LAB: Igor Stravinsky and electronic music

R.C. Have you any further observations to make about electronic ‘music’?

I.S. I would still repeat the criticisms I made of it two years ago – namely, I do not see why a medium so rich in sound possibilities should sound so poor; and, though shape and composition are more in evidence and the liaisons more convincing in the newer pieces, the impression of desultoriness is still a main impression. At the same time the newer electronic music has more direction – a fact I attribute to the clearer division between those who are trying to create a new and purely electronic sound and those who are trying to transform existing sounds, instrumental and otherwise; some attractive results have been attained on both sides of this split. Now, however, with the appearance of the R.C.A. synthesizer the whole electronic music experiment set up to the present can only be regarded as a pre-natal stage in its development.

[...] Perhaps the real future of electronic music is in the theatre. Imagine the ghost scene in Hamlet with electronic ‘white noise’ entering the auditorium from several directions (Berio’s Omaggio a Joyce is perhaps a preview of this kind of thing). But this is very theatricality – which electronicians will object to as more for the effect of another art than for the thing itself – exposes another problem. ’Concerts’ of electronic music are, in fact, more like seances. With nothing to look at on the stage – no exhibition of orchestra and conductor, but only conduit-speaker boxes and, suspended from the ceiling, mobile reflectors – what is the audience to look at? Surely not anything as arbitrary as the ‘symbolic’ colours and pictures of the San Francisco ‘Vortex’ experiment?

I have uncovered a Diaghilev letter that should be of at least historical interest in the discussion of ‘Futuristic’ music, music concrete, and electronic music. It is dated Rome, 8 March 1915, and was sent to me at the Hotel Victoria, Chateau d’Oex, Switzerland. It is naive, of course, but not more so than the ‘Futuristic’ composers themselves; and it is a good example of Diaghilev’s flair.

[...] dance action must be supported not by music but by sounds, id est, by filling the ears harmonically. The source of this ‘filling’ should not be recognizable. The changes of these harmonic junctures, or liaisons, must not be remarked by the ear – one sound merely joins or enters another, id est, there is no obvious rhythm whatsoever, because one does not hear either the beginning or end of the sound. The projected instruments are: bells wrapped round with cloth and other material, aeolian harps, guzli, sirens, tops and so on. Of course all this has to be worked out, but for that purpose Marinetti proposes we get together for some days in Milan and discuss it with the leader of their ‘orchestra’, and examine all their instruments. Also he guarantees that at this time he will bring Pratella to Milan so he can show us his newest works which are, according to him formidables. We could do it between the 15th and 20th of March. Telephone me at Naples, Hotel Vesuvio, if you can come to meet us in Milan. You will see many new Futuristic studios; from there we will go together to Montreux. I urge you very strongly to come – it is very important for the future . I will send you some money for the trip immediately. As for the concert of Prokofiev in Geneva, he can give it as a benefit for the Serbs if he is busy on the 20th. Then, until we meet soon,
je t’embrasse,
SERIOSHA
PS. Compose Noces quickly. I am in love with it.

Quote from pp228-230 of ‘Stravinsky in Conversation with Robert Craft’ in 1958 (published 1962). Penguin Books. Thanks to La Bouscarle for this.

LAB: Arvo Pärt

Everyone who writes serial music thinks that the more complex the structure, the stronger and better it is. But that’s not right: it’s the other way around. Why is Webern’s music so highly regarded by contemporary composers? Because it’s so simple; disciplined and rigorous, but simple. (That isn’t to say that there aren’t also very complex things in his music.) Unfortunately however, composers often think that because they think a lot they have something to say. They don’t realise that they have almost nothing to say. Underneath all this complexity there is only a lack of wisdom and no truth. The truth is very simple; earnest people understand that to be so. Those who are not earnest, or who are utterly mistaken, don’t understand it and they translate their mistakes into their music.

— arvopart.info
— Articles, texts, research materials
— Spike Magazine Interview
— International Arvo Pärt Centre

Music: Für Alina, Salve Regina, My heart is in the highlands

Эти 10 минут заменят все ссылки, очень советую посмотреть.
На 4:30 особенно хорошо рассказывает.

LAB: Sound

Для тех, кто спрашивал, где брать звук для перформанса. Я, конечно, не удержалась и добавила ссылок на science sounds, которые я тоже надеюсь где-нибудь использовать. А sound maps — это гениально, можно послушать пиццерию в Бруклине, полицейскую сирену в Новом Орлеане, китайский квартал в Нью-Йорке, лягушек в парке и еще примерно пару тысяч записей (к некоторым прилагаются фотографии).

Sound Archives
— www.archive.org
— freemusicarchive.org
— British Library Archival Sound Recordings

Nature Sounds
— Animal Sound Archive (Tierstimmenarchiv) of the Humboldt-Universität, Berlin
— Borror Library of Bioacoustics
— California Library of Natural Sounds
— Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s MacCauley Library of Natural Sounds
— FonoZoo (хамелеон очень страшные звуки производит)
— Ocean Conservation Research Sound Library (серого кита послушайте)
— Xeno-Canto bird songs
— Scripps Institute Whale Acoustics Center
— Whale Song
— Fish Sounds of New England
— Listening to Birds
— The sounds of the Cicada swarms of 2004
— Sons de Mar
— Orca Live

Science Sounds
— 90 Degrees South
— Earth Sounds (например, Japan earthquake 2011)
— Radio Sounds from Saturn
— Space Audio
— The Song of Dunes (!)
— Sun Rings / NASA / Terry Riley / Kronos Quartet

Soundscapes
— Acoustic Environments in Change
— Western Soundscape Archive
— World Soundscape Project

Sound Maps
— BBC Save Our Sounds
— Cinco Cidades Soundmap
— Hudson Valley Sound and Story Project
— London Sound Survey
— Mississauga Sound Map
— Montreal Sound Map
— New York Sound Map
— Open Sound New Orleans
— Radio Aporee
— Sounds of New York
— A Sound Walk across California
— Memoryscapes

Periodicals
— Computer Music Journal - Computer Generated Sound
— Interface – The Journal of New Music Research
— Leonardo Music Journal – Aesthetic Issues in Contemporary Music & Sonic Arts

Thx to labouscarle, zivjeti and Patrick K.H.

LAB: 221111

Фотография с занятия в Лаборатории ММСИ. Напоминаю, что все материалы с занятий можно найти по тегу Performance Lab.

Harry Partch
Iconoclastic American composer, musical theorist, philosophic instrument builder, raconteur, hobo, artist
— www.harrypartch.com
— Corporeal
— Instruments
— Harry Partch demonstrates his instruments (video)

Alessandro Bosetti
— www.melgun.net
— Vimeo

Chunky Move
— www.chunkymove.com
— YouTube playlist

+++

XYZT présentation from Adrien Mondot on Vimeo.

LAB: 171111

Gilbert&George
Singing and living sculptures
— Gordon makes us drunk (classic 1930s comedy, отреставрированная версия The GGG Archive, очаровательно)
— Major Exhibition at Tate Modern, London, 2007
— 2007 interview from Independent

Erwin Wurm
One minute sculptures
— www.erwinwurm.at
— Lehmann Maupin Gallery

Luigi Ontani
Saint Sebastian
— MoMA Multimedia

Piero Manzoni
Artist's shit
— www.pieromanzoni.org
— Дерьмо художника

Paisley Smith
— Becoming Mr. Peanut
— Mommy, why does Mr. Peanut sound like Iron Man? And why does he have a Band-Aid on the back of his head?

Bruce Nauman
— Clown Torture

Mike Kelley
— Extracurricular Activity Projective Reconstruction (video)
— OpenSpace

Amir Baradaran
— www.amirbaradaran.com
— Act I: Bodies and Wedding, On Marina Abramovic's The artist is present

Joseph Beuys
The whole question of potential, the possibility that everybody has now to do his own particular kind of art, his own work, for the new social organization. Creativity is national income.
«Как объяснять картины мертвому зайцу»
«Койот: я люблю Америку и Америка любит меня»
— About
— «Внутренняя Монголия»
— Music on Ubuweb
— Articles about Beuys
— 1978 newspaper article «Appeal for an Alternative»

LAB: Programming for Interactive Media

— Max
— Pure Data
— vvvv
— Processing

Processing
— Processing.org
— OpenProcessing, sketches
— Codify — Processing for iPad

— Ben Fry (!)
— Daniel Shiffman (!)
— Casey Reas
— Moritz Stefaner
— Aaron Koblin
— Matt Pearson
— Anthony Mattox
— Marius Watz

Books:
— Getting Started with Processing
— Processing: A Programming Handbook for Visual Designers and Artists
— Learning Processing: A Beginner’s Guide to Programming Images, Animation, and Interaction (!)
— Generative Art

Links:
— Flickr: Processing Group
— Vimeo: videos tagged «processing.org»
— O’Reilly Answers
— Creative Applications: made with processing
— Abandoned Art, generative art ideas and source code by zenbullets.com
— YouTube: hamoid channel, a nice guy from Finland teaching creative programming
— MAKE, a magazine about groundbreaking new DIY technologies, like Arduino microcontrollers and 3D printing

Special thanks to: Oleg Makarov, Patrick K.-H.
Images belong to Christian Bannister (1), thecreators.tv (2), Moritz Stefaner (3), Aaron Koblin (4).
Soundtrack: Alva Noto — Uni Acronym

Все думают, что перформанс — это когда кто-то кого-то режет

Затем Харри вырезала из него сердце, а в зале раздались возгласы «Насилие над женщинами!» — OpenSpace.

Фотография с занятия в Лаборатории 151111. Как видите, пока никого не режу.

Таня Бругера: «Художник не имеет права избегать преисподней»:

Я поступила в аспирантуру уже с опытом и знанием истории кубинского перформанса, а там мне начали промывать мозги. Рассказывали о художниках из Соединенных Штатов 1970-х годов и все такое прочее. Едва упоминали Марину Абрамович. Поэтому я и придумала термин «искусство поведения», а не перформанс, для своих проектов. Американские учебные заведения похожи на армейские лагеря — постоянная муштра. Молодым художникам это сложно критиковать, поскольку они только определенную точку зрения и знают. Поэтому перформанс и превращается в американское искусство, а концептуализм возможен, только если комментируешь более ранние произведения искусства. Конечно, можно и стоит комментировать ранние произведения. Например, сейчас я делаю проект, который основан на работах Дюшана. Посудите сами: я женщина, не с Запада, кубинка — и посмела заляпать руками того, кто на Западе неприкасаем. Так что должен быть способ делать концептуальное искусство и сохранять критический настрой, не уходя полностью в формализм. И последнее: в здешних вузах преподают так, что студенты делают работы для галереи или музея, то есть для узкой публики. А что же делать с нормальной широкой аудиторией? О ней нельзя забывать. Я всегда стараюсь делать проект на доступном уровне. Люди могут его не понять в силу различных причин, например отсутствия политической грамотности. Но точки соприкосновения там всегда есть. Как сахарный тростник в гаванском проекте («Без названия (Гавана)», 2000. — OS) — на Кубе он везде, его все знают.

Soundtrack: Bonobo — Animal Magic