Stockhausen's Spaceship

[Mandryka]

Awesome. Keep'em coming .. there is so much territory to cover.

Yes, seconded - much appreciated.

[Uatu]

OK you got it!

Opus 25 - KURZWELLEN
("Shortwaves")
For tam-tam (gong) with microphonist, viola (with contact mic), electronium, piano, 4 shortwave radios and sound mixer

http://stockhausenspace.blogspot.com/2014/10/opus-25-kurzwellen.html

Basically structured electroacoustic free improvisations triggered by shortwave radio interference - hardcore stuff from the psychedelic late 60s!

[Uatu]

From a personal standpoint, of course improvised music could never match the best written stuff in the result dept., but it's cool that KS explored these avenues and mixed things up a little.

Yes, I agree, I kind of wish Stockhausen had made a new "realization" for these semi-improvised works and scored everything out exactly.  He did that for MIXTUR, which resulted in MIXTUR 2003, which sounds more focused than the original, which had several sections where players had free choice of certain pitches and rhythms.  I think I read somewhere that while scoring Momente he was getting tired of writing out all these trombone parts, and so did these "symbolic" scores.  But then maybe he became disillusioned with the results and that's why he wrote MANTRA, which is totally scored.  Just my theory.

[Uatu]

Final part of Karlheinz Stockhausen's opera Thursday from LIGHT: MICHAEL'S HOMECOMING. A very rich and layered choral work with instrumental soloists, as well as a tap-dancing, trombone-playing, toreador-garbed devil-dragon.

MICHAELs HEIMKEHR

http://stockhausenspace.blogspot.com/2014/10/opus-50-michaels-heimkehr.html

[Uatu]

ORCHESTER-FINALISTEN, MITTWOCHS-ABSCHIED, LICHT-RUF

http://stockhausenspace.blogspot.com/2014/10/orchester-finalisten-mittwochs-abschied.html

LICHT-RUF would make a great ring-tone.  Not much more to add there, it's a nice, brief Signal to LIGHT.

ORCHESTER-FINALISTEN is a great collection of instrumental solos with a very rich and organic musique concrete background tape.  It contains all of Stockhausen's favorite playing techniques as well as some pretty typically absurd moments, such as the mummy with the Chinese gong (I wonder if there's a subtext there or if it just came to him in a dream?).

The tape portion, MITTWOCHS-ABSCHIED is just as enjoyable separate from Orchestra Finalists as with, maybe even more so.  Stockhausen managed to juxtapose some disparate elements which could never (or at least rarely, depending on how often elephants dive into swimming pools) occur in real life.  In any case, ORCHESTER-FINALISTEN was one of those scenes which had a reputation for being "unperformable" due to the score requirement of having the soloists fly around over the sea and in the sky.  The only production so far by the Birmingham Opera Company is a valiant effort, but I'm looking forward to the future where hopefully anti-gravity belts will be available for the soloists to use.

[Uatu]

Back from a trip to Istanbul - lots of great music there.  Wrote a primer about Turkish music on my blog (http://stockhausenspace.blogspot.com/p/traditional-music-of-turkey.html).  But now back to KS:


MUSIK IM BAUCH (& TIERKREIS)
Stockhausen's cosmic jazz standards, with and without giant birdman.

     Despite the fact that the 12 zodiac melodies are composed using unique and meticulous theoretical concepts, they still "swing".  They basically come across as ethnic folk melodies from outer space (Sirius, if one needs to be specific!).  Upon first listening they all seem to have a similar "style", but after awhile one realizes this is Stockhausen's "book" of cosmic "jazz standards", and each one reveals it's own story.  "Music in the Belly" is enjoyable as a listen, but I believe the visual aspect is really necessary to fully appreciate it.  However is still a fascinating composition in multiple layers of metal and wood percussion, with lots of elements of surprise, tension and fun.

[Mirror Image]

Copy-and-paste, copy-and-paste, copy-and-paste....

[Uatu]

Stockhausen's sci-fi opera (the first one!).  This is a really hard piece to immediately dig, but once I figured out what the heck was going on I really admired the amazing structure.  This is a big basket of ideas.

SIRIUS

http://stockhausenspace.blogspot.com/2014/11/opus-43-sirius.html



     SIRIUS was a very difficult listen the first time I ever heard it - in fact I didn't really like it much for years.  The electronic music timbres generated by the EMS Synthi 100 are somewhat colder and less "classic" than those in favorite works like KONTAKTE or TELEMUSIK, and the melodic material of the soloists sounded a bit unfocused and basically all over the place - however this was before I had heard the 12 TIERKREIS melodies.  After absorbing the 12 zodiac melodies (which in my opinion is almost a necessary prerequisite to fully appreciating SIRIUS) the crystalline beauty of SIRIUS's 7-layer polyphony revealed itself.
   
     Stockhausen packed alot of concepts and techniques into this work, many stemming from his experiments in melodic pitch compression/expansion (MANTRA), extreme melody to pitch tempo manipulations (KONTAKTE) and timbre sequence melodies (INORI).  All of this material is embedded in a science fiction cantata sung/spoken in oddly-mannered English (with brief passages in German and a brief bit of Italian).  Some people have compared SIRIUS to the work of Sun Ra, another composer with a "cosmic backstory", but SIRIUS has a very rigorously structured musical fabric, and is not connected to jazz improvisation at all.

     After analyzing the work, SIRIUS has personally become much more enjoyable (though there were definitely moments during my research where I was a bit frustrated and wondering where this was going).  In order to learn to differentiate all the moving parts of SIRIUS, it's very helpful to listen to the soloist's versions of ARIES, LIBRA and CAPRICORN ("additional works generated"), since there are only up to 4 layers in those works and it's much easier to follow the melodic manipulations.  It is also possible to obtain the electronic music of SIRIUS by itself - though the CD is a bit expensive.  In any case, SIRIUS may seem cacophonous on first listen (and maybe even the first 5 listens..10 listens?), but once one learns the "language" of SIRIUS, the work truly shines as one of Stockhausen's most ambitious and well-structured works.  However, I'm still not exactly in love with the timbres of the Synthi 100, so perhaps one day a new realization of the electronic music based on Stockhausen's version using a modern granular synth would make the work even better.

[Uatu]

Very cool. 

I had the Zodiac melodies well embedded into my consciousness prior to hearing Sirius, so on first hearing it, I got it .. and I loved how those melodies are heard everywhere within the music. The work is simply amazing from a polyphonic point of view .. 

I just ordered the MODE DVD ..  will report back once I actually receive it and check it out.

[asin]B00MQSCJJE[/asin]

You're lucky James that you already knew TIERKREIS!  It's basically a TIERKREIS cantata.  The first time I heard it the experience was like reading Moby Dick in Chinese (which I can't read).  The thing with Stockhausen I find is that the language he uses in his music is not very traditional (to say the least).  Anybody can appreciate Beethoven or Bach, since diatonic harmony is hitting us all the time from the radio/internet/TV, but if you don't have familiarity with world national anthems then HYMNEN doesn't seem all that focused.  And if you don't know TIERKREIS then SIRIUS sounds like cacophony. 

[Uatu]

I don't know .. you think knowing those simple tunes prior is necessary? I mean they are pretty self-evident on their own (he used them a lot throughout his career), and he goes to town with them creatively in this work, you can hear them clearly, even within the electronic score, and the work breathes a lot .. I never really perceived or heard this work in the way you do. It is very musical .. and it is a operatic, theatrical work ..  and no doubt 'seeing it' performed, and with the proper sound diffusion would clarify what is going on. This is another one perfectly suited for video production.  Same would apply with your earlier entry Music in the Belly.

And I own the discs of the seasonal electronic music .. and the 3 child works Aries, Libra & Capricorn. I've listened to all of this stuff innumerable times. The whole affair is a total pre-cursor to LICHT. And if one is familiar with the 2nd Viennese School, Electronics, Polyphonic music  .. it shouldn't be that hard going. I can even picture fans of jazz, electronic music, and more unconventional pop music, as well as trumpet, clarinet players, and singers finding interest/value in it or liking it. Heck, perhaps even science fiction oriented folks may like things about it too.

Everything you say above makes perfect sense - yet even as a well-seasoned Stockhausen/Contempo-Class. fan  and jazz musician I disliked SIRIUS.  For years.  And I've had multiple conversations with other well-informed musicians trying to explain why they should give SIRIUS a 2nd chance.  I think the problem is that the CD starts out with this scifi "Presentation" which has text and sounds very much of its time, and then Cancer suddenly starts with a somewhat jarring and extremely dense polyphonic web which goes on for quite awhile before the melodies become more palatable (at least on first listen). 

Also when SIRIUS came out it was very hard to find the record of MUSIK IM BAUCH and nobody had really heard the TIERKREIS melodies in their pure form.  It was only later that all the versions became available. 

I wonder if the Winter version was the one recorded than it would be easier since I think that one starts more simply and then ramps up. 

So in my opinion you are very lucky to appreciate SIRIUS from the get-go!

[Uatu]

Yea maybe .. I mean it is a work that has a lot of mileage too. But its overall vibe is light & fun imo. I found some of his earlier work harder to get because it is was a lot more emotionally abstract, irregular, aperiodic .. Sirius, like a lot of the melody-compositions .. is full of more conventional & catchy melody and harmony imo. And like his theatrical works there are characters & narrative. And timbre-wise each part has its very distinct sound (the quartet .. trumpet, bass clarinet, soprano, bass, and the clean octophonic electronic score) .. so .. makes things easy to hear & follow even at its most complex contrapuntally/dynamically (central section), very chamber like ..

Ah I see what you mean.  Yes, I grew up on the abstract stuff and so I (and my other friends at that time) felt that the melodiousness of SIRIUS was a kind of "watering down" of the hardcore abstraction that went on in the decades before.  Now I'm much more accepting of acoustic melodies, but some people I know still prefer strictly "sound effects" type electronic music.

[chadfeldheimer]

However, I'm still not exactly in love with the timbres of the Synthi 100, so perhaps one day a new realization of the electronic music based on Stockhausen's version using a modern granular synth would make the work even better.

At first I also had problems with the timbres of the analog Synthesizer in Sirius, but those timbres for me got richer and deeper with every listen. Now I prefer them to the digitally produced sounds Stockhausen later used e.g. in Oktophonie, which is still a great work though. 

[Uatu]

At first I also had problems with the timbres of the analog Synthesizer in Sirius, but those timbres for me got richer and deeper with every listen. Now I prefer them to the digitally produced sounds Stockhausen later used e.g. in Oktophonie, which is still a great work though.

Actually the score to Oktophonie has a diagram which includes the Synthi 100 (the synth for Sirius) in the signal chain.  I assume he probably mixed that with some other effects.  Initially I wasn't a fan of the timbres used for either piece, but after a  studied Oktophonie for a long time (http://stockhausenspace.blogspot.com/2014/05/opus-61-invasion-explosion-mit-abschied.html) I got used to them..and now I think I'm getting used to the Sirius timbres.  Which just goes to show that some sounds get better with age.  I think?

[Uatu]

Registration is now open for the 2015 Stockhausen Courses in Kuerten Germany (near Cologne).  9 days of concerts and masterclasses by Stockhausen performers July 11-19.

http://www.stockhausen-verlag.net/

[chadfeldheimer]

Actually the score to Oktophonie has a diagram which includes the Synthi 100 (the synth for Sirius) in the signal chain.  I assume he probably mixed that with some other effects.

Oh - I didn't know that. Maybe the following probably digital sound processing makes the timbres sound more icy and for me a bit more one-dimensional. I probably get used to it too after a few more spins. Do you know the  Stockhausen CD49 "ELECTRONIC MUSIC with SOUND SCENES of FRIDAY from LIGHT"? If yes - what do you think of it? I'm thinking about purchasing it. Like "Oktophonie" it may be is not as much a free standing work as say "Hymnen", but this does "Oktophonie"not prevent from being great (with slight deductions due to the used sounds/timbres).

[chadfeldheimer]

Oktophonie is a masterwork, and it is it's textural/polyphonic aspects and use of octophonic-projection that are really the highlights/triumphs .. all of the CDs of the purely electronic scores from LICHT sound really exceptional on disc. Strongest recommendations. CD49 is killer. CD66 is also enjoyable.

Thanks for the recommendations. I listened to parts of CD49 via youtube. It seems to be a more quiet, ambient-like work than Oktophonie with very long arcs of suspends. But there seem to be many details going on beneath the surface. Like with Oktophonie I have slight problems with the timbres used. I'm just a sucker for the analog timbres of his early electro-acustic masterpieces (Gesang .., Kontakte, Telemusik, Hymnen)

[Uatu]

I actually don't have CD49.  Since I already had CD50, the complete opera, I didn't really need it, since 49 is just the electronic music in between the live  parts.  I would get CD 50 if I were you, but it's of course more expensive...  As far as the sounds of CD49, it's almost all manipulated (ring modulated) samples of musique concrete sounds.  They come in layers, up to 12 I think.  It's pretty different than the tape-based electronic music and also different from synth tones in Sirius and Oktophonie.   

Stockhausen used these sounds in a film soundtrack for the Quay Brothers which is pretty cool. 
In Absentia:
http://vimeo.com/43784860

[Uatu]

Thanks for the recommendations. I listened to parts of CD49 via youtube. It seems to be a more quiet, ambient-like work than Oktophonie with very long arcs of suspends. But there seem to be many details going on beneath the surface. Like with Oktophonie I have slight problems with the timbres used. I'm just a sucker for the analog timbres of his early electro-acustic masterpieces (Gesang .., Kontakte, Telemusik, Hymnen)

Yeah, I'm with you there.  Those early pieces are just raw and super-spikey.  The later stuff is definitely more droney and ambient-like.  But variety is the spice of life and all that!

[chadfeldheimer]

I actually don't have CD49.  Since I already had CD50, the complete opera, I didn't really need it, since 49 is just the electronic music in between the live  parts.  I would get CD 50 if I were you, but it's of course more expensive.

Yes - but I still have some aesthetical problems with some aspects of Stockhausens Licht-operas (Text's, plot and also some musical ones). Also a few years ago I already rent CD50 from the public library and was mostly impressed by the electronic music.

..  As far as the sounds of CD49, it's almost all manipulated (ring modulated) samples of musique concrete sounds.  They come in layers, up to 12 I think.  It's pretty different than the tape-based electronic music and also different from synth tones in Sirius and Oktophonie.   

I see, but there are also some synth-sounds in it, as you can see in the end credits of the film you linked (Thanks for that ). Just saw the film, which is indeed pretty cool with it's Eraserhead meets 20s expressionism feel. The music fits in pretty good as well and adds to the harrowing atmosphere. I would love to see more films using his music.

Yeah, I'm with you there.  Those early pieces are just raw and super-spikey.  The later stuff is definitely more droney and ambient-like.  But variety is the spice of life and all that!

That's true.

[ritter]

Yes - but I still have some aesthetical problems with some aspects of Stockhausens Licht-operas (Text's, plot and also some musical ones). Also a few years ago I already rent CD50 from the public library and was mostly impressed by the electronic music.

I sympathise with that, Chad. I think I've said so before; after being very impressed with Donnerstag and Samstag, I found Montag to be a significant letdown...tedious and, at points, silly (verging on the ridiculous)...I should, after a hiatus of about a year, move on to the next installment, though...