Abstract
Abstract The 2017 set by the electroacoustic duo Third City comprised five pieces, each defined by an audio path linking different acoustic musical instruments to digital musical instruments to enable live sampling. Performances were then improvised within structures developed in rehearsal. The authors here ask how the different instruments and audio paths influenced the improvisational roles taken by the performers. Previously established differences between acoustic musical instruments and digital musical instruments are highlighted, and questions regarding their use within improvisation are articulated. A taxonomy of improvisational roles is then selected and applied to the pieces. In identifying correlations between the instruments and audio paths of the five pieces and the improvisational roles used by the performers, conclusions are reached to serve as guidance in the setting up of audio paths for other electroacoustic improvisation pieces using live sampling. This article is the result of research into practice, an asynchronous post hoc consideration (Onsman and Burke 210) of the 2017 Third City set carried out by the duo having repositioned themselves relative to their music-making selves as researchers referring to both the experience of performers and the projected experience of the audience as inferred from archive footage.
Highlights
This paper concerns the way in which different improvisational roles were manifest in the musical lines generated within the 2017 set of Third City, a performance duo which incorporates digital musical instruments alongside the live performance of acoustic musical instruments
In identifying correlations between the instruments and audio paths of the five pieces and the improvisational roles used by the performers, conclusions are reached to serve as guidance in the setting up of audio paths for other electroacoustic improvisation pieces using live sampling
Following Magnusson and Hurtado Mendieta’s survey, the limitations of the acoustic musical instruments used were felt to provide inspiration. These limits were mitigated through the use of multiple instruments across the set but, flexible acoustic musical instruments such as the violin or voice can be with regards to timbre and tuning, the use of live sampling meant that the digital musical instrument was always capable of greater timbral diversity and pitch range
Summary
This paper concerns the way in which different improvisational roles were manifest in the musical lines generated within the 2017 set of Third City, a performance duo which incorporates digital musical instruments alongside the live performance of acoustic musical instruments. Digital musical instruments are those that, through the transfer of digital information, use an interface to trigger sounds from a sound generation unit. The interface may be an existing tool such as the keyboard or trackpad of a laptop, or maybe custom-built either in imitation of an existing acoustic musical instrument or to an original design. The sounds produced by the sound generation unit are usually synthesised, as in created from scratch, though may instead be sampled, as in recordings captured using microphones to be replayed with or without transformations applied through additional audio processing. The great variety of interface designs and the limitless variety of sounds that can be triggered offer enormous opportunity for musicians working with digital musical instruments. Whilst there is some dispute about the extent to which acoustic musical instruments and digital musical instruments are entirely separate categories of instrument
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