ABSTRACT
This chapter proposes a typology of sound/image relations in audiovisual forms, using videomusic as a model. The typology identifies how syntactical, kinetic and morphological relations between music and moving images carry the discourse of screen-based videomusic works. In videomusic, discourse forms a meta-narrative, in which the connection of music and moving images yields coherent meaning outside the conventional unfolding of a story. The sentient awareness that sound and image bind together over variable time spans generates the main rewarding experiences in these types of works. Borrowing from film theory, electroacoustic music theory and Gestalt psychology, the typology is built around two classes of sound/image relations: synchresis (when do connections happen) and diegesis (the context in which connections happen). The traditional meaning of the terms synchresis and diegesis is extended in a number of ways and, using examples from a number of artists’ work, ten descriptors of synchresis and seven descriptors of diegesis are identified.
