<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

<p>In this contribution, I discuss the perceptual potential of certain genres of experimental and contemporary music, commonly grouped under the label “sound-based music”. The sonic patterns typical of this music are mostly associated, during listening, with visual and tactile sensory qualities and can evoke mental representations as shapes in motion. These are the result of physical-acoustic energies organized according to a perceptual grammar whose organization follows a series of Gestalt and kinaesthetic principles. The paper explores the nature of the relationship between sound patterns of sound-based music and their mental images. Based on morphodynamic theory, it is proposed the emergence of cognitive image schemas, which are at the centre of this relationship. The image schemas depict the forces and tensions of our experience of the world (e.g., figure-background, near-far, superimposition, compulsion, blockage), as being the cognitive and experiential response to the incoming sound patterns. The sense of this music activates precisely the basic structures of sensorimotor experience by which we encounter a world that we can understand and act within, leading to a rich series of high-level associations and responses.</p>
</abstract>

In this contribution, I discuss the perceptual potential of certain genres of experimental and contemporary music, commonly grouped under the label “sound-based music”. The sonic patterns typical of this music are mostly associated, during listening, with visual and tactile sensory qualities and can evoke mental representations as shapes in motion. These are the result of physical-acoustic energies organized according to a perceptual grammar whose organization follows a series of Gestalt and kinaesthetic principles. The paper explores the nature of the relationship between sound patterns of sound-based music and their mental images. Based on morphodynamic theory, it is proposed the emergence of cognitive image schemas, which are at the centre of this relationship. The image schemas depict the forces and tensions of our experience of the world (e.g., figure-background, near-far, superimposition, compulsion, blockage), as being the cognitive and experiential response to the incoming sound patterns. The sense of this music activates precisely the basic structures of sensorimotor experience by which we encounter a world that we can understand and act within, leading to a rich series of high-level associations and responses.

Listening to Sound-based music: Defining a perceptual grammar based on morphodynamic theory

University ‘Nova’ of Lisbon. Av. de Berna, 26 C

Gestalt Theory

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

In this contribution, I discuss the perceptual potential of certain genres of experimental and contemporary music, commonly grouped under the label...

Listening to Sound-based music: Defining a perceptual grammar based on morphodynamic theory

Published Online: May 02, 2024

Page range: 199 - 223

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/gth-2023-0017

Keywords
Sound-based Music, Embodied Cognition, Auditory Gestalt, Sound Aesthetics

© 2023 Riccardo D. Wanke, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Listening to Sound-based music: Defining a perceptual grammar based on morphodynamic theory

Published Online: May 02, 2024

Page range: 199 - 223

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/gth-2023-0017

KeywordsSound-based Music, Embodied Cognition, Auditory Gestalt, Sound Aesthetics

© 2023 Riccardo D. Wanke, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Keywords
Sound-based Music, Embodied Cognition, Auditory Gestalt, Sound Aesthetics