- School of Creative Arts and Technologies,
Ulster University, Magee campus
Derry/Londonderry
BT48 7JL, Northern Ireland
Brian Bridges
University of Ulster, School of Creative Arts, Faculty Member
- Contemporary Music, Electroacoustic Music, Live Electroacoustics, Embodied Cognition, Music Psychology, Auditory Perception, and 19 moreSound Art, Microtonal Music, Composition of Electroacoustic Music, Electronic Music, Composition (Music), Music Perception, Experimental Music, Gesture, Spatial Audio, Embodiment, Sound studies, Embodied Music Cognition, Music Technology, Sound Spatialization, Computer Music, Music Aesthetics, New Interfaces for Musical Expression, Musical Composition, and Soundedit
- Brian Bridges is a composer, researcher and electronic musician. He is Lecturer in Music and Creative Technologies at Ulster University in Northern Ireland. www.brianbridges.netedit
As a result of the advent of recording technologies and a developing experimental ethos, twentieth century music composition underwent a ‘bottom–up’ revolution, placing environmental sound materials at the centre of what had previously... more
As a result of the advent of recording technologies and a developing experimental ethos, twentieth century music composition underwent a ‘bottom–up’ revolution, placing environmental sound materials at the centre of what had previously been a form more concerned with abstract materials and structures. Beyond the environmental derivation of the raw materials themselves, the structure of electroacoustic music is frequently seen as being related to environmental logics. One of our most influential theories of electroacoustic music, Smalley’s (1986; 1997) spectromorphology, approaches musical structure from the perspective of apparent physicality and causality. This parallels a more recent ‘bottom–up’ revolution within cognitive science, the rise of embodied cognition, which posits that cognitive processes are based on familiar bodily actions and environmental affordances. Embodied image schema theory (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980; 1999) proposes that cognition is based on schematic structures which are abstracted from common sensorimotor experience. These ideas have previously been applied to common practice music (Brower, 2000; Johnson, 2007; Wilkie, Holland and Mulholland, 2010). However, we consider these theories to be even more directly applicable to electroacoustic music and related forms. We identify parallels between many of Smalley’s formal structuring and dynamic principles and image schema theories. Given these parallels, we believe that an examination of electroacoustic music may support the development of theories of embodied cognition. However, more significantly for our own field, we propose that a thorough consideration of image schema theory could contribute to extending unifying theoretical and descriptive frameworks for electroacoustic music. Such an approach also has the potential to inform developments in other areas, including the design of music performance and production systems and human–computer interaction.
NB: The full text of this paper will be published in the EMS15 proceedings in October 2015.
NB: The full text of this paper will be published in the EMS15 proceedings in October 2015.
Research Interests:
This article will explore practical and aesthetic questions concerning spatial music performance by interrogating new developments within an emerging hyperinstrumental practice. The performance system is based on an electric guitar with... more
This article will explore practical and aesthetic questions concerning spatial music performance by interrogating new developments within an emerging hyperinstrumental practice. The performance system is based on an electric guitar with individuated audio outputs per string and multichannel loudspeaker array. A series of spatial music mapping strategies will explore in-kind relationships between a formal melodic syntax model and an ecological flocking simulator, exploiting broader notions of embodiment underpinning the metaphorical basis for the experience and understanding of musical structure. The extension and refinement of this system has been based on a combination of practice-led and theoretical developments. The resulting mapping strategies will forge new gestural narratives between physical and figurative gestural planes, culminating in a responsive, bodily based, and immersive spatial music performance practice. The operation of the performance system is discussed in relation to supporting audiovisual materials.
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This thesis engages with the topic of microtonal music through a discussion of relevant music theories and compositional practice alongside the investigation of theoretical perspectives drawn from psychology. Its aim is to advance a... more
This thesis engages with the topic of microtonal music through a discussion of relevant music theories and compositional practice alongside the investigation of theoretical perspectives drawn from psychology. Its aim is to advance a theory of microtonal music which is informed by current models of auditory perception and music cognition. In doing so, it treats a range of microtonal approaches and philosophies ranging from duplex subdivision of tempered scales to the generation of intervals in just–intonation– based schemes, including systems derived directly from the structure of the harmonic series. It contains an analytical survey of case studies relating to twentieth–century microtonal approaches, focussing on the conceptual and perceptual implications of the use of such materials by these early microtonal practitioners, through engagement with their stated theories and compositional practice. Through this process, it begins to advance components of a perceptually and cognitively–informed theory of microtonality, which is then consolidated by a series of theory–based chapters which investigate the phenomenon from the perspective of current theories within the field of psychology. The theories which are thus advanced are further informed by a component of compositional practice in the research process, which is used as a vehicle to refine and extend them. The result is a comprehensive theory of microtonal music which incorporates contexts drawn from ecological and embodied perspectives on perceptual and cognitive processes.
The thesis is available online and in print from the Maynooth University Library: http://eprints.maynoothuniversity.ie/6737/
The thesis is available online and in print from the Maynooth University Library: http://eprints.maynoothuniversity.ie/6737/
Research Interests:
"This paper describes the design, theoretical underpinnings and development of a hyperinstrumental performance system driven by gestural data obtained from an electric guitar. The system combines a multichannel audio feed (parsed for its... more
"This paper describes the design, theoretical underpinnings and development of a hyperinstrumental performance system driven by gestural data obtained from an electric guitar. The system combines a multichannel audio feed (parsed for its pitch contour, spectral content and note inter–onset time data) with motion tracking of the performer’s larger–scale bodily movements using a Microsoft Xbox Kinect sensor. These gestural materials provide the basis for the system’s musical mapping strategies, informed by an integration of embodied cognitive models with electroacoustic/electronic music theory (specifically, Smalley’s spectromorphology). The performance system’s sound processing is further animated using the boids flocking algorithm by Reynolds. This provides an embodied/ecological base for connecting Lerdahl’s spatial and syntactical models of tonal harmony with sound spatialization and textural processing. Through this work, we aim to advance broadly applicable performance gesture ecologies, providing typologies that facilitate creative (but still coherent) mappings from physical and figurative performance gestures to spatial and textural structures."
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"This paper explores the application of gestural structures and embodied image schemas in the design of control mappings and interpretative layers for a spatial music performance system. In doing so, it advances a design that maps... more
"This paper explores the application of gestural structures and embodied image schemas in the design of control mappings and
interpretative layers for a spatial music performance system. In doing so, it advances a design that maps structural features derived from musical performance gestures to various aspects of spatial and timbral sound processing. An analysis of a system by one of the co-authors will be undertaken, in addition to discussion of wider implications for performance system designs based upon these theoretical perspectives. The importance of image schemas in such a model is their potential utility in contributing to the development of richer, yet coherent, mappings that go beyond simpler localized transduction–based models to encompass a variety of less localized output modalities."
interpretative layers for a spatial music performance system. In doing so, it advances a design that maps structural features derived from musical performance gestures to various aspects of spatial and timbral sound processing. An analysis of a system by one of the co-authors will be undertaken, in addition to discussion of wider implications for performance system designs based upon these theoretical perspectives. The importance of image schemas in such a model is their potential utility in contributing to the development of richer, yet coherent, mappings that go beyond simpler localized transduction–based models to encompass a variety of less localized output modalities."
Research Interests:
Inclusive music activities for people with physical disabilities commonly emphasise facilitated processes, based both on constrained gestural capabilities, and on the simplicity of the available interfaces. Inclusive music processes... more
Inclusive music activities for people with physical disabilities commonly emphasise facilitated processes, based both on constrained gestural capabilities, and on the simplicity of the available interfaces. Inclusive music processes employ consumer controllers, computer access tools and/or specialized digital musical instruments (DMIs). The first category reveals a design ethos identified by the authors as artefact multiplication – many sliders, buttons, dials and menu layers; the latter types offer ergonomic accessibility through artefact magnification.
We present a prototype DMI that eschews artefact multiplication in pursuit of enhanced real time creative independence. We reconceptualise the universal click-drag interaction model via a single sensor type, which affords both binary and continuous performance control. Accessibility is optimized via a familiar interaction model and through customized ergonomics, but it is the mapping strategy that emphasizes transparency and sophistication in the hierarchical correspondences between the available gesture dimensions and expressive musical cues. Through a participatory and progressive methodology we identify an ostensibly simple targeting gesture rich in dynamic and reliable features: (1) contact location; (2) contact duration; (3) momentary force; (4) continuous force, and; (5) dyad orientation. These features are mapped onto dynamic musical cues, most notably via new mappings for vibrato and arpeggio execution.
We present a prototype DMI that eschews artefact multiplication in pursuit of enhanced real time creative independence. We reconceptualise the universal click-drag interaction model via a single sensor type, which affords both binary and continuous performance control. Accessibility is optimized via a familiar interaction model and through customized ergonomics, but it is the mapping strategy that emphasizes transparency and sophistication in the hierarchical correspondences between the available gesture dimensions and expressive musical cues. Through a participatory and progressive methodology we identify an ostensibly simple targeting gesture rich in dynamic and reliable features: (1) contact location; (2) contact duration; (3) momentary force; (4) continuous force, and; (5) dyad orientation. These features are mapped onto dynamic musical cues, most notably via new mappings for vibrato and arpeggio execution.
Research Interests:
This paper will discuss issues relating to the integration of an expanded vocabulary of sonic materials in music (for the sake of brevity termed ‘sound’ in the title). It will examine this issue from three perspectives: (1) contextual and... more
This paper will discuss issues relating to the integration of an expanded vocabulary of sonic materials in music (for the sake of brevity termed ‘sound’ in the title). It will examine this issue from three perspectives: (1) contextual and referential aspects of the use of such materials in composition, (2) timbral organisation in music, and (3) organisational influences in music which have themselves been influenced by structures to be found in environmental sounds. It will largely focus on music rather than sound art (the version of the sonic artform which owes much to conceptual art) directly, though it will touch on issues (from this perspective) relating to how differences between the two artforms may be articulated. Indeed, it may be that the central question of this paper could be reframed as ‘can sound function in music without such music becoming indistinguishable from sound art?’.
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Can harmony be non-linear? This is the question which New York composer Glenn Branca has posed in relation to the potential for new developments in the role of harmony in contemporary music. The question will be investigated in relation... more
Can harmony be non-linear? This is the question which New York composer Glenn Branca has posed in relation to the potential for new developments in the role of harmony in contemporary music. The question will be investigated in relation to a discussion of the characteristics of more traditional conceptions of harmony. The discussion will first focus on aspects which could be considered to be ‘linear’ along with a brief survey of changing approaches to harmony in Western music history. This will be followed by a survey of possibilities for the construction of harmony based on principles of non-linearity in terms of temporal, textural and pitch elements. These possibilities will be discussed with reference to experimental compositions and compositional approaches
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Presented at the Irish Association for American Studies, 2008; also published in Maynooth Musicology (1).
Full text available here:
http://brianbridges.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/cultureclash.pdf
Full text available here:
http://brianbridges.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/cultureclash.pdf
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Experimental musics are extreme cases of sonic organization, defying easy categorization as ‘music.’ They situate themselves as disruptive agents at music’s fringes, either by tugging gently at loose threads of cultural norms, or by more... more
Experimental musics are extreme cases of sonic organization, defying easy categorization as ‘music.’ They situate themselves as disruptive agents at music’s fringes, either by tugging gently at loose threads of cultural norms, or by more iconoclastic interventions. Musical experimentalism, such as that found in the 1960s/1970s New York ‘Downtown’ loft scene, encompasses a diversity of carefully structured (or carefully unstructured) media and performances that play with social/cultural, technological and, perhaps most fundamentally, cognitive-perceptual limits. This use of extreme materials often creates novel musical environments as much as performances. The conjunction and cross-pollination of this scene with more traditional institutionally-based research at New Jersey’s Bell Labs suggests that the experimentalism of composers such as La Monte Young and John Cage was part of a larger cultural dynamic.
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Sometimes, it seems like Western music has spent most of the last 2,500 years trying to ‘kill off’ the body (counting from Pythagoras of Samos)! The body is, obviously, at the center of music production activities, whether in... more
Sometimes, it seems like Western music has spent most of the last 2,500 years trying to ‘kill off’ the body (counting from Pythagoras of Samos)!
The body is, obviously, at the center of music production activities, whether in performance or the recording and manipulation of that performance using contemporary digital technologies. It provides a vehicle for musical performance and an interface between a producer/engineer/editor/composer and the recording technologies they use. However, until relatively recently, bodily structures and their capabilities did not feature in the mainstream of academic musical discourse on the Western art–music tradition, being largely confined to the circumscribed domain of ‘performance practice as interpretation.’ Similarly, for much of the history of computer music, the lack of available processing power for ‘real–time’ (low latency) responses of systems meant that richer embodied interactions within these systems could not be a priority. Even as the increase in available processing power has provided for more real–time interactions, this ‘body–blindness’ remains a feature of many interfaces: the
dominant embodied strategy is to reference the ‘tried and tested’ embodiment of certain legacy studio hardware through digital re–creations of mixing desks and analogue synthesisers. One of the key challenges for contemporary music technologists is to provide the rich variety of control available from complex digital processes whilst providing a more imaginative, yet coherent, means of interacting as performing. A renewed emphasis on embodied models at the centre of interface design may provide one solution.
The body is, obviously, at the center of music production activities, whether in performance or the recording and manipulation of that performance using contemporary digital technologies. It provides a vehicle for musical performance and an interface between a producer/engineer/editor/composer and the recording technologies they use. However, until relatively recently, bodily structures and their capabilities did not feature in the mainstream of academic musical discourse on the Western art–music tradition, being largely confined to the circumscribed domain of ‘performance practice as interpretation.’ Similarly, for much of the history of computer music, the lack of available processing power for ‘real–time’ (low latency) responses of systems meant that richer embodied interactions within these systems could not be a priority. Even as the increase in available processing power has provided for more real–time interactions, this ‘body–blindness’ remains a feature of many interfaces: the
dominant embodied strategy is to reference the ‘tried and tested’ embodiment of certain legacy studio hardware through digital re–creations of mixing desks and analogue synthesisers. One of the key challenges for contemporary music technologists is to provide the rich variety of control available from complex digital processes whilst providing a more imaginative, yet coherent, means of interacting as performing. A renewed emphasis on embodied models at the centre of interface design may provide one solution.
Research Interests:
The slides for this talk will be added shortly.
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Public lecture for the Crash Ensemble/Project Arts Centre. Composer Brian Bridges will present a survey of Glenn Branca’s early guitar ensembles through to the harmonic series and non-harmonic series symphonies, discussing the... more
Public lecture for the Crash Ensemble/Project Arts Centre.
Composer Brian Bridges will present a survey of Glenn Branca’s early guitar ensembles through to the harmonic series and non-harmonic series symphonies, discussing the ‘Downtown’ context and of Branca’s music and his significance to the new music scene. The talk will include audio examples, documentary footage and an informal opportunity to ask questions.
Composer Brian Bridges will present a survey of Glenn Branca’s early guitar ensembles through to the harmonic series and non-harmonic series symphonies, discussing the ‘Downtown’ context and of Branca’s music and his significance to the new music scene. The talk will include audio examples, documentary footage and an informal opportunity to ask questions.
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Guest lecture on microtonal music and its perceptual effects, delivered at the Composition Department, Central Conservatory of Music.
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Guest lecture on microtonal music composition, perceptual issues and software technologies for composition, for MPhil in Music and Media Technologies, Trinity College Dublin.
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Guest lectures delivered for composition/computer music students at the Central Conservatory of Music, Beijing and the MA in Digital Media at Peking University
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Guest lecture/lecture–recital for the MA/MSc in Music Technology, University of Limerick (Digital Media and Arts Research Centre), on the composition of 'Angels at the Shotgun Wedding' , a multi-movement microtonal composition for massed... more
Guest lecture/lecture–recital for the MA/MSc in Music Technology, University of Limerick (Digital Media and Arts Research Centre), on the composition of 'Angels at the Shotgun Wedding' , a multi-movement microtonal composition for massed electric guitars and electronics.
http://www.dmarc.ie/events/upcoming/
'Angels at the Shotgun Wedding' by Brian Bridges (Maynooth Electric Guitar Array, conductor Marc Balbirinie), is a large scale piece for 23-member electric guitar ensemble. The piece uses a combination of electronic drones, microtonal tunings, and amplification to create novel harmonies and textural effects. The aim is to create a piece which balances the inherent force of the ensemble with the subtlety of the materials. Creating something both delicate and visceral with blunt instruments. - See more at: http://www.dmarc.ie/events/upcoming/#sthash.gP9Ueinv.dpuf
http://www.dmarc.ie/events/upcoming/
'Angels at the Shotgun Wedding' by Brian Bridges (Maynooth Electric Guitar Array, conductor Marc Balbirinie), is a large scale piece for 23-member electric guitar ensemble. The piece uses a combination of electronic drones, microtonal tunings, and amplification to create novel harmonies and textural effects. The aim is to create a piece which balances the inherent force of the ensemble with the subtlety of the materials. Creating something both delicate and visceral with blunt instruments. - See more at: http://www.dmarc.ie/events/upcoming/#sthash.gP9Ueinv.dpuf
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Handout to accompany introductory lecture for second year undergraduate students. Download available from here:
http://brianbridges.net/?p=336
http://brianbridges.net/?p=336
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The School of Creative Arts & Technologies at Ulster University (Magee) has brought together the subject of computing with creative technologies, cinematic arts (film), drama, dance, music and design in terms of research and education. We... more
The School of Creative Arts & Technologies at Ulster University
(Magee) has brought together the subject of computing with creative technologies, cinematic arts (film), drama, dance, music and design in terms of research and education. We propose here the development of a flagship computer software platform, SceneMaker, acting as a digital laboratory workbench
for integrating and experimenting with the computerprocessing of new theories and methods in these multidisciplinary fields. We discuss the architecture of SceneMaker and relevant technologies for processing within its component modules. SceneMaker will enable the automated production of multimodal animated scenes from film and drama scripts or screenplays. SceneMaker will highlight affective or emotional content in digital storytelling with particular focus on character body posture, facial expressions, speech, non-speech audio, scene composition, timing, lighting, music and cinematography. Applications of SceneMaker include automated simulation of productions.
(Magee) has brought together the subject of computing with creative technologies, cinematic arts (film), drama, dance, music and design in terms of research and education. We propose here the development of a flagship computer software platform, SceneMaker, acting as a digital laboratory workbench
for integrating and experimenting with the computerprocessing of new theories and methods in these multidisciplinary fields. We discuss the architecture of SceneMaker and relevant technologies for processing within its component modules. SceneMaker will enable the automated production of multimodal animated scenes from film and drama scripts or screenplays. SceneMaker will highlight affective or emotional content in digital storytelling with particular focus on character body posture, facial expressions, speech, non-speech audio, scene composition, timing, lighting, music and cinematography. Applications of SceneMaker include automated simulation of productions.