Iannis Xenakis

Sunday, 4 February, 2001, 15:01 GMT
Xenakis, modern composer, dies

The leading contemporary music composer, Yannis
Xenakis, has died in France at the age of
seventy-eight.

Xenakis, born in Romania into a family of Greek
origin, invented a new music style using computers.

He was also a reputed mathematician and architect.

Xenakis moved to Paris in 1947 because of his political
beliefs after fighting with the Greek resistance during
the second world war.

The French president, Jacques Chirac, said the country
had lost one of its most brilliant artists.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm
* http://mp3.com/davidbeardsley

--- In tuning@y..., David Beardsley <xouoxno@v...> wrote:

/tuning/topicId_18327.html#18327

> Sunday, 4 February, 2001, 15:01 GMT
> Xenakis, modern composer, dies
>
> The leading contemporary music composer, Yannis
> Xenakis, has died in France at the age of
> seventy-eight.
>

Thank you, David, for keeping us in touch with this so promptly.
Last year, I had the good fortune to meet privately in Paris with
Xenakis and my conductor friend who has been doing his music.

He didn't look all that well then... but not really so bad. However,
things can certainly change rapidly at that age.

Thanks again for the prompt notice!

_______ _____ ____ _
Joseph Pehrson

Godspeed You granular emperor
RIP Iannis
i have an original copy of his book

Pat Pagano, Director
South East Just Intonation Society
http://indians.australians.com/meherbaba/
http://www.screwmusicforever.com/SHREESWIFT/
----- Original Message -----
From: <jpehrson@rcn.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 04, 2001 2:31 PM
Subject: [tuning] Re: Iannis Xenakis

> --- In tuning@y..., David Beardsley <xouoxno@v...> wrote:
>
> /tuning/topicId_18327.html#18327
>
>
> > Sunday, 4 February, 2001, 15:01 GMT
> > Xenakis, modern composer, dies
> >
> > The leading contemporary music composer, Yannis
> > Xenakis, has died in France at the age of
> > seventy-eight.
> >
>
> Thank you, David, for keeping us in touch with this so promptly.
> Last year, I had the good fortune to meet privately in Paris with
> Xenakis and my conductor friend who has been doing his music.
>
> He didn't look all that well then... but not really so bad. However,
> things can certainly change rapidly at that age.
>
> Thanks again for the prompt notice!
>
> _______ _____ ____ _
> Joseph Pehrson
>
>
>
>
> You do not need web access to participate. You may subscribe through
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>
>
>

jpehrson@rcn.com wrote:
>
> --- In tuning@y..., David Beardsley <xouoxno@v...> wrote:
>
> /tuning/topicId_18327.html#18327
>
> > Sunday, 4 February, 2001, 15:01 GMT
> > Xenakis, modern composer, dies
> >
> > The leading contemporary music composer, Yannis
> > Xenakis, has died in France at the age of
> > seventy-eight.
> >
>
> Thank you, David, for keeping us in touch with this so promptly.
> Last year, I had the good fortune to meet privately in Paris with
> Xenakis and my conductor friend who has been doing his music.

I'll guess: Charles Zacharie Bornstein?

> He didn't look all that well then... but not really so bad. However,
> things can certainly change rapidly at that age.

I heard that he had Alzheimer's disease
and had stopped composing. Any truth to this?

> Thanks again for the prompt notice!

I first caught win of this this morning in a usenet newsgroups,
but couldn't verify this until afternoon. I wanted to make
sure it wasn't a web hoax.

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm
* http://mp3.com/davidbeardsley

Hello
I am glad that there are people appreciating Greek artists outside of
Greece.
Here , nobody talked about Xenakis except for the evening news on his death.
Goodbye Iannis

_________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

Jay here,
Thanks much, David, for sending the obit on. As some of you may know, I
studied with, and was a grad assistant for Xenakis for four years while At
Indiana U. We held classes that went for hours, long into the night. He was
a mentor to me and and a good friend. No, I won't start on the myraid
stories about him, but you can be sure that there are plenty! Guess I'll
let the studio resound with "Orient Occident" and some others.
At 01:52 PM 2/4/01 -0500, you wrote:
>Sunday, 4 February, 2001, 15:01 GMT
>Xenakis, modern composer, dies
>
>The leading contemporary music composer, Yannis
>Xenakis, has died in France at the age of
>seventy-eight.
>
>Xenakis, born in Romania into a family of Greek
>origin, invented a new music style using computers.
>
>He was also a reputed mathematician and architect.
>
>Xenakis moved to Paris in 1947 because of his political
>beliefs after fighting with the Greek resistance during
>the second world war.
>
>The French president, Jacques Chirac, said the country
>had lost one of its most brilliant artists.
>
>>From the newsroom of the BBC World Service
>
>
>--
>* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
>* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
>* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm
>* http://mp3.com/davidbeardsley
>
>
>You do not need web access to participate. You may subscribe through
>email. Send an empty email to one of these addresses:
> tuning-subscribe@egroups.com - join the tuning group.
> tuning-unsubscribe@egroups.com - unsubscribe from the tuning group.
> tuning-nomail@egroups.com - put your email message delivery on hold for
the tuning group.
> tuning-digest@egroups.com - change your subscription to daily digest mode.
> tuning-normal@egroups.com - change your subscription to individual emails.
>
>
>

Jay Williams wrote:
>
> Jay here,
> Thanks much, David, for sending the obit on. As some of you may know, I
> studied with, and was a grad assistant for Xenakis for four years while At
> Indiana U. We held classes that went for hours, long into the night. He was
> a mentor to me and and a good friend. No, I won't start on the myraid
> stories about him, but you can be sure that there are plenty!

Write it all down anyway!

> Guess I'll
> let the studio resound with "Orient Occident" and some others.

I listened to Live in NY and Electronic Music (EMF/INA) this afternoon.

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm
* http://mp3.com/davidbeardsley

--- In tuning@y..., David Beardsley <xouoxno@v...> wrote:

/tuning/topicId_18327.html#18334

> >
> > Thank you, David, for keeping us in touch with this so promptly.
> > Last year, I had the good fortune to meet privately in Paris with
> > Xenakis and my conductor friend who has been doing his music.
>
> I'll guess: Charles Zacharie Bornstein?
>

This is correct, David... and Xenakis widow phoned him shortly after
it happened...

>
> > He didn't look all that well then... but not really so bad.
However,things can certainly change rapidly at that age.
>
> I heard that he had Alzheimer's disease
> and had stopped composing. Any truth to this?
>

Well, it was really unclear that it was Alzheimers... I believe he
had a series of small strokes that made it difficult for him to
concentrate. He seemed pretty sharp last year when I saw him... but
not, of course, like he used to be. I think it was more the
concentration thing that made it difficult for him to compose... and
yes, he had stopped for a year or so...

Johnny Reinhard, who also knows Xenakis, claims that he has been in
decline for some time. It is a sad case when somebody as brilliant
as he was starts to drop marbles.... C'est la vie!

>
> > Thanks again for the prompt notice!
>
> I first caught win of this this morning in a usenet newsgroups,
> but couldn't verify this until afternoon. I wanted to make
> sure it wasn't a web hoax.
>
Thanks for the notice and followup...

_____ ____ ___ _
Joseph Pehrson

As it happened when I got the sad news about my favourite contemporary
composer I was listening to R.Strauss' Metamorphosen. I will play his
works as soon as I feel sufficiently recovered.

I was not aware that he was ill. I last saw him when I persuaded the
University to give him an honorary degree, but that was some time
back.

==John ffitch

Xenakis was in New York not too long ago, and I noticed he did not respond
directly to questions posed by the many people asking. He didn't recognize
me, even though a year earlier he was reminiscing about me to his buddy Radu
Stan in the Salabert offices. But a year later, Xenakis' most recent
composition, premiered by conductor Bornstein, was for brass and in a most
tonal "non-Xenakisian" harmony. It was sweet with consonance. I thought,
and shared my feelings with close friends that he was seriously ill.

What is less anecdotal is my 2 hour stay at his home in Paris in 1985. I had
called him on the telephone and he said come on over. Without resource of
instrument or recordings we talked as if we were on the same wave length.
How I had hoped for a solo work by the great European master. He was always
my favorite for France. At that time Xenakis was planning a Mayan excursion
to Mexico. It was the phase for him at the time. Afterwards I long thought
it superb that we both lived in walkup apartments in big cities. No
elevators, and he had 2 floors at the top of the building.

Xenakis was a man who was real, who stood by convictions, who was a brilliant
polymath, who harnessed improvisation in stochasticism, who deepened the
ear's journey through sound, who was in complete command of technology, who
was the premier architect of both the tangible and intangible, and who was a
generous educator in all parts of the world.

His interest did not lie in just intonation. Rather, Xenakis - who thought
the explosive sounds he heard in his bombed village the most "beautiful"
sounds he ever heard - plotted quartertones and the glissandi the combines
them.

One of my favorite moments was conducting his octet "Anaktoria" on an AFMM
concert. What a wonderful work - "Castle in the Sky" in Greek. He possessed
theater, mass, delicacy, virtuosity, a plot. In short, he will be sorely
missed.

Johnny Reinhard
AFMM