Colloquium - Presenters

ABSTRACT

Since Christopher Small’s musicking gained major traction in 1998 with the publication of Musicking: the Meanings of Performing and Listening, a wide variety of researchers have built upon his ideas from musicological, ethnomusicological, and interdisciplinary perspectives. However, as David Borgo pointed out in 2007, Small’s confusing use of similar verbiage to describe multiple phenomena and lack of acknowledgement of further-flung networks has left musicking practically inaccessible to many. To complicate matters further, while musicking as a term remains omnipresent across a variety of interdisciplinary literatures today, many writers simultaneously, knowingly or unknowingly, rely on conflicting definitions on a regular basis.

By examining and presenting my own compositional and musical practice through the lens of an updated musicking, and elaborating upon Small’s theories by connecting them with relevant contemporary literature from subjects including philosophies of music and action, Bakhtinian studies, and communication studies, I show the foundational role that individual intention may play in the social activity of music. Furthermore, I outline what my findings, reached by way of analytical and creative research, ultimately imply about the vastness of the creative enterprise; the rationale of working outside, between, or within numerous different disciplines and subjects; and the unity that may be found between variable artistic practices.  

 

KEYWORDS

Musicking, Intention, Ontology of music, Embodiment, Interdisciplinary

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BIO
Tristan Zaba is a musicologist, composer, performer, and production worker in the music PhD programme at York University. He holds degrees in composition from the Universities of Toronto and Manitoba. Zaba’s work has been published in The Lovecraft Annual and his compositions have been heard throughout North America and Europe.