Skip to main content

Listening Report to Pierre Schaeffer – Valse

 

After torturing myself with Stockhausen’s Kontakte, Pierre Schaeffers Valse was a boon to my poor ears. Somehow it felt like there was a rhythm and almost a melody that made it, at least in the beginning, entertaining to listen to the piece. Even though while listening to it in a continuous loop it quickly became annoying. Nevertheless, I found this piece particularly exciting and interesting when listening to it. One reason for this is the way in which this piece of music was created. Maybe I only liked the parts that Pierre Schaeffer put together for this sonic collage, because it is a variation of waltz.      
Because to me it always sounded like you were rewinding a tape, I started to wonder if it would make a difference if you tried to play this piece backwards. Every time I listened to it, I tried to understand the conversation and interpret what was happening. It had something dramatic and yet entertaining, almost like I was trying to solve a riddle. There was certainly a younger woman, a young man and probably a slightly older women talking on the record. And it was presumably something in French. The chunks of conversation also make me laugh a little bit every time. It's kind of reminiscent of the way some people imagine the language of extraterrestrials. Or as if you want to parody the way foreign languages sound to some people. It actually made me remember an episode of Friends where Phoebe tries to teach Joe some French words and everything he says sounds like gibberish.

At the same time, it reminded me of a competition from the radio where the song is played backwards, and you have to guess who the artist is or the title of the song. Furthermore, you could also think it is a sound file that is quickly pushed forward, as if you had increased the speed of the turntable.

The constant listening has again created a movie or rather a scene in my mind, corresponding to the piece Central Park in the dark by Charles Ives. This time it was a scene from a romantic movie similar to the ones from the 50s or 60s, in which the supposed couple meets for the first time and dances together. I basically thought of Walt Disney's production of Cinderella where she and the prince dance together until she has to run away before her evil stepmother sees her and she loses her glass slipper. And it is precisely this part that is being rewound on the VHS tape and Schaeffer's piece is giving the sound to it.

This piece is the kind of avant-garde experimental music I like. It makes me curious about more works by Schaeffer. It doesn't hurt to listen to it and it always encourages my imagination.

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

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

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