Electronic Inspirations: Technologies of the Cold War Musical Avant-Garde (The New Cultural History of Music Series)

316 Pages·2018·4.163 MB·English

by  Jennifer Iverson

Electronic Inspirations
Series Editor Jane F. Fulcher
Series Board
Members: Celia Applegate
Philip Bohlman
Kate van Orden
Michael P. Steinberg
Enlightenment Orpheus: The Power of Music in Other Worlds
Vanessa Agnew
Voice Lessons: French Mélodie in the Belle Epoque
Katherine Bergeron
Songs, Scribes, and Societies: The History and Reception of the Loire
Valley Chansonniers
Jane Alden
Harmony and Discord: Music and the Transformation of Russian
Cultural Life
Lynn M. Sargeant
Musical Renderings of the Philippine Nation
Christi- Anne Castro
The Sense of Sound: Musical Meaning in France, 1260–1 330
Emma Dillon
Staging the French Revolution: Cultural Politics and the Paris Opera,
1789– 1794
Mark Darlow
Music, Piety, and Propaganda: The Soundscapes of Counter- Reformation
Bavaria
Alexander J. Fisher
The Politics of Appropriation: German Romantic Music and the Ancient
Greek Legacy
Jason Geary
Defining Deutschtum: Political Ideology, German Identity, and Music-
Critical Discourse in Liberal Vienna
David Brodbeck
Materialities: Books, Readers, and the Chanson in
Sixteenth- Century Europe
Kate van Orden
Singing the Resurrection: Body, Community, and Belief in
Reformation Europe
Erin Lambert
Electronic Inspirations: Technologies of the Cold War Musical
Avant- Garde
Jennifer Iverson

Electronic
Inspirations
Technologies of the Jennifer
Iverson
Cold War Musical
Avant- Garde
1
3
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers
the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education
by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University
Press in the UK and certain other countries.
Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press
198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America.
© Oxford University Press 2019
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction
rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the
address above.
You must not circulate this work in any other form
and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Iverson, Jennifer, author.
Title: Electronic inspirations : technologies of the Cold War musical avant-garde / Jennifer Iverson.
Description: New York, NY : Oxford University Press, 2018. |
Series: New cultural history of music series | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018006765 | ISBN 9780190868192 (hardcover : alk. paper) |
ISBN 9780190868208 (pbk. : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Electronic music—20th century—History and criticism. |
Westdeutscher Rundfunk. Studio umlaut: Elektronische Musik.
Classification: LCC ML1380.I84 2018 | DDC 786.709/045—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018006765
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Paperback printed by Sheridan Books, Inc., United States of America
Hardback printed by Bridgeport National Bindery, Inc., United States of America
This volume is published with the generous support of the AMS 75 PAYS Endowment of the
American Musicological Society, funded in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
For Della and Ian: dream it.
Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
1 Origins: Creating a Laboratory 23
2 Kinship: Cage, Tudor, and the New Timbral
Utopia 49
3 Collaboration: The Science and Culture of Additive
Synthesis 75
4 Reclaiming Technology: From Information Theory
to Statistical Form 105
5 Controversy: The Aleatory Debates Beyond
Darmstadt 139
6 Technosynthesis: From Vocoder Speech to
Electronic Music 167
Epilogue 195
Notes 201
Glossary of Actors 241
Bibliography 251
Index 293
Don’t stop after beating the swords
into ploughshares, don’t stop! Go on beating
and make musical instruments out of them.
Whoever wants to make war again
will have to turn them into ploughshares first.
— Yehuda Amichai, “An appendix to the vision of peace”
Acknowledgments
Once I articulated “invisible collaboration” as a central theme of this book,
I began to see it everywhere. My own work is deeply and immeasurably
enriched by the collaborative encounters that define my scholarship. In
researching this book, I have spent considerable time in European archives,
foremost among them the Paul Sacher Foundation in Basel—t he city I call
my second home. While I am there and while I am not, I am grateful for
the attentive guidance of Heidy Zimmermann, Matthias Kassel, Angela
Ida de Benedictis, Michèle Noirjean-L inder, Evelyne Diendorf, and Isolde
Degen. At the WDR Historical Archive in Cologne, I benefited from the
help of Jutta Lambrecht, Petra Witting- Noethen, and Maria Lutze. At the
Stockhausen Foundation in Kürten, I am grateful for the significant assis-
tance of Maria Lukas, Suzanne Stephens- Janning, and the always responsive
Kathinka Pasveer. Several copyright holders have generously given permis-
sion to publish archival materials, including the Amichai family, the Nono
family, the Xenakis family, the Pousseur family, and the Berio family. I have
benefited much from sustained interactions with European interlocutors who
know midcentury electronic music inside and out, including Kees Tazelaar,
Pascal Decroupet, and Elena Ungeheuer. I have especially enjoyed many
conversations with Gottfried Michael Koenig, who generously shared his
insider experience and deepened my understanding of everything from the
techniques to the politics of the studio.
I began working on this project in fits and starts at the University of
Iowa, where the support of David Gier (now at University of Michigan) and
the mentoring of Christine Getz and Jennifer Sessions helped me toward a
crystalized idea. I learned so much in conversations and continuing study
with my then- junior colleagues, including Matthew Arndt, Nicole Biamonte