Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 June 2020
A small group of composers and performers are collaborating orally/aurally on the creation of experimental music that eschews written scores (‘living scores’). By charting the overlaps between working methods and relationships – both social and musical – this article endeavours to shed light on how these practices rub against standard modes of documentation, transmission, scholarship and performance. The article begins by mapping out of the orally transmitted collaborative practices of four composers – Cassandra Miller, Pascale Criton, Éliane Radigue and me – as documented through interviews with prominent performer-collaborators such as Deborah Walker, Silvia Tarozzi, Juliet Fraser and Cat Hope. A guiding metaphor frames these practices as gardens and highlights shared thematic concepts such as extended time, hospitality, note-taking and responsibility.
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2 Cassandra Miller in conversation with the author, 17 August 2019.
3 Cassandra Miller, ‘Transformative Mimicry: Composition as Embodied Practice in Recent Works’ (PhD, University of Huddersfield, 2018), http://eprints.hud.ac.uk/id/eprint/34998/.
4 Louise Catherine Antonia Marshall, ‘Deep Listening: The Strategic Practice of Female Experimental Composers Post 1945’ (PhD, University of the Arts London, 2018), http://ualresearchonline.arts.ac.uk/13477/.
5 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
6 Cassandra Miller in conversation with the author, 17 August 2019.
7 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
8 Cassandra Miller in conversation with the author, 17 August 2019.
9 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
10 Cassandra Miller in conversation with the author, 17 August 2019.
11 Juliet Fraser in conversation with the author, 20 June 2019.
12 Juliet Fraser in conversation with the author, 20 June 2019.
13 Juliet Fraser in conversation with the author, 20 June 2019.
14 Juliet Fraser in conversation with the author, 20 June 2019.
15 Juliet Fraser in conversation with the author, 20 June 2019.
16 Cassandra Miller in conversation with the author, 17 August 2019.
17 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
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24 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
25 Criton and Walker, ‘Chaoscaccia’.
26 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
27 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
28 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
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30 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
31 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
32 Criton and Walker, ‘Chaoscaccia’.
33 Éliane Radigue and Julia Eckhardt, Intermediary Spaces/Espaces Intermédiaires (Brussels: Umland Editions, 2019). p. 144.
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38 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
39 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
40 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019. For more information on a typical Occam Ocean transmission session, see my article ‘Occam Notions’.
41 Deborah Walker, Liner notes for Occam Ocean 2, ONCEIM Ensemble and Frédéric Blondy. CD, vol. eer2, Shiiin, 2019.
42 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
43 Charles Curtis, ‘Éliane Radigue et Naldjorlak’, in Éliane Radigue, ed. Évelyne Gayou, Portraits Polychromes 17 (Paris: INA-GRM, 2013).
44 Walker, Liner notes for Occam Ocean 2.
45 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
46 Cat Hope and Carol Robinson, ‘Occam Hex II: A Collaborative Composition’, Tempo 71 (2017), pp. 18–28.
47 Cat Hope in conversation with the author, 27 July 2019.
48 Nickel, ‘Occam Notions’.
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55 Roche, ‘Luke Nickel Transmits a Living Score’.
56 Roche, ‘Luke Nickel Transmits a Living Score’.
57 Here I refer to Sandeep Bhagwati's observation that conceptual traditions often called Western Art Music are found in practices not dependent on the geographical location or lineage of the participants.
58 Radigue and Eckhardt, Intermediary Spaces/Espaces Intermédiaires, p. 149.
59 Radigue and Eckhardt, Intermediary Spaces/Espaces Intermédiaires, p. 37.
60 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
61 Nickel, ‘Occam Notions’, p. 44.
62 Tom Service, ‘A Guide to Toru Takemitsu's Music’, The Guardian, 11 February 2013, www.theguardian.com/music/tomserviceblog/2013/feb/11/contemporary-music-guide-toru-takemitsu.
63 Nickel, ‘Occam Notions, and Curtis ‘Éliane Radigue et Naldjorlak’.
64 Juliet Fraser in conversation with the author, 20 June 2019.
65 Cat Hope in conversation with the author, 27 July 2019.
66 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
67 Juliet Fraser in conversation with the author, 20 June 2019.
68 Cat Hope in conversation with the author, 27 July 2019.
69 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
70 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 3 August 2019.
71 Silvia Tarozzi in conversation with the author, 2 July 2019.
72 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
73 Deborah Walker in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
74 Émilie Girard-Charest in conversation with the author, 2 August 2019.
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76 Radigue and Eckhardt, Intermediary Spaces/Espaces Intermédiaires, p. 77.
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