Getting 'into the groove': Exploring the musicality of asynchronous communication

A 'note' on musicality

In music, there are time signatures, beats, rests, and rhythm; there are dynamics that shape the rise and fall of sound, giving timbre, colour, and melody. Asynchronous communication carries these qualities too. It has its own pulse, meter and phrasing. Messages form into refrains that sound both in the moment, and across longer arcs of time. The rhythm may be looser, more elastic, yet no less expressive—a continuous composition written between people who, although apart across place and time, are still very much in tune.

Time and timing

Familiar voices can land on our devices in their own time, announcing their arrival, yet waiting to be picked up when energy and space allow. The receiver and author are both liberated to choose the timing of their response; to stay in the moment, or to step to one side; to think further or perhaps find more time to give, when time in the present is short, or energy levels are lower. In this way, asynchronous communication can be an act of genuine human attunement and connection with self, others and the world, rather than communication as performance, fitting the frameworks and rules of a system or process.

Moving to a different beat

With new destinations to explore, and authenticity as the driver, individual and co-created, innovative and attuned communication has space to thrive.

Words are just one of many ways in which meaning can be shared. Words themselves can be cut, stretched and 'disrupted', split into parts, perhaps to emphasise the...

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Space becomes multidimensional and itself a mode of communication; The space between letters, words and replies all carry nuance. It can also be part of the connection, where time spent reflecting on the messages received is as important, as the content shared in the messages themselves.

         

Dynamic melody

Different timings can contribute to the shapes in the flow, sound and feel of what is shared, with interactions layering to give depth and direction.

Visual palettes include "CAPs" on "caps" off, as well as font styles, such as bold or italics and use of punctuation.

Repetition and additional space...

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...create volume and lend weight.

The use of language becomes a vocal layer within the melody. Words can be placed swiftly, yet with skill and compassion, in a furtive and heady exchange of quick-fire rounds, the energy of the moment underscored through volume, both of quantity and of feeling. Meanings can simmer and build slowly too, held in the collective electronic memory of what has gone before, added to and augmented at a later date, with new knowledge and subtly different direction.

Playing with language shapes adds further lyrical dynamics and can happen in a variety of ways—through repetition, or in inventing something entirely new through acronyms or blended word forms.

Language extends too beyond the borders of the single context. Chunks - gestalts - from memory, from songs, films and books, from authentic lived experience, are freed from their original position, and can land with space and in safety, offering multiplicity and nuance in a single delivery, inviting collective processing that is born from and into embodied liberation.

The infinite potential for what is possible, rather than the constraints of what is permissible, give rise to music that is personal and unique to those who are part of the conversation. Collaborators become both conductor and composer; the joint synergy continually strengthening relationships and sharpening the focus of the topic at hand.

In so many ways, opening up our personal vocabularies, with their emotionally imbued language and meanings, and offering these 'in physical form' as part of a flow of shared consciousness, further deepens group bonds. This widens the available musical vocabulary for all 'in the chat', whilst building in exchanges that over time can become shared and unifying 'anthems'.

The refrain

Replies can come in the moment, or at a later point. The meaning of the original is held gently, whilst additional shades of subtlety may be layered in the reply. This acts like an echo of an echo, or a shared ripple of energy within the melody, or across the song-book. These energising 'refrains' are a further way in which the immediate context can be explored or emphasised, and a memory of a memory can become a bond of mutually shared vocabulary.

The full orchestra

Words are of course not the only 'parts' available in the music that is created. There are emojis, gifs, stickers, memes, links to YouTube and other internet locations, not to mention personal photos and videos. Voice notes add further sensory, meaning and emotional texture; with all the inflections and fluidity that sound can convey. The breadth of what can be shared adds to the depth of the communicative experience. Exchanges and conversations in multi-modal form can express meaning beyond what words on their own can easily convey; and hold space for communication to flow when words themselves may be a barrier. 

Get into the Groove, Madonna, July 15th 1985

And you can dance

For inspiration

Come on

I'm waiting...