Making "Wild Sound": A Case Study in Engineering and Musical Performance Co-design

This paper describes and analyzes the development of Wild Sound, a musical work composed by Glenn Kotche and performed by Third Coast Percussion, with custom instruments designed and built by engineering students at the University of Notre Dame, that has been performed for national audiences. Using theories of design from Simon’s Sciences of the Artificial and current views of Design Thinking, the paper examines the complex multidisciplinary design process behind the development of this work. It also examines the learning experiences of the design team and suggests ways that future academic design projects may benefit from this experience. Introduction “Wild Sound” has been described as challenging “the distinctions that exist between music and noise, instrument and everyday object, performance and daily life.” Written by modern classical composer Glenn Kotche—who is also the drummer for the Grammy award-winning rock band Wilco—and performed by Chicago-based percussion ensemble Third Coast Percussion, the 45 minute extended work “Wild Sound” features custom instruments that were designed by a team of faculty and undergraduate students at the University of Notre Dame, simultaneously with the composition of the piece and the choreography of the performance. Since its premier at the Notre Dame DeBartolo Performing Arts Center, Wild Sound has also been performed at the St. Paul (Minnesota) Chamber Orchestra and has scheduled performances for spring 2015 at the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The purpose of this paper is to provide a formal analysis of this fascinating co-design process using an engineering design framework that considers objectives, constraints, multidisciplinary decomposition, and iteration across the engineering, musical composition, and performance domains. It considers the applicability of two theories of design, the work of Herbert Simon from the 1960s presented in his seminal monograph, The Sciences of the Artificial and Design Thinking that is currently much in favor in design education. The research methodology involved interviewing the participants in the project and asking them a series of questions. Responses were then mapped to elements of the models. In performing such an analysis, the paper seeks to provide insights into the conduct of a complex multidisciplinary design project that may lead to improvements in the design process for future projects. The remainder of the paper is organized as follows. First, it provides an overview of the Wild Sound project. Next, it summarizes the relevant theories of design. After this, it provides excerpts of the interviews of participants, including the composer, the performers, and the student engineers, and then maps observations from the interviews to the design theories. Following this, the paper provides reflections from the participants on what they learned from the project, as well as suggestions from the students regarding further development of classes that integrate engineering and the arts. Additionally, P ge 26123.2 results of a survey of audience members on their reactions are cited. The paper closes with conclusions and future work. Overview of Wild Sound Project The making of Wild Sound began approximately five years ago, when Third Coast Percussion approached composer Glenn Kotche regarding the possibility of commissioning a work from him. That possibility became a reality in 2012 when Third Coast began a 5-year tenure as artists-in-residence at the University of Notre Dame, where the university, with several other partners, decided to fund this commission. At that time, composer Kotche had a kernel of an idea for the work: to explore the relationship between “wild” and “tamed” sounds, the distinction between noise and music, and between musical performance and theater. The concept also included the notion of constructing musical instruments on stage, where the sounds of the construction were part of the score, and then playing the instruments. Figure 1: Scenes from Wild Sound, top to bottom, left to right. Constructing primitive instruments from scratch in Part 1, “Wilderness;” playing music with sticks in a foam block, amplified by a piezo contact microphone embedded in a meat thermometer during Part 2, “Rural;” playing a reciprocating saw with attached electric guitar pickup in Part 3, “Industrial;” playing Arduino-based synthesizer keyboard with conductive fabric gloves in Part 4, “Modern”. P ge 26123.3 The narrative arc of “Wild Sound” celebrates the evolution of technology from rural to modern industrial times. It has four distinct sections or movements: “Wilderness,” “Rural,” “Industrial,” and “Modern,” illustrated in Figure 1. As part of the performance, non-traditional instruments are constructed on stage, where the sounds of the construction are part of the musical score. The custom instruments include acoustical instruments that are shaped with hand and power tools, an “audience participation” instruments massproduced with a laser cutter, embedded piezo contact microphones, and a variety of MIDI synthesizers designed using Arduino processor technology. A team of faculty and 6 undergraduate summer research interns performed the design of the electronic instruments. The complete “Wild Sound” performance also includes a video track projected behind the stage and an ambient audio track with “found sounds” that Kotche collected while on tour internationally with Wilco, and real-time adjustments by an audio engineer.