concepts and elaborations

Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G Major – II. Andante by Wendy Carlos

Is a classical piece performed on an electric piano. There are many different pitch bends and sound effects in the piece, which make it more interesting then your typical classical piece. The strengths of this work are its melody and versatility of sounds. The different sound effects combine to create very interesting sound layers. However, some of the sounds used are borderline campy. Some seem like they could have been created using a children’s piano toy. These sounds add a layer of informality to the work. However, if these were created by an actual children’s piano (or something similar) this re-appropriation of technology could be very inventive. The aesthetic that comes from this work reminds me of an 8-bit video game soundtrack. It sounds like the midi tracks used to create the sounds for old Nintendo games. This aesthetic is very successful though, because for me it creates visuals of these games while I am listening to the piece.

Concert PH by Innis Xenakis

Is a very piece with recorded sounds that sound like they are from a wind chime or some sort of percussive instrument. It is a piece that relies only on one source for its music. It is textually build up from the clanking of the object, and the overlap of these sounds creates the sonic texture used throughout the piece. This piece, however, is very redundant. The sound, while it is interesting, seems to almost carry the whole piece the whole way though, but at the end it leaves the listening wishing that something more happened in the song. Using one sound could be considered innovative, but it seems like more variety could have been used to make the sounds more interesting. The aesthetic intention of this work seems to call in inspiration from a wind chime or rain hitting a tin roof. While this is achieve somewhat, it seems that the piece could use more variation to make it stronger.