ISTANBUL TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES SOUNDSCAPE COMPOSITION ANALYSIS OF CURRENT AESTHETICS Ph.D. Thesis by Erdem HELVACIOĞLU Department : Social Sciences Programme : Music OCTOBER 2011 ISTANBUL TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES SOUNDSCAPE COMPOSITION ANALYSIS OF CURRENT AESTHETICS Ph.D. Thesis by Erdem HELVACIOGLU (409032004) Date of submission : 23 December 2010 Date of defence examination: 12 October 2011 Supervisor(Chairman) : Prof. ġ. ġehvar BEġĠROĞLU (ITU) Members of the Examining Committee : Prof. Cihat AġKIN (ITU) Prof. Dr. Metin ÜLKÜ (MSFAU) Doç. Dr. Kıvılcım Yıldız ġENÜRKMEZ (MSFAU) Yrd. Doç. AyĢegül Kostak TOKSOY (ITU) OCTOBER 2011 ĠSTANBUL TEKNĠK ÜNĠVERSĠTESĠ SOSYAL BĠLĠMLER ENSTĠTÜSÜ MEKAN SESĠ BESTECĠLĠĞĠ ÇAĞDAġ ESTETĠKLERĠN ANALĠZĠ DOKTORA TEZĠ Erdem HELVACIOĞLU (409032004) Tezin Enstitüye Verildiği Tarih : 23 Aralık 2010 Tezin Savunulduğu Tarih : 12 Ekim 2011 Tez DanıĢmanı : Prof. ġ. ġehvar BEġĠROĞLU (ĠTÜ) Diğer Jüri Üyeleri : Prof. Cihat AġKIN (ĠTÜ) Prof. Dr. Metin ÜLKÜ (MSGSÜ) Doç. Dr. Kıvılcım Yıldız ġENÜRKMEZ (MSGSÜ) Yrd. Doç. AyĢegül Kostak TOKSOY (ĠTÜ) EKĠM 2011 FOREWORD This work has been prepared as the doctorate thesis for the Istanbul Technical University Music for Advanced Studies Department. It is supported by ITU Institute of Social Sciences. I would like to express my deep appreciation and thanks for my advisor Prof ġehvar BeĢiroğlu. I would like to thank Pieter Snapper and Reuben de Lautour for their advice on the technical issues of the work, Ros Bandt for expressing her ideas and advice about sonic archeology, Rajivan Ayyappan for his detailed portrait of the soundscape of India, Thomas Gerwin, Damian Keller, Rajivan Ayyappan, Ros Bandt and Hildegard Westerkamp for letting me analyze their works, Claude Schryer, Bruce Davis, Chris de Laurenti, Bob Gluck, Andra McCartney, Alessandro Bosetti, Michael Rusenberg, Darren Copeland, Douglas Quin, Sascha Karminski, Neil Bruce, Peter Cusack, Steve Feld, Michael Noble, Jeff Gburek, Katharine Norman, Thor Magnusson, James A Wyness, Bernie Krause, Petri Kuljuntatusta, Annea Lockwood, David Rothenberg, Jack Body, Rinus van Alebeek, Kjell Samkopf, Bruce Odland, Stephen Vitiello, Jacob Kirkegaard, Duncan Whitley, Lasse Marc Riek, Philip Samartzis, Brandon Labelle, Dallas Simpson, Aaron Ximm, Francisco Lopez, Pete Stollery, Kim Cascone and Yannick Dauby for sharing me their ideas about soundscape composition. December 2010 Erdem HELVACIOĞLU v vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page FOREWORD...............................................................................................................v TABLE OF CONTENTS.........................................................................................vii ABBREVIATIONS....................................................................................................ix LIST OF FIGURES...................................................................................................xi SUMMARY...............................................................................................................xv ÖZET.......................................................................................................................xvii 1. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................. 1 1.1 Purpose of the Thesis.........................................................................................2 1.2 The Method ........................................................................................................ 2 2. AESTHETICS AND TECHNIQUES OF SOUNDSCAPE COMPOSITION.........................................................................................................9 2.1 The History of Soundscape Composition...........................................................9 2.2 The Aesthetics of Soundscape Composition.....................................................18 2.3 The Techniques of Soundscape Composition...................................................23 3. COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF INTERVIEWS DONE WITH VARIOUS SOUNDSCAPE COMPOSERS AND LOCATION RECORDISTS....................29 3.1 Questionnaire for the interviews.......................................................................32 3.1.1 Basic questions.......................................................................................32 3.1.2 Personal questions..................................................................................33 3.2 Comparative analysis of interviews..................................................................37 3.2.1 Analysis of basic questions....................................................................37 3.2.2 Analysis of personal questions...............................................................46 3.3 List of interviews...............................................................................................58 4. TECHNIQUES FOR THE ANALYSIS OF ELECTROACOUSTIC MUSIC.....................................................................................................................149 4.1 Listening Analysis..........................................................................................149 4.1.1 Pierre Schaeffer and typo-morphology................................................149 4.1.2 Francois Delalande and typo-morphology...........................................151 4.1.3 Dennis Smalley and spectromorphology.............................................153 4.1.4 Simon Emmerson and syntax-discourse..............................................157 4.1.5 Stephan Roy and listening analysis......................................................158 4.1.6 Spectrograms........................................................................................159 4.1.7 Multimedia representations..................................................................159 4.2 Genetic analysis..............................................................................................161 4.3 Computational analysis...................................................................................161 4.3.1 Music informational retrieval...............................................................161 4.3.2 Description, segmentation and classification.......................................161 5. ANALYSIS OF FIVE DIFFERENT SOUNDSCAPE WORKS FROM FIVE DIFFERENT CONTINENTS................................................................................163 5.1 Hildegard Westerkamp ―Beneath the Forest Floor‖.......................................163 5.2 Ros Bandt ―Thrausmata‖................................................................................175 vii 5.2.1 Analysis of "Thrausmata" Part 1..........................................................185 5.2.2 Analysis of "Thrausmata" Part 2..........................................................197 5.2.3 Analysis of "Thrausmata" Part 3..........................................................190 5.2.4 Analysis of "Thrausmata" Part 4..........................................................192 5.2.5 Analysis of "Thrausmata" Part 5..........................................................194 5.2.6 Analysis of "Thrausmata" Part 6..........................................................196 5.2.7 Analysis of "Thrausmata" Part 7..........................................................198 5.3 Rajivan Ayyappan ―Subsequent Hearing".....................................................202 5.4 Thomas Gerwin ―Kurzgeschichten‖...............................................................208 5.5 Damian Keller ―touch n go‖...........................................................................215 5.5.1 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 1 - Pandemonium 2..............................222 5.5.2 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 2 - Realpolitik......................................223 5.5.3 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 3 - Action to be taken in the event of a fire.................................................................................................................225 5.5.4 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 4 - Farewell, welfare............................228 5.5.5 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 5 - let me see...how can I word it?.......229 5.5.6 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 6 - least but not last..............................231 5.5.7 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 7 - let me see...how can I word it? 2....234 5.5.8 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 8 - Pandemonium 1..............................239 5.5.9 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 9 - A waltz in a ball..............................241 5.5.10 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 10 - sCRATch....................................244 5.5.11 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 11 - coin a name.................................247 5.5.12 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 12 - spiel, spill, spoil..........................249 5.5.13 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 13 - Vox Populi..................................252 5.5.14 Analysis of "touch n go" Part 14 - Pandemonium 3..........................254 6. ANALYSIS OF PERSONAL COMPOSITIONS............................................257 6.1 Analysis of ―Aeterna Pulchritudo‖.................................................................258 7. CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS............................................................269 AUDIOGRAPHY....................................................................................................279 REFERENCES........................................................................................................283 APPENDICES.........................................................................................................289