Composition strategies for the creation of science-based interdisciplinary and collaborative music-theatre

Daniel Blanco Albert

The practice-based PhD research project comprises the development and application of composition strategies and techniques generated through interdisciplinary collaboration to integrate elements and ideas from non-sonic disciplines into the musical discourse of new music-theatre works, specifically opera. I explore mechanisms of mapping and association that engage with both the specific subject matter of each piece and the creative collaborative environment in which they are created, thus generating different compositional resources that I use to inform the creative process. By using mapping techniques, I can deeply engage and communicate a subject matter on different levels in the musical composition. The framework for this research is the intertwining of art and science on a variety of levels from a music compositional perspective. Within this framework, I explored the integration of knowledge and data from the natural and social sciences to inform the composition of four science-based music-theatre works: In response to Naum Gabo: Linear Construction in Space No. 1 (2020), Autohoodening: The Rise of Captain Swing (2021), The Flowering Desert (2022), and TRAPPIST-1 (2023). With this approach, I aim to closely link these works with their particular subject matter instead of being composed based just on my personal musical taste. By consistently and cohesively applying the strategies and techniques explored in this research, the outcome is not creating music about science or music inspired by science, but, instead, music embedded with science in which the scientific data and knowledge inform the composition decisions. The subject matter is therefore intertwined within the musical discourse, its performativity and theatricality, and its relationship with the other disciplines and collaborators involved in the creation of these music-theatre works.

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Acknowledgements

Many thanks to:

My supervisors, Prof. Aleksandar Dundjerović, Prof. Michael Wolters, and Prof. William Chaplin, for their invaluable support and guidance.

The academics and members of staff that have supported me throughout this journey: Prof. Joe Cutler, Dr Seán Clancy, Dr Carrie Churnside, Prof. Christopher Dingle, Dr Sian Vaughan, Dr Oliver Carter, Dr Sarah Cooper, Dr Selina Schmidt, Julie Timms, Mark Eastwood, and Prof. Nicola Royan.

The key collaborators that made this research project possible: Roxanne Korda, Dr Amaury Triaud, Colin Hutcheson, Post Workers Theatre (Demitrios Kargotis, Dash MacDonald, and Nicholas Mortimer), Gavin Stewart, Leon Trimble, Alexander Kaniewski, and Tadas Stalyga.

The performers that made the music included in the portfolio a reality: Hannah McDonald, Dalma Sinka, Olivia Thornber, Megan Artemova-Thomas, Edward Harrison, Teddy Woolgrove, Michael CT Lam, Aaron Kendall, Arjun Jethwa, Aidan Hammond, Dominika Blatt, William Hammond, Lucy Samuels, Edwin Podolski, Ricardo Brown, Alicja Humeniuk, Verena Koay, Oliver Farrow, Alex Collet-Sinfield, Jose Lluna, and Jennie Robson; as well as David Kirkham, Reiss Smith and Katherine Christie Evans for their technical support. Also, many thanks to Ben Jones and George', of the St Nicholas-at-Wade with Sarre Hoodeners, for their recording of the song Poor Ole Hoss.

All the institutions and venues that supported the research or the works included in the portfolio: Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, Midlands4Cities, Think Tank Planetarium (Birmingham), Infinite Opera, Grand Union Gallery, Vivid Projects, Digbrew Co., The Barber Institute of Fine Arts, GMB Union, Birmingham School of Art, Goldsmiths University of London, ÒBNC, and the Luleåbiennalen 2022. Many thanks, especially to Midlands4Cities, the AHRC, and the UKRI, for funding this research project.

All my friends and family, and all the people that have supported me during all these years: Søren Kaae, Carles Tamarit Merino, Oliver Webb, Joan Enric Lluna, Maria José Aroca, Lise Olson, Josep Ribera Vanyó, Joe Broughton, Paloma Trigas, Andrew Toovey, Edwin Roxburgh, Gerardo Adesso, Marcin Sz, Alis Oldfield, Dietrich Grosse, Sandra Taylor, Isaac Macho, and Conchi Moyano.

And special thanks to my parents, Barbara Albert Borrás and Jose Miguel Blanco Serrano, and to my partner, Maja Pluta.

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