The Maestro Myth – Exploring the Impact of Conducting Gestures on the Musician’s Body and the Sounding Result by Sarah Lisette Platte M.A. Visual Communication and Iconic Research FHNW HGK Basel, 2014 State Examination (M.A.) in Political Science University of Freiburg, 2009 State Examination (M.A.) in Music University of Music Freiburg, 2008 Submitted to the Program in Media Arts and Sciences, School of Architecture and Planning, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology June 2016 © 2016 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. All rights reserved. Signature of Author .................................................................................... Sarah Lisette Platte Program in Media Arts and Sciences 6 May 2016 Certified by ......................................................................................................... Tod Machover Muriel R. Cooper Professor of Music & Media, MIT Media Lab Program in Media Arts and Sciences Thesis Supervisor Accepted by ........................................................................................................... Pattie Maes Academic Head Program in Media Arts and Sciences The Maestro Myth – Exploring the Impact of Conducting Gestures on the Musician’s Body and the Sounding Result by Sarah Lisette Platte Submitted to the Program in Media Arts and Sciences, School of Architecture and Planning, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on May 6, 2016 ABSTRACT Expert or fraud? Opinions differ widely when it comes to the profession of the conductor. The powerful person in front of an orchestra or a choir attracts both hate and admiration, but which influence do a conductor’s actions actually have on the musician’s body and the sounding result? Unlike any other musician, the conductor produces no sound himself, and though the profession of conducting, as we know it today, has existed for more than 150 years, it still lacks a systematic theoretical foundation. Aiming to throw light on the fundamental principles of this special gestural language, this thesis approaches the communication between conductor and musician as a matter of physics and as an analogic – rather than a symbolic – language. By means of two studies we can prove a direct correlation between the gestures and muscle-tension of the conductor and the musicians’ reaction in onset-precision as well as the quality and length of the evoked sound. While examining the gestural impact on the sounding result, we also examine, whether and in which way the mere form of the conducting gestures affect the musicians’ stress level. With our research we contribute to the development of a theoretical framework on conducting and enable a precise mapping of its gestural parameters, the use of which – not only in the discourse about conducting, but also as a base for hard- and software devices in the education of conductors – could decisively enhance musical learning, performance and expression. Furthermore, this framework provides new insights into a number of aspects of musical perception. Thesis Supervisor: Tod Machover Title: Muriel R. Cooper Professor of Music and Media The Maestro Myth – Exploring the Impact of Conducting Gestures on the Musician’s Body and the Sounding Result by Sarah Lisette Platte The following person served as a reader for this thesis: Thesis Reader ............................................................................................................................. Joseph Paradiso Associate Professor of Media Arts & Sciences, MIT Media Lab The Maestro Myth – Exploring the Impact of Conducting Gestures on the Musician’s Body and the Sounding Result by Sarah Lisette Platte The following person served as a reader for this thesis: Thesis Reader ............................................................................................................................. Prof. Dr. Joseph Willimann Professor of Musicology, University of Music Freiburg AKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis was made possible by the generous support of friends, colleagues, and mentors. In particular, I'd like to thank the following people: Tod Machover, my advisor, for welcoming me into the group, and for two years of inspiration and support. Joe Paradiso and Joseph Willimann for their valuable feedback as readers. Rosalind Picard for introducing empirical research and stress measurement to me, and for being a fantastic teacher. My fellow students of the Opera of the Future group. Kelly Donovan and Simone Ovsey for making almost anything possible. David Nunez for working with me on mapping conducting gestures. Asaf Azaria for introducing me to Python. MIT Media Lab faculty, staff and students for filling this unique place with playfulness, creativity, and wisdom. My parents, for being supportive of my apparently never-ending path of learning. My partner, for his infinite support. I couldn’t have done this without him. TABLE OF CONTENTS I Introduction .................................................................................................... 15 1. Motivation ............................................................................................ 15 2. Introduction ......................................................................................... 15 3. Contribution ....................................................................................... 16 II Background and Related Work ....................................................................... 18 1. Conducting – a Short Historical Overview ........................................... 18 2. The Maestro Myth & the Role of the Conductor ................................. 22 3. Related Work ....................................................................................... 27 a. Conducting as Subject for Research und Study ......................... 27 b. Research on Conducting ............................................................ 29 c. Research on Multimodal Perception and Expression ................. 38 d. Research in Related Fields ......................................................... 45 III Touch-Sensor Study ....................................................................................... 51 1. Preliminary Analysis & Study Design ................................................... 51 2. Data Collection .................................................................................... 55 3. Results ................................................................................................. 61 4. Discussion ............................................................................................ 74 IV Violin Study .................................................................................................... 76 1. Preliminary Analysis & Study Design ................................................... 76 2. Data Collection .................................................................................... 81 3. Results ................................................................................................. 85 4. Discussion ............................................................................................ 88 V Practical Applications .................................................................................... 90 VI Conclusion, Impact & Future Work ................................................................ 93 List of Figures ........................................................................................................ 96 Bibliography ........................................................................................................ 103 "You cannot not communicate” –– Paul Watzlawick ! ! ! ! 14 ! I INTRODUCTION AND MOTIVATION 1. Motivation As an active musician I became acquainted with the gestural language of conducting at the age of 13, playing the alto-saxophone in a local youth orchestra. Since then I have played and sung under the direction of many and very different conductors. During college I finally had the opportunity to learn conducting myself. Having to learn the craft then, I wished there had been a clear methodology, as I knew it from other fields. Back then, it was quite disappointing that my professor, a conductor of renown, tried to teach conducting without any scientific explanation, without a teaching book or any visuals, just through telling us to “feel the music” and to be “durchlässig” (pervious, transmissible) in our gestures. It was only after my exam that I learned about a different conducting method, which clearly explained causality between conducting gesture and sounding result. The experience afterwards to actually be able to convey my musical interpretation in real-time without long explanations, even to my amateur church choir, was game-changing and led me to the decision to explore the underlying mechanisms of this craft scientifically. 2. Introduction What does a conductor do? Although he is the only musician producing no sounds himself, he is still in the limelight of almost every orchestral and choral performance. The status OF his special role is widely questioned, even within his own “instrument” – the orchestra: “Conducting is surely the most demanding, musically all-embracing, and complex of the various disciplines that constitute the field of music performance. Yet, ironically, it is considered by most people […] to be either an easy-to-acquire skill (musicians) or the