Billy's Swan

Abstract

Billy’s Swan is an electroacoustic work which assesses the fantastic escapism that dance can offer the young queer male identity. The audio adopts routine melodic fragments from Tchaikovsky’s ballet score, Swan Lake, and sets these against expressive digital sounds. The fantastic element is symbolised by a sprawling climax of bells chimes (sounds with queer potential) that develop as the piece progresses and the fragments of ballet score fade out. The piece uses musical traditions of arrangement and transcription coupled with the social and political meanings of different sound worlds to consider queer identities.