Music of Its Own Accord Aura Satz a b s t r a c t The disembodied hands of spiritualist sittings touched people and levitated objects but also strummed guitars, rang bells, played closed pianos and accordions in cages. Likewise, the mechanical music machines of the time (orchestrions, piano- las, etc.) seemed animated by invisible fingers. Highlighting the historical and haptic parallels between these manifestations, ands played a spectacular role in shap- In the darkened séance room it was the author addresses the lack H of a visible performing body, ing the manifestations of spiritualism. There were the many not the sense of sight that was privi- knuckles rapping out messages on tables in telegraphic code; leged but the tactile, dactylographic which remains implicit through the invisible animating agency. the hand of the medium scribbling out automatic writing; the evidence provided by hands, called She looks at the moment before touching fingers of participants placed upon the planchette upon time and again to demon- music became abstracted into of the Ouija Board; the interlocked sweaty palms in the circle strate the truth of events. People in- the grooves of the gramophone, of the séance sitting; the tied, manacled or chained wrists of sisted they could recognize the soft when music still looked like instruments, though without the the medium. Then there were the spirit hands materialized by touch of a deceased family member gestural presence of the per- mediums, the disembodied hands that manifested themselves or loved one or see the gentle ges- former. The article is illustrated by levitating things, stroking heads and knees, strumming gui- tures of their outstretched hands, with images from the author’s tars, striking drums, ringing bells. These floating hands were that their faces were patted or their project Automamusic. often luminous or invisible but palpable. beards and hair pulled. Male and female bodies, material and imma- terial, brushed up and touched one The SenSeS of The Séance another, subverting the polite conventions of gendered con- Hands, whether those disembodied, disassociated from the tact of the time. Human agency was embodied by the haptic visible living bodies in the room, or those that served as passive choreography of nimble fingers, so that while the hands of the transmission entities, could be said to be the true agents of séance sitters were gripped tightly in a chain of handclasps laid spiritualism. Séances took place in the dark or in the semi-light plainly above the table, these invisible fingers moved about of flickering oil lanterns or gas lamps, and the threshold of the making themselves known as presence and substantiating the visible tended to manifest itself through manual gesticulation. claim of a possible afterlife. The other sense organ that spiritualist manifestations most addressed, at the expense of the over-privileged witness of the Aura Satz (artist, writer), U.K. E-mail: <[email protected]>. Web site: <www. eye, was the ear. The birth of spiritualism is alleged to have iamanagram.com>. commenced with the mysterious rappings of the Fox sisters in Fig. 1. “spirits and their Manifes- tations—an Evening séance,” an original wooden type engraving fea- turing a seance from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, New York, 2 april 1887. this engraving depicts a typical 19th-century séance and includes standard phenomena such as spirit writing, flying instruments and a séance table. (reprinted with permission from the Museum of the Macabre. all rights reserved.) ©2010 ISAST LEONARDO MUSIC JOURNAL, Vol. 20, pp. 73–78, 2010 73 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/LMJ_a_00015 by guest on 26 September 2021 1847, and this idea of acoustic presence MuSical inSTruMenTS family of Athens County, Ohio, became prevailed in later manifestations. Chan- and PerforMance known for their elaborate musical sé- neled ghostly voices from the past, disem- Musical instruments provided an ex- ances [3]. They were ordered by the bodied and transformed, at times with the tension of these vocal manifestations, spirits to build a ‘“Spirit Room” and to aid of spirit trumpets, made themselves where again the spirits were challenged furnish it with a number of musical in- known, as if to proclaim the imminent to produce mere sound as presence, and struments: a tenor drum, a bass drum, technological advent of the telephone the faintest hint of melody was a bonus. two fiddles, a guitar, an accordion, (1876), the gramophone (1877) and the Combining both hand and sound, musi- a trumpet, a tin horn, a tea bell, a tri- radio (1895), just as, in another techno- cal performances became a prominent angle and a tambourine. During the logical ghosting, the rappings had cor- mode of communication with the dead. séances the spirits would give concerts responded to and indeed adopted the Daniel Dunglas Home, a famous Scottish using the musical instruments. A circle Morse code of telegraphy (first trans- medium known for, among other things, of 20–30 people would be formed, the mitted in 1844). It is true that much has his levitating skills, describes a séance in lights would be extinguished, and the been made of spiritualism’s reliance on 1854 during one of his tours in New York, performance would open with fright- the visual evidence of spirit photography during which a guitar was first heard to fully dramatic drum-rolls, followed by and full body materializations, but in fact move in its case. Then the case was un- various musical performances, and end- from the 1870s onward these visible ma- locked and the guitar placed under the ing with human voices singing until the terializations were eclipsed by a distinct table, from which it was played repeat- room appeared to be inhabited by a full emphasis on “direct voice” phenomena edly, “not, to be sure, in the highest grade choir. All the while spirit hands and arms as it was known. Thus, voice became the of the art, but with very fair average skill” would form by the aid of a solution of highest form of spiritual communication [2]. Finally the guitar was passed from phosphorous. The effect of such concerts and the most immediate and immaterial hand to hand of the people present, un- in the dark must have been powerful, the guarantor of presence [1]. These voices, til it was removed by “invisible agency.” eyes straining to latch sound onto source, divorced from their owners, floating in Such amateur handless music was com- gratified at the sight of hands and arms the ether, were the ultimate evidence of mon practice in spiritualist circles, as forming and materializing, providing a a vocalic life after death. Much like spiri- was the conjoined, indistinct group au- sense of embodiment to what they had tualist automatic writing, the voices often thorship implicit in the passing of the just witnessed. The Koons’ exhibitions had very little of substance to say. They instrument from hand to hand, at once of musical “spiritual pyrotechnics” were provided just enough intelligible speech charging it with handfuls of added en- enlivened by the “luminous bodies flying to hint at a presence of sorts, through ergy while proving its handless autonomy. about with the swiftness of insects” resem- signs, initials, names and so forth. Also around the mid-1850s, the Koons bling “different-sized human hands” [4]. Fig. 2. aura satz, Automamusic, hand-printed cibachrome print, 2008. (© aura satz) 74 Satz, Music of Its Own Accord Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/LMJ_a_00015 by guest on 26 September 2021 Fig. 3. aura satz, Automamusic, hand-printed cibachrome print, 2008. (© aura satz) In one of the séances an old out-of-tune [8]. The hands of the medium could and tunes “without any visible agency” violin was tuned to concert pitch and likewise be termed self-playing, as they [10]. Again efforts were made to reduce played in various locations throughout would frequently play automatically as if contact between his hands and the accor- the room (including against the wall, with a life of their own, while the medium dion, and yet his hand was the powering and strings downward against one of was in trance, channeling an “invisible force, the animating plug, as it were, for the sitter’s knees!) [5]. The frail Lord piano-forte player,” for instance. Musi- he could hold the accordion from the sisters performed musical feats of the cal instruments, especially pianos, often bottom with one hand, the keys being most astounding physical force, playing served similar roles to tables, floating, out of reach, while leaving the other on a double-bass violoncello, guitar, drums, rocking and being rapped upon. Now the table, and even so the instrument accordion, tambourine, bells and more, and then the piano keys were used like played many a tune [11]. To add energy at times singly, at others in unison, cli- a typewriter of sorts to answer questions. to the accordion it was then passed into maxing the performance with the lights Much of the mystery centered around the hands of sitters while it continued turned back on to reveal one of the sisters the proximity or distance of the musical to play of its own accord. The eminent seated silently in her invalid chair sur- instruments to the hands, and the ten- scientist Sir William Crookes subjected rounded by a pile of musical instruments sion generated by insulating one from Home to a series of scientific experi- [6]. Similarly, the famous Davenport another. Music would leak out despite ments in 1871, by placing a brand new Brothers toured an act that consisted of all efforts to isolate contact between the accordion within a drum-shaped metal entering a cabinet with their arms tied instrument and the medium: Piano keys cage wrapped in copper wire.