Ballads and Ohms: Vocal traditions, electronics and compositional strategies

This commentary presents the research and ideas underlying the submitted portfolio of compositions. The core of the portfolio is the exploration of composition and performance methods for transforming traditional vocal folk music using the tools and aesthetics of contemporary electroacoustic and experimental music. The process also led to a wider compositional enquiry into the connections between language and music, between technology and performance, and between scores, encryption and performance. Additionally, extended voice techniques, audio processing, information theory and encryption form a set of nodes that have expressed themselves in various combinations resulting in a portfolio that includes vocal and instrumental, electroacoustic and acoustic music. The submitted works have been created employing bespoke use of technology, selfimposed restriction on real-time voice performance and applying encryption methodology to music and text. This commentary examines the submitted works from three perspectives: the use of voice, of language and of technology. It also discusses the music in the context of perceptual and cognitive discourses about the nature of voice.