Sonic Figurations for the Anthropocene: A Musical Bestiary in the Compositions of Liza Lim

Abstract

This article presents a musical bestiary, a collection of creatures found in the work of the composer Liza Lim. It is a thought experiment, meant to unsettle current ways of thinking about music and its relationship with the world. Centring our discussion on sonic figurations rather than on a composer’s works, we experiment with alternative musical ontologies and consider their lessons for understanding the role of contemporary art in a time of ecological breakdown. Thinking of Lim’s musical creations in terms of strange beasts inhabiting the Anthropocene draws out a range of themes – including uncanny ventriloquism, performer-instrument symbiosis, theatricalization and the everyday, musical mourning and witnessing – that might help make sense of the sensory and conceptual derangements of our time. The prose style and nonlinear format are likewise experimental, intended as provocations that we might read and write otherwise about music in the Anthropocene.