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Musique concrète (; ): " problem for any translator of an academic work in French is that the language is relatively abstract and theoretical compared to English; one might even say that the mode of thinking itself tends to be more schematic, with a readiness to see material for study in terms of highly abstract dualisms and correlations, which on occasion does not sit easily with the perhaps more pragmatic English language. This creates several problems of translation affecting key terms. Perhaps the most obvious of these is the word ''concret''/''concrète'' itself. The word in French, which has nothing of the familiar meaning of "concrete" in English, is used throughout 'In Search of a Concrete Music''with all its usual French connotations of "palpable", "nontheoretical", and "experiential", all of which pertain to a greater or lesser extent to the type of music Schaeffer is pioneering. Despite the risk of ambiguity, we decided to translate it with the English word ''concrete'' in most contexts, as an expression such as "real-world" does not cover the original's range of meanings, and in particular it would not link with the main subject ..." is a type of
music composition Musical composition can refer to an original piece or work of music, either vocal or instrumental, the structure of a musical piece or to the process of creating or writing a new piece of music. People who create new compositions are called ...
that utilizes recorded sounds as raw material. Sounds are often modified through the application of
audio signal processing Audio signal processing is a subfield of signal processing that is concerned with the electronic manipulation of audio signals. Audio signals are electronic representations of sound waves—longitudinal waves which travel through air, consisting ...
and tape music techniques, and may be assembled into a form of
sound collage In music, montage (literally "putting together") or sound collage ("gluing together") is a technique where newly branded sound objects or Musical composition, compositions, including songs, are created from collage, also known as musique concrè ...
. It can feature sounds derived from recordings of
musical instrument A musical instrument is a device created or adapted to make Music, musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can be considered a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument. A person ...
s, the
human voice The human voice consists of sound Voice production, made by a human being using the vocal tract, including Speech, talking, singing, Laughter, laughing, crying, screaming, shouting, humming or yelling. The human voice frequency is specifically ...
, and the natural environment, as well as those created using sound synthesis and computer-based
digital signal processing Digital signal processing (DSP) is the use of digital processing, such as by computers or more specialized digital signal processors, to perform a wide variety of signal processing operations. The digital signals processed in this manner are a ...
. Compositions in this idiom are not restricted to the normal musical rules of
melody A melody (), also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most literal sense, a melody is a combination of Pitch (music), pitch and rhythm, while more figurativel ...
,
harmony In music, harmony is the concept of combining different sounds in order to create new, distinct musical ideas. Theories of harmony seek to describe or explain the effects created by distinct pitches or tones coinciding with one another; harm ...
,
rhythm Rhythm (from Greek , ''rhythmos'', "any regular recurring motion, symmetry") generally means a " movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions". This general meaning of regular r ...
, and
metre The metre (or meter in US spelling; symbol: m) is the base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI). Since 2019, the metre has been defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of of ...
. The technique exploits acousmatic sound, such that sound identities can often be intentionally obscured or appear unconnected to their source cause. The theoretical basis of ''musique concrète'' as a compositional practice was developed by French composer Pierre Schaeffer beginning in the early 1940s. It was largely an attempt to differentiate between music based on the abstract medium of notation and that created using so-called sound objects (''l'objet sonore''). By the early 1950s musique concrète was contrasted with "pure" '' elektronische Musik'' as then developed in
West Germany West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republi ...
''–'' based solely on the use of electronically produced sounds rather than recorded sounds – but the distinction has since been blurred such that the term "electronic music" covers both meanings. Schaeffer's work resulted in the establishment of France's Groupe de Recherches de Musique Concrète (GRMC), which attracted important figures including Pierre Henry, Luc Ferrari,
Pierre Boulez Pierre Louis Joseph Boulez (; 26 March 19255 January 2016) was a French composer, conductor and writer, and the founder of several musical institutions. He was one of the dominant figures of post-war contemporary classical music. Born in Montb ...
,
Karlheinz Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. He is known for his groun ...
,
Edgard Varèse Edgard Victor Achille Charles Varèse (; also spelled Edgar; December 22, 1883 – November 6, 1965) was a French and American composer who spent the greater part of his career in the United States. Varèse's music emphasizes timbre and rhythm; h ...
, and
Iannis Xenakis Giannis Klearchou Xenakis (also spelled for professional purposes as Yannis or Iannis Xenakis; , ; 29 May 1922 – 4 February 2001) was a Romanian-born Greek-French avant-garde composer, music theorist, architect, performance director and enginee ...
. From the late 1960s onward, and particularly in France, the term
acousmatic music Acousmatic music (from Greek ἄκουσμα ''akousma'', "a thing heard") is a form of electroacoustic music that is specifically ''composed'' for presentation using speakers, as opposed to a live performance. It stems from a compositional tradit ...
(''musique acousmatique'') was used in reference to fixed media compositions that utilized both ''musique concrète-''based techniques and live sound spatialisation.


History


Beginnings

In 1928 music critic André Cœuroy wrote in his book ''Panorama of Contemporary Music'' that "perhaps the time is not far off when a composer will be able to represent through recording, music specifically composed for the gramophone". In the same period the American composer
Henry Cowell Henry Dixon Cowell (; March 11, 1897 – December 10, 1965) was an American composer, writer, pianist, publisher, teacher Marchioni, Tonimarie (2012)"Henry Cowell: A Life Stranger Than Fiction" ''The Juilliard Journal''. Retrieved 19 June 2022.C ...
, in referring to the projects of
Nikolai Lopatnikoff Nikolai Lopatnikoff (Russian, Николай Львович Лопатников; born 16 March 1903 in Tallinn - 7 October 1976 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) was a Russian-American composer, music teacher and university lecturer. He composed some ...
, believed that "there was a wide field open for the composition of music for phonographic discs". This sentiment was echoed further in 1930 by
Igor Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky ( – 6 April 1971) was a Russian composer and conductor with French citizenship (from 1934) and American citizenship (from 1945). He is widely considered one of the most important and influential 20th-century c ...
, when he stated in the revue ''Kultur und Schallplatte'' that "there will be a greater interest in creating music in a way that will be peculiar to the gramophone record". The following year, 1931, Boris de Schloezer also expressed the opinion that one could write for the gramophone or for the
wireless Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information (''telecommunication'') between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided transm ...
just as one can for the piano or the violin. Shortly after, German art theorist
Rudolf Arnheim Rudolf Arnheim (; July 15, 1904 – June 9, 2007) was a German-born writer, art and film theorist, and perceptual psychologist. He learned Gestalt psychology from studying under Max Wertheimer and Wolfgang Köhler at the University of Berlin and ...
discussed the effects of microphonic recording in an essay entitled "Radio", published in 1936. In it the idea of a creative role for the recording medium was introduced and Arnheim stated that: "The rediscovery of the musicality of sound in noise and in language, and the reunification of music, noise and language in order to obtain a unity of material: that is one of the chief artistic tasks of radio". Possible antecedents to musique concrète have been noted;
Walter Ruttmann Walter Ruttmann (28 December 1887 – 15 July 1941) was a German cinematographer and film director, an important German abstract experimental film maker, along with Hans Richter, Viking Eggeling and Oskar Fischinger. He is best known for dir ...
's film ''Wochend'' (''Weekend'') (1930), a work of "blind cinema" without visuals, introduced recordings of environmental sound, to represent the urban soundscape of
Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
, two decades before musique concrète was formalised. Ruttmann's soundtrack has been retrospectively called ''musique concrète''. According to Seth Kim-Cohen the piece was the first to "organise 'concrete' sounds into a formal, artistic composition." Composer Irwin Bazelon referred to a sound collage in the film ''
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde'' is an 1886 Gothic fiction, Gothic horror fiction, horror novella by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. It follows Gabriel John Utterson, a London-based legal practitioner who investigates a series ...
'' (1931), during the first transformation scene, as "pre-musique concrète".
Ottorino Respighi Ottorino Respighi ( , , ; 9 July 187918 April 1936) was an Italian composer, violinist, teacher, and musicologist and one of the leading Italian composers of the early 20th century. List of compositions by Ottorino Respighi, His compositions ra ...
's '' Pines of Rome'' (1924) calls for a phonograph recording of
birdsong Bird vocalization includes both bird calls and bird songs. In non-technical use, bird songs (often simply ''birdsong'') are the bird sounds that are melodious to the human ear. In ornithology and birding, songs (relatively complex vocalization ...
to be played during the third movement.


Pierre Schaeffer and Studio d'Essai

In 1942, French composer and theoretician Pierre Schaeffer began his exploration of radiophony when he joined
Jacques Copeau Jacques Copeau (; 4 February 1879 – 20 October 1949) was a French Theatre, theatre director, producer, actor, and dramatist. Before he founded the Théâtre du Vieux-Colombier in Paris, he wrote theatre reviews for several Parisian journ ...
and his pupils in the foundation of the Studio d'Essai de la Radiodiffusion nationale. The studio originally functioned as a center for the
French Resistance The French Resistance ( ) was a collection of groups that fought the German military administration in occupied France during World War II, Nazi occupation and the Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy#France, collaborationist Vic ...
on radio, which in August 1944 was responsible for the first broadcasts in liberated Paris. It was here that Schaeffer began to experiment with creative radiophonic techniques using the sound technologies of the time. In 1948 Schaeffer began to keep a set of journals describing his attempt to create a "symphony of noises". These journals were published in 1952 as ''A la recherche d'une musique concrète'', and according to Brian Kane, author of ''Sound Unseen: Acousmatic Sound in Theory and Practice'', Schaeffer was driven by: "a compositional desire to construct music from concrete objects – no matter how unsatisfactory the initial results – and a theoretical desire to find a vocabulary, solfège, or method upon which to ground such music. The development of Schaeffer's practice was informed by encounters with voice actors, and microphone usage and radiophonic art played an important part in inspiring and consolidating Schaeffer's conception of sound-based composition. Another important influence on Schaeffer's practice was cinema, and the techniques of recording and montage, which were originally associated with cinematographic practice, came to "serve as the substrate of musique concrète". Marc Battier notes that, prior to Schaeffer, Jean Epstein drew attention to the manner in which sound recording revealed what was hidden in the act of basic acoustic listening. Epstein's reference to this "phenomenon of an epiphanic being", which appears through the transduction of sound, proved influential on Schaeffer's concept of reduced listening. Schaeffer would explicitly cite Jean Epstein with reference to his use of extra-musical sound material. Epstein had already imagined that "through the transposition of natural sounds, it becomes possible to create chords and dissonances, melodies and symphonies of noise, which are a new and specifically cinematographic music".


Halim El-Dabh

As a student in
Cairo Cairo ( ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Egypt and the Cairo Governorate, being home to more than 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, L ...
in the early to mid-1940s, Egyptian composer Halim El-Dabh began experimenting with electroacoustic music using a cumbersome wire recorder. He recorded the sounds of an ancient '' zaar'' ceremony and at the Middle East Radio studios processed the material using reverberation, echo, voltage controls, and re-recording. The resulting tape-based composition, entitled ''The Expression of Zaar'', was presented in 1944 at an art gallery event in Cairo. El-Dabh has described his initial activities as an attempt to unlock "the inner sound" of the recordings. While his early compositional work was not widely known outside of Egypt at the time, El-Dabh would eventually gain recognition for his influential work at the
Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center The Computer Music Center (CMC) at Columbia University is the oldest center for electronic and computer music research in the United States. It was founded in the 1950s as the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center. Location The CMC is h ...
in Manhattan in the late 1950s.


Club d'Essai and ''Cinq études de bruits''

Following Schaeffer's work with Studio d'Essai at Radiodiffusion Nationale during the early 1940s he was credited with originating the theory and practice of ''musique concrète.'' The Studio d'Essai was renamed Club d'Essai de la Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française in 1946 and in the same year Schaeffer discussed, in writing, the question surrounding the transformation of time perceived through recording. The essay evidenced knowledge of sound manipulation techniques he would further exploit compositionally. In 1948 Schaeffer formally initiated "research in to noises" at the Club d'Essai and on 5 October 1948 the results of his initial experimentation were premiered at a concert given in Paris. Five works for
phonograph A phonograph, later called a gramophone, and since the 1940s a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogue reproduction of sound. The sound vibration Waveform, waveforms are recorded as correspond ...
– known collectively as '' Cinq études de bruits'' (Five Studies of Noises) including ''Étude violette'' (''Study in Purple'') and ''Étude aux chemins de fer'' (Study with Railroads) – were presented.


Musique concrète

By 1949 Schaeffer's compositional work was known publicly as ''musique concrète''. Schaeffer stated: "when I proposed the term 'musique concrète,' I intended … to point out an opposition with the way musical work usually goes. Instead of notating musical ideas on paper with the symbols of solfege and entrusting their realization to well-known instruments, the question was to collect concrete sounds, wherever they came from, and to abstract the musical values they were potentially containing". According to Pierre Henry, "musique concrète was not a study of timbre, it is focused on envelopes, forms. It must be presented by means of non-traditional characteristics, you see … one might say that the origin of this music is also found in the interest in 'plastifying' music, of rendering it plastic like sculpture…musique concrète, in my opinion … led to a manner of composing, indeed, a new mental framework of composing". Schaeffer had developed an aesthetic that was centred upon the use of sound as a primary compositional resource. The aesthetic also emphasised the importance of play (''jeu'') in the practice of sound based composition. Schaeffer's use of the word ''jeu'', from the verb ''jouer'', carries the same double meaning as the English verb ''to play'': 'to enjoy oneself by interacting with one's surroundings', as well as 'to operate a musical instrument'. During this early development of music concrete, Schaeffer continued participation in his Club d’Essai. Prior to their collaboration on Timbres-Durées (1952), Schaeffer’s acquaintance and serialist composer, Olivier Messiaen, periodically participated in broadcasts, round tables, and critiques surrounding musique concrète.


Groupe de Recherche de Musique Concrète

By 1951 the work of Schaeffer, composer-
percussionist A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Ex ...
Pierre Henry, and sound engineer Jacques Poullin had received official recognition and the Groupe de Recherches de Musique Concrète, Club d 'Essai de la
Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française (; RTF; "French Radio and Television Broadcasting") was the French national public broadcaster television organization established on 9 February 1949 to replace the post-war "''Radiodiffusion Française''" ...
was established at RTF in Paris, the ancestor of the ORTF. At RTF the GRMC established the first purpose-built
electroacoustic music Electroacoustic music is a Music genre, genre of Western art music in which composers use recording technology and audio signal processing to manipulate the timbres of Acoustics, acoustic sounds in the creation of pieces of music. It originated a ...
studio. It quickly attracted many who either were or were later to become notable composers, including
Olivier Messiaen Olivier Eugène Prosper Charles Messiaen (, ; ; 10 December 1908 – 27 April 1992) was a French composer, organist, and ornithology, ornithologist. One of the major composers of the 20th-century classical music, 20th century, he was also an ou ...
,
Pierre Boulez Pierre Louis Joseph Boulez (; 26 March 19255 January 2016) was a French composer, conductor and writer, and the founder of several musical institutions. He was one of the dominant figures of post-war contemporary classical music. Born in Montb ...
,
Jean Barraqué Jean-Henri-Alphonse Barraqué (17 January 1928 – 17 August 1973) was a French composer and music writer. His relatively small is known for its serialism. Life Barraqué was born in Puteaux, Hauts-de-Seine. In 1931, he moved with his family to P ...
,
Karlheinz Stockhausen Karlheinz Stockhausen (; 22 August 1928 – 5 December 2007) was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. He is known for his groun ...
,
Edgard Varèse Edgard Victor Achille Charles Varèse (; also spelled Edgar; December 22, 1883 – November 6, 1965) was a French and American composer who spent the greater part of his career in the United States. Varèse's music emphasizes timbre and rhythm; h ...
,
Iannis Xenakis Giannis Klearchou Xenakis (also spelled for professional purposes as Yannis or Iannis Xenakis; , ; 29 May 1922 – 4 February 2001) was a Romanian-born Greek-French avant-garde composer, music theorist, architect, performance director and enginee ...
, Michel Philippot, and
Arthur Honegger Arthur Honegger (; 10 March 1892 – 27 November 1955) was a Swiss-French composer who was born in France and lived a large part of his life in Paris. Honegger was a member of Les Six. For Halbreich, '' Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher'' is "more even ...
. Compositional "output from 1951 to 1953 comprised ''Étude I'' (1951) and ''Étude II'' (1951) by Boulez, ''Timbres-durées'' (1952) by Messiaen, '' Étude aux mille collants'' (1952) by Stockhausen, ''Le microphone bien tempéré'' (1952) and ''La voile d'Orphée'' (1953) by Henry, ''Étude I'' (1953) by Philippot, ''Étude'' (1953) by Barraqué, the mixed pieces ''Toute la lyre'' (1951) and ''Orphée 53'' (1953) by Schaeffer/Henry, and the film music ''Masquerage'' (1952) by Schaeffer and ''Astrologie'' (1953) by Henry. In 1954 Varèse and Honegger visited to work on the tape parts of ''
Déserts ''Déserts'' (1950–1954) is a musical composition, piece by Edgard Varèse for 14 winds (brass instrument, brass and woodwind instrument, woodwinds), 5 percussion players, 1 piano, and electronic audiotape, tape."Blue" Gene Tyranny (2010). "[ D� ...
'' and ''La rivière endormie''". In the early and mid 1950s Schaeffer's commitments to RTF included official missions that often required extended absences from the studios. This led him to invest Philippe Arthuys with responsibility for the GRMC in his absence, with Pierre Henry operating as Director of Works. Pierre Henry's composing talent developed greatly during this period at the GRMC and he worked with experimental filmmakers such as Max de Haas, Jean Grémillon, Enrico Fulchignoni, and Jean Rouch and with choreography, choreographers including Dick Sanders and Maurice Béjart. Schaeffer returned to run the group at the end of 1957, and immediately stated his disapproval of the direction the GRMC had taken. A proposal was then made to "renew completely the spirit, the methods and the personnel of the Group, with a view to undertake research and to offer a much needed welcome to young composers".


Groupe de Recherches Musicales

Following the emergence of differences within the GRMC, Pierre Henry, Philippe Arthuys, and several of their colleagues, resigned in April 1958. Schaeffer created a new collective, called ''Groupe de Recherches Musicales'' (GRM) and set about recruiting new members including Luc Ferrari, Beatriz Ferreyra, François-Bernard Mâche,
Iannis Xenakis Giannis Klearchou Xenakis (also spelled for professional purposes as Yannis or Iannis Xenakis; , ; 29 May 1922 – 4 February 2001) was a Romanian-born Greek-French avant-garde composer, music theorist, architect, performance director and enginee ...
, Bernard Parmegiani, and Mireille Chamass-Kyrou. Later arrivals included Ivo Malec, Philippe Carson, Romuald Vandelle, Edgardo Canton and François Bayle. GRM was one of several theoretical and experimental groups working under the umbrella of the Schaeffer-led Service de la Recherche at ORTF (1960–1974). Together with the GRM, three other groups existed: the Groupe de Recherches Image GRI, the Groupe de Recherches Technologiques GRT and the Groupe de Recherches which became the Groupe d'Etudes Critiques. Communication was the one theme that unified the various groups, all of which were devoted to production and creation. In terms of the question "who says what to whom?" Schaeffer added "how?", thereby creating a platform for research into audiovisual communication and mass media, audible phenomena and music in general (including non-Western musics). At the GRM the theoretical teaching remained based on practice and could be summed up in the catch phrase ''do and listen''. Schaeffer kept up a practice established with the GRMC of delegating the functions (though not the title) of Group Director to colleagues. Since 1961 GRM has had six Group Directors: Michel Philippot (1960–1961), Luc Ferrari (1962–1963), Bernard Baschet and François Vercken (1964–1966). From the beginning of 1966, François Bayle took over the direction for the duration of thirty-one years, to 1997. He was then replaced by Daniel Teruggi.


Traité des objets musicaux

The group continued to refine Schaeffer's ideas and strengthened the concept of '' musique acousmatique''. Schaeffer had borrowed the term acousmatic from
Pythagoras Pythagoras of Samos (;  BC) was an ancient Ionian Greek philosopher, polymath, and the eponymous founder of Pythagoreanism. His political and religious teachings were well known in Magna Graecia and influenced the philosophies of P ...
and defined it as: "''Acousmatic,
adjective An adjective (abbreviations, abbreviated ) is a word that describes or defines a noun or noun phrase. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun. Traditionally, adjectives are considered one of the main part of speech, parts of ...
: referring to a sound that one hears without seeing the causes behind it''". In 1966 Schaeffer published the book ''Traité des objets musicaux'' (Treatise on Musical Objects) which represented the culmination of some 20 years of research in the field of ''musique concrète''. In conjunction with this publication, a set of sound recordings was produced, entitled ''Le solfège de l'objet sonore'' (Music Theory of the Acoustic Object), to provide examples of concepts dealt with in the treatise.


Technology

The development of musique concrète was facilitated by the emergence of new
music technology Music technology is the study or the use of any device, mechanism, machine or tool by a musician or composer to make or perform music; to musical composition, compose, music notation, notate, playback or record songs or pieces; or to Music infor ...
in post-war Europe. Access to microphones, phonographs, and later magnetic tape recorders (created in 1939 and acquired by the Schaeffer's Groupe de Recherche de Musique Concrète (Research Group on Concrete Music) in 1952), facilitated by an association with the French national broadcasting organization, at that time the Radiodiffusion-Télévision Française, gave Schaeffer and his colleagues an opportunity to experiment with recording technology and tape manipulation.


Initial tools of musique concrète

In 1948, a typical
radio studio A recording studio is a specialized facility for recording and mixing of instrumental or vocal musical performances, spoken words, and other sounds. They range in size from a small in-home project studio large enough to record a single sin ...
consisted of a series of shellac
record players A phonograph, later called a gramophone, and since the 1940s a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogue reproduction of sound. The sound vibration waveforms are recorded as corresponding phys ...
, a
shellac Shellac () is a resin secreted by the female Kerria lacca, lac bug on trees in the forests of India and Thailand. Chemically, it is mainly composed of aleuritic acid, jalaric acid, shellolic acid, and other natural waxes. It is processed and s ...
record recorder, a mixing desk with rotating
potentiometer A potentiometer is a three- terminal resistor with a sliding or rotating contact that forms an adjustable voltage divider. If only two terminals are used, one end and the wiper, it acts as a variable resistor or rheostat. The measuring instrum ...
s, mechanical
reverberation In acoustics, reverberation (commonly shortened to reverb) is a persistence of sound after it is produced. It is often created when a sound is reflection (physics), reflected on surfaces, causing multiple reflections that build up and then de ...
units,
filters Filtration is a physical process that separates solid matter and fluid from a mixture. Filter, filtering, filters or filtration may also refer to: Science and technology Computing * Filter (higher-order function), in functional programming * Fil ...
, and
microphone A microphone, colloquially called a mic (), or mike, is a transducer that converts sound into an electrical signal. Microphones are used in many applications such as telephones, hearing aids, public address systems for concert halls and publi ...
s. This technology made a number of limited operations available to a composer: *Shellac record players: could play sound forwards or in reverse; could change speed at fixed ratios, permitting limited transposition. *Shellac recorder: would record any result coming out of the mixing desk. *Mixing desk: would permit several sources to be mixed together with an independent control of the gain or volume of the sound. The result of the mixing was sent to the recorder and to the monitoring loudspeakers. Signals could be sent to the filters or the reverberation unit. *Mechanical reverberation: made of a metal plate or a series of springs that created an artificial reverb effect. *Filters: two kinds of filters, third-octave octave filter banks and high- and
low-pass filter A low-pass filter is a filter that passes signals with a frequency lower than a selected cutoff frequency and attenuates signals with frequencies higher than the cutoff frequency. The exact frequency response of the filter depends on the filt ...
s. They allowed the elimination or enhancement of selected
frequencies Frequency is the number of occurrences of a repeating event per unit of time. Frequency is an important parameter used in science and engineering to specify the rate of oscillatory and vibratory phenomena, such as mechanical vibrations, audio ...
. *Microphones: essential tool for capturing sound. The application of the above technologies in the creation of musique concrète led to the development of a number of sound manipulation techniques including: *Sound transposition: reading a sound at a different speed than the one at which it was recorded. *Sound looping: composers developed a skilled technique in order to create loops at specific locations within a recording. *Sound-sample extraction: a hand-controlled method that required delicate manipulation to get a clean sample of sound. It entailed letting the
stylus A stylus is a writing utensil or tool for scribing or marking into softer materials. Different styluses were used to write in cuneiform by pressing into wet clay, and to scribe or carve into a wax tablet. Very hard styluses are also used to En ...
read only a small segment of a record. Used in the ''Symphonie pour un homme seul''. *Filtering: by eliminating certain frequencies from a signal, the remains would keep some trace of the original sound but alter it often beyond recognition.


Magnetic tape

The first tape recorders started arriving at ORTF in 1949; however, they were much less reliable than the shellac players, to the point that the ''Symphonie pour un homme seul'' (1950–1951) was mainly composed with records even if the tape recorder was available. In 1950, when the machines finally functioned correctly, the techniques of the studio were expanded. A range of new sound manipulation practices were explored using improved media manipulation methods and operations such as continuous speed variation. A completely new possibility of organising sounds appeared with tape editing, which permitted tape to be spliced and arranged with much more precision. The "axe-cut junctions" were replaced with micrometric junctions and a whole new technique of production, less dependent on performance skills, could be developed. Tape editing brought a new technique called " micromontage", in which very small fragments of sound were edited together, thus creating completely new sounds or structures on a larger scale.


Development of novel devices

During the GRMC period from 1951 to 1958, Schaeffer and Poullin developed a number of novel sound creation tools. These included a three-track
tape recorder An audio tape recorder, also known as a tape deck, tape player or tape machine or simply a tape recorder, is a sound recording and reproduction device that records and plays back sounds usually using magnetic tape for storage. In its present ...
; a machine with ten playback heads to replay tape loops in echo (the morphophone); a keyboard-controlled machine to play tape loops at preset speeds (the keyboard,
chromatic Diatonic and chromatic are terms in music theory that are used to characterize scales. The terms are also applied to musical instruments, intervals, chords, notes, musical styles, and kinds of harmony. They are very often used as a pair, es ...
, or ''Tolana phonogène''); a slide-controlled machine to replay tape loops at a continuously variable range of speeds (the handle, continuous, or ''Sareg phonogène''); and a device to distribute an encoded track across four
loudspeaker A loudspeaker (commonly referred to as a speaker or, more fully, a speaker system) is a combination of one or more speaker drivers, an enclosure, and electrical connections (possibly including a crossover network). The speaker driver is an ...
s, including one hanging from the centre of the ceiling (the ''potentiomètre d'espace'').


''Phonogène''

Speed variation was a powerful tool for sound design applications. It had been identified that transformations brought about by varying playback speed lead to modification in the character of the sound material: * Variation in the sounds' length, in a manner directly proportional to the ratio of speed variation. * Variation in length is coupled with a variation in pitch, and is also proportional to the ratio of speed variation. * A sound's attack characteristic is altered, whereby it is either dislocated from succeeding events, or the energy of the attack is more sharply focused. * The distribution of spectral energy is altered, thereby influencing how the resulting timbre might be perceived, relative to its original unaltered state. The phonogène was a machine capable of modifying sound structure significantly and it provided composers with a means to adapt sound to meet specific compositional contexts. The initial phonogènes were manufactured in 1953 by two subcontractors: the chromatic phonogène by a company called Tolana, and the sliding version by the SAREG Company. A third version was developed later at ORTF. An outline of the unique capabilities of the various phonogènes can be seen here: *Chromatic: The chromatic phonogène was controlled through a one-octave keyboard. Multiple capstans of differing diameters vary the tape speed over a single stationary magnetic tape head. A tape loop was put into the machine, and when a key was played, it would act on an individual pinch roller / capstan arrangement and cause the tape to be played at a specific speed. The machine worked with short sounds only. *Sliding: The sliding phonogène (also called continuous-variation phonogène) provided continuous variation of tape speed using a control rod. The range allowed the motor to arrive at almost a stop position, always through a continuous variation. It was basically a normal tape recorder but with the ability to control its speed, so it could modify any length of tape. One of the earliest examples of its use can by heard in ''Voile d'Orphée'' by Pierre Henry (1953), where a lengthy
glissando In music, a glissando (; plural: ''glissandi'', abbreviated ''gliss.'') is a wikt:glide, glide from one pitch (music), pitch to another (). It is an Italianized Musical terminology, musical term derived from the French ''glisser'', "to glide". In ...
is used to symbolise the removal of
Orpheus In Greek mythology, Orpheus (; , classical pronunciation: ) was a Thracians, Thracian bard, legendary musician and prophet. He was also a renowned Ancient Greek poetry, poet and, according to legend, travelled with Jason and the Argonauts in se ...
's veil as he enters hell. *Universal: A final version called the universal phonogène was completed in 1963. The device's main ability was that it enabled the dissociation of pitch variation from time variation. This was the starting point for methods that would later become widely available using digital technology, for instance harmonising (transposing sound without modifying duration) and time stretching (modifying duration without pitch modification). This was obtained through a rotating magnetic head called the Springer temporal regulator, an ancestor of the rotating heads used in video machines.


Three-head tape recorder

This original tape recorder was one of the first machines permitting the simultaneous listening of several synchronised sources. Until 1958 musique concrète, radio and the studio machines were
monophonic Monaural sound or monophonic sound (often shortened to mono) is sound intended to be heard as if it were emanating from one position. This contrasts with stereophonic sound or ''stereo'', which uses two separate audio channels to reproduce sou ...
. The three-head tape recorder superposed three magnetic tapes that were dragged by a common motor, each tape having an independent spool. The objective was to keep the three tapes synchronised from a common starting point. Works could then be conceived
polyphonic Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice ( monophony) or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords ...
ally, and thus each head conveyed a part of the information and was listened to through a dedicated loudspeaker. It was an ancestor of the multi-track player (four then eight tracks) that appeared in the 1960s. ''Timbres Durées'' by Olivier Messiaen with the technical assistance of Pierre Henry was the first work composed for this tape recorder in 1952. A rapid rhythmic polyphony was distributed over the three channels.


Morphophone

This machine was conceived to build complex forms through repetition, and accumulation of events through delays, filtering and
feedback Feedback occurs when outputs of a system are routed back as inputs as part of a chain of cause and effect that forms a circuit or loop. The system can then be said to ''feed back'' into itself. The notion of cause-and-effect has to be handle ...
. It consisted of a large rotating disk, 50 cm in diameter, on which was stuck a tape with its magnetic side facing outward. A series of twelve movable magnetic heads (one each
recording head ''Tape Head'' is the seventh studio album by American rock band King's X King's X is an American Rock music, rock band formed in Springfield, Missouri, in 1979. They were first called the Edge and later became Sneak Preview before settli ...
and erasing head, and ten playback heads) were positioned around the disk, in contact with the tape. A sound up to four seconds long could be recorded on the looped tape and the ten playback heads would then read the information with different delays, according to their (adjustable) positions around the disk. A separate
amplifier An amplifier, electronic amplifier or (informally) amp is an electronic device that can increase the magnitude of a signal (a time-varying voltage or current). It is a two-port electronic circuit that uses electric power from a power su ...
and
band-pass filter A band-pass filter or bandpass filter (BPF) is a device that passes frequencies within a certain range and rejects ( attenuates) frequencies outside that range. It is the inverse of a '' band-stop filter''. Description In electronics and s ...
for each head could modify the
spectrum A spectrum (: spectra or spectrums) is a set of related ideas, objects, or properties whose features overlap such that they blend to form a continuum. The word ''spectrum'' was first used scientifically in optics to describe the rainbow of co ...
of the sound, and additional feedback loops could transmit the information to the recording head. The resulting repetitions of a sound occurred at different time intervals, and could be filtered or modified through feedback. This system was also easily capable of producing artificial reverberation or continuous sounds.


Early sound spatialisation system

At the premiere of Pierre Schaeffer's ''Symphonie pour un homme seul'' in 1951, a system that was designed for the spatial control of sound was tested. It was called a ''relief desk'' (''pupitre de relief'', but also referred to as ''pupitre d'espace'' or ''potentiomètre d'espace'') and was intended to control the dynamic level of music played from several shellac players. This created a
stereophonic Stereophonic sound, commonly shortened to stereo, is a method of sound reproduction that recreates a multi-directional, 3-dimensional audible perspective. This is usually achieved by using two independent audio channels through a configurat ...
effect by controlling the positioning of a
monophonic Monaural sound or monophonic sound (often shortened to mono) is sound intended to be heard as if it were emanating from one position. This contrasts with stereophonic sound or ''stereo'', which uses two separate audio channels to reproduce sou ...
sound source. One of five tracks, provided by a purpose-built tape machine, was controlled by the performer and the other four tracks each supplied a single loudspeaker. This provided a mixture of live and preset sound positions. The placement of loudspeakers in the performance space included two loudspeakers at the front right and left of the audience, one placed at the rear, and in the centre of the space a loudspeaker was placed in a high position above the audience. The sounds could therefore be moved around the audience, rather than just across the front stage. On stage, the control system allowed a performer to position a sound either to the left or right, above or behind the audience, simply by moving a small, hand held transmitter coil towards or away from four somewhat larger receiver coils arranged around the performer in a manner reflecting the loudspeaker positions. A contemporary eyewitness described the ''potentiomètre d'espace'' in normal use:
One found one's self sitting in a small studio which was equipped with four loudspeakers—two in front of one—right and left; one behind one and a fourth suspended above. In the front center were four large loops and an ''executant'' moving a small magnetic unit through the air. The four loops controlled the four speakers, and while all four were giving off sounds all the time, the distance of the unit from the loops determined the volume of sound sent out from each.
The music thus came to one at varying intensity from various parts of the room, and this ''spatial projection'' gave new sense to the rather abstract sequence of sound originally recorded.
The central concept underlying this method was the notion that music should be controlled during public presentation in order to create a performance situation; an attitude that has stayed with acousmatic music to the present day.


Coupigny synthesiser and Studio 54 mixing desk

After the longstanding rivalry with the
electronic music Electronic music broadly is a group of music genres that employ electronic musical instruments, circuitry-based music technology and software, or general-purpose electronics (such as personal computers) in its creation. It includes both music ...
of the Cologne studio had subsided, in 1970 the GRM finally created an electronic studio using tools developed by the physicist Enrico Chiarucci, called the Studio 54, which featured the "Coupigny modular synthesiser" and a Moog synthesiser. The Coupigny
synthesiser A synthesizer (also synthesiser or synth) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...
, named for its designer François Coupigny, director of the Group for Technical Research, and the Studio 54 mixing desk had a major influence on the evolution of GRM and from the point of their introduction on they brought a new quality to the music. The mixing desk and synthesiser were combined in one unit and were created specifically for the creation of musique concrète. The design of the desk was influenced by
trade union A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...
rules at French National Radio that required technicians and production staff to have clearly defined duties. The solitary practice of musique concrète composition did not suit a system that involved three operators: one in charge of the machines, a second controlling the mixing desk, and third to provide guidance to the others. Because of this the synthesiser and desk were combined and organised in a manner that allowed it to be used easily by a composer. Independently of the mixing tracks (24 in total), it had a coupled connection patch that permitted the organisation of the machines within the studio. It also had a number of remote controls for operating tape recorders. The system was easily adaptable to any context, particularly that of interfacing with external equipment. Before the late 1960s the musique concrète produced at GRM had largely been based on the recording and manipulation of sounds, but synthesised sounds had featured in a number of works prior to the introduction of the Coupigny. Pierre Henry had used oscillators to produce sounds as early as 1955. But a synthesiser with envelope control was something Pierre Schaeffer was against, since it favoured the preconception of music and therefore deviated from Schaeffer's principle of "making through listening". Because of Schaeffer's concerns the Coupigny synthesiser was conceived as a sound-event generator with parameters controlled globally, without a means to define values as precisely as some other synthesisers of the day. The development of the machine was constrained by several factors. It needed to be modular and the modules had to be easily interconnected (so that the synthesiser would have more modules than slots and it would have an easy-to-use patch). It also needed to include all the major functions of a
modular synthesiser Modular synthesizers are synthesizers composed of separate modules for different functions. The modules can be connected together by the user to create a patch. The outputs from the modules may include audio signals, analog control voltages, ...
including
oscillators Oscillation is the repetitive or periodic variation, typically in time, of some measure about a central value (often a point of equilibrium) or between two or more different states. Familiar examples of oscillation include a swinging pendulum ...
, noise-generators,
filters Filtration is a physical process that separates solid matter and fluid from a mixture. Filter, filtering, filters or filtration may also refer to: Science and technology Computing * Filter (higher-order function), in functional programming * Fil ...
, ring-modulators, but an
intermodulation Intermodulation (IM) or intermodulation distortion (IMD) is the amplitude modulation of Signal (electrical engineering), signals containing two or more different frequencies, caused by non-linear, nonlinearities or time variance in a system. ...
facility was viewed as the primary requirement; to enable complex synthesis processes such as
frequency modulation Frequency modulation (FM) is a signal modulation technique used in electronic communication, originally for transmitting messages with a radio wave. In frequency modulation a carrier wave is varied in its instantaneous frequency in proporti ...
,
amplitude modulation Amplitude modulation (AM) is a signal modulation technique used in electronic communication, most commonly for transmitting messages with a radio wave. In amplitude modulation, the instantaneous amplitude of the wave is varied in proportion t ...
, and modulation via an external source. No keyboard was attached to the synthesiser and instead a specific and somewhat complex
envelope generator In sound and music, an envelope describes how a sound changes over time. For example, a piano key, when struck and held, creates a near-immediate initial sound which gradually decreases in volume to zero. An envelope may relate to elements such ...
was used to shape sound. This synthesiser was well-adapted to the production of continuous and complex sounds using intermodulation techniques such as cross-synthesis and frequency modulation but was less effective in generating precisely defined frequencies and triggering specific sounds. The Coupigny synthesiser also served as the model for a smaller, portable unit, which has been used down to the present day.


Acousmonium

In 1966 composer and technician François Bayle was placed in charge of the Groupe de Recherches Musicales and in 1975, GRM was integrated with the new Institut national de l'audiovisuel (INA – Audiovisual National Institute) with Bayle as its head. In taking the lead on work that began in the early 1950s, with Jacques Poullin's potentiomètre d'espace, a system designed to move
monophonic Monaural sound or monophonic sound (often shortened to mono) is sound intended to be heard as if it were emanating from one position. This contrasts with stereophonic sound or ''stereo'', which uses two separate audio channels to reproduce sou ...
sound sources across four speakers, Bayle and the engineer Jean-Claude Lallemand created an orchestra of loudspeakers (''un orchestre de haut-parleurs'') known as the Acousmonium in 1974. An inaugural concert took place on 14 February 1974 at the Espace Pierre Cardin in Paris with a presentation of Bayle's ''Expérience acoustique''. The Acousmonium is a specialised
sound reinforcement system A sound reinforcement system is the combination of microphones, signal processors, amplifiers, and loudspeakers in Loudspeaker enclosure, enclosures all controlled by a mixing console that makes live or pre-recorded sounds louder and may also ...
consisting of between 50 and 100
loudspeakers A loudspeaker (commonly referred to as a speaker or, more fully, a speaker system) is a combination of one or more speaker drivers, an enclosure, and electrical connections (possibly including a crossover network). The speaker driver is an ...
, depending on the character of the concert, of varying shape and size. The system was designed specifically for the concert presentation of musique-concrète-based works but with the added enhancement of sound spatialisation. Loudspeakers are placed both on stage and at positions throughout the performance space and a mixing console is used to manipulate the placement of acousmatic material across the speaker array, using a
performative In the philosophy of language and speech acts theory, performative utterances are sentences which not only describe a given reality, but also change the social reality they are describing. In a 1955 lecture series, later published as ''How to D ...
technique known as '' sound diffusion''. Bayle has commented that the purpose of the Acousmonium is to "substitute a momentary classical disposition of sound making, which diffuses the sound from the circumference towards the centre of the hall, by a group of sound projectors which form an 'orchestration' of the acoustic image". As of 2010, the Acousmonium was still performing, with 64 speakers, 35 amplifiers, and 2 consoles.


In popular music

Although Schaeffer's work aimed to defamiliarize the used sounds, other composers favoured the familiarity of source material by using snippets of music or speech taken from popular entertainment and mass media, with the ethic that "truly contemporary art should reflect not just nature or the industrial-urban environment but the mediascape in which humans increasingly dwelled", according to writer
Simon Reynolds Simon Reynolds (born 19 June 1963) is an English music journalist and author who began his career at ''Melody Maker'' in the mid-1980s. He subsequently worked as a freelancer and published a number of books on music and popular culture. Reynold ...
. Composers such as
James Tenney James Tenney (August 10, 1934 – August 24, 2006) was an American composer and music theorist. He made significant early musical contributions to plunderphonics, sound synthesis, algorithmic composition, process music, spectral music, microt ...
and Arne Mellnäs created pieces in the 1960s that recontextualised the music of
Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977) was an American singer and actor. Referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one of the most significant cultural figures of the ...
and the singer's own voice, respectively, while later in the decade, Bernard Parmegiani created the pieces ''Pop'electric'' and ''Du pop a l'ane'', which used fragments of musical genres such as
easy listening Easy listening (including mood music) is a popular music genre and radio format that was most popular during the 1950s to the 1970s. It is related to middle of the road (MOR) music and encompasses instrumental recordings of standards, hit s ...
,
dixieland Dixieland jazz, also referred to as traditional jazz, hot jazz, or simply Dixieland, is a style of jazz based on the music that developed in New Orleans at the start of the 20th century. The 1917 recordings by the Original Dixieland Jass Band ( ...
,
classical music Classical music generally refers to the art music of the Western world, considered to be #Relationship to other music traditions, distinct from Western folk music or popular music traditions. It is sometimes distinguished as Western classical mu ...
and
progressive rock Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog) is a broad genre of rock music that primarily developed in the United Kingdom through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early-to-mid-1970s. Initially termed " progressive pop", the ...
. Reynolds writes that this approach continued in the later work of musicians
Matmos Matmos is an experimental electronic music duo formed in San Francisco and based in Baltimore. M. C. (Martin) Schmidt and Drew Daniel are the core members, but they frequently include other artists on their records and in their performances no ...
, whose '' A Chance to Cut Is a Chance to Cure'' (2001) was created with the sounds of cosmetic surgery, and the "pop-
collage Collage (, from the , "to glue" or "to stick together") is a technique of art creation, primarily used in the visual arts, but in music too, by which art results from an assembly of different forms, thus creating a new whole. (Compare with pasti ...
" work of John Oswald, who referred to the approach as '
plunderphonics Plunderphonics is a music genre in which tracks are constructed by sampling (music), sampling recognizable musical works. The term was Neologism, coined by composer John Oswald (composer), John Oswald in 1985 in his essay "Plunderphonics, or Aud ...
'. Oswald's ''Plexure'' (1993) was created using recognisable elements of rock and pop music from 1982 to 1992.


1960s

In the 1960s, as popular music began to increase in cultural importance and question its role as commercial entertainment, many popular musicians began taking influence from the post-war avant-garde, including
Brian Wilson Brian Douglas Wilson (June 20, 1942 – June 11, 2025) was an American musician, songwriter, singer and record producer who co-founded the Beach Boys. Often Brian Wilson is a genius, called a genius for his novel approaches to pop compositio ...
of
the Beach Boys The Beach Boys are an American Rock music, rock band formed in Hawthorne, California, in 1961. The group's original lineup consisted of brothers Brian Wilson, Brian, Dennis Wilson, Dennis, and Carl Wilson, their cousin Mike Love, and their f ...
, who would use silence as an instrument on the group's single " The Little Girl I Once Knew" (1965) and splice in a
found sound Found objects are sometimes used in music, often to add unusual percussive elements to a work. Their use in such contexts is as old as music itself, as the original invention of musical instruments almost certainly developed from the sounds of nat ...
recording of passing trains that served as a "musical tag" in the album version of his solo release "
Caroline, No "Caroline, No" is a song by the American musician Brian Wilson that was released as his first solo record on March 7, 1966 and, two months later, reissued as the closing track on the Beach Boys' album ''Pet Sounds''. Written with Tony Asher, the ...
" (1966). He was to have expanded on this further with the ultimately-cancelled Beach Boys album, ''
Smile A smile is a facial expression formed primarily by flexing the muscles at the sides of the mouth. Some smiles include a contraction of the muscles at the corner of the eyes, an action known as a Duchenne smile. Among humans, a smile expresses d ...
'' (1967), where he had plans on weaving in studio recordings of
spoken word Spoken word is an oral poetic performance art that is based mainly on the poem as well as the performer's aesthetic qualities. It is a 20th-century continuation of an oral tradition, ancient oral artistic tradition that focuses on the aesthetic ...
interruptions, vegetable chomping for percussion, construction tools in operation, and wood burning in a trash bin, as well as Nagra tape recordings of various water sources, with the idea of these being crucial aspects of the music. Alongside Wilson, popular exponents of this practice were
the Beatles The Beatles were an English Rock music, rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. The core lineup of the band comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are widely regarded as the Cultural impact of the Beatle ...
, who incorporated techniques such as tape loops, speed manipulation, and reverse playback in their song "
Tomorrow Never Knows "Tomorrow Never Knows" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles, written primarily by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. It was released in August 1966 as the final track on their album ''Revolver'', although it was the firs ...
" (1966). Bernard Gendron describes the Beatles' ''musique concrète'' experimentation as helping popularise avant-garde art in the era, alongside
Jimi Hendrix James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix (born Johnny Allen Hendrix; November 27, 1942September 18, 1970) was an American singer-songwriter and musician. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential guitarists of all time. Inducted ...
's use of
noise Noise is sound, chiefly unwanted, unintentional, or harmful sound considered unpleasant, loud, or disruptive to mental or hearing faculties. From a physics standpoint, there is no distinction between noise and desired sound, as both are vibrat ...
and
feedback Feedback occurs when outputs of a system are routed back as inputs as part of a chain of cause and effect that forms a circuit or loop. The system can then be said to ''feed back'' into itself. The notion of cause-and-effect has to be handle ...
,
Bob Dylan Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan; born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Described as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture over his nearly 70-year ...
's surreal lyricism and
Frank Zappa Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American guitarist, composer, and bandleader. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa composed Rock music, rock, Pop music, pop, jazz, jazz fusion, orchestra ...
's "ironic detachment". In ''
The Wire ''The Wire'' is an American Crime fiction, crime Drama (film and television), drama television series created and primarily written by the American author and former police reporter David Simon for the cable network HBO. The series premiered o ...
'', Edwin Pouncey wrote that the 1960s represented the height of confluence between rock and academic music, noting that composers like
Luciano Berio Luciano Berio (24 October 1925 – 27 May 2003) was an Italian composer noted for his experimental music, experimental work (in particular his 1968 composition ''Sinfonia (Berio), Sinfonia'' and his series of virtuosic solo pieces titled ''Seque ...
and Pierre Henry found likeness in the "distorting-mirror" sound of
psychedelic rock Psychedelic rock is a rock music Music genre, genre that is inspired, influenced, or representative of psychedelia, psychedelic culture, which is centered on perception-altering hallucinogenic drugs. The music incorporated new electronic sound ...
, and that ''concrète'''s contrasting tones and timbres were suited to the effects of
psychedelic drug Psychedelics are a subclass of hallucinogenic drugs whose primary effect is to trigger non-ordinary mental states (known as psychedelic experiences or "trips") and a perceived "expansion of consciousness". Also referred to as classic halluc ...
s. Following the Beatles' example, many groups incorporated found sounds into otherwise typical pop songs for psychedelic effect, resulting in "pop and rock musique concrète flirtations"; examples include
the Lovin' Spoonful The Lovin' Spoonful is a Canadian-American folk-rock band formed in Greenwich Village, New York City, in 1964. The band were among the most popular groups in the United States for a short period in the mid-1960s and their music and image influ ...
's " Summer in the City" (1966),
Love Love is a feeling of strong attraction and emotional attachment (psychology), attachment to a person, animal, or thing. It is expressed in many forms, encompassing a range of strong and positive emotional and mental states, from the most su ...
's " 7 and 7 Is" (1967) and The Box Tops' " The Letter" (1967). Popular musicians more versed in modern classical and experimental music utilised elements of musique concrète more maturely, including Zappa and
the Mothers of Invention The Mothers of Invention (also known as the Mothers) were an American rock music, rock band from California. Formed in 1964, their work is marked by the use of sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. Originally an ...
on pieces like the
Edgard Varèse Edgard Victor Achille Charles Varèse (; also spelled Edgar; December 22, 1883 – November 6, 1965) was a French and American composer who spent the greater part of his career in the United States. Varèse's music emphasizes timbre and rhythm; h ...
tribute " The Return of the Son of Monster Magnet" (1966), " The Chrome Planted Megaphone of Destiny" and '' Lumpy Gravy'' (both 1968), and
Jefferson Airplane Jefferson Airplane was an American Rock music, rock band formed in San Francisco, California, in 1965. One of the pioneering bands of psychedelic rock, the group defined the San Francisco Sound and was the first from the San Francisco Bay Area, ...
's "Would You Like a Snack?" (1968), while the
Grateful Dead The Grateful Dead was an American rock music, rock band formed in Palo Alto, California, in 1965. Known for their eclectic style that fused elements of rock, blues, jazz, Folk music, folk, country music, country, bluegrass music, bluegrass, roc ...
's album ''
Anthem of the Sun ''Anthem of the Sun'' is the second album by American rock band the Grateful Dead, released on July 16, 1968, by Warner Bros-Seven Arts. The album was assembled through a collage-like editing approach helmed by members Jerry Garcia and Phil Les ...
'' (1968), which featured Berio student Phil Lesh on bass, features musique concrète passages that Pouncey compared to Varèse's ''Deserts'' and the "keyboard deconstructions" of John Cage and
Conlon Nancarrow Samuel Conlon Nancarrow (; October 27, 1912 – August 10, 1997) was an American-Mexican composer who lived and worked in Mexico for most of his life. Nancarrow is best remembered for his ''Studies for Player Piano'', being one of the first ...
. The Beatles continued their use of concrète on songs such as "
Strawberry Fields Forever "Strawberry Fields Forever" is a song by the English Rock music, rock band the Beatles, written by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. It was released on 13 February 1967 as a double A-side single with "Penny Lane". It represented ...
", "
Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite! "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" is a song recorded by the English rock band the Beatles for their 1967 album ''Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band''. It was written and composed primarily by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. ...
" and "
I Am the Walrus "I Am the Walrus" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their 1967 television film ''Magical Mystery Tour (film), Magical Mystery Tour''. Written by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney, it was released as the B-side to ...
" (all 1967), before the approach climaxed with the pure musique concrète piece "
Revolution 9 "Revolution 9" is a sound collage from the Beatles' 1968 self-titled double album (also known as the "White Album"). The composition, credited to Lennon–McCartney, was created primarily by John Lennon with assistance from Yoko Ono and George ...
" (1968); afterwards,
John Lennon John Winston Ono Lennon (born John Winston Lennon; 9 October 19408 December 1980) was an English singer-songwriter, musician and activist. He gained global fame as the founder, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of the Beatles. Lennon's ...
, alongside wife and
Fluxus Fluxus was an international, interdisciplinary community of artists, composers, designers, and poets during the 1960s and 1970s who engaged in experimental performance art, art performances which emphasized the artistic process over the finishe ...
artist
Yoko Ono Yoko Ono (, usually spelled in katakana as ; born February 18, 1933) is a Japanese multimedia artist, singer, songwriter, and peace activist. Her work also encompasses performance art and filmmaking. Ono grew up in Tokyo and moved to New York ...
, continued the approach on their solo works ''Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins, Two Virgins'' (1968) and ''Unfinished Music No. 2: Life with the Lions, Life with the Lions'' (1969).


1970s

The musique concrète elements present on Pink Floyd's best-selling album ''The Dark Side of the Moon'' (1973), including the cash register sounds on "Money (Pink Floyd song), Money", have been cited as notable examples of the practice's influence on popular music. Also in 1973, German band Faust (band), Faust released ''The Faust Tapes''; priced in the United Kingdom at 49 pence, the album was described by writer Chris Jones as "a contender for the most widely heard piece of musique concrete" after "Revolution 9". Another German group, Kraftwerk, achieved a surprise hit in 1975 with "Autobahn (song), Autobahn", which contained a "sampled collage of revving engines, horns and traffic noise". Stephen Dalton of ''The Times'' wrote: "This droll blend of accessible pop and avant-garde musique concrete propelled Kraftwerk across America for three months". Steve Taylor writes that industrial music, industrial groups Throbbing Gristle and Cabaret Voltaire (band), Cabaret Voltaire continued the concrète tradition with collages constructed with tape manipulation and loops, while Ian Inglis credits Brian Eno for introducing new sensibilities "about what could be in included in the canon of popular music", citing his 1970s ambient music, ambient work and the musique concrete collages on ''My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (album), My Life in the Bush of Ghosts'' (1981), which combines tape samples with synthesised sounds.


1980s and beyond

With the emergence of hip hop music in the 1980s, deejays such as Grandmaster Flash utitlised turntablism, turnables to "[montage] in real time" with portions of rock, rhythm and blues, R&B and disco records, in order to create groove (music), groove-based music with percussive scratching; this provided a parallel breakthrough to collage artist Christian Marclay's use of vinyl records as a "noise-generating medium" in his own work. Reynolds wrote: "As music sampler, sampling technology grew more affordable, DJs-turned-producers like Eric B. developed hip-hop into a studio-based art. Although there was no direct line traceable between the two Pierres and Marley Marl, it was as if ''musique concrète'' went truant from the academy and became street music, the soundtrack to block parties and driving." He described this era of hip hop as "the most vibrant and flourishing descendant – albeit an indirect one – of ''musique concrète''". ''Chicago Readers J. Niimi writes that when Public Enemy producers the Bomb Squad "unwittingly revisited" the concept of musique concrète with their sample-based music, they proved that the technique "worked great as pop". In 1989, John Diliberto of ''Music Technology'' described the group Art of Noise as having both digitised and synthesised musique concrète and "locked it into a crunching groove and turned it into dance music for the '80s". He wrote that while Schaeffer and Henry used tapes in their work, Art of Noise "uses Fairlight CMIs and Akai S1000 samplers and the skyscrapers of multitrack recording to create their updated sound". As described by Will Hodgkinson, Art of Noise brought classical and avant-garde sounds into pop by "[aiming] to emulate the musique concrète composers of the 1950s" via Fairlight samplers instead of tape. In a piece for ''Pitchfork (website), Pitchfork'', musicians Matmos noted the use of musique concrète in later popular music, including the crying baby effects in Aaliyah's "Are You That Somebody?" (1998) or Missy Elliott's "Work It (Missy Elliott song), backwards chorus", while noting that the aesthetic was arguably built upon by works including Art of Noise's "Close (to the Edit)" (1984), Meat Beat Manifesto's ''Storm the Studio'' (1989) and the work of Public Enemy, Negativland and People Like Us (musician), People Like Us, among other examples. Chuck Eddy writes that, by 1991, heavy metal music, heavy metal bands began absorbing a wealth of esoteric outside inspirations, citing the "found-sound jackhammer-and-national-anthem musique concrète" on Slaughter (band), Slaughter's "Up All Night (Slaughter song), Up All Night" (1990) as a key example.


See also

* Audium (theater), Audium * Birmingham ElectroAcoustic Sound Theatre * Canadian Electroacoustic Community * Computer music * Concrete poetry * Noise music * Sound art * Sound collage * Sound design * Sound engineering


Notes


References


Sources

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Further reading

* Dack, John (1993). "La Recherche de l'Instrument Perdu". ''Electroacoustic Music: Journal of the Electroacoustic Music Association of Great Britain'' 7:. * * (cloth) (pbk). * * Jaffrennou, Pierre-Alain (1998). "De la scénographie sonore". In ''Le son et l'espace: 1ères Rencontres musicales pluridisciplinaires, Lyon, 1995'', edited by Hugues Genevois and Yann Orlarey, 143–156. Musique et sciences. Lyon: GRAME & Aléas. . * Kane, Brian (2007). "L'Objet Sonore Maintenant: Pierre Schaeffer, Sound Objects and the Phenomenological Reduction". ''Organised Sound'', 12, no. 1:15–24. * Manning, Peter (1985). ''Electronic and Computer Music''. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press. . * Michael Nyman, Nyman, Michael (1999), ''Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond'', 2nd edition. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. (cloth); (pbk). * Palombini, Carlos (1998).
Pierre Schaeffer, 1953: 'Towards an Experimental Music', An Exegesis of Schaeffer's 'Vers une musique expérimentale'
. ''Music & Letters'' 74, no. 4:542–557. * Schaeffer, Pierre (1952b). "L'objet musical". ''La Revue Musicale: L'œuvre du XXe siècle'', no. 212: 65–76. * * Vella, Richard (2000). ''Musical Environments: A Manual for Listening, Improvising and Composing'', with additional topics by Andy Arthurs. Sydney: Currency Press. . Reprinted as "Sounds in Space: Sounds in Time: Projects in Listening, Improvising and Composing". London: Boosey & Hawkes, 2003. . *


External links


INA-GRM website
*
Home page
François Bayle
Michel Chion official site

Electroacoustic Music Studies Network
* Bernard Parmegiani's persona
website
* INA-GRM 31st season (2008/2009). Multiphonies program o
events

''Organised Sound''
an international journal of music and technology
Audium
a theatre of sound-sculptured space {{DEFAULTSORT:Musique Concrete Musique concrète, Pierre Schaeffer Sound collages Experimental music Musical techniques