Encoding Post-Spectral Sound

This article examines computer-based music (ca. 1982–87) created by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho at the Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique (IRCAM) in Paris. A detailed account of archival materials for an early étude in voice synthesis, Vers le blanc (1982), demonstrates the music-theoretical import of software to Saariaho’s development of a robust compositional method that resonated with the emergent aesthetics of a post-spectral milieu. Subsequent analyses of two additional works from this period—Jardin secret II (1984–86) for harpsichord and tape, and IO (1987) for large ensemble and electronics—serve to illustrate Saariaho’s extension of this method into instrumental settings. Specific techniques highlighted include the use of interpolation systems to create continuous processes of transformation, the organization of individual musical parameters into multidimensional formal networks, and the exploration of harmonic structures based on the analysis of timbral phenomena. Relating these techniques to the affordances of contemporaneous IRCAM technologies, including CHANT, FORMES, and Saariaho’s own customized program, “transkaija,” this article adopts a transductive approach to archival research that is responsive to the diverse media artifacts associated with computer-based composition.

Arvo Pärt’s Music: Facets of the Tintinnabuli Technique

"This article comprises an analysis of two of the religious works signed by the Estonian composer, Arvo Pärt, both written in the tintinnabuli technique, 9 years apart - De profundis and Miserere. After an overview of the tintinnabuli concept and after indicating their technical features, I have observed how the minimalist compositional method, specific to Pärt, has acquired elasticity, as years went by. Nonetheless, the hermeneutical principles which the composer intended to soundly integrate in his composition style are preserved, regardless of how the tintinnabuli technique arises (strict or elastic). In both musical works analyzed, the tintinnabuli technique (technique used in composition since 1976) does not refer to serialization of sound parameters, but addresses the algorithmizing process of the musical material, which originates from formal and philosophical thinking. Keywords: tintinnabuli, minimalism, holy minimalism, Arvo Pärt."

Documenting the undocumented: Valeria Luiselli’s refugee children archives

This article reads comparatively Valeria Luiselli’s essay Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in Forty Questions and her novel Lost Children Archive in the context of critical debates about the uses of archival documents in contemporary literature and in relation to archival theory (Foucault, Derrida, Farge). Both texts draw on a wealth of archival materials to explore the causes of mass migration from Mexico and Central America to the United States since 2014, and especially the plight of refugee children who disappear in the desert, in detention centres, and through deportation. I argue that these texts use the archive as a compositional method to confront restricted representations of Mexican and Central American migration with a plethora of documents that propose a historical and transnational perspective. The proliferation of archives stands in for missing evidence and foregrounds multiple points of view on the refugee children, compelling readers to imagine their migrant journeys more vividly.

Using a Sonic Time-Lapse Method as a Compositional Tool

This article describes an innovative compositional method based on the use of a sonic time-lapse algorithm to create soundscape audio montages. The method is based on the superposition of short audio samples of 24-hour continuous field recordings carried out in various kinds of wildlife sonic environments. The optimisation of the algorithm focused on the enhancement of gradual crossfade transitions between recorded samples and the use of variable sample durations as a way of recreating a natural sense of evolution of sonic events in time. Future developments of the project will integrate virtual reality interfaces and environmental education projects as part of the time-lapse algorithm machine-learning techniques and also creative tools suitable for multimedia installations.

Modelling of unsaturated gas flow by Thebes code: Validation tests

This paper presents the simulations replicating two well-documented benchmarks on coupled gas-liquid flow in unsaturated soil. The results serve as validation and verification of the formulation of the gas flow in unsaturated geomaterials in the newly developed THMC coupled FEM code Thebes. The paper first discusses the basis of the compositional method and the role of the dry air mass balance equation in the theoretical framework. The fundamental constitutive assumptions related to gas flow, as adopted in the Thebes code, are also discussed in details. Afterwards, the paper discusses simulation of a two-phase infiltration test in unsaturated sand, as well as a one dimensional drainage test. The numerical results of these two examples show that the code is able to capture the main features associated with the gas flow in unsaturated soil. The possible future improvements, both related to the theoretical framework and the numerical implementation, are discussed at the closure of the paper.

Transcoding the I Ching as Composition Techniques in Chou Wen Chung, Zhao Xiaosheng and Chung Yiu Kwong

This article examined into three Chinese composers’ compositional method based on the ancient Chinese philosophy I Ching. Transcoding the 64 hexagrams of the I Ching in the piano solo works of Chou Wen Chung, Zhao Xiao Sheng and Chung Yiu Kwong display new representative of Chinese New Music. The analysis shows Chou and Chung’s creations that emphasize the use of the 64 hexagrams within a Westernized context, while Zhao brought out a new and individual compositional method based on the Chinese ancient philosophy that shows a complete departure from the West.