Body Lutherie: Co-Designing a Wearable for Vocal Performance with a Changing Body

Rachel Freire, and Courtney N. Reed

Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression

Abstract

Research at NIME has incorporated embodied perspectives from design and HCI communities to explore how instruments and performers shape each other in interaction. Material perspectives also reveal other more-than-human factors' influence on musical interaction. We propose an additional, currently unaddressed perspective in instrument design: the influence of the body not only the locus of experience, but as a physical, entangled aspect in the more-than-human musicking. Proposing a practice of "Body Lutherie," we explore how digital instrument designers can honour and work with living, dynamic bodies. Our design of a breath-based vocal wearable instrument incorporated uncontrollable aspects of a vocalist's body and its physical change over different timescales. We distinguish the body in the design process and acknowledge its agency in vocal instrument design. Reflection on our co-design process between vocal pedagogy and eTextile fashion perspectives demonstrates how Body Lutherie can generate empathy and understanding of the body as a collaborator in future instrument design and artistic practice.

Citation

Rachel Freire, and Courtney N. Reed. 2024. Body Lutherie: Co-Designing a Wearable for Vocal Performance with a Changing Body. Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.13904800 [PDF]

BibTeX Entry

@article{nime2024_18,
 abstract = {Research at NIME has incorporated embodied perspectives from design and HCI communities to explore how instruments and performers shape each other in interaction. Material perspectives also reveal other more-than-human factors' influence on musical interaction. We propose an additional, currently unaddressed perspective in instrument design: the influence of the body not only the locus of experience, but as a physical, entangled aspect in the more-than-human musicking. Proposing a practice of "Body Lutherie," we explore how digital instrument designers can honour and work with living, dynamic bodies. Our design of a breath-based vocal wearable instrument incorporated uncontrollable aspects of a vocalist's body and its physical change over different timescales. We distinguish the body in the design process and acknowledge its agency in vocal instrument design. Reflection on our co-design process between vocal pedagogy and eTextile fashion perspectives demonstrates how Body Lutherie can generate empathy and understanding of the body as a collaborator in future instrument design and artistic practice.},
 address = {Utrecht, Netherlands},
 articleno = {18},
 author = {Rachel Freire and Courtney N. Reed},
 booktitle = {Proceedings of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical Expression},
 doi = {10.5281/zenodo.13904800},
 editor = {S M Astrid Bin and Courtney N. Reed},
 issn = {2220-4806},
 month = {September},
 numpages = {10},
 pages = {117--126},
 presentation-video = {},
 title = {Body Lutherie: Co-Designing a Wearable for Vocal Performance with a Changing Body},
 track = {Papers},
 url = {http://nime.org/proceedings/2024/nime2024_18.pdf},
 year = {2024}
}