Book review: Thor Magnusson, Sonic Writing: Technologies of Material, Symbolic, and Signal Inscriptions

Sonic Writing, Technologies of Material, Symbolic, and Signal Inscriptions is the first monograph by Thor Magnusson. It offers a thoughtful and creative insight into the past, present and future of music technologies. Questions, such as what is the origin of music, what is a musical instrument, what does the digital bring into musical practices, how do we write music and what do we write, are addressed throughout its 290 pages with the aim of understanding the nature, lineage and future directions of contemporary digital instruments. The captivating cover image, Study no. 57, is made by Ryan Ross Smith and belongs to an animated notation. The still image is an abstract visualisation that finely represents one of the main contributions of the book related to the nature of sonic writing when using digital musical technologies.