Speech choir - forms and functions in music

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Thomas Schipperges
• Subject Area: Musicology
• Term: since 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 465195544

Choric speech is omnipresent. Speech Choir is a worldwide social phenomenon. However, choral speaking is also often performed in an artistic way. In many cases, this form of performance is musically concentrated into a composition. The speaking choir has a musical side.Central elements of a musical art form are found in the spoken word (solo or choral). The relationship between music and language is one of the most frequently treated fields of musicological research. In addition to the treatment of the word-sound-relationship in texts, research has focused on the treatment of the speaking voice and speech in music. Latest Schönberg's Pierrot lunaire (1912) made the fixation of pitch, intonation and expression of speaking voices a lasting awareness as a fundamental innovation. With the speech sound compositions of the musical avant-garde since the 1950s, the theatricality of artistic speech came into focus. As a rule, scientific studies are based on soloistic speech in music or as music. Choral speech is only marginally treated. Vice versa, the scientific treatment of choral speaking has so far concentrated only on phenomena in the peripheral fields of musicology: on the origin of the chorus in ancient drama in connection with stage and movement, on modern adaptations of speaking choirs in theatre, on the lay choral movement with choral speaking elements that are often pedagogically oriented, on transitions between singing and speaking in the field of speech science and speech education, and finally on socially oriented areas of application of choral speaking, for example at political rallies or sporting events.In its really different origins and in its musical peculiarity on the different levels of its appearance as a form of performance, composition and ensemble, the speech choir has not been systematically researched. This project is dedicated to this.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Co-Investigators: Dr. Christina Richter-Ibáñez; Professor Dr. Jörg Rothkamm; Professor Michael Speer