This paper presents the self-built electroacoustic musical instruments of Hugh Davies (1943-2005), and proposes points of similarity between Davies’s practice and present-day live coding practice. (Live coding, in this context, refers to the practice of using a computer programming language to program a musical performance in real time.) In the first part of the paper, the context within which Davies’s instrument-building practice developed, in the late 1960s, is outlined, and a number of specific instruments are described. Aspects of Davies’s performance style, repertoire, and the ensembles with which he performed are discussed, as are activities such as instrument-building workshops and public exhibitions of instruments, in which he regularly participated. In the second part of the paper, four areas of connection with present-day live coding practice are suggested, namely, that both are: (1) part of a long historic tradition of live electronic music performance (as opposed to electronic music constructed in the studio); (2) practices in which the performer him or herself builds the apparatus (whether physical or code-based) through which the music is mediated; (3) improvised or semi-improvised art-forms in which music is developed in real time, within a framework bounded by material or quasi-material constraints; and (4) centred upon communities of practice with a distinct agenda of promoting understanding through engagement.
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)