Mimetic strategies in three works by Francois -Bernard Mâche.

摘要

Composer and musicologist Francois-Bernard Mâche achieves a certain notoriety for his music fusing recorded natural sound sources with live instrumental performances. This study analyzes three works by Mâche specifically examining his "naturalist" aesthetic in light of its engagement with the techniques of mimesis. Mâche's work revives abandoned aesthetic controversies about the role of imitation in art while challenging the standard opinion that music is a completely abstract form of expression. The interaction of taped animal and elemental sounds with a live harpsichordist in Korwar (1972) is examined using methods borrowed from structural anthropology stressing that valuable human knowledge is formed in the experience of otherness. Sopiana (1980) is analyzed through the optic of a fictitious classical sonata form to suggest an aesthetic debate opposing repetition with development, with the discourse articulated entirely by recorded birds, subsequently imitated by a pianist and a flautist. Nocturne (1981) for piano and digitally synthesized sounds explores the mimetic processes inherent in the transcription of an extramusical idea across different media. Mâche's productive spectrum of mimetic strategies allows us to extend the concept of musical imitation as an activity to used explore the much contended and permeable boundary between nature and culture.