Skip to main content

Listening Report on Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Kontakte (version Nr. 12 ½)

 Sarah Kumar

Dr. Bernd Herzogenrath

The Future of (American) Music

05 Mar. 2023

Listening Report on Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Kontakte (version Nr. 12 ½)

The composition starts with the piano, then incorporates percussion and not long after electronic sounds. The electronic sounds sound like distortions of the piano at times, like static disrupting the piano’s flow, but it slowly becomes part of it as a deep reverberating noise builds up behind the percussion and piano sounds. The components to this composition have different pitches and tones, and the piano, in comparison to the longer electronic sounds, has rather short, abrupt sounds. It reminds me of music for thrillers or horror movies, in which during scenes of surprise or anticipation, dissonant sounds are played to convey the disarray of the situation. The abrupt high pitches of the piano feel like a jump-scare at times.

However, although I did call the sounds in this composition dissonant, they still fit together as a whole. The lower pitch of the electronic sound – the distorting noises – make the piano sound less random but pulled together into a piece. The sounds in this composition decrease and increase in volume and timbre, until at some point, they sound like brown noise to me. I think this composition is meant to be heard from several speakers that can carry the sound throughout the room, and I would imagine it to be like waves crashing in from one side of the room to the other, from several directions.

This is especially evident in the middle of the composition. It starts off with a very quiet, low electronic sound that slowly grows in volume until some piano notes and percussion set in. The electronic sound in the background is what I imagine visuals of sonic waves to sound like (Kontakte 22:31). If the sound came out of speakers, it would feel like a rolling wave that rises and falls from different directions. I think that this is the effect the composition wanted to accomplish, that is, the effect of sonic waves. The different pitches and timbres and volume of the sounds in it are like separate pieces that flow from different directions of a room to coagulate inside a person’s mind. Therefore, I believe that the pauses in the composition are not simply empty to leave room before the next sounds come in; rather, the electronic sounds are too low to be heard, and only after they pass a certain point can the ear make them out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

Herzogenrath, Bernd. Kontakte (version Nr. 12 ½). Google Drive – Reader FUTURE OF MUSIC, 16 Nov. 2023, https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1QDtXfi9NKoOUnvw7RedhUQ2O2BfQp8lA. Accessed 6 Mar. 2023.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Listening Report on John Oswald: Plexure

 Sarah Kumar Dr. Bernd Herzogenrath The Future of (American) Music 06 Mar. 2023 Listening Report on John Oswald: Plexure According to John Oswald, “[a] plunderphone is a recognizable sonic quote, using the actual sound of something familiar which has already been recorded” (Lecture Slides 18). However, only if the source stays recognizable can it be called plunderphonics. In his album Plexure , several songs are played back and mixed together, thus creating a new sound. This is interesting because while the excerpts of songs that are used are recognizable or at least sound familiar to some degree, played backwards and mashed up as they are in Plexure , they create a new sound. Like on the cover of the album, on which a collage making up a man can be seen, the mixing of different songs played backwards gives a new feeling to something known. The way the songs are mixed makes them unintelligible. The meaning of the words of the original recordings are not able to be compr...
Post a Comment
Read more

John Cage – Inlets

  This does not sound like music to me. Depending on the interpretation of different players or performers, this piece will always sound different. In this case, it sounds to me like someone is walking through a cave with water at the bottom, dragging their feet through it. Sometimes it sounds like water in a toilet bowl, especially when we hear the water in a bigger shell being swished around. These sounds are relaxing in the background, it is like a gentle stream of water. I just wonder what went through the head of the composer while writing this piece. But I guess he had some experimental ideas that are interesting to try out. Those shells are quite pretty, I have never seen such big ones that are not broken. I was surprised when something else happened towards the end of the piece. That tone which came out of the one shell was so clear, it sounded like a trumpet. I didn’t know that shells can sound like that. It was quite beautiful. It was a nice way to end the piece. I di...
Post a Comment
Read more

William Basinski – The Disintegration Loops III

  The Disintegration Loops is a quartet of albums published in 2002 and 2003 by American avant-garde composer William Basinski. The pieces are made up of tape loop recordings that were played over time, with noise and crackles rising as the tape deteriorated. Basinski noticed this effect when attempting to convert his older recordings to digital format. The completion of the recordings coincided with the September 11, 2001 events, which Basinski witnessed and adds a deeper meaning to the composition. The composition is fascinating in many ways and makes the listener lose track of time. The tape loop recording had a very calming effect on me and put me in a trance-like state when I listened to it in its entirety. The tape loop is really soothing, so much so that I didn't even notice the loss of quality when I first listened to it. It makes you forget about time and allows you to really get into the piece capturing the calmness it exudes. You forget or don't really notice how i...
Post a Comment
Read more