Theatrimusicality: Spectauralising Performance

Situated at the interstices of music and theatre studies, Theatrimusicality: Spectauralising Performance reframes the dynamic interplay of theatricality and musicality and theorisestheatrimusicality as a conceptual consequent of analysing contemporary performance practices that lie in the intersection between theatre and music. The book introduces theatrimusicality as a hermeneutic apparatus and a dramaturgical approach to examining these works of the ’in-between’ that defy neat taxonomies. Examining the co-transformative inter-workings, where the musical frames the theatrical even as the theatrical fashions the musical, Tan demonstrates how theatrimusicality allows new ways of meaning-making, interpretation and analysis. The book also introduces an accompanying concept of spectaurality, a mode of reception that involves ’seeing’ musicality and ’listening’ to theatricality. Encountering performance spectaurally engenders alternative interpretive and affective experiences. Through deep analyses of a range of performances from varying cultures and contexts, Theatrimusicality encourages an appreciation of the co-presence of listening and seeing where perception becomes intertwined and relational.

Marcus Cheng Chye Tan is Associate Professor of Drama at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University Singapore. His publications include Acoustic Interculturalism: Listening to Performance (2012), Performing Southeast Asia: Performance, Politics and the Contemporary (2020), Music Theater and Politics: Restaging Histories, Decentering Perspectives (2026) and Devising in Times of Crisis: Practices for a Post-Pandemic World (2026). He has also published in TDR, Theatre Research International, Performance Research and Contemporary Theatre Review. Apart from his research interests in theatre acoustemology, intercultural theatre and virtual performativities, Marcus is the Assistant Editor of Theatre Research International and the Secretary-General (Communications) of the International Federation for Theatre Research.