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[Gil Sansón]

By the way, I agree with the view that the serialist movement never existed. Few composers embraced it, important and relevant composers at the time denounced it as neurosis (Ligeti), and its proponents quickly reach to similar conclusions (Boulez). I think the whole thing was blown out of proportion by those essays on the subject by Boulez, written in an incendiary prose. In the end the only thing that remains of it it's a couple of works like Structures for two pianos (Poliphonie X was retired after a couple of performances and never published) and perhaps the impulse to go beyond the twelve semitones and taste for complexity that may have inspired some current music (in a way the algorythm friendly music of Autechre reminds of serialist music), but in fact the whole thing was an impasse, a fever, so to speak, from which a bunch of composers went for less than a year.

[J.F.]

I don't know that book, but I'd never call integral serialism a "movement" anyway, to begin with. It was/is a technical approach to composing. One that helped changing the whole game from the late 40s on. I like to view it as something of a tabula rasa situation, that esthetically freed many composers (needless to say Cage & friends helped there too). Anyway, in a particular and huge 20th century music segment, nothing has been the same after integral serialism.

My collection of course reflects my taste and perspective, but indeed my shelves are full of music delving into integral serialism, and "post-serial" compositions. I even got the impression it was quite trendy and widespread for a period of time. Sure - the completely rigid methods soon weren't in use anymore, but composers developped their own, with integral serialism clearly having left its mark.

Additionally taking into account the new ground composers broke in the field of electronic music - challenged by certain consequences of integral serialism - I don't quite understand the post above.

[Gil Sansón]

Well, the comment about Autechre (among others) takes into consideration the influence of the serialist movement in the development of electronic music, I just didn't want to mention Stockhausen...

A great deal of my favorite works of the XX century are in the post serislist idiom, Le Marteau, Kontakte and many others, one thing is to state the obvious and say there was no thing such as a total serialist movement and another is to say that as an idea it didn't gave any consequences.

[J.F.]

...and another is to say that as an idea it didn't gave any consequences.

I probably don't understand on which level you're thinking here (I'm lacking any references to & ideas from that mentioned book).
I understand right that you consider "post-serial" composition not to be a consequence of integral serialism? There's no consequences in the two works you mention - Kontakte & Marteau - from integral serialism? That stance would completely contradict my world view on that musical sphere

[Gil Sansón]

no need to worry, I think that integral serialism gave birth to post serialism and those works that we all love and enjoy such as le marteau or Kontakte, and they clearly are a consequence of integral serialism, in that they somehow wanted to keep from integral serialism some aspects, while relaxing quite a bit those other aspects deemed as too strict or cumbersome. I don't think you can take integral serialism out of the picture and pretend that the musical landscape wouldn't be seriously altered as a consequence. I still think it was some kind of bug in the air, a product of the need many composers felt to get rid of ways of making music that had become loaded with undesirable contents, and also the perceived need of a unified language that anyone could use to avoid nationalism. Analysis of the scores was also of paramount importance for similar reasons, there was a general rejection of subjectivity and analyzing a score seemed like a way out of this subjectivity, and soon the score became more important than the actual sounding of the resulting music, something that was admitted even by Boulez. Le Marteau sounds wonderful, he clearly found the need to balance the cleverness of the construction with the aspect of sound in itself. I also think that the complexities of integral serialism were a consequence of Schoenberg and his principle of constant variation, all of the Darmstadt composers (and also Cage, Feldman and company) were frowning upon repetition argumenting similar reasons.

[Gil Sansón]

Christian Wolff-American Conemporary

Great find, and out of print vinyl transfer of an old LP. Side A is taken by a string quartet of sorts, very beautiful, but the real find is side B, with Accompaniments, a fantastic piece for singing pianist (Rzewski, of course) from Wolff's more political works, and one of the more successful at that. Got it from here:

http://closetcurios2.blogspot.com/2007/ ... orary.html

[patois]

Nearing ten times in a row - so many terrible renditions of Gertrude Stein out there, this one works so well in a way I haven't heard outside of Stein's own readings:

UbuWeb: Miss Furr and Miss Skeene - Warren Burt

I was taken with "Miss Furr and Miss Skeene," one of the earliest texts in the collection. This short story/poem/play tells the story of two American women living in Paris, studying voice, and enjoying the cafe life of the time. They meet, fall in love, live together, have difficulties, separate, and eventually, both leave Paris. What attracted me to the text was the way Stein combined an obsessive use of language with a simple narrative structure. This seemed to suggest musical possibilities to me.

The children's animation program "Hollywood" has several different computer voice styles it calls "melodic 1" thru "melodic 5." Each of these will "sing" a text typed into the computer, always singing a particular word in the same way, with the same pitch and inflection each time it occurs. This structure, combined with the obsessive repetitive nature of Stein's language generated some wonderful found-object melodies.

The piece then, is a grand compilation of found objects - a found text, a found method of text setting, and found harmonies derived from the found melodies. In the juxtaposition of all these found objects, however, hopefully the result is greater than the sum of the parts.

This piece was commissioned by VOYS, Inc. with funds provided by the Music Fund of the Australia Council.

[ambiguous_figures]

Mike Kelley / Paul McCarthy / Violent Onsen Geisha ‎– Comp O.S.O.

these guys are weird.

[mono tony]

Jandek - Nine Nocturnes: Nocturne Nine, from The Song of Morgan

Why anybody gave the go-ahead for nine cds worth of this is bewildering.

[ambiguous_figures]

i think because jandek doing something really bold and distinct might make it seem like it must be amazing since he's so strange.

but yeah i made it maybe a minute into the first track before deciding it's just really crummy.

[mudd]

nobody needs to give the go-ahead for jandek, he runs his own label.

m

[Piano Mouth]

Lana Del Rey - Born to Die (Deluxe Version)

Pretty excellent pop record.

Norbert Moslang - The Sounds of Insects

Wow, this one is really good. Prepare to be blown away. Such a nice mix of sounds. Amazing.

Michael Pisaro - July Mountain

[ambiguous_figures]

Olivier Capparos and Lionel Marchetti - Livre Des Morts

anyone here heard anything by capparos that didn't involve marchetti?? the release with marchetti i've heard by him are really great (especially this soundtrack) and i'm curious how he sounds alone or with other artists. i can't find hardly any info about him online though.

[lao]

kunsu shim - love

amazing music, let down by very careless engineering - the noise gate audibly clicking open and shut is extremely distracting in places. i can see why inserting digital silences is desirable with recordings of this kinda music but if it is to be implemented this carelessly i'd much rather the hiss of mics/preamp and environmental sounds. a shame since there's so few recordings of kunsu shim's music out there. or maybe i'm being overly nitpicky, idk

[yonhosago]

Robert Ashley That morning thing (1967)

[mpisaro]

I had intended to re-play the 'balance' box on erstwhile but haven't been able to move past 'tint' (Günter Müller/Toshimaru Nakamura). Even after all these years it strikes me as such strong work. Müller brilliantly finds a way to bring the otherworldly frequencies of Nakamura into a sort of harmonic and rhythmic context. There are lots of great Nakamura recordings, but this one does something which (to my knowledge) no one else tried.

[bnuob]

thanks for bringing that one to my attention. can't believe I'm just hearing it for the first time. great work! I was going to list my favourite Nakamura duos but it was practically all of them- special mention to Soba To Bara though, Nakamura's contributions alone there are amongst the best I've heard from him, Yoshida verges on harrowing and I love the indeterminate aspect of it's production. I think this record, along with "2 Seconds" were instrumental in demonstrating to me the real beauty that can only result from giving up control in such a large way.

anyway not to get too off topic, listened to Christian Wolff Microexercises (EWR) earlier, a good recording, one that I'll be returning to. Wolff's music has been my discovery of the year, a strong instant influence and I'm not even a musician. I just found the concerns he puts forth with his music very transparent and well effectuated. was fortunate to see Apartment House perform some of his works recently, fantastic and definitely the concert to top for me this year. to the labels: please release more Wolff recordings! (can I put in a request for Wobbly Music)

[ambiguous_figures]

my fav nakamura:


Andrea Neumann & Toshimaru Nakamura - ATØN

apart from erstlive 005 of course
between is up there as well

[bedouin]

my fav nakamura:


Andrea Neumann & Toshimaru Nakamura - ATØN

apart from erstlive 005 of course
between is up there as well

yes to all these, but top spot for me:
Tetuzi Akiyama / Toshimaru Nakamura - Semi-Impressionism, and
Annette Krebs / Toshimaru Nakamura - Siyu

[F&B]