Dirty Electronics Portfolio 2014-2020: A selection of works covering composition, performance and instrument design, and texts outlining research agendas and questions.
- Submitting institution
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De Montfort University
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Output identifier
- 33091
- Type
- T - Other
- DOI
-
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- Location
- -
- Brief description of type
- Multi-component output: collection of creative and critical work on related topic, collectively greater than the sum of their parts.
- Open access status
- -
- Month
- -
- Year
- 2020
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- Yes
- Number of additional authors
-
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- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- Yes
- Double-weighted statement
- This multi-component output demonstrates sustained research effort from 2014-2020. The components of the portfolio articulate a single core aesthetic of Dirty Electronics. Components are grouped in projects/works that feed into the overall research imperatives outlined in the statement. The portfolio contains: 4 compositions; 1 video documentary and recording of a live performance-installation; 3 papers, 2 articles and 1 book chapter; and 3 texts outlining research agendas and questions. The portfolio also comprises designs and documentation (recordings, images and video) of 7 instruments/sound objects, including schematics and code that further illustrate the fundamental considerations of the research.
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- My research explores the boundaries between music, performance art, electronics, and graphic design as well as having a socio-political dimension. These interests have enabled me to firmly establish a distinctive and original research profile and aesthetic that I refer to as Dirty Electronics. A new piece for Dirty Electronics often begins with an idea for a sound generating device that can be built and played by more or less anyone. The new work is usually presented in the context of a live event and as a performance.
This holistic approach to music making has allowed for an experimental practice to emerge that blurs the distinction between instrument maker, performer and composer, and highlights the necessity to discover and explore the musical potential of a newly created device or instrument from a naive position. From this practice, research has coalesced around three imperatives:
1. Exploring the material nature of electronic sound and an object- orientated form of music-making: letting the object speak for itself.
2. Making sound objects/instruments as a procedural part of performance.
3. Questioning a more active participatory role of the audience/listener within a technological context and how this may lead to new and original performance paradigms.
The resulting sound objects/instruments from the research are a crossover between printed circuit board, electronic instrument and copper etched artwork, and have taken on greater significance as works of art in their own right and embodiments of compositional ideas. They have also become a form of documentation of a process that allows for the research to be effectively shared in a wide variety of formats through video and audio recordings, schematics, code, articles/text and as commercial products. By creating stand- alone sound objects as ‘composition’, the research raises fundamental questions surrounding music and its consumption and how musical ideas are disseminated.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -
