From: Thanos Chrysakis <azimuths@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: microsound <microsound@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: microsound <microsound@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [microsound] Sound Art Now: An Online Symposium
Date: Fri, 07 May 2004 23:58:23 +0100
on 5/7/04 11:23 PM, john kannenberg at john@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
> Yes, it's very long, but I found it some of the best discussion of
> sound art I've ever read online. I was particularly interested in the
> attempts to define the difference between sound art and music,
> classifying music as temporal and sound art as spatial.
> Overly-generalized, but a pretty solid base to build on.
I read it and found it interesting. Though, this distinction that it's
coming actually from Max Neuhaus doesn't apply for me.
Actually, music seemed to have a close relationship with the space from the
beginning. The acoustic properties of particular architectures and
buildings
eg. ancient Greek theatres, cathedrals and so on were shaping actually the
ways that musicians were perceiving and were doing music.
Sound occupies both Time & Space simultaneously either in a sound only
context or as music.
There are some examples from the western music history [I'm sure there are
examples from other cultures as well] that show that space was taken into
consideration from musicians.
These are some points....that are taken from John Dacks's article
Sound, Installtions and Music.
"The antiphonal music of Gabrieli in St Mark?s Cathedral in Venice is
frequently cited but other composers can be referred to. For example,
Mozart
used an off-stage ensemble in "Don Giovanni" and, as a dramatic tour de
force, Berlioz instructed that brass and percussion instruments be
distributed throughout the space of "Les Invalides" when his "Grand Messe
des Morts" was performed ? a site-specific composition par excellence! More
recently, compositions by Charles Ives and Gustav Mahler have exploited
instrumental groupings in different locations and even the use of muffled
trumpets by composers like Debussy must be considered as evoking distance
in
addition to their more immediate effects of timbral modification. Indeed,
when used metaphorically, space can encourage a process of recollecting
distant memories as events recede into indistinct and barely retrievable
remembrances. The role of "distance" in Romantic and Post-Romantic thought
surely plays a part in the musical indications "de loin" and "lontano"? In
the post-war period many composers have experimented with placing
instrumentalists in specific positions on the stage or amongst the
audience.
Berio and Xenakis have composed such works and the pioneering example of
Henry Brant?s orchestral works are noteworthy for their use of space as an
integral part of the composition. The ultimate incorporation of space into
the parameters of music along with pitch, duration, dynamics and timbre was
of course only possible with the advent of electroacoustic music and its
related technology. With regard to the use of space as a compositional
determinant Karlheinz Stockhausen can be identified as a pioneer in the
field and Pierre Boulez has remained consistently interested in this aspect
as his work Répons testifies. Stochausen?s article "The Four Criteria of
Electronic Music" includes the notion of spatiality. "
Also, maybe is of interest just to mention that as I re-listened
a live performance of La Mer by Debussy it seemed to me
that the orchestra was separated in two sides and as
the movements of the music were so rapid at times it reminded me
the kinetic stereophony that electronic music uses a lot.
With this I mean that we play with space more or less even when
we just play a stereo recording not in big manner but we do, so then
comes multichannel in which you can acheive a much more
refined movement in the space that mean you can have a counterpoint
of movements.
so for me both music & sound occupy Time & Space
simultaneously. It is up to the musicians if they choose to explore
the aspect of space in music. There is not something intrinsic
in music that says it doesn't relate to space, it's the opposite!
Warm Regards
Thanos
PS::Oh! this is a long e-mail... hope it is of some worth.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: microsound-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
For additional commands, e-mail: microsound-help@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
website: http://www.microsound.org