2. The emergence of ‘mobility’ in the musical score

The mid-century saw a sudden abundance of ideas pushing against their own boundaries and pointing towards a new paradigm of openness and mobility in art works. In technology and the non-musical arts, these developments included Alexander Calder's first sculptural ‘mobile’ Feathers (1931) (Selz Reference Selz1966: 72); the invention of the Memex (1945) – a method of organising data ‘as we may think’ by Vannevar Bush (Bush Reference Bush1945: 101–108); the publication of Raymond Queneau's Cent mille milliards de poèmes (Hundred Thousand Billion Poems, 1961), a compendium (and ‘writing machine’) for generating 10¹⁴ possible ‘mobile’ sonnets (Dack Reference Dack2005: 2); Theodore Nelson's description of a system linking related texts together in the digital medium as ‘hypertext’ (Nelson Reference Nelson1967: 191–210); Alain Robbe-Grillet's Pour un nouveau roman (Towards a New Novel), espoused disjunctions in time, place and point of view as a method of breaking down the dominance of the omniscient narrator (Robbe-Grillet Reference Robbe-Grillet1963); and Umberto Eco published the first major theoretical text on the field Opera aperta (The Open Work) (Eco Reference Eco1989).

During the same period some of the basic concepts that underpinned notated music were also confronted by develpments such as graphic notation, indeterminate notation and the mobile score. These deviations from the conventions of traditional musical notational often introduced a greater ‘openness’ to performer's interpretation and realisation of the work. The avoidance of traditional notational conventions changed the performer's relationship to the score allowing great interpretive latitude and sometimes implying the freedom to move around the page in a more interrogative fashion. As Cornelius Cardew put it:

Earle Brown's December 1952 is thought to be the earliest example of these challenges to notational convention: ‘filled with nontraditional notational signs and symbols, … with the resulting shape totally unfixed and different each time’ (Dubinets Reference Dubinets2007: 412). The score for his December 1952 is ‘open’ in a number of ways:

The work employs asemic graphical notation – it does not privilege any manner of reading or interpretation. To most trained music readers it presents more like a painting of the neo-plasticism school than a musical score. The deviation from musical notational conventions points towards meaning that is more ‘open’ to interpretation and the avoidance also implies the freedom for the performer to move around the page in a more interrogative fashion.

John Cage, beginning with Winter Music (1957), amplified the existing ambiguities of musical notation to create scores in which semantic interpretation was more indeterminate. The 63 pages of his Concert for Piano (1958) are a virtually encyclopedic exploration of non-traditional notational. Such notation presumes that ‘the performer's mind is … inspired by the graphics through some sort of mental resonance’ (Hajdu Reference Hajdu2004: 5). Cage emphasised the indeterminate nature of this approach:

A simultaneous development in notation was the mobile score: the idea that a music notation (graphic or otherwise) could be reordered or reorganised for, or even during, each performance. Mobile scores most commonly offered performer choice in the pathway(s) taken through the work. The ability for performers to read rhythm from left to right, or for composers to express harmony from top to bottom, was no longer required.

In the mobile score, the composer defers the final ordering and distribution of notated musical events until the performance. In such works

The musical developments towards mobility of the score pioneered by Brown and Feldman quickly spread to the European avant garde and elsewhere (Griffiths Reference Griffiths1975: 330). Mobile structure works by Stockhausen (Klavierstück XI (1956) and Zyklus (1959)) and Boulez (Third Sonata (1957–)) appeared almost immediately in the wake of visits to New York by Boulez in 1952 and to Darmstadt and Paris by David Tudor (1954), Earle Brown and Morton Feldman (1956) and Cage (1958) (Beal Reference Beal2007: 341–342).

During the same period, numerous projects in the visual arts, including Arseny Avraamov's hand-drawn motion picture soundtracks (1930) (Holzer Reference Holzer2010), Len Lye's A Colour Box (1935), camera-less animation, abstract films painted and scratched directly onto film (Manovich Reference Manovich2001: 258), and James and John Whitney's experiments (1943–44) in which sounds and images were synchronised optically by light shot through a stencil system (Brougher Reference Brougher2005: 125), sought to explore the visualisation of music. Interestingly there was little cross-over between the ‘visualised music’ and the ‘sonified image’ of the musical score.

It is strange to note that in the avant-garde scene of the 1950s and 60 s, the work of numerous abstract filmmakers such as the Whitneys, Fischinger, Harry Smith, Joseph Cornell, Maya Deren, Kenneth Anger, Stan Brakhage and Jordan Belson did not exert more influence on the experimental music works of the New York school and the Fluxus movement. As revolutionary as composers in the New York school were musically, the paper medium for presentation of notation to musicians remained relatively unchallenged.

3. Issues complicating the ‘real’ mobility of mobile scores

The ideological shifts that drove composers to explore new methods of notating music were varied. Roman Haubenstock-Ramati claims that:

According to Earle Brown graphical notation and mobility provided a greater level of ‘spontaneity, direct spontaneous action, and more spontaneity in the compositional process’ (Brown Reference Brown1970: 378), allowing ‘the performer to share directly with the composer in the construction of the music’ (Welsh Reference Welsh1994: 300). Stockhausen's earliest mobile-structure works reflected his interest in representing the aleatoric nature of the structure of sound itself. Later ‘moment’ works such as Kontakte (1958–60), Momente (1958–60) and Mixtur (1964) sought to explicitly avoid traditional musical narrative structure: ‘The piece tells no story. Every moment exists for itself’ (Pasler Reference Pasler2007: 38). Composers such as Xenakis used game structures to draw on mobile form's ‘field of possibilities’ to create tension. In Xenakis's Duel (1958), the composer employs game structure to outline 19 tactics of interaction between two orchestras performing notated music. Here the subject of the work is the inherent drama in the ‘playing out’ of the rules. As the dubious attribution to Sartre says, ‘everything is complicated by the presence of the opposing team’. Composers also extended the conventions of notation in search of a way to convey new compositional concerns such as extended techniques or aleatoric choices.

The reasons for the resilience of the paper medium in music until recent times are not entirely clear. In the past, practical issues such as the expense, convenience or even the operating noise of projections systems may have played a part. However, many of the compositional goals implied by the innovations were, in part, at odds with the capabilities of the paper score. Crucially, the space-inefficient paper score imposed upon composers an inverse relationship between the ease of mobility and the amount of information that could be provided for performer.

Some early mobile scores, such as Intermission 6 and Klavierstuck XI, solved this problem by employing a single performer and including all of the necessary information on a (sometimes very large) single page. Feldman's work comprises 15 fragments or musical objects, each a single note, chord or grace note. They fit comfortably on a standard sheet of paper and there is no great challenge to the performer in the realisation of the work, namely to freely order the fragments.

Stockhausen's Klavierstück XI provides somewhat greater challenges for the performer. The work comprises 19 musical passages or ‘groups’, each followed by a three indications detailing the tempo, dynamic and articulation that must be applied the group that is performed next:

The implication of this formal arrangement, where both the order of groups and manner of performing them are variable, is a potentially momentous number of realisations of the score. (Read and Yen have calculated the number as greater than 10⁴⁰ possible permutations (Read and Yen Reference Read and Yen1995: 5)). As a result, rather than ‘looking at random’ in order to determine the succession of events, many pianists ‘pre-order’ the score into a particular fixed sequence.

Stockhausen instructs the performer to ‘look at random to any other group’ in order to determine which group to perform next. It is hard to imagine how the composer, listener or even performer might verify whether this instruction is being followed. In the case of a paper score, however, involuntary choice is the most pragmatic solution for achieving an aleatoric order of groups. Stockhausen's stated motivation for this instruction is ‘that the performer will never link up expressly chosen groups or intentionally leave out others. Each group can be joined to any of the other eighteen’ (Stockhausen Reference Stockhausen1954: n.p.).

The coordination of multiple performers and scores in a live situation creates an even greater impediment to the goal of formal mobility in real time. Preparation of the order of the events in the score prior to the performance becomes a necessity rather than just a pragmatic convenience. The following account of an early performance of Stockhausen's Momente (1962–69) shows the imperative for pre-ordering of the orchestral parts.

Clearly the pre-ordering of the performance materials prevents any formal reorganisation ‘at will’. Although the ability to assemble a unique sequence of musical events allows a form of ‘openness’ in the score, the pre-ordering essentially reduces the work to a closed form in performance.

Boulez's exploration of mobility in his third sonata draw on the emerging concept of the ‘open work’, a labyrinth to be explored through multiple, variable instantiations. ‘Because a development that is fixed in a final way has struck me as no longer coinciding exactly with the current state of musical thought, with the very evolution of musical technique, which it must be recognised is turning more and more toward the search for a relative universe, toward a permanent discovery-comparable to a “permanent revolution”’ (Boulez Reference Boulez1963: 32).

Xenakis's Duel employs a more radical (and awkward) means of coordination of its two orchestras. Non-notational visual cues, consisting of a complex arrangement of yellow, blue, red and violet coloured lights, are used to cue the different musical materials (Xenakis Reference Xenakis1959). Such a solution, in addition to being logistically complex, adds a further cognitive layer to the already taxing requirements for the performers, and arguably creates unnecessary non-musical distraction.

In regard to December 1952, Brown's original intention was that the performers should be left entirely to their own devices in the realisation of the work; however, as he later indicated, the creation of a new paradigm combining composition and performance required a level of creativity not always reached by performers accustomed to traditional notated music.

If the problem with scores such as Klavierstück XI is that the detailed notation lends itself to pre-ordering by performers into a linear form indistinguishable from a ‘closed’ work, the problem with the very openness of December 1952 is that it lends itself to improvisation with little regard for the score. The freedom created by allowing the unspecified interpretation of the range, duration and nature of the sound events as well as the orientation of the score and rate at which it should be read, leaves the performer with little necessity for precision in their interpretation.

Composers such as Brown, Stockhausen and Xenakis pushed the paper score medium to its limits in these works. The pursuit of true mobility would require the avoidance of pre-determined ordering of materials, the possibility of realtime re-ordering of materials based on aleatoric or other procedures, and the ability to coordinate longer and more complex materials with larger and more complex instrumental and/or electronic forces. Following the advances of the avant garde, the continued exploration of these ideas lay dormant, waiting for the advent of a more ‘natural’ medium for their expression. The computer generated ‘screen score’ provided the solution to many of these issues.

4. The screen score

The renewal of the goal of mobility of the musical score has been a product of developments in technology. The rapid improvements in graphics-processing capacity, smaller, lighter and cheaper screens, and data projection have all played an important part in promoting the exploration of these possibilities. Development of a range of software capable of robust realtime manipulation of notation began to emerge in 2007Footnote ¹ and has also enhanced potential of this approach.

There were a number of precursors to the presentation of musical notation on screen, such as Mauricio Kagel's work Prima vista (1962–63), which uses 25 slides randomly placed in the carousel of a slide projector, and is one of the earliest examples of score to be screened visible to both the musicians and audience. Academic discussion of this approach is, however, quite recent, gaining momentum as recently as 2004 with the publication of research by Didkovsky (Reference Didkovsky2004) and Winkler (Reference Winkler2004)Footnote ² .

The range of approaches to the digital presentation of notation have resulted in a technology that is perhaps best referred to as the ‘screen score’.

Clay and Freeman note that terms to describe the range of new approaches to presenting the score on a computer screen have not yet been standardised (Clay and Freeman Reference Clay and Freeman2010). There are four principal considerations governing the relationship between these new screen-based approaches and the traditional notated score (Table 1).

Table 1

Paradigms for the presentation of notation to live performers

Note: The categorisations in this table are based on similar categories proposed by Reference AarsethAarseth 1997: 64.

1. 1. Medium – the expanded range of approaches may give rise to either static or dynamic arrangement of materials analogous to traditional print text and computer-based hypertext.

2. 2. Composer – the musical materials may be configured so that they are read sequentially, permutated, transformed or generated in real time. The computer-generated score provides a seamless medium for such approaches.

3. 3. Performer – the relationship between the performer and the score may be characterised as interpretative (of a traditional score), explorative (of a ‘mobile score’), ‘immanent’ (in that reading may be expected to occur more ‘in the moment’) or interactive (in the case that the performer's actions result in changes in the score).

4. 4. Score – traditional musical notation implies the abstraction of taking a continuous ‘scroll’ of music and splitting it into sections that can be arranged on successive pages. The scrolling score uses the computer to actualise the continuous paradigm of linear music on screen. In the mobile paper score, the notation remains fixed on paper, but ‘the order of musical sections is outlined either just before or during performance’ (Kim-Boyle Reference Kim-Boyle2010). The realtime score ‘refers to any notation, either traditional or graphic, which is created or transformed during an actual musical performance’ (Clay and Freeman Reference Clay and Freeman2010: 1).

5. Formal Implications

A sense of structure is derived from changes in continuity and discontinuity in materials, processes and transformations evident in the sonic outcomes arising from a particular performance model. In the traditional classical model the sense of structure derives principally from the score, with a relatively minor contribution drawn from the performers’ interpretation and interaction.

Computer coordination of live musical performance (figure 7) allows for the control and synchronisation of the score and the temporal framework, in addition to the generation of electronic sounds and electronic transformation of both the acoustically and electronically generated sounds.

Figure 7

A computer-controlled performance model

The computer-generated clicktrack creates the opportunity not only to independently control the tempi of multiple performers, but also to transmit formal (for example nonlinear selection of score materials) and performance (such as articulation, dynamics and so forth) parameters in real time.

Computer coordination can control many components in a performance in a manner analogous to the team of players necessary to bring symphony to life. Auditory and visual cues still play an important role in the coordination of the live performance; importantly, however, in a computer-controlled performance feedback into the system can also be achieved though other means:

• • the performers may interact with the computer via hardware interface(s);

• • the acoustic performance itself may be used as an interface through computer analysis; and

• • the audience may interact with the computer, playing a role in defining the performance.

For centuries the relationship between the composer, the score and the performer has remained remarkably constant. The advent of random-access computing has created a range of new opportunities for revolutionising the interaction between the parties involved in musical performance.

Computer coordination allows a radical redistribution of the relationships between the performers, the score, the digital components and the audience. Structural decisions may arise from any level of the performance model and may be the result of interaction and improvisation as well as predetermination. In Jason Freeman's Glimmer (2004) for chamber orchestra and audience participation, for example, the audience influences the unfolding composition ‘by waving four-inch battery-operated LED light sticks back and forth’ in front of video cameras (Freeman Reference Freeman2008: 31).

Computer coordination allows for greater distinction between voices and layers in a musical work through expansion of timbral, dynamic, spatial and temporal qualities both ‘vertically’ and ‘horizontally’.

Sampling provides a pathway to unprecedented referentiality to sound objects outside the performance model. Networking and telepresence expand the potential of these possibilities beyond the specific environment of the performance model. Perhaps these possibilities will someday allow for the realisation of Anthony Braxton's ‘orchestral musics’ conceived ‘to be performed simultaneously in different cities’ (if perhaps not ‘on different planets and even in different galaxies’ (Adler Reference Adler2007).

In The Open Work, Umberto Eco theorised the possibility of the ‘work in movement’ permitting ‘numerous different personal interventions’ (Eco Reference Eco1989). The computer-coordinated performance provides just such a possibility, allowing for the existence of a precise, unique but variable, multi-versioned work, in which each performance renders a new outcome.

Computer coordination reduces the cognitive load on the performer. The manipulation of musical materials and the provision of coordination for their performance reduces non-musical decision-making, and potentially allows the performer give greater focus to their performance. It is also possible to apply structure to materials that are freely improvised, placing the performer(s) in an environment where the only consideration is the ‘performed moment’. George Lewis, the composer of the Voyager (1987), an ‘interactive musical environment that privileges improvisation’, states that ‘with no built-in hierarchy of human leader/computer follower – no ‘veto’ buttons, footpedals or physical cues – all communication between the system and the improvisor takes place sonically’ (Lewis Reference Lewis2000: 36). Other systems specifically designed for improvised performance include those of Lawrence Casserley and Evan Parker (Casserley Reference Casserley1998), and William Hsu and John Butcher (Hsu Reference Hsu2005).

In this environment the performer might be potentially capable of playing in an ‘immanent’ state, what Deleuze defines as ‘a pure stream of a-subjective consciousness, a pre-reflexive impersonal consciousness, a qualitative duration of consciousness without a self’ (Deleuze Reference Deleuze2001: 29).

Permutative, generative and transformative strategies can be independently employed in a single work through computer coordination. The combination of formal structures in a single work leads to structural polyphony – poly-structure. Poly-structures are additive in nature allowing the accretion of formally distinct material. The converse process – removing structural material – is also facilitated by computer coordination. Precise realtime excisions of material provide a novel structural approach.