PA6303 - 'Liveness' In Electronic Music

"Clouds" by Newton Faulkner at the London Palladium

On his The Best of Newton Faulkner… So Far tour, Newton Faulkner performed his song, “Clouds” at the London Palladium. When this song was originally released by Newton Faulkner, it was an acoustic track. While performing live, it would often solely be him and his acoustic guitar, which can be seen here:

"Clouds" by Newton Faulkner (Acoustic)

For this performance, the core of the acoustic guitar and vocals are still there. However, live electronic have now been introduced. Firstly, Newton is using reverb and echo effects on both his vocals and guitar (this is demonstrated at 01:00). Secondly, he is using his left foot to play an electronic bass drum pad, while using his right foot for a MIDI bass pedal to play a high-hat sound and low, organ like bass notes. During the introduction and the middle eight of the song, Newton uses a drum pad to play oscillating drone notes and hand claps.

One of the key uses of the electronic instrumentation is to work at the rhythm section of the song. Namely, the bass drum, high-hat and hand claps all fill this function. Rhythm is important in a song as it’s the “music component that makes us move, or even just tap the foot, when we listen to a song” (Song Academy, 2015, n.p.). The need to make the listener move is arguably more central during a live performance and without these electronics, this strong sense of rhythm wouldn’t be possible, highlighting the importance of the electronic elements, here.

The electronic elements of the performance also have an impact of the dynamics, timbre and pitch range of the song. The bass pedal, oscillating drone and bass notes all expand the dynamics of the performance. They are also increasing the range of pitch for the performance as without the electronics, it would lack bass. Though often neglected, bass instruments are “the foundation upon which the melody rests and without which there be no melody” (Murimi, 2016, n.p.), again showing the importance of the electronics. These impacts on dynamics and pitch change the timbre of the piece, with this difference displayed between this performance and the acoustic one.

There could be an argument to be made that as this performance moves away from its original, acoustic parameters, the “liveness” of the performance can be taken into question. The “liveness” of an electronic performance can be viewed in the terms of three distinctive dislocation: time, space and mechanical causality (Emmerson, 1994). The use of the drum and bass pads are a dislocation in time, as the bass drum and clap sounds are pre-recorded (i.e. they are being cued, not generated). Furthermore, there is a dislocation in space from the vocals and guitar, with the use of reverb and delay effects influencing the way the acoustic sound is heard by the audience.

However, does this really take away from the liveness of the piece? When the sixth string of a standard tuned acoustic guitar is played, the note of E is heard: one expects it to be heard. This is arguably no different to Newton hitting a pad and knowing a hand clap sound will come from it; we don’t question the liveness of the former, so why the latter? Similarly, the shape and size of a room greatly affect the reverberation of sound, and therefore how it is experienced (Cosper, 2018). The sound of a grand piano will be experienced completely differently depending on the room it is played in, yet, again, we don’t question the liveness of this. What one can take from this is that “liveness” is no longer a binary concept and must now be seen as a spectrum (Sanden, 2013).

Newton establishes his connection with the live electronics through gesture and then subsequent dislocation. Each electronic element is cued in a similar way to how a performer would play an acoustic instrument (e.g. hitting a drum, the pedalboard of an organ etc.). For example, Newton hits the drum pad and then the oscillating drone sound continuously plays until he hits another pad. With this being said, it could be said that Newton is blurring the lines with what can be referred to as the instrument model. Imogen Heap made use of the instrument model with her Mi.Mu gloves, which create sound through movement of the body (Heap, 2015). Though not quite what Newton is doing, he is using all four of his limbs, along with his voice, to create his performance; this could be seen as a form of mechanical causality (Emerson, 1994).

Imogen Heap, Mi.Mu gloves TED Talk

During the middle eight of the performance, Newton splits the audience into sections in order to sing a musical round. Phillip Auslander theorises that much of live music is mediatised as many people’s experience of a performance will come from “read[ing] it off a video monitor” (1999, p.24). By involving the audience in this way, Newton breaks any over-arching experience of mediatisation as the audience is a part of the performance, itself. Nevertheless, this isn’t to say there is no mediatisation, at all. The audience member who recorded this performance on their phone is experiencing it through their electronic device. Furthermore, the aforementioned pre-recorded sounds of the electronic elements could lead some to claim that these sounds are, inherently, mediatised.

Newton Faulkner encapsulates the concept of live music being a spectrum. He has grown from a man and his guitar to a full blown, electronic one man band, yet the aura of the music stays the same. Sat behind all his electronics, there is no doubt that Newton creates at atmospheric, impactful live performance.

References

Auslander, P. (1999) Liveness: Performance in a Mediatized Culture. 1st edition. London: Routledge.

Cosper, A. (2018) sciencing.com: How Does the Shape of a Room Affect Reverberation Time? [online]. Available at: https://sciencing.com/how-does-5200731-shape-room-affect-reverberation-time-.html. [Accessed on: 24/11/19].

Emmerson, S. (1994) ‘Timbre Composition in Electronic Music’, Contemporary Music Review, vol. 10, no. 2, pp. 1-240.

Heap, I. (2015) youtube.com: Sculpting music with Mi.Mu gloves [online]. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oeEQhOmGpg. [Accessed on: 24/11/19].

Murimi, E. (2016) merriammusic.com: The Scientifically Proven Importance of Bass in Musical Performances [online]. Available at: https://www.merriammusic.com/school-of-music/importance-of-bass-in-performances/. [Accessed on: 24/11/19].

Sanden, P. (2013) Liveness in Modern Music. 1st edition. London: Routlage.

Song Academy. (2015) songacademy.co.uk: Rhythm… why so important? [online]. Available at: https://www.songacademy.co.uk/rhythm-important/. [Accessed on: 24/11/19].