Fretless Architecture – Guest Lecture/Seminar

The fretless electric guitar remains relatively unexplored due to its young age and ‘prepared’ nature, and it features increasingly in popular music and the neo-traditional music(s) of West-Asia. This research considers its use in broader, more contemporary, and eclectic settings – both as a solo instrument and within different ensembles – exploring extended performance techniques; including an engagement with technological augmentation (expressly the use of effects pedals, loops, E-bow etc.), to discern new timbres. This lecture-recital will begin with a discussion of various performance techniques specific to the fretless electric guitar, as well as any discoveries of new techniques and sounds which have emerged from my personal practice. This will be followed by a solo, part-composed/part-improvised performance, demonstrating how such techniques and sounds might be used in a contemporary music context.