Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-gtxcr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-24T03:16:11.844Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Mimetic Space – Unravelled

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 June 2008

Rajmil Fischman
Affiliation:
Music Department, Keele University, Keele, Staffordshire, ST5 5BG, UK email: r.a.fischman@keele.ac.uk

Abstract

This article is a development, refinement and expansion of a paper presented at the Electroacoustic Music Studies Conference, 2007 (EMS07). It aims to provide a framework and terminology for the discussion, analysis and creation of music that articulates mimetic discourse and structure. In doing so, it also intends to enable parallel and complementary analytical approaches to those concerned with the aural and spatial aspects of musical articulation. It proposes the notion of multidimensional mimetic space, taking as its point of departure Emmerson's Language Grid (Emmerson 1986), and constructing additional axes representing compositional continua, similar in function to those proposed by spectromorphology (Smalley 1986), but applicable to mimetic material. The argument considers the mimetic implications of both purely acousmatic music and works that combine the acousmatic with live performance. After a brief consideration of the relationship between mimetic space and space-form (Smalley 2007a), the discussion concludes with a perspective on narrative as a component of mimetic space; providing an extensive discussion of issues pertinent to the idea of signifier space, which was originally introduced in the preceding paper.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Fischman sound files

First train horn to graduated continuant

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 3.6 MB

Fischman sound files

Pitched graduated continuant: train horn connotations

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 1.7 MB

Fischman sound files

Emergence of human voices

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 3.9 MB

Fischman sound files

Emergence of pitched graduated continuants resembling pitch

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 4 MB

Fischman sound files

Slowed-down unstable pitched continuants containing vowel-like formants

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 3.9 MB

Fischman sound files

Extended section of virtually untouched field recordings

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 29 MB

Fischman sound files

Filtering: blur of sonic image

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 6.6 MB

Fischman sound files

Surreal reverberation

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 3.7 MB

Fischman sound files

Interjections of silence

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 5.1 MB

Fischman sound files

First appearance and granulation of adult male’s phrase

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 1.9 MB

Fischman sound files

Slow looping of adult male’s phrase

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 1.8 MB

Fischman sound files

Le sommeil

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 30.7 MB

Fischman sound files

Beginning of fifth section

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 10 MB

Fischman sound files

Red Bird excerpt

Download Fischman sound files(Audio)
Audio 9.1 MB