Dirty Projectors And The Art Of Hocketing

The Dirty Projectors are not a new band. Having adorned the experimental music landscape for over eight years, the always-changing line-up has explored new sonic territories with orchestral and choral operas, re-imaginging of classic punk records and even intimate collaborations with Björk and David Byrne.

But its the historic contextualization of the group’s pieces that brings new advancements to the broader, modern musical environment. And it is promoted, in part, to the band’s novel use of hocketing in their songs.

On the history of the vocal technique, Voice Is A Language explains:

“Its origins date to the 13^th century, where this polyphonic device was used in motets, although forms of the hocket also exist in African percussion and Indonesian gamelan. Characterised by the distribution of a melodic line split between two or more players or voices, hocketing requires only one sound to be heard at any point. In vocal hockets, voices don’t overlap so much as cut each other off.

The hocket [is] a form of call and response, foregrounding the act of listening within participants, and building a contingent form of sound.”

In the video below, Dirty Projectors leader Dave Longstreth discusses and demonstrates the process at length at Minneapolis’ Walker Art Center.

Dirty Projectors