Reimagining Athletic Gesture: Transforming Basketball Sound into Narrative Electroacoustic Music

This paper presents FMVP, an electroacoustic fixed-media composition that transforms the sounds of basketball into a narrative of doubt, struggle, and redemption. Built entirely from field recordings captured on an indoor court, the work reimagines sport as a metaphor for resilience and creative endurance. Through granular time-stretching, spectral transformation, dynamic filtering, and spatial motion, physical gestures such as dribbling, sliding, and impact are translated into evolving sonic textures and large-scale form. Inspired by the career arc of NBA player Stephen Curry, the composition explores how kinetic rhythms can be reshaped into emotional trajectories, aligning with the conference theme of Innovation, Translation, Participation. Methodologically, the project sits within artistic research, using composition as a mode of inquiry into the relationship between embodied action and sound narrative. The paper discusses the conceptual framework, sound-design process, and structural strategies underpinning FMVP, arguing that everyday athletic environments offer rich material for electroacoustic storytelling and for rethinking how listeners participate in narratives constructed purely through sound.