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By Jennifer Myers I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas.
I'm frightened of the old ones. -John Cage The soundscape of the 21st century is disturbed by, or composed of, the distant hum of electricity and electrical processes. Most of the sounds in the milieu-nouveau are fabricated they are products of technology. Subliminally, we listen to this bombardment of sounds, distant car radios, streetcars passing in the night, commercials being played from 80-foot screens. Often to stop and hear the birds sing is to tune into a synthesized sound object made to emulate the perfect bird. It isn’t all that bad. We have been conditioned to tune some things out, to recognize digitally created sounds, and for the most part, we have learned to love them. Digitally modifying everything around us, we have come just one step closer to utopia. All kidding aside, the influx of synthetic sounds has left a huge impact not only on the soundscape but also on the people. The technology behind synthesizing has opened a door of vast possibilities for discovery. And the wide range of sound objects has allowed a range of artistic freedom never before realized.
Electronic music has often carried a stigma of negativity – stemming from alleged rampant narcotic abuse, wild euro-tech parties in the 80s and the techno-obscurity of dark-wave. But the true interest in electronic music lies within the inception and evolution of it. Looking back to the very beginning, where small electric charges were used to create intricate compositions; so much more than repetition, hallucination and feverish dancing. The investigation into the true conception of electronic music goes far beyond Kraftwerk.
France 1759, Jean-Baptiste Delaborde invents the Clavecin Electrique, which can be best described as an "electric harpsichord”. (Synthmuseum.com) “a keyboard instrument that employed static electrical charges to cause small metal clappers to hit bells” (Chadabe, E.M.M.com) . The significance of this instrument lies with the usage of electronic principles, and the unprecedented explosion of electro-technologies. Culturally and agriculturally Europe had gone through a revolution, and the impending economic boom was upon the horizon. Mechanics and mechanical modes of production were being developed rapidly, and by the beginning of the next century some of the most vital inventions to date were developing from in theorem to reality.
An epoch later, half a world away, Elisha Gray “accidentally dicovered (sic) that he could control sound from a self vibrating electromagnetic circuit and in doing so invented a basic single note oscillator. The 'Musical Telegraph' used steel reeds whose oscillations were created and transmitted, over a telephone line, by electromagnets. Gray also built a simple loudspeaker device in later models consisting of a vibrating diaphragm in a magnetic field to make the oscillator audible.” (obsolete.com, Elisha...) And around the same time, technological pioneers like Edison, Telsa and Bell were harnessing and utilizing electricity to change the possibilities of North American culture.
One of the most important figures in the progression of electronic music was Dr. Thaddeus Cahill whose contribution to industrial progress included the invention of the electric typewriter. He was also credited with being the “designer and builder of the first musical synthesizer and, by default, originator of industrial muzak” (Dunn, Artscilab.org). At the end of the 19th century cultural enthusiasm for such technologies was making celebrities out of inventors. At this point, however, electricity could be harnessed, but it was not widely accessible. Telephone companies were expanding and telephone service was soon to be a part of everyday life. Research into electric phenomenon brought experimentation into sound systems. Since Cahill had made so much progress on the invention of the telephone, he was well learned in the concept of tele-communications. Viably, Cahill’s creation – the Telharmonium was a well-motivated attempt to say the least. This electro-mechanical device consisted of 145 rheotome/alternators capable of producing five octaves` of variable harmonic content in imitation of orchestral tone colors. Its principal of operation consisted of what we now refer to as additive synthesis and was controlled from two touch-sensitive keyboards capable of timbral, amplitude and other articulatory selections. Since Cahill's machine was invented before electronic amplification was available he had to build alternators that produced more than 10,000 watts. As a result the instrument was quite immense, weighing approximately 200 tons.(Dunn, artscilab.org)
Cahill presented his instrument to New York City in 1906. When Gray saw that his Telharmonically could be broadcast onto homes, he began redesigning feverishly. But with the amateurish telephone systems, and interference with the service, Cahill’s invention soon lost popularity and the company bankrupted. Cahill’s episode with electronics and broadcasting led to the re-networking of telephone systems, had a profound effect on radio as an entertainment medium and it brought another and seemingly important level to the new-mediaesque debate of technology vs. art. In Cahill’s case, technology and art were intertwined, but marketability was thrown into the mix. The desperate appeal for electronics and newfound technology to be utilized for entertainment had to be matched, but culturally everything just wasn’t’ ready.
There are so many fundamental and revolutionary ideas embodied in the invention that it will be a long time before we grasp or grow accustomed to them all and only one or two can now be accentuated. Electricity has been the greatest centralizing, unifying, force these hundred years... highly composite vibrations are built up which fall upon the ear as musical chords of great beauty and purity of tone. This process of interweaving of currents can be pushed very far, and the complex vibrations from different keyboards can be combined into others even more subtly superposed and wedded so as to produce in the telephone receiver the effect of several voices or instruments Within the range of such an equipment appear possible some sounds never before heard on land or sea.” (Martian, Earlyradiohistory.us)
In 1907, two years before the Italian Futurists publish their manifesto, Feruccio Busoni publishes Sketch of a New Aesthetic of Music. “Suddenly, one day, it seemed clear to me that full flowering of music is frustrated by our instruments ... In their range, their tone, what they can render, our instruments are chained fast and their hundred chains must also bind the composer.... (Ele-mental.org) Busoni’s ideology stemmed directly from his experience with the Telharmonium and the potential that he saw in this kind of a system. His ideas helped to inspire Edgard Varese, who under the tutelage of Busoni would emerge as a prominent component to this history as well. Chronologically, however, Varese would not emerge as a key figure until almost a decade later.
Now, approaching the second decade of the new century, things in the world of invention were progressing quite satisfactorily. An American, Lee de Forest makes a most significant contribution with his development of the radio tube. Subsequently, he made progress with the conception and practical usage of amplification. “The radio tube made it possible to amplify signals from radio, TV, gramophone and tape recordings. It was also possible to make oscillators (combinations of pipes, condensers, resistance capacitators and other electronic components) that served as the basis for new instruments that were to come, electrophones as they are called in systematic musicology.” (notam. DSP) now amplifying sounds was easy, unlike all the complicated and large equipment used by Cahill for example. Sounds were becoming more and more a part of everyday life, just as sound art was becoming more and more about everyday sounds.
The soundscape was changing. Technology and the motorization of everyday transportation systems were bringing change to the ideas and the sounds of the time. All great movements occur because of reactionaries and the need to contrast and act in response to previous conventions. Futurism was nothing at all like the Ibsen-esque grandiose and feathery sentimentality of romanticism. In Italy there began a need for machines, an interest in pollution, a craving for speed and industrialization. But most importantly in this context, the term Futurism was synonymous with noise. The Futurists welcomed the changing world with open arms, feeling the rush of excitement and hearing the changing sounds of the post-industrial revolutionized world. “They embraced the exciting new world that was then upon them rather than hypocritically enjoying the modern world’s comforts while loudly denouncing the forces that made them possible. Fearing and attacking technology has become almost second nature to many people today” (unknown.nu)
Whereas Futurism as a movement began around 1909, the shift to music as a predominant medium didn’t really occur until 1913 when the Italian Futurist Luigi Russolo scribed the manifesto The Art of Noises. The World was on the verge of the First World War and tensions were surmounting. First printed as a pamphlet, Russolo’s piece suggested a new form of music. Melody and Harmony were no longer important, and the ideology of a factory was to shape this new wave. Factories were mechanical, repetitive, rhythmatic in a productionist sense. Symbolically, they represented change and growth. Russolo wanted to advocate a style that utilized these factory sounds and the varieties of noise that often went un-noticed. It was the background hum that he wanted to use and conquer, to create “a music in which factories could be tuned” This tonal experience was to come about before the usage of even the most rudimentary recording tools. Russolo intention was to mimic the rhythm of society’s industrialization and obsession with growth in his music. He wrote “The rhythmic movements of a noise are infinite: just as with tone there is always a predominant rhythm” (unknown.nu)
Russolo found that classical instruments were constricting, and no longer were they able to satisfy the contemporary... orchestrate of noise. Intonorumori is the Italian word for “noise intoners” and can best be described as noise machines, although Russolo preferred to refer to them as simply instruments. Using electro-mechanical technologies, Russolo created his own means to produce the soundscape he desired. These acoustic sound generators were clownish in appearance, the metal speakers concealed within solid boxes, all different sizes, and painted in bright child-like colours. Russolo described the process;
It was necessary for practical reasons that the noise Intoners were to be as simple as possible.... and this we succeeded in doing. It is enough to say that a single stretched diaphragm placed in the right position gives, when tension is varied a scale of more than ten notes, complete with all the passages of semitones, quarter-tones and even the tiniest fractions of tones.
The preparation of the material for these diaphragms is carried out with special chemical baths and varies according to the timbre required. By varying the way in which the diaphragm is moved further types of timbres of noise can be obtained while retaining the possibility of varying the tone" (keyboardmuseum.org)
Before Russolo abandoned his stint as an instrumental inventor, he developed the "Rumorarmonio" in 1922 and the "Enharmonic Piano" in 1931. The instruments themselves are not at all as important as the concept behind this music, and the influence that it had on the evolution of music from this point on. By creating sound art from everyday life and contemporary sounds, he bewildered audiences with his usage of industrial sounds, whistles, buzzers and the like. The Italian futurists would now be known for experimental music that re-invented the status-quo. “This musical evolution is paralleled by the multipication (sic) of machines” – Russolo from the Art of Noise – (unknown.nu) And in succeeding creating art from noise, he opened the door for those wanting to transcend traditional thinking further, and led to the influence of many important sound-artists, Varese and Stravinsky, and later Musique Concrete and John Cage.
Varese’s two main influences were the aforementioned, Busoni’s Sketch of a New Aesthetic of Music, and the evolution of industrial and everyday noises into the aural-transference of the 20th century. “I long for instruments obedient to my thought and whim, with their contribution of a whole new world of unsuspected sounds, which will lend themselves to the exigencies of my inner rhythm.” (ele-mental.org) He thought that music should be broken down to the most rudimentary form, in which case a sound becomes a material, which manipulated by the artist would create a piece. The exploration into sound, and the idea of sound exploitation were the driving forces behind his work. In 1923, he caused a riot in New York City after the presentation of Hyperprism. This was one of the first compositions that was written almost exclusively for percussion, and the performance utilized “several performers playing sleigh bells, cymbals, crash cymbals, rattles, triangle, anvil, slapstick, Chinese blocks, tam-tam, Indian drum, snare drum, bass drum, (and a) tambourine.” (csunix1.lvc.edu) Varese’s use of un-traditional sound methods was a direct correlation with the ideology of Russolo, who had a huge impact on this event. Varese’s unconventional sounds like a siren and a synthetic Lions roar caused a great deal of controversy. The paradigm had shifted, but the public still expected compositions to be more melodic in nature and less experimental. Varese spent the next few years in further exploration, and in 1930 produced a manifesto called The Liberation of Sound in which he credits science for opening new realms of potential in the electro-audio sphere. Varese spends several years in a deep depression, to later re-emerge as a forefather of this technology once again.
The Second decade of the century was full of auditory experimentation, and the science world was taking notice. Once again, Invention was a primary concern, and this time electro-acoustics was the primary field of study. The theory that was emerging from all of the articles and manifestos concerning sound to date had an un-requited need for new instruments. The beginning of the second decade began with Leon Theremin, a Russian engineering student who came up with an object that by moving ones hands along the two antennas, the participant could control pitch and volume. Most importantly, all of this was done using electricity. The instrument was first called the “Aetherophone,” and later when RCA patented and began to market the instrument, it became known as the Theremin. New and electronic, this instrument;
based on radio-frequency oscillations (was) controlled by hands moving in space over two antennae. The extraordinary flexibility of the instrument not only allowed for the performance of traditional repertoire but also a wide range of new effects. The theatricality of its playing technique and the uniqueness of its sound made the Theremin the most radical musical instrument innovation of the early 20th century.(Dunn Artscilab.org)
When he returned to Russia, he had been in development of a cross-rhythm instrument, but the Bolshevik oppression stifled all invention on a global scale. He was placed under house arrest, and continued his work with electronics building systems for the Soviets.
Now at this point, electronic devices were being incorporated into the music world – with several developments over a short period of time. Jorg Magar’s Spharophon used loudspeakers and an oscillator-based keyboard. Maurice Martenot introduced the Ondes Martenot, which was directly influenced by Theremin and his instrument. “The Ondes-Martenot's success was the Theremins loss, although both used the vacuum tube oscillator as a sound source and were both monophonic, where the Theremin had a sliding scale and no fixed preset notes the Ondes-Martenot had a keyboard and a strip control for glissando and vibrato and an appearance that was familiar to any keyboard player.” (obsolete.com)
The invention of all of these auditory mechanics would be relatively insignificant if it wasn’t for the artists that were using them. The Dadaists had been making some interesting progress in the art world, which paralleled the evolution of acoustic-electronics. At some point, Ballet Mechanique the movie was created and George Anthil composed a soundtrack. The audio was composed on a solitary piano, but was meant for several electro-mechanical pianos. Given the technology at the time, his piece was unplayable – at least in its original state. He changed the composition to suit several human pianists, and it was un-approved by the public in both Europe and North America. The technical challenges, at this point in history, were too overwhelming. But ballet Mechanique tried to be a sound-art piece, a soundtrack and a performance all at the same time. It is events like this, however unsuccessful at the time, that led to the conception and popularity of multi-media performances. The progression of technology has been good to Anthil’s spirit. Ballet Mechanique the score in its original composition has been fashioned using MIDIs and modern-day technologies. Using synths, computers and the concept of remediation, several contemporary artists performed “a piece which no-one, including the composer, had ever heard before.” (Lehrman, SoundonSoundcom)
Dada as a movement was brought about by the horrors of WWI. Subsequently, each of the movements in this timeline was somehow influenced by war. And by the rise of Hitler in 1933, German scientist Fritz Pfleuner had produced the “first practical plastic recording tape,” (Dunn, Artscilab.org) the result of experiments with plastic tape and oxide coated paper. Two years later at the Berlin Radio fair, the AEG Magnetophone was introduced, becoming the “prototypical magnetic tape recorder and was vastly superior to the wire recorders then in use. By 1945 the Magnetophone adopted oxide-coated papertape.” (Dunn, Artscilab.org) Now with this technology, recording was an actuality, leading to new innovations. It was now possible to have flexibility; musicians could “store and manipulate sound events.” (Dunn, Artscilab.org) Now, there could also be proper documentation, audio could effectively be recorded live and these events led to further creative exploration, and the emergence of sound studios. Experimentation with magnetic tape influenced the works of Cage and Musique Concrete, where manipulation was key.
I believe that the use of noise wherever we are, what we hear is mostly noise. When we ignore it, it disturbs us. When we listen to it, we find it fascinating. The sound of a truck at 50 m.p.h. Static between the stations. Rain. We want to capture and control these sounds, to use them, not as sound effects, but as musical instruments. Every film studio has a library of ‘sound effects’ recorded on film. With a film phonograph it is now possible to control the amplitude and frequency of any one of these sounds and to give to it rhythms within or beyond the reach of anyone's imagination. Given four film phonographs, we can compose and perform a quartet for explosive motor, wind, heartbeat, and landslide. -John Cage (1937) Lecture “The Future of Music: Credo” (elemental.org)
No one adopted and re-orientated all of the 20th century aural-ideologies quite like John Cage. He wanted to emphasize rhythm in composition, rather than harmony. Cage incorporated Eastern philosophies and Duchamp’s ready-mades into a complex and well-considered mantra of his own. His experiences at Black Mountain College helped Cage to understand how music and dance can create a synchronized and beautiful rhythmus. His Imaginary Landscape Pieces numbered 1, 3, 4 and 5... all made use of electronics and conceptually paid homage to the Dadaist, Futurist and Constructivist ideologies of the first quarter of the 1900s. Imaginary Landscape #1 was composed for muted piano, several phonographs and Chinese symbols. “In this short piece mixing the slow grind and whistle of the turntable with ambient percussion fills, Cage was the first to explore the aural potential in the new audio medium of the turntable.” (Smith, Josephwaters.com) Test tones from recordings, and adjusting the speeds on the turntables aided the effect. This has been considered, possibly the first composition for electronic music.
A great deal of Cage’s work included composition for disc recordings. He also “anticipated a wide range of new media innovations, from deejay culture to artificial life to ‘collider’ Internet art to open source programming. Many of the techniques he pioneered, such as chance, recombination, and indeterminacy, are reflected in his scores for the Imaginary Landscapes created between 1939 and 1952.” (Ippolito, newyorkdigitalsalon.org) John Cage as a theorist was almost more interesting than John Cage as a musician. But at this point in his career he was just beginning to come into his full understanding. After Musique Concrete begins to broadcast over airwaves in Paris, electronic manipulation of music begins to take shape, as does Cages career.
Vive le France. In Paris Pierre Schaeffer had been using phonographs to record and manipulate music. He developed his own theoretical approach to music, which he called Musique Concrete “in order to emphasize the sculptural aspect of how the sounds were manipulated.” (Dunn, Artscilab.org) Using recorded musical and natural sounds in combination, he reduced all audio into sound objects playing them backwards or sped up or similarly recognizable sounds in odd succession. With the invention of magnetic tape and the tape recorder, audio compositions or sound objects could be cut, spliced, rearranged, mixed, and frequency could be easily adjusted. But even before Musique Concrete had access to tape records, Schaeffer and his counterparts Poullin and Henry MADE Symphonie Pour un Homme Seul. Musique Concrete began its own sphere of influence, and received recognition. Schaeffer himself relied on Russolo for inspiration. However, “Even though Schaeffer and his colleagues were consciously aligned in overt ways with the Futurists' concern with noise, they tended to rely on dramatic expression that was dependent
upon illusionistic associations to the sounds undergoing deconstruction.” (Dunn, Artscilab.org) Musique Concrete was more didactic and collaborative. The emphasis was on development, collaboration, manipulation and experimentation. “The group's experiments in a pseudo-scientific manner that forms a lexicon of sounds and their distinctive characteristics which should determine compositional criteria and organization.” (Dunn, Artscilab.org)
Collaborations using borrowed studios, and borrowed equipment began to emerge. John Cage was a part of one such collaborative called “The Music for Magnetic Tape Project.” From this and over nine months of editing and splicing came Cage’s William’s Mix. The piece took over 6000 recordings and used hundreds of sound samples. Cage and his counterparts categorized each of the sounds used. “The sounds are in 6 categories: A (city sounds), B (country sounds), C (electronic sounds), D (manually produced sounds), E (wind produced sounds) and F ("small" sounds, which need to be amplified).” (Engine27.org) Significantly, Compositionally sound, William’s Mix was meticulously notated. No longer a randomness of sounds, Cage’s work took on classical modes of composing scores and applied it to spliced and manipulated sound objects.
At the close of the 1950s Varese makes his comeback. Traditionally, he could not complete all that he had aurally imagined. Now with all of the advancements made with electronics and the shift in contemporary ideas, Varese could take the abstract and make it a reality. Composed for the Philips Pavilion at the Brussels World Exposition, and entitled Poeme Electronique, This piece has been credited as the first multi-media event. “The original consisted of three synchronized tracks, to be played on multiple amplifiers and loudspeakers over diverse 'sound routes.’” (Cogan, Stanford.edu) Varese utilized the same kind of “found” and “concrete” sounds as his contemporaries, and borrowed from the industrial sounds of the Futurists and the synthesized sounds developing throughout the last decade. Along-side of this, he had human voice, harmonics – and all of these were played on different channels using 400 speakers. Varese’s Poeme Electronique is extremely significant. This was a culmination of ideas that had spread over 40 years, festering and developing. Also, Varese had created a true soundscape of his own. And all of this in 480 seconds.
In accordance to the development of electronic music, the first half of the 20th century was about invention, exploration and manipulation. None of that will change. Each of the aforementioned brought something extraordinarily important to the soundscape of today. A great deal of the soundscape in the 21st century is fabricated, as Russolo has foreseen. Electronic music has since made a shift, in part thanks to John Cage, and has now become not only harmonic, but also melodic and well composed. Electricity and electronics have become so crucial to current day aesthetics, and the soundscape, although in part artificial has melded into something, which is in, and itself beautiful. Harmony and technology new have not only the ability and intention but also the need to come together and develop a new and ever evolving status quo. The investigations into the very roots of this medium are so crucial to the interpretation and appreciation of it. The struggle to modify and manipulate in ways not technologically possible drove men like Varese almost into madness. Electricity began to power man, not only machine. Looking back at the last century, the developments, it leaves so much promise for the future. Wherever evolution may take us, electronically. It will certainly meld both computing and catharsis indefinitely.
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