Resumen de Synesthete composer A. Scriabin: reception history and archetypal imagery of late piano miniatures, visualisation of musical texture. Alexander scriabin: imágenes arquetípicas de las miniaturas tardias para piano. Visualización de la textura musical
Synesthete Composer A. Scriabin: Reception History and Archetypal Imagery of Late Piano Miniatures, Visualisation of Musical Texture.
Abstract (English) Synesthesia is a blending senses condition characterized by sensory pairings. It influences perception and could be the source of creative endeavor. The figure of the Russian composer Alexander Scriabin (1872-1915) has held a mysterious fascination to this day. He possibly had sound to visual-tactile pairings of musical-space synesthesia. At the turn of the 20th century the Russian Mystic Symbolist movement was in full bloom and Scriabin was hailed as a prophet. It was his life’s ambition to create a multisensory drama capable of transforming the consciousness of the human mind through an act of theurgy. By inserting a colour organ in his poem Prometheus, he wanted to make harmony more evident with coloured light.
Scriabin developed a new approach to the principles of harmony by considering a broader concept of temperament, and was precursor of Shoenberg and Messiaen’s modes of limited transpositions. His late piano moniatures, Opuses 71, 73, and 74, are considered to be sketches for the Preparatory Act of Mysterium (Morrison2002), Scriabin’s final unfinished multisensory drama. Scriabin wrote poetry for Mysterium and it serves as a guidance for interpretation of piano works.
The author hypothesises that the musical texture of synestheste composers is organised in a certain way, making an Image/ Archetype visually and audibly recognisable. Archetype mapping of musical texture follows the symbolic philosophical context of compositions. The Russian Yavorsky/Dernova Dual Modality system of analysis is of assistance in describing Scriabin's harmonic structures, alongside some reference to Schenkerian analysis developed in Europe and the Octatonism in the US. A 4D model of Musical –Space Synesthesia, developed by the author, demonstrates visualisation of musical texture by layers of gesture archetypes.
Music Analysis based on the archetypal system could be utilised as guidance for Art visualisations and could bring a new evaluation of the late piano miniatures and their aesthetic to a wide audience.
Keywords: musical-space synesthaesia, archetypes of musical texture, visualisation Conclusions - The study of Scriabin’s reception history reveals that the composer’s heritage shared the ideas of symbolism of his time. His harmonic innovations situated him historically as a precursor of Schoenberg’s serial music and modes of limited transposition found in the works of Messiaen.
- By analysing Scriabin’s unique impressions of sound, verbal metaphors, compositional language and performing style, there is a conclusion: he had stable sound, visual, tactile associations, which could belong to musical-space synesthesia, he had three colour-pitch association of chromosthesia. His piano touch and mastery of pedalling to access overtones, created sound beyond just a piano sound, giving impressions of ‘perfume’, ‘essence’. Sound to tactile synesthesia pairings, possibly, gave him the ability to feel the shape of the sound as a physical substance.
- Musical texture visualisation in 3D changes time perception. The assessment of the composer’s recordings demonstrates that layers of musical texture create different timelines. The author’s demonstration of 4D model of musical-space synesthesia perception in a live performance, can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbmnmWFp1yE. The author contents that this conclusion could be the subject of further studies and alternative methodologies on reading musical scores much faster than via the conventional system.
- To reveal the complex symbolic content of Scriabin’s late piano miniatures, the author applied an alternative system of Archetypal Music Analysis through visualisation of musical texture. This type of analysis could be applied to other synesthete composer’s musical texture on the basis of audibly and visualy recognisable gestures archetypes. Verbal description of archetypes could be utilised as a guidance for Visual Artworks on musical compositions and make music accessible to a wide audience.
- Below is a film on Art and Music synesthetic expressions with Interviews from Dr Kevin Mitchell and composer Tim Doyle. It was recorded and directed by the author at the National Concert Hall, Dublin, Ireland and the School of Computer Science, Trinity College Dublin. https://player.vimeo.com/video/218623029 Musical analysis based on Archetypal Imagery and Cross-Modal Associations of musical texture can be utilised as a guidance for Art & Digital Visualisations, examples: www.svetlana-rudenko.com Visualisation of Musical Texture: Svetlana Rudenko/ 4D Model of Musical-Space Synesthesia
