Abstract
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>Ecological thinkers, such as Jakob von Uexküll and Bernie Krause, have imagined ecosystems as natural orchestras. This chapter reverses the metaphor, drawing on ecological psychology. It considers the orchestra as a musical ecosystem. First, the chapter examines orchestration in terms of ecological acoustics. Because orchestral music, like everyday sound, offers perceptual information about sounding sources, it reveals a complex system of interacting objects and agents. Second, the chapter applies James Gibson’s theory of affordances to the orchestra’s instruments. It emphasizes that the instruments’ sonic and physical affordances are distinct yet overlapping, and it highlights player-instrument relations as a technical condition for orchestral practices. Finally, the chapter builds on Roger Barker’s research on behavior settings to investigate patterns of social and sonic interaction in the orchestra. Ultimately, an ecological approach to orchestration highlights relations—among listeners and sound sources, players and instruments, and participants with varied social and musical roles.</jats:p>