Speed in music

Abstract

This dissertation investigates musical speed: what it is, how it is perceived, and how it can be explored within compositional, improvisational, and performance practice. Drawing on decades of work as a composer, flutist, and improviser, the author argues that speed in music is far richer than tempo alone suggests. Speed is defined as the rate of perceptual events in time, functioning across multiple concurrent timescales, and co-constructed by the music, performer, environment, and listener.

The dissertation builds this framework through five perspectives: thresholds of speed; temporal resolution and biological perception limits; density and motion; smooth and striated time (drawing on Boulez, Deleuze, Guattari, and Grisey); and speed as relational phenomenon, framed through Phillips' LEMI model and Haraway's situated knowledge.

These foundations are applied through three investigations. First, tuplets are examined as tools for shaping perceived speed, capable of generating smooth time from striated precision. Second, polytempo compositions serve as laboratories for examining concurrent temporalities, haptic metronomes, and controlled asynchrony. Third, a case study of the solo flute piece Torrent proposes a "speed of creation" framework treating improvisation and composition as points on a continuum of decision-making speed and reflective latitude.

The research demonstrates that musical speed is relational, offering practical and theoretical insights for composers, performers, and scholars.