Haptics (Music)

Haptic hedonism is about producing sensual enjoyment through corporal stimulation. Haptic here referes to the sense of touch in all its forms, including proprioception and kinaesthesia, but in particular the cutaneous sensations of tactile pressure (mechanoreceptors) (Paterson 2007: ix). The context of art, design and technology frames this investigation on how corporal pleasures can become an integral part of interactive experiences. The focus on the design of haptic bodysuits relates to questions such as: How can corporal pleasure constitute the user experience? How can the sensations of the body be understood as an artistic and design specific ‘material’? And, can we aesthetically manipulate our bodies to sense a real and reproducible pleasure? How can the body be experienced as a canvas of sensations? Or even a design product?

At the core of techno music lies a constant haptic pulse that impacts on the entire body. In contrast to most musics dedicated to aurality — i.e. the dominance of hearing by ear — techno aesthetically aims at a physical interaction between the pulsating sonic material and the listener’s body in motion. This listener feeds back into the techno event’s energy that is ultimately directed by the performing DJ. The latter oversees the energy flow and adjusts the sonic reality accordingly. In the end, a constant current runs through the venue comprised of a confluence of sonic pulsation and bodily movement.

This paper focuses on such non-aural reception and physical reverberation of techno music by approaching it as a vibrational practice. Coined by Nina Sun Eidsheim in Sensing Sounds: Singing & Listening as Vibrational Practice (2015), the term derived from a mode of musicking that rejects experiential fixity and instead builds on idiosyncratic bodily engagement with sound. In line with Sensing Sound, I theorise techno musicking’s functioning as a vibrational practice through the inter-relational manifestation of its spatial, tactile, technical, and above all corporeal operations.

Beyond the vibrational practice approach, I draw on Gilbert Simondon’s On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects (1958 [2017]) in order to approach the techno object as a dynamic system. More than a merely aural act, techno musicking is a synergetic practice that revolves wholly around the flow of energy generated by the beat. Simondon’s theorisation of technical objects, although over sixty years old, remains relevant in outlining our relation to technology. Hence a music as mechanical as techno lends itself well for analysis from the standpoint of philosophy of science.

In this paper we describe a prototype system for haptic feedback embedded in a MaxMSP-based modular framework for composition and performance of live-electronics. In these performance contexts, there is typically no physical connection between the human performer and the live-electronics system, breaking the action-perception loop, which is vital to music performance. Leveraging recent works in the field of tactile notification we aim at closing this loop by communicating information from the live-electronics system to the performer via the haptic channel. We present a prototype tactile synthesizer, implemented as a module in CLEF (CIRMMT Live-electronics Framework). Tactile notifications can thus become part of a musical score and provide performers with information about the system, allowing for tighter interaction with the live-electronics.

This paper introduces a tool known as the Haptic Drum Kit, which employs four computer-controlled vibrotactile devices, one attached to each wrist and ankle. In the applications discussed here, haptic pulses are used to guide the playing, on a drum kit, of rhythmic patterns that require multi-limb co-ordination. The immediate aim is to foster rhythm skills and multi-limb coordination. A broader aim is to systematically develop skills in recognizing, identifying, memorizing, retaining, analyzing, reproducing, and composing polyphonic rhythms.

Physical interaction with instruments allows performers to express and realise music based on the nature of the instrument. Through instrumental practice, the performer is able to learn and internalise sensory responses inherent in the mechanical production of sound. However, current electronic musical input devices and interfaces lack the ability to provide a satisfactory haptic feedback to the performer. The lack of feedback information from electronic controllers to the performer introduces aesthetic and practical problems in performances and compositions of live electronic music. In this paper, we present an initial study examining the perception and understanding of artificial haptic feedback in live electronic performances. Two groups of trumpet players participated during the study, in which short musical examples were performed with and without artificial haptic feedback. The results suggest the effectiveness and possible exploitable approaches of haptic feedback, as well as...

ABSTRACT In this paper we describe a prototype system for haptic feedback embedded in a MaxMSP-based modular framework for composition and performance of live-electronics. In these performance contexts, there is typically no physical connection between the human performer and the live-electronics system, breaking the action-perception loop, which is vital to music performance. Leveraging recent works in the field of tactile notification we aim at closing this loop by communicating information from the live-electronics system to the performer via the haptic channel. We present a prototype tactile synthesizer, implemented as a module in CLEF (CIRMMT Live Electronics Framework). Tactile notifications can thus become part of a musical score and provide performers with information about the system, allowing for tighter interaction with the live-electronics.

Traditional film analysis is insufficient as it too often privileges the visual and fails to understand the transformative power of sound, thus it ultimately proves deficient as it fails to take into consideration the affect the dynamic audio-visual relationship will have on the whole. Song sequences in film musicals are often sites of spectacle and multi-sensory excess: moments of reaching out and touching the audience. Here, music and image are a single entity (one cannot exist without the other) challenging the ocularcentrism found in traditional theory. I will analyse how key numbers from the British film Billy the Kid and the Green Baize Vampire (1985) demonstrate how the interaction between audio-visual elements induces an essentially haptic experience (a tactile relationship with the film) thereby promoting a sensory based approach utilising micro-analysis.
Theory is increasingly turning towards multi-sensory analysis; however, image’s dominance is at the expense of audio-visual understanding. Theorists such as Elsaesser and Sobchack have championed sensory analysis yet they stop short at examining music. I will illustrate how Billy the Kid, a musical about a snooker playing vampire that toys with the genre’s conventions, can be analysed both visually and more importantly musically to give a haptic reading of its numbers which thus enables an embodied tactile spectatorship through the negotiated space between music and image. Forms of notation (micro-analysis) will help analyse the audio-visual space and argue that the increasing trend towards multi-sensory analyses can and should be applied to music.

Physical interaction with instruments allows performers to express and realise music based on the nature of the instrument. Through instrumental practice, the performer is able to learn and internalise sensory responses inherent in the mechanical production of sound. However, current electronic musical input devices and interfaces lack the ability to provide a satisfactory haptic feedback to the performer. The lack of feedback information from electronic controllers to the performer introduces aesthetic and practical problems in performances and compositions of live electronic music.