SOUNDING PLACES

534 Pages·2009·1.21 MB·English

SOUNDING PLACES:
SITUATED CONVERSATIONS THROUGH THE SOUNDSCAPE
COMPOSITIONS OF HILDEGARD WESTERKAMP
ANDRA SHIRLEY JEAN McCARTNEY
A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
Graduate Programme in Music
York University
Toronto, Ontario
August 1999
copyright page
certificate page
Abstract
In this dissertation, I consider the significance of Hildegard Westerkamp's work to
current scholarship in the area of feminist epistemology, and to contemporary
electroacoustic music in the genre of soundscape composition, specifically in her
receptive, dialogic approach to particular places and their sonic, social, political and
technological resonances.
In Chapter Two I discuss how Canadian concert composers deal with the idea of Canada
as a place within music of the last century, differentiating the generalized myths of
nationalist music from Westerkamp's focus on specific places. In Chapter Three, I focus
on the position of soundscape composition within electroacoustic music, using feminist
epistemology as a critical lens. Chapter Four is a biography of Westerkamp. Chapter Five
is about my analytical methods: I bring together critical and feminist theory with James
Tenney's gestalt approach to musical analysis, and listener responses.
In Chapter Six I discuss the importance of soundwalking to Westerkamp's association
with acoustic ecology, to her early compositional formation, as well as to her work as a
radio artist, through an analysis of Kit's Beach Soundwalk. The CD ROM also includes a
website and an interactive installation about soundwalking. In Chapter Seven, I analyze
Cricket Voice, a wilderness piece about the sounds of a cricket in the desert and about the
urban person's experience of desert as spiritual refuge and alien environment. Moments of
Laughter, the subject of Chapter Eight, is a performance piece based on Westerkamp's
musical relationship with her daughter. The CD ROM includes excerpts of Moments of
Laughter linked to images and score excerpts. In Chapter Nine, I analyze Breathing
Room, a miniature intended to reflect Westerkamp's overall style. I interpret Breathing
Room as a representation of a cyborg body, using Donna Haraway's ironic image of the
cyborg. The CD ROM includes an installation based on this analysis. In Chapter Ten, I
analyze Gently Penetrating Beneath the Sounding Surfaces of Another Place, which is
representative of Westerkamp's current international work, based on her experiences of
sound in New Delhi. I chronicle the construction of this piece in a section on the CD
ROM called "In the Studio." The conclusions consider interactivity in the hybrid form of
the dissertation, in the developing relationship between Westerkamp and myself, and in
the constructed dialogues of my analyses.
Acknowledgments
to Hildegard Westerkamp, for opening up her heart and home to me, for trusting me with
so much of her life and work, for walking with me in British Columbia, in Ontario and in
my dreams
to the over two hundred listeners who participated in this study, for the insight, surprise
and challenge of their responses
to my supervisor, James Tenney, for his inspiring ideas and generous attitudes about
composition, contemporary music, and how to listen intently
to Beverley Diamond for her clear thinking about identity issues and her excitement
about new approaches to fieldwork; for her consistent support, challenge and energy
to Jody Berland for fuelling my interests in praxis, cultural theory and contemporary
music since we first met seventeen years ago; for continuing to spark new directions in
my creative work and research
to Lorraine Code for her insights about second-person epistemology and for urging me to
develop the "connective tissue" of my writing
to Norma Sue Fisher-Stitt, Jane Couchman and Katharine Norman for their insightful
commentary on the dissertation in its final stages
to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and to York University for
providing scholarships to support this research
to the Canadian Association for Sound Ecology for their support of my work; particularly
to board members Claude Schryer and Gayle Young for presenting the CD ROM in
Stockholm
to Jean Routhier, Barb Woolner, Andrea Polli, Barry Truax, and the staff of earsay
productions, for helping to organize listener response sessions
to Tere Tilban-Rios for assistance in negotiating the paperwork
to Evy Strong, Don Sinclair and the staff of the Winters Fine Arts Computer Centre, for
providing access to computer facilities in a supportive environment
to Judith, Jean, and Jeff McCartney; Kate Thomas, Peter van Wyck, Don Sinclair, Donna
Warr, Mawgan Macdonald, Karen Pegley, Gary Ferrington, Laurence Montgomery,
Joshua Thorpe, and Lauren Pratt for the stimulating conversations about various parts of
this study
to my daughter, Sian Hughes, for accompanying me to North Toronto C.I. and for
mulling over many of the issues raised in that session
to my son, Daniel Hughes, for being my science fiction companion (including the all-day
Alien series extravaganza) and for the assistance with data entry
to my dog Nikita for being my first audience for Moments of Laughter and for stirring me
to go for walks
and most of all to my partner, P. S. Moore, for his creative collaboration in Soundwalking
Queen Elizabeth Park; for organizing the move to Montréal as I wrote; for even on the
difficult days, making me laugh
Thank you.
Table of Contents
iv Abstract
vi Acknowledgments
1 Chapter One Introduction
18 Chapter Two Musical place in Canada
70 Chapter Three Knowing one's place
131 Chapter Four Westerkamp's Soundings: biography as
Breathing Room
163 Chapter Five Methodologies: listening to electroacoustic
music, reading responses
193 Chapter Six Soundwalking as subjectivity in
environment: Kits Beach Soundwalk
228 Chapter Seven Cricket Voice and the power of wilderness
264 Chapter Eight Moments of Laughter: recording childhood,
performing motherhood, refusing to shut up, and
laughing
309 Chapter Nine Breathing room and the twofold pressures
of the cyborg body
336 Chapter Ten Gently Penetrating Beneath the Sounding
Surfaces of Another Place: inside and outside the
soundscape
364 Chapter Eleven Conclusions
375 Appendix A North and South: Fernandez reading
Ethnocentrism
376 Appendix B Northernness and Canonicity
383 Appendix C Electroacoustic textbooks and chapter
headings
384 Appendix D Soundscape works appearing in recorded
anthologies of electroacoustic music
396 Appendix E Listener responses: summary information
398 Appendix F Operation of the CD ROM
401 Appendix G Soundwalking Queen Elizabeth Park:
compositional process and audience
responses
407 References Works by and about Westerkamp;
references and bibliographic sources
Chapter One
Introduction
In the winter of 1989, on Peterborough's community radio station, Trent Radio, I heard
Hildegard Westerkamp's Cricket Voice. I was transported into a world in which the song
of a single cricket reverberated and resonated in an expansive place, in a way that I had
never heard before. Moreover, I felt urged to compose. It was an odd sensation. I had
grown up listening to and playing a wide variety of music, and had always been drawn to
electroacoustic music (even though initially I didn't call it that) since first hearing it in
England at a very early age.1 I had heard the work of hundreds of composers, and had
never felt drawn to compose electroacoustic music before this. Yet now a powerful desire
to record sounds and work with them on tape caused me to go out, rent equipment, and
begin. Since then, I have discovered that, through her composition, teaching, and radio
work, Westerkamp has had a similar effect on other composers, and is a particular source
of inspiration to many women composers in Canada. I believe that this is due to the way
she approaches soundscape. In the liner notes to Westerkamp's recent CD,
Transformations, American composer Pauline Oliveros says:
One can journey with her sound to inner landscapes and find unexplored
openings in our sound souls. The experience of her music vibrates the
potential for change. Her compositions invite interaction—a chance to
awaken to one's own creativity.2
In this dissertation, I consider the significance of Hildegard Westerkamp's work to
current scholarship in the area of feminist epistemology, and to contemporary
electroacoustic music in the genre of soundscape composition. I focus specifically on her

1 On the program Dr. Who. After thirty years, I can still hear it. I wasn't aware at that time that the music
for this British TV show was composed by Tristram Cary, an electroacoustic composer who is perhaps
better known in the electroacoustic world for his work on the VCS3 or Putney synthesizer (Chadabe 1997:
53-54; 150-152).
2 Oliveros, Pauline. "The Music and Soundscapes of Hildegard Westerkamp." Transformations CD liner
notes. Montréal: DIFFUSION i MéDIA, 1996, 18.