Eighteenth International Conference on the Arts in Society

Abstract

The term ‘immersive’ when applied to music performance practice can be vague and ambiguous. There is no musical style called ‘immersive music’, whilst there are no established approaches for this performance medium. As such, it can be very difficult for music creators to develop performance work that is truly immersive; and yet the term remains a buzz word regularly applied without definition. Therefore, the key aim of this study has been to critically investigate immersivity in music performance, and how it can be successfully implemented in practice. Innovative approaches have evaluated how the combination of the performance space, musical style and delivery methods can produce unique and valuable sonic experiences for the audience. Thus, it presents a framework of compositional and spatial characteristics which define this performance paradigm. It does this by providing a taxonomy of immersive parameters which creators should consider when developing music for immersive performance.