Xenakis Matters

Xenakis Matters PDF Author: Sharon E. Kanach
Publisher: Iannis Xenakis
ISBN: 9781576472385
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 443

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Book Description
Countering Leonardo da Vinci's notorious statement that "Art is never finished, only abandoned," this volume rather subscribes to sculptor Ibram Lassaw's formula that "Artworks are never finished, only begun." Through knowledge and imagination, the thirty scholars, artists, musicians, architects, musicologists, philosophers, and art historians collected here are living proof that what was pioneered by (and thus mattered to) Xenakis still represents fertile ground for current and future exploration, experimentation, and creation. Curated from the ambitious public programming around the Iannis Xenakis: Composer, Architect, Visionary exhibition's tour in North America in 2010-11-as the cornerstone of worldwide tributes remembering the tenth anniversary of his death-this volume attests to the fact that yes, Xenakis Matters. Following a Preface by Kanach, who collaborated closely with Xenakis from the late 1970s until his death in 2001, the book begins with a previously unpublished Conversation between David Rosenboom and the composer. The book is then divided into three main chapters: Contexts (where Xenakis' history and place not only in North American culture is refreshed), Processes (where specific works or techniques from his oeuvre are approached in novel ways), and Applications (where ten practicing artists describe their respective indebtedness to his example and their resulting creative expressions). An appendix of the public events around the exhibition's North American tour is included.

Xenakis Matters

Xenakis Matters PDF Author: Sharon E. Kanach
Publisher: Iannis Xenakis
ISBN: 9781576472385
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 443

Get Book Here

Book Description
Countering Leonardo da Vinci's notorious statement that "Art is never finished, only abandoned," this volume rather subscribes to sculptor Ibram Lassaw's formula that "Artworks are never finished, only begun." Through knowledge and imagination, the thirty scholars, artists, musicians, architects, musicologists, philosophers, and art historians collected here are living proof that what was pioneered by (and thus mattered to) Xenakis still represents fertile ground for current and future exploration, experimentation, and creation. Curated from the ambitious public programming around the Iannis Xenakis: Composer, Architect, Visionary exhibition's tour in North America in 2010-11-as the cornerstone of worldwide tributes remembering the tenth anniversary of his death-this volume attests to the fact that yes, Xenakis Matters. Following a Preface by Kanach, who collaborated closely with Xenakis from the late 1970s until his death in 2001, the book begins with a previously unpublished Conversation between David Rosenboom and the composer. The book is then divided into three main chapters: Contexts (where Xenakis' history and place not only in North American culture is refreshed), Processes (where specific works or techniques from his oeuvre are approached in novel ways), and Applications (where ten practicing artists describe their respective indebtedness to his example and their resulting creative expressions). An appendix of the public events around the exhibition's North American tour is included.

Xenakis

Xenakis PDF Author: James Harley
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135874948
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
Xenakis: His Life in Music is a full-length study of the influential contemporary composer Iannis Xenakis. Following the trajectory of Xenakis’s compositional development, James Harley, who studied with Xenakis, presents the works together with clear explanations of the technical and conceptual innovations that shaped them. Harley examines the relationship between the composer and two early influences: Messiaen and Le Corbusier. Particular attention is paid to analyzing works which were vital to the composer’s creative development, from early, unpublished works to the breakthrough pieces Metastasis and Pithoprakta, through the oft-discussed decade of formalization and the evolving styles of the succeeding three decades.

Xenakis Creates in Architecture and Music

Xenakis Creates in Architecture and Music PDF Author: Roger Reynolds
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000468119
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
• Describes the creative energy of two highly respected 20th century artists, Iannis Xenakis both as engineer and composer, and Roger Reynolds, Pulitzer prize winning musician in 1989 • Will appeal to the professional sector of musicians and architects, and students in both of these disciplines • Connects the creative path of architecture and music, i.e., Xenakis’ treatment of “light” in an architectural context parallels his use of varying textural density in his music. • Analyzes chamber works Achorripsis, Thallein, and his string quartet, Tetras, which pertain to the interactive house design

Theatre in the Dark

Theatre in the Dark PDF Author: Adam Alston
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1474251196
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
Theatre in the Dark: Shadow, Gloom and Blackout in Contemporary Theatre responds to a rising tide of experimentation in theatre practice that eliminates or obscures light. It brings together leading and emerging practitioners and researchers in a volume dedicated to exploring the phenomenon and showcasing a range of possible critical and theoretical approaches. This book considers the aesthetics and phenomenology of dark, gloomy and shadow-strewn theatre performances, as well as the historical and cultural significances of darkness, shadow and the night in theatre and performance contexts. It is concerned as much with the experiences elicited by darkness and obscured or diminished lighting as it is with the conditions that define, frame and at times re-shape what each might 'mean' and 'do'. Contributors provide surveys of relevant practice, interviews with practitioners, theoretical reflections and close critical analyses of work by key innovators in the aesthetics of light, shadow and darkness. The book has a particular focus on the work of contemporary theatre makers – including Sound&Fury, David Rosenberg and Glen Neath, Lundahl & Seitl, Extant, and Analogue – and seeks to deepen the engagement of theatre and performance studies with what might be called 'the sensory turn'. Theatre in the Dark explores ground-breaking areas that will appeal to researchers, practitioners and audiences alike.

Exploring Xenakis: Performance, Practice, Philosophy

Exploring Xenakis: Performance, Practice, Philosophy PDF Author: Alfia Nakipbekova
Publisher: Vernon Press
ISBN: 1622736575
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 146

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Book Description
Considered to be one of the most revolutionary composers of the twentieth century, Iannis Xenakis pushed the boundaries of classical music. As a largely self-taught composer, Xenakis drew from his technical training in engineering and architecture to produce music that had the ability to both unnerve and enrapture his audiences. Motivated by his intense study of many scientific disciplines, he employed the mathematical rules of the natural world to test the traditional rules of counterpoint and harmony, and to explore the spatial texture of sound, colour and architecture. The Romanian-born Greek-French composer transformed twentieth century classical music for decades to come, leaving behind an undeniable legacy that continues to inspire and even shock listeners to this day. By approaching Xenakis’s creative output from a variety of perspectives, the contributors to this edited volume seek not only to situate Xenakis’s music within a larger cultural, social and political context but also to shed light on contemporary issues surrounding his work. Each chapter focuses on a different aspect of Xenakis’s music (in the context of particular works) and musical philosophy: mathematical, structural, performative, as well as the genesis of his compositional style and distinctive sound. Xenakis’s artistic presence on the contemporary music scene, his political influence during the tumultuous protests in Paris ’68, and his first piano composition, Herma, are also explored in-depth providing new insights into the life and work of this avant-garde figure. This book will appeal to contemporary music researchers, students and scholars and may also be of interest to artists, performers and composers, alike.

Iannis Xenakis’s Persepolis

Iannis Xenakis’s Persepolis PDF Author: Aram Yardumian
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1501381520
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 161

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Book Description
Iannis Xenakis' Persepolis stood as witness to one of the most important events in modern human history, the Iranian Revolution in 1979. Its existence is owed to an invitation to participate in the 1971 Shiraz Arts Festival, which was overseen by Empress Farah Pahlavi. Like the Festival, and the extravagant celebratory party held the same year, Xenakis' symbolic paean to Persian history was polarizing. Many loved it, others detested it. Overwhelming but also subtle and precise in its non-harmonic shifts in texture and density, listeners and critics simply did not know what to make of it. This book tells the story of Xenakis' early history and involvement in the Resistance against the Axis occupation of Greece during the Second World War, escape and re-settlement in Paris, work as an architect with Le Corbusier, and distinct views on world history and politics that all led to his 1972 electro-acoustic album Persepolis.

Electronic Inspirations

Electronic Inspirations PDF Author: Jennifer Iverson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019086821X
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
For a decimated post-war West Germany, the electronic music studio at the WDR radio in Cologne was a beacon of hope. Jennifer Iverson's Electronic Inspirations: Technologies of the Cold War Musical Avant-Garde traces the reclamation and repurposing of wartime machines, spaces, and discourses into the new sounds of the mid-century studio. In the 1950s, when technologies were plentiful and the need for reconstruction was great, West Germany began to rebuild its cultural prestige via aesthetic and technical advances. The studio's composers, collaborating with scientists and technicians, coaxed music from sine-tone oscillators, noise generators, band-pass filters, and magnetic tape. Together, they applied core tenets from information theory and phonetics, reclaiming military communication technologies as well as fascist propaganda broadcasting spaces. The electronic studio nurtured a revolutionary synthesis of science, technology, politics, and aesthetics. Its esoteric sounds transformed mid-century music and continue to reverberate today. Electronic music--echoing both cultural anxiety and promise--is a quintessential Cold War innovation.

Performing Xenakis

Performing Xenakis PDF Author: Sharon E. Kanach
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781576471913
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 412

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Book Description
A collection of essays by international performers of Xenakis's music. Each essay gives perspective on what the composer was looking for, or on "tricks of the trade" for performing technical passages. Divided into sections by instrumentation, the book presents issues unique to each family of instruments as well as the performance of electronic works.

Sounding the Virtual: Gilles Deleuze and the Theory and Philosophy of Music

Sounding the Virtual: Gilles Deleuze and the Theory and Philosophy of Music PDF Author: Nick Nesbitt
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317052447
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 344

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Book Description
It is the contention of the editors and contributors of this volume that the work carried out by Gilles Deleuze, where rigorously applied, has the potential to cut through much of the intellectual sedimentation that has settled in the fields of music studies. Deleuze is a vigorous critic of the Western intellectual tradition, calling for a 'philosophy of difference', and, despite its ambitions, he is convinced that Western philosophy fails to truly grasp (or think) difference as such. It is argued that longstanding methods of conceptualizing music are vulnerable to Deleuze's critique. But, as Deleuze himself stresses, more important than merely critiquing established paradigms is developing ways to overcome them, and by using Deleuze's own concepts this collection aims to explore that possibility.

Ferruccio Busoni as Architect of Sound

Ferruccio Busoni as Architect of Sound PDF Author: Erinn E. Knyt
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0197625517
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
Ferruccio Busoni as Architect of Sound presents the composer as an innovator inspired not only by past musical traditions but also by a contemporary interest in experimentalism. In the twentieth-century, Busoni wrote pieces where sound radiates from different directions, created montage formal structures, and freely used all twelve pitches of the chromatic scale without avoiding consonances. This book reveals how he also applied his understanding of tangible architectural spaces, buildings, and floor plans to his music, reconciling the spatial and temporal divide in music through an interdisciplinary approach. His innovation prompted and inspired new trends in pitch organization, the spatialization of sound, and the expansion of formal structures. Transcending physical boundaries of compositional innovation, Busoni also engaged in a rich exchange of ideas with contemporary architects and artists. Through a broad analysis of Busoni's compositional activities, musicologist Erinn E. Knyt brings Busoni's music into dialogue with more recent accounts of modernism in music that move beyond elitist esotericism and notions of rupture with the past. In addition, she facilitates a discourse between Busoni and other twentieth-century artists and explores how Busoni's spatialized architectural music left a lasting imprint on future generations of musicians and early film pioneers.