Electronic Music

[Serial_Apologist]

Currently listening to Richard B's 'Lakhesis', from the album 'binary systems' and I'm hearing much more of it than I remember doing which is great. Some potent juxtapositions of hysterical bass clarinet with electronic sounds - the latter often weaving a beguiling accompaniment around the former, though sometimes their relation might take a more combative turn. Sometimes the electronic sounds evoke a forest of chirping, sparkling alien birds and dripping rain - in fact, often there is more than one electronic part in the texture, as one oscillating riff might be taken up and repeating with variations at the same time as another variously shaped strand of the texture continues concurrently; such a riff or drone might return in a transformed form, with synth-type sounds that microtonally wobble. Overall, a very futuristic & fascinating tapestry of colourful & trippy textures and timbres for the ears to explore - also there is much great affect gained in surreal combination of humour and playfulness with the aforementioned intensity and screams from the bass clarinet. I have tried to capture something of the piece's form which might escape the neophyte - and offer further commendation for music of such richness that, before the invention of electronic music, a composer would doubtless have had to resort to an orchestra to try to recreate such imaginative conception.

Indeed, one might regret Harrison Birtwistle's not having explored electronic media more!

Great description of the piece, Joseph K.

[RichardB]

Yes, thanks JK.

Although it should be pointed out that the bass clarinet part is entirely Lori Freedman's doing (apart from my having edited three separate improvisations together to make her solo part). For those who might be interested, I've been writing quite a long text going into some detail about how that whole album was made, as part of a new book focusing on improvisation which with luck I'll be bringing out next year. Lori remarked after hearing the final version of this piece that it sounded not unlike what we would do when improvising together. I don't think we would be able to achieve all that precise coordination though!

[Joseph K]

For those who might be interested, I've been writing quite a long text going into some detail about how that whole album was made, as part of a new book focusing on improvisation which with luck I'll be bringing out next year.

That's good to know - I look forward to it.

And yes - I should have mentioned Lori Freedman!

[RichardB]

Following his mention in the thread about "faith in music", I listened to a few pieces by Jonathan Harvey earlier on. The one I found most striking was Ritual Melodies, which is an electronic piece featuring some vocal utterances now and again. Like a lot of Jonathan's electronic music it has what used to be recognisable as an "IRCAM sound", which I suppose might now be renamed an "early and rather crude computer-generated sound". Like much of the early electronic music from the 1950s it has a charm of its own, of course. Indeed, back in its time (1990) it was the kind of piece that would get me excited about the musical possibilities of the new technology, although actually my own first foray in that direction, the previous year, was realised at Xenakis's "Les Ateliers UPIC" which was, like Xenakis himself, radically opposed to the kind of stuff that went on chez Boulez. At that time, IRCAM of course was already installed in its bunker opposite the Centre Pompidou; UPIC on the other hand occupied a row of Portakabins on a building site just inside the Periphérique (that site is now the Parc de la Villette, where the Conservatoire and Philharmonie de Paris are located). The IRCAM aesthetic suited Jonathan very well though, with his interest both in overtone spectra and serialism. I think Ritual Melodies is his most interesting purely electronic piece.

[Mandryka]

Following his mention in the thread about "faith in music", I listened to a few pieces by Jonathan Harvey earlier on. The one I found most striking was Ritual Melodies, which is an electronic piece featuring some vocal utterances now and again. Like a lot of Jonathan's electronic music it has what used to be recognisable as an "IRCAM sound", which I suppose might now be renamed an "early and rather crude computer-generated sound". Like much of the early electronic music from the 1950s it has a charm of its own, of course. Indeed, back in its time (1990) it was the kind of piece that would get me excited about the musical possibilities of the new technology, although actually my own first foray in that direction, the previous year, was realised at Xenakis's "Les Ateliers UPIC" which was, like Xenakis himself, radically opposed to the kind of stuff that went on chez Boulez. At that time, IRCAM of course was already installed in its bunker opposite the Centre Pompidou; UPIC on the other hand occupied a row of Portakabins on a building site just inside the Periphérique (that site is now the Parc de la Villette, where the Conservatoire and Philharmonie de Paris are located). The IRCAM aesthetic suited Jonathan very well though, with his interest both in overtone spectra and serialism. I think Ritual Melodies is his most interesting purely electronic piece.

It's a very nice bit of music!

(I've started to listen to Wagner Dream.)

[RichardB]

I just heard the news that Gottfried Michael Koenig passed away yesterday at the age of 96. As founder of the Institute of Sonology in the 1960s, he kept in touch with its evolution over the following decades and was a frequent presence at our concerts until quite recently. In 2018 I had the opportunity to translate a selection of his writings for the book Process and Form (Wolke Verlag). This is from my translator's introduction:

It seemed to me that the nature of the texts implied a translation which would lean towards precision rather than elegance, to “translate the difficulties” as it were, rather than smoothing them out and thus misrepresenting them. It should be borne in mind that many of these difficulties stem from much of the material having been written at a time when the ideas being described were new and even controversial, rather than having been subsumed into the often simplified overview of the evolution of serial and electronic music during the 1950s and 1960s which now forms part of the mythology surrounding that music. One thing that distinguishes Koenig’s account is that it provides a rational and impartial alternative to those of many of his contemporaries whose transparent intention is so often to put themselves at the cutting edge of developments. If electronic music is not just about new sounds but a fundamentally new way of thinking about music, Koenig’s writings and interviews are the expression of an incisive mind committed to understanding and mapping this new way. I believe this is still an urgent and unfinished task, and that Koenig’s contributions are of undiminished value for those of us who continue to engage with it.

It goes without saying of course that his compositional work is an even more valuable legacy than his writings. He was active in creating new works well into his 90s, although these were mostly instrumental rather than electronic. Here is the premiere of Event IV for piano in 2015, played by Teodora Stepančić: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vz-gBLz0AcE

[Joseph K]

Sorry to hear this, Richard.

I haven't spent much time listening to his music, though I did check some of his stuff out a while back, I wasn't too enthused by it. I'll give the piece you link to a listen - and it goes without saying that I welcome suggestions as to what other pieces, electronic or otherwise, are his very strongest and thus should check out.

[RichardB]

I haven't spent much time listening to his music, though I did check some of his stuff out a while back, I wasn't too enthused by it. I'll give the piece you link to a listen - and it goes without saying that I welcome suggestions as to what other pieces, electronic or otherwise, are his very strongest and thus should check out.

Well if you don't like it you just don't like it! Most of his important electronic compositions are on a double album released by the Dutch label BVHaast back in the 90s, which is still available (and on Qobuz). I was listening earlier to Funktion Rot which can also be found here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtfJTORi7tc - for me, though, one of the most fascinating aspects of these pieces is how they were composed. Having been Stockhausen's studio assistant in the composition of Gesang der Jünglinge and Kontakte (to both of which he made important creative contributions), he was looking for a way to create electronic music that didn't involve constructing thousands of sounds on separate bits of tape and then editing them together, so he hit on the idea of using recorded sine waves with changing frequencies as control signals for the sound-generating and -processing equipment in the studio, so that much larger and more complex structures could be built up without cutting and splicing tapes. This strand in his thinking continues through to his Project 1 and Project 2 in the early 1970s which are computer programs designed to create data based on a composer's input which can then be transcribed into notated scores (as in the piano piece I linked to). All of these ideas were very influential, as you can imagine, on the subsequent development of music composed with the aid of computers.

[Mandryka]

Having been Stockhausen's studio assistant in the composition of Gesang der Jünglinge and Kontakte (to both of which he made important creative contributions), he was looking for a way to create electronic music that didn't involve constructing thousands of sounds on separate bits of tape and then editing them together.

I bet he was. Stockhausen says this about Kontakte

In some sections of KONTAKTE I had to splice it all by hand, which is an unbelievable labour. Imagine, I worked on the last section of KONTAKTE beginning around 23'00 or 24'00, together with Gottfried Michael Koenig in Studio 11 on the third floor of Cologne Radio, for three months. And when it was completely ready, I spliced it together with previous sections, listened, turned pale, left the studio and was totally depressed for a whole day. And I came back next morning and announced to Koenig that we had to do it all over again. I mean, he almost fainted.

You see, there is so much work involved in the synchronization of layers, and every sound of KONTAKTE is made in a very complicated way from speeded-up trains of pulses. We had to do it all over again because the general speed was too fast, the music was in too much of a rush. This meant we had to edit the whole section all over again, splicing hundreds, even thousands of small segments of music. That mosaic technique was extraordinarily difficult, and also because you could only hear the result at the very end. If I had been using a synthesizer, as I did for SIRIUS, I would only have had to change the timescale, and I could have done this in one day, and been able to hear the result straight away, during the time of working.

I have this CD, and tomorrow (I'm just about to go out) I shall listen to the string trio I think

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/7996586--gottfried-michael-koenig-60-blatter-fur-streichtrio

There's a website celebrating him here

https://koenigproject.nl/

Ligeti also mentioned him favourably as one of his reasons for going to Cologne, in this very entertaining documentary video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AhKWofVV0E&t=2s&ab_channel=OmriAbram

[Joseph K]

Well if you don't like it you just don't like it! Most of his important electronic compositions are on a double album released by the Dutch label BVHaast back in the 90s, which is still available (and on Qobuz). I was listening earlier to Funktion Rot which can also be found here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtfJTORi7tc - for me, though, one of the most fascinating aspects of these pieces is how they were composed. Having been Stockhausen's studio assistant in the composition of Gesang der Jünglinge and Kontakte (to both of which he made important creative contributions), he was looking for a way to create electronic music that didn't involve constructing thousands of sounds on separate bits of tape and then editing them together, so he hit on the idea of using recorded sine waves with changing frequencies as control signals for the sound-generating and -processing equipment in the studio, so that much larger and more complex structures could be built up without cutting and splicing tapes. This strand in his thinking continues through to his Project 1 and Project 2 in the early 1970s which are computer programs designed to create data based on a composer's input which can then be transcribed into notated scores (as in the piano piece I linked to). All of these ideas were very influential, as you can imagine, on the subsequent development of music composed with the aid of computers.

Thanks, Richard. And thanks Mandryka for the additional links (also envy on my behalf that you're going out!)

[Joseph K]

The Xenakis 5-disk complete Electroacoustic works box arrived today. To celebrate, I am now spinning Persepolis - one work of several I held off on listening to from the download.

It's been a while since I listened to the version of this tune from the Alpha & Omega box, but it's definitely sounding even better from what I at least think I can recall. Awesome!

edit - I should add, the CD cover gives a brief history of this work on record, and explains that the version here is a 'proper stereo-reduction and mix from the original 8-track tape.'

[Joseph K]

Now spinning - Xenakis - La Légende d'Eer

Another good one.

Overall, this box is good but if I had one complaint, it's that they do not tell us the lengths of each track - it's strange when record companies make this omission.

[Quarky]

Now spinning - Xenakis - La Légende d'Eer

Another good one.

Overall, this box is good but if I had one complaint, it's that they do not tell us the lengths of each track - it's strange when record companies make this omission.

This may/ may not be of interest to you, Joseph - Xenakis concerts extracted from the website of France Musique - a veritable Aladdin's Cave::

https://www.francemusique.fr/culture-musicale/iannis-xenakis-8-petites-choses-que-vous-ne-saviez-peut-etre-pas-sur-le-compositeur-de-metastasis-96029

[Dave2002]

This may/ may not be of interest to you, Joseph - Xenakis concerts extracted from the website of France Musique - a veritable Aladdin's Cave::

https://www.francemusique.fr/culture...tastasis-96029

An interesting overview article. Maybe I'll listen to the programme later in the week.

[Joseph K]

This may/ may not be of interest to you, Joseph - Xenakis concerts extracted from the website of France Musique - a veritable Aladdin's Cave::

https://www.francemusique.fr/culture...tastasis-96029

Unfortunately, my French is nonexistent.