Panel Discussion: Inclusive Co-Creation in and of Online Sonic Spaces

Abstract

Since the outbreak of the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, online spaces mediated by technologies such as JackTrip have played a vital role in collective music-making and dissemination. As the pandemic continues, these online  music-making spaces remain a valuable resource for several key reasons: 1) they  offer a safe alternative to in-person experiences for those who are at high risk of  serious outcomes from a COVID infection; 2) they expand music-making  opportunities for people with limited mobility or with home care  responsibilities; 3) they continue to offer an ecological method of connecting  across distances; and 4) they offer their own distinct characteristics, proper to  the online medium, including possibilities for sound transformation and co creation in a horizontal, shared virtual space.  

As these online spaces continue to propagate for these motivations, two questions arise: how can these spaces be rendered more accessible to Disabled music-makers, for whom online performance may be a particularly precious resource, and how can these spaces be more effectively used for co-creation? Part of this discussion will consist of considering how multimodality can be introduced into online experiences, for instance through the use of biosensing and haptics. 

We propose to address these issues from a range of perspectives, including Disabled digital musicians and representatives of organizations from the non-profit sector working in the areas of co-creation and inclusive performance. These experts will include partners in two current research projects:  Considering Disability in Online Cultural Experiences (The Changing Human Experience project) and Multisensory, User-centered, Shared cultural Experiences through Interactive Technologies (MuseIT), an EU Horizon project, participating  in-person and remotely (as is appropriate for the nature of this project). 

Biographies

Patricia Alessandrini is a composer/sound artist creating compositions, installations, and performance situations which are most often interactive and theatrical. Her works have been presented in the Americas, Asia, Australia, and over 15 European countries. She is also a performer and improviser of live electronics.  

She holds two PhDs, from Princeton University and the Sonic Arts Research Centre (SARC). She has taught Computer-Assisted Composition at the Accademia Musicale Pescarese, Composition with Technology at Bangor University, Sonic Arts at Goldsmiths College, and is Assistant Professor of Composition at Stanford University since 2018, where she performs research on embodied interaction, immersion, and instrument design for inclusive performance at the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA). She is a member of the international board of ShareMusic & Performing Arts. In 2020, she and her collaborators were awarded the NIME Accessibility Award. Her works are published by Babelscores, and may be consulted at patriciaalessandrini.net 

Hans Kretz is a conductor, pianist, researcher and author. He holds PhDs in Music and Philosophy from the University of Leeds and the University of Paris 8  Vincennes-Saint-Denis respectively. His research interests include philosophy of culture, aesthetics, philosophical anthropology and philosophy of technology. His writings have appeared in the Recherches d’Esthétique Transculturelle series of L’Harmattan, and in the Cahiers Critiques de Philosophie. He is a Lecturer at Stanford University, where he currently conducts and directs the Stanford New Ensemble. 

He has used JackTrip with the Stanford New Ensemble since before the global pandemic started in 2020, and was one of the first ensemble directors at  Stanford to integrate JackTrip into rehearsals and concerts in Spring 2020. He has presented his research on networked performance on several occasions, including at the IRCAM-NYU Forum, 2022. His article on networked performance as a collective space for creation and student engagement will be published this year by Routledge in ‘Rethinking the history of technology-based music’  (University of Huddersfield, 2022-23).