The Sound Commons and Applied Ecomusicologies

Abstract

Applied ecomusicologies address interdisciplinary problems that bear on music/sound, culture/society, and nature/environment. The ecocentric concept of the ‘sound commons’ offers a framework for theorising and focusing applied ecomusicologies. A sound commons expresses an ecological rationality as a soundscape in which all beings enjoy a commonwealth of sound, freely communicating in their acoustic niches with as little interference as possible. This chapter examines two principal perspectives in applied ecomusicologies. First, non-consumptive values are illustrated through discussion of the musical performance and media production collective Ecosong.net and their project Together Alone , which aims to actualise the principles, ethics, and objectives of the sound commons. Second, consumption of environmental materials, for example for musical instruments and infrastructure, is critiqued in the context of how such consumption allows for modern music culture to exist in the planetary sound commons. Doing so pushes applied musicological work from anthropocentrism towards ecocentrism.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 6 citations exist upstream.