aworks :: "new" american classical music

Early Improvisations (1957). Pauline Oliveros, Terry Riley, and others #oliveros #improv #dry

From a NY Times article on Pauline Oliveros:

A 1957 film-scoring engagement with the composer Terry Riley and Loren Rush, a bassist and koto player, introduced Ms. Oliveros to free improvisation. Invigorated by the experience, the trio experimented further and recorded the results. 

This reminds me of the Keith Jarrett Spirit improvisations which were interesting but ultimately dry. 

Kudos to Steve Smith for linking in his article to the stream on archive.org. The archive.org descritpion may be hyperbolic, though:

These early experiments with aleatoric and improvisatory music serves as a valuable historical record chronicling the emergence of a new musical aesthetic that was to dominate contemporary classical music for much of the latter half of the 20th century, and hints at the type of minimal and chance compositions for which many of the performers would later become famous. As such they should be of great interest and provide considerable enjoyment to any fan or student of 20th century, avant-garde, classical music.

Related articles

The Composer Pauline Oliveros Stays Busy at 80

Time Perspectives (1991). Pauline Oliveros /what harmony is, via john cage/

Alien Bog (1967). Pauline Oliveros /crazygravy/

Crone Music: A Woman Sees How the World Goes with No Eyes (1988). Pauline Oliveros

Music Review: Pauline Oliveros Tribute at Darmstadt Institute

aworks listening log :: pick a related artist and play their most popular track

Crone Music: A Woman Sees How the World Goes with No Eyes (1988). Pauline Oliveros

Cover of Crone Music

Crone Music was a commission by Mabou Mines for a production of Shakespear's King Lear. The track I am listening to is subtle, somber, and interesting.

This is from the Utopia Americana compilation but I need to track down the full Crone CD (Amazon MP3s here).

DRAM:

Pauline Oliveros has developed a unique style of accordion playing through her interest in electronics. The expanded accordion is her concept. Oliveros uses four digital delay processors. During performance each output from the right and left hand is sent separately to a processor which she controls to accomplish layering, pitch bending or modulation. Pitch bending is controlled with foot pedals. The results are sent to two other processors for reverberations which simulate a variety of aural experiences from landscapes and indoor spaces. The second pair of processors and the mixing is controlled by Panaiotis.

Poem of Change (1990). Pauline Oliveros /"is this your wake up call?"/

Image via Wikipedia

Poem of Change is the strangest thing I've heard in awhile. The first listen was bewildering, the second enlightening.

The composer:

A Poem of Change is my text mixed with actual World War II sounds, accordion and vocal sounds.

HurdAudio on the piece:

The calm delivery of the text (that is often whispered) and the sparse drones of the accordion punctuated by the sound of warfare are well matched. This is a rare case where the concrete meaning of the text serves and is served by the abstract qualities of the composition. 

30 second stream on lala:

Alien Bog (1967). Pauline Oliveros /crazygravy/

Pauline Oliveros (via last.fm)

I was considering a post of how lala is great for novelty but for whatever reason, doesn't help find the truly "a" works. Then tonight, it's a stream of Pauline Oliveros'  Alien Bog (via Jeff L's CrazyGravy lala playlist, with some other interesting tracks including Ornette Coleman, some odd Herbie Hancock, John Cage by Stephen Drury, an excellent early Eric Dolphy track etc).

I probably listen to more older electronic music than most, I'm an "aworker" after all, but while I can never make up my mind about say Charles Wuorinen's Time Encomium, these kinds of pieces tend to sound as timbrally dated as you might expect. Alien Bog on the other hand, while clearly early electronica, might be a more substantial work.

Apple Box Double (1965). Pauline Oliveros

The Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York has a festival next month, WOW & FLUTTER - 1961 <->,  featuring the music of the founders of the San Francisco Tape Music Center, including Pauline Oliveros and Morton Subotnick among others.

The composer on her work Apple Box:

...remembering the instruments I made in San Francisco at the end of the '50s and remembering I had a piece called "Apple Box." I had an old apple box I liked and I knew. It was like an old friend as well, because an apple box that has seasoned wood is a very resonant box. I used to amplify the box and put all kinds of things on the box to play: curb scrapers from automobiles, little implements from the kitchen -- anything, small little things -- and then amplify them, do things with them, make sounds.

Apple Box Double was a duet with David Tudor (and will be performed at next month's festival), and Apple Box Orchestra was written for ten apple box players.

Terry Riley premiered his In C in 1964 at the San Francisco Tape Music Center; Steve Reich played his It's Gonna Rain there in 1965.

Disclaimer: The piece is recorded on the ONCE Festival box set of CDs and  I intended to listen to this piece when I recently checked out the set from the university library near work.  However, to my dismay, for the first time in my illustrious career as a library patron, I temporarily misplaced lost the material.  I don't know how the library collection system works but as suitable punishment, maybe they will make me listen to the lesser works of say, Yoko Ono, and then reinstate my borrowing privileges.