Xenakis, Iannis

[Joseph K]

When I've suffered from depression the main effect it has on my work is to make it extremely difficult to do at all.

My experience too.

[Mandryka]

Quite. I'm sure Xenakis had his ups and downs like we all do, but I think he would have strongly denied the idea that his mental state at one time or another would influence the sound of his music. When I've suffered from depression the main effect it has on my work is to make it extremely difficult to do at all.

When a composer writes something like the final minute of DOX-ORKH, it seems right for a listener, as interpreter, to ask what impelled them to compose such affects. And if it's not the mental state of the composer, his attitude to the world, it leaves that basic question answered.

(In For Samuel Beckett, the reason is presumably something Feldman read into Beckett. And in Piano, Violin, Viola, Cello, which is arguably depressed and bleak sounding, it may be valedictory: intimations of mortality.)

[Bryn]

When a composer writes something like the final minute of DOX-ORKH, it seems right for a listener, as interpreter, to ask what impelled them to compose such affects. And if it's not the mental state of the composer, his attitude to the world, it leaves that basic question answered.

(In For Samuel Beckett, the reason is presumably something Feldman read into Beckett. And in Piano, Violin, Viola, Cello, which is arguably depressed and bleak sounding, it may be valedictory: intimations of mortality.)

When 'speaking' of Morty, to refer to "intimations of mortality" sounds rather too much like punning. As to PVVC, it is surely you who are imposing your own emotions on MF's psyche? I hear no such intimations in the work. Your comment rather reminds me of the way my erstwhile neighbours asked why I listened to such depressing music. They were referring to Bach's 6th Cello Suite as played by Anner Bylsma. A work, and performance, I hear as full of joy.

[Mandryka]

When 'speaking' of Morty, to refer to "intimations of mortality" sounds rather too much like punning. As to PVVC, it is surely you who are imposing your own emotions on MF's psyche? I hear no such intimations in the work. Your comment rather reminds me of the way my erstwhile neighbours asked why I listened to such depressing music. They were referring to Bach's 6th Cello Suite as played by Anner Bylsma. A work, and performance, I hear as full of joy.

That’s exactly why I said “arguably”. But surely no one could find joy in For Samuel Beckett!

[Mandryka]

Ooh, another late one chosen at random, Ioolkos from 1996. Hmmmmm, this one seems uniformly menacing and tough. Trudge. It may be his final piece. A musical gravestone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5B-dNqVd_Lg&ab_channel=HansDeinzer-Topic

It's in the same mould as Ergma, from 1994 -- also tough, static and . . . .something

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3OlV7RlG0Q&ab_channel=Belanna111

[ahinton]

When a composer writes something like the final minute of DOX-ORKH, it seems right for a listener, as interpreter, to ask what impelled them to compose such affects

I take you to mean "effects" rather than "affects", although you make it fairly clear how it "affects" you "That basic question" is not left "unanswered", however (and The Unanswered Question is by Ives anyway) but, since it seems that you want an answer as to what impelled Xenakis to write as he did, I will give it - his aural imagination. Simples.

[Mandryka]

I take you to mean "effects" rather than "affects"

No, I meant affekts.

[ahinton]

No, I meant affekts.

OK - but you have your answer anyway.

[Serial_Apologist]

I see that Akanthos is included on this coming Saturday night's New Music Show (2200-0000hrs).

[Mandryka]

Just pursuing my late works project, is there a recording of Bacchae?

[RichardB]

Just pursuing my late works project, is there a recording of Bacchae?

Not as far as I know. His last work was (the appropriately titled) O-Mega for percussion and ensemble from 1997, for which he needed some assistance, after which he decided that he was no longer well enough to carry on composing.

[RichardB]

When a composer writes something like the final minute of DOX-ORKH, it seems right for a listener, as interpreter, to ask what impelled them to compose such affects.

I don't think Xenakis was at all concerned with equating sounds and feelings. One of his most quoted statements was "Music is not a language. Any musical piece is akin to a boulder with complex forms, with striations and engraved designs atop and within, which people can decipher in a thousand different ways without ever finding the right answer or the best one…"

[Mandryka]

Not as far as I know. His last work was (the appropriately titled) O-Mega for percussion and ensemble from 1997, for which he needed some assistance, after which he decided that he was no longer well enough to carry on composing.

It's sweet and tender -- more me!

[Mandryka]

I don't think Xenakis was at all concerned with equating sounds and feelings. One of his most quoted statements was "Music is not a language. Any musical piece is akin to a boulder with complex forms, with striations and engraved designs atop and within, which people can decipher in a thousand different ways without ever finding the right answer or the best one…"

In Xenakis on Xenakis we read (p 18)

The power of music is such that it transports you from one state to another. Like alcohol. Like love. If I wanted to learn how to compose music, maybe it was to acquire this power. The power of Dionysus.

And on page 1 of Music and Achitecture he informs us that

Art, and, above all, music, has a fundamental function, which is to catalyze the sublimation that it can bring about through all means of expression. It must aim [...] to draw towards a total exaltation in which the individual mingles, losing his consciousness in a truth immediate, rare, enormous, and perfect. If a work of art succeeds in this undertaking even for a single moment, it attains its goal.

[RichardB]

Exactly. And none of those statements are in mutual contradiction. He talks about the transformative power of music, its consciousness-expanding potential, not about communicating feelings.