Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book examines aspects of live electronic music from the overlapping perspectives of composition, performance and study. It presents information obtained through a survey of twelve performers from France and Quebec. The book discusses the collective nature of the creative process at the Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique in Paris, the Centre for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics at Stanford University and the Centro di Sonologia Computazionale in Universita di Padova. It also examines the innovative notational approaches that composers have devised in order to communicate their instructions and the challenges that these approaches entail for the performer. The book looks at how the performance practice of music by Luciano Berio, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Luigi Nono has generated problems of authorship and work identity.