Composing from Within
Notes on working with sound
A sound drags me away. I didn’t see what caused it (that was its power). Restoring composure is its own trial. The body is beyond itself, outline traced ahead, ghosted forward like the translucent overlay of an animation frame, merging into focus.
Why did that sound lead me elsewhere? I know that its power came from more than mere loudness. But to reason further would be to proceed from its nature. That would be an overreach; it would miss the point.
A shout in a library takes a stand against the prevailing quiet. It furnishes contrast (Latin contra- + stare). Anyone who has studied in a library knows its effect: the compulsion to look up from one’s reading. The power is in surrendering to interruption, without enquiry.
This etymological diversion suggests a caveat, one that I might have heeded more frequently. Analysis can act as a shield, an apologia for sensation. It can protect the body from the disruption of unmediated experience.
The work of composing electronic music happens deep within a thicket of craft. I am enveloped, sonically, in the process of creation, which means that ideas are felt in motion, not merely thought. Knowledge comes from the senses.
I hold onto the sensations of experience and feel exposed without the safeguard of theory. What is it like to perceive? Attunement: solidarity with sensation, the acceptance of vibration.
But still, I’m held up by abstraction, adjusting numbers. I hear the sound of abrasion and flinch. I dial things back until what comes out matches what I can assimilate. This is styling, a form of curation. It’s more primal than appeasement.
Yet it’s easy to go too far and find there is nothing left to speak of. Not a landscape, only a tundra of scarcity and dejection. So I turn the dial the other way and reinstate assurance. There it is: a life-form of sorts, pleasingly uneven.
There is another act, which goes further: “mapping” one set of numbers across the range of another. The personality of the original set drives the character of the second.
When I compose with sound, I am cut off in a kind of exile, obscured yet tinged with agency. I pass through a field of opportunity, encountering one form or another. I have the sense that I am floating through a kaleidoscope of propositions—interventions that seek purchase.
I need a landing point where I can stop, reach for my tools, and consider what gives. I find my footing, wedged briefly in a crevice and try things out. What works? This has nothing to do with regulation.
Aesthetic experience elicits action. Whether I’m able to make best use of it is another matter. But it’s all there, easily missed. Still, I sense that unthinking urge to look for some framework. The antidote is to stay a while with how things are.
I leave my resting place and move on. I hear mavericks: sounds that make claims beyond their means. They drag me away. I rotate my neck and look at the loudspeaker. It has no idea what it broadcast.
Sometimes, I’m lulled to sleep by the flatness of my design, a landscape without profile. I think of outer space where there is no sound and have another go.
There is trickery in how things take shape. In the end, materials find their meaning; newly born sprites converse with their properties. Some things feel brighter, spirits skewed to higher frequencies. Others are more sluggish. But still I’m nagged by a compulsion to explain why they found their place at all. I need something to ease the pressure.
I return to etymology and find something in the root of leisure (via Old French, leisir), which speaks of freedom and permission. Safeguarded, I start again and notice the shadows of things on my cheeks as I float on by.
I think of contrast as a way of communicating, sounds standing against others. I have a slight unease about their future. But I draw back, given my leave to remain with things as they are.
© N.G.Brown, 2026
This post is part of a series that considers philosophical approaches to composing with digital media.