Spatial music is composed music that intentionally exploits

sound localization Sound localization is a listener's ability to identify the location or origin of a detected sound in direction and distance. The sound localization mechanisms of the mammalian auditory system have been extensively studied. The auditory system us ...

. Though present in Western music from biblical times in the form of the

antiphon An antiphon ( Greek ἀντίφωνον, ἀντί "opposite" and φωνή "voice") is a short chant in Christian ritual, sung as a refrain. The texts of antiphons are the Psalms. Their form was favored by St Ambrose and they feature prominentl ...

, as a component specific to new musical techniques the concept of spatial music (''Raummusik'', usually translated as " space music") was introduced as early as 1928 in Germany. The term ''spatialisation'' is connected especially with electroacoustic music to denote the projection and localization of sound sources in physical or virtual space or sound's spatial movement in space.

Context

The term "spatial music" indicates music in which the location and movement of sound sources is a primary compositional parameter and a central feature for the listener. It may involve a single, mobile sound source, or multiple, simultaneous, stationary or mobile sound events in different locations. There are at least three distinct categories when plural events are treated spatially: #essentially independent events separated in

space Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in which objects and events have relative position and direction. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually cons ...

, like simultaneous

concert A concert is a live music performance in front of an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, choir, or band. Concerts are held in a wide variet ...

s, each with a strong signaling character #one or several such signaling events, separated from more "passive" reverberating background complexes #separated but coordinated performing groups.

Examples

Examples of spatiality include more than seventy works by

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina ( – 2 February 1594) was an Italian composer of late Renaissance music. The central representative of the Roman School, with Orlande de Lassus and Tomás Luis de Victoria, Palestrina is considered the leading ...

(canticles, litanies, masses, Marian antiphons, psalm- and sequence-motets), the five-choir, forty- and sixty-voice ''

Missa sopra Ecco sì beato giorno The ''Missa sopra Ecco sì beato giorno'' is a musical setting of the Ordinary of the Mass, for 40 and 60 voices, by Florentine Renaissance composer Alessandro Striggio. It probably dates from 1565–6, during the reign of his employer, Cosimo I ...

'' by

Alessandro Striggio Alessandro Striggio (c. 1536/1537 – 29 February 1592) was an Italian composer, instrumentalist and diplomat of the Renaissance. He composed numerous madrigals as well as dramatic music, and by combining the two, became the inventor of madrigal c ...

and the possibly related eight-choir, forty-voice motet ''

Spem in alium ''Spem in alium'' (Latin for "Hope in any other") is a 40-part Renaissance motet by Thomas Tallis, composed in c. 1570 for eight choirs of five voices each. It is considered by some critics to be the greatest piece of English early music. H. B. ...

'' by

Thomas Tallis Thomas Tallis (23 November 1585; also Tallys or Talles) was an English composer of High Renaissance music. His compositions are primarily vocal, and he occupies a primary place in anthologies of English choral music. Tallis is considered one ...

, as well as a number of other Italian—mainly Florentine—works dating between 1557 and 1601. Notable 20th-century spatial compositions include Charles Ives's Fourth Symphony (1912–18),

Rued Langgaard Rued Langgaard (; born Rud Immanuel Langgaard; 28 July 1893 – 10 July 1952) was a late-Romantic Danish composer and organist. His then-unconventional music was at odds with that of his Danish contemporaries but was recognized 16 years afte ...

's ''Music of the Spheres'' (1916–18), Edgard Varèse's ''

Poème électronique ''Poème électronique'' (English Translation: "Electronic Poem") is an 8-minute piece of electronic music by composer Edgard Varèse, written for the Philips Pavilion at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair. The Philips corporation commissioned L ...

'' (

Expo '58 Expo 58, also known as the 1958 Brussels World's Fair (french: Exposition Universelle et Internationale de Bruxelles de 1958, nl, Brusselse Wereldtentoonstelling van 1958), was a world's fair held on the Heysel/Heizel Plateau in Brussels, Bel ...

Henryk Górecki Henryk Mikołaj Górecki ( , ; 6 December 1933 – 12 November 2010) was a Polish composer of contemporary classical music. According to critic Alex Ross, no recent classical composer has had as much commercial success as Górecki. He became a l ...

's ''Scontri'', op. 17 (1960), which unleashes a volume of sound with a "tremendous orchestra" for which the composer precisely dictates the placement of each player onstage, including fifty-two percussion instruments,

Karlheinz Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th-century classical music, 20th and early 21st-century ...

's '' Helicopter String Quartet'' (1992–93/95), which is "arguably the most extreme experiment involving the spatial motility of live performers", and

Henry Brant Henry Dreyfuss Brant (September 15, 1913 – April 26, 2008) was a Canadian-born American composer. An expert orchestrator with a flair for experimentation, many of Brant's works featured spatialization techniques. Biography Brant was born i ...

's ''

Ice Field An ice field (also spelled icefield) is a mass of interconnected valley glaciers (also called mountain glaciers or alpine glaciers) on a mountain mass with protruding rock ridges or summits. They are often found in the colder climates and highe ...

'', a "'spatial narrative,'" or "spatial organ concerto," awarded the 2002

Pulitzer Prize for Music The Pulitzer Prize for Music is one of seven Pulitzer Prizes awarded annually in Letters, Drama, and Music. It was first given in 1943. Joseph Pulitzer arranged for a music scholarship to be awarded each year, and this was eventually converted ...

, as well as most of the output after 1960 of

Luigi Nono Luigi Nono (; 29 January 1924 – 8 May 1990) was an Italian avant-garde composer of classical music. Biography Early years Nono, born in Venice, was a member of a wealthy artistic family; his grandfather was a notable painter. Nono beg ...

, whose late works—e.g., '' ... sofferte onde serene ...'' (1976), '' Al gran sole carico d'amore'' (1972–77), '' Prometeo'' (1984), and ''A Pierre: Dell'azzurro silenzio, inquietuum'' (1985)—explicitly reflect the spatial soundscape of his native Venice, and cannot be performed without their spatial component. Technological developments have led to broader distribution of spatial music via smartphones since at least 2011, to include sounds experienced via Global Positioning System localization (BLUEBRAIN, Matmos, others) and visual inertial odometry through augmented reality (TCW, others).

Sources

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Elliott Schwartz Elliott Shelling Schwartz (January 19, 1936 – December 7, 2016) was an American composer. A graduate of Columbia University, he was Beckwith Professor Emeritus of music at Bowdoin College joining the faculty in 1964. In 2006, the Library of ...

and Barney Childs, with Jim Fox, 221–242. Da Capo Press Music Reprint Series. New York: Da Capo Press. * * Copps, Will.
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Journal of New Music Research ''Journal of New Music Research'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal covering research on musicology (including music theory), philosophy, psychology, acoustics, computer science, engineering, and other disciplines. Articles deal with theory, ...

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Leonardo Leonardo is a masculine given name, the Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese equivalent of the English, German, and Dutch name, Leonard Leonard or ''Leo'' is a common English masculine given name and a surname. The given name and surname originate ...

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Music Educators Journal The ''Music Educators Journal'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal that covers in the field of education. The editor-in-chief is Ella Wilcox, and the Academic Editor is Corin Overland (University of Miami). It was established in 1914 an ...

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Archiv für Musikwissenschaft The ''Archiv für Musikwissenschaft'' is a quarterly German-English-speaking trade magazine devoted to music history and historical musicology, which publishes articles by well-known academics and young scholars. It was founded in 1918 as the s ...

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Christoph von Blumröder Christoph von Blumröder (born 18 July 1951) is a German musicologist. Career Born in Northeim, Blumröder studied musicology at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg in Breisgau with Hans Heinrich Eggebrecht, philosophy and history of the . ...

, 26–39. Signale aus Köln: Musik der Zeit 3. Saarbrücken: Pfau-Verlag. . * Solōmos, Makīs. 1998. "Notes sur la spatialisation de la musique et l'émergence du son". In ''Le son et l'espace'', edited by Hugues Genevois, 105–125. Musique et Sciences. Lyon: Aléas. . * Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1957. "Musik im Raum". '' Die Reihe'' 5 ("Berichte—Analyse"): 59–73. Reprinted in his ''Texte zur Musik'' 1, edited by Dieter Schnebel, 152–175. Excerpt reprinted under the same title in ''Darmstädter Beiträge zur Neuen Musik'' 2, 30–35. Mainz: Schott, 1959. English version, as "Music in Space", translated by Ruth Koenig. ''Die Reihe'' 5 ("Reports—Analyses", 1961): 67–82. * Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 2000. "Neue Raum-Musik: ''Oktophonie''", transcribed by Michael Öhler. In ''Komposition und Musikwissenschaft im Dialog I (1997–1998)'', edited by Imke Misch and

, 60–77. Signale aus Köln: Musik der Zeit 3. Saarbrücken: Pfau-Verlag. . * Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 2009. ''Kompositorische Grundlage Neuer Musik: sechs Seminare für die Darmstädter Ferienkurse 1970'', edited by Imke Misch. Kürten: Stockhausen-Stiftung für Musik. . * Sykes, Debra. 1996. "Henry Brant and His Music: Spatialman". ''

Musicworks ''Musicworks'' is a Canadian avant-garde music magazine, launched in January 1978 by Andrew Timar (editor-in-chief) and John Oswald (design and production). History The first 4 issues came as a supplement to ''Only Paper Today'', a Toronto ar ...

: Explorations in Sound'', no. 64 (Spring): 42–48. * Teruggi, Daniel. 2007. "Technology and Musique Concrete: The Technical Developments of the Groupe de Recherches Musicales and Their Implication in Musical Composition". ''

Organised Sound ''Organised Sound'' is an international peer-reviewed academic journal which focuses on the rapidly developing methods and issues arising from the use of technology in music today. Background Published three times a year, it concentrates upon t ...

'' 12, no. 3:213–231. * Thigpen, Ben.
Spatialization Without Panning
" '' eContact! 11.4 — Toronto Electroacoustic Symposium 2009 (TES) / Symposium Électroacoustique 2009 de Toronto'' (December 2009). Montréal: CEC. * Trochimczyk, Maja. 2001. "From Circles to Nets: On the Signification of Spatial Sound Imagery in New Music". '' Computer Music Journal'' 25, no. 4 (Winter): 39–56. * Winckel, Fritz. 1968. "Elektroakustische Musik—Raummusik—Kybernetische Musik". ''Beiträge der Österreichischen Gesellschaft für Musik'' 1:72-79. * . 1961. "Current Chronicle: Germany". ''

The Musical Quarterly ''The Musical Quarterly'' is the oldest academic journal on music in America. Originally established in 1915 by Oscar Sonneck, the journal was edited by Sonneck until his death in 1928. Sonneck was succeeded by a number of editors, including Ca ...

'' 47, no. 2 (April): 243–247. * Zelli, Bijan.
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" '' eContact! 11.4 — Toronto Electroacoustic Symposium 2009 (TES) / Symposium Électroacoustique 2009 de Toronto'' (December 2009). Montréal: CEC. * Zvonar, Richard.
An Extremely Brief History of Spatial Music in the 20th Century
" ''eContact! 7.4 — Diffusion multi-canal / Multichannel diffusion'' (May 2005). Montréal: CEC. {{div col end

External links

* García Karman, Gregorio. 5 October 2007.
Studio Report:
Spatialization of Karlheinz Stockhausen's ''

Cosmic Pulses ''Cosmic Pulses'' is the last electronic composition by Karlheinz Stockhausen, and it is number 93 in his catalog of works. Its duration is 32 minutes. The piece has been described as "a sonic roller coaster", "a Copernican asylum", and a "tornado ...

''". (accessed 4 April 2014). Electronic music Vocal music

Context

Examples

See also

Sources

Further reading

External links