Charles S. Peirce’s triadic semiotics and creativity in the interpretation of experimental music

predication and form in the realization process of One for One by Jean-Luc Guionnet

Abstract

This study addresses the interpretation of the experimental work One for One, for any pitched instrument and computer (2015) by French composer Jean-Luc Guionnet through the three branches of Charles S. Peirce’s semiotic theory. The starting point is the relationship that players establish with an indeterminate notation as signs whose meaning needs to be created. This work involves, on the one hand, the creation of a patch in SuperCollider and, on the other, the generation of general criteria that informs both the sound production of the instrument, an electric guitar, and the computer. This refers to the interpreters’ intrinsic knowledge who inferentially determine the elaboration of the sound qualities that a version exhibits, namely the predication with respect to the score. The elaboration is thereby examined by means of the notion of sign, the three types of inference (abduction, induction and deduction) and form, a proposition whose qualities are refined in a diachronic process that tests the criteria that arise during the creative work. This not only seeks to explain the way in which the possibilities of meaning in notation are explored, but also proposes a realization methodology consistent with the concept of indeterminacy.