Composing for vibrational sound installations

Abstract

This reflective commentary focuses on the creation of a composition portfolio based on vibrational art installations in Lesotho and South Africa. I consider my positionality as a Black African scholar in the Global South and how technology can be coupled with indigenous philosophies to produce spaces that can be read as culturally contemplative. The three sites selected for the study are Morija Museum and Archives, the Tankwa Karoo, and the Raw Spot Gallery/ the International Library of African Music (ILAM). To do so, I use the African philosophy of Ntu, the ultimate cosmic principle that permeates all nature, to engage in an inter-material dialogues among artefacts, historical sites, visual art, and sound. I situate my study by considering the historical and political events that shaped the establishment of the archive and the archive’s effects on the listening and musicking practices manifest as hybridity in the performed compositions.