The PhD investigates the creation of closeness and immediacy through composition, exploring the processes of capturing, processing and composing sound materials, their spatialisation both during production and performance, and the sound materials' contexts. It is suggested that closeness can be understood spatially, temporally and in addition as being familiar with sounds and musical languages; whereas immediacy adds the meaning of being involved at some level in the shaping or decoding of the meaning of sounds of a composition. In that sense closeness and immediacy together form entry-points for the listener to make him/her become engaged in the compositional narrative. Seven original acousmatic and mixed media works are presented in the portfolio. These are stone and metal, empty rooms, weave/unravel, skalna, pulses, beeps and triptych. The pieces rely on found sounds and their referential qualities, with both informing the compositional methodologies. They also borrow elements from soundscape composition, electronic music and film music. Over the development of the portfolio the inclusion of elements of other genres of music became a valuable source of inspiration and shaped the compositional methodology which lead to the development of a unique, personal style of composition. Three of the PhD's compositions - pulses, beeps and triptych - investigate the musical opportunities of an acousmatic take on stems to improve the flexibility and perceived depth of spatialisation. The spatial layers of the compositions are split into parts of a soundfile. These parts can be mapped according to specific rules to the number of loudspeakers available. The portfolio pieces demonstrate that composing in spatial stems enhances spatial depth as close and distant sounds can be reproduced independently of each other on dedicated loudspeakers at the same time. The sounds of the distant loudspeakers merge with the acoustic properties of the performance space and therefore assist in making the composed spaces credible. In addition to the compositions, one original software tools are presented in the portfolio (PLib), as well as a substantial contribution to an existing tool (MANTIS Diffusion System). They aim to facilitate the production and performance of electroacoustic music. Their application and potential is briefly discussed in the commentary.

The portfolio consists of seven instrumental compositions, composed during a period of three years. The portfolio is accompanied by a CD and DVD, containing the recordings of the compositions, and a written commentary. The latter gives an overview of the portfolio and focuses on the most important compositional issues. The Introduction presents the early influences and describes the evolution of the author's musical language. Chapter 1 studies the author's personal identity and Dominican identity and their influence on the music. Chapter 2 examines the different musical structures in the portfolio, comparing them to the traditional narrative arc. Chapter 3 discusses the origins of the rhythmic language and its elements, focusing on the creation of different textures. Chapter 4 deals with pitch and the construction of harmonic soundworlds. Chapter 5 studies the ritualistic elements and their evolution in the portfolio. The conclusion gives details of the compositions the author has written since finishing the portfolio and his future plans.