To my knowledge, this is Alain Meunier‘s unique LP release – and not to be confused with French classical music cellist Alain Meunier. Titled Voyage aux Fonds de la Mer, or A Trip to the Bottom of the Sea, it is a rare example of electronic music on Le Kiosque d’Orphée. My copy doesn’t come with any information, though there was perhaps, in typical K.O. fashion, some xeroxed info sheet enclosed that is missing here. The Discogs page apparently knows better and lists a precise instrumentation as well as guest musician Christine Meunier on Hohner Clavinet on the 1st side, and that it was recorded and mixed in the Bordeaux area.
♫ Starting with an exquisite acoustic guitar track, the LP only progressively indulges into pure electronic endeavors to become a genuine, instrumental Kosmische Musik travelogue in the tradition of Pascal Comelade’s Fluence project (1975) or Richard Pinhas’ Chronolyse (1976). Aquatic, floating synth sounds emerges on track #2, graced by a sublime Fripp-ian guitar melody. Meunier unleashes the beast on #3: a Korg 800 DV duophonic, analog synthesizer (nice YouTube demo here), used by the likes of Vangelis or Kitaro. The next one, Promenade avec les Poissons, or A Walk with the Fishes, is a tripping, almost acid house instrumental. After #4, a short, funny interlude about sea slugs (!), the pièce de résistance is the epic, side-long Les Épaves, a stately, hypnotic exploration of underwater worlds by means of undulating cosmo-synth lines, a 23 minute ride on electronic music waves through semi-hypnagogic hazes. Happy diving!
01 Ballade (Sur les Rochers) (2:34)
02 Descente dans ce Monde Inconnu I-IV (6:18)
03 Promenade avec les Poissons (9:40)
04 Aplysia Depilans (Lièvre de Mer) (2:07)
05 Les Épaves I-V (23:08)
Total time 43:47
LP released by Le Kiosque d’Orphée, ref. KO 09.0410, France, 1979
German composer, musicologist and educator Joseph Otto Mundigl (1942-1999) was born in Langquaid in Niederbayern (Lower Bavaria), south east of Nürnberg. He studied musicology in nearby Regensburg University from 1968 to 1975, where he also taught electronic music to students and educators. In 1975, he wrote the first German guide for the newly launched EMS Synthi-E titled “Musik aus Strom: eine Einführung in die elektronische Musik: Arbeitsbuch zu Synthi-E von EMS” (or Music From Power: an introduction to electronic music, A guide to the EMS Synthi-E), published by EMS or Electronic Music Studios, London, UK. Mundigl used to tweak and modify the Regensburg University’s EMS synthesizers, as well as his own gearing, including the Dual Ring Modulator he called “doppelringmodulator” that went for sale on eBay recently. Due to illness, Mundigl retired from education in 1993 [biography from this German article].
An independent — even, isolated — composer with his own studio [in Hall at Kelheim], Mundigl started composing electronic music in the 1970s, with pieces like “Electronic Study No. 1″, “Dialogue for Two Speakers” (1972) or “Kristalle I, Klangfarbenmusik zu Bildern von Karl Freyer, part 1″ (1974). Mundigl also experimented with interaction between human blood pulse and synthesizer, and computer-generated images inspired by the chaos theory for a film by Ernst Lanke. When he suddenly died in 1999, aged 57, he was working on an electronic adaptation of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Two Part Inventions.
♫ Mundigl self released his unique LP in 1981. It was technically produced at Internationales Musikstudio in Nürnberg, a professional studio who worked with composers like Peter Thomas and Martin Böttcher. Considering the LP’s title, it seems fair to assume Mundigl wanted to assert his own conception of Elektronische Musik with a selection of his latest compositions and, indeed, his warm and poetical style is at odds with more abstract and authoritative efforts by fellow German composers of the time. Mostly recorded on the EMS Synthi-E and possibly self-build filters, the music is mildly experimental, with a rounded edge to the sounds that make it very listenable. With a minimum of means, Mundigl creates mysterious, immersive, multi-colored soundscapes drawing the listener into otherworldly meanderings, though there is a surprising reminiscence of a Bach fugue 21:20mn into #1 Glasperlenspiel. The track’s title itself is inspired by the Herman Hesse novel of the same name, though I believe Mundigl also took some inspiration from German artist Manfred Sillner, an engraving of whom ornates the cover.
After this week’s interesting events regarding certain cyberlocker, a reshuffle of one kind or another is likely to happen among the mp3 bloggers community, as some bloggers will lose most of their files while others simply get shut down by the Blogger and Tumblr platforms. As I wrote in a previous post, some irresponsible and greedy bloggers spoiled the freedom to post sound files when they chose instead to make money with illegal mp3s – from what I’ve read in the media this week, we are talking something like $150,000 per month for some bloggers. As for me, I will continue to upload music with virtually no commercial potential. It doesn’t get me lots of readers, all right, but I won’t be shut down or prosecuted like some bloggers are likely to be in the future.
Now, what kind of game is Ubuweb founder Kenneth Goldsmith playing, I wonder? On his Twitter page, he apparently embarked on a campaign vindicating the freedom of filesharing and illegal copy, supporting, for instance, the anti-SOPA campaign. He seems to expect Ubuweb to be closed any day soon – or is he merely hoping to become some kind of freedom of speech martyr? In any case, and to my surprise, Ubuweb is slowly moving from an educational, avantgarde repository to an anti-copyright champion.
Retrospectively, 1958 proved a turning point for André Almuró [see previous post & wiki]. Though he had just joined Pierre Schaeffer’s newly launched GRM, 1958 was the year Almuró actually started emancipating himself from Schaeffer’s sphere of influence. That year he produced very personal electroacoustic works like Croquis aux Percussions and Erostrauss, ventured into film making with Pierre Clémenti (“Les Enfants de Misère”), and created his awesome Van Gogh, Le Suicidé De La Société, a radio play after Antonin Artaud’s 1947 book of the same name, written after the visit of a Van Gogh exhibition. The actors are Maria Casarès and Roger Blin, for whom Almuró created a bold radiophonic mise en scène and stunning, if short, musique concrète interludes. The LP was reissued by BAM in 1970 with a different cover.
Born in 1907, Blin collaborated to the stage direction of Artaud’s play The Cenci in 1935 (including parts for Ondes Martenot) and their friendship survived Artaud’s internment years (1937-1946). Maria Casarès and Roger Blin first collaborated on the infamous Pour en finir avec le jugement de Dieu 1947 radioplay, also written by Artaud. Both later played in Jean Cocteau’s film Orphée, 1950, and in Almuró’s radio play Nadja Etoilée, 1955, based on André Breton’s book.
Artaud’s Van Gogh is not a dialogue nor a theater play. For this radiophonic adaptation, Almuró distributed the reading between the 2 actors, taking advantage of Casarès’ smooth voice to bring relief during the reading of the intensely emotional text, and using Blin’s stately voice to deliver disturbing and maddening sentences that fall on you like a hammer blow. In addition, the composer inserted claustrophobic, musique concrète noises (bass rumbles, metallic resonances, strange shamanistic looped vocals at 9:20 into side 1, etc) mirroring the alienation experienced by the Dutch painter and French writer. The fact the former’s work was completely ignored during his lifetime could only resonate in Almuró, himself almost completely obliterated from the history of electroacoustic music.
01 Van Gogh, Le Suicidé de la Société (19:48)
02 Van Gogh, Le Suicidé de la Société – continued (21:45)
Total time 41:33
LP released by BAM [Boîte à Musique], France, 1958
This is the legendary 1978 samizdat recording of Audience, starring Václav Havel (1936-2011) as Vanek and Pavel Landovský as Sládek. It was recorded by folk singer Vladimír Merta in his Prague appartment in 1978 and published by the Šafrán label, ran from Upsalla, Sweden, by Czech exiles Jirí Pallas and Jaroslav Hutka, both signatories of the Charter 77. The LP was unofficially circulated in Czechoslovakia and many Czechs knew parts of the play by heart after 1978, despite the fact any Havel publication was banned in the country since the 1968 Soviet invasion. Havel himself was briefly imprisoned in 1978 and continuously from June 1979 to January 1984. This is a rare example of a record which proved dangerous for its authors, as well as for the entire Soviet system. Czech record company Bonton officially published the recording for the first time in 1990, soon after Havel became president of Czechoslovakia in December 1989.
Audience (as it is titled in Czech) belongs to a trilogy of partly autobiographical one-act plays also known as the Vanek Trilogy, comprising Audience (1975), Protest (1978) and Mistake (1983), based on Havel’s experience of being forced to work in a brewery and under constant harassment from the Communist regime. Taking place in the brewery’s office, Audience is a meeting between the brewery’s manager Sládek and employee Vanek. While the manager is clearly opening too many beers and inducing into binge drinking, it is less clear what he wants from Vanek, though it ultimately transpires he has a deal to offer: a promotion agaisnt informations on Vanek’s political activities. A transcript of the play in Czech is available as PDF here. A short synopsis here. See also Havel’s biographer Carol Rocamora’s analysis of these one-act plays here.
Altered images on the front and back cover of this LP allude to the Communist regimes’s habit of altering and falsifying photographs. Framed Czechoslovakia president Gustáv Husák is letting his eyebrows grow thick ala Brejnev, an allusion to his allegiance to the Soviet regime. In 1975, Havel addressed a letter to Husák, pleading for more democracy in the country.
The sign “Dobre Dari” is the end of the famous Czech motto “Kde se pivo vari, tam se dobre dari” (Where beer is brewed, they have it good). It becomes “BRDA” on the flip, though I couldn’t find the signification of this (any help welcomed).
01 Audience 21:00
02 Audience – continued 20:25
Václav Havel, Vanek
Pavel Landovský, Sladek
Total time 41:25
LP released by Bonton records, Prague, Czechoslovakia, 1990
Kinothek is apparently short for the German word Kinobibliothek, that is, cinema library. The music of Kinothek Percussion Ensemble is indeed intended as film music, but is not overtly library music as such. KPE was a one man affair, that of San Franciscan percussionist and sound artist Dna Hoover. In the late 1970s, Hoover studied sculpture in Virginia and California universities. He created sound sculptures using tape recorders or record players, neon lights, modified ceiling fan, etc. Musicwise, he had a duo with Bill Seaman as Evidence, an had one project with J.A. Deane of Indoor Life. In the 1990s, Hoover worked for film soundtracks or multimedia events. In 1992, for instance, he collaborated with Club Foot Orchestra’s clarinetist Beth Custer for the soundtrack to a film by Peter McCandless called The Braggart, the Soldier, and the Parasite (info from interview in Bananafish #5, 1993).
♫ Though the project is called Percussion Ensemble, this LP is far from what one would expect from a drummer’s solo effort. Instead, Suspense is a collection of elusive and enigmatic tracks recorded with synthesizer (possibly a Fairlight) and percussion, be it sampled or live. A typical track consists in a slow build-up of ambient synth washes, some synth loop, muted sampled percussion, and then live percussion. Some untold drama underlines parts of this music, which could indeed be used in films. In some synthesizer nuances, elaborate arrangements or dark atmospheres, echoes of other Bay Area artists can be perceived, like Philip Perkins’ King of the World LP (1983), Rhythm & Noise’s 1984 and 85 LPs, or even Andy Partridge & Harold Budd’s Through The Hill collaboration (1994).
01 Interruptus (4:03)
02 Snake’s Kin (3:02)
03 Yassou Sazoud (3:24)
04 A Rumble (on the Track) (2:20)
05 Assassin (3:42)
06 Broken Knees (1:50)
07 Gagaku (2:45)
08 Too Many Shadows (2:56)
09 Tsunami (3:27)
10 Vertigo (3:11)
11 Agitated (2:41)
12 Outback (3:08)
13 The Old Man’s Basket (2:55)
14 Arnhem’s Evil Giant (3:03)
Total time 42:24
LP released by Audiox, San Francisco, CA, 1989
00:00
Keith Jarret – Overture, from the Ruta+Daitya LP, ECM, 1973. One of the first Jarret LPs for ECM, with the pianist on electric organ and Jack De Johnette on drums.
01:42
Yves Pacher – excerpt from a cassette titled Musique des buissons, des sentiers, de l’imagination, (Music from Bushes, Trodden Tracks and Imagination), released by UPCP/Geste Paysanne, Poitiers, France, 1983. A regionalist/ environmentalist cassette teaching children how to build music instruments from wood, plants or grass blades, as is the case here.
02:02
Eero Koivistoinen – excerpt from Muusa ja Ruusa, 1971, an electronic, free jazz opera for children by Finnish saxophonist Koivistoinen. Extremely rare LP of which an excerpt is available on Extra Edition blog.
03:34
Eduard Artemiev – Motion, a collaboration with Yury Bogdanov, from the 1982 Melodya LP Metamoprhoses. Soviet film music composer Artemiev is better known for the Andrei Tarkovsky soundtracks, Solaris and Stalker.
05:51
Sven Grünberg – Rohelised Leed, from Mess, 1975-76. Founded in the early 1970s by keyboardist Grünberg and a group of Estonian musicians, Mess was a progressive rock band from Estonia who were never allowed to release their music on state label Melodya. The album finally surfaced in 1995, with a CD release on Bella Musica, Germany.
08:47
Arne Nordheim – I Auroheimen, or In the Other Home, from the opera Draumkvedet, CD, Simax records, 2006. Nordheim’s masterpiece Draumkvedet, or The Dream Ballad, was commissioned for the 1994 Olympic Winter Games in Lilehammer, Norway. The opera blends traditional and contemporary styles and techniques. It includes untrained folk singers, medieval language, electronic music, orchestra and chorus.
14:47
Steve Waring – Image, from the 7” single titled Mirobolis on Le Chant du Monde, France, 1978. American guitarist Steve Waring made a career in France since 1965, championing fingerpicking guitar and jamming with many French guitarists. From the late 1970s, he specialized in children’s songs and released several records on Le Chant Du Monde, of which Mirobolis might be the first one. Backing musicians are Workshop de Lyon members Louis Sclavis on clarinet and sax, Maurice Merle on alto sax, Jean Bolcatto on bass and Christian Rollet on drums.
19:05
Cory Allen – track #5 from Hearing is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Hears, CD, Quiet Design, 2009. Texan composer Cory Allen runs the Quiet Design label and releases intricate, minimalist electronic music compositions that both soothe and mesmerize.
19:51
Luciano Berio & Bruno Maderna – excerpts from the 1st part of Ritratto di Città, or Portrait of the City, 1954. A poetical sound portrait of Milano, Ritratto… was a radiophonic, electroacousitc composition, inaugurating the newly launched Studio di Fonologia Musicale in Milano. The text was written by Roberto Lyedi, readers are Nando Gazzolo and Ottavio Fanfani. Electroacoustic and electronic sounds by Bruno Maderna and Luciano Berio. Sound from YouTube video.
25:40
Patrick Cowley & Jorge Socarras – Soon–Kink Remix, 2009, Macro, Berlin. From the Macrospective 2011 2CD-set. After nearly two decades of presence, it seems Berlin minimal techno is part of Europe’s genes, now, and the genre is alive and kicking.
32:12
Dariusz Mazurowski – excerpts from Divertimento, from the “Pseudaria/ Divertimento” CD on Acte Préalable, Poland, 2011. Based on his fascination for early electronic music pioneers, Polish composer Mazurowski’s music blends analog recording technique with a digitial editing process, for what could pass for an homage to Elecktronische Musik.
43:28
Belgrade art students – Story On Copy, texts on copy in art written and read by Belgrade art students. Inspired by Manhattan gallery Salon de Fleurus, dedicated to copy and fake paintings, named after Gertrud Stein’s address in Paris, Rue de Fleurus. Apparently part of an exhibition on “The Case of Students’ Cultural Centre in the 1970s”.
50:38 Chunky Move – Mortal Engine, 2008. Soundtrack by Ben Frost for the multimedia dance performance by Australian company Chunky Move, directed by Gideon Obarzanek.
52:50 Zs – Acres of Skin, from the New Slaves CD, 2010. With New Slaves, Brooklyn trio Zs have produced their most radical record to date, an intimidating mix of math rock guitars, shrieking saxophone and stubborn, metronomic drums.
55:56 Wolf Biermann – Wie Ich Ein Fisch Wurde, from the Hälfe des Lebens LP, CBS, West Germany, 1979. After a poem by Günter Kunert, How I Becam A Fish, written 1963. Born 1936 in West Germany, Biermann relocated to East Germany in 1965 to experience Socialism in the flesh. A folk singer, poet and political activist, he instilled his Marxist ideas in LP records published in the West. On his 1978 LP Trotz Allerdem!, free jazz saxophonist Albert Mangelsdorff and Heiner Goebbels both contribute, the latter on accordion. Biermann’s daughter Catharina Hagen is better known as Nina Hagen.
63:14 Ed Cox – The Triumphant March of Piaf, from the Hardcordian EP, 2006 (sound from MySpace). Cambridge-based Ed Cox plays a hybrid form of musette accordion with robust Jungle rhythm machine. A street musician, he also plays outdoor during free parties – but always dressed as a clown, as if to break barriers with passers-by. The Triumphant March of Piaf is a wonderfully optimistic and uplifting anthem, perhaps inspired by French singer Edith Piaf.
66:10 Jean-François Charles – Zygomatic. A piece for laugh and live electronics by French composer Jean-François Charles, interpreted by soprano singer Isabelle Jost, with live interaction through Max/MSP and Jitter softwares.
69:07 Fatima Miranda – El principio del fin, from Concierto en Canto CD on El Europeo Música CD, Spain, 1994. An exquisite sound poetry lullaby for onomatopeia and kisses by the ever playful Fatima, Ultimately, everything ends with kisses, as it should be.
US composer Joel Chadabe, born 1938 in NYC, has been experimenting with synthetic sounds, computer-generated music and interactive systems since the late 1960s. He was a reviewer for Electronic Music Review magazine, 1967-68, edited by Reynold Weidenaar & Robert Moog – archive now hosted online at Ubuweb–, but also for many other publications like Perspectives of New Music or Leonardo Music Journal. Chadabe developed several music programs, including the software sequencer PLAY with Roger Meyers in 1977 ; the interactive composing program M (still available at Cycling 74) ; or the touchpad controller Touchsurface with David Asher in 1990. See official website for more info.
♫ Rhythms was Chadabe’s 3rd LP release after Ideas Of Movement At Bolton Landing on Opus One in 1974 and Echoes/Flowers on CP2 Records in 1976. Recorded in 1980, Rhythms is a set of rhythmic variations for computer-generated sounds and live percussion – the computer’s live interaction with an acoustic instrument being the pioneering aspect of the record. Developed by Chadabe, the program is based on an original rhythm structure whose parameters can be modified by the composer, and able to interact with live sounds from percussionist Jan Williams – something Chadabe had already experimented in his duo with violinist Paul Zukovsky in Echoes/Flowers. Consisting in looped midi sounds, mellow rhythm patterns and light percussion interjections, the music on Rhythms isn’t radical or cutting edge as such – it can even, to some extent, function as musique d’ameublement, or furniture music. Midi sounds emulate glass or gamelan instruments, and rhythm programing often denotes exotic touches – Chadabe quoting Caribbean and African influences.
01 Rendezvous (4:39)
02 Bagatelle (2:19)
03 Hot Sauce (2:15)
04 After the Blues (9:31)
05 Bird Bath (2:21)
06 Carnival (5:57)
07 Song Without Words (7:26)
08 Yum Yum (3:28)
09 Pas de Deux (1:35)
10 Au Revoir (2:51)
Joel Chadabe, computer-synthesizer system
Jan Williams, vibraphone, marimba, log and slit drums,
woodblocks, temple blocks, cowbells, glass bowls
Total time 42:22
LP released by Lovely Music, USA, 1981
