It is a Matter of Amalgam. Constructions of Sound Image in Multipart Singing Practices

As a result of coordinated behaviours aimed at achieving predicted, identified and recognized musical outcomes, multipart performances take particular care about sound quality. In a certain sense, every multipart performance is a question of choices derived from collective negotiations, often concerning even the smaller details of the sound production. Within a group, every singer has the sensation of being at the very centre of the music as a resonant experience. Amalgam is the key word for this feeling : the search for a peculiar and distinctive amalgam is the main goal of many multipart singing practices. Symbolically connected with processes of the construction of group identity, amalgam means a combination between the maintenance of individual distinctiveness and mutual merging. Within presentational music (i.e. performative scenarios involving a group of people clearly providing music for an audience, as in a concert on stage) the care of sound quality has different guidelines. In the non-professional scenario, too, the instrumentation of sound is a relevant resource of music-making processes, with particular aims of stressing cultural representations. Based on my research experiences in Corsica, Sardinia and other Italian regions, my paper introduces some significant cases dealing with different strategies of sound instrumentation within the dynamics of group relationships of local communities.