Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-vpsfw Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-16T10:41:16.845Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Feeling Blend: Feeling and emotion in electroacoustic art

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 June 2014

Gary S. Kendall
Gary S. Kendall*
Affiliation:
Artillerigatan 40, Stockholm, Sweden
*
E-mail: garyskendall@me.com
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Starting from the assumption that meaning in electroacoustic music is an outcome of the listener's mental processes, it is the goal of this essay to explicate the mental processes whereby feeling and emotion contribute to meaning when listening to electroacoustic music. This essay begins with a broad consideration of feeling and emotion with an eye toward artistic experience, spanning from basic emotions to nuanced phenomenal qualities. It then introduces the concept of mental layers in support of the multi-levelled nature of meaning, especially in this case, meaning that is felt as well as comprehended. These two preliminary topics precede the introduction of the feeling blend, an extension of blend theory as presented by Fauconnier and Turner (2002). Core issues for blend theory, such as what constitutes a mental space and what triggers a blend, are reconsidered in the light of practical examples from the literature of electroacoustic music. In conclusion, the feeling blend is proposed as an essential concept to understanding artistic experience and an intrinsic aspect of being human.

Type
Articles
Information
Organised Sound , Volume 19 , Special Issue 2: The Sound of Cultures , August 2014 , pp. 192 - 202
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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.)

References

References

Arnold, M.B. 1960. Emotion and Personality. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Bharucha, J.J., Curtis, M. 2008. Affective Spectra, Synchronization, and Motion: Aspects of the Emotional Response to Music. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 31(5).Google Scholar
Born, G. 1995. Rationalizing Culture: IRCAM, Boulez, and the Institutionalization of the Musical Avant-Garde. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Brandt, P.A. 2004. Spaces, Domains, and Meaning: Essays in Cognitive Semiotics. European Semiotics: Language, Cognition, and Culture, vol. 4. Bern: Peter Long.Google Scholar
Brandt, P.A. 2006. Form and Meaning in Art. In M. Turner (ed.), The Artful Mind: Cognitive Science and the Riddle of Human Creativity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Bregman, A. 1990. Auditory Scene Analysis: The Perceptual Organization of Sound. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Damasio, A. 2000. The Feeling of What Happens. London: Vintage Books.Google Scholar
Deacon, T. 2006. The Aesthetic Faculty. In M. Turner (ed.), The Artful Mind: Cognitive Science and the Riddle of Human Creativity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dirks, P.L. 2012. An Analysis of Jonathan Harvey's ‘Mortuos Plango, Vivos Voco’, http://cec.sonus.ca/econtact/9_2/dirks.html (accessed on 3 January 2013).Google Scholar
Ekman, P. 1994. Strong Evidence for Universals in Facial Expressions: A Reply to Russell's Mistaken Critique. Psychological Bulletin 115.Google Scholar
Ekman, P., Friesen, W.V., Ellsworth, P. 1972. Emotion in the Human Face. New York: Pergamon.Google Scholar
Fauconnier, G. 1994. Mental Spaces: Aspects of Meaning Construction in Natural Language. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Fauconnier, G., Turner, M. 2002. The Way We Think: Conceptual Blending and the Mind's Hidden Complexities. New York: Basic Books.
Frijda, N.H. 1999. Emotions and Hedonic Experience. In D. Kahneman, E. Diener and N. Schwarz (eds.), Well-Being: The Foundations of Hedonic Psychology. New York: Sage.Google Scholar
Harvey, J. 1981. Mortuos Plango, Vivos Voco: A Realization at IRCAM. Computer Music Journal 5(4).Google Scholar
Hodges, D. 2010. Psychophysiological Measures. In P.N. Juslin and J.A. Sloboda (eds.) Handbook of Music and Emotion: Theory, Research, Applications. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Huron, D. 2006. Sweet Anticipation: Music and the Psychology of Expectation. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Johnson, M. 1987. The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination, and Reason. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Juslin, P. 2009. Music and Emotion: Seven Questions, Seven Answers. In I. Deliège and J. Davidson (eds.), Music and the Mind: Investigating the Functions and Processes of Music. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kendall, G. 2006. Juxtaposition and Non-Motion: Varèse Bridges Early Modernism to Electroacoustic Music. Organised Sound 11(2).Google Scholar
Kendall, G. 2008. What is an Event? The Event Schema, Circumstances, Metaphor and Gist. Proceedings of the 2008 International Computer Music Conference. Belfast: ICMA.Google Scholar
Kendall, G. 2010. Meaning in Electroacoustic Music and the Everyday Mind. Organised Sound 13(1).Google Scholar
Kendall, G. 2014. Listening and Meaning: How a Model of Mental Layers Informs Electroaoustic Analysis. In Simon Emmerson and Leigh Landy (eds.), Expanding the Horizons of Electroacoustic Music Analysis. Forthcoming.Google Scholar
Koestler, A. 1964. The Act of Creation. New York: Penguin Books.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. 1987. Women, Fire and Dangerous Things. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G., Johnson, M. 1999. Philosophy in the Flesh. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Lang, P.J., Bradley, M.M., Cuthbert, M.M. 1997. Motivated Attention: Affect, Activation and Action. In P.J. Lang, R.F. Simons and M.T. Balaban (eds.), Attention and Orienting: Sensory and Motivational Processes. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
LeDoux, J. 1998. The Emotional Brain. London: Orion Books.Google Scholar
Meyer, L. 1956. Emotion and Meaning in Music. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Plutchik, R. 1980. Emotion: A Psychoevolutionary Synthesis. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Pöppel, E. 1997. A Hierarchical Model of Temporal Perception. Trends in Cognitive Science 1(2).Google Scholar
Pöppel, E. 1998. Mindworks: Time and Conscious Experience. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.Google Scholar
Prinz, J.J. 2004. Gut Reactions: A Perceptual Theory of Emotion. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Smalley, D. 1986. Spectromorphology and Structuring Processes. In S. Emmerson (ed.), The Language of Electroacoustic Music. Basingstoke: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Tomkins, S.S. 1962. Affect, Imagery, Consciousness. New York: Springer.Google Scholar
Turner, M. 2006. The Art of Compression. In M. Turner (ed.), The Artful Mind: Cognitive Science and the Riddle of Human Creativity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Zbikowski, L. 2002. Conceptualizing Music: Cognitive Structure, Theory, and Analysis. AMS Studies in Music. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar

Discography

Dhomont, F. 1989. Novars. On Les dérives du signe. Montreal: Empreintes Digitales, IMED-9608-CD, 1996.Google Scholar
Ferrari, L. 1977. Presque rien no. 2. On presque rien. Paris: INA/GRM, INA C 2008 275482, 1995.Google Scholar
Harvey, J. 1981. Mortuos Plango, Vivos Voco. On Computer Music Currents 5, Wergo, WER 2025-2, 1990.Google Scholar
Lucier, A. 1990. I am sitting in a room. Lovely Music, Ltd., CD 1013.Google Scholar
Schaeffer, P. 1958. Étude aux allures. On Pierre Schaeffer: L’Œuvre Musicale. Paris: INA-GRM, Ina G 6027/6029.Google Scholar
Smalley, D. 1974. Pentes. On Sources/Scenes. Montreal: Empreintes Digitales, IMED-0054-CD, 2000.Google Scholar
Truax, B. 1980. Riverrun. On Digital Soundscapes. Burnaby, CA: Cambridge Street Records, CSR-CD 8701, 1986.Google Scholar
Varèse, E. 1957–8. Poème électronique. On Varèse: The Complete Works. New York: London, 289 460 208-2, 1998.Google Scholar