Human Voice and Instrumental Voice: An Investigation of Voicelikeness

Paola Livorsi

This artistic research explores the relations between human and instrumental voice (in the case of string instruments), seen from an embodied and performative point of view. The question originates from from my experience of violinist and composer. Voice is a unique mark of human identity: if this is particularly true for vocal timbre, something similar is at play in the ‘instrumental voice’, as a unique expression of personal and musical identity. This research aims to uncover the importance of the vocal and instrumental relations, acknowledging their common embodied nature and shared origins. As utterances directed at the ‘other’, both human and instrumental voice are deeply relational. From 2016 to 2022, I investigated the question of voicelikeness between a musician’s voice and their own instrument through five multidisciplinary art projects: in Imaginary Spaces fragments of individual and collective voice inhabited a performative environment shared by musicians and audience; The end of no ending focused on the relationships between two female voices and their mutable surroundings; Between word and life explored the multiple relations of voice and instrument in an electroacoustic space, de-multiplied by bringing in dance and video; Sounding Bodies gathered human and mechanical bodies to explore an unconventional space, inviting the audience to follow their path; Medusa was a music theatre work putting into perspective the question of voicelikeness by evoking Italian Early Baroque music, visual art, and dance. This artistic research was carried out through an artistic process, with supporting methods such as grounded theory, ethnography, and autoethnography, creating a virtuous cycle between practice and theory, with some interesting and unexpected changes taking place in my artistic journey. The research outcomes consist of a written part combined with a collection of traces, sounds, images, and video examples presented on the Research Catalogue. The theoretical framework for this inquiry includes recent studies in paleoanthropology, human development, music psychology, and embodiment. Cavarero’s philosophy of voice, Arendt’s philosophy of the ‘in-between’, various philosophies of the ‘other’, as well as a few contributions from psychoanalysis are put in mutual dialogue with my artistic practice. Among the research outcomes are the re-evaluation of vocal layers in personal and musical identity, considering music making as a relational practice, and an exploration of the porous boundaries between the roles of composer, performer, and listener. In this perspective, the new terms to ‘in-hear’ and to ‘co-hear’ respectively denote an attention to inner sounds, and toward one another in a community of listeners. Keywords: voicelikeness, artistic research, in-between, relationality, embodiment, performative space

The End of No Ending, Black Box 2017, full video (Otto Olavinen)

TO PORTFOLIO

THE END OF NO ENDING

2017

ARTISTIC PROCESS

Press on the image to start the video

Voices and Spaces (Black Box, 20.10.2017) collected previous works involving human voice and string instrument – either literally or as music material (male voice’s formants at the basis of a string quartet etc.). The theme of space was strongly present in two works: a new version of my string quartet Suonno, with spatialization made in collaboration with Juan de Diós Magdaleno; and the new piece The end of no ending, with two female voices, ensemble, and electronics.

Suonno (2003-04) was originally thought spatially: I carefully planned where each musician should sit, for the four voices to follow certain trajectories – acoustic trajectories, imaginary square or curved lines and gestures. The background work was an electroacoustic piece for eight channels, Vuoto, where I mixed many layers of very short excerpts of (mostly whispering) human voice’s samples. They also followed certain trajectories, for ex. circulating in different directions.

The new version highlighted the mobility of the single voice: each voice designed complex trajectories in the space (add scheme). The amplification and spatialization changed the nature of the piece giving it more dimensions. Another layer of space was represented by Marek Pluciennik’s live projections. Marek chose pre-existing materials from his analogue films, creating light and color small variations over time (for ex. light intensity varied according to sound intensity), which matched well the spirit of the piece.

The end of no ending (2017) was based on the combination of spoken/sung human voices with frame-drum resonances. I made recordings with both singers, using three different frame-drums, and the Persian instrument daf. I then analysed the spectra of the most interesting vocal and instrumental sounds, and based on their spectra the four sections of the piece. Each section is based on a poem – in the form of landai, Afghan anonymous women’s poetic form. The choice of the frame-drum was connected to this tradition, since the poems are read or sung with the accompaniment of a frame-drum. It is a private and even secret practice, since the poems express something forbidden in that society (be it love feelings or war experiences).

The poems were originally written in Pashtun and translated in English.

The singers used two frame-drums in the performance, and the Persian daf and tombak were played by the Kurdish-Iranian musician Ahoora Hosseini, with Uusinta ensemble.

The space was organized acoustically: a percussion section and a trumpet were placed in the back of the hall, while the singers performed in different positions in different sections; they were also singing and walking in between sections, to reach their new locations.

The electronics consisted of pre-recorded sounds, mostly percussion resonances without the attack, spoken and whispered voices. The electronic sounds linked the different sections, and they were also spatialized on eight channels.

The visual part was also thought from a microscopic point of view – paralleling the method used for the sound material (diving into layers of partials in the acoustic material): Marek filmed and photographed parts of my skin, eyelashes, hair, and used them as abstract material re-worked in live projections. We decided together to use round shapes – echoing those of Imaginary Spaces. The result was a combination of circles of different dimensions and colors, with textures created from the enlarged body parts.

Keywords: female voices, strings, resonances, spaces, bodies, microscopic, movements/trajectories

Tuuli Lindeberg, soprano

Anni Egecioglu, vocalist

Petri Kumela, guitar
Ahoora Hosseini, daf, tombak

Uusinta string quartet: Maria Puusaari, Aleksi Kotila, Max Savikangas, Markus Hohti

Uusinta Ensemble:

Malla Vivolin, flute
Marko Portin, clarinet

Tomas Gricius, trumpet

Péter Jánosi, French horn

Kazutaka Morita, percussion

Antti Suoranta, percussion

Petri Kumela, guitar

Maria Puusaari, violin
Aleksi Kotila, violin
Max Savikangas, viola

Markus Hohti, cello
Adrian Rigopulos, double bass

Jószef Hárs, conductor

Paola Livorsi: composition and sound design

Live electronics: Juan de Diós Magdaleno
Live processed video: Marek Pluciennik
Light designer: Ainu Palmu
Sound engineers: Jon-Patrik Kuhlefelt, Marko Myöhänen

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