Origins of a Form: Acoustical Exploration, Science and Incessancy Author(s): Source: Leonardo Music Journal, Vol. 8, Ghosts and Monsters: Technology and Personality in Contemporary Music (1998), pp. 5-11 Published by: The MIT Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1513391 Accessed: 07/05/2009 02:37

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http://www.jstor.org ARTIST'S ARTICLE Origins of a Form: Acoustical Exploration, Science and Incessancy ABSTRACT JohnCage's use of chance operationscoupled with David Tudor'sconfigurations of found electronicdevices formed a radical Alvin Lucier departureintwentieth-century mu- sic compositionand performance. Inspiredby this collaboration, au- thor-composerLucier, along with composersRobert Ashley, David Behrmanand , formedthe , a live AND DAVID TUDOR ourselves the Sonic Arts Group, electronicmusic ensemble de- but we votedto thepperformance of each On 24 September 1960, I attended a concert by John Cage, Ashley suggested we change other'sworks. The author used sci- ourobut name to Sonic Arts Union be- David Tudor, and Carolyn Brown at La entificexperiments, as well as au- Fenice Theater in Venice. I had come to Venice that summer cause we were not really a group diotest equipment,to compose that or made collabo- worksthat explored the natural on a Fulbright Scholarship to study at the Benedetto improvised rative works. We were like- characteristicsof sound. Along Marcello Conservatory before going on to Rome, where I simply withcertain other in- minded who to- composers, would spend the next 2 years. The Cage-Tudor event came composers got cludingRobert Ashley, Tom to share and like a bolt out of the blue-all the protocols of the concert gether equipment Johnson, and Steve we lived in dif- Reich,who created works in which situation were violated. The concert began, as I remember, perform concerts; ferent of the When simpleprocedures yielded com- with David Tudor striding down the aisle of the theater and parts country. wefirst started the Sonic Arts plexresults, the author helped cre- diving under the , hitting the underside to make the atea newmusical form. Union, Bob and Gordon first sound of the concert. Cage made an appearance playing Ashley Mumma lived in Ann Arbor, a piano that rose up into the pit hydraulically. The four per- David Behrman lived in formers had cards upon which were written instructions re- Michigan, and I was at Brandeis in garding sounds or actions to be made and where to make teaching University Massachusetts. In the moved on them. The entire theater was used-stage, aisles, balconies. Waltham, early 1970s, Ashley to Mills in Mumma the The work was Music Walk with Dancers (1958). During that College Oakland, California, joined Merce Dance in New and I trans- concert a man walked down the aisle and struck the piano Cunningham Company York, ferred to in . with an umbrella and announced: "Now I am a composer!" At Middletown, I was at first and Mumma's attitudes the height of the pandemonium, Cage was tuning a radio surprised by Ashley's toward music Their musical looked neither west that he used as a sound source, and the Pope came on asking making. gaze to nor east to but was rooted in the American for peace on earth. Europe Asia, Midwest. looked and listened the That concert forever altered the way I thought about mu- Ashley at, carefully to, for and which sic. Until that time I had followed the conventional pattern of Michigan landscape images speech patterns, he used in a series of works with his composer-performer-audience relationships. One would speech, including many for television. For in She Was compose a work, wait for some soloist, ensemble or orchestra operas example, a Visitor(1967), for the last of "visitor" was to perform it, then hope that the audience would like it. It spoken chorus, syllable pro- nounced not as is in the more standard was a lonely life; a waiting game. I had studied at Brandeis "er," "or," customary North American vocal In his vocal works he University with the gifted composer Harold Shapero, who, pronunciation. made no to hide the Midwestern he after having composed the stunning Symphonyfor ClassicalOr- attempt twang; instead, it for its musical works were al- chestra(1947), suffered the bitter humiliation of a long hiatus exploited qualities. Ashley's even his acoustical were before another orchestra performed the work and propelled ways theatrical; explorations staged in In Four four men in busi- his career along. It was a lesson to me. It was not until a few imaginative ways. Ways (1967), ness suits and close the lids of attache the years later, when I got back to the United States and worked open cases, altering acoustics of sounds hidden inside them. In The directly with Cage and Tudor, that I fully realized the ramifi- Wolfman a work about feedback-a is cations of their pioneering work. At that time, Tudor was de- (1964), essentially microphone so close to the veloping systems of homemade and consumer electronic de- positioned performer's mouth that changes in the size of the oral about in the vices primarily for realizing the live electronic compositions cavity bring great changes feedback sound-the the of a of John Cage. Devoted to live performance, Tudor would performer projects image or used to scour electronic stores searching for inexpensive compo- nightclub singer political demagogue. Ashley say that music was "about From 1957 to nents, mixers, phonograph cartridges and contact mics, always something." 1964, and Mumma directed the Studio for Elec- which he combined in ingenious ways, creating his own por- Ashley Cooperative tronic Music in Ann table orchestra capable of an immense range of expression. Arbor, Michigan. Behrman and Mumma designed their own equipment rather than relying on the banality of the synthesizer or the THE SONIC ARTS UNION institutional electronic studio, to which they did not have ac- In 1966 I started working with composers more my own age: , David Behrman and Gordon Mumma, with Alvin Lucier (composer, author, teacher), Department of Music, Center for the Arts, whom I formed the Sonic Arts Union. For a few years we called Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT 06457, U.S.A. E-mail: .

? 1999 ISAST LEONARDO MUSIC JOURNAL, Vol. 8, pp. 5-11,1998 5 cess. For Hornpipe (1967), Mumma de- Also called "square waves," pulse waves struck by how much of the acoustic signed what he called a "Cybersonic consist of all the odd-numbered over- space one can hear. Conceiving this Console," a small metal box worn on the tones or harmonics. The nomenclature piece as a quasi-improvised perfor- performer's belt, which consisted of a of these wave forms is derived from the mance work, Behrman allowed ample microphone and eight variable reso- shapes they assume when viewed on an time for the possibilities offered by his nance circuits. As Mumma played oscilloscope-a device consisting of a circuitry to unfold. This time-space, as sounds into the space on his French cathode ray tube and fluorescent screen, well as the repetitive rhythmic figures horn, the microphones would pick up the vertical axis representing the ampli- that dominate the performance, served the room acoustics articulated by the tude (loudness) of the signal, and the to articulate the acoustic characteristics horn sounds, gradually mapping the horizontal, the frequency (pitch). A volt- of the space-they became additional resonances of the space. Gordon had age control amplifier is simply an ampli- components in the work. In Hornpipe designed the circuits to change, depend- fier that can be controlled by an exter- and Runthrough,there were no scores to ing on the sounds and how the space re- nal signal. A ring modulator produces follow; the scores were inherent in the sponded to them-he never explained the sums and differences of two or more circuitry-that was a new idea for me. exactly how they did that. It was as if the frequencies fed into its input, while sup- circuits were alive and had the the It was a capacity pressing original signals. MAKING MUSIC of memory. Sometimes the system would simple device to make; its name is de- WITH FOUND get out of balance and try to balance it- rived from the ring-like arrangement of EQUIPMENT self, hence the prefix "cyber" from cy- its four diodes. Behrman's system was I did not have the inclination to learn bernetics, the science of self-governing designed for a specific work, not as a electronics to the extent that I could de- control systems. At a certain moment in common denominator of what a large sign my own equipment. I had been on the performance, gigantic strands of consumer public wanted. It sounded the constant lookout for existing equip- feedback would sound. That moment better than store-bought synthesizers-it ment I could use for musical purposes. was the turning point in the form of the had the mark of a master craftsman. For my composition, Music for Solo Per- work and took the place of the classical The most exciting possibility that volt- former (1965), for enormously amplified climax in conventional music. For the age control offered the composer was brain waves and percussion, I procured a rest of the piece, Mumma's task was to that virtually every component could be differential amplifier that had enough complicate the mapping circuits, per- used as a sound source and a control sig- gain to pick up and amplify alpha waves haps by overloading them with informa- nal. One of the salient characteristics of through a pair of electrodes applied to tion, until they could no longer func- Runthrough-slow crescendos followed the performer's scalp. A differential am- tion-then the performance was over. by thumps of sound-was generated by plifier is simply a circuit that amplifies In David Behrman's Runthrough ramp waves controlling voltage control the voltage difference between two input (1967-1968), one or two players work amplifiers. A ramp wave, also known as a signals. The output voltage is equal to dials and switches that control various sawtooth wave, rises from zero in ampli- some constant multiple of the difference sound generators and modulators while tude to a pre-determined level, then between the input voltages. For my work two other players shine small flashlights falls abruptly to zero again. When in the North American Time Capsule (1967), I onto photoresistors housed in tin cans, audible range, its timbre (or tone color) used a Sylvania Electronic Systems vo- distributing sounds to four loudspeakers consists of all the overtones above the coder designed for making secure voice deployed around the concert space. A fundamental, decreasing in amplitude communications and efficient transmis- photoresistor is simply a semiconductor as the wave rises in frequency or pitch. sion through narrow bandwidths via tele- that, when illuminated, causes a drop in When tuned below audibility-that is, phone or radio channels over long dis- resistance, allowing the signal to flow too low to be heard as sounds by the hu- tances. A vocoder (voice coder) analyzes unimpeded-as if a dam were suddenly man ear-the sawtooth wave may be and decodes speech sounds into slowly removed in a fast-flowing river. Each re- used as a control voltage, imparting its varying voltages, then synthesizes or en- sistor was routed to an amplifier and shape (envelope) to whatever compo- codes the original speech from the ana- loudspeaker, so the performer could nents it is patched into. Runthroughhad lyzer output. As performers spoke, sang send the sounds from David's equip- an all-over form, similar to Jackson and played musical instruments into an ment to any loudspeaker in any combi- Pollock's action paintings-that is, most unfinished prototype-the vocoder was nation, simply by shining lights on the of the time the listener heard everything still under construction, with wires hang- resistors. The photoresistors acted like there was to hear. There were, however, ing out of it-I de-tuned and physically pan pots or balance controls on stereo abrupt changes in rhythm, texture and removed or dislodged certain compo- amplifiers. Behrman had designed and loudness that could be achieved only by nents, mostly filters, producing the rich built his own configuration of home- the electronic medium. The circuit, am- and garbled result I was looking for [1]. made components, all of which could be plifier and loudspeaker implemented In 1967, I discovered Listening, Incor- found in commercially available synthe- these changes more quickly than could porated, a small company in Arlington, sizers at the time, including sine and a bowed string or blown column of air. Massachusetts, that was engaged in hu- pulse wave oscillators, voltage control (The only other work that matched, and man-to-dolphin communication re- amplifiers and ring modulators. perhaps exceeded, these quick shifts of search. This company was at the time Sine wave oscillators produce pure level was Gordon Mumma's Mesa manufacturing devices called "Sondols" tones-that is, sounds without over- [1966], in which sustained planes of (sonar-dolphin) -battery-operated, tones-similar to those heard by blow- softness and loudness alternate instanta- hand-held pulse wave oscillators that ing across the mouth of a bottle. Pulse neously. It was unprecedented and ex- emitted short clicks whose repetition waves, however, have rich timbres, some- hilarating to experience.) While listen- rate could be manually varied and were what like a clarinet in its lower range. ing to a recording of Runthrough,one is optimal for creating echoes off reflective

6 Lucier,Origins of a Form __

Fig. 1. Crossings(1982), for small orchestra, with slow sweep pure wave oscillator, page 1 of the manuscript score. The diagonal line repre- sents a slowly ascending sine wave sweeping from C at 32.7 cycles per second to F-sharp at 92.5 cycles per second. Whole notes straddling the diagonal denote long tones played by various instruments. Those on the left and right of the diagonal denote the left and right sides of the loudspeaker from which the rising wave flows. Numbers to the left and right of the diagonal are cues in cycles per second for the players to begin and end their sustained tones.

Lucier,Origins of a Form 7 the double basses to the high C (4,186 cycles) in the violins. As the wave rises, the instruments play long tones across the rising wave, creating audible beating patterns that start at the speed of the dif- ference between the pitch of the long tone and that of the rising wave at that moment, slowing down to zero and no beating when unison is reached and speeding up again as the wave rises above the sustained tone. The speed of this ges- ture doubles with each higher octave. The orchestration is determined by the ranges of the instruments-that is, as soon as the rising wave comes into range of a particular instrument, that instru- ment enters; as the wave rises out of range, that instrument exits (Fig. 1). I also created purely acoustical works in which the beating is produced by the combination of two or more musical in- struments. In my work Fideliotrio(1987), for viola, cello and piano, the strings slowly sweep up and down, a semitone Fig. 2. The Queen of the South, sand on aluminum, 1972. A 4-x4-ft square aluminum plate was above and below a central tone, A at 220 laid on the floor and sand was on its surface. One or more sine waves flowed sprinkled cycles per second, while the piano repeats through audio transducers affixed to the underside of the plate, causing the grains of sand that tone at time intervals to to move and form various Due to the of the aluminum, the size and proportional patterns. irregularities the distances between the of the weight of the grains of sand, and the continually changing pitch and loudness of the sound pitch pi- waves, a bird-like figure was formed. (Photograph from video by Carol Reck. ? Carol S. ano tones and those of the sweeping Reck 1998.) strings. The closer the tone of the strings is to the tone of the piano, the farther apart are the repetitions of A on the pi- surfaces. They were designed to be used continually slow down and speed up. If ano, and vice versa. At unison, the piano's by boat owners and the blind. I used one stands midway between the two time intervals are 12 and 13 seconds (the Sondols as musical instruments for Ves- loudspeakers, one can feel the waves distance in cycles between the adjacent pers (1968), in which acoustic orienta- moving across the space as the wave semitones, A flat and B-flat, respectively). tion was accomplished by means of fronts collide [2]. Perhaps the first work At the apex of the sweeps, the pianist re- echolocation: four performers oriented to use sine waves in a spatial way was La peats the A once per second. The piano themselves in the dark, avoiding ob- Monte Young's Drift Study (1964), in part could be considered a code for the stacles by monitoring the echoes that re- which two or more oscillators, routed strings' tunings. The beats in this work turned from the walls, floors and ceil- through amplifiers to loudspeakers, are less vivid; but at the beginning and ings of the performance space. I were allowed to drift in pitch, their ending of the work, when the strings and subsequently used energy efficient pulse waves moving around the room. Test the piano are close in pitch, the results waves-they only have to be on a frac- equipment, particularly sine and pulse sound like an out-of-tune piano. The tion of their cycle time-in my work So- wave oscillators, has provided me with viola and cello act as a fourth and fifth lar Sounder(1979), a sun-powered sound neutral sound sources with which I have string sounding on the piano's A below installation that is still up and running tried to make expressive music. Middle C, in which there are already in the Citizens Bank in Middletown, In the mid-1980s, performers began three strings sounding on the piano when Connecticut. Numerous times, I have asking me for works. In order to maintain the soft pedal is not depressed. used sine wave oscillators for creating the poetry I had tried to achieve in my standing waves and interference pat- earlier electronic compositions, I decided SCIENTIFIC EXPERIMENTS terns (audible beating) between closely to explore the acoustic phenomenon of tuned waves, in performance pieces as audible beating. If two or more closely Scientific experiments have often given well as in sound installations. Because of tuned tones are sounded, audible beats- me ideas for pieces; sometimes I do little their purity, the crests and valleys of bumps of sound that occur when the more than frame them in an artistic con- their waves can be perceived in the same waves coincide-are produced. In several text. For example, in my work The Queen way as one can see the nodes and anti- works I used musical instruments com- of the South (1972), Chladni figures are nodes on a vibrating violin string. The bined with sine waves, whose purity of formed in real time during the perfor- nodal point is where the string is barely sound provided optimal beating with the mance. By bowing or striking solid ob- moving; the antinode is where it is most richer instrumental timbres. For ex- jects that have been sprinkled with iron actively vibrating. For example, in Seesaw ample, in Crossings(1982), for small or- filings or other fine materials, E.F.P. (1983), a sound installation, a slowly chestra, a slowly rising sine wave sweeps Chladni (1756-1827) showed how sweeping oscillator tone crosses a fixed up through the range of the orchestra, sound waves propagate in solid materi- tone, causing the beating patterns to from a low C (32.7 cycles per second) in als. During the duration of the vibra-

8 Lucier,Origins of a Form tion, the solid material would resonate sympathetically and the grains would migrate along the nodal lines of the ob- ject, forming geometric figures. In The Queenof the South, sand, tea, coffee, salt, rice, etc., are strewn on metal, wood, glass or other flat surfaces. As sound from any source causes the surfaces to resonate, the fine materials form pat- terns determined by the frequency and loudness of the sounds and the physical dimensions of the surfaces. Because the surfaces are not exactly symmetrical, the figures that are created are imperfect and asymmetrical, resembling sand dunes, moon craters and other natural geological formations (Fig. 2). Spectacu- lar photographs of these figures can be found in Hans Jenny's book, Cymatics [3]. Most recently The Queenof the South was performed by the Barton Workshop, Fig. 3. Musicfor Pure Waves,Bass Drums and AcousticPendulums, 1980. As a constantly as- sine a Dutch ensemble consisting of violin, cending wave flowed through loudspeakers hidden behind four bass drums, Ping- balls that were in front of the drumheads were caused to bounce cello, double bass, clarinet and trom- Pong suspended away from the heads in or lesser on the resonant characteristics bone. The surfaces used were two greater excursions, depending of each drum. (Photo: Bill Jacobson, Jack Tilton Gallery, New York, 1984) stretched canvases, one white, one black. (Dutch art students were commis- sioned to make them; they came up with The writings of natural philosopher Bass Drums and AcousticPendulums, I sus- Mondrian-like results.) Ground coffee John Tyndall (1820-1893) have given pended Ping-Pong balls in front of and was strewn on the white surface, sugar me ideas for pieces [4]. His experiments touching four upright bass drums, which on the black. Each player's instrument with sound-sensitive flames inspired my are driven by a rising sine wave flowing was miked and its sounds routed piece Tyndall Orchestrations (1976), a from loudspeakers positioned behind through an amplifier to loudspeakers on work in which a gas flame reacts to re- the drums. As the wave rises, it briefly the floor that were facing upward into, corded birdcalls, a female voice, violin, passes through the resonant regions of but not touching, the canvases. After jangling keys or o'ther high-pitched the drums, the drumheads vibrate and some experimentation by the players, a sounds, causing the flame to assume the Ping-Pong balls are sent flying away single resonant frequency was chosen- temporary shapes. I think of the Bunsen from the heads (Fig. 3). Although the low G in the bass clef, within the range burner as a nineteenth-century oscillo- waves are constant and the drums are all of the double bass, cello and trom- scope-instead of a varying electrical of the same size, the resonant regions bone-that forcefully resonated the can- signal being manifested by curves on a are never the same from drum to drum. vases. The clarinet played the G an oc- fluorescent screen, a picture of the It often happens that one or two drums tave above. The violin had to be sound is outlined as the sound waves dis- are inactive, almost unresponsive, until excluded because its range was too high, turb the flame. One can almost imagine well into the wave. All of a sudden, a qui- or it did not have enough power to en- seeing the shape of the bird whose call is escent drum will become active for no able even its low C to cause the canvas to causing the flame to jump. In another apparent reason. As the waves flow resonate. The players were free to sus- version of this work, glass tubes are through the drumheads, the balls are tain long tones on and around the G, placed over the gas flames, producing sent on excursions of various lengths, slightly raising and lowering the pitch, pure tones whose pitches may be slightly depending upon the force of the reso- causing the grains to move in greater altered by regulating the flow of gas and and lesser ways. Closely tuned tones be- raising and lowering one end of the tween instruments created audible beat- tube over the flame. Two or more Fig. 4. Spira Mirabilis, the spiral path of an closely insect as it draws toward a which caused the to tuned tubes vivid light. Drawing ing, grains pulsate produce beating. from Wigglesworth (after van Buddenbroek), at the of the One video Music Pure Bass Drums and speed beating. for Waves, in D'Arcy Thompson, On Growthand Form camera hung above the canvases, an- Acoustic Pendulums (1980) is simply an [6], p. 178. Used by permission. other at a low grazing angle, picking up orchestration of an experiment I discov- the visual activity for viewing by specta- ered in a British college textbook on the tors. In the summer of 1996, Queenof the physics of sound [5]: a pith ball was South was performed in Indonesia with hung by a silk cord against a bell that was four gongs. The struck gong sounds, sounded with a violin bow. The ball was consisting of initial attacks followed by driven away from the bell by the action fairly long decays as the sounds faded to of the sonic vibrations in the bell. The silence, caused the strewn material to experiment was meant to demonstrate move abruptly rather than continuously the presence of sound in a solid object as it did when vibrated by sustained wind when the waves are too faint to be seen and string tones. or felt by touch. In Musicfor Pure Waves,

Lucier,Origins of a Form 9 I ral at 120 cycles per second). Because ' the light tone is more or less pure, au- FOLD 3 dible beating can be heard between it FOLD 2 and the instrument, typically a trom- \x V~~~~~~~~~~~~~~obone. Spira Mirabilis is not in the cat- FOLD I egory of my other works that are actually in some sense experiments, the out- come not exactly known. It is rather a piece aboutsomething scientific, similar to program music. In any event, I was Fig. 5. Martin Gardner, "Three folds gener- happy to create a work for a friend, for a ate an order-3 dragon," from Martin specific occasion. Gardner, Mathematical Magic Show: More Puzzles, Games, Diversions, llusions and Other Mathematical Sleight-of-Mind(New York: TOWARDA NEW FORM Vintage Books, 1977). Used by permission. Several other composers have made works in which a constant unidirectional action yields unexpected and complex nances. It often happens that a ball will results. In James Tenney's work Having fall back to a drumheadjust as that head NeverWritten a Notefor Percussion(1971), is vibrating outwardly; the ball may be a percussionist rolls continuously on a propelled away from the head in ex- gong or other percussion instrument, tremely long excursions, up to 4 or 5 feet making one slow, gradual crescendo and in length. If a ball is caught when the diminuendo. The gong's response, how- drumhead is in an inward mode, it may ever, is not continuous; it steps into dif- be stopped dead. ferent modes of vibration. In 1994, I dedicated a whimsical work, Robert Ashley's work String Quartet 1 Spira Mirabilis, to biologist Spencer Describingthe Motions of LargeReal Bodies Berry, who teaches a popular course on (1972) takes its metaphor from the animal architecture at Wesleyan Univer- pseudo-scientific writings of Immanuel sity, Middletown, Connecticut. In D'Arcy Velikovsky [7]. In several ofVelikovsky's Thompson's textbook on this subject books, including Worldsin Collision,he I came across a of the states that twice in the distant the 2 "- // / [6], drawing spiral past path of an insect as it moves toward then-comet Venus came perilously % .- - light. Since the insect has compound close to Earth, sweeping its fiery tail eyes, it cannot look straight ahead and across the land, causing catastrophes of has to crawl toward the light at a certain Biblical proportions. If it came speed- angle. As it adjusts its path, it draws an ing toward Earth, we would not per- is, one in which ceive it in constant motion; we would 3 1< equiangular spiral-that all of the angles are equal (Fig. 4). Spira only notice it at discrete intervals. The , 1 Mirabilisis for any bass-sustaining instru- same is true for objects in slow motion. ment and electric light (an ordinary In Ashley's Quartet, the players bow floor lamp) illuminating an array of slack strings extremely slowly and con- photoelectric cells which, when lit, acts tinuously-about 10 minutes per bow as a microphone, picking up the 120 length; instead of a continuous tone, ~~/4 %~, 4F7 cycles per second tone (roughly a B, sec- discrete pulses of sound are produced. ond line bass clef). The tone is caused In contrast to the extreme slowness of by a 60-cycle hum, the sound of alternat- the bowing, Ashley routes the string ing current in the United States (it is 50 pulses through one to seven delay ma- cycles in Europe). During the brief per- trixes timed from 5 to 250 milliseconds. formance, the player walks toward the The structure of Tom Johnson's work light in an equiangular pattern-in ten Dragons in A (1979) is taken from a constant angles-imitating an insect. mathematical he found in an old 1 game 5 For each angle, the performer sounds a issue of Scientific American [8]. The long tone whose duration and pitch fol- game uses a simple binary formula best lows a descending Fibonacci series explained for non-mathematicians by (each succeeding number is the sum of folding a piece of paper in half several the two previous ones). Starting on F times, always in the same direction, re- 6. Martin "Geometric Fig. Gardner, (55 above the B), the sus- when method for an order-5 cycles player vealing, partially opened up generating dragon," tains that tone for 55 followed and viewed from the an from Martin Gardner, Mathematical seconds, again side, Magic a for 34 a Show: More Puzzles, Games, Diversions, Illu- by D-sharp seconds, D for 21 asymmetric form resembling the shape sions and OtherMathematical Sleight-of-Mind seconds and so on, until eventually of an imaginary dragon (Fig. 5). Figure (New York: Vintage Books, 1977). Used by reaching unison with the 60-cycle hum, 6 depicts a geometric realization of the permission. the tone of the sounding light (B-natu- same idea. Another way of demonstrat-

10 Lucier,Origins of a Form this is to ls References and Notes Music for Baritone with Slow SweepPure Wave Oscilla- ing phenomenon assign tors Music Tho- and Os to inward and outward re- (1993), Lovely (forthcoming 1998). folds, 1. Alvin Lucier, Reflections/Reflexionen (Cologne, mas Buckner, baritone. Five folds of a of Germany: MusikTexte, 1995) pp. 416-424. spectively. piece paper would thus the Musicfor Instruments,Microphones, Amplifiers yield following pattern: 2. Lucier [1] pp. 484-490. and Loudspeakers(1994), (forthcoming 1, 110, 1101100, 110110011100100, 1998). Wesleyan University Gamelan Ensembles. 3. Hans A. = Switzer- 1101100111001001110110001100100. Jenny, Kymatic Cymatics(Basel, land: Basileus Presse, 1974). Music for Piano with Magnetic Strings (1996), Lovely to Is, and Music (forthcoming 1998). Lois Svard, piano. By assigning upward steps 4. 3rd revised and downward to Os in the John Tyndall, Sound, Ed., steps preceding enlarged(New York: D. Appleton and Company, Musicfor Piano with One or MoreSnare Drums (1992), pattern,Johnson derived a graceful and 1897) pp. 244-271. Lovely Music CD 1020. Hildegard Kleeb, piano. satisfying melody [9]. 5. Edmund Catchpool andJohn Satterly, Textbookof Musicfor Piano with AmplifiedSonorous Vessels (1991), The works mentioned above are as Sound, 7th Ed., revised by H.N.V. Temperley (Lon- Lovely Music CD 1020. Hildegard Kleeb, piano. different from each other as are the don: University Tutorial Press, 1949) p. 2. Music for Pure Waves,Bass Drums and AcousticPendu- composers who created them. In retro- 6. D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson, On Growthand lums (1985), Lovely Music VR 1017. Form (abridged), John Tyler Bonner, ed. (Cam- it is that so often, these Solo Music VR 1014. spect, surprising bridge, U.K: University Press, 1942) p. 178. Musicfor Performer(1965), Lovely composers used scientific, mathematical Enormously amplified brain waves and percussion. 7. Immanuel Velikovsky, Worldsin Collision(Garden or acoustical testing procedures as struc- with Slow Pure WaveOscillators City, New York: Doubleday, 1950). Musicfor Soprano Sweep tural methods. Perhaps the reason was a (1993), Lovely Music (forthcoming 1998). Joan La 8. Martin "Mathematical response to John Cage's use of the Gardner, Games," Scientific Barbara, soprano. American216, No. 4 (April 1967) pp. 116-123. Magic Square, the hexagrams derived Navigations for Strings (1992), live documentation, 9. Melodies Edition Wittener ffir Neue Kammermusik New from the I Ching, the Chinese Book of TomJohnson, Self-Similar (: Tage (Witten 75, 1996) pp. 83-92. Chamber Music Days) 1997, West German Radio, Oracles, and chance operations, which Cologne, Germany (1997). Arditti String Quartet. he employed to achieve a non-subjective of Discography Works by the Author North American Time Capsule (1967), CBS Odyssey music. A similar result was attained 32 16 0258 and Music of Our Time Series by Bird and Person Records, neutral devoid of Dyning (1975), Cramps Records, S 34-60166. Voices and vocoder. using procedures per- Italy. Performer with microphones and electric birdcall. sonal choices or predilections, including "Nothing Is Real (1990)," HyperBeatles 2, Eastworld TOCE 6655. Piano and (Aki exploratory tasks (Gordon Mumma's Chambers (1968), RAS, Revista de Arte Sonoro, (Japan) teapot. Takahashi, piano). Hornpipe),continuous actions of the per- Number 2. Performers with resonant objects. former Panorama (1993), Lovely Music CD 1020. (Roland (Robert Ashley's String Quartet Clocker(1978), Lovely Music LCD 1019. Performer Dahinden, trombone; Hildegard Kleeb, piano.) and James Tenney's piece Having Never with galvanic skin response sensor, digital delay sys- tem and clock. Written a Note for Percussion), or auto- amplified Septetfor ThreeWinds, Four Strings and Pure WaveOs- cillator Music LCD 1018. New World Music LCD 1018. Small or- (1985), Lovely matic systems (TomJohnson's Dragonsin Crossings(1984), Lovely Consort. A). It is ironic that most of these chestra with slow sweep pure wave oscillator (New pieces World Consort). were as Sferics (1980), Lovely Music VR 1017. Electromag- intensely personal, particularly netic disturbances from the ionosphere. far as the were con- The Duke of York(1971), Cramps Records, Italy. performances Voice and synthesizers. (Alvin Lucier, voice). SilverStreetcarfor the Orchestra(1988), Algen CD 120, cerned. The neutrality of these struc- Berlin. CD Amplified triangle. (Rainer Romer, triangle). tures seemed only to place the per- Fragmentsfor Strings (1961), Disques Montaigne 782010. Arditti String Quartet. Sound on Music VR 1017. former, and therefore the listener, more Paper (1985), Lovely IAm in a Room Source Record #3. in the human situation in which Sitting (1970), Still and MovingLines of Silencein Familiesof Hyperbolas, firmly Alvin Lucier, voice. most found themselves in that Part II, Numbers1-4 (1983), Lovely Music VR 1015. people Voice, clarinet, flute, horn and pure wave oscillators. world. Most I Am Sitting in a Room (1970), Lovely Music LCD burgeoning technological 1013. Alvin Lucier, voice. of the works share a common Still and Moving Lines of Silencein Familiesof Hyperbo- composi- Part Numbers5-8 Music VR In Music LCD las, II, (1983), Lovely tional an action or MemoriamJonHiggins (1985), Lovely 1016. Mallet instruments and wave oscillators. principle: process, 1018. pure set into motion and sustained through- Theme (1994), Lovely Music (forthcoming 1998). Thomas Ridenour, for clarinet in A with slow sweep out the course of the work, produces un- Four readers with amplified sonorous vessels. pure wave oscillator. expected and complex results. These (Jacqueline Humbert,Joan La Barbara, Sam Ashley, In Memoriam Thomas Buckner, readers). and other similar works, including Steve Jon Higgins (1985), Timescraper Records EWR 9608. Jurg Frey, clarinet. Reich's Come Out (1966) and my own Vespers(1969), Mainstream MS/5010. Acoustic ori- Indian Summer What Next? AC- entation by means of echolocation. work I Am Sitting in a Room (1970), both (1993), Recordings, DC-VC,Non Sequitor.Jeffrey Krieger,electronic cello. of which to turn ev- Wind Shadows (1994), Lovely Music CD 1020. Solo employ repetition trombone with tuned wave oscillators. into are Music on a Long Thin Wire(1977), Lovely Music LCD closely pure eryday speech music, perhaps 1011. (, trombone). closer in spirit to alchemy, whose pur- "Music for Assorted Percussion and pose was to transform base metals into Alpha Waves, Automated Coded Relays (1980)," ImaginaryLand- pure gold. scapes,Elektra/Nonesuch 9 79235-2. Manuscript received 27January 1998.

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