perhaps a phenomenology of discursive practices as well as electronic mus…
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In a message dated 5/5/2008 6:54:15 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
zeug at an-archos.com writes:
On 05/05/2008, at 1:30 PM, michaelP wrote:
> If we
> concentrated on recorded musics, then virtually all music (as
> consumed)
> would be electronic: is this the way we need to think the
> ‘electronic’ and
> the ‘music’ of ‘electronic music’?
Hi MichaelP,
so yes, shall we start with a basic definition?
Broadly speaking electronic music is defined in terms of either the
use of electrically generated sound in performance (apart from merely
amplification) or the use of electronics in composition. A microphone
and an amplifier can be a performance instrument for instance and an
example would be Robert Ashley’s feedback work ‘Wolfman’, but just
using a mic for vocal or instrument amplification isn’t electronic
music. Hendrix feedback guitar is electronic performance … and what
of the difference between Dylan’s acoustic folk and The Band? Well
yes, you could argue the latter was electronic in the widest sense.
Kraftwerk is a no brainer, of course they’re electronic musicians but
also try unplugging Motley Crue’s Mick Mars from his FX rack and see
what happens. As a general rule of thumb ask yourself the question:
If you take electricity out of the equation what do you have left? Is
it music or just tinnitus ringing in your ears?
Synthesis is of course electronic but so is electroacoustic sampling
whether that’s Cage using custom sine wave recordings on variable
speed phonographs in 1939, tape compositions in the 50’s and 60’s or
today’s multi-track digital audio compositions. But just recording to
disc/tape/HDD isn’t a compositional device so no, a SACD of the
London Philharmonic isn’t electronic music, unless they’re using an
Ondes Martenot for Messiaen’s Turangalila Symphonie … in which case
yes it has an electronic music component in both the performance and
composition. The Beatles Lonely Hearts Club used both 4 track tape
composition methods and electronic effects to realize an electronic
work, but using EQ, delay for ‘wetness’ and compression and
multitracking a version of a live performance isn’t ‘electronic music’.
In its widest sense you could also define electronic music in terms
of its basic concepts which go back to Helmholtz’ mid 19th C treatise
on acoustics and musical tone which influenced generations of
musicians well before electrical technology was mature enough to
support electronic instrumentation. I love the futurist Russolo’s
Intonarumori, mechanical noise contraptions he used to demonstrate
his modernist concept of ‘noise’ as music, Ferruccio Busoni’s vision
of an electric music future, Schoenberg and Webern’s mathematical
approach to composition which was a natural fit for the calculability
available to later electronic musicians … and so on. Today it’s
second nature for electronic musicians, especially those with a
scientific background, to think of music in terms of frequency,
amplitude and envelope as also with todays lap top kids who don’t
think twice about the fourier waveform dancing in their EQ GUI.
There’s no strictly followed definition though, just various
discursive ways of approaching what is nonetheless strictly a
technologically modern phenomenon.
Cheers,
Malcolm
Lads: A phenomenon is not necessarilly aletheia. Today I was visited by a
flute player whose playing held me in quiet ecstacy for an hour and giving some
relief from the auditory babble above mentioned to which we are collectively
exposed by an irresponsible media.
Sincerely;
Bernard
