of knowledge acquisition through evaluation tests; (4) the establishment of the same academic goals for all children; (5) the focusing of classroom activities mainly around academic, organizational and disciplinary issues; (6) the use of much time in teaching and learning specific tasks; and (7) the frequent students’ performance evaluations. In order to holistically influence the lesson plans, the following guidelines were established: (1) the adoption of a teaching-learning model where both teacher and students are central; (2) the set of contents structuration based on school subjects interconnection; (3) the basic importance given to children’s development, establishing a self-reflection teaching-learning model based on the observation of students’ individual parameters like attendance, punctuality, behaviour, interest, motivation, participation, concentration, teamwork, comprehension of contents and school progression; (4) freedom in the establishment and planning of objectives and curricular contents according to a logic based on flexibility and functionality for all children; (5) focusing the classroom activities mainly around songs, exercises, stories, games, dances, reflections, questions, movie viewing, song listening and other diversified activities, often arising both from the awareness that arises from the human relationship established between teacher and students, as well as from the daily situations experienced or reported in the classroom which may potentially stimulate the domains of contemplation, emotion and reasoning; (6) using most of lesson time in experimenting, testing and enjoying the proposed activities; (7) the adoption of a continuous students’ performance observation strategy instead of the adoption of a frequent standardized assessment tests strategy; (8) focusing lesson strategies on a global perspective of the child involving students as a whole (mind and body) in the process of teaching-learning; (9) conceive that all aspects of reality are interrelated and interconnected and should therefore be presented as such, in an integrated way and not in a fragmented one; and (10) the transformation of students’ reasoning models from a fragmented logic to a perspective in which they are progressively able to grasp the complexity of the interrelations between all aspects of reality in a globalizing, self-conscious and emotionally active way. With regard to the second point—classroom space management—we tried to avoid the conventional lined up distribution of students, often promoting a certain inequality, and favorized, instead, a reorganization of the classroom space considering, above all, the following guidelines: (1) organization of students in a comfortable way, taking into account aspects such as lighting, adaptation to the proposed activities and the physical posture of the student; (2) the need for the digital board to occupy a central and equidistant place relative to all students; (3) the existence of a free space in the center of the classroom in which both students and teacher can move easily; (4) placement of the piano allowing an easy, close and immediate interaction between the teacher and the students; and (5) the creation of an environment
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conducive to the implementation of all the guidelines aforementioned in the holistic approach to lesson planning discussion, taking into account, inter alia, the creation of an organized, humanized, quiet and stimulating classroom space in which both sound, image, word, movement, expression and introspection lives in harmony with a healthy physical, psychological, cognitive and social development of all students. With regard to the third point—student-teacher relationship dynamics—we sought to guide the didactic intervention according to the following holistic educational models principles: (1) to stimulate in the student an engaged, creative and inquisitive perspective towards the world around, trying, as teachers, to avoid as much as possible a merely instructive posture in favor of an attitude that makes students’ curiosity stand out, enabling them, in the long term, to continue learning autonomously throughout life and in any context; (2) to help students not only to deepen their self-knowledge, but also to deepen their knowledge of society and the world around them, understanding, inter alia, its interconnections; (3) to emphasize an attitude of seeking knowledge through experimentation and the test of ideas, establishing, in this sense, an environment that privileges a certain degree of freedom, permeated with passion, joy and diversity; (4) to intellectually base the knowledge vehiculated in the classroom on a diverse set of critical, inquisitive, comprehensive, flexible and creative approaches, thus enabling the teacher to effectively help the student finding the most favorable teaching-learning path; (5) to refuse a widespread attitude of using memorization as the main didactic tool; (6) to refuse an educational model that transforms the classroom into an overly authoritarian and disciplinary place; (7) to establish and develop a safe, familiar and affective classroom environment; (8) to refuse the traditional “prison guard” teacher role, assuming, alternatively, the role of an educational space manager in order to not overload the child with instruction and supervision routines; (9) to respect and understand the child simultaneously as a child and as a singular individual, not as an adult; (10) to adopt as a teacher the role of a monitor and motivator of learning, avoiding pressuring or forcing the child into a certain degree of performance guided by a previous set of rules or within a pre-established time window; (11) always stimulate cooperation and mutualism between students in order to provide them a growth opportunity based on the concept of community; and (12) respect the individual pace and characteristics of each child ensuring the success of all. With regard to the fourth point—curriculum dynamics—we have articulated and integrated several subjects and objectives, not only those found in Regional Conservatory of Baixo Alentejo curriculum used with children attending the 4th Grade Elementary Education level musical training classes, but also some of the official Portuguese Ministry of Education contents and objectives found in the 4th Grade Elementary Education curricula, approved by legal order no. 6944 A/2018 of July 19, in the subjects of Portuguese Language, Mathematics, Nature and Sciences, Artistic Education, Citizenship, Physical Education and English Language (http:// www.dge.mec.pt/aprendizagens-essenciais-ensino-basico). In order to answer the first research question—how to implement a holistic and multidisciplinary music didactic within the scope of musical training classes at elementary education level?—several procedures have been developed. Firstly, the
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musical training lessons were observed in a non-participant way. We tried, above all, to understand and analyze the previous lessons’ structuration, their impact on the students, as well as to better understand their school routines, procedures, activities and exercises. It was clear for us, on one hand, the excellence of the class in parameters like “behavior”, “attendance” and “punctuality”. On the other hand, it was also clear for us what seemed to be the class most problematic aspect—the low levels achieved in the parameter “interest, motivation and involvement”. We sought, then, to reflect on the strengths and on the weaknesses detected trough out the observed lessons, conceiving a diversified holistic set of activities and exercises that could, eventually, stimulate the parameter “interest, motivation and involvement”. Secondly, several informal conversations were held with the Elementary School teachers of all students involved. These conversations took place briefly, and it was then possible to better understand how different subjects’ curricula were implemented daily in Elementary School. It was also possible to obtain a copy of each official 4th Grade manual students use daily in classes (Portuguese Language, Nature and Sciences, Mathematics and English Language). These manuals allowed us to analyse both the curricula, exercises and procedures used daily by elementary school teachers and revealed to be of a tremendous value in the game “Os Sabichões” process of construction and curricula interconnection. Thirdly, the students were interviewed with the objective of better understand their relationship with school subjects, with general aspects of teaching-learning and school (Table 1), as well as their conceptualization of the ideal school (Table 2). Consequently, in the game “Os Sabichões” the school subjects mentioned by the students were implemented with special attention. The categories resulting from the students’ answers were also taken into account. Thus, the general aspects that children least enjoy at school (namely, the behavioral profile of some teachers, physical violence, verbal violence, indiscipline, non-compliance with rules and hygiene), as well as their conceptualization of the ideal school (aesthetic dimension, organization, hygiene, reduction of various forms of violence, the socioaffective dimension and behavioral profile of teachers and staff) gave rise to the adoption of the following perspectives and procedures in implemented activities and exercises: (1) the teacher’s adoption of an empathic, clear, assertive and reassuring behavioral profile; (2) the rejection of any type of physical, psychological or verbal violence among the students; (3) the establishment of a good classroom environment based on the enforcement of simple, clear and direct rules of participation and intervention; (4) the creation and maintenance of an aesthetically pleasing, organized and sanitized school space; and (5) the promotion of a classroom environment that emphasizes and values the relationships of friendship, mutual respect and teamwork.
5 Conclusion After this project implementation and consequent analysis of the collected data and observations, the following conclusions were inferred: (1) the juxtaposition of the
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Table 1 General aspects that students like less at school General aspects that students like less at school Categories
Interview quotes
Occurrences
Teachers’ behavioral profile
Student 7: (…) when teacher gets angry 4 (…) Because the small children and the others are always talking at the same time! Student 1: (…) when they make lots of noise and teacher gets angry. Student 3: (…) I also don’t like to be in a class where the teacher is a little nervous (…). Student 6: To see the teacher unnerved (…). When teachers get angry with others (…).
Physical, psychological and/or verbal violence
Student 6: (…) to see others beating others, and saying naughty names (…).
3
Student 3: If someone wants to beat me, they tell me that so I can challenge them for a fight. I don’t like this (…). Student 3: When in the middle of the lesson (…) they start to call themselves naughty names (…). Indiscipline and non-compliance with Student 6: (…) to see others behave rules badly…
2
Student 3: When (…) they start interrupting the lesson all time and then it’s only at the end that we have just 5 min or sometimes less to do the things we had to do. Then we start getting behind schedule on the subjects we should learn and I also don’t like when the teacher is not in the room and she goes to the bathroom or talk to other teacher and some kids throw things on the floor, screaming, dancing, making jokes and making naughty gestures. Food
Student 7: I like everything! Except the food! (…) It tastes badly!
1
Hygiene
Student 6: (…) the dirty tables on the cafeteria.
1
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Table 2 The ideal school as conceptualized by the children The ideal school as conceptualized by the children Categories
Interview quotes
Occurrences
Improved aesthetics, organization and hygiene
Student 1: I would like to have the school painted.
6
Student 6: (…) If the school were all “smooth”, if it was all perfect, brilliant (…). Student 3: (…) all being tidy (…). Student 1: I would like that it doesn’t looked so much like a prison! (…) At the entrance the windows are like prison bars instead of having glasses. [Student 1: I would like that it doesn’t looked so much like a prison! (…)] Student 7: I agree! Student 3: (…) The cafeteria should be cleaned (…). Less physical, psychological and/or verbal violence
Student 7: (…) I don’t like one thing—violence.
3
Student 6: (…) I would like no one would beat no one and no one would get hurt (…). Because it happens all the time and there’s a diabetic boy in my class and they’re always making fun of him. In the 3th grade they were always making fun of him and saying he was fat, diabetic and all that. But then the ancillary workers were always grounding them, but this is still happening in the 4th grade (…) once in the cafeteria there was this boy who threw Bernardo—who is a deaf boy with no hearing—to the ground and started hitting him and then he had to be treated with ice on his legs and arms. That’s why we have a psychologist in our school. Student 3: (…) I would like also the students behaving themselves better (…). Sometimes in the middle of the lessons they swear (…). And this also happens because we play football and someone loses and everyone starts making fun of each other (…). And there’s this kid who can’t hear at all and has a [hearing] problem and they all made fun of him and beat him. They’d come up to him and say, “So, you’re not listening to anything?!” (continued)
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Table 2 (continued) The ideal school as conceptualized by the children Categories
Interview quotes
Occurrences
Socioaffective dimension
Student 7: I’d like to see my friends (…). 2 Student 1: In trumpet class, I wish there was one more student.
Teachers and staff behavioral profile
Student 3: I would like that the ancillary 1 workers and the teachers didn’t get angry so often (…).
observation of classes taught according to a traditional model with the observation of classes taught according to a model of holistic influence (Fig. 4) suggests that the latter seems to induce a generalized increase in all parameters observed, especially in the parameter “interest, motivation and involvement”; (2) the students interviews highlighted the tendency for them to establish a positive relation with school when they consider themselves good at what they do, when classes are considered fun, when there is some degree of novelty in the contents and in the way lessons are presented, and when the contents, methods and objectives are challenging; (3) the students interviews highlighted the tendency for them to establish a negative relation with school when it mediates violent behaviors, indiscipline, ugliness, stress, dirtiness, mess and socioaffective exclusion; (4) the efficacy and acceptance of the didactic game “Os Sabichões” among the school community was stated. This game, is to be understood mainly as an attempt to improve the weakest parameters observed in the
Fig. 4 Observed and taught lessons analysis
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class—namely interest, motivation and involvement—making use and drawing on the diversity of previously gathered educational materials and as a reflexive reaction to the questions raised by the students in the interviews conducted. Thus, in a summarized way and taking into account the foregoing discussion— how to implement a holistic and multidisciplinary music didactic within the scope of musical training classes at elementary education level? Firstly, observing, analyzing and problematizing the daily teaching-learning practices. Secondly, working as a team with other teachers, continuously building a sharing environment, exchanging and interconnecting a wide set of diversified forms of knowledge and information. Thirdly, by dialoguing with students, in particular about their relationship with general subjects, the general aspects of learning-teaching, the general aspects of the school, as well as about its conceptualisation of the ideal school. Fourthly and lastly, putting into practice, testing and operationalizing a multiple set of activities and exercises, seeking to establish several interconnections in a simple, harmonious and humanized way, crossing different school curriculum domains as well as different forms of knowledge with the curriculum of musical training classes at elementary education level. In this work the musical training classes were understood and approached not as a curricular musical domain closed on itself, adopting and repeating contents and practices of the past without any kind of self-reflection or self-criticism, but, instead, the musical training classes were here understood and approached as a dynamic, conscious, flexible and effective window of opportunity to foster on children a rich and meaningful musical experience. Regarding the second research question—how effective and relevant is the implementation of a holistic and multidisciplinary music didactic within the scope of musical training classes at elementary education level?—the following conclusions were drawn: (1) the sharp increase of all observed parameters seems to corroborate the holistic teaching models effectiveness and pertinence thesis in order to provide students a motivating, effective and humanized experience; and (2) the students seemed to relate in a positive way to the holistic teaching-learning model, manifesting in the interviews their empathy with the proposed activities and considering very interesting the curricula interconnections. Some children also mentioned they considered this experience to be a good framing for teamwork, getting the opportunity to know each other better, forming closer friendships, creating thus, in their opinion, a good opportunity to highlight the best of each one of them thanks to the diversity of the exercises and activities carried out. Finally, we would like again to emphasize that the small number of students participating in this project doesn’t allow any kind of research outcome scientific generalization. However, the data obtained seems to enhance the holistic procedures effectiveness, especially in terms of students’ motivation, interest and involvement. We consider that the most significant achievement of this project was, perhaps, the quality and effectiveness of the methodologies and approaches implemented in the game “Os Sabichões”, an activity that cannot certainly be understood as the only structuring element of teaching-learning procedures, but simply as a practical and effective didactic tool, developed mainly with the purpose of stimulating students’ interest, motivation, concentration and involvement, thus promoting their progression
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in the teaching-learning processes through, in this particular case, a set of approaches strongly influenced by holistic educational perspectives.
References Anderson, D. (1991). Imagination running wild. In R. Miller (Ed.), New directions in education. (pp. 243–255). Holistic Education Press. Bourdieu, P. (2000). Cultural reproduction and social reproduction. In R. Arum & I. Beattie (Eds.). The structure of schooling (pp. 56–69). Mayfield Publishing Company. Clark, E. (1991). The search for a new educational paradigm: The implications of new assumptions about thinking and learning. In R. Miller (Ed.), New directions in education. (pp. 16–37). Holistic Education Press. Cook, J. (2004). Integrated thematic instruction: A case study (PhD thesis). Oklahoma State University. Flake, C. (1993). Holistic education. In C. Flake (Ed.), Holistic education: Principles, perspectives, and practices (p. 77). Holistic Education Press. Gibson, R., & Peterson, M. (2001). Whole schooling: Implementing progressive school reform. In E. Ross (Ed.), The social studies curriculum: Purposes, problems, and possibilities (Revised ed., pp. 103–125). State University of New York Press. Hirsch, E. D. (1996). The schools we need and why we don’t have them. Doubleday. Hirsch, E. D. (1997). Why Traditional Education is More Progressive. The American Enterprise, 8(2), 42. Hirsch, E. D. (1999, September 11). Finding the answers in drills and rigor. The New York Times. p. B9. Hirsch, E. D. (2001). The roots of the education wars. In T. Loveless (Ed.), The great curriculum debate (pp. 13–24). Bookings Institution Press. Kessler, S. (1993). The mysteries program. In C. Flake (Ed.), Holistic education: Principles, perspectives, and practices (pp. 19–25). Holistic Education Press. Kovalik, S., & Olsen, K. (2002). Exceeding expectations: A user’s guide to brain based research in the classroom. Books for Educators, Inc. Miller, R. (1990). What are schools for? Holistic education in American culture. Holistic Education Press. Miller, R. (Ed.). (1991). New directions in education. Holistic Education Press. Miller, R. (1993). We need a holistic teaching training program. In C. Flake (Ed.), Holistic education: Principles, perspectives, and practices (pp. 112–114). Holistic Education Press. Newby, T., Stepich, D., Lehman, J., & Russell, J. (2000). Instructional technology for teaching and learning: Designing instruction, integrating computers, and using media. Sorokin, P. (2000). Social and Cultural Mobility. In R. Arum & I. Beattie (Eds.). The structure of schooling. (pp. 19–22). Mayfield Publishing Company.
Teaching Piano Through Letters: An Innovative Educational Tool by Carl Czerny Giovanna Carugno
Abstract This paper aims at analyzing the ten letters published by Carl Czerny on the art of playing the piano. These letters constitute an epistolary work intended to accompany Czerny’s School of Piano, as a guide for every budding pianist. The choice of the letters, instead of a treatise, allowed Czerny to use a style of writing that put the teacher in dialogue with his ideal pupil. In this sense, the letters were conceived to meet the needs of the new class of music amateurs, growing between the 18th and the nineteenth century. Thus, the letter becomes a new teaching instrument, that facilitates the learning of practical (fingering, improvisation, ornamentation) and theoretical (musical writing and reading, harmony) elements, also underlining the importance of selecting the piano repertoire, that should be inspired by general principles of proportionality and progressive increase. For their features, the letters by Carl Czerny represent the work of a pioneer of piano pedagogy, based on a learner-centered approach, which makes them worthy of specific consideration by contemporary musicologists and piano teachers.
1 Introduction Carl Czerny was not only a notable pianist and composer, but also a piano teacher, renowned in the whole European territory. As one of the most productive and influential Austrian musicians of the nineteenth century, he showed a relevant commitment in the development of piano teaching and playing. Czerny’s ability to play piano came to light during his early childhood. The composer started to study music under the guidance of his father, Wenzel Czerny, a Bohemian violinist who provided piano lessons and repaired musical instruments to economically support his family (Bell, 2004). Wenzel was “a demanding but experienced and unordinary thinking teacher” (Kvasnikova, 2015, p. 522) for his son.
G. Carugno (B) “Giuseppe Martucci” Conservatory of Music, Salerno, Italy © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_18
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The young Carl had not only the opportunity to be instructed by his father, but also to assist him while “playing and instructing” other pupils “on a daily basis” (Larson, 2015, p. 2). Besides Wenzel, a variety of musicians influenced the training of Czerny as a pianist. Ludwig van Beethoven was his teacher for two years, from 1801 to 1803. Therefore, historical sources demonstrate that Czerny had many chances to meet Muzio Clementi and Johann Nepomuk Hummel between 1801 and 1804.1 Both expressed words of encouragement and motivated Czerny in pursuing his career. Like his father, Czerny started to teach piano very soon, at the age of fifteen. He provided lessons with a strict schedule, for about twelve hours every day (Czerny & Sanders, 1956, p. 313), and he organized concerts the best students, to be held at his own house (Ferrati, 2011). Among Czerny’s pupils, were Sigismond Thalberg and Stephen Heller. This latter, some lessons, was not able to afford the high fees required by his teacher and decided to study with Anton Halm (Barbedette & Borthwick, 1877). Czerny quickly earned a great reputation for his teaching method, to the point that also Beethoven had asked him to teach piano to his nephew, Karl. In 1819 Czerny was entrusted with the teaching of the enfant prodige Franz Liszt, who had learned a lot from the great composer. Czerny describes this pupil as “a pale, delicate-looking child […] while playing swayed on the chair as if drunk”, so he “often thought he would fall to the floor. Moreover, his playing over, his irregular, careless, and confused, and he had so little knowledge of correct fingering that he threw his fingers over the keyboard in an altogether arbitrary fashion” (Czerny & Sanders, 1956, pp. 314–315). Liszt “was taught [by Czerny] to think, and to think independently, about piano playing” (Walker, 1988, p. 72), and he was grateful to his teacher, as demonstrated by the fact that he dedicated to Czerny the 24 Grandes Études pour le piano, published in 1839, in Vienna, and then in Milan and Paris (Fig. 1). Some of the pupils of Czerny became teachers, like Theodor Kullak—who was the founder of the Berlin “Stern” Conservatory, in 1850, and of the Neue Akademie der Tonkunst, established in 1855 as a private music education school (Soderlund, 2006)—and Theodor Leschetizky (Leffler, 1998). These instructors had the merit to pass the legacy of Czerny’s way of teaching and conceiving music to the following generations of pianists.2 1
Czerny participated in the musical environment of Vienna, being introduced to talented pianists and composers that attended the recitals organized by the wife of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Constanze Nissen (Czerny & Sanders, 1956, p. 308), as was the case of Hummel. 2 (Liszt described this meeting in a letter send to his piano student Ilka Horowitz-Barnay in 1875. He underlined the patience and positive attitude of Czerny, valuing the capacity of his master in motivating him. Liszt wrote: “I was about eleven years of age when my venerated teacher Czerny took me to Beethoven. He had told the latter about me a long time before, and had begged him to listen to me play sometime. Yet Beethoven had such a repugnance to infant prodigies that he always had violently objected to receiving me. Finally, however, he allowed himself to be persuaded by the indefatigable Czerny […] I somewhat shily, Czerny amiably encouraging me” [Knittel, 2003, 19])
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Fig. 1 Drawing by Rudolf Lipus (1940), representing Carl Czerny while introducing his pupil Franz Liszt to Ludwig van Beethoven
2 Czerny’s Teaching Style Czerny composed a lot of works for his pupils. His early piano teaching style was largely inspired by the models of Beethoven and Clementi, as highlighted by Czerny himself: “I became familiar with the teaching method of th[e]s[e] celebrated master [Muzio Clementi] and foremost pianist of his time, and I primarily owe it to this circumstance that later I was fortunate to train many important students to a degree of perfection for which they became world-famous” (Czerny & Sanders, 1956, p. 313). The influence of Beethoven on Czerny’s approach to piano teaching is evident in the crucial role recognized to the study of technique and articulation. Beethoven recommended to the young Czerny to follow the indications contained in the Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s Versuch über die wahre art das vlavier zu spielen, playing the scales in all the keys and practicing for obtaining a good use of the thumb. In the same way, Czerny assigned to Liszt “massive doses of endurance exercises”, to develop the technical skills to play the scales, while observing rules of “correct fingering, […] strict rhythm, and […] tone production” (Walker, 1988, p. 72). Later, Czerny proposed to his student to play a selection of pieces, ranging from his piano sonatas for four hands to various arrangements of Beethoven’s and Mozart’s compositions. Notwithstanding this apparent strictness, Czerny highly considered the personality and the musical tastes of his pupils. For this reason, Hinson (1985, 16) stated: Czerny “did not believe in method because he felt that each student was different and no one method would be correct for all”. In other words, Czerny adopted his own teaching style, which cannot be defined as a “method”, in the pure sense of this term. He learned from his teachers and he perfected their advices in a creative and original way. As a matter of fact, “the development of the craft of music was maintained by […] reproducing the rules handed down by masters, elaborating them, and inventing new ones” (Gellrich & Sundin, 1993, p. 140).
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As emphasized by Howard (1952), Czerny wrote not only exercises, but also compositions to meet specific needs of his students. The selection of the repertoire for each lesson was inspired by the idea of answering the necessities of the moment, providing to each pupil appropriate musical stimuli and tasks. Therefore, Czerny put in action a sort of “empathetic teaching”, believing that “a reserved but friendly, amiable attitude without a minimum sign of impatience is always the most efficacious way with pupils […] It bends even the most extravagant temperament to obedience and attention; from the most docile to the most obstinate” (Hinson, 1985, p. 18). A general overview on the way in which Czerny intended the piano teaching can be re-built by taking in account the exercises and études composed with a pedagogical aim, which represent the most relevant part of his piano production (Finizio, 1950). These works are contained in well-known collections, such as the School of virtuosity (Opus 365), the School of velocity (Opus 299), and the School of the left hand (Opus 399), that have been widely played nowadays, as a part of the repertoire included in the Conservatory’s piano programs. Czerny embedded the compositions for his pupils with some principles—such as the consolidation of the velocity of fingering and the strengthening the sound control—, with the aim to expand their technical and musical abilities. He was very attentive in valuing the natural inclinations of his students, “allowing, for example […] different fingerings for differently made hands” (Mather, 1970, p. 30). For the attention he paid to the technical aspect, “Czerny has become associated with repetition, routine, predictability, and the most mechanical definitions of musical skill. But Czerny, at a pivotal point in the instrument’s history, created the basics of technique so that the average student and future piano owner could play” (Botstein, 2004). In these terms, Carl Czerny can be considered as the father of modern piano technique and pedagogy.
3 The Letters to a Young Lady on the Art of Playing the Pianoforte The Letters to a young lady on the art of playing the pianoforte were published in Vienna in 1830 by Anton Diabelli3 with the original title Briefe über den Unterricht auf dem Pianoforte. An English version of the Letters was edited by the music writer
3
Anton Diabelli was not only a music publisher, but also a musician and a composer. He motivated Czerny to write music for dilettanti and to print and sold it. The first publication by Czerny for the Diabelli & Co. publishing house was the Brilliant Rondeau on Cavatine de Carafa à quatre mains (Opus 2), a short and easy piece composed by the Austrian master for his piano students.
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James Alexander Hamilton4 and published in 1840 by Robert Cooks in London,5 followed by the publication of a separate work which contained only the second part of the full collection, constituted by letters n. 7 (Rudiments of Thorough-bass), n. 8 (On the Formation of Chords), n. 9 (Continuation of Thorough-bass), and n. 10 (On Extemporaneous Performance).6 This publication was preceded by an American edition of the work, diffused in New York by Hewitt & Jaques between 1837 and 1841.7 The Letters to a young lady on the art of playing the pianoforte represent a literary work and an ideal guide for every budding pianist in learning to play the instrument. They provide both practical (fingering, improvisation, ornamentation) and theoretical (musical writing and reading, harmony, figured bass) indications. As pointed out in the Preface, the Letters were intended to accompany Czerny’s Pianoforte school (Opus 500)8 as a supplementary work. Czerny wrote: “The Publisher of my Great Pianoforte School, Op. 500, have expressed to me a wish that I would explain, under the epistolary form, and in a concise, clear, and familiar manner, the peculiar mode of proceeding in the instruction of my pupils, and of leading them forwards step by step, which I have employed during my long career as a teacher of the pianoforte; and that, in so doing, I would fully detail all those minute particulars which, from their nature, could not well find a place in a pianoforte school” (Czerny, 1840, IV).9 Such an explicit reference draws a line of connection between the content of the Pianoforte School and the Letters. These two works were both the result of the long teaching activity undertook by Czerny and they are a source of invaluable knowledge for the readers. 4
Hamilton was born in London in 1785 and died in the same city in 1845. He was “son of a dealer in old books, and was largely self-educated”, studying “the books in his father’s shop and acquir[ing] a knowledge of languages and particularly of music” (Golby, 2004). Hamilton translated a lot of works by composers of different nationalities. Among these, he particularly praised the compositions by Carl Czerny, listed in a comprehensive work, titled Catechism on the art of writing for an Orchestra, and on playing from score, published in London in three editions (the last one, in 1841). 5 Information about the English editions of the Letters were briefly reported by Damschroder and Williams (1990, p. 62). In the title page of the first London edition appears a reference to a French reprint, made by the Parisian publisher S. Rishault. 6 The title of the work, published by Cooks in 1946, and edited by Hamilton, was Letters on thorough-bass, with an appendix on the higher branches of musical execution and expression. 7 All the quotations from the Letters included in this article should be referred to the London edition of the work, that faithfully reproduces the German text. 8 The Pianoforte-Schüle was published by Wolfenbüttel in 1830, before the Letters. It was a collection of three volumes, containing theorical and practical instructions for the beginner pianists (the title specifically referred to a theoretisch-practische school of piano), as well as small exercises and studies. Both a copy of the first printed edition of this work and one of the Letters are preserved in Munich, at the Bayerischen Staatsbibliothek. The Pianoforte School appeared in London in 1839, sold in an English translation by the same publisher of the Letters (Robert Cooks), with the title Complete theoretical and practical piano forte school: from the first rudiments of playing to the highest and most refined state of cultivation with the requisite numerous examples newly and expressly composed for the occasion, opera 500 (see Czerny, 1839). 9 The request of the publisher of the Pianoforte School shows the potential value of the Letters as a commercial musical product to be proposed to a large platea of consumers, from women to dilettanti.
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In the Preface, Czerny specified the aim of the Letters: “Through these letters are written as a kind of appendix to my own Pianoforte School, still they may be used with equal advantage along with any other method; and may therefore, perhaps, be considered as a not unwelcome assistance to pupils in general” (Czerny, 1840, p. V). Czerny chose to publish a series of “short, friendly, and cheerful” (Czerny, 1840, p. IV) letters, instead of a treatise—the kind of work used from the Medieval era to transmit the musical knowledge—, to communicate instructions and suggestions to the reader. He utilized a simple writing style, which put in dialogue the “ideal” teacher of piano with his pupil (Caldarola, 2010). The fictional atmosphere is created by an imaginary conversation between two parts, being supervised by the intervention of the “local piano teacher”, a figure that is not being directly addressed in the letters”, but “constitutes a crucial third party who can observe the pupil closely and carry out the author’s disciplinary orders almost telepathically” (Björkén-Nyberg, 2019, p. 128). By “constructing this dialogue within the guise of ‘real time’ brings weight and believability to the claims of progress it lays out, and this both reinforces Czerny’s status as a pedagogue and implies that equal diligence [by the pupil] will achieve equal results—thereby, finally, enhancing the commercial viability of the Letters” (Davis, 2008, p. 74).
3.1 The Addressee of the Letters As stated by Czerny in the Preface of the work, the Letters are addressed to an imaginary girl of about twelve years old, who started to play the piano. The girl, called Cecilia, is “talented and well-educated”, and lives outside of the city, in a country place (Czerny, 1840, p. IV). Such a portrait reminds to the typical student of piano of the nineteenth century, an era in which was common for a teacher to train young ladies belonging to the medium-class, since piano lessons represented an important part of women education. In fact, “adolescent girls were ideally suited to take over musical tasks, through which they not only performed an important service for the family, but also developed their own wifely and mothering skills” (Davis, 2008, pp. 69–70). Evidence of this phenomenon can be found in the musical iconography. Many painters of that time represented scenes of women that play the piano: a noteworthy example is constituted by the painting of Pierre-Auguste Renoir, titled Two young girls at the piano (Fig. 2). The piano “was not only an emblem of social status, it provided a gauge of a woman’s training in the required accomplishments of genteel society. Its presence or absence in the home could be a sign of social climbing, security of status, or loss of place” (Burgan, 1986, p. 51). In addition, this instrument was “the most available […] for reasonable price” and it “could harm the [woman] less than any other instrument, because it required a natural posture, balance in use of arms/fingers, not particular strength of the breath” (Vanoni, 2017, p. 6).
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Fig. 2 Pierre Auguste Renoir, Two young girls at the piano, 1892
Considering this context, Czerny’s Letters were an instrument to educate to the art of the pianoforte the young women of the medium class. Historical research reveals that, among Czerny’s pupils, appeared a lot of young women10 : one of them, Anna Caroline de Belleville—also known as Ninette de Belleville, to whom Fryderyk Chopin dedicated his Waltz Opus 70, n. 2,—became a great pianist, attending Czerny’s classes for more than three years, between 1816 and 1820. Czerny introduced her to Beethoven; thus, she had the opportunity to “heard him to improvise on the piano” (Fuller-Maitland & Lamb, 2001). The Austrian teacher affirmed that she “was a rare musical talent, and since it was her father’s wish that she devote herself to a musical career, […] a student whose numerous public performances augmented [his] reputation, which by that time was already considerable” (Czerny & Sanders, 1956, p. 313). After all, in his first letter, Czerny defines piano training as “one of the most charming and honorable accomplishments for young ladies, and, indeed, for the female sex in general” (Czerny, 1840, p. 2).
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Davis (2008) supposed that this was the reason for which Czerny preferred to address his Letters to a woman.
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3.2 Structure and Content of the Letters The collection is organized as a series of letters, corresponding to progressive lessons of piano.11 Czerny considered a timeline of around one year and a half for his ideal piano course. A length of about two months separated one letter from the other, to give to the reader enough time to put in practice the indications learned in each lesson.12 In this perspective, the Letters pursue the aim to lead the pupil in the practice of piano playing, following a step-by-step approach, inspired by a principle of proportionality. The collection is opened by the First rudiments of the piano, illustrated in the first letter; namely, the knowledge of the keys and the notes. Differently from the first volume of the Pianoforte School, in which Czerny explained the same rudiments by providing a picture of the keyboard, in the Letters the author created a less formal and friendly atmosphere, enriched through ironic comments on the notions.13 One of the first indication that Czerny gave to Miss Cecilia is to assume a proper posture at the piano. He illustrated the appropriate position of the feet and of the forearms. Since the piano overcame the harpsichord in the musical environment of the nineteenth century, a different use of the body of the performer was required. As specified by Mather (1970, p. 29), “the body has to become the servant of the piano, as the piano is the servant of the music”. Some preliminary suggestions can be also found in the first volume of the above-mentioned Czerny’s Opus 500. At the beginning of the first lesson, under the heading Position of the body, and of the hands, Czerny remarked the importance of assuming a correct posture at the piano for a good performance (Czerny, 1839, p. 1). He affirmed that “[i]t is not merely that an awkward position is disagreeable and ridiculous, but it also impedes, if not prevents, the development of a free and elegant style of playing” (Czerny, 1840, p. 4). After suggesting how to place the fingers on the keyboards to obtain a good sound, Czerny explained some elements of music theory, such as the names of the notes and how to read them. 11
While the lessons in which is divided the first book of the Pianoforte School are nineteen, those of the Letters are ten. In fact, the epistolary work summarizes concept already illustrated in Opus 500, that usually contains headings which are similar to those chosen by Czerny to title each letter (for example, On Graces or Notes of Embellishments is the title of the sixteenth lesson of the Pianoforte School and partially that of the Letter IV of the collection addressed to Miss Cecilia). This element should be read as an attempt made by the author to guide the reader of the Letters and to establish, at the same time, an ideally link with the exercises, studies and notions provided by the Pianoforte School. 12 Czerny observed: “It is further assumed that each letter follows that which immediately preceded it, after a lapse of about eight or ten weeks; so that the pupil may have sufficient intermediate time to learn all the rules which are laid down, and to avail herself of them in her subsequent practice” (Czerny, 1840, p. IV). 13 Czerny defined them “the only really tedious and unpleasant points in learning music” (Czerny, 1840, p. 3).
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An important advice that Czerny provided to his pupil is to copy the musical scores and write under the notes their names, to better facilitate the process of music memorization, following the idea that “notes are much easier to write than letters” (Czerny, 1840, p. 7).14 Reading the first letter makes immediately evident that the rules suggested by Czerny does not only reflect the playing style of his time but are still the basis of the piano training, being easily found in contemporary educational works for the young pianists. In the other letters, Czerny focused his attention on music theory and practice. In the second letter, titled On touch, tone, and the mode of treating the pianoforte, he introduced to Miss Cecilia some basic information on the touch and on the passage of the thumb. In addition, he pointed out the importance of the “principle of equality”, dividing it into three different categories: “equality of strength”, “equality in point of quickness” and “equality in holding the notes down” (Czerny, 1840, p. 16). Czerny better specified this principle by observing that “the five fingers are by no means equal to each other in natural strength. Thus, for example, the thumb is much stronger than any of the other fingers; the first finger is much stronger than the little finger, and the third finger, on the contrary, is, with almost every person, the weakest of all. The pianist, however, must know how to employ these various degrees of power, so that in playing the scales all the fingers may strike their appropriate keys with perfect equality of strength; for the scales sound well only when they are played in every respect with the most exact equality” (Czerny, 1840, p. 16).15 In the third letter (On Time, Subdivision of the Notes, and Fingering), Czerny spent some words on the duration of the notes and on the importance to count the value of them while playing a piece, making differences between “counting aloud”, that could be problematic and could hinder the freedom of interpreting the piece, and “counting in idea”—or in the mind (“mentally”)—, as the best solution to remember the rhythm (Czerny, 1840, p. 22). Czerny advised against “beating the time with the foot”, considering it as “a bad habit”, difficult to be changed (Czerny, 1840, p. 22). Finally, he suggested to Miss Cecilia to adopt an appropriate fingering an to observe the initial tempo of the composition, without accelerating or slowing it during the performance. The fourth letter concerns the Expression, and graces or embellishments. Czerny recalled to his pupil the importance to study with perseverance, three hours a day, 14
Copying music represents a useful exercise in any stage of learning. Czerny himself started to study orchestration by making copies of “many J.S. Bach fugues, Scarlatti Sonatas and other works by ‘ancient’ composers. He describe[d] learning orchestration by copying the parts from the first two Beethoven symphonies, and several Haydn and Mozart symphonies as well” (Lindeman & Barth, 2001). 15 The relevance of the technique to enhance the equality between the fingers and the ability of dexterity was also underlined by Czerny in his biography. The author affirmed: “Since I knew from numerous experiences that geniuses whose mental gifts are ahead of their physical strength tend to slight solid technique, it seemed necessary above all to use the first months [of lesson] to regulate and strengthen his mechanical dexterity” (Czerny & Sanders, 1956, p. 315). It is important to remind that Czerny dedicated one of his work to the art of finger dexterity: Opus 740 (Die Kunst der Fingerfertigkeit), a collection of fifty studies in the brilliant style, published in Wien in 1844.
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“of which about half an hour shall be appropriated to the exercises, as much more to playing over the old pieces, and the remaining time to the study of new compositions” (Czerny, 1840, p. 29). Then, Czerny declared that “expression, feeling, and sensibility are the soul of music” (Czerny, 1840, p. 29); so, it is necessary to reproduce them by observing the marks of expression and articulation—as forte, piano, legato, staccato—and by playing the ornaments in a correct way. The ornaments are defined by the master “the flowers of music” (Czerny, 1840, p. 33) and contributed at enriching the performance. The fifth letter (On the Keys, on Studying a Piece, and on Playing in the presence of others) contains a list of useful expedients for practicing and preparing public performances. In this context, Czerny defined in the sight-reading one of the most important skill for a good pianist. He also underlined the importance to read “in all the keys”, as “one of the most necessary acquirements for a pianist” (Czerny, 1840, p. 35). The author pointed out the risk of time wasting while studying a complex musical composition. To avoid that, he introduced Miss Cecilia to the “art of studying”,16 suggesting some simple steps: (a) reading and decoding the musical signs on the score; (b) playing the piece slowly; (c) deciding and fixing the fingering; (d) “gain[ing] a general insight over the whole”; (e) studying the difficult passages separating them from the whole piece and, only when well learned, in connection with it. In the idea of Czerny, these passages take few days of practicing. Next, “the whole piece must be played over quietly and composedly, but at the same time attentively, and without any distraction of ideas, till we are enabled to execute it without trouble, and in the exact time indicated by the author” (Czerny, 1840, p. 37). The performance in front of an audience is considered by Czerny an occasion to stimulate the pupil in practicing more and with passion. He suggested to Miss Cecilia to learn some little pieces to be play by heart and to be properly prepared for the recital, to gain confidence in playing in front of a public.17 During the recital, the pianist should play “with tranquillity and self-possession, without hurrying, without allowing […] ideas to wander, and more especially without coming to a stand-still; for this last is the most unpleasant fault which we can commit before an audience” (Czerny, 1840, p. 40). Czerny gave importance not only to the way of playing, but also to the general outline of the performance. From his 16
Czerny highlighted that “[t]here are pupils who study […] compositions attentively enough it is true, but so slow and with such frequent interruptions, that these pieces become tedious and disagreeable to them before they have half learned them. Such pupils often take half a year to learn a few pieces tolerably; and, by this wasteful expenditure of time, always remain in the back-ground” (Czerny, 1840, p. 36). 17 In the opinion of Czerny, it “is very necessary” to “study and commit to memory a good number of little, easy, but tasteful pieces” and “to be able to play them by heart: for it appears rather childish to be obliged, for every trifle, to turn over one’s collection of music; or, when in a strange place, to be always obliged to draw back, with the excuse ‘that you cannot play any thing by heart’” (Czerny, 1840, p. 41). Czerny pointed out that some of these compositions are included in his Pianoforte School and suggested to Miss Cecilia to start every public performance playing a short prelude selected from that collection.
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indications, emerges the idea of the pianist as an artist that utilizes the body and the instrument as a medium to communicate a message to the audience. The pianist should keep his hands warm and should choose an appropriate dress for the occasion. It would be desirable that the pianist could play the instrument with which is “well acquainted; for an instrument, of which the touch is much lighter or much heavier than that which one is accustomed to, may very much confuse a player” (Czerny, 1840, p. 40). The sixth letter, titled On the Selection of Compositions most suitable for each Pianist, deals with the choice of the repertoire. According to Czerny, the selection should be not limited to the études composed by the most famous pianists of his time (e.g., Cramer and Bertini), but should be enlarged at including short pieces (like rondos, sonatas, variations, etc.), appropriate to the technical level of the pupil. At the first stages of piano practice, does not make sense to propose to the pupil “grand and difficult pieces by Chopin, Hiller, Hummel, Henselt, Kalkbrenner, Liszt, Potter, Thalberg”: Czerny recommended Miss Cecilia “to study at some future time, when [her] execution shall have reached a very high degree of excellence”, since “most of these pieces are splendid bravura-compositions, intended rather for highly cultivated players, and for public performances, than for the instruction of those […] have still to climb many steps to arrive at perfection” (Czerny, 1840, p. 44). Letters number seven, eight and nine cover the most relevant issues of the studying of harmony, such as the intervals, the formation of chords and the importance to properly realize the figured bass, as an important skill for improvising, “playing at sight, and accompanying” other musicians or singers (Czerny, 1840, p. 55). Czerny provided not only written explanations of the notions, but also included in the text some images and tables to indicate chord sequences. In the last letter, after spending some words on the art of music, defining as a language used by the human being to express feelings (Czerny, 1840, p. 78), the author gave to Miss Cecilia some information on how to improvise at the piano. Improvisation tawhen “nothing is been written down before, nor previously prepared or studied, but which is merely the fruit of a momentary and accidental inspiration” (Czerny, 1840, p. 78): these are the cases of Extemporaneous performance, as the title of the letter suggests. In the idea of Czerny, improvising is an art and many masters of his time, “such as Beethoven and Hummel, have particularly distinguished themselves in it” (Czerny, 1840, p. 78). Czerny believed in the capacity of every musician to improvise18 ; in that, what distinguishes a dilettante from a professional pianist is the complexity of the improvisation result and the technical skills implemented in it.
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He was “convinced that any body, who has attained to more than a moderate skill in playing, is also capable, at least to a certain degree, of acquiring the art of playing extemporaneously […] for this purpose it is requisite to commence this sort of practice at an early period” and “to indefatigably apply the experience […] gained by studying the compositions of others” (Czerny, 1840, p. 79).
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4 Final Remarks The Letters to a young lady on the art of playing the pianoforte represents the literary trace of a pioneering approach in piano teaching. This work is inspired by ideas that are still applied in the piano pedagogy field, being extremely useful to tackle not only the repertoire of the nineteenth century (Bräm, 2012), but also the exercises, that were “embraced with […] enthusiasm” by the piano students of Czerny and his contemporaries (Gellrich & Parncutt, 1998, p. 5). In the words of Czerny, the letters constitute both a guide to introduce beginner students to the “earliest rudiments” of the piano knowledge, and a tool to accompany advanced pupils in the “highest stage of cultivation” of the instrument (Czerny, 1840, p. V). The letters give to the students the chance to become more aware of the importance of some aspects, such as fingering, touch, sight-reading and improvisation. From the methodological side, they are the witness of the early development of the learned-center principle, a basis of the contemporary instrumental music education. Czerny dedicated the same attention to the theoretical and practical aspects of piano playing, adopting a mixed method as that used nowadays in piano courses. Then, the Letters follow a principle of proportionality and progressive increase, that should inspire every teaching activity. They are also “universally oriented”, since they are only ideally addressed to a young lady: they could be read and operationally applicated—quoting Czerny—by “pupils of every age, and in every stage of their progress” (Czerny, 1840, p. V). A key-concept emerged from the Letters is the principle of “repetition”, not only of the exercises, scales and arpeggios, but also of the pieces. This principle accompanied the idea of a daily piano practice or routine, without neglecting the artistic value of playing the instrument in public (Rattalino, 2008). Thus, the Letters face the challenge to encourage the pupil to practice and to perform in front of an audience, providing appropriate suggestions for these occasions. In light of that, the Letters to a young lady on the art of playing the pianoforte should be re-discovered and re-valuated by piano teachers and pupils. This work demonstrates the intense dedication of Czerny not only to the art of playing the pianoforte, but also to the art of teaching music. Czerny’s commitment to these arts facilitated the growth of the “musical alphabetization” of the bourgeoisies’ class and the valorization of many gifted piano performers (Ferrati, 2011, p. 43). The letters have been conceived as an instrument to contribute to this process. Their success19 19 This success is proved by the high number of reprints and translations of the Letters, that circulated from 1842 also in a Russian version, printed in Saint Petersburg with the title Pis’ma Karla Cherni, ili Rukovodstvo k izucheniiu igry na fortepiano ot nachal’nykh osnovanii do polnago usovershenstvovaniia s kratkirn obiasneniem generalbasa (Damschroder & Williams, 1990, p. 62). Various composers and piano pedagogues took inspiration from the literary work by Czerny. For instance, the pianist Nathan Richardson, defined Czerny’s letters “genial and instructive” in his New Method for the Piano-forte: An improvement upon all other instruction books in progressive arrangement, adaptation and simplicity, published in Boston by Oliver Ditson in 1859.
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played a fundamental role to rehabilitate the figure of Czerny, which was for a long time obscured by critics and negative opinions20 or considered less important when compared to his master Beethoven.21 In conclusion, the Letters to a young lady on the art of playing the pianoforte assigns to Czerny a place among the most prominent pedagogues in the field of piano teaching.22
References Barbedette, H., & Borthwick, R. B. (1877). Stephen Heller: his life and works. Ashdown & Parry. Barth, G. (2008). Carl Czerny, composer. In D. Gramit (Ed.). Beyond the art of finger dexterity: Reassessing Carl Czerny (pp. 139-144). University of Rochester Press. Bell, N. (2004), Czerny, Carl. In C. J. Murray (Ed.). Encyclopedia of the Romantic era, 1760–1850 (pp. 246–247). Routledge. Björkén-Nyberg, C. (2019). From Carl Czerny’s Miss Cecilia to the Cecilian: Engineering, Aesthetics, and Gendered Piano Instruction. Journal of Historical Research in Music Education, 40(2), 125–142. Botstein, L. (2004). Beethoven’s pupil. Accessed July 5, 2018, www.americansymphony.org Bräm, T. (2012). Music pedagogy in the 21st century. Musica docta. Rivista digitale di pedagogia e didattica della musica, 2, 1–8. Burgan, M. (1986). Heroines at the piano: women and music in nineteenth-century fiction. Victorian Studies, 30(1), 51–76.
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Schumann (1880, p. 281) underlined that, at the end of the nineteenth century, Czerny “lost much [his] favour with the public”, being overshadowed by other composers and pianists, such as Moscheles, Kalkbrenner and Cramer. Music history literature agrees that the “large quantities of routine” and “quickly composed” pieces, “emphasizing slapdash virtuosity and superficial prettiness destroyed Czerny’s reputation and discouraged exploration of the rest of his oeuvre” (Barth, 2008, p. 139). The works by Carl Czerny are still neglected by the musicological and pedagogical research. As an example, a recent volume on piano teaching suggested to “study a few of Czerny’s studies on a limited basis”: it appears “not sensible to burden students with years of Czerny”, since this repertoire “is not music a student looks forward to with enthusiasm” (Ponce, 2019, p. 42). Positive comments on Czerny’s contribution to the art of music remain isolated voices (see, for instance, Lindeman & Barth (2001), who states that “Czerny’s works reveal, in addition to the familiar pedagogue and virtuoso, an artist of taste, passion, sensitivity, drama, lyricism and solitude”). 21 Kuerti (1997) observed that such a “close association with a smouldering genius like Beethoven is certainly inspiring, it is also, like living beside a volcano, fraught with danger. The volcano/genius can humble, threaten, and even suffocate all who are too close, and inevitably wields excessive influence over students, easily turning them into disciples rather than artists. Indeed, the greatest talents often have the lowest self-confidence and are thus all too easily overwhelmed and discouraged. Eventually every young protege must either go through a rebellion akin to the teenage detachment syndrome, challenging the supremacy of his master; or else humbly submerge himself in the anonymity of disciplehood, accepting unquestioningly and without regret the indisputable and eternal superiority of the master”. 22 For its educational vocation, this work was compared to the pedagogical contribution of the Swiss philosopher Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, lived shortly before Carl Czerny (Musser, 2019). A study on the relevance of the indications provided by Czerny in his Letter for contemporary instrumental music education was recently carried out by Haddad (2015).
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Caldarola, M. C. (2010). Introduzione. In M. C. Caldarola (Ed.). Carl Czerny: Lettere ad una giovinetta sull’arte del suonare il pianoforte. Florestano. Czerny, C. (1839). Complete theoretical and practical piano forte school: from the first rudiments of playing to the highest and most refined state of cultivation with the requisite numerous examples newly and expressly composed for the occasion, opera 500. Cooks. Czerny, C. (1840). Letters to a young lady on the art of playing the pianoforte. Cooks. Czerny, C., & Sanders, E. (1956). Recollections from my life. The Musical Quarterly, 42(3), 302– 317. Damschroder, D., & Williams, D. R. (1990). Music Theory from Zarlino to Schenker: A Bibliography and Guide. Pendragon Press. Davis, D. C. (2008). The veil of fiction. Pedagogy and rethorical strategies in Carl Czerny’s Letters on the art of playing the pianoforte. In D. Gramit (Ed.). Beyond the art of finger dexterity: reassessing Carl Czerny (pp. 67–81). University of Rochester Press. Ferrati, F. (2011). La didattica pianistica nella storia. Rugginenti. Finizio, L. (1950). Quello che ogni pianista deve sapere. Curci. Fuller-Maitland, J. A., & Lamb, A. (2001). Oury, Anna Caroline. Grove Music Online, 11. Accessed May 12, 2018, www.oxfordmusiconline.com Gellrich, M., & Parncutt, R. (1998). Piano technique and fingering in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries: bringing a forgotten method back to life. British Journal of Music Education, 15, 5–23. Gellrich, M., & Sundin, B. (1993). Instrumental practice in the 18th and 19th centuries. Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, 119, 137–145. Golby, D. J. (2004). Hamilton, James Alexander (1785–1845). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Accessed May 5, 2018, www.oxforddnb.com Haddad, R. (2015). An analytic study of the didactical opinions of Carl Czerny dedicated for piano performing skills. Journal of Arts and Social Sciences, 2(9), 1–18. Hinson, M. (1985). Carl Czerny remembered. Clavier, 24(18), 15–19. Howard, W. (1952). La musique et l’enfant. Presses universitaires de France. Knittel, K. M. (2003). Pilgrimages to Beethoven: Reminiscences by his contemporaries. Music & Letters, 84(1), 19–54. Kuerti, A. (1997). Carl Czerny: In the shadow of Beethoven. Queens Quarterly, 104(3), 487–497. Kvasnikova, J. (2015). Carl Czerny, a composer and teacher whom we do know. Educational Alternatives, 13, 520–526. Larson, L. K. (2015). An underestimated Master: a critical analysis of Carl Czerny’s Eleven Piano Sonatas and his contribution to the genre. Student Research, Creative Activity, and Performance— School of Music, 92, 1–143. Leffler, D. G. (1998). Czerny, Leschetizky, Vengerova: a genealogical study of piano pedagogy technique. San Jose State University. Lindeman, S. D., & Barth, G. (2001). Czerny, Carl. Grove Music Online, 11. Accessed May 12, 2018, www.oxfordmusiconline.com Mather, E. (1970). Methods in piano teaching. American Music Teacher, 20, 29–47. Musser, J. (2019). Carl Czerny’s mechanical reproductions. Journal of the American Musicological Society, 72(2), 363–429. Ponce, W. (2019). The tyranny of tradition in piano teaching: a critical history from Clementi to the present. McFarland & Company. Rattalino, P. (2008). Storia del pianoforte. Il Saggiatore. Schumann, R. (1880). Music and musicians: essays and criticisms. New Temple Press. Soderlund, S. (2006). How did they play? How did they teach? A history of keyboard technique. Hinshaw Music. Vanoni, M. C. (2017). Technique and expression in Carl Czerny’s teaching: a critical study of Czerny’s Piano-Forte School, Opus 500, demonstrating the direct relation between mechanical teaching and expression in performance. Boston University Press. Walker, A. (1988). Franz Liszt. The virtuoso years. 1811–1847. Cornell University Press.
Transtherapy of Music as a Benefit Beyond Ears and Senses Hermes de Andrade Júnior and Tamar Prouse de Andrade
Abstract Transdisciplinarity is a challenge to our style of living and a great relief in the sense of being an opportunity to attach, to consider differences and methods previously judged despicable and to have keys to the intended solutions of balancing in a world of complexities. A brief conceptual and empirical review is developed that seeks the transdisciplinary nexus in the connection with the social sciences and health areas, crossing references of musical applicability in the junction of musical aesthetics and functionality with medical science and with their experiences with the sacred. It aims to strengthen the transdisciplinary epistemological basis with the musical component, amplifying the discussion about the supreme benefit of the use of music as a therapeutic, in the most varied faces of medical science. In the field of medical ethics, this work hopes that music will be massively included as a powerful “transtherapeutic” resource that transcends standardized models of health systems and reaches everyone in the medical-professional sense.
1 Introduction Transdisciplinarity is a challenge to our style of living and a great relief, in the sense of being an opportunity to attach and consider differences and methods deemed despicable, and to hold the keys to the desired balancing solutions in a world of complexities, once which seeks the resumption of the encounter of science with art and with the sacred, better qualifying us for the increasing crises of the millennium. Transdisciplinarity refers to what is at the same time between the disciplines, through the different disciplines and, in addition to all the disciplines, showing a categorical non-linear and quantum behavior. As its goal is to understand the present world and one of the imperatives for this is the unity of knowledge, it brings a reinforcement to the methodological and epistemological challenges of our era. H. de Andrade Júnior (B) · T. P. de Andrade University of Vigo, Doc CREA S2i, Pontevedra, Spain © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_19
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Since disciplinary research relates at best to one and the same level of reality or, in most cases, it refers to only a fragment of a level of reality, transdisciplinarity concerns the dynamics generated by different levels of reality at the same time. But although it is not a new discipline or a new superdiscipline, transdisciplinarity is nourished by disciplinary research. That is: disciplinary research is enlightened in a new and fruitful way by transdisciplinary knowledge, not being conflicting, but complementary. Thus, transdisciplinarity is linked to both a new vision and a lived experience. It is a path of self-transformation oriented to self-knowledge, to the unity of knowledge and to the creation of a new art of living (Nicolescu, 1996). In order to contextualize the musical applicability of the human being in the transdisciplinary proposal, Thomas de Aquino (1225–1274), through the study of the work of Aristotle (384–322 BC), recognizes in his notions the possibility of reconciling two tendencies seemingly antagonistic to faith and reason (Aquino, 2005). To conceive human nature from a Creator (the origin of the Sacred), to understand it in its deprivations and possibilities, in its acts and powers, where spirit and matter constitute a substantial unity, matter participating in the life of the spirit, that of life material, can still be absurd for hegemonic science. For example, the human body has systematically become the object of worship, a marionette of innumerable devices of power, scientific research, industry, systems, technologies, manipulations and high negotiations. A culture of modeling of physical form multiplies itself in gyms, surgeries, body-buildings, applications, appliances, vitamins, aesthetics, gastronomy, media, publications, in short, the success of this narcissistic self is the image of the vanity of vanities. The beauty of physical appearance took on the connotation of good. Man has been reduced to his physiology, movement to mechanical functional impulses, feeling to chemical reactions, thought to a network of synapses, mind only a byproduct of these and so we can understand success. This heavy criticism for the ephemerality and superficiality of our time goes by the disregard of re-integrating the human being in its aspects, physical, aesthetic, intellectual, emotional and spiritual. At the intellectual level, systemic thinking takes into account the complexity of the relationships between the most varied phenomena, inserting uncertainties and antagonisms, which is one way of dealing with superficiality. In opposition to the reductionist paradigm of knowledge, which only recognized order as the principle of explanation, systemic thinking is constituted from the associative interrelationships between the notions of system-interaction-organization (Morin, 2005). It is a paradigm that faces the idea of disorder and indeterminacy. Morin emphasizes that the disorder brings uncertainty because we no longer have an algorithm and because we do not find a deterministic principle that allows us to know the consequences of this or that phenomenon (Morin, 2003). The underlying research questions that motivated this study are: Why is music not massively used in health institutions if music reaches so many dimensions of living things? Is it because it is not necessarily adopted as public policy in all institutions? What is the reason for its limitation in a prescriptive way? Is there a shortage of capable professionals to understand and apply their principles for therapy? Is it
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because music would be cheap and easy enough to not make big profits for big business owners? Here there will be no answers to such questions, but there will be more arguments for strengthening musical applicability as therapeutic. Thus, this paper intends to discuss using a conceptual review and showing the results who indicates that complexity of music allows to make an interdimensional transit that here is considered an applied transtherapeutics of music in the following perspectives of appeal: (1) in the conception of a human being endowed with body, soul and spirit through which music reaches the direction of fully recovering it, (2) at the intersection of formal disciplines in the social sciences, health and music itself, leading to a consideration that music arrives through vehicles of communication and is the object of semiology in the sense of deciphering meaningful signs, mediated by varied cultures; (b) for the goals sought by many health disciplines, some of them already resulting from mergers, to be satisfied by the contextualized music therapy and by the music itself; understanding its peculiarities always acting within the theory of complexity that defy melodies, harmonies and rhythms in methodologies supported by aesthetic elements and intelligent textures for the act of curing or preventing, in an increasingly consolidated therapy; (3) in the inclusion of music with definitive incorporation of medical ethics and (4) in the recognition that the megadimensions of science, art and the sacred will naturally be connected in a dynamic transdisciplinary process.
2 Background 2.1 Edgar Morin’s Theory of Complexity For a long time, but firmly in the eighteenth century, the validation of scientific knowledge was based on the rational empirical procedure in which observation, experience, and reason grounded the whole activity of science. Founded on the three fundamental pillars of knowledge (order, separability and reason), scientists from various areas tried to explain all phenomena and thus understand the world. However, from the beginning of the twentieth century, tragic events such as world wars occurred in parallel with important discoveries in the field of physics, having revolutionized the field of order and certainty, introducing disorder and uncertainty as elements incorporated into research. Thus, a theory of complexity arises as a result of this and other advances in knowledge, opposing the Cartesian principles of fragmentation and compartmentalization of knowledge. It proposes a reconnection of these, thus providing a new way of looking at and interacting with a world in which there is no “single, last, sure foundation of knowledge” (Pena-Vega & Nascimento, 1999, p. 22). Morin’s theory of complexity consists of systemic thinking, the dialogical principle, and the hologramatic principle. Systemic thinking seeks to interconnect the parts, reducing the distance between them, which enables a joint thinking
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(system), without losing sight of all its components. The system is a non-hierarchical, non-totalitarian concept, open to “politotalities”, a complex concept that Morin (2005) called unitas multiplex. The above terms form a macroconcept, so that each concept can not be dissociated from the others, always referring to each other. The System, therefore, constitutes an ambiguity, unstable, in which each and every part is constantly associated and dissociated by the unpredictability, instabilities and polidependences that constitute it (Sá, 2013). The dialogic principle is one of the foundations of Cartesian thought and is at the heart of dichotomous thinking when it is operated by binary classical logic, that is, true or false, reason or emotion, and so on. This classical logic led to the compartmentalization of knowledge, making it difficult to dialogue between disciplines, stimulating a rigid disciplinary structure with well-established fixed boundaries and an increasingly fragmented view of knowledge. Thus, under classical logic, reasoning is non-contradictory, valuing objectivity and non-contradiction, excluding interaction between opposites. In contrast to this logic, Morin elaborates the idea of complexus. Complexus is what is together and is the fabric formed by different threads that have become one thing. That is, all this is intertwined, everything intertwines to form the unity of complexity. However, “the unity of the complexus does not destroy the variety and diversity of the complexities that have woven it” (Morin, 2005, p. 188). For complexity, thinking is always multidimensional and integrative, encompassing the most diverse knowledges. According to the author, the dialogical principle, therefore, “allows us to maintain duality within the unity. It associates two terms, at the same time, complementary and antagonistic and dialogical means two logics, two principles that are united without the duality is lost in this unity” (Morin, 2005, p. 189). The dialogical principle proposes the breaking of the closed spheres of knowledge, establishing articulations between what was separated in order to better understand the world. The hologramatic principle is intimately connected with the former because, according to Morin (2005, p. 181), “not only is the part in the whole, but also that the whole is in the parts”. The hologramatic principle seeks a dynamic interconnection of knowledge through the articulation of binary pairs: simple-complex, part-whole, reason-emotion.
3 Focus of the Chapter 3.1 The “Trans” Efficacy of Music and Its Complexity I (Time, Communication, Aesthetics, Texture and What Transcends) As an example of the hologramatic principle, in music we experience a time that Langer calls virtual time, because there occurs a transposition of our experiences
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into a pure and articulated way. Tensions turn into musical tensions, content in musical quality. Music creates the illusion of time lived, experienced, vital, given its essence characterized by a movement of non-visible forms whose duration can only be measured by our sensibility, tensions and emotions. The fast or slow movement, the melody that rises or descends, the chords that run over, happen continuously, without interruption. There is no time that passes, but time that lasts. Music establishes flows, a chain of intentions, always in movement (Langer, 1942). Music also frees us from our frozen mental habits and makes our minds move as they usually can not. When we are involved in well-written music, we have understandings “that surpass those of our worldly existence and are often beyond remembrance, when music ceases (unless we remember the music itself). When the sound stops, we return to our mental wheelchairs” (Jourdain, 1998, p. 383). Behind the social link created in musical communication is the transcendental, where values and virtual norms are still signs that have not become signs for anyone. This is because the sphere of semiotic actuation consists only of fields of being for myself or of being for the other. The ends of a semiotic square are the field of pre-signals, which surround semiosis on two sides in the proper sense. However, this semiosis or process of the corresponding acts and signs can not be understood without leaving itself, that is, transcending itself, in the same direction as Kantian analytics (Tarasti, 2012). The original model can be applied to portray not so much the external communication that occurs in music, but the internal model, and of course, consists of many elements that are internalized from the social context, but which also originate from our personal and inner essence as a corporeal entity. Thus, when used in musical analysis, it shows us how each act of communication in music contains many levels that it establishes and also how complex music is ultimately a manifestation of “superior communication” (Tarasti, 2012, p. 451). In the fifteenth century, the dominant, highly articulated and rational worldview remained magical, as scholars bent on trying to understand the universe in terms of invisible forces that produced results on people with their power of control (Horden, 2000). One of the studies that sought to understand the spiritual dimension of the question came from Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499), architect of the scientific practice of the socalled natural magic, who tried to discover and recover the powers of music described by the philosophers of antiquity. According to Voss, Ficino generated the revival of Platonic philosophy, translating and editing ancient texts in his search for the secrets of the therapeutic potential of music. His intellectual goal was to integrate Platonism and Christianity, and in practice brought a holistic approach to healing which proved to be an original and advanced way of understanding and acting in the world, weighed down in his reading of Hermetic, Neoplatonic, and Arab texts combined with his medical, astrological and musical skills (Voss, 2001; Thram, 2014). Seeing the human soul as the force that united mind and body, he sought to harmonize it with the soul of the world or force that would have united heaven and earth. From his experience as a musician accompanying himself on the lyre while singing Orpheus’ hymns (he translated them from greek into latin), Ficino
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was convinced that the most powerful way of achieving this union or balance in life was through a careful preparation and performance of the music (Cf. Horden, 2000, Thram, 2014). The study of Thram interprets Ficino’s concept of spiritus as a bodily vapor that acts as connector between the body and the incorporeal soul and serves as an instrument for sensory perception, imagination, and motor activity. Ficino says that the therapeutic efficacy of music lies in the body’s ability to hear (sensory perception) and its ability to transmit what it hears and to influence physical (motor activity), mental (imagination) potentials, and emotional (incorporeal soul) (Thram, 2014). Thus, Ficino recognized the biological basis of music therapy in human sensory and neurological capacities (Gouk, 2004). Curious is that from the published reports about Ficino’s understanding of how music moves through the body, it seems that his concept of human spiritus corresponds to what we now know as the human nervous system, once he realized that the transmission of sound required reception through the ear, with the auditory nerve leading the sound directly to the brain and consequently to the whole body (overall effectiveness). However, since the physiology of the ear and nervous system were not known or understood until several centuries later, their concepts and terminology seem foreign to twenty-first century readers and require careful interpretation on the part of historians familiar with the premodern era (Thram, 2014). During the beginning of the modern era after the Reformation, which lasted more than a century after its instigation by Luther in 1517, Protestants and Catholics sought the proper way for humans to approach the divine, and the role of music in worship and life was generally a matter of great importance. It was generally known and believed that in ancient civilization music had great power over morals and human behavior. What was the source of this power? How could it be restored? Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750) was a fervent lutheran, composer, regent, chapel master, expert organist and organ luthier. In his work Mass in B Minor, in several moments, one perceives the character of irreversibility of the death alternating with the music of the resurrection, that announces a surprisingly new life. There are difficulties in describing connections between the two, since crucifixion is a tragic event and the limit of the human world and the resurrection is a spiritual event, even though it occurs in the human world and is somehow connected with the crucifixion. Certain aspects of resurrection music play a central role in the Mass as a whole and focusing on this role makes the problem of describing the connection between the music of the crucifixion and the music of the resurrection even more intractable. As a practicing lutheran christian and a traditional family of the same origin, Bach’s testimony claims to be a witness of Christ. But such a witness is ambiguous in the sense that the act of writing this music marks a matter of saying what he believes in, but also of learning for himself what he believes, and therefore also of deepening what he believes. Because of the surprising quality of the resurrection event, a strong affective and cognitive component is reinforced where emotions and thoughts are involved. Bach is witnessing in a situation where conclusive material evidence is, in principle, impossible. However, for this very reason, his testimony can serve as an event of the material world by which the
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resurrection can be seriously considered. Without this event, it would be impossible, in principle, that the possibility or the actuality of the resurrection be transmitted. A key aspect of Bach’s testimony is that it is therefore pointing to the possibility that the same spiritual power can enter one’s life through music in a place where novelty is impossible and turn a situation literally hopeless. Updates of this possibility include events in which sacrificial love exercises redemptive power, events in which forgiveness is transforming or in which unexpected and imaginative goodness drives out rage and suspicion as well as death is expelled for a new life and then there is the eternalization of being alongside the creator. Because the union of the spiritual and the human in the resurrection of Christ are based on the power of God, they are mutually related. To know the authenticity of these unions is to know that the power of God, according to the testimony of the music of the resurrection, is also effective in elevating Christ to a new life. In view of this mutuality, this work of Bach attempts to elaborate how the meaning of each event is included in the meaning of the other (Greene, 2010). Another example of this moving complexity as dialogic and hologramatic is that of the end-time quatour of Messiaen that attempts to draw the human being’s attention to its temporal and timeless boundaries. Throughout the movements of his end-time Quatour, Messiaen (1942) elaborates criteria of composition of a duration without limits, like the notion of eternity, in the adequacy of the worldview of the sacred. The sense of the listeners that each note continues at reasonably, in a direction suggested by the notes preceding, would be impaired. The author used the feature to produce the effect of reducing predictability and an unquantifiable duration, making the “now” of “then” impossible. In the first movement, four instruments define a distinct plane of sound, as four separate refractions of light, and also in the understanding that they are the inaudible harmonies of the sky. Each of the four planes of the work has its own mode of contradiction, and thus the time that shapes the ordinary human experience ends. And so, each has its own way of making the inaudible audible. The four planes of sound are irrelevant to each other, in the sense that none of them helps the listener understand the other three. None of them helps listeners hear the other song as meaningful. The non-quantifiable duration is a first metaphor for a contrast with conventional time and is an auditory image as something else for measurable time (Cf. Greene, 2010). Two-step metaphors occur more and more frequently and become increasingly important as the Quartet advances. Two layers of song of the birds are joined by two other layers of sound, the parts of cello and piano. Their music is measured, the pulses are regular and the focal pulses (downbeats) occur at regular intervals. The result is that the measurable duration is juxtaposed to the non-quantifiable duration of the birds. Part of the cello enters the musical texture. Beginning with a pianissimo harmonic in the weak part of the third beat, it can hardly be heard as the beginning of everything. It does not articulate a downbeat and is not anachronistic to a downbeat. It begins without a beginning. The first time hearers know they are listening, they also know they have heard. Again, but differently, they are in contact with an unquantifiable duration (Greene, 2010).
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3.2 The “Trans” Efficacy of Music and Its Complexity II (Effects of Music on Plants, Benefits of Intrauterine and Neonatal Therapy) Music has a direct influence on plants. Several studies have shown that specific frequencies of audio in the form of music facilitate the germination and growth of plants, regardless of the musical genre (Gautama et al., 2013; Sharma et al., 2015; Jun-ru et al., 2011; Vanol & Vaidya, 2014; Chowdhury & Gupta, 2015; Galiano, 2013; Retallack, 1973; Robertson, 2015).1 On the other hand, noise, which is a non-rhythmic and non-harmonious overlap of various audio frequencies, had a negative effect on plant growth (Chowdhury & Gupta, 2015). This observation is similar to the observations of Chivukula and Ramaswamy (2014) for rock music, which is also not a calming vibration. Increasing the growth rate in terms of more flowers, leaves, buds, among other parts of plants suggests that specific audible frequencies, including music, can benefit the agricultural sector with increased productivity. At the same time, this may reduce the requirement for toxic chemical fertilizers and pesticides and thereby reduce environmental pollution and facilitate the wellbeing of plants, animals and humans. There is a broad scope for further research in this interdisciplinary field, where physicists, biologists and agricultural engineers can actively engage in designing a scheme to nurture this green path of agriculture (Chowdhury & Gupta, 2015). “The importance of music and singing addressed to the newborn is not limited to the relation between baby-parents/responsible” (Ilari, 2002a,2 p. 88). The use of music and singing has benefited premature and life-threatening infants (Caine, 1991; Moore & Standley, 1996; Standley, 1998, 1999, 2001) and pregnant women (Winslow, 1986; Klein & Winkelstein, 1996). Musical interventions in preterm infant incubators have aided in stabilizing oxygen saturation levels (Moore & Standley, 1996), reducing weight loss and reducing stress (Caine, 1991) and reducing hospitalization days (Caine, 1991; Standley, 1999). Still in the incubators, the use of lullabies has reinforced the learning of the sucking act, difficult for many premature babies. The use of music also helps reduce infant colic, a serious problem that is faced by several babies and their caregivers. Singing as therapy is very popularly known. One of the most striking features of these children’s songs, whether they are lullabies or play songs, is simplicity. Such songs employ small melodic intervals, fairly simple rhythms and a large number of repetitions of musical phrases (Trehub et al., 1993), and are considered appropriate for infants and children in general. Besides the purpose, what differentiates a lullaby from a play song is the tempo. Playful songs are usually faster, and feature word games or suggestions of body
1 2
The credit for this review is from Chowdhury and Gupta (2015, op. cit.). The full credits of this review are from this author, op.cit.
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movements that aid the auditory perception and the development of the motor coordination, sociability, language and musicality of the baby. Lullabies, by contrast, are generally slower because they have the purpose of calming and stimulating sleep. Curious is the fact that there are lullabies in practically every culture in the world, and that these songs have common musical elements that are universally recognized (Unyk et al., 1992; Trehub et al., 1993). Although the use of music in childhood is universal, there are still those who think of the baby as a passive and unsophisticated listener. However, in the last decades, students of the area of perception and musical cognition in childhood have revealed that, even before the age of one, babies are quite sophisticated listeners (Trehub et al., 1984; Ilari, 2002b). The prenatal sound environment and the postnatal musical memory is something interesting to know (Ilari, 2002b). The human ear develops around the 22nd (twentieth) day of gestation, but becomes functional only from the 25th (twenty-fifth) week of pregnancy (Woodward et al., 1992). However, it is from the 32nd (thirty-second) week of gestation that the fetus has the complete auditory system and listens relatively well, still inside the uterus. Through experiments using methods such as insertion of tiny microphones into the uterus of pregnant women in labor or soon after delivery, much important information about the acoustic-sound environment of the human uterus was obtained. It is known today that the maternal uterus is quite noisy and contains constant lowfrequency sounds plus cardiovascular, intestinal and placental sounds (Woodward et al., 1992). These sounds constitute a kind of acoustic background in which other external sounds emerge and can be recognized, like some vowels and melodic contours (or intonation) of speech (ibid.). Concerning music, there is evidence that some sounds, such as the attacks of musical notes (i.e., accents), get lost in the acoustic background, but that the balance between highs, lows and bass and the character of the music undergo minor changes, not significant from the point of view of experimental statistics. In other words, the uterine acoustic environment is not silent as many believed, but rather a rich and unique sound universe that gives the baby a great mix of external and internal sounds. Interestingly, infants are not passive to the sounds of the uterine acoustic environment; on the contrary, they are very attentive to the sound environment, learning different sounds, music and language. With only three days of life, infants recognize and prefer the maternal voice to the voice of another woman (De Casper & Fifer, 1980), recognize stories (De Casper & Spence, 1986), rhymes, parlors (De Casper et al., 1994) and songs (Lamont, 2001) heard during the last trimester of pregnancy. Babies exposed to music during pregnancy exhibit changes in heartbeat and body movements when the same music is played after birth (Hepper, 1991; Wilkin, 1995). These studies suggest that musical learning can begin when the baby is still in the womb.
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4 Solutions and Recommendations 4.1 Music Therapy as an Intervention Present in human history, since the earliest times, music is as important to man as the presence of water in his life. Where there is water, there is life. Where there is music, there is movement, awareness, motivation, art, quality of life, hope. Like water, music penetrates the hardened soils and fertilizes them. In this sonorous-musical universe, full of vibrations and energies, the therapeutic process through music requires the presence of a qualified professional who will direct and lead patients to a fruitful relationship with music, forming a sound identity. The professional music therapist will have objectives traced and guided in a methodological way to achieve significant results that encompasses transit environments and transdisciplinary domains.
4.2 Music Therapy as a Relationship Between the Professional and the Patient The importance of meeting music with the patient lies in the fact that music facilitates rapprochement between people and fosters relationships, opening the way to empathy. In the encounter of the sounds with the patient also the confrontation with their subjective contents happens. The music falls on him, penetrating the body and the psyche.
4.3 Music Therapy for Health Professionals It is important to emphasize that music also has contraindications, requiring a followup of its therapeutic application. The use of excessive volume in practice, certain combinations of sound or music compositions indiscriminately can lead to alienation, passivity, confusion or aggression, among other physiological losses. Remember that music triggers biochemical reactions.
4.4 The Music Therapist in His Relationship with Music Since music is the basis of music therapy, there must be constant contact between this base and the music therapist. No professional will be well qualified if he does not have durable and qualitative communication with the source of his knowledge. Although the elements of the therapeutic relationship are found, there are spaces in which they do not mix, preserving the realities that are distinct from each other.
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Music therapy takes place in a global process, which involves the whole being without swallowing it, without interfering in an invasive way. It is less invasive to access the individual’s interior through music. The space of each subject is respected and the therapeutic process contributes to the affirmation of the identity of each one.
4.5 Music Therapy as Caring (Patients, Companions and Family) The musico-therapeutic approach is a priority of techniques and actions that are rooted in the theories and practices of Music Therapy, but motivated to be transcendent and that can surpass expectations. It is not the music therapist who performs the transformation in the patient’s life, but it is the music-therapy relationship that, in its dynamics, helps to find the inner keys and motivates them to open and order the patient’s upset spaces.
4.6 Music Therapy and Bioethics Medical ethics should not deprive the patient of the benefit of music, since its transdisciplinary effects pass through most fields of human health and it is known that music exerts influence on living beings. Thus, it refers to practical ethics, which is concerned with right action. According to the principle of beneficence, health professionals seek the patient’s good, health promotion and disease prevention. It refers to the action of doing good. The principle of non-maleficence is related to not causing harm to the patient. It is an abstention, a failure to do. Neglecting health care is an ethical issue of relevance that is supported by Bioethics and its principles, especially those of beneficence rather than maleficence. But there is another problem that is tied to this principle of non-maleficence which is the omission of a doing, knowing that it is good for the cure and well-being of the patient. That is why musical knowledge applied to therapy should be taken seriously. Several evidences point to the noninvasive and painful therapy of music with the minimum of costs.
4.7 Music Therapy and Its Results The music therapist leads the patient along the paths of musical language and plunges him into the harmonious world to clarify and harmonize his weakened space, rescuing his balance. The therapeutic processes are solid and innumerable, all with the aim of transforming, in some way, the disharmonious realities brought by the patient,
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leading to an empowerment and consequent improvement of their health centers. The music therapy literature is filled with great achievements, overcoming limits and even cures. Due to the undeniable evidences, it is recommended that music, carefully assisted by qualified professionals, be incorporated into the propaedeutics and therapy as a whole, analyzing the cases and situations of their applicability. It would be very important that it be, given its importance, also incorporated into the bioethical medical decal in a compulsory manner, tied to all national public health policies.
5 Future Research Directions Deepening the empirical and experimental studies of music as a strong demonstration of principles of transdisciplinarity and complexity in movement, is necessary. More empirical studies that seek to connect living beings with their properties (including quantum theory and superstring theory) are important projects of the future. Through the process of discovering causes and cures performed with musical properties many material resources and human lives will have a quality assured, painless and noninvasive and inexpensive. Without a doubt, the future in balance.
6 Conclusion The “trans” efficacy of music and its complexity has been presented slightly in the form of review in the domains of time, communication, aesthetics, texture and what transcends, as well as its positive effects on plants and the benefits of intrauterine therapy and neonatal. This article tried to make believe that the complexity of music allows to make an interdimensional transit considered as a transterapeutics applied in the following perspectives of appeal: (1) in the conception of a human being endowed with body, soul and spirit through which the music reaches the direction (2) at the intersection of formal disciplines in the social sciences, health and music, leading to the consideration that music comes through communication vehicles and is the subject of semiology in the sense of deciphering significant signs, mediated by varied cultures; (b) the goals sought by many health disciplines, some of them already resulting from mergers, to be met by contextualized music therapy and by music itself, understanding its peculiarities always acting within the theory of complexity that defy melodies, harmonies and rhythms in sustained methodologies by aesthetic elements and intelligent textures for the act of curing or preventing, in a therapy more and more consolidated; (3) in the inclusion of music with definitive incorporation of medical ethics and (4) in the recognition that the megadimensions of science, art and the sacred are naturally connected in a dynamic transdisciplinary process.
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Development of a Musical Instrument to Apply to Music Therapy Beatriz Nunes, Inês Rodrigues, and Adriano Pinho
Abstract Music therapy (MT) helps with various diseases through music, where the musical instrument is an essential element, defined as the tool of communication between the patient and the music therapist. Despite the first music therapists began to appear in the twentieth century, there is still a lack of proper instruments and solutions more focused on therapy, and it is usually chosen to make changes to preexistent instruments. Through research methods, such as bibliographic investigation, interviews and product analysis, the field of MT was investigated, as well as how it can be related to design, involving concepts like emotional design, relaxation and meditation, in order to develop an instrument that can be used in MT sessions, by both therapist and patient. A swinging wood idiophone was developed with a single note, through a Design research based on practice, called innovation inspired by materials adjusting its initial shape and ergonomics according to the desired sound which aims to prolong and oscillate the sound. This paper presents the investigation and process since the definition of shape and the inherent concepts of the proposed product, to the finishes and a brief discussion.
1 Introduction Music Therapy is defined as a therapeutic relationship to address physical, emotional, cognitive, and social needs of individuals (What is Music Therapy | American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) 2020), where the musical instrument is an essential element, through which the patient expresses himself, and the music therapist makes his analysis (Norman & Norman, 2011). As referred by AMTA, after assessing the strengths and needs of each patient, the qualified music therapist supplies the B. Nunes (B) · I. Rodrigues University of Porto, Praça Gomes Teixeira, 4099-002 Porto, Portugal A. Pinho University of Aveiro, Campus Universitário de Santiago, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_20
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indicated treatment including creating, singing, moving to, and/or listening to music (What is Music Therapy | American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) 2020). The first music therapists began to appear in the twentieth century, where MT was applied to soldiers from World War II due to problems acquired on the battlefield— head injuries and traumatic brain injuries or post-traumatic stress disorder (Oliveira & Gomes, 2014). Studies have also shown that MT is effective in reducing anxiety, stress and depression by around 95% (Krauss, 2019). To that end, it is essential that the instrument corresponds to the needs of both the patient and therapist. According to Dr. Natália Santos (Santos, 2020) from Benenzon Center of Porto, for some patients, there are difficulties playing musical instruments. Therefore, many times, music therapists need to make some adaptations of the instruments to help the use of musical instruments by these patients, like changing the tune on xylophone—one of the most used musical instruments in the center (Santos, 2020). MT helps with a wide range of diseases and it seems important to create something new in this field, since it brings surprise to its patients, and so, motivates and stimulates the treatment with music (Oliveira & Gomes, 2014). This article seeks to focus Design on the development of a musical instrument for music therapy in all diseases in which it applies, integrating concepts such as relaxation and meditation. As so, this article studies the development of an ideophone that, through the design process, intends to develop an artifact with therapeutic properties that can be used by both therapist and patient. Design can be applied to MT, in these aspects: emotional and affective dimension of the object, the material, the process, the functional and the ergonomics dimension. The product can offer an emotional connection through several situations: by its appearance, where the referred material dimension dominates; for the way it works— ergonomic for the meanings that are created before the product—emotional and affective dimension (Alaniz & Biazzo, 2019). Design can play a significant role in the field of therapy and health due to its innovative, creative, and strategic process based on the needs of people, transforming them into a positive experience (Giambattista, 2017), since the experiences gotten by these individuals increasingly have more meaning in design (Park, 2015).
2 Methodology The method adopted for the development of this paper consisted of investigating the field of music therapy and its encounter with Design in the face of existing problems. First, an investigation was conducted into the subject of music therapy, specifically into therapeutic vibrations and what they induce in humans, as well as the problems that the music therapist and the patient face while using an instrument. This was done through traditional means of research such as bibliographic, analysis of case studies, scientific and academic journal articles, books, and dissertations. Two interviews were conducted with music therapists from Benenzon Center of Porto, to understand the needs of music therapists and patients.
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In the development of the instrument, in addition and simultaneously to the research, drawing was one of the fundamental tools for finding the solution, as well as the sound tests. Finishes and shape were continuously tested, since they were factors that determinate the sound produced by the therapeutic musical instrument that was developed. The method of this project was revised in the strategic approach to design mentioned by Eddie Norman called innovation inspired by materials, which is a type of design investigation based on practice—to go on producing and designing according to the research the criteria of materials, finishes and shape already mentioned, until reaching the aimed result (Pedgley et al., 2009).
3 Design as a Tool for Music Therapy As referred to by Norman and Norman (Norman & Norman, 2011), Design is a tool for innovation and change that enhances the possibilities that result from the connection between Design and MT. Emotional design is achieved through attachment, interactions and connections that come from the strong emotional relation between the user and the object, through its aging characteristic with time and use, and the meaning that users share with the product (Moran, 2014). Emotional design can be used in MT through sounds and senses since it could connect patients and music therapists to the object. Then, it could allow improvement of the efficiency of the therapy itself since, as described before, the musical instrument is a link between the music therapist and the patient (Norman & Norman, 2011). In fact, it is the emotional design that allows users to communicate with others about the positive experience they had with the object. We do not need to see two eyes and a mouth on a product to connect with it emotionally: this is done subconsciously from abstract things like perspective (Walter, 2011). Note that both design and music can create an emotional link with human beings. The emotional dimension is central to design: it is from it that we make decisions, from instincts. Logic does not filter what attracts human beings (Schifferstein, 2011). For the reasons described, it seems proper that these two aspects come together in an emotional therapy design. The aesthetic-usability effect is also notable: attractive things make people feel good, which makes them think more creatively. How does this make an object easier to use? Simple, making people find solutions to the problems they face more easily (Norman, 2005, 2013). From the holistic and emotion, and from its anthropological approach, Design can contribute to MT practices with a product that is designed for a health disorder in order to enhance the patient’s therapy effects (Giambattista, 2017), and so it seems that Design may enhance music therapy’s effects as well. Thus, the emotional dimension of design is important when applied to a musical instrument designed for music therapy. Design is fundamentally linked to users’ emotions, and the emotional dimension of products is an important factor for success, which has been increasingly the subject of research in the Design literature (Alaniz & Biazzo, 2019). Therefore, if the object for MT is associated with a positive experience
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and the feeling of well-being, the user is expected to build memories about the object creating emotional attachment. This is a key factor that design can apply on a musical instrument, that along with the multisensorial component may answer to the needs of music therapy. Although musical instruments have already been developed for MT, this has been addressed mainly by the inclusion and adaptation of instruments—adapted music. Despite the fact that adapted music and music therapy are correlated, they are different areas. Therefore, the lack of design projects in music therapy may be because the instruments are perceived as preexisting, already adapted, and with no opportunity for change (Norman & Norman, 2011).
4 Development As investigated and described, design can be applied to therapy by music, in these aspects: the emotional and affective component of the object, the material and process dimension, the functional and the ergonomics. By analyzing some interventions of Design in MT, it appears that the ergonomic dimension is one of the possible aspects to apply to a product, since a product can provoke emotions for the way it works (Alaniz & Biazzo, 2019). As analyzed, music therapists must consider ergonomics when choosing or adapting musical instruments for use in sessions, and it is understood that design can be considered as a possible intervention in music therapy for this purpose, as well. Besides the emotional potential of design, music itself can carry emotional meanings: it acts as a means of recovering memories in patients with dementia (Vilar, 2018). Not only Design affects how we see and feel about an object and through experience creating memories associated with it, but also music can be associated with an event and a memory and therefore with emotions (Walter, 2011). Music influences people’s feelings, emotions, and mood. It appears that different chords are associated with different emotions, where minor chords are associated with emotions of sadness and the major chords with emotions of happiness (Hagan, 2015). In practice, through some neuroscience studies including neuroimaging, it is understood that music can change activity in structures of brain cells that are known to be involved in emotions, like the meso limbic system and the amygdala, responsible for release of types of neurotransmitters such as adrenaline, and serotonin and dopamine, respectively (Schaefer, 2017). Music can be used as therapy to release emotions or as a way the individual learns to relate to others through music (Hagan, 2015). There is a link between music and nervous processing: the psychological effects of which are proven in its emotional influence and musical memories. In fact, music can connect people and help create great social cohesion of groups and motivation to keep interpersonal relationships (Koelsch, 2010), due to the social function, reflected in interaction between people, that music has. Yet, the ease of using the instrument may also be an important point in the case of music therapy. One of the methods used in music therapy sessions is musical
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improvisation, and also the non-verbal communication that the patient demonstrates (Santos, 2020). For that reason, it seems important that patients feel at ease when playing instruments to express themselves freely to music therapists. Thus, Design can embrace all its dimensions mentioned before in addition to emotional meanings of music to create a new product to be used in this therapeutic context, where it is essential to highlight the process dimension of Design. In this case, through the process of improvisation and constant redesign, never disregarding that the shape also changes the sound, it is important to develop a solution according to the needs of the patients. The multisensory approach to products also highlights the experience with its users that can be advantageous for people with some type of sensory deficiency (Schifferstein, 2011).
5 Designing an Instrument for Music Therapy In addition to the possibility of adapting a certain instrument, other factors influence its choice by music therapists, such as transport, size, and cost. It is verified that one of the dynamics of music therapy is to use improvisation of music in treatment sessions, so that patients express their emotions and have the experience of being under control of what they play. Then, the musical objects should seek to ease musical improvisation to the patient, so that it is accessible to people without musical training and to open the possibility to play freely without the fear of making notes sound dissonant (Norman & Norman, 2011). It is important to know that the process of producing a musical instrument, like manual production, experimentation and improvisation, can be fundamental in the creative process. As it turns out, the shape influences the sound of the object, and therefore in the manual process, it is necessary to redraw the object according to the desired sound. Having already had a pre-conceived formal structure, the shape is refined until the desired sound is reached (Chimero, 2012). “Sometimes the results of graceful rethinking can be thought of as magic, because it produces something, we previously thought to be impossible” [7, p. 53]. As said before, the process dimension of design is crucial, because products originated by this approach have unexpected results, as they explore a field never analyzed before (Chimero, 2012)—this can be used in the manual process and design of an object. Taking this into consideration, it was important to know the characteristics and factors that influence sound on musical instruments and do some research on acoustics, materials, and sound, for the development of the therapeutic idiophone. In its definition, an idiophone is part of a class of musical instruments, in which resonant material, such as metal or wood produces the vibration of its own sound, whether through percussion or friction, as in the case of the xylophone and Tibetan bowls (Idiophone | Definition & Examples, 2020). One of the characteristics of the greatest influence on sound quality is material. The material is the factor that makes the design possible—even if it has attractive natural characteristics, it must be shaped, joined and finished to result in a product
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(Edwards, 2003). In the selection of materials for acoustic and sound purposes, it should be considered the knowledge of a luthier in the processes, materials and finishes of musical instruments. It is above all an artisanal process, in which it is necessary knowledge and accuracy in the selection of the most suitable woods, in the execution of the pieces, in the assembly and in the finishing. It is also imperative to understand which woods have better sound properties (Brito & Brito, 2009). For example, maple is one of the woods used, because of its properties like medium density, and low speed of sound proliferation, between 3 and 4 thousand m/s. (Brito & Brito, 2009). Specifically speaking about the idiophones, the greatest influence on sound quality is reflected in the choice of the mallet, in the same way of the felt quality has in the hammer of the piano. A harder mallet on its surface produces a more penetrating and cheerful sound, while a softer mallet produces a melancholy sound more suited to low notes. The woods that have high density and low sound loss coefficient are the most suitable for the instruments (Wegst, 2006). It is also important to select the material to be played, that is, the instrument’s material’s sound, since that is exactly the definition of the idiophone—the sound produced by the instrument’s own vibration. In this case, it was intended that the material to be played had an extended sound (achieved with greater sound propagation), thereby it was done research on the best materials with that property of sound—bronze. A sound wave moves through a medium on which the speed of sound depends. Bronze is one of the materials that, in addition to copper, for example, has a longitudinal sound velocity of 4700 m/s and a transverse sound of 2100 m/s, which presents greater propagation of sound as it travels a greater distance (Kuttruff, 2007). For that sound propagation, it was also found that resonance is the energy accumulated in an object that makes it vibrate. For example, the swing accumulates energy when it swings, gaining more height. As energy is added (movement of pushing, pulling, among others) to the natural resonance frequency of an object, energy (verified in the case of sound waves) accumulates, creating greater resonance and sound oscillation (Hobbs, 2014). Applying the swinging characteristic to the idiophone thus seems to have the necessary characteristics so that there is more resonance and oscillation. The choice of the extended sound characteristic on idiophone was not random, because there are studies on “Ohm” song—the meditation practice (Brown & Gerbarg, 2012), in which the individuals who listened to it for 30 min in a row, showed changes in their electroencephalograms, with an increase in brain waves, namely the delta and theta, responsible for deep relaxation of the body, and the deep state of sleep and meditation. By prolonging the “Om”, the individual becomes aware of the vibrations that travel through the body as he continues to sing, which is also a method of meditation (Brown & Gerbarg, 2012). It is also important to say that wood used in musical instruments is an example of user interaction with technical and aesthetic attributes. It is a material that has a texture of its own, that others do not have and therefore, it is above all tactile—it is perceived as being lighter, hotter and softer. It is also associated with characteristic smells and sounds (Edwards, 2003), and so the multisensory approach of design on the development of a musical instrument for music therapy with this material seems
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Fig. 1 Nautilus’ shell (Original image by Scanudas. https://www.flickr. com/photos/scanudas/289 97290251/)
fundamental. This is the main reason for the choice of wood for the therapeutic idiophone. The form is also important when designing a product and a musical instrument. The study of “Effects of Sound and Form in Design,” by Tyan-Yu Wu and Alan Lee (Wu & Lee, 2018), shows that from less bulky shapes there is an association with a lower volume of sound and a sharper tone, while sharpest angles are associated with a higher volume of sound and a higher pitch, and the more rounded shapes correspond to a lower sound volume and a lower pitch. So, it is important to consider the user’s perceptive cognition, to also introduce affordances on the product. To produce any musical instrument, it is crucial to know that the larger the ringing surface, the greater the acoustic impedance and so the increase in sound. In the case of metals, the tone of the organ tubes also depends on the shape and size it has (Raichel, 2006). All things considered, the material and the process are the factors that most influence the shape, (Edwards, 2003) and consequently influence the sound. It was also fundamental to understand some concepts of therapies in this research. Then, it was perceived that music based on sounds from nature has beneficial effects in reducing pain and anxiety in patients who have undergone surgery, as it increases human relaxation (Cutshall et al., 2011). Also, environments rich in images of nature also have beneficial effects in reducing stress and increasing concentration and attention—this is called the biophilia effect.1 It is not necessary to be a real environment to have these effects (Lidwell et al., 2010). Consequently, the symbiosis between a multisensorial component and the biophilia effect and swing movement on a musical instrument prove to be a fundamental basis in the creation of a therapeutic idiophone merging design and music therapy. The Nautilus’ shell (Fig. 1) represents an inspiration for the form of the idiophone that was developed, because of its aesthetic dimension that may lead to a more positive experience, as described before.
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Human tendency to seek nature, becoming fond of it—trend based on genetics (Biophilia Hypothesis | Description, Nature, & Human Behavior, 2019, retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/ science/biophilia-hypothesis, retrieved, 4th May 2020).
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6 Project The creative process along with experimentation were fundamental; a process where the shape, finish and material of the musical object was determined according to the desired sound and result, using constant redesign until reaching the intended objective. The developed idiophone is like a xylophone, but instead of several metal tubes it has only one suspended tube. The swinging movement was thought to serve as a basis for the sound to be more prolonged, since when pushing the musical piece, it is expected that the sound oscillates more. Inspired by the Nautilus’ shell in its formal concept, the idea of this idiophone that was developed is to also have carvings inspired by the Nautilus shell pattern. The purpose of the instrument is to prolong sound frequency with therapeutic properties. The note to reach was the C in the fifth octave, due to the frequency of 523 Hz, the closest to the frequency (Backus, 1977) that has therapeutic properties-528 Hz (Akimoto et al., 2018). Furthermore, the swinging movement of the musical instrument creates conditions of resonance, oscillation, and prolongation, another goal that would determinate the ease of use. In this case, it was decided that with just one impulse or movement from the user the idiophone can be used and then adapted to the patient’s limitations. As said before, one of the goals for the idiophone was also to explore the multisensorial dimension. However, there are still several aspects to investigate like testing usability along with its users (patients) and test other characteristics like smell with research of concepts such as aromatherapy and touch with affordances, where the carvings previously described would act. Drawing is fundamental to the process (Fig. 2), so that the relationship between material and production restrictions along with the shape reached the intended function, always depending on the produced sound. It also seemed fundamental to reflect on the entire process adopted, as it is part of the record of the evolution of these products and the method adopted. On a first phase, the goal was to study and test the relationship between sound prolongation and the object’s swing movement, as showed previously. After finding the shape of the idiophone geometrically, was investigated the proper dimensions for the bronze tube to reproduce the C note in the fifth octave. For this note to be produced, it was seen that for a diameter of 15 mm, the tube would need a length of 366 mm (Lapp, 2003).
Fig. 2 Study of form through Euclidean geometry
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Fig. 3 Conceptual rendering 1
Fig. 4 Conceptual rendering 2
The aim was to simplify the shape drawing it having a basis on Euclidean Geometry. It started by thinking about fixing the tube, and how to integrate the mallet into the instrument. 3D modeling and renders were performed in the Autodesk Fusion 360 CAD software (Fig. 3, 4) so that it could give some ideas of the shape constraints and reformulation. Initially, the prototype was made from sycamore, but then it was realized that birch wood would be more adequate as it has a higher sound speed than other woods such as maple and carpino—more resistant and harder woods also used in instruments (Wegst, 2006). It is also necessary to understand which processes are part of the construction of musical instruments, and what factors can influence the sound. For example, the finishing that is carried out with the luthier’s own varnish is important to ensure the quality of the instrument’s acoustics. The varnish must have properties such as transparency, brightness, elasticity, flexibility, resistance, among others. The application is made with several coats, reaching up to 20 and intervals for drying (Brito & Brito, 2009). There are several finishes for wood that are often used. However, due to the greatest advantages, it was decided to use shellac. Shellac is a natural resin that has been widely used due to its excellent properties. It is a resin of animal origin secreted by insects Kerria Lacca being one of the most used finish for musical instruments due to the aesthetics of the layer and other factors (Weththimuni et al., 2016). Shellac is completely non-toxic, which makes it a great advantage over other finishes that are pollutants. In addition, it has helpful features for musical instruments such as: excellent bond, do not yellow, does not dampen the vibration of a sounding board,
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it is a good sealant not allowing moisture to pass into the wood, and allows later repairs as the new shellac melts into the old one. It is easy to remove as it dissolves in alcohol and can be applied in diverse ways, by brush, spray, or fill (Weththimuni et al., 2016). Following material selection that was made, there was a search for the best production process for the idiophone body, where the tube would resonate. It was understood that through the CNC (Computer Numeric Control) machine one could test the shape continuously, as it is a faster and more rigorous process. Prototyping from the CNC also allowed for rapid repetition of the prototype, so that there was useful time for redesign and testing. After finishing the drawing of the idiophone and its geometry, parts were cut through the CNC: the sides of the instrument with the circular shape, and the lower circular part. For this first process, plywood was used. To fit the bottom, a groove was made in the interior of each side, leaving a lower margin so that when swinging the instrument, there was only one part of contact with the surface—in this case, the sides. The fact that only the sides have contact with the surface would mean that there would be no acoustic restraint, since the resonance box was suspended. Before that, the curved part of the piece was molded: the plywood was bent by pressure and heat after being wet for 6 h, then, part of the bottom was glued to the sides of the instrument. To increase the resistance of the piece, two wooden tubes were placed along the length of the instrument (Fig. 5) between the sides and the curved plywood bottom that fits that cavity. To test the suspension of the metal tube and its sound, first, two tacks and a waxed line were used. It was quickly realized that for the sound to have more length, it could not have any other moving material in contact—it had to be completely stuck. Thus, two holes were drilled vertically at both ends of the tube (Fig. 6), where two wooden pins would fit. In these wooden pins another hole was drilled in its center, this time Fig. 5 Wooden tubes placed along the length of the instrument
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Fig. 6 Drilling the tube
in the horizontal direction (Fig. 7), so that the line would support the tube (Fig. 7), and so that there would be no material that could move and split the sound of the tube. The line was attached to the improvised studs that were placed on the sides of the instrument, with the purpose of testing the sound. After that experience, it was understood that the sound was not broken by the material in contact with the tube and that the sound went longer. This first experiment and sound test was done with a copper tube (Fig. 8), since it was not possible to find a bronze tube with the precise measures that were intended. Fig. 7 Wooden pin in the horizontal direction of the tube to support the tube with line attached
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Fig. 8 Copper tube in position for the first sound test with elastic cord solution
It was also agreed to use an elastic cord (Fig. 8) that had sufficient strength when stretched, since for the sound to last, it was found that it was necessary that the line was as stretched as possible. It was also found that a change of material or a different way of positioning the elements of the instrument influenced the sound: for fixing the tube there was an attempt to insert a more resistant elastic that passed through the wooden pins inserted into the copper tube and it was noted that it muffled the sound. Then it was tried to insert a thin double line—still fixed by the studs: when the line was stretched, the sound was lost and when released, it gained more sound. However, it was still a very muffled and uncontrolled sound, because when the tube was played it rotated and fractionated the sound. Through various experiments with different lines and systems of fixation, other metals were tried. It was noticed that using a chrome-vanadium steel key available at the workshop that a purer, resonant, and prolonged sound was achieved. Next, various ways of fixation were experimented, like two rubber bands that held the hole on each side of the key (Fig. 9). These elastics allowed a purer sound, not breaking it because they did not pass through the metal but held the piece across. Fig. 9 Chrome-vanadium steel key test
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Fig. 10 Replaced wooden pin that were chosen in the initial test
It was also seen that the chrome-vanadium steel key, when touched and fixed with elastics, allowed it to move around while producing a greater oscillation. In these conditions, when played the chrome key had 6 s of sound prolongation. As soon as the first layer of shellac was applied in the prototype the sound extension increased for 12 s of vibration. It was understood in practice the importance of the accuracy of the properties of both the material and finish. To replace the improvised studs that fixed the chromevanadium key, two wooden pins were made (Fig. 10), replacing the pins that had been thought of initially. This decision was made because after the experiments that were carried out, it was perceived that there is no need to rotate and stretch the rope that suspends the metal too much. It was also noticed that the material of the mallet influenced the sound of steel and harder wood made the sound sweeter and longer, so it was chosen the use of tacula wood. The visual balance of the product (Fig. 12, 13) along with its swinging move allowed the natural fit of the mallet on the idiophone. When placed along the width of the idiophone, the mallet is held. (Fig. 11, 12, and 13). Fig. 11 Mallet placed along the width of the idiophone
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Fig. 12 Side view of the idiophone
Fig. 13 Idiophone final result obtained
7 Discussion Even though there is a lack of research in Design in MT, it is understood that Design can have an important role in the creation of instruments, adapting them to the different needs and limitations of each patient, responding to both patients and music therapists. Taking this in consideration, Design can be used as a mediator to MT and work in the emotional and affective dimension of the object, the emotional dimension present both in design and in music, the material and process component, the functional and the ergonomics. The studies found about vibrations produced by the frequencies of sounds and their effects on humans, the biophilia effect and the multisensory dimension of objects are understood as relevant principles to be applied in the design of MT instruments like the idiophone that was developed. Nevertheless, the limitations found in the production of the idiophone still need further investigation in their production. In the design process of the instruments, it is necessary more sound tests, to be refined at a formal and acoustic level. This includes accuracy in terms of materials, shape and finishes, since great precision is necessary to produce the desired sound. Improvements can be achieved from the continuation of the development of the object and further investigation.
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As for the future work required for the idiophone mentioned, it is understood that: it must be tested in a larger dimension in order to recognize if the size can influence the power and resonance of the sound; it is observed that it is also necessary to carry out several tests at the sound level and therefore test different fixation of materials in addition to the elastics that were lastly tested so that the sound is further refined; it is also essential to test bronze and its resonance properties in comparison to chrome-vanadium steel; to understand whether the irregular shape of the metal part is interesting for the produced sound, since from the experience carried out it was concluded that the fact of being suspended in two misaligned places results in a different and interesting sound; and at last a comparison of sound should be investigated between a hollow tube and an asymmetric and closed shape. In short, one must realize the results regarding the enhancement of therapy and usability when future tests are carried out with patients, and also test the multisensory dimension in this case, like the texture from the wood engraving, as well as the aromas on the olfactive dimension. According to the context of COVID-19, it was not possible to perform usability tests with patients, as there was neither time nor availability for this purpose. This analysis of the results of the prototype and the respective tests allows the identification of errors and necessary changes to be made in the future. After the sound tests,2 it was understood that it is necessary to do more experiments and redesign to obtain the desired sound, since either factor alters it. The fact that it is a very experimental process prevented that, due to pandemic circumstances, there was not enough time to reach a final solution. For this reason, the prototype still needs some refinement in terms of sound and finish. These referred aspects are a focus on future research to consider.
8 Conclusion The design by doing process applied, following the Innovation Inspired by Materials method, in the prototyping phase of the idiophone allowed greater control and adjustment of dimension, material, shape and therefore sound, being a method that has been found to be quite effective in understanding the characteristics and differences of the materials themselves used in instruments, going beyond aesthetics and ergonomics. With the realization of this project, it is understood that there is still not much research in the area of Design in MT, and it is necessary that Design intervenes in this area, so that one can respond efficiently to the problem since the needs and limitations of each patient are always different, and also to enhance the effects of therapy by music. The design “must respond both to patients as well to the music
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Link to the video that demonstrates the sound tests performed: https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=N1TC7l3U5GI.
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therapists, since sometimes they use the instrument in cases of great physical and motor disability” (Rocha, 2020). Despite all the existing limitations at work, it was concluded that it was a process of experimentation and learning. This is what characterizes Design as a disciplinary area, not only the drawing along the creative and thinking process, but also the drawing in process and all the constraints that can be found. It is also learned that it is imperative to use methods of trial–error, sound tests and redesign, taking into account a considerable knowledge of the physical and acoustic properties of the materials, finishes, as well as the shape itself, which together these elements open a wide range of possibilities for new sounds.
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Lidwell, W., Holden, K., & Butler, J. (2010). Universal principles of design: 125 ways to enhance usability, influence perception, increase appeal, make better design decisions, and teach through design ; [25 additional design principles ] (rev. and updated). Rockport Publ. Moran, A. (Ed.). (2014). Love objects: Emotion, design, and material culture. Bloomsbury. Norman, D. A. (2005). Human-centered design considered harmful. Interactions, 12(4), 14–19. https://doi.org/10.1145/1070960.1070976. Norman, D. A. (2013). The design of everyday things (Revised and expanded edition). Basic Books. Norman, L., & Norman, E. (2011). Engaging industrial designers with music therapy. Music and Medicine, 3(3), 163–171. https://doi.org/10.1177/1943862111407204. Oliveira, C., & Gomes, A. (2014). Breve História da Musicoterapia, suas Conceptualizações e Práticas. Atas do XII Congresso da SPCE, 3338. https://apps2.utad.pt/files/SPCE2_EIXOS_ BOOK%20CC.pdf. Park, J. H. (2015). Health care design: Current and potential research and development. Design Issues, 31(1), 63–72. https://doi.org/10.1162/DESI_a_00310. Pedgley, O., Norman, E., & Armstrong, R. (2009). Materials-inspired innovation for acoustic guitar design. Metu Journal of the Faculty of Architecture, 188. Raichel, D. R. (2006). The science and applications of acoustics (2nd ed.). Springer. Rocha, M. (2020). Music Therapist Benenzon Center of Porto [Recording]. Santos, N. (2020). Enterview Benenzon Center of Porto [Recording]. Schaefer, H.-E. (2017). Music-evoked emotions—Current studies. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 11, 600. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2017.00600. Schifferstein, H. N. J. (2011). Multi sensory design. In Proceedings of the Second Conference on Creativity and Innovation in Design—DESIRE (Vol. 11, p. 361). https://doi.org/10.1145/207 9216.2079270. Vilar, D. (2018). Design para a demência—Música como meio de estimulação de memórias autobiográficas [Master’ Dissertation, University of Porto]. https://repositorio-aberto.up.pt/bitstream/ 10216/117821/2/304186.pdf. Walter, A. (2011). Designing for emotion. A Book Apart. Ulrike G. K. Wegst. (2006). Wood for Sound. American Journal of Botany, 93(10), 1439–1448. Retrieved January 16, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/4123127. Weththimuni, M. L., Capsoni, D., Malagodi, M., Milanese, C., & Licchelli, M. (2016). Shellac/nanoparticles dispersions as protective materials for wood. Applied Physics A, 122(12), 1058. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00339-016-0577-7. What is Music Therapy | American Music Therapy Association (AMTA). https://www.musicther apy.org/. Access March 16, 2020. Wu, T.-Y., & Lee, A. (2018). The study of sound and shape effects on design. In C. Baldwin (Ed.), Advances in neuroergonomics and cognitive engineering (Vol. 586, pp. 123–130). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60642-2_11.
Notes on the Relationships Between Design and Music Washington Morales Maciel
Abstract This chapter aims to elucidate the relationships between design and music, appealing to the conceptual metaphor debate. It considers the epistemological importance of George Lakoff’s invariance hypothesis on conventional metaphors to criticize the labor of historians of culture who focus on design, visual arts, and music connections. Given that many relevant cultural historians interpret entire historical intervals as epochal units by crossing through heterogeneous practices and assuming their discursive identity, this chapter intends to point out how methodologically conduct the historian across the study of trans-disciplinary connections. As an example, this chapter examines the String Quartet op. 7 composition process by Arnold Schoenberg. Schoenberg’s musical compositions were constituted by a music theory and also by epistemic virtues based, in turn, on a metaphysical conception of art whose mayor principle is reducible into the following primary metaphor: an artwork is an organism. That metaphysical metaphor was precisely the link among different heterogeneous practices as design and music. The famous rejection of “decoration” by rejecting ornaments was founded in Schoenberg’s Vienna in that particular metaphor. Keywords Metaphor · History · Arnold Schoenberg · Adolf Loos
1 Introduction There is a common naïve tendency to conceive diverse forms of design in terms of music and, conversely, it is usual to speak about music through visual design languages. In our everyday life, that synaesthetic disposition has the extraordinary power of communicating our visual, tactile, and acoustic experiences while listening to music, seeing a design piece, or even living a complex artifact combining both music and graphic elements. In fact, our synaesthetic utterances’ input is a peculiar amodal experience, mainly when one listens that instrumental or absolute music, W. M. Maciel (B) Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 L. Correia Castilho et al. (eds.), Perspectives on Music, Sound and Musicology, Current Research in Systematic Musicology 10, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78451-5_21
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whose sounds do not pretend an active visual imagination. According to contemporary cognitive musicology trends, that makes sense because amodal perception is a key-feature of musical meaning (Kuhl, 2008).
In other words, music perception implies no distinction between [...] three modes of communication (sensory-motoric, auditory, and visual) [...] represented as single, amodal gestalt (Kuhl, 2008).
Therefore, communicating our music experiences usually entails a peculiar mental activity, which cannot be expressed only by appealing to specific musical concepts. In turn, it is common to refer to images employing some terms imported from music into our linguistic expressions on the graphic world. For example, when a critic sees a figurative painting composed of subtle lines suggesting movement and then says, extraordinary rhythm!. Thus, phenomenologically speaking, verbally conceiving design pieces by means of the language of music and music works through design terms does not need any kind of epistemic justification. These interrelationships merely happen in our cognition. Nevertheless, a phenomenal individual perspective is not enough to defend an epochal interpretation of history that presupposes immediate connections among different aesthetic practices. That is the main focus of this chapter, namely, to call into question precisely those interpretations of history that assume direct connections among music, visual arts, design, literature, architecture, philosophy, and press. Toulmin and Janik Wittgenstein’s Vienna Toulmin and Allan (1973) and Hal Foster’s Design and Crime: And Other Diatribes (Foster, 2003) are clear examples of the direct extension of that everyday naïve tendency (communicating experiences of design and music) into the historian theses. As an alternative approach, this chapter argues that: 1. Historian’s epochal conclusions which involve trans-disciplinary aesthetic remarks entail that problem called by Theodor Adorno The conflict between art and the arts (Adorno, 2003) 2. The relationships between music and design are a notable instance of that conflict 3. The debate on the relationships between design and music implies a discussion about different accounts of metaphor as well as an analysis of historical and theoretic metaphor use conditions 4. Arnold Schoenberg’s String Quartet op. 7 composition process is a fruitful case study of metaphors from which genuinely infer statements about music and design connections. This chapter consists of three sections. The section two points out the main epistemological problem of historical perspectives in design and music by Hal Foster, Stephen Toulmin, and Allan Janik. The section three elucidates the epistemological problem introducing the invariance hypothesis held by George Lakoff and criticized by Ray Jackendoff. Furthermore, the final section explores the central role of metaphors in Arnold Schoenberg’s String Quartet op. 7: studying design and music
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relationships can be successfully developed by asking for the conventionalization of metaphors as AN ARTWORK IS AN ORGANISM.
2 Towards the Problem of Design and Music Analogies Hal Foster’s interpretation of Adolf Loos’s design poetics emphasizes, as always happens, the architect’s criticism of ornamentation. Foster quotes a famous passage from “Ornament and Crime” (1908), according to which “the evolution of culture is synonymous with the removal of ornament from objects of everyday use” (Loos, 2019). Ornaments are crimes because they are an erotic degeneration that could be removed for the well-being of society. Moreover, Foster adds another source for his interpretation of Loos’s ideas, which is appreciated for transcending at least a little bit the recurrent quotation of that Loos’s essay written in 1908. “The Poor Little Rich Man” (1900), through a parabolic form, criticizes that is usually considered the dominant Viennese Zeitgeist, that is, “Art in everything and anything” (Loos, 2003). According to Foster, the bourgeois was looking to construct his personal identity by turning into artwork every quotidian object of his everyday life. So, Foster concludes that Loos’s parable is associable with Robert Musil’s famous novel The Mann without Qualities (1943): “rather than a man of qualities, he is a man without them [...], for what he lacks, in his very completion, is difference or distinction.” Foster (2003). Finally, according to Foster, that in-distinction of bourgeois qualities went hand in hand with the utilitarian value of objects and the assumed non-utilitarian value of artworks because “Art Nouveau designers [...] want to infuse art [...] into the utilitarian object” (Foster, 2003). In the light of contemporary discussions (Matteucci, 2017), Loos’s criticism of ornaments is an extraordinary example of artification and aestheticization of everyday life debate, because for “aestheticization” philosophy intends a loss of sense of artistry in art and, at the same time, a loss of sense of specificity in non-artistic practices. That is the case in Foster’s historical appealing to Adolf Loos: the Austrian’s idea of design and art depended on the assumed distinction between, on the one hand, the aesthetic objects and, on the other, the functional ones to confront the significant tendency to embellish each and everything trivially, which, for its part, characterized most of the Jugendstil design (Fujan, 2010). Thus, the explicit interest in Loos’s ideas is finally an interpretation of history, from which can be considered to analyze present issues critically. However, the goals of this chapter are not those final ones by Foster. What I would like to point out is the insufficient epistemic force of Foster’s conclusions from the set of his historical premises. According to Foster, Loos was to design “what Schönberg was to music, Wittgenstein to philosophy, or Karl Kraus to journalism—a scourge of the impure and the superfluous in his own discipline” (Foster, 2003). Why do not invert the order of things set out by Foster? Schoenberg was to music what Loos was to design, Wittgenstein to philosophy, and Kraus to journalism. Immediately, it appears a challenging problem that is not considered by Hal Foster. If music
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also participated in those Viennese polemics on everyday life’s aestheticization, other premises are necessary to conclude such an inclusion into Viennese diatribes. It is not problematic to accept a concept of aestheticization associated with, for example, a pair of shoes whose visual properties we could finally trace to a drawing by Theodor Heine or Gustav Klimt. Nevertheless, postulating the aestheticization in music implies a study of musical and visual connections. In Wittgenstein’s Vienna by Stephen Toulmin and Allan Janik, although more sophisticated than Design and Crime, it also finds a cross-disciplinary connection’s interest very similar to that shown by Hal Foster: Our aim is, by academic standards, a radical one: to use each of our four topics as a mirror in which to reflect and to study all the others (Toulmin & Allan, 1973).
According to the authors, art, design, and music reflect social and political events, each of these practices is reflected in personal ethoi, and philosophy reflects and is reflected in all of them. The admirable book’s value is precisely that fruitful approach to mutual “influences” among diverse disciplines, since as usually happens in the academic division of labor, theoretical cross-interactions might have been as significant as their own internal evolution will be considered only grudgingly, after all internal factors have been demonstrably exhausted (Toulmin & Allan, 1973).
Just as it is necessary considering, for example, technological developments as the rotogravure to interpreting visual design’s historical transformations as the emergency of magazines (Gervais, 2015), a deep understanding of Arnold Schoenberg music requires profound musical knowledge and also extra-musical information. As Foster concludes cross-disciplinary convergences from Loos and Schoenberg analogies, Toulmin and Janik arrive at their outcomes from statements like the following one: Kraus considered himself as doing for language what Loos was doing in the sphere of designmaking people morally aware of the essential distinction between [...] articles for use from objets d’art (Toulmin & Allan, 1973).
Once again, the cross-disciplinary analogies come into play. Furthermore, looking for a holistic disciplinary approach is a laudable objective, but it does not achieve its adequate strategy by mere analogical discursive connections among Viennese intellectuals. In the Toulmin and Janik work, the categories that found these analogies are “inspiration” and “influence”, meanwhile the recurrent use of some expressions or terms across diverse disciplines, like “ornament”’ in architecture, design, and music, seems to be a sufficient ground from which inferring an interdisciplinary identity. A relevant example of that is: Schoenberg ’s music and painting, like the buildings of Loos and the polemics of Kraus, were yet another element in the common all-embracing critique of contemporary society and culture (Toulmin & Allan, 1973).
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Indeed, Schoenberg was a prolific music critic and even an acclaimed painter, which is a fact that cannot be negated to hold any analogy between visual and musical expression. Nevertheless, against what Foster, Toulmin, and Janik thought, Schoenberg’s discourse and music are conceptually different. A historian’s challenge, who pretends to find a culture’s criticism in something more than only a poetics of music, is to ask for up to what point heterogeneous aesthetic practices are pointing out to the same object designed by the same term. Otherwise, theoretically reconstructing a music poetics would simply substitute what in fact had pretended to complete, that is, “on the technical problems posed by the apparent exhaustion of the older diatonic system” (Toulmin & Allan, 1973). Therefore, the challenge is studying the relationships among design poetics, visual art poetics, music poetics, and the relationships between them and their products to finally studying the connections among these various products. Although attacking decoration was indeed usual among many Viennese intellectuals at the beginning of the twentieth century, as Walter Frisch remarks, “The unsatisfactory nature of much of the literature on music and Jugendstil stems from the often unspoken assumption that such terms as line, ornament, and symmetry are readily transferable to music” (Frisch, 1990). The problem of the arts’ identity (Adorno, 2003) can be laid out only through researching the historical and theoretical conditions of those metaphors whose formulations historians and critics have been usually blithely assumed. Sometimes historians and critics have reduced design pieces and music works into the discursive poetics of their authors. Moreover, added to that tendency, an intuitive lexical identity among heterogeneous disciplines goes with it, which turns theoretically tempting to generalize an entire cultural frame from all the terms shared by design, music, and visual art poetics. However, as Frisch reasonably pointed out, “line in music, by which we usually mean a coherent succession of tones, might not necessarily fulfill the same technical or aesthetic function as line in a drawing” (Frisch, 1990). Therefore, conceptual connections among disciplines and the historical conventionalizations of their metaphorical expressions are part of historians’ and critics’ tasks.
3 Music and Conceptual Metaphor Theory This chapter’s central thesis is the following one: the above problem set out by Walter Frisch can be successfully elucidated if one accepts some cognitive science relevant accounts. As noted above, historians and critics infer statements on music and design without considering different connections among socio-political contexts, poetics, and artifacts. Frisch’s problem formulation seems to point out “gaps” between the visual and sound realms, and the nature of these gaps would precisely explain historians’ and critic’s omissions. That needs an example. For an illustrative proposal, let us postulate definitions of “ornament” from music and architecture. According to architecture, an ornament is a decorative device,
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not essential to structure, but often necessary to emphasize or diminish the impact of structural elements, sometimes with iconographic roles (Curl & Susan, 2015).
For its part, according to Michael Buchler, In common-practice tonal music, surface-level neighbors, suspensions, escape tones and the like undoubtedly suggest a hierarchy of structural importance and are therefore essentially prolongational. When we claim that note x is more structural than note y that ornaments x, we are effectively saying that x is prolonged (Buchler, 2020).
It follows from both definitions a common element. The architectural use of “ornament” entails a distinction between “essential” and “decorative”. Meanwhile music ornaments also entail a distinction which opposes “ornamental” to “structural”. Prima facie, that common distinction is enough to extend every quality attributed to design into the music domain and conversely. Many architectural aspects allow that mapping of the source—architecture—and the target—music. For example, as Larson and Johnson point out, and just to mention a few of them, “span” corresponds to “interval”, “vertical spatial dimension” to “interval size”, “foundation” to “underlying structure”, “arch” to “melodic arch” or “bridge” to “bride” as a passage in music (Larson & Johnson, 2003). However, that is extremely curious. If one keeps in mind the spatial character of the architecture and the temporal one of music, are we talking about the same thing when we use “foundation” in music and architecture? It seems that some primary metaphors are assumed as natural ones. As a part of the history and philosophy of music and design tasks, it is necessary to trace back the different origins behind our conventionalized metaphors. Therefore, for historians, every basic conceptual metaphor set should be traced back to its more abstract domains and connections. As Ray Jackendoff y David Aaron observed: An initial problem with Lakoff and Turner metaphorical analyses concerns the proper choice of schema. Lakoff and Turner often assert that a particular metaphorical schema applies, but do not show why that schema, rather than something more general or more specific, is the most appropriate. For instance, when Lakoff and Turner invoke the schema LIFE IS A FIRE, why not LIFE IS SOMETHING THAT GIVES OFF HEAT (more general) or LIFE IS A FLAME (more specific)? (Jackendoff & Aaron, 1991).
In music and architecture connections, it is evident that it will be possible to construct metaphors and analogies between one to another, art and music, because it is assumed that Heinrich Schencker’s theory of music is already expressed in architectural terms. The question is why that is so. Following Croft and Cruse (2004), the question consists of asking for the “concept profile” and its “basis” connections. If the source domain of music is already metaphorically constructed by architectural terms, music and architectural analogies will be almost literal expressions. So, Jackendoff and Aaron’s remarks on the invariance principle are reasonable: are there, in the case of architecture and music, metaphors or mere instantiations of conceptual structures in two different conceptual domains? Thus historians’ and critics’ question should be the following one: if actually there are metaphors, what are the historical and theoretical factors that make the construction of these metaphors possible? However, it is necessary one step back before reconsidering that question.
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Despite these problems pointed out by Jackendoff and Aaron, the conceptual metaphor theory is very fruitful for solving the gap between heterogeneous disciplines. If there were a language and psychological theory whose hypotheses were beyond the schematic conception of mind and language involved in the gap problem, there would be no hunting of music and design links. Fortunately, the principle of invariance, which defines metaphors, and cognitive linguistics and psychology outcomes, are the best candidates to fulfill the requirements. The gap between design and music requires two elements: firstly, conceiving the mind as a complex set of concepts which are themselves profiled in complex domain matrices, often also abstract and so ultimately presuppose a large array of basic domains that can be called a domain structure Croft and Cruse (2004)
and, secondly, conceiving metaphors as a specific conceptual relationship among profile concepts and frames/bases/domains, in fact, an asymmetrical and partial connection between a source domain and a target one (Lakoff, 1993). By “concept profile”, linguistic literature means the concept intended by any word, meanwhile by “domain”, “frame”, or “base” cognitive linguistics intends a conceptual structure that is presupposed by the profiled concept (Croft & Cruse, 2004). Essentially, one concept intended by a symbol presupposes another complex net of concepts, which is frequently called “frame”, “base”, or “domain”. Alternatively, as Croft and Cruse remark: In fact, a concept may presuppose (be profiled in) several different domains. For example, a human being must be defined relative to the domains of physical objects, living things and volitional agents (and several other domains, e.g. emotion). The combination of domains simultaneously presupposed by a concept such as HUMAN BEING is called a domain matrix (Croft & Cruse, 2004).
Like that intended by the symbol “ornament”, every profile concept presupposes several different domains, and the predicative relationships between the profile concept and its presuppositions can be metaphorical ones. “Ornament” presupposes “structure”, and both terms presuppose metaphorical links with other domains of knowledge. That relationship of presupposition obeys the Invariance Principle: The image-schema structure of the source domain is projected onto the target domain in a way that is consistent with inherent target domain structure. Mappings are not arbitrary, but grounded in the body and in everyday experience and knowledge. A conceptual system contains thousands of conventional metaphorical mappings which form a highly structured subsystem of the conceptual system. There are two types of mappings: conceptual mappings and image mappings; both obey the Invariance Principle (Lakoff, 1993).
What makes a metaphor possible is precisely a knowledge presupposed in a set of domains: a complex net of basic concepts called “source” mapped onto another domain called “target”, which already contains elements involved in the source and partially determines the match’s consistency. As remarked above, sometimes historians and critics assume metaphors as natural expressions already conventionalized.
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However, as conventional metaphors, those ruling music and design links are possible because they presuppose a corpus of knowledge, which maps the source onto a specific domain. The knowledge that links these domains is not essentially constituted, but historically. Which are the basic metaphors behind the design and music relationships? What is the corpus of knowledge that makes them possible? Furthermore, which conceptual chains are associating the most abstract basic metaphors with the most specific music structures? According to the conceptual metaphor theory, the first question proposes a conceptual analysis of verbally expressed metaphors because they are conceptual relationships, not “figures of speech”. Assuming that, as Jackendoff and Aaron remark (Jackendoff & Aaron, 1991), there are many metaphorical levels as the basic metaphorical schema that historians and critics should deal with. The second question points out the diverse domains of knowledge involved in every metaphorical level expressed in metaphorical speech figures. Also, it points out the metaphorical presuppositions, which links these possible knowledge domains. Finally, the third question asked for the specific metaphorical schemes and levels of knowledge that make possible connections among knowledge presuppositions. Music receives its non-specific music commands through particular metaphorical presuppositions, which hinges on metaphorical and non-metaphorical levels. The next section shows all these three elements functioning together to determine which metaphorical levels are involved in music and design relationships.1
4 Epistemic Virtues and Organicism in Schoenberg’s Op. 7 This section pretends to reconstruct an interpretation of Arnold Schoenberg’s String Quartet op. 7 already archived (Maciel, 2020) from the point of view sketched in the above section. The String Quartet op. 7 composition process gives rich information on the various metaphorical levels involved in Schoenberg’s music, their fundamental metaphysical assumptions, and, above all, the set of domain concepts that allow for the match between the metaphysical presuppositions and the technical music level. In particular, “musical thought” (musikalische Gedanke) and “basic shape” (Grundgestalt) associate some epistemic properties entailed in metaphysical concepts as organism with more basic musical concepts as motive, interval, pitch, and rhythmic figure. So, let us consider some comments by Schoenberg on his own work: The great expansion of this work required careful organization. It might perhaps interest an analyst to learn that I received and took advantage of the tremendous amount of advice suggested to me by a model I had chosen for this task: the first movement of the ‘Eroica’ Symphony. Alexander von Zemlinsky told me that Brahms had said that every time he faced difficult problems he would consult a significant work of Bach and one of Beethoven, both of which he always used to keep near his standing-desk (Stehpult). How did they handle a 1
Holly Watkins has written two excellent texts on the current topic (Watkins, 2008, 2011). Both are extremely relevant to complete the main theses of this chapter, because his interest domains—in a technical sense—are the metaphors of DEPTH associate with those of INTERIOR and EXTERIOR in music.
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similar problem? Of course the model was not copied mechanically, but its mental essence was applied accommodatingly. In the same manner I learned, from the ‘Eroica,’ solutions to my problems: how to avoid monotony and emptiness; how to create variety out of unity; how to create new forms out of basic material; how much can be achieved by slight modifications, if not by developing variation, out of often rather insignificant little formulations
Schoenberg (2008) understood his compositions in terms of problems and solutions. What he expresses in that passage are precisely the problems and solutions implied in his Quartet op. 7. Every problem has a general structure that can be set out also in very general terms. In the first place, Schoenberg was looking for a too long sonata piece. Like Franz Liszt, Schoenberg played with extensive musical forms, particularly the sonata form, without subdividing it into discontinuous parts. Indeed, String Quartet op. 7 is a non-stop continuous flux of sounds. That is the first problem’s premise. In the second place, that musical quest could not be achieved in any which way. The Quartet could not be monotonous and empty. It also should be varied, but at the same time, being a single unit. It should be reducible to a basic material and modified over the entire piece. Firstly, the long work extension plus a pretension of reduction to a “basic material” could produce a monotonous unity. Secondly, that first sought property plus a musical variety could produce a disjoint unity. Therefore, a sought extension was not easily compatible with non-monotonic and varied unity: an identical piece over its development could easily be monotonic or disjoint. According to Schoenberg: Intelligibility in music seems to be impossible without repetition. While repetition without variation can easily produce monotony, juxtaposition of distantly related elements can easily degenerate into nonsense, specifically if unifying elements are omitted. Only so much variation as character, length and tempo required should be admitted: the coherence motive-forms should be emphasized
Schoenberg’s (1967) problem involved in the String Quartet op. 7 is, in fact, an instance of a bigger problem, namely, understanding music implies repetitions, identical repetitions could produce monotony, and completely varied passages can easily degenerate in nonsense. The more extensive a piece is, the more difficult it turns the equilibrium between monotony and nonsense. These categories are metaphorically attributed to a musical piece, and particularly “coherence” is a metaphorical predicate of “music piece”. Thus, the problem and its solution are, according to Schoenberg, metaphorically articulated. However, why is that so? Coherence, economy, variety, and unity are particular concepts whose literal predicative domains are usually science and philosophy. Every one of these categories is called “epistemic virtue” by the philosophers of science. They are the traits of a theory that show it is probably true or worth accepting. Although the identification, characterization, classification, and epistemic standing of theory virtues are debated by philosophers and by participants in specific theoretical disputes, many scholars agree that these virtues help us to infer which rival theory is the best explanation
Keas’s (2018) advanced here consists of arguing that every schoenbergean epistemic virtue is categorically presupposed in a fundamental or basic metaphor, that
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is, AN ARTWORK IS AN ORGANISM.2 Tracing back that metaphor is the result of a conceptual analysis of some statements uttered by Schoenberg. Some of his statements are metaphysical ones, others are specifically musical, and finally, the third group of statements associates those metaphysical with these musical ones. Schoenberg’s appraisals of music involve these categories of intelligibility and nonsense, which are related to coherence as a predicate of a musical idea (musikalische Gedanke) that is, in turn, associated with basic shape (Grundgestalt). The basic shape and its variations organize the specific musical rules reflected in the score, namely, the concrete musical concepts. In that sense, the concept designed by “basic shape” is presupposed in a literal way by the concrete music concepts. In that sense, the concept designed by “basic shape” is presupposed in a literal way by the concrete music concept, but, at the same time, their own presuppositions are “coherent musical thought” metaphors, which are expressions that presuppose others like “functional” and “ornamental”. These last two expressions, in turn, presupposes metaphors that mapping language onto music and, at the same time, join together language to organism. Therefore, “Basic shape” responds to literal presuppositions as much as metaphorical ones. The backgrounds of Schoenberg’s music aesthetic theory are biological as well as linguistic. Just to illustrate the organicist backgrounds, one can consider these brief passages as: in the succession of motive-forms produced through variation of the basic motive, there is something which can be compared to development, to growth
According to Schoenberg (1967), musical pieces are organisms, because they have developmental tendencies, specific nature or essence, and set out some obligations to composers . Moreover, according Schoenberg (2011) to Schoenberg: By the position of internal organs—as indeed the external appearance of every well– constructed organism corresponds to its internal organization, hence the native external appearance is not to be regarded as accidental
In Schoenberg (2011) this way, “ornament” and “structure” can be mapped onto the target domain of music, because the chains of presuppositions in Schoenberg’s music theory were those of speculative biology traced back to Romanticism and beyond to the Kantian Third Critique and even to Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Nevertheless, the most relevant point is not that of the organicist dominant conception of art and design in Vienna. What makes possible the whole mapping of design concepts onto the music target domain was the concept of basic shape. Without it, there would not be any hinge linking the abstract domain of speculative biology and the most concrete musical concepts.
2
That was already pointed out by Spitzer (2004) and Cox (2016).
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5 Conclusions “The gap problem” has arrived at a tentative answer. Design and music have different sets of basic concepts, because every domain of concepts presupposed in their respective concepts profile does not entirely converge with each other. As Walter Frisch remarked, concepts as “line” in music and visual arts do not profile the same frame information. That implies an actual gap between these disciplines. Nevertheless, since composers and designers share common lexical information in their poetics, it would be very counterintuitive to reject intimate relationships between the artifacts and their corresponding poetics. In other words, gaps among different disciplinary poetics imply gaps between specific domain poetics and their respective works. From these premises, it follows some outcomes. Firstly, the conceptual metaphor theory gives the primary conceptual tools to recognize the basic presuppositions entailed in design and music analogies. Secondly, the “ascending” movement from the most specific disciplinary conceptual domains to less specific ones gives, in turn, information on the convergent and divergent epistemic and ontological properties playing a role in music and design connections. Thirdly, applying that approach in the history of design and music connections allows for determining the most primary transformations of frames that make some metaphorical mappings possible. Finally, since it is possible to determine the concepts of music or design, it is also possible to explain the links behind the poetics and products, poetics and different poetics, and different poetics pointing out different products. Although ornaments are not the same entities in atonal, tonal, and interior or visual design, different metaphorical presuppositions permit constructing a shared meaningful use of “ornament” in each practice where the term is employed. The most important task of a historian of culture will be precisely asking for, on the one hand, the metaphorical base grounding intermediary metaphors and, on the other hand, the connection between the intermediary metaphors and the most literal profile concepts. Implementing that frame can solve problems as the relationships between knowledge and art or visual design, or even those problems entailed in old debates on ideology and art. Acknowledgements Without the patient and lovely help offered by Luísa Flores Somavilla this chapter would have been just a forgotten possibility in a PC folder.
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Curl, J. S., & Wilson, S. (2015). The Oxford dictionary of architecture. USA: Oxford University Press. Foster, Hal. (2003). Design and Crime: And Other Diatribes. London: Verso. Frisch, Walter. (1990). Music and Jugendstil. Crit Inq, 17(1), 138–161. Fuján, Hélène. (2010). Dressing down: Adolf Loos and the Politics of Ornament. The Journal of Architecture,. https://doi.org/10.1080/1360236032000068451. Gervais, T. (2015). Illustrating sports, or the invention of the magazine. In J. E. Hill, & V. Schwartz (Eds.),Getting the picture. The visual culture of the news (131–138). Bloomsbury. Jackendoff, R., & Aaron, D. (1991). More than cool reason: A field guide to poetic metaphor by George Lakoff and Mark Turner (review). Linguistic Society of America.https://doi.org/10.1353/ lan.1991.0079. Keas, M. N. (2018). Systematizing the Theoretical Virtues. Synthese. https://doi.org/10.1007/ s11229-017-1355-6. Kühl, Ole. (2008). Musical Semantics. Berlin: Peter Lang. Lakoff, George. (1993). The contemporary theory of metaphor. In Andrew Ortony (Ed.), Metaphor and Thought (pp. 202–251). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Larson, S., & Johnson, M. (2003). Architectural metaphors in music discourse and music experience. Yearbook of comparative and general literature, 50, 141–154. Loos, A. (2003). The poor little rich man. In A. Sartnitz (Ed.), Adolf Loos. 1870-1933. Architect, cultural critic, dandy (pp. 18–24). Taschen. Loos, Adolf. (2019). Ornament and Crime. London: Penguin. Matteucci, Giovanni. (2017). Everyday aesthetics and aestheticization: reflectivity in Perception. Studi di Estetica, 1, 207–227. Maciel, W. M. (2020). Epistemic virtues as theoretical bridges between design and Arnold Schoenberg’s String Quartet op. 7. In D. Raposo et al. (Eds.), Advances in design, music and arts (pp. 641–650). Springer. Schoenberg, A. (1950).Style and idea. Philosophical Library. Schoenberg, A. (1967). Fundamentals of musical composition. Faber and Faber. Schoenberg, A. (2008). Preface to the four string quartets. In J. Auner (Ed.), Arnold Schoenberg reader. A document of a life, (pp. 280–281). Yale University Press. Schoenberg, A. (2011). Theory of harmony. University of California Press. Spitzer, M. (2004). Metaphor and musical thought. Chicago University Press. Toulmin, S., & Janik, A. (1973). Wittgenstein’s Vienna. New York: Touchstone. Watkins, H. (2008). Schoenberg’s interior designs. Journal of the American Musicological Society. https://doi.org/10.1525/jams.2008.61.1.123. Watkins, H. (2011). Metaphors of depth in German musical thought. From E. T. A. Hoffmann to Arnold Schoenberg. Cambridge University Press.