This paper aims to posit performers and performance (within the Western Art Music tradition) as a source of knowledge in a reconsideration of the musical work’s ontology. I argue that performance, when involving precomposed pieces, cannot be fully understood without an acknowledgement of a “relationship” between performer and work, and vice versa—that the work cannot be properly understood without serious consideration of performances. 

This polyphonic audio paper addresses the relation between master and apprentice in the music conservatoire, and gives voice to the central human and non-human agents in this context. We aim to explore the power structures that constitute a structural framework for these relations, with regard to the agency with which students shape their individual interpretations, and therefore also to the role of imitation in instrumental music teaching.

This audio paper draws on analysis of a case study within the field of artistic research. In summer 2018, the project sent poet Gunnar D. Hansson, composer Anders Hultqvist and ecological sound artists Stefan Östersjö and Halla Steinunn Stefánsdóttir on a search for the sounds of the book Tapeshavet (Hansson, 2017). The work links to the author’s Activation Series, which employs the artistic method of activation through a practice of performative responsivity to an environment. It therefore falls under the field of ecological sound art.

The term historically-informed has a long-standing association with musical performance. Indeed, for over half a century performers have been developing and describing strategies for delivering performances that are historically-informed, typically involving the use of period (or replica) instruments to present historic works, with some performers adopting performance conventions that were (ostensibly) used at the time such works were composed. There are, of course, many reasons for adopting such historically-informed performance strategies. For example, one might reason that historically-informed performances respect the composer’s intentions, or help to re-establish forgotten readings of musical texts, or even revive musical contexts, behaviours and customs that disappeared long ago. Whether these aims may be reasonably achieved, however, has been the subject of much debate among scholars, with critical notions of historical accuracy and authenticity taking centre stage.

Founded in 1892 and known as the birthplace of modern astrophysics, the Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay, Wisconsin ceased operations in 2018. That year, its mechanical technologies were captured by Coppice (Noé Cuéllar and Joseph Kramer) to draw parallels between its acoustic signatures and functions, and those of Coppice’s glossary of study since 2009.

This audio paper is produced by Salomé Voegelin and Mark Peter Wright as part of the UK research council funded project Listening Across Disciplines II. It reflects on the practice and teaching of auscultation – a medical technique for listening to the body with a stethoscope – in relation to how we know the body as a physiological and a political entity from its sound.

Et NemID er normalt noget, man modtager med posten. Ud over bunkerne af reklamer, der ryger direkte i containeren, er det lille, uundværlige nøglekort nærmest den eneste tilbageværende årsag til overhovedet at åbne sin postkasse. Som et analogt efterslæb i kølvandet på den digitale revolution klynger nøglekortet sig til et brevformat, der for længst er blevet overhalet. Derfor virker det også som et symbolsk møde med det arkaiske, når jeg nu står foran en af de karismatiske røde postkasser med mit gamle NemID i en konvolut. Denne gang som afsender og ikke modtager. At poste et brev i en offentlig postkasse føles som at åbne en sprække til fortiden, og jeg indrømmer min ærgrelse over, at jeg ikke kunne forlænge nostalgien ved at hente frimærker i kiosken.