An Asian-Pacific hybrid blues voice : a syncretic sonic grit journey from ancient Chinese and Korean musical forms to 20th & 21st century rural blues and gospel music

Abstract

This thesis and [four] accompanying recorded works are an auto-ethnography of sound, exploring the sonic journeying of an Australian musician towards an antipodean Pacificrim sonic-grit infused blues voice, through utilising a reflective practice approach (Schon, 1983) as part of "practice-led research" (Smith & Dean, 2009, p. 1). The exegetical component examines the sonic parallels between music traditions originating in Southeast and East Asia, and traditional American rural blues and gospel traditions, through the experience of a musical journey. The overall work presents a sonic connection across boundaries. As author, my music explores a fluctuating world noise, drawn from a core of rural American blues and gospel combined with and East and Southeast Asian cultures, all reinvented through journeying (musical, geographical and cultural) as an Australian- Asian sonic moment approach. The result is in a reinvented personal musical voice. The practice-led research component of the thesis follows sonic grit and microtones through a portfolio of four recorded music projects, each focussing on a cross-cultural collaboration with musicians specialising in different cultural and ultimately musical styles. I begin with Asian music traditions of the Chinese guqin and the Korean komungo, then through to American musical styles: Mississippi hill country blues and gospel; and African-American church-based Sacred Steel guitar music traditions. As an Australian hybrid-blues musician, I analyse their cross-fertilisation in the context of a personal journey of collaboration. A notion of travelling eclecticism of Australian culture within the lineages of these traditions provides the basis for the thesis's key proposal of a reinvented hybrid Asian-influenced, Pacific-rim blues voice. In the process of discovering a personal musical voice, the thesis explores a central theme of sonic grit as well as several sub-themes including fixed structured music forms versus improvisational forms, locality aesthetics, as well as border crossing and hybridisation. The research revealed an expansion of awareness of grit through; fully exploiting the tactility of musical instruments, expanding microtonal choices, and melding new musical-cultural knowledge. The resultant effect was a broadening of the author's musical voice, reflecting this new sonic and cultural knowledge.

Date of Award	2019
Original language	English