Sounding Decolonial Futures: Decentering Ethnomusicology's Colonialist Legacies

Term: Transcription

Transcription is typically defined as the act of graphically depicting and reflecting specific instances of sonic practices that one has heard directly, either in live performance or from a recording. A transcription need not be reliant on staff notation, but in the early days of transcribing and collecting Indigenous materials in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, staff notation was the standard format, despite the significant discrepancies in melodic and rhythmic materials. In other words, staff notation--and its users--were not equipped to deal with the sonic complexities of musical systems other than those for which they were designed, i.e. Western Art Music. Some transcribers did try to make allowances for pitches outside standard 12 tones embodied in staff notation. 

Ethnomusicologist, Victoria Levine, clarifies the matter in the introduction to her volume, Writing American Indian Music: Historic Transcriptions, Notations, and Arrangements,  

A notation is any set of symbols designed to communicate how music should be performed...[it is described as prescriptive] Transcription involves either rewriting music from one form of notation into another, or music dictation, in which actual musical sounds are written while listening... [described as descriptive] This latter mode of transcription is what has been used most often in academic studies of Native American music. Like notation, the arrangement is also prescriptive. Arrangement involves the adaptation of a notation or transcription for the purpose of performance, a process that usually involves harmonization, orchestration, or the addition of instrumental accompaniment. (2002:ix-xx)


 

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