Between the Digital and Physical

E-sports is one of the fastest growing entertainment genres in the world, with millions of viewers and ever-increasing revenue streams flowing into bigger and more impressive tournament displays. One of the ways that this revenue is utilized by e-sports producers and event managers is to engage audiences with musical events prior to large finals tournaments, events which are emblematic of the games being played and the competitive nature of the participating professional gamers. Within this thesis, I aim to deconstruct these events in their context, understanding the ways that these events provide a microcosm of the e-sports genre and move forward a legitimization of e-sports as a whole. I look closely at the 2019 League of Legends World Championship Finals Opening Ceremony (and other similar League of Legends opening ceremonies as necessary) as a particular example of this phenomenon, focusing on emergent themes such as virtuality, intersectionality in terms of race, class, and gender, and economic influences on e-sports. I draw on Bruno Latour's actor-network theory as well as theories of music mediation developed by scholars such as Georgina Born to inform my analysis, and to determine how assemblages of physical and digital mediators influence and interact with one another in the opening ceremonies I analyze. These events are more than simply a precursor to the main event; they are themselves signifiers of the widely interconnected nature of e-sports which has only continued to expand into new markets, new audiences, and new platforms. By closely analyzing the themes introduced by these ceremonies and the ways that technologies are utilized by the individuals associated with these events, we can move closer to understanding why e-sports has undergone such a massive explosion of growth in such a brief span of time; further, this can also inform the ways that entertainment will continue to expand and evolve in an increasingly virtual landscape.