| In this paper I aim to analyze the role and function of communication in contemporary music, specifically improvised music, as I believe it has shifted from a system of presence and absence to one of pattern and randomness, which in turn mirrors a similar progression in cybernetic thought and its influence on social theory and communication. In order to demonstrate this shift I will provide examples of multiple musical works that function within this scope through the lenses of concurrent developments in First, Second, and Neocybernetic theory. Ultimately, because of this shift in communication, it is my belief that contemporary improvised musical situations are now Neocybernetic in nature, meaning that performers within an ensemble function as structurally coupled but operationally closed systems whose boundaries are defined through a reduction of complexity as they engage with emergent forms as events. This reduction of complexity is enforced through the coordinative selection of information from all available environmental information through reflexive recognitions of perturbations external to these systems. Communication within these contexts therefore relies solely on definitions of pattern from randomness through experience of interactions with the communicative system rather than through communication itself, and therefore redefines the role of structuring within musical contexts as one that requires the emergence of self-organized form through the constrained construction and coordinative evaluation of experiences. By using my own work as an example, I will explore this method of constrained constructing through graphic and text scoring. |
