Re: [tuning] Digest Number 1033: the unimpressed

Joseph Pehrson was generally unimpressed by composers using csound, John
ffitch by a first taste of Partch.

I think Mr. Pehrson is first making a category error, in that csound (which
I don't happen to use myself)is not a school of composition but rather an
environment and collection of tools for realizing compositions. The use of
csound is not restricted to people who compose and then use csound to solve
particular realization problems. Indeed, I would not be surprised if the
csound users' community was largely made up of people who started out to
compose and then became progressively more engaged wit technical issues.
Thus, a lot of the work done is more in the form of examples than extended
compositions.

Pehrson's alternative suggestion was to use midi. That is not quite right,
as (a) there are countless more mediocre compositions made in midi
environments as in csound, and (b) midi can well be part of a cscound
composer's workbench. For example, by composing in midi, then rendering a
final recording in csound, which can be much more finely -- and broadly
detailed -- than a pure midi arrangement.

To John ffitch, I would say, as someone who has lived with the complete
Partch works for a long time (recordings for 26 years, the scores for 23)
that he was both a significant and uneven composer. When he was good
(Barstow, the Intrusions, Castor & Pollux, Oedipus, The Bewitched, On the
Seventh Day Petals Fell on Petaluma, Delusion of the Fury), he was superb.
Some pieces are near-misses (US Highball, Revelation in the Courthouse
Park), his failures are sometimes interesting (Even Wild Horses, Dark
Brother), sometimes not (Water! Water!). His reputation has suffered due to
uneven performances and recordings, and he was not altogether innocent in
this. The best performances, in my opinion, remain those on the two
Columbia recordings (The World of Harry Partch, Delusion of the Fury), and
The Dreamer That Remains (on the New World release, which include some of
the Intrusions and Li Po songs, as good examples of questionable
performances).

Daniel Wolf
Budapest

Daniel Wolf wrote,

<< The best performances, in my opinion, remain those on the two
Columbia recordings (The World of Harry Partch, Delusion of the Fury),
and The Dreamer That Remains (on the New World release, >>

The New World "Dreamer" is probably my favorite Partch performance as
well...

--Dan Stearns

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "Daniel Wolf" <djwolf1@m...> wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/17268

> I think Mr. Pehrson is first making a category error, in that
csound(which I don't happen to use myself)is not a school of
compositionbut rather an environment and collection of tools for
realizing compositions. The use of csound is not restricted to
people who compose and then use csound to solve particular
realization
problems. Indeed, I would not be surprised if the csound users'
community was largely made up of people who started out to compose
and then became progressively more engaged wit technical issues.
Thus,
a lot of the work done is more in the form of examples than
extended compositions.
>

Hello Daniel Wolf, and I am very happy to see that you have,
apparently, surmounted your "pesty" online access problems in
Budapest, and have been contributing again. Your contributions, as I
am more than certain you are aware, our invaluable to our discussions
here, particularly in the historical realm of the so called "Western
Common (very) Practice Period..." (And others)

However, I do have to disagree a bit with the statements you make
above. I remember from my early days in computer music, using "Music
4," the predecessor of CSOUND in the uproarious '60's, that the
majority of people working with this computer program were people
majoring in science or mathematics. Well, yes, many were also
composers, and I am certain that several (though I can't think of
any) went on to composition careers. For many of these people, the
WORKINGS of Music 4 was as much "fun" as the final composition
product which, unfortunately because of the interface, was rather
minimal.

At the risk of boring some of the younger listers... but hang in
there, becase this is kind of humorous... I would like to briefly
describe the process:

In the first place, there was the "computer." No, there were no
"personal computers..." Imagine that. The "computer" was a large
black box-building... looking a little like a Moslem shrine (what is
the big one, the "Kabala..."??) Anyway, of course it was a
mainframe, and an entire building. The irony is the fact that I am
certain it had the "brainpower" of an average laptop today.

THEN, there was the issue of the "interface." Ahem. There were no
"computer monitors..." Sure, people had television sets, but nobody
yet thought to hook one up to a computer... or, at least, they were
only in the prototypical stages...

For each "run" of the computer program, one had to wait in a long
line, behind a string of science and engineering students until your
number was "called." It was a little like fast-food take-out, only
not as speedy....

Then, you would get a "print out" with the results of your program.
Not any kind of "sound file" but a text print out. This would show
the results of your program, and for EACH CHANGE... i.e. in a "bug
fix" you had to run the d... thing again and stand in line.

ADDITIONALLY, in order to make the changes, you had to PUNCH CARDS...
not only were there no monitors, but there were no KEYBOARDS... You
would then hand these cards to the student behind the fast food
window...

Is it any wonder that only a limited amount of music could be
produced in this way??

Also, nowadays each computer has within it, a "digital to analog"
converter... every sound card has one... so we can immediately hear
the music.

Not then. There was no such thing anyplace. The only institution in
the entire Midwest that had one was Oberlin. University of Michigan,
where this cube existed, didn't have one...

So, we all had to ride in a mini-van down to Oberlin to get our
pieces converted. Frankly, I only had about a 20 second piece and,
as I recall, I never did get to hear it, since some of the
computer-science types had longer affairs that, apparently, took
precedence. I don't believe I heard ANY of their efforts either,
however...

The only "upside" was the fact that this entire class was under the
direction of John Clough... whom many on this list know as an eminent
theory and tuning scholar... so that made it all worthwhile...

A little bit of humorous history for those interested....
________ _____ ____
Joseph Pehrson

on 1/9/01 3:51 PM, tuning@egroups.com at tuning@egroups.com wrote:

> Message: 10
> Date: Tue, 09 Jan 2001 14:32:09 -0000
> From: "Joseph Pehrson" <pehrson@pubmedia.com>
> Subject: the dark ages of computer music
>

> At the risk of boring some of the younger listers... but hang in
> there, becase this is kind of humorous... I would like to briefly
> describe the process:
>
> In the first place, there was the "computer." No, there were no
> "personal computers..." Imagine that. The "computer" was a large
> black box-building... looking a little like a Moslem shrine (what is
> the big one, the "Kabala..."??) Anyway, of course it was a
> mainframe, and an entire building. The irony is the fact that I am
> certain it had the "brainpower" of an average laptop today.

Thanks for posting this story. It offers a great perspective, especially
since, even with all the technology and tools available to us today as
composers, I/we still find plenty of problems in them to kvetch about.

Seth

--
Seth Austen

http://www.sethausten.com
email; seth@sethausten.com

"Music is far, far older than our species. It is tens of millions of years
old, and the fact that animals as wildly divergent as whales, humans and
birds come out with similar laws for what they compose suggests to me that
there are a finite number of musical sounds that will entertain the
vertebrate brain."

Roger Payne, president of Ocean Alliance

--- In tuning@egroups.com, Seth Austen <acoustic@l...> wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/17362

>>
> Thanks for posting this story. It offers a great perspective,
especially since, even with all the technology and tools available to
us today as composers, I/we still find plenty of problems in them to
kvetch about.
>
> Seth
>
> --
> Seth Austen
>
> http://www.sethausten.com
> email; seth@s...
>
>

Thanks, Seth... glad you enjoyed it!

> "Music is far, far older than our species. It is tens of millions
of
years old, and the fact that animals as wildly divergent as whales,
humans and birds come out with similar laws for what they compose
suggests to me that there are a finite number of musical sounds that
will entertain the vertebrate brain."
>
> Roger Payne, president of Ocean Alliance

The "vertebrate brain".... That's definitely what I'm going for in my
own composing!

_________ _____ _____ _
Joseph Pehrson