ABSTRACT
The Sonic Meditations (1971) are by far the most widely known and frequently “performed” works by Pauline Oliveros. These guided improvisatory pieces stand alone in her creative output as they have been reprinted and written about more often than any of her other compositions. Over thirty years since their emergence, they still challenge the conventional distinctions among composer, performer, and listener within western art music. Furthermore, they beckon me to consider the powerful nexus of feminist ideas and lesbian artistic communities that formed in the early 1970s wave of the women’s liberation movement.
