The Transformative Power of Speculative Design in Music

Speculative design applied to lutherie is not limited to technical innovation or the exploration of disruptive aesthetics; it can also act as a creative catalyst for the conceptualization and reinvention of musical instruments. This approach revisits traditional standards and rethinks the way musicians interact with their musical interfaces, opening up new possibilities for experimentation and musical expression.

Speculative design, emerging technologies and possible futures

Speculative design combines imagination and critical analysis to project possible futures, challenging current paradigms and generating debate from a transdisciplinary perspective. Speculative ideas allow us to imagine scenarios without the current limitations of technological or economic feasibility. This approach is in line with Dunne and Raby's (2013) proposal in Speculative Everything; its value lies in rethinking the established and envisioning new directions for sound creation.

Speculative design and design fiction, the central approaches of this text, provide alternative perspectives for lutherie. While the former promotes critical reflection through hypothetical scenarios without feasibility constraints, the latter translates these ideas into concrete narratives and concepts that model plausible futures. Together, both methods facilitate the identification of potential challenges and opportunities, which can be materialized in speculative stories or prototypes. In this way, the possibility of fostering creative and critical reflection in the field of lutherie is opened up, with the caveat that, sometimes, speculative proposals can transcend the conceptual stage and consolidate themselves as viable solutions applicable in practice .

Lutherie: between technology, tradition and innovation

As Sève (2018) argues, musical instruments are carriers of cultural memory and collective expressions that reflect the social imaginary of an era. In this sense, applying a speculative perspective to lutherie can contribute to preserving the cultural link, integrating it as a possible transformative engine in the art of designing and building musical instruments. In this way, instruments can be conceived as portals that connect cultural legacy with future musical manifestations (Greenfield 2017). Idoru and the dematerialization of music: a literary reference.

The novel William Gibson's Idoru (1996) explores the idea of virtual artists who not only present themselves as digital idols (idol-singers or idoru), but also redefine the concept of musical performance. The work depicts a future in which music and performance are dematerialized, suggesting a conceptual expansion of lutherie beyond the physicality of traditional instruments .

"But do they really have singers who don't exist?" "Virtual idols," he said, starting up the sloping curve of the bridge. "Some of them are enormously popular." (Idoru , chapter 6: "DESH", Gibson 1996).

Cover of Idoru, a novel by William Gibson. Penguin Books edition.

Case 1: Hatsune Miku and the hybridization between the digital and the physical

Today, this concept has parallels with projects such as Hatsune Miku, a virtual singer of Japanese origin developed by Crypton Future Media using Yamaha's Vocaloid technology, a software also with Japanese roots. Her holographic projection, accompanied by a band of real musicians playing live, illustrates how lutherie can integrate digital tools to expand the possibilities of musical expression. This evolution opens up key questions about the role of virtuality in music and how the sound experience might evolve in the future:

➜ What does speculative design propose? Musical authenticity is transformed when the artist becomes a virtual figure and the instrument ceases to be a physical object and becomes a programming environment.

➜ What does design fiction propose? Concerts of the future could integrate virtual reality to merge audience presence, human performance, and the participation of a virtual artist into a single digital environment, creating entirely new musical experiences.

Official announcement of the collaboration between ESP Guitars and Hatsune Miku for the creation of the Wings of Creation guitar. Source: ESP Guitars.

Case 2: The ESP x Hatsune Miku guitar and the materialization of the digital

An example of the intersection between the digital and the physical is the ESP x Hatsune Miku GT-Miku-NT guitar, designed in collaboration with ESP Guitars, an internationally recognized Japanese brand. This instrument materializes a digital concept into a physical object, combining traditional guitar building techniques with a design by Rella, a graphic designer with Japanese roots, inspired by the visual universe of Hatsune Miku. It is a unique piece that reflects the convergence between conventional lutherie and new technologies. This type of integration between the physical and the digital raises new possibilities for the relationship between the instrument, the musician and the audience:

➜ What does speculative design propose? If the audience can directly intervene in the creation and selection of a virtual artist's repertoire, instruments could be designed to react to the audience immediately, opening up new forms of interaction in live music.

➜ What does design fiction propose? Speculative lutherie, through artificial intelligence and digital interactivity technologies, could transform the relationship between musician, instrument, and audience, generating more dynamic and participatory musical experiences.

Concept design of the Wings of Creation guitar, inspired by Hatsune Miku's 16th-anniversary visual. Image courtesy of ESP Guitars.

Case 3: Musical co-creation and collective participation

The interaction between performer and instrument is not limited solely to the materiality of the sound object, but also depends on the systems that facilitate its use and adaptation. In the case of Hatsune Miku, the community of users actively participates in the creation and selection of the repertoire, which demonstrates a shift in the relationship between composers and listeners. This approach suggests that, in the future, instruments could be designed to respond to collective participation, blurring the boundaries between composition, performance, and reception.

If the audience can directly intervene in the development and selection of a virtual artist's repertoire, it is worth questioning whether instruments can be designed to react to the audience immediately. It is also pertinent to investigate whether speculative lutherie, using artificial intelligence or digital interactivity resources, could reframe the relationship between musician, instrument, and audience.

This new model of collaborative creation invites us to rethink how we understand musical instruments and what we consider authentic in digital and participatory music:

➜ What does speculative design propose? When the artist is a virtual figure and the instrument becomes a digital environment, musical authenticity takes on a new meaning. Performance ceases to depend on physical presence and opens up unprecedented possibilities for sonic interaction.

➜ What does design fiction propose? Concerts of the future could integrate virtual reality to merge audience presence, human performance, and the participation of a virtual artist into a single digital environment, creating entirely new musical experiences.

In this context, the incorporation of emerging technologies and the exploration of new paradigms invite us to question not only the materiality of instruments, but also the limits of musical creation. This approach leads to fundamental questions about the interaction of performers, composers, and audiences with instruments and their sonic evolution.

New sound possibilities

➜ What sounds have we not yet imagined?

➜ How can technology transform soundscapes?

➜ What new listening experiences might emerge in the future?

Interaction between performer and instrument

➜ How can instruments strengthen the connection between performer and audience?

➜ How does technology transform the relationship between the performer and their instrument?

➜ How does the design of the instrument influence musical expression and perception?

Industry and market impact

➜ How has the music industry influenced our perception of sound?

➜ What is lost by prioritizing efficiency and commercialization over sound exploration?

➜ Is musical production free from profitability criteria possible?

These questions highlight the potential of speculative design to rethink the future of lutherie. By taking a speculative approach, lutherie not only experiments with new forms of sound creation, but, in dialogue with prevailing models of music production, can also explore the implications of industrial standardization, opening up space for approaches that value experimentation and sonic diversity.

Resistance to sound standardization

In an environment where homogenization has influenced the conception of musical instruments, the speculative approach has emerged as an alternative to question the restrictions imposed by economies of scale (Attali 1985). In this line, LaBelle (2018) conceives sound as a tool of cultural resistance capable of reconfiguring established structures, while Jameson (2009) argues that imagining alternative futures is essential to challenge conventional models .

Conclusion

Speculative design in lutherie has the potential to reconfigure the relationship between audience, performer and instrument, to expand the possibilities for music-making through interdisciplinary dialogue (Fry 2012), and to stimulate reflection on the future of music. This approach invites us to actively participate in conceiving the sound of tomorrow and to rethink the paradigms that have guided its evolution and its relationship to innovation and tradition.

References cited

➜ Attali, Jacques. [1977] 1985. Noise: The Political Economy of Music. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

➜ Bleecker, Julian. 2009. Design Fiction: A Short Essay on Design, Science, Fact and Fiction. Near Future Laboratory.

➜ Dunne, Anthony, and Fiona Raby. 2013. Speculative Everything: Design, Fiction, and Social Dreaming. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

➜ Fry, Tony. 2012. Becoming Human by Design. London: Berg Gibson, William. 1996. Idoru . New York: GP Putnam's Sons.

➜ Greenfield, Adam. 2017. Radical Technologies: The Design of Everyday Life. London: Verse.

➜ Jameson, Fredric. 2009. Archaeologies of the future: the desire called utopia and other science fiction approaches . Madrid: Akal.

➜ LaBelle, Brandon. 2018. Sonic Agency: Sound and Emergent Forms of Resistance. London: Goldsmiths Press.

➜ Sève, Bernard. 2018. The Musical Instrument: A Philosophical Study. Madrid: Casimiro.