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Encyclopedia > Zoomusicology

Zoomusicology is a field of musicology and zoology or more specifically, zoosemiotics. Zoomusicology is the study of the music of animals, or rather the musical aspects of sound or communication produced and received by animals. Musicology is reasoned discourse concerning music (Greek: μουσικη = music and λογος = word or reason). In other words: the whole body of systematized knowledge about music which results from the application of a scientific method of investigation or research, or of philosophical speculation and rational systematization to the facts, the processes and the... Zoology is the biological discipline which involves the study of non-human animals. ... Animal communication is any behaviour on the part of one animal that has an effect on the current or future behaviour of another animal. ... Music is a form of art that involves organized and audible sounds and silence. ... Phyla Subregnum Parazoa Porifera Subregnum Eumetazoa Placozoa Orthonectida Rhombozoa Radiata (unranked) Ctenophora Cnidaria Bilateria (unranked) Acoelomorpha Myxozoa Superphylum Deuterostomia Chordata Hemichordata Echinodermata Chaetognatha Xenoturbellida Superphylum Ecdysozoa Kinorhyncha Loricifera Priapulida Nematoda Nematomorpha Onychophora Tardigrada Arthropoda Superphylum Platyzoa Platyhelminthes Gastrotricha Rotifera Acanthocephala Gnathostomulida Micrognathozoa Cycliophora Superphylum Lophotrochozoa Sipuncula Nemertea Phoronida Ectoprocta Bryozoa... The aspects of music are any characteristic, dimension, or element taken as a part or component of music. ... It has been suggested that this article be split into articles entitled Sound, Sound pressure and Sound pressure level, accessible from a disambiguation page. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...


Zoomusicology may be distinguished from ethnomusicology, the study of human music. Zoomusicology is most often biomusicological, and biomusicology is often zoomusicological. Ethnomusicology (from the Greek ethnos = nation and mousike = music), formerly comparative musicology, is the study of music in its cultural context, cultural musicology. ... Biomusicology is the study of music from a biological point of view. ...

Contents

Background

Zoomusicologist Dario Martinelli describes the subject of zoomusicology as the "aesthetic use of sound communication among animals." George Herzog (1941) asked, "do animals have music?" François-Bernard Mâche's Musique, mythe, nature, ou les Dauphins d'Arion (1983), includes a study of "ornitho-musicology" using a technique of Nicolas Ruwet's Langage, musique, poésie (1972), paradigmatic segmentation analysis, shows that bird songs are organized according to a repetition-transformation principle. One purpose of the book was to “begin to speak of animal musics other than with the quotation marks” (Mâche 1992: 114), and he is credited by Dario Martinelli with the creation of zoomusicology ([1]). Aesthetics (or esthetics) (from the Greek word αισθητική) is a branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty. ... François-Bernard Mâche (born April 4, 1935 Clermont-Ferrand) is a French composer of contemporary music. ... Nicolas Ruwet (December 31, 1932 - November 15, 2001) was a linguist, literary critic and musical analyst. ... Bird songs are certain vocal sounds that birds make—in non-technical use, those sounds that are melodious to the human ear. ... Repetition is the occurrence of an event which has occurred before. ... In music, a transformation consists of any operation or process that a composer or performer may apply to a musical variable (usually a set or tone row in twelve tone music). ...


In the opinion of Jean-Jacques Nattiez (1990), "in the last analysis, it is a human being who decides what is and is not musical, even when the sound is not of human origin. If we acknowledge that sound is not organized and conceptualized (that is, made to form music) merely by its producer, but by the mind that perceives it, then music is uniquely human." According to Mâche, "If it turns out that music is a wide spread phenomenon in several living species apart from man, this will very much call into question the definition of music, and more widely that of man and his culture, as well as the idea we have of the animal itself." (Mâche 1992: 95) Jean-Jacques Nattiez is a musical semiologist or semiotician and professor of Musicology at the University of Montreal. ...


In music

Shinji Kanki composes music for dolphins according to conventions found in dolphin music or found to please dolphins in his Music for Dolphins (Ultrasonic Improvisational Composition) for underwater ultrasonic loudspeakers (2001). Shinji Kanki is a composer who has composed music for dolphins according to conventions found in dolphin music or found to please dolphins in his Music for Dolphins (Ultrasonic Improvisational Composition) for underwater ultrasonic loudspeakers (2001). ... See also: 2001 in music (UK) Musical groups established in 2001 Record labels established in 2001 other events of 2001 list of years in music 2000s in music // January 1 Comeback of Guns N Roses in House of Blues Hum disbands. ...


Composers have evoked or imitated animal sounds in compositions including Jean-Philippe Rameau's The Hen (1728), Camille Saint-Saëns's Carnival of the Animals (1886), Olivier Messiaen's Catalogue of the Birds (1956-58), and Pauline Oliveros's El Relicario de los Animales (1977). (Von Gunden 1983, p.133) Jean-Philippe Rameau, by Jacques André Joseph Aved, 1728 Jean-Philippe Rameau (September 25, 1683 - September 12, 1764) was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. ... Charles Camille Saint-Saëns () (9 October 1835 – 16 December 1921) was a French composer and performer, best known for his orchestral work The Carnival of the Animals. ... Olivier Messiaen Olivier Messiaen (IPA: ; born December 10, 1908 in Avignon, France; died April 27, 1992 in Clichy, Hauts-de-Seine, France) was a French composer, organist, and ornithologist. ... Pauline Oliveros (born 1932 in Houston, Texas) is an accordionist and composer who currently resides in Kingston, New York. ...


The icaros (sacred healing songs and chants) sung by ayahuasca healers, or shamanic practitioners, among Amazonian tribes are evocative of many of the sounds of birds, animals and insects of the jungle. The widely used Quechua name ayahuasca (pronounced ) has two highly interrelated yet distinct meanings and referents: 1) an Amazonian giant vine native to the rainforest containing various harmala alkaloids, generally Banisteriopsis caapi, and, by extension, 2) pharmacologically complex psychoactive infusions prepared from it for shamanic, folk-medicinal, and religious purposes. ... The shaman is an intellectual and spiritual figure who is regarded as possessing power and influence on other peoples in the tribe and performs several functions, primarily that of a healer ( medicine man). The shaman provides medical care, and serves other community needs during crisis times, via supernatural means (means... Amazon River basin The Amazon Basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributaries. ...


See also

Bioacoustics is a cross-disciplinary science, which investigates sound production and reception in animals, including man, the biological acoustically-borne information transfer and its propagation in elastic media. ... Bird songs are certain vocal sounds that birds make—in non-technical use, those sounds that are melodious to the human ear. ... See: Animal echolocation: animals emitting sound waves and listening to the echo in order to locate objects or navigate. ... Humpback whales are well known for their songs Whale song is the sound made by whales to communicate. ...

External link

Sources


  Results from FactBites:
 
Zoomusicology - Facts, Information, and Encyclopedia Reference article (176 words)
One purpose of the book was to “begin to speak of animal musics other than with the quotation marks” (Mâche 1992: 114), and he is credited by Dario Martinelli with the creation of zoomusicology ([1]).
Zoomusicology may be distinguished from anthropomusicology, the study of human music.
Zoomusicology is most often biomusicological, and biomusicology is often zoomusicological.
A BRIEF DEFINITION OF ZOOMUSICOLOGY (4010 words)
The goal of this article is to analyse a specific portion of the enormous area of musical universals, from a zoosemiotic (and zoomusicological in particular) perspective, i.e., starting from the hypothesis that certain ‘universal’ musical features—which I call transpecific traits—are shared within a zoological domain, rather than simply the human one.
Zoomusicology approaches “non-human animals” from the direction of human sciences, and music from the direction of biological sciences.
In zoomusicology, this level constitutes the best-known part of the research, with many of its aspects having already been investigated by ethology.
  More results at FactBites »

 

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