Electronic Music

Electronic MusicThe capacity of electronic machines such as synthesizers, amplifiers, tape recorders, and loudspeaakers to create different sounds was given importance by 20th century composers like Edgar Varese, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and Mario Davidovsky.Music that uses the tape recorder is called musique concrete, or concrete music. The composer records different sounds that are heard in the environment such as the bustle of traffic, the sound of the wind, the barking of dogs, the strumming of a guitar, or the cry of an infant.These sounds are arranged by the composer in different ways like by playing the tape recorder in its fastest mode or in reverse. In musique concrete, the composer is able to experiment with different sounds that cannot be produced by regular musical instruments such as the piano or the violin.

EDGARD VARESE (18831965)Edgard (also spelled Edgar) Varse was born on December 22, 1883. He was considered an innovative French-born composer. However, he spent the greater part of his life and career in the United States, where he pioneered and creatednew sounds that bordered = between music and noise.The musical compositions of Varese are characterized by an emphasis on timbre and rhythm. He invented the term organized sound, which means that certain timbres andrhythms can be grouped together in order to capture a wholenewdefinition of soundAlthough his complete survivingworks are scarce, he has been recognized to have influenced several major composers of the late 20th century.

POME LECTRONIQUEVarese use of new instruments and electronic resource made him the Father of Electronic Music and he was described as the Stratospheric Colossus of Sound. His musical compositions total around 50, with his advances in tape-base proving revolutionary during his time. He died on November 6, 1965.

KARLHEINZ STOCKHAUSEN (1928 )Karlheinz Stockhausen is a central figure in the realm of electronic music. Born in Cologne, Germany, he had the opportunity to meet Messiaen, Schoenberg, and Webern, theprincipal innovators at the time. Together with Pierre Boulez, Stockhausen drew inspiration fromthese composers as he developed his style of total serialism.Stockhausens music wasinitially met with resistance due to its heavily atonal content with practically no clear melodic or rhythmic sense. Still, he continued to experiment with musique concrete.Some of his works include Gruppen (1957), a piecefor three orchestras that moved music through time and space; Kontakte (1960), a workthat pushed the tape machine to its limits;and the epic Hymnen (1965), an ambitioustwo-hour work of 40 juxtaposed songs and anthems from around the world.The climax of his compositional ambition came in 1977 when he announced the creation of Licht (Light), a seven-part opera (one for each day of theweek) for a gigantic ensemble of solo voices, solo instruments, solo dancers, choirs, orchestras, mimes, and electronics.His recent Helicopter String Quartet, in which a string quartet performs whilst airbornein four different helicopters, develops his long-standing fascination with music whichmoves in space.It has led him to dream of concert halls in which the sound attacks the listener from every direction. Stockhausens works total around 31. He presently residesin Germany.

STUDY II