Forum week 4

This weeks forum topic was collaborations. The forum started off with Stephen Whittington giving a brief speech on collaborations and some of the factors that may need to be considered. Mr. Whittington touched on points such as; the possibility of collaborators speaking different languages, collaborations between different fields of expertise, what is expected of you, and the need to sometimes have to compromise.

After this short speech the first student presenter was introduced, David Dowling. His presentation was on the collaboration between a conductor of western art music named Michael Kamen and the band Metallica. He discussed some of the considerations that had to be considered when placing a rock band on the same stage as an orchestra such as clear, see through baffles and the problems with separating sound.

Next was Vinny Bhagat's presentation on Trilok Gurtu, a percussionist who plays a number of traditional Indian instruments, and how he collaborates with other artists to produce a fusion between traditional Indian instruments and modern day instruments such as bass, guitar, etc.

William Revill discussed how collaborations are now being conducted over the Internet using the Microsoft program XACT. He spoke of some of the problems faced with collaborations between people working with sound (ie: the need for a space on their own) and how this program allows for each separate participant in the collaboration to be aware and access work done by the other participants.

The last presenter was Khaled Sanadzadeh. In his presentation he spoke of his own opinions on 'World' music and that in his opinion that collaborations between 'world' music and western music is a one way process. He touched on the effects of commercialism and the fact that a number of western instruments are not able to play some traditional music. The discussion was then opened up to the forum to discuss.

Overall I think the forum covered a number of interesting points in regards to collaboration.