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Conversation between Alex and Stephen (prev top next)

2007feb24

Stephen,

This was an issue which occurred to me in the construction of the paths for DFR. In that circumstance you already have what is coming laid out in front of you like a score. Through the clever use of appropriate camera angles you can hide what is about to come, while earlier having hinted at what that something might be. With DFR however, the fact remains that there was only one set path for each voice and this is evident in the visuals. There is still enough scarcity of information in this work to make you wonder what a particular path architecture is going to sound like, but ultimately, the gist of what is coming is set.  In the future, when this score like construction embodies things like key, tempi, phrasing, instrumentation and mood changes, it risks the problem of revealing everything ahead of time and working against expectation-surprise. One way around this, I thought, would be through lighting and false leads, i.e., lighting is used in such a way that you may vaguely see some hints of a vast towering castle like construction which looks like a full orchestral climax (for example) coming from a distance, but the path there is obscured with darkness, the path and the music eventually at some point builds at what might seem like the arrival at  this castle, and you may see its tantalizing reappearance out of the darkness as if it is about to be reached, yet suddenly the path heads off in another direction, we have a longer journey before we reach the promised land.
This is just an example of how I imagine this to happen, which plays itself out on a much broader scale to what you originally introduced for discussion. However I think that this approach can also be adapted for smaller sections and motifs.

In hindsight, I am not so sure about following the style of DFR where the paths are already set. It is possible to have the paths being created as the musical entities carve them out in the process of playing. However, the issue of expectation and surprise involve the concept of future. So there are aspects of visual delivery which might require an approaching visual stage which generates an expectation, which at the very point of arrival, is turned away from.

This is why I wish I had some form of  grant so I could sit my butt down behind my computer everyday of the week to bring my head space into a tangible reality.

Alex

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