Repetition, Patterns, Accumulation: Southeast Asian Perspectives within Compositional Practices

Wong, Adeline Yi Mei

Repetition, Patterns, Accumulation: Southeast Asian Perspectives within Compositional Practices

Wong, Adeline Yi Mei (2025) Repetition, Patterns, Accumulation: Southeast Asian Perspectives within Compositional Practices. Doctoral thesis, Birmingham City University.

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Abstract

This practice-based research comprises a portfolio of eight pieces composed between 2020 and 2024 that investigate the interaction between repetition and the manipulation of reductive micro-resources, resulting in unpredictability and complexity within autoethnographic musical environments. The compositions in the portfolio reflect my own experiences as a Southeast Asian composer, incorporating Western and Southeast Asian conceptions of repetition into musical compositions while evoking complex dynamics of contextual, aesthetic, and cultural dialogues.

The notion of repetition and a conscious discipline for the economy of material has always served as a guiding inspiration for my own compositional approaches. Repetition serves as a foundation of musical structure in Western and Southeast Asian traditions, providing a framework for musical development and coherence. It is also the spectra of unpredictability and complexity of the nuances within the respective traditions that I will seek to uncover through a congruence of art, architecture, and culture, which I aim to incorporate into my overall creative compositional approach to achieve emotional resonance and expressivity.

As a result, my core research question focuses on how I use repetition through structural, psychological, and emotional experience woven into a journey from the past to the present, incorporating elements of personal narrative and cultural identity in search of the transformative potential of integrating both Western and Southeast Asian tenets within autoethnographic musical landscapes.

The portfolio of compositions explores repetition across three domains: i) patterns, through considerations of form and continuity resulting in a series of related works; ii) place, by engaging with cultural references within Southeast Asian contexts; and iii) people, through the evocation of memory and personal interconnection. Acting as a bridge, the commentary accompanying my portfolio reflects the creative process, contextualises the compositions within pertinent theoretical and historical contexts, presents analysis, and contributes to scholarly discussions in composition studies.

Item Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Dates:	Date Event 2 October 2025 Accepted
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Repetition, patterns, series, accumulation, layered complexity, contextual complexity, musical hybridity, cross-cultural, time, memory
Subjects:	CAH20 - historical, philosophical and religious studies > CAH20-02 - philosophy and religious studies > CAH20-02-01 - philosophy CAH25 - design, and creative and performing arts > CAH25-01 - creative arts and design > CAH25-01-02 - art CAH25 - design, and creative and performing arts > CAH25-02 - performing arts > CAH25-02-02 - music
Divisions:	Doctoral Research College > Doctoral Theses Collection Royal Birmingham Conservatoire
Depositing User:	Louise Muldowney
Date Deposited:	03 Nov 2025 09:58
Last Modified:	03 Nov 2025 09:58
URI:	https://www.open-access.bcu.ac.uk/id/eprint/16705