On the 1st of November 2022, The Centre for Sound, Technology and Culture invited Marcus Boon, author of the recently published book The Politics of Vibration: Music as a Cosmopolitical Practice (Duke University Press, 2022), to speak about his work, share music and stimulate discussion around the question of how music constructs a vibrational space of individual and collective transformation. Goldsmith’s Sonics Immersive Media Lab (with its 12.2 sound system) provided the perfect context for immersive listening and engaging discussion.
Professor Julian Henriques gave an introductory overview of Marcus Boon’s research to date, before delving into his most recent publication, The Politics of Vibration. The book explores four key musical case studies: the Hindustani classical vocalist Pandit Pran Nath, Swedish drone composer and philosopher Catherine Christer Hennix, Houston-based hip-hop musician DJ Screw and the Canadian electronic and First Nation influenced band Halluci Nation. Boon contends that music, as a shaping of vibration, needs to be recognized as a cosmopolitical practice—in the sense introduced by Isabelle Stengers—in which what music is within a society depends on what kinds of access to vibration are permitted, and to whom.
From this introductory springboard, Boon then delved deeper into the philosophical underpinnings and musical examples central to the book, which offers an important contribution to the new interdisciplinary field of Vibration studies. He described vibration as a mathematical and a physical concept, as a religious or ontological force, and as a psychological determinant of subjectivity. A discussion of Pran Nath’s music was accompanied by short examples of Hindustani music and Pran Nath’s performance of 21 VIII 76 NYC Raga Malkauns.
The influence of Catherine Christer Hennix’s work was discussed at length concerning topics of topology and transfeminism. Attendee at the event, Hao Zheng, described: “When we talk about Catherine Christer Hennix’s use of matrices to create sound, the sound space she creates consists of multiple dimensions with topological properties that have continuity and stability without regard to time, but also independent of size and depth in the physical geometric sense” (Hao Zheng, student and colloquium attendee).
The discussion then broadened to include audience thoughts and questions, including topics of sound and spirituality and the philosophical implications of DJ Screw’s production techniques (such as beat repeats, pitch or temporal manipulation). Boon then took the audience on a journey through DJ Screw’s mixtapes and music, exploring how sound can break away from linear temporalities. Below is an an example of DJ Screw’s music taken from the playlist created by Boon to accompany The Politics of Vibration, which can be found here.
These snippets of music – sounded on the SIMIL space’s system – and accompanying reflective discussion allowed for collective sonic and theoretical deliberations on topology, alternatives to linear time, and the Politics of Vibration.
Attendee Tilda Storey’s visual response to the listening intervals (in order of appearance: DJ Screw, Hennix, Pran Nath) throughout the event offers a final reflection on the fruitful insights and examples that Boon explored (below).
