Four Theoretical Intersections

Theory that informs sound structure must be able to frame ethereal processes whilst operating in a malleable function that allows the interfacing properties surfacing during assimilation of acoustic referents in the soundscape to become apparent. It is at the intersection of models that a manifestation of a static frame of reality, a simulacra of death, arises during the transformation from soundscape to deathscape. Drawing from Baudrillard, Brøvig-Hanssen, Fales, and Luper, the four stages of each procession correlate to augment a source referent soundscape of memorial site acoustic landscapes to a deathscape. Stages progress linearly, a snapshot of the reality of death is drawn from a reflection of the artifact which replicates itself, then morphs and is subsumed into a sonified deathscape. Techniques are chosen for their correlation and impact on sound sources that relate to the theoretical stages and processes evoked between the two. It is this dialectic that shapes and augments the soundscape into a deathscape. Through this model, source material is decayed, augmented and assimilated into the composition, facilitating the transformation of materials into a hyper real ‘aether’. Techniques described by Joe Banks [as covered in the Rorschach Audio Project] such as Albert Bregman’s ‘picket fence’ effect and 3-4 syllable manipulation of perception and illusion in EVP recording facilitate this hyper real approach to electronic composition. The hyperrealism [1] of certain electronic music production facilitates perceptual flux in the consciousness of the listener. Fales explains, ‘the auditory system works to promote the perceptual confidence that signals from the acoustic world literally are the percepts they provoke, thereby concealing the fact of an acoustic world of which listeners’ perceptual worlds are only “best guess” versions’ (Fales 2004: 164). In this imaginary event, musical soundscapes as opposed to environmental soundscapes facilitate more malleable auditory processing. Fales continues, ‘since listeners cannot form a sensation without some organising system, part of their motivation must include an alternate perceptual schema for exchange with the default schema they have renounced’ (Fales 2004: 165).

[1] Hyperrealism is a term defined by composer Noah Creshevsky as: ‘an electroacoustic musical language constructed from sounds that are found in our shared environment (realism), handled in ways that are somehow exaggerated or excessive (hyper)’ (Creshevsky 2007).