Sound Object? Sound Event!

Ideologies of Sound and the Biopolitics of Music

Abstract

This article elaborates on the ideology of the sound object, as a predominant factor in common attitudes of sound-making and listening, and contrasts it with an understanding of sound as the event of time-specific and space-specific traces left by desired or necessary interac- tions. The discussion is described as one bearing on the biopolitics of music: by weaving together an ecological awareness of sound and a critical (and creative) view of music technologies, the article emphasizes the relationship between the material conditions and the cognitive mechanisms of auditory experience qua “conditions of existence” of purposeful sound-making in general. Commitments of the kind can take the form of scholarly research and/or of artistic explorations. Therefore the discussion touches both on broader questions of musical knowledge in their relation to issues in audio media theory, and on particular examples of sound art practices where reconsidered notions of aura seem to emerge.