Concrete PH

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Philips Pavilion, Brussels 1958

Concret PH (1958) is a tape composition by Iannis Xenakis , created for the Philips Pavilion at the 1958 World Exhibition in Brussels . - This “ Poème électronique ”, a total work of art made up of architecture, light, film and music, was developed by Le Corbusier , Edgar Varèse composed the tape music for it, and Xenakis was commissioned with the realization as an assistant to Le Corbusier's architectural office. In the approximately eight-minute, automatically running show, the music played from hundreds of spatially arranged speakers in front of around 500 spectators. For the time in between, when the audience left the building and new viewers came in, Xenakis composed Concret PH with a duration of two and a half minutes.

Emergence

The title alludes to the building material and some of the musical and architectural foundations: “Concret” is the English word for prestressed concrete ; " Musique concrète " was introduced by Pierre Schaeffer as a term for electroacoustic music based on recorded original sounds. "PH" is an abbreviation for hyperbolic paraboloids , which formed the mathematical basis for the tent-like construction of the building.

A studio was available for Edgar Varèse at Philips in Eindhoven, in which he could experiment with the sounds and spatial arrangement of loudspeakers. Xenakis was not allowed in here and realized Concret PH in Pierre Schaeffer's studio Groupe de recherches musicales in Paris.

Material and workmanship

“Start with a sound made up of many particles, then see how you can make it change imperceptibly, growing and developing, until an entirely new sound results ... This was in defiance of the usual manner of working with concrete sounds. Most of the musique concrète which had been produced up to the time of Concret PH is full of many abrupt changes and juxtaposed sections without transitions. This happened because the original recorded sounds used by the composers consisted of a block of one kind of sound, then a block of another, and did not extend beyond this. I seek extremely rich sound (many high overtones) that have a long duration, yet with much internal change and variety. So, I explore the realm of extremely faint sounds highly amplified. There is usually no electronic alteration of the original sound, since an operation such as filtering diminishes the richness. "

“Start with a sound made up of many particles, then let it inaudibly change, grow and develop until a completely new sound comes out… This approach was a defiant reaction to the usual way of working with concrete sounds. Most of the musique concrète produced up to Concret PH is full of abrupt changes and contrasting parts without transitions. This came about because the original recordings used consisted of a block of one type of sound, then a block of another, and did not point beyond. I am looking for extremely rich sounds - many high overtones that last, but with constant change and tonal variety. In addition, I research the area of ​​extremely soft sounds that I amplify. I normally don't make any electronic changes to the original sound, because a process like filtering reduces the richness of the sound. "

- Xenakis in the program booklet and in the text accompanying the Nonesuch recording H-71246

Xenakis used the cracking noises of burning charcoal as the only sound source . The tapes with these recordings were cut into short fragments of about one second, which were then played , layered and mixed at different speeds . It emerged granular textures from which Xenakis mounted the work. He worked purely intuitively, not on the basis of mathematical formulas and processes.

The use of a single basic sound, the origin of which is not immediately identifiable, but which captivates with its overtone-rich, clearly metallic character and its uninterrupted, lively, almost organic clinking movement, contributes greatly to the intense effect of the composition. After almost a third of the course, another layer is clearly audible, which is also based on the initial sound material, but shifts it to a lower pitch range. This finally seems to ebb gradually, until a third layer is added in the last half minute, again created from the same sounds, but again deeper.

Unusual for such an atmospheric composition, but understandable from the history of its creation, the music fades out after just two and a half minutes and leaves the idea that it would go on forever underground.

effect

The original multi-track tape was played in the Philips Pavilion using an 11-channel system over 425 loudspeakers. Xenakis described the effect as "lines of sound moving on complex paths from point to point in space, like needles poking out from everywhere."

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ here quoted from Curtis Roads, Microsound (2004), ISBN 978-0-26268-154-4 , p. 64f
  2. ^ Curtis Roads, Microsound (2004), ISBN 978-0-26268-154-4 , pp. 64f.
  3. ^ Lewis Rowell, Thinking About Music: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Music , (1985), ISBN 978-0-87023-461-3 , p. 241.

literature

  • Agostino di Scipio: Compositional Models in Xenakis's Electroacoustic Music , in: Perspectives of New Music 36, No. 2 (1998), pp. 201-243.
  • Katharine Norman Sounding Art: Eight Literary Excursions Through Electronic Music , 2004, ISBN 978-075460-426-6 , pp. 22-25.