Text as Music, Music as Text: Stuart Saunders Smith's Works for Percussion and Spoken Word

Abstract

American composer Stuart Saunders Smith (b. 1948) has been active in the composition of contemporary art music for over forty years, composing over 200 musical and interdisciplinary works. His music ties the experimental world of contemporary music to his experiences living, composing, and teaching in the northeastern United States. Many of his works have included spoken word as a percussion instrument, either alone or blended with instrumental percussion writing. Although not unique in blurring the boundaries between text and music, Stuart Saunders Smith’s texted percussion works manage to both belong to tradition and exist as a unique body of works, as can be seen by studying the context of their creation, technique in synthesizing music and text, and usage of text as melodic material.