"Broke and Broken Cogito" for Tenor

 

BROKE AND BROKEN COGITO

2024

40” X 30”; 101.6 X 76.2 cm

Ink, Graphite Pen, Charcoal, Ash, Color Ink on C-Print

Edition of 5 with 2 APs

Broke and Broken Cogita: Language as Score, Sound as Resonance

To approach Broke and Broken Cogita for tenor voice is to navigate a space where the boundaries between language, sound, and meaning are blurred, entangled, and constantly renegotiated. The score is less a set of instructions for musical performance than an intricate architecture of signifiers. It situates itself in the fertile territory where sound emerges from language and language folds back into sound, creating a recursive cycle of interpretation that both constructs and deconstructs the musical act.

Language, as the primal vessel of human intimacy and expression, becomes the nucleus of this work. Words are not merely vehicles for communication but sites of action—places where meaning is fragmented, recomposed, and infinitely deferred. This composition, then, is not a linear narrative but a fractured discourse: a multiplicity of voices, histories, and emotional resonances intertwined within the subjectivity of both performer and listener.

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Structure: Words as Communicative Apparatus

The structural uniqueness of Broke and Broken Cogita lies in its deliberate prioritization of words as the primary medium of expression. Here, the linguistic and musical are not distinct realms but mutually constitutive forces. The score, rather than prescribing melodic and rhythmic content in detail, organizes itself around textual fragments, phonemes, and linguistic gestures. These are scaffolded in such a way that the performer must engage with language as a corporeal, rhythmic, and sonic material.

This approach positions the tenor voice as both narrator and instrument—a duality that forces an interrogation of the boundaries between speech and song. Each utterance becomes both a musical event and a semantic proposition, inviting the performer into a space of active interpretation. The performer’s engagement with the text is physicalized, requiring not only vocal execution but an embodied navigation of the tensions between meaning and sound.

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Language as a Resonant System

Embedded within this framework is an implicit acknowledgment of the power of language to transcend its acoustic and semantic boundaries. Language in Broke and Broken Cogita is not just heard—it is felt. Words become sensory triggers, evoking tactile, emotional, and cultural associations that ripple outward into the interpretative field. By privileging language, the composer creates a score that resonates not only in the ear but also in the viscera, engaging the performer and listener on deeply subjective levels.

This process calls attention to language's polysemy. A single word or syllable may carry multiple valences depending on its articulation, its placement within the score, and its interaction with surrounding sounds. Here, meaning is not fixed but destabilized—a fluid construct that invites imaginative participation from all who encounter the work. The performative act becomes a site of negotiation, where the tenor enacts an intimate, individualized reading of the score, inflected by their own history, identity, and subjectivity.

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Performance and Materiality

The physicality of performance in Broke and Broken Cogita extends beyond the voice. Words are rendered as sonic objects that are shaped, molded, and fragmented. The tenor becomes a medium through which language is materialized into soundscapes. This process mirrors the pliability of language itself—its ability to be disassembled and reconfigured, much like a sculptor reshapes raw material into form.

By emphasizing the corporeal dimensions of language, the score demands a heightened awareness of vocal timbre, breath, and resonance. It is not enough for the performer to enunciate; they must embody the linguistic gestures, channeling their physicality into the production of meaning. Each vocalized word carries with it the weight of its cultural, historical, and emotional lineage, rendered tangible through the act of performance.

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Historical Echoes and Subversion

Broke and Broken Cogita does not operate in a vacuum; it dialogues with the Western canon while simultaneously subverting its conventions. The use of the tenor voice, a timbral register often associated with heroism and emotional intensity in Western operatic tradition, is reframed here. Instead of adhering to the traditional narrative structures of arias or recitatives, the score fractures these conventions, reassembling them as an open-ended exploration of resonance and temporality.

This approach recalls artistic practices that interrogate the high-art canon by infusing it with alternative narratives, such as Richard Kennedy’s Fubu Fukú. In that work, Kennedy’s reinterpretation of operatic tropes served as a vessel for a queer Black retelling of colonial history. Similarly, Broke and Broken Cogita embeds layers of cultural and historical resonance into its linguistic fabric, offering a space where performers and audiences can interrogate and reimagine the histories embedded in language and sound.

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Temporal Disjunction and Deferred Meaning

Central to the score’s ethos is its treatment of time. Traditional musical structures often guide listeners through a linear progression of events; here, time is fractured, recursive, and indeterminate. Words are presented as fragments, echoes, and palimpsests, with their meanings emerging only in the interplay between performer, score, and audience. This temporality echoes the Derridean notion of différance, where meaning is never fully present but always deferred, existing in the interplay between elements.

This temporal disjunction creates a dynamic, unstable space where each performance becomes a unique act of interpretation. The tenor voice, in navigating this terrain, constructs a sonic narrative that is as much about absence and silence as it is about sound. The audience, in turn, becomes an active participant, filling in the gaps and imbuing the work with their own subjectivities.

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Language as Continuum

Broke and Broken Cogita is a work that transcends the traditional boundaries of musical composition. By placing language at its core, it invites a profound engagement with the resonant capacities of words—capacities that extend beyond their sonic or semantic properties to encompass the full spectrum of human experience. The score’s fractured, recursive structure mirrors the complexities of communication itself, offering a space for exploration, subversion, and reimagining.

In this interplay of sound, meaning, and performance, the composition asserts that language is not merely a tool of expression but a continuum—a dynamic system through which humanity articulates its deepest intimacies, its cultural legacies, and its infinite possibilities. Through this lens, Broke and Broken Cogita becomes more than a musical work; it is a profound meditation on the act of communication itself, a conversation between past and present, performer and audience, sound and silence.

Acta Combinatorial for Cello

Darmstadt

Darmstadt 

"A Puritan With A Secret". For Piano. The Score.

"A Puritan With A Secret".  

For Piano. 

Bil Smith Composer

Thanks To A Generous Contribution From Timothy Raines

The Score.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5lqYq0XwE76eDVjUXp2dUpUUnc/view?usp=sharing

Prologue as Receipt" >>>. W.I.P. (The score and the story)

 

Radical New Compositional Practice: The Emergence of Photo-Realism, Tilt-Shift Photography, and 'Brutalist Tablatures' as Hyper-Notational Tools

Contemporary composition is undergoing a radical transformation, one in which notation is no longer a passive conduit for sonic realization but an active, multi-sensory interface. Within the multiplicative strata of contemporary notational thought, one finds an increasingly urgent need to recalibrate the mechanisms through which microtemporalities, gestural polysemy, and spatialized inference can be inscribed into the fabric of the score itself. 

In my latest score, I address the emergence of photo-realism and tilt-shift photography as hyper-notational tools, alongside the integration of 'Brutalist Tablatures,' a system that imposes rigid yet interpretable constraints on performance. These methods are uniquely applied within the context of photographing models specifically chosen for their integral role in the interpretive and performative elements of the score.

The Role of Photo-Realism in Notation

Photo-realism in notation challenges conventional symbolic reduction by embracing hyper-detail as an expressive and structural necessity. Traditional notation seeks to streamline communication, prioritizing clarity and functional legibility. However, my approach aims to capture the nuances of musical expression with the same precision and textural depth as a hyper-detailed visual representation. This results in a score that does not simply direct performance but acts as a landscape of sonic potential, where every detail carries performative weight.

Tilt-Shift Photography as a Notational Strategy

Tilt-shift photography extends this vision by incorporating selective focus and depth of field as integral aspects of the score’s structure. By intentionally blurring certain regions while sharpening others, tilt-shift introduces a perceptual hierarchy within the notation. This technique compels the performer to navigate a shifting field of clarity and ambiguity, where focused elements demand explicit articulation while blurred elements encourage interpretive fluidity. As a result, notation becomes a layered topography of emphasis, wherein perception itself dictates the unfolding of musical events.

'Brutalist Tablatures': Structuring Sonic Brutality

My integration of 'Brutalist Tablatures' adds another dimension to this hyper-notational approach. Inspired by the austere, monolithic forms of Brutalist architecture, these tablatures impose structural rigor onto the performance environment. Unlike conventional tablature systems, which provide a direct mapping of finger positions or actions, 'Brutalist Tablatures' function as architectural impositions—non-negotiable constraints that the performer must either adhere to or resist. These blocks of instruction do not merely dictate pitch and rhythm but structure the very materiality of instrumental engagement, reinforcing a dialectic between determinacy and performative agency.

Photographing Models: The Embodied Identity of the Score

Central to this methodology is the process of photographing models, whose identities become paramount to the interpretive performative dimension of the score. Each model is exhaustively screened and selected, not as passive figures but as living embodiments of the score’s gestural and psychological dimensions. The photographed figures become notational subjects, their presence informing the score’s spatial, textural, and conceptual underpinnings. This practice transforms the act of notation into a form of portraiture, where each model’s identity, posture, and expression contribute to the sonic realization of the piece.

The Score as a Living Entity

Through the synthesis of photo-realism, tilt-shift photography, and 'Brutalist Tablatures,' my scores exist as dynamic, multi-layered objects that resist static interpretation. Performers engage with them not as conventional instructional texts but as perceptual environments that demand real-time negotiation and discovery. The interplay of hyper-detail, selective focus, and architectural constraint reshapes the relationship between composer, score, and performer, ultimately redefining the act of musical interpretation itself.

As these techniques continue to evolve, they point toward a new paradigm in music notation—one where visual, architectural, and performative elements converge to create an immersive, embodied musical experience. By pushing the boundaries of what a score can be, this radical compositional practice challenges the very foundations of contemporary performance, offering a new way forward for experimental music notation.

The Guilloche Staff in Musical Notation

The Guilloche Staff in Musical Notation: Reframing the Semiotics of Musical Inscription

Throughout history, the visual language of music notation has oscillated between the mechanical and the interpretative, striving to reconcile the precision of instruction with the organic unpredictability of performance. Western musical notation, emerging from the modular neumes of Gregorian chant to the rationalized staff of modernity, has solidified its utility at the cost of untapped aesthetic resonance. However, in an era where semiotic boundaries are ripe for deconstruction, the time has come to envision a notational paradigm that exceeds its functional constraints.

Enter the Guilloche Staff, an enigmatic system that fuses the exquisite precision of interlaced patterns with the evocative potential of sound. Drawn from the decorative intricacies of guilloche design, long revered in the realms of luxury engraving and banknote security, this newly crafted archetype resists reductive readings, opening interpretative pathways that destabilize and enrich the performer’s relationship with the score. The guilloche system, while echoing the lineage of Western notation, dares to reconstitute the staff as an interactive and philosophically charged artifact.

Guilloche: Expanding Performative Possibilities

Spatial Metaphors as Sonic Coordinates

In this reconceptualization, the guilloche’s delicate intricacies transcend their ornamental origins to operate as spatial metaphors for microtonalities, asymmetries, and unquantifiable fluctuations. By abandoning the rigidity of linearity, the performer is offered a visual matrix that gestures toward multidimensionality.  It presents itself as an immersive architecture where phrasing emerges not from prescribed symbols, but from the interplay of embedded contours and rhythmic deviations.

For example, densely coiled guilloche bands might suggest accumulative tension, their visual density a sonic harbinger of harmonic compression or tonal dissonance. Conversely, stretched motifs could signify ethereal expansiveness and a dynamic invitation to interpret temporal elasticity.

Displacing Certainty with Aesthetic Agency

Traditional notation, with its definitive symbols and rigid structures, assumes a unidirectional flow of authority: from composer to performer. The guilloche staff resists such certainty. Instead, it interweaves ambiguity into its design, enabling a performer to negotiate between preordained gestures and emergent interpretations. This destabilization, rather than being disorienting, cultivates an intimate dialogue between score and performer, dismantling hierarchies of control.

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Guilloche as Interpretative Topography

Multilayered Semiotics: Dynamic and Textural Encoding

The guilloche’s curvatures invite interpretative layering:

• Dynamic Gradations: Subtle shifts in line density might embody crescendos or decrescendos, dynamically nuanced beyond the capacity of conventional hairpins.

• Timbre Modulation: Spiraling motifs could encode shifting timbral hues, embedding a cartographic representation of coloristic variation.

• Temporal Anchoring: Rhythmic integrity, often fixed by bar lines, is liberated through curvilinear arcs that insinuate pulsation without enforcement.

Recalibrating Complexity

In an era saturated with the performative demands of extended techniques and asymmetrical forms, notation must evolve to embody not only technical precision but also gestural intent. The guilloche staff's multidimensionality accommodates nested rhythms, polymetric layers, and textural juxtaposition, all without imposing restrictive symmetry.

For instance, in a hypothetical movement for ensemble, the flute’s passage might spiral outward in guilloche waves to signify airy fragility, while the cello’s part interlaces denser helices, alluding to grounded, resonant tension. This interpretative freedom, anchored in visual suggestion, enriches collaborative exploration.

Theoretical Challenges: Toward a Meta-Notation

Translational Fluidity

While the guilloche staff’s semantic richness offers unrivaled interpretative depth, its abstracted forms may challenge performers accustomed to finite, codified symbols. Transitioning requires a reeducation, not only of the performer,  but of pedagogical frameworks.

Interdisciplinary Synthesis

How does one standardize ambiguity? A paradox emerges: to universalize guilloche notation’s abstract language, does one risk diluting its radical freedom? Resolving this tension demands interdisciplinary collaboration, from cognitive psychologists studying visual interpretation to digital innovators designing adaptive performance interfaces.

Philosophical Ramifications: Beyond the Page

The guilloche staff is, in essence, a post-structuralist critique of notation’s historical rigidity. By reframing the staff as not only a functional but a poetic artifact, this approach echoes Derridean deconstruction: the “text” of notation becomes an unstable site of meaning. In such instability lies infinite interpretative potential, where notation ceases to dictate and instead collaborates.

Performers, as interlocutors, translate guilloche’s enigmas into lived sound. This process honors music as a space of becoming rather than being.

Toward an Unknowable Horizon

The guilloche staff gestures not merely toward an evolution of musical inscription but toward a rupture: a dismantling of the limits we once imposed upon sound’s visual representation. It merges the ornamental with the functional, destabilizing rigid hierarchies while opening paths for exploratory creativity.

By embracing its enigmatic design, we engage not in solving music’s mysteries but in reveling within them, cultivating a paradigm of notation that perpetually transforms alongside the boundless possibilities of music itself.

The Brutalist Tablatures

Brutalist Tablatures are structured upon the principles of Brutalist architecture.  They reject the ornamentation and historical continuity of the five-line staff. Instead, it embraces a stark, materially direct framework that prioritizes density, stratification, and spatial concreteness as primary vehicles of sonic articulation. Through an analysis of notational ergonomics, cognitive resistance, and semiotic deconstruction, this whitepaper presents Brutalist Tablature as an autonomous aesthetic object, not merely a container for sound.

Deconstructing the Five-Line Staff: Towards a Concrete Semiotics

The five-line staff, despite its entrenched cultural status, operates primarily as a passive intermediary.  It emerges as a translucent screen upon which sonic intentions are projected. By contrast, Brutalist Tablature foregrounds the structural grid as an active participant in compositional determination, embedding sonic parameters within an explicit architectonic topography. The redundant lines of traditional staff notation yield to an array of thickened slabs, subdivided by deliberate fissures that articulate durational instability and registral ambiguity.

Brutalist Tablature does not seek to be intuitive. It is obstinate, a site of tension between performer, score, and interpretative praxis. It demands that notation itself be as resistant to instant comprehension as the music it encodes.

Materiality as Notational Imperative: Density, Compression, Striation

Rather than relying on staves as mere orientation devices, the Brutalist Tablature enforces a stratified, monolithic approach to pitch organization.

• Density: Musical elements are inscribed in reinforced blocks, their relative opacity indicating degrees of parametric congestion. Verticality is no longer an index of absolute pitch but an indicator of polyphonic mass.

• Compression: Instead of barlines, partitions of sonic mass are delineated by intrusion zones.  They are where musical materials coalesce into singular gestural entities before erupting into fracture lines.

• Striation: Sonic artifacts:  Articulations, timbral specifications, and extended techniques exist as textural encrustations within a framework of structured erosion.

This spatialization of musical matter ensures that the score exists as an object of interpretation rather than transcription, requiring performers to engage with notation as material rather than symbolic suggestion.

The Architectonics of Gesture: Performative Agglomeration and Resistance

Brutalist Tablature does not grant the performer passage as it obstructs, resists, and asserts its own presence. Each gesture must be excavated from a matrix of encoded density, a process of confrontation rather than mere execution. It subverts the prescriptive function of traditional notation in favor of a topological relationship between player and material.

Gesture is no longer a matter of indicated movement but of structural intervention:

• Thickened zones denote haptic intensity, requiring shifts in bodily pressure rather than merely volume or dynamic contrast.

• Collapsed spaces function as sonic voids, sites of non-action that demand interpretative inertia as much as engagement.

• Forced overlap disrupts sequential legibility, requiring the performer to engage with multiple layers of simultaneous decision-making.

The result is a score that exists not to instruct but to provoke, an active field of resistance against conventional interpretative fluidity.

Brutalist Tablature is neither an alternative notation nor a mere reorganization of conventional graphic principles. It is a concrete sonic architecture.  It is a mass of musical raw material, an insistent structure of sonic determination.

In this model, the score ceases to be a translucent vehicle for sound. Instead, it manifests as an autonomous brutalist object, imposing its own weight upon the performer, demanding excavation rather than passive reading.

Notation becomes concrete, raw, indelible.

Music, in turn, emerges not from the passive act of playing but from an architectural confrontation between body, score, and sound.