In the format for the C21MP Research Challenge the Rationale / Hypothesis section consists of the proposals by the practice research participants that outlines their initial ideas and approach.

Robert Bromley’s initial proposal

I will explore the creative affordances of bespoke tunings for fingerstyle guitar. Drawing on experience within American primitive—an avant-folk genre founded by John Fahey amid the post-war folk revival, currently experiencing a resurgence via artists such as Glenn Jones, Daniel Bachman, and Gwenifer Raymond—I will demonstrate how custom tunings serve as discrete, habit-shattering terrains, promoting new playing styles and musical trajectories.

My approach adapts common tunings such as D modal, open D, and open C, altering strings to create unfamiliar, colourful tunings. Typically, an octave tonic is retained on the E and D strings, alongside a fourth or fifth on the A string, affording sustained drone—mirroring the tambura in Hindustani classical. Alternating thumb provides a tonal and rhythmic backdrop, orienting the flow of complex melodic and harmonic passages on upper strings. Conversely, bass-led melodies are contextualised by open treble strings.

These tunings promote improvisation and empiricism. By disrupting conventional fretboard knowledge—shapes, intervals, and patterns—they foster a lateral rather than vertical playing style. Functioning as creative catalysts, akin to Eno’s Oblique Strategies, they challenge authorial agency and suggest new creative pathways. Through processes of unlearning and relearning, existing embodied and theoretical knowledge is recontextualised and reconfigured.

Matthew Mazanek’s initial proposal

My performance practice and research spans historical performance, traditional ‘folk’ music and contemporary art music. My project is to explore and adapt the tunings of historical instruments for modern guitar playing. This project will explore contemporary applications of the alternate tunings proposed by Francois Campion (1686-1747) from his Nouvelles Découvertes Sur la Guitarre (published in 1705). My approach is to experiment with these tunings to inspire free improvisations and creative arrangements borrowing from my background in both baroque counterpoint and 20th century harmony with my professional practice playing a wide range of styles and instruments.

Since these tunings are for five-course guitar, the adaptation of them for six-string guitar allows me some creative freedom. While, my technical foundation is built on classical guitar techniques, I also employ plectrum playing derived from jazz and metal. My intention is to observe how these competing techniques work in dialogue through these unfamiliar tunings. The project will take the form of free solo improvisations and arrangements of historical and contemporary songs. I see these efforts as an imagined conversation between the practices of historical musicians and the sound world of a 21st century guitarist torn between traditions, genres and idioms.