Spectator understanding of performative interaction : the influence of mental models and communities of practice on the perception and judgement of skill and error in electronic music performance ecologies

• Main Author: Fyans, Andrew Cavan
• Published: Queen's University Belfast 2016
• Subjects: 786.7
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.705919

Within the domain of novel performative electronic interactions there is an aspiration to develop musical interactions that allow or exhibit high levels of performative skill, virtuosity and expressive qualities. Research and development in the domain has primarily focused on these features as functions of the performer-system relationship, with little regard for the fact that the experience of them is an ecologically situated subjective assessment made by a spectator. Furthermore it has often been assumed that a spectator is inherently qualified to understand novel performative interactions in a similar manner to acoustic instruments, regardless of the radical divergence of many novel electronic interactions. In this thesis I examine and unpack underlying factors influencing the spectator experience of novel performative electronic interactions. This was achieved through three exploratory studies of spectatorship in which primarily qualitative, phenomenological data was collected relating to participants’ cognition, judgment and experience of contrasting musical performances. This yielded diverse and rich datasets allowing for the examination of central hypotheses and research questions but also allowing for the exploration of unexpected emergent phenomena, which ultimately guided the direction of this work. Analysis highlighted the rich, holistic nature of the spectatorship and demonstrated unique features in the spectator experience of novel performative interactions. This showed that the cognition and judgement of some electronic interactions may be analogous to acoustic instruments but others offer vastly divergent spectator experiences, influenced by a range of novel factors including the cognition of a wide range of perceptual-motor, cognitive and preparatory skills. Phenomena surrounding mental models, embodiment and communities of practice were observed to be central in the experience of skill in novel performative interaction and indicative of distinct challenges in the development of novel performative interactions.