Figure 1: The left side of the model describes the different phases of analysis, composition, staging and performance in the creation of the work. These phases should not be understood as a linear process from score analysis to performance; rather the creative work was characterised by iterative cycles of these four phases. The right side describes a work informed by data registration of a multimodal recording, addressed in Visi et al. 2024. Graphical model © Frödin & Unander-Scharin.
Experimental phenomenology and perspective variation as artistic method
Ihde’s phenomenological investigations focus on structures that shape perception, and his experimental phenomenology is an investigative science in which both experiential and thought experiments are important components (1986). The phenomenological investigation not only examines the object or phenomenon perceived, but also directs its attention to how it is perceived. What is noticed in a situation is not given in advance. Through different perspectives we can observe and emphasise different aspects and qualities of a phenomenon. The ability to shift between several perspectives means that we can observe, analyse, and describe the world and phenomena in the world in a variety of different ways. The inherent theory of different perspectives shapes our perception and becomes normative for what is possible to perceive in a certain situation (Unander-Scharin, 2008). Ihde's experimental phenomenology is interested in exploring the multiplicity of perspectives – the multistability of reality that makes man and the world appear to us in different ways (1993). Experimental phenomenology's call to constantly search for and explore further perspectives is the driving force that characterises our research on bodies, movement and sound in choreomusical work and processes (Unander-Scharin 2008, 2009, 2011, Unander-Scharin & Unander-Scharin, 2016; Eriksson et al. 2019). As Ihde notes, “the arts, unlike the noematic and noetic sciences, exercise intentionality itself as variational. There is a playfulness in art deeply related to phenomenological playfulness, and it is possible to see the practice of the artist as latently phenomenological from the outset” (Ihde, 1986, p.148).
When composing and staging Fragmente2, we have constantly moved our attention between different perspectives on the musical and choreographic objects and their interaction. The choreomusical objects and interactions are understood as multistable phenomena that we need to approach from different perspectives (Ihde, 2002; Unander-Scharin, 2008). To elaborate the artistic materials and interaction we have used score analysis, choreography scripts (see column C in "Perspective variation"), metaphorical descriptions (column A), movement annotated scores (column B) and video analysis of recordings. Analysis of video-recorded performances has constantly been an important tool to identify things that need to be further refined and clarified in our performance of Fragmente2.
In thought experiments and bodily fantasies, we can relate to our body as a multitude of separate parts (Unander-Scharin, 2008). The body is then no longer perceived as a whole. The organisation of the parts of the body is not given once and for all. Biology's and various culturally sedimented images of the body can always be questioned (Ihde, 2002). In the design of choreographic materials and methods, the way of dividing and organising gestures and movements can be varied and reshaped. The habits of our body intrude, and we must actively break with them to create and embody something different. The diversity of aspects means that we will never exhaustively cover all potential perspectives, since new theories and technologies will always offer new perspectives.
Introduction
This exposition presents Fragmente2 (2021) a choreomusical work created and performed by musician Kerstin Frödin and choreographer-dancer Åsa Unander-Scharin. The basis for our work is the Japanese avant-garde composer Makoto Shinohara's solo piece Fragmente (1968) for tenor recorder. The aim is to develop and explore methods for composing and performing a contrapuntal choreomusical work where dance and music interact as equal parts. Both performers are fully choreographed and interact through a series of 17 short fragments.
Choreomusicology is a relatively young field of research that has emerged from Euro-American traditions of musicology and performance studies concerned with studying the relationship between music and dance in artistic works (Damsholt, 1999; Jordan, 2011; Mason; 2012). While choreomusicology analyses relationships between music and dance in different performances, our project concerns the artistic processes of composing, staging and performing a choreomusical work.
Fragmente2 is situated in the tradition of Western theatre dance where dance and music are considered independent art forms and where the relationship between them is consciously composed. In the early 20th century, a series of collaborations between composers and choreographers resulted in artistic works that show a rich and dense relationship such as Vaslav Nijinsky’s ballets choreographed in detail to Igor Stravinsky’s scores. In the 1950s Merce Cunningham and John Cage adopted a novel approach where music and dance are created separately to be performed in parallel so that the relationship between them emerges in the moment of performance. Today, the development of interactive technology opens up new possibilities where dancers' gestures and movements digitally create sounds and shape the music (Schacher & Neff 2016; Siegel, 2012; Unander-Scharin, 2009, 2011, 2022a, 2022b). However, the most common situation for Western dance performances of today involves dancers performing live to music played from a fixed medium.
A contemporary reference for our work is the choreographer Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker’s sharply developed interactions between dance and music in live performance. Her Rosas danst Rosas (1983, film version 1997) is a minimalistic work based on abstract movements that constitute a layered choreographic structure in which repetition plays a lead role. The exhaustion and perseverance generated by the repetitive movements create an emotional tension that contrasts sharply with the rigorous structure of the choreography. The repetitive music composed by Thierry De Mey and Peter Vermeersch was developed in parallel with the choreography. In Vortex Temporum (2013), De Keersmaeker creates a danced counterpoint for seven dancers based on Gérard Grisey's polyphonic music of the same name. Here she explores how to visualise polyphony by dancing it. The choreographic staging consists of an intricate interweaving of sound and movement where each dancer is linked to one of the seven musicians and colours their dance with movement patterns adapted to the instrument (Rosas).
Thierry De Mey’s Musique de table (1987) is a detailed and elaborate work for three percussionists where hand gestures and sounds are intertwined into a choreomusical performance. The percussionists each have a small table as their only instrument and De Mey describes in an interview how the piece:
'...is constructed as a baroque suite, with an overture, rondo, fugato, galop, recapitulation and coda. The whole rhythmic counterpoint uses a limited number of figures that are described precisely, but metaphorically as well, to the performers: both musicians/dancers […] in this piece, I was already using, more or less wildly, the notion of “rhythmic imprint” : I would replace the silences in a given figure with beats and vice versa, to create complementary rhythms that each hinted at the other.' (Plouvier, 2001, n.p.)
Musique de table approaches the delicate border between music and gestures, where the visual and choreographic aspect is in perfect balance with the sound and musicality of the performance.
With a background in Jaques-Dalcroze’s eurythmics, choreographer Susanne Jaresand is deeply committed to a detailed and elaborate relationship between music and dance. She emphasises the importance of listening and deciding what function and relationship the music will have to the dance. Should the music be a carpet of sound, a creator of a mood, an atmosphere or should it clarify or enhance the dance expression? In her article on Beauty/Schönheit/Skönhet (2014), she describes how the music shifted between being a counter voice for the choreographer to frame the dance and being a counter voice performed to a pre-choreographed dance (Jaresand & Calissendorff, 2018). The way she brought forth the listening stance was to let a composer write music to a dance that she had choreographed in silence.
Fragmente2 has been developed in a collaboration between a musician (not a composer) and a choreographer-dancer. The interaction takes place between the physical bodies and sounds of both the musician and the dancer. Both the dancer and the musician are fully choreographed and thus turned into choreomusical performers. The choreomusical relationships are multi-layered and arise within the performers, as well as between them.
In the collaborative artistic process, we needed to constantly shift between different perspectives on the musical and choreographic materials and the relationships between them. Don Ihde's experimental phenomenology proved to be an approach that we could transform into artistic methods that helped us analyse and explore different aspects of our choreomusical materials and interaction concepts (1986).
In addition to Ihde's experimental phenomenology (1986, 2002), we have used Maurice Merleau-Ponty's distinction between abstract and concrete movements (1945/2002), Pierre Schaeffer's musical objects (1966/2017), and our own concept of choreographic objects to understand and address the choreomusical elements. To jointly analyse and evaluate different interaction concepts we used video recordings, annotated scores, choreography scripts, movement instructions, personal reflections, and metaphorical descriptions of the 17 fragments. The different documentary formats provided us with perspectives that highlight and clarify different aspects of the choreomusical objects and interaction concepts, enabling us to shift between first, second and third person perspectives – zoom in and zoom out, discuss and refine our articulation in performance (see Figure 1).
In Phenomenology of Perception (2002) Maurice Merleau-Ponty makes a distinction between a concrete and an abstract approach to the movement of one's own body. The background of the concrete movement is the given world, while the background of the abstract movement is constructed. The concrete movements are directed towards the world and the goal is what the movement achieves: as for example when we point out a direction, turn our head to listen or grab a glass to bring it to our mouth and drink. Intuitively, the body knows what to do to reach the goal. Without us thinking about it, the hand reads the weight and hardness of the glass so that we don't drop it. The interaction with the eye and the mouth causes the hand and arm to angle the glass so that a steady stream of water flows in without us having to be aware of the angle of the glass or the opening of the mouth. In the concrete movements, we do not need to control the body parts to succeed - my decision and my body relate mysteriously to each other. In the concrete movements, the body becomes one with the goal and intention of the movement. We don't have to lead the body to its end point – we can concentrate on the end point itself.
While the body in the concrete movement is the carrier of the movement, in the abstract movement it is itself the goal. The movement instruction is then aimed at the body and its parts to perform the movement. The abstract movement implies a different possibility of moving our body, a different modality, than the concrete one. With this possibility, we can consciously calculate and more directly control the different parts of the body. The image of the concrete movement causes the body to indirectly carry out the coordination of body parts required to perform the action without us having to make ourselves aware of all the parts. We perceive the concrete movement as a movement with an end point, while the abstract is perceived as a number of sub-movements.
With the two methods, we can perform largely the same movement - the same physically measurable movement - but the approach and perception of the movement differ radically. The concrete grasping of the glass in the example above could also be performed as an abstract series of hand, finger, lower and upper arm movements; a bending of the forearm against the upper arm which is simultaneously lifted, the fingers opening, the upper and lower arm extending straight forward and the fingers folding around the glass. As an abstract movement, we can continue to break down and bring to consciousness more and more sub-moments – an infinite number of sub-moments. All attention is then directed to the body itself. Merleau-Ponty describes how he can initiate and curiously observe this strange sign machine that cancels the anchoring of movement in the given world: the abstract movement superimposes a virtual or human space on top of the physical space.
Choreographic work involves the creation and processing of gestures and movement that in the early phases are approached as abstract bodily movements - as a coordination of parts. What was initially designed or analysed as sub-elements is then gradually joined into ever larger wholes. In the choreographic work, we switch between abstractly breaking down and constructing the coordination of body parts, and performing the movement as a whole - a concretely given choreographic form. The abstract analysis is a prerequisite for being able to specify the articulation of details. We cannot consciously manage all the details at once but must pay attention to one or a few aspects at a time. In the later phases, our focus turns the abstractly constructed movement into a movement that we can intuitively grasp as a concrete movement. We then have access to and can perform the movement with as clear an intention as a concrete gesture. The abstractly constructed movement has then become a concrete movement for the performer (Unander-Scharin, 2008).
Figure 3: Still images from each of the 17 fragments are arranged clockwise in the figure, starting at 12:00. As can be seen, some fragments are closely linked (e.g. F1– F5 – F8) while others are more independent (e.g. F2 and F6).
Figure 2: Kerstin Frödin and Åsa Unander-Scharin in the exibition space Färgfabriken, Stockholm, 2021. Photo credit: Patrik Eriksson
Choreomusical objects
Throughout this project, we have considered a multimodal perspective of embodied gestural and sounding objects, which are perceived directly, or activated through modi such as memory, fantasy, imagination, and metaphor. This idea was initially inspired by the concept of objects as described by the French composer, theorist and researcher Pierre Schaeffer (1910–1995) and his collaborators at the Groupe de Recherches Musicales (GRM) founded in 1958. Their research focused on the perception of musical sounds and was guided by the method of repeatedly listening to fragments of sound, so-called sonic objects, and depicting what is heard. The main criterion of a sonic object was that it could be perceived holistically as a coherent and meaningful unit, typically lasting 0.5–5 seconds. However, sonic objects that constitute artistic material in music, are by Schaeffer labelled musical objects and may consist in units such as a single note, a complex chord, a glissando or a rapidly played group of notes (Schaeffer, 2017).
In Rolf-Inge Godøy’s more recent research on sonic objects, he adopts a multimodal perspective on perception of sound by also considering the inner imagination of bodily gestures as an aspect of musical perception. What we actually do when we perceive music, Godøy argues, is to “recode musical sound into multimodal gestural-sonorous images” based on imagages of bodily gestures (2006, p. 149). The features of a sonic object often evolve or have various characteristics, and such an object could therefore, according to Godøy, rather be called a gestural sonic object.
The method of dividing the artistic materials of the two performers into smaller units has been crucial for developing the intertwined whole of the work. In our work we use the concepts of musical objects and choreographic objects to analyse and elaborate the choreomusical interaction. In Fragmente2, we concider the sounds produced by the musician as well as the sounds produced by the moving bodies, such as hand claps and steps, as musical objects. Furthermore, the physical gestures and movements of both performers are divided into choreographic objects.
Metaphors
Our collaborative approach has also been based on and developed through a shared metaphorical foundation on different levels; to name and specify musical and choreographic objects, to jointly elaborate different interactions, to create a common understanding of what artistic qualities and expressions we want to achieve in each fragment. Hence, metaphors have served to connect musical and physical rhythms and gestures and to develop the performers' intercorporeal relationships. This kind of correspondence across modal and domain boundaries is referred to as metaphorical mapping.
A central theoretical framework for such processes is George Lakoff's and Mark Johnson's (1980) conceptual metaphors linking cognitive, physical, bodily and language structures. Their studies of metaphors have since then been highly influential and expanded in cognitive science.
Our collaborative work with bodies and sound in physical space involves a staging of metaphors. Further, to elaborate the choreomusical material and interaction, Johnson's (1987/1990) concepts of image schemas have been useful, as well as his concept of force structures such as compulsion, counterforce, diversion, and attraction in order to sharpen the articulation of our performance of music, gestures and movements.
Shinohara, Fragmente and Fragmente2
Makoto Shinohara (b. 1931) belongs to the first generation of Japanese composers who engaged with the European avant-garde movement, with particular interest in electronic music and musique concrète. In Europe, Shinohara studied in Paris with, among others, Pierre Schaeffer and Olivier Messiaen, and later in Cologne with Gottfried Michael Koening and Karlheinz Stockhausen who also engaged Shinohara as his assistant between 1964–1966. Shinohara also worked at the Siemens studio in Munich and at the Institute of Sinology in Utrecht.
His Fragmente (1968) for tenor recorder is an open form composition consisting of 14 short fragments with a total duration of about eight minutes. Although it is an acoustic work, Shinohara is in this piece clearly inspired by the new technologies of the time. The use of extended techniques (unconventional playing techniques) on the recorder is central and allows for structures built on the transformation of sound, rather than on pitch. In the piece, the materiality of the tenor recorder is explored through a wide range of expressions from aggressive sound explosions to soft glissandi and strong high-pitched sounds. Apart from a few limitations set by the composer, it is up to the performer to organise the order of the 14 fragments, during or prior to the performance.
In our staged version of Fragmente, not only musical aspects but also choreographic and spatial perspectives have been crucial in determining the order of the fragments. Further, in Fragmente2, we have added three movement-based fragments to this series which are performed in relative silence (FX, FY, FZ) and which, like Shinohara’s fragments, vary in length, execution and expression. The 17 fragments (14 + 3) are distributed in the following sequence: FX – F1 – F5 – F8 – F2 – F6 – F11 – F9 – F12 – F3 – F13 – FY – F10 – F4 – F7 – F14 – FZ.
Figure 4: Layers of interaction between gesture, movement and sound. © Frödin & Unander-Scharin, 2024.
Layers of choreomusical interaction
Figure 4 below shows the different layers of choreomusical interaction that take place both within each artist individually and in interaction with each other. In Figure 4, we have separated the performers' upper body gestures from the lower body movements and spatial locomotions. The arrows are marked with numbers indicating the overall order in which we have worked out the choreographic materials and the interactions.
With a few exceptions, the musician's upper body gestures (arrow 1) are not choreographed but are intrinsic to the score and the musical interpretation. In Western theatre dance, musical rhythm and form have traditionally served as a point of contact and base upon which choreography is built. Concequently the relationship between music and choreography is often discussed in terms of how the dancers' movements relate to the music score and the sounding music (green arrow 3) (Damsholt, 1999; Jordan, 2011; Hodgins, 1992). In Fragmente2, the dancer's choreography is based on the musical form in the sense that it consists of a series of fragments and attemps to capture a characteristic variation similar to that found in Shinohara's fragments.
However, the dancer's choreography has not developed from the music and the already composed score per se. In order to create two equal and independent parts, the dancer’s choreographic material was created before we started to compose and stage the choreomusical interaction. Hence, the dancer's choreographic material was developed separately and independently of the music (arrow 2). In Fragmente2, the dancer's upper body gestures involve the coordination of arms, hands, torso, head, and gaze. The lower body choreography means an interplay of steps and movements performed by the feet, legs, and pelvis. The gestures and movements of the upper and lower body create a variation of polyrhythmic coordinations.
The next step in our joint artistic process was to compose and stage the choreomusical interaction between the dancer and the music (arrow 3). In this phase we tried out the different choreographic materials in combination with different musical fragments. Through this exploration we decided how to combine choreographic materials with the 14 musical fragments. These combinations fell into place quite intuitively since we knew the music almost by heart and we were used to reading and reacting to each other's impulses and movements.
Once we had determined the order of Shinohara's 14 fragments, a collaborative process followed in which we elaborated in more detail the rhythmic and spatial interactions in each fragment. In this phase of the creative process we divided and analysed the music and the choreography into manageable short perceptible units: musical objects and choreographic objects (see the section Choreomusical objects).
Thereafter, we developed the musician's choreography, a phase based on the musician's gestures involved in the performance of the music (arrow 4a). The musician's choreography is mainly based on spatial locomotions (lower body movements). This phase of the process, which involved both performers interacting bodily in the performance space, was largely driven by jointly developed metaphors (arrow 4b). In a final phase, we added more details such as gazes and particular choreographed gestures for the musician (arrow 5).
Throughout the creative process, we have strived for an overall contrapuntal choreomusical relationship between music and dance as well as between musician and dancer. On an individual level, both performers' choreography consists of polyrhythmic coordinations of upper and lower body gestures and movements.
Unlike the music (score), the dancer's choreography is not defined in an established notation system that describes the coordination of all body parts throughout the performance. To create and define the choreography for each of the fragments, the choreographer-dancer has used written instructions, poetry, sketches, drawings, and maps. These are presented in more detail on the page "Perspective variation".
The intrinsic relationship between the musican's playing gestures and the music is not addressed in this exposition. This perspective is analysed and discussed in our co-written book chapter "Empirical Analysis of Gestural Sonic Objects Combining Qualitative and Quantitative Methods" (Visi et al., 2024).
Creating and performing a contrapuntal choreomusical work
Our aim was to create a contrapuntal choreomusical work where music and dance act as equal parts. The main challenge was to find a common understanding of each other's musical and choreographic materials. To achieve this, we divided the music and choreography into objects, using annotated scores, movement descriptions, video recordings and metaphors. Moreover, it was crucial to develop the performance over a long period of time, so that we continuously could reassess our work.
The point of departure was an already existing musical work. Makoto Shinohara’s Fragmente carries a flexible musical structure that opens for a multitude of interpretations. His partly graphical score allows an elastic approach to the sounding material with respect to timing and phrasing. These conditions allowed the musician an elastic relationship with the dancer’s choreographic material in her playing. Consequently, the dancer's choreographic material needed to consist of gestures and movements with a similar elasticity so that music and dance could form parts of a contrapuntal composition.
The recorder is an instrument that allows this flexibility of movement in a way that is not possible with all instruments. The choreography requires her to play from memory in order to move while playing and interacting with the dancer. Her poetic reflections presented on the next page reveal her first-person perspective during the performance. The same page also presents the dancer's movement instructions and choreographic script.
Live performance requires a mutual in-depth understanding of the elasticity of the other's material in order to perceive and respond to each other's sounds, gestures and phrasing. In addition to the musician's ability to perform choreography, our work together has also been facilitated by the dancer's experience of reading music.
For each fragment, we developed an overall metaphor that served as the basis for shaping and dividing the materials into choreomusical objects and elaborating the interaction between them. The objects were in turn given metaphorical names so that we could talk about them and work out the relationships (see column A on page "Perspective variation"). In addition to metaphors we have also used artistic references such as Chaplin's films, Modern Times (1936) and The Great Dictator (1940).
The artistic practice and knowledge gained from Fragmente2 were eventually used and further developed in The Conference of the Birds (2022), a longer staged choreomusical performance involving an interplay between music, electroacoustics, dance, video projections, sound, light, and costume. In this work we continued to explore additional ways of composing and performing choreomusical interactions. The electroacoustic part was distributed through speakers placed around the audience and the performance space, while the video projections were projected on screens and other surfaces, as well as on the floor. These artistic materials were based on recorded gestures, sounds and movements and thus became, in addition to the musician and dancer, choreomusical actors in the work.
Both Fragmente2 and The Conference of the Birds will be discussed in Frödin's forthcoming doctoral dissertation with the preliminary title Watch the sound – listen to the gesture (Luleå University of Technology).