Performing Electronic Dance Music: mimesis, reflexivity and the commodification of listening

Abstract

Recent changes in the economy of music have induced some musicians in the electronic ance scene to adapt their repertoire to concert performance. However, this conversion is far from being unproblematic, as electronic dance music, being based on additive operations, programming and merging of roles, resists, to an extent, live performance. I will then examine some of the strategies that musicians adopt in order to bring into the performance an element of actuality, focusing on the sensorial implications of this process. The stage concert, however, challenges not only the modes of production, but also the ideology of club culture, which is based on participation and inclusiveness. Mimesis, as a means to establish contact with the audience through identification, allows overcoming the division drawn by the stage. On the other hand, reflexivity, as a way to acknowledge the different roles at play, counteracts the role of mimesis and restores the distinction between audience and performer, thus substantiating the condition that prompted this transformation and that entails, in the first place, the commodification of musical experience.

Keywords

• Electronic dance music
• Reflexivity
• Mimesis
• Intersensoriality
• Commodification
• Performance