MAP Project: Sang Song — Questionnaire & write-up

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Sang Song — Questionnaire & write-up

1. How did binaural listening impact your reflections on how your partner’s intent in the composer-performer interaction is communicated?

I would say one of the most salient features about binaural recordings is their vividness. Supposedly because of their “3D”-qualities, binaural recordings seem to preserve a sonic environment more vividly and palpably than a non-binaural recording would. During the long lockdown period when human interactions—even virtual ones—were limited, it was precious to be invited into my partner Berk’s daily life1 and given access to his creative endeavors2 by way of binaural recordings, which had the effect of humanizing our composer-performer interactions despite the challenging circumstances.

2. How did listening to binaural recordings of your own practice provide for methods in which these intentions can be communicated and preserved with regards to the interaction between composition - score and performance?

(Not applicable.)

3. How did listening to binaural recordings influence your perception of timbre? In what ways did this compliment the theoretical timbral descriptors that already exist within ACTOR’s research axes?

This theme will be reiterated with respect to some of the other questions below, but one of the unfortunate consequences of the MAP Project taking place during the pandemic was that there were very few opportunities to compare real-life experience of a sound environment with binaural recordings of that environment. More specifically, while I am pretty convinced that binaural recordings would influence one’s perception of timbre at least to a degree, these differences are likely to be noticeable only if one can compare his or her real-life experience of a sonic environment with a binaural recording of it. Except for the one described in my response to Question 4 below, this was an opportunity not afforded to me as the composer of a composer-performer duo as I was exposed solely to the recordings made by my partner without experiencing the sonic events preserved in the recordings in person. Accordingly, I unfortunately do not have any meaningful contribution to make on this issue.

4. Did any of your attitudes towards timbre change during the course of the project? This may include phenomenological characteristics of spatialized timbre. For instance, how one feels, hears, and thinks about the real-life application of binaural technology. How did this technology change how you perceive the world around you?

As described in my answer to Question 3 above, my experience with respect to timbre has been limited as it was impossible to directly compare my real-life experience of a sonic environment with a binaural recording of it. However, I do have something meaningful to say in response to the last prong of the question.

On January 15, 2021, my partner Berk and I did an in-person recording session at the Pioneer Park in San Diego. Under ideal circumstances, recording sessions like that would have taken place in a recording studio or at least in an indoor space, but the raging pandemic in Southern California at the time forced us to opt for an outdoor space, which both Berk and I thought of as an unfortunate compromise.

Listening to the recordings made during that al fresco recording session3 afterwards, however, turned out to be revelatory: the binaural recordings so vividly captured everything that I either ignored or was simply unaware of during the recording session that it prompted me to question the role of memory in such a context. Berk and I at the time were toying with the idea of taking the concept of memory as reflected in the evolution—or transformation—of the “Frog Prince” story4 as the springboard for our collaborative piece, and the experience of realizing how my memory failed to preserve or even to register so many details about the sonic environment I was in during the recording session solidified our plan.

5. How did our experience together as a composer performer duo inform your creative improvisational and/or compositional structure?

Working with Berk has been such a privilege. He is not only a phenomenal musician but also a wonderful human being, and his dedication and commitment to the MAP Project gave me a lot of inspirations.

6. Do you have a creative personal statement to accompany your final work?

(Please refer to the program notes to the score of Anura.)

7. With our new compositional freedom, there has emerged a need to understand how music as it is notated and performed maps onto music as it is perceived. How did binaural technology inform these ‘translations’ for you? How did you think binaural listening contributed to negotiation between the composer and performer?

While I remain a skeptic when it comes to the use of binaural technology in concert halls, there is no doubt that binaural technology has the potential to significantly enhance composer- performer communications thanks to its ability to preserve a sonic event/environment in a vivid and palpable manner.

8. How do the varieties of interindividual differences shape timbre perception? What may be a good test in the future to compare the timbre perceptions of different individuals using binaural technology?

As described in my response to Question 3, I unfortunately have limited basis on which to formulate a meaningful answer to this question.

1 See, e.g., the “7 - Berk Dec 12 & 13 wav files” in the duo’s “Shared Sonic Files” folder or the “2 – Berk Dec 13.mov” file in our “Shared Photo & Video Files” folder.
2 See, e.g., the “10 – Berk – Jan 27 (2)” and “13 – Berk – Feb 4 (binaural etude)” recordings available in our “Shared Sonic Files” folder or the many photos of the books Berk was reading at the time available in our “Shared Photo & Video Files” folder.
3 Available in the “Jan 15 Binaural Recording Session” folder of our “Shared Sonic Files” folder.
4 As documented in, e.g., (i) the video recordings of the Zoom meetings that took place between Berk and Sang on December 9, 2020 and December 15, 2020, (ii) the e-mail correspondence from Sang to Berk, dated December 14, 2020 and (iii) various uploads made in the “6 – Sang (Dec 18) – Frog Prince” folder in our “Miscellaneous” folder.