In Search of a Concrete MusicPierre Schaeffer’s In Search of a Concrete Music (À la recherche d’une musique concrète) has long been considered a classic text in electroacoustic music and sound recording. Now Schaeffer’s pioneering work—at once a journal of his experiments in sound composition and a treatise on the raison d’être of “concrete music”—is available for the first time in English translation. Schaeffer’s theories have had a profound influence on composers working with technology. However, they extend beyond the confines of the studio and are applicable to many areas of contemporary musical thought, such as defining an ‘instrument’ and classifying sounds. Schaeffer has also become increasingly relevant to DJs and hip-hop producers as well as sound-based media artists. This unique book is essential for anyone interested in contemporary musicology or media history. |
Contents
Chapter | 5 |
Chapter | 11 |
Captions enclosed in brackets beneath the figures in the text have been supplied from the following list which was included at the end of the French e... | 17 |
Serial structures of the Etude aux chemins de fer 2627 | 27 |
Recording spiral symbolic representation | 32 |
Example of total transposition Suite 14 | 35 |
Distortion of an initial form | 40 |
Transformation of an initial form | 41 |
First experimental score for concrete music Musique sans titre | 75 |
The Concrete Approach | 113 |
The Experimental Method | 123 |
The Musical Object | 131 |
From the Object to Language | 147 |
From the Object to the Subject | 157 |
Inventory | 167 |
Farewells to Concrete Music | 184 |
Analysis of the first sequence of Prosopopée I | 46 |
Initial element of a fragment of Concerto des ambiguïtés | 71 |
Symbolic reduction of bar 1 of Prosopopée I | 73 |
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Common terms and phrases
abstract acoustics aesthetic April attack Bach characterology classical music closed groove color complex note complex sound composed concept concrete music criteria decay defined dodecaphonic dominant duration dynamic plane effect elements example experiment experimental expression FIGURE fragments give harmonic homme seul human idea imagine initial instruments John Cage language listening longer machines manipulations matter and form Maurice Le Roux means melody ment monophony musical object musical sound musicians Musique Musique Concrète noise notation ondes Martenot orchestra Orphée painting parameters percussion performance Pierre Henry pitch plane of tessituras planes of reference poetry polyphony precisely prepared piano problem Prosopopée pseudoinstruments pure sound record relationship reverberation rhythm rhythmic Schaeffer's Schönberg score seashell sense sequence sound material sound object sound phenomenon spectrum Stravinsky strings structures Symphonie technique tessitura theme theory thing three planes timbre tion turntables variations vibrating violin voice words