Aloys Kontarsky: piano
[Klavierstücke I-XI]
Aloys Kontarsky: Tamtam I
Alfred Alings: Tamtam II
Johannes Fritsch: Mikrophon I
Harald Bojé: Mikrophon II
Karlheinz Stockhausen: Filter & Regler I
Jaap Spek & Hugh Davies: Filter & Regler II
[Mikrophonie I für Tamtam, zwei Mikrophone, zwei Filter und Regler]
Herbert Schernus: cond.
Alfons Kontarsky: Hammondorgel
Johannes Fritsch: Zeitgeber
Mimi Berger, Meta Ackermann, Frigga Ditmar, Ulla Terhoeven, Helga Hopf, Monika Pick: Sopran
Arno Reichardt, Dietrich Satzky, Hermann Steigers, Peter Weber, Friedrich Himmelmann, Werner Engelhardt: Baß
[Mikrophonie II für Chor, Hammondorgel und Ringmodulatoren]
Lossless: Ape (img + cue + log) = 444 mb
Lossy: Mp3 (lame "preset standard") = 181 mb
Scans @ 300dpi = 27 mb (English notes only)
Total playing time: 70:37 + 63:48
Recorded:
Klavierstücke: July 1 & 2, November 15-17, 1965 - KGH, Winterthur, Switzerland
Mikrophonie I: December 17 & 18, 1965 - West German Radio Studios, Cologne
Mikrophonie II: June 11, 1965 - West German Radio Studios, Cologne
Released: 1993, Sony Classical S2K 53346
Track listing:
1. Klavierstück I
2. Klavierstück II
3. Klavierstück III
4. Klavierstück IV
5. Klavierstück V
6. Klavierstück VI
7. Klavierstück VII
8. Klavierstück VIII
9. Klavierstück IX
10. Klavierstück XI
11. Klavierstück X
12. Mikrophonie I
13. Mikrophonie II
Reviews:
Amazon.com customer review:
Famously quoted by Stockhausen as `... my drawings...' these pieces were composed between Stockhausen's fledgling years as a student in Germany and his rise and permanence to international infamy as a bizarre musical personality of dazzling compositional virtuosity primarily of timber, spatial organization and electronics.
Expanding the boundaries of what were perennially perceived `pianistic' in the 19th century (its orchestral range in pitch, dynamics and extreme responsiveness), Stockhausen revisited and utilized unique strengths of the instrument such as applying distinct dynamics simultaneously on separate horizontal lines and redefined what was considered one of the instrument's ultimate deficiency as a non sustaining instrument into a unique strength - epitomized by the gradual, continuous decay of thunderous, complex clusters down to a single note in Klavierstuck X. Stockhausen was interested in the musical contrast and orchestration of extremes, both simultaneously and as they evolved through the entire piece.
The particular milestone of this creative collection is the aforementioned Klavierstuck X. Lasting between 22 to 25 minutes, `organized sound' with assigned, specific numerical values act as agents that explore through maximum chaos and violence, austere Webernian simplicity and serenity, and everything in between. Similar to how Beethoven's Fifth symphony blazed through the transition from darkness of the first movement to the incandescent fourth impelled primarily by the modulation from a minor to major key, it follows a very specific but convoluted overall musical scheme that plays on volume, tempo fluctuations and flirtatious oscillation within the boundary of what we consider noise and 'clean' notes produced by a musical instrument.
Any rendition must be supported by superb acoustics, and this is where surprisingly, Kontarsky's 1965 analog version reins supreme over the other easily accessible, digital Henck recording of the 80's. Henck's razor sharp cluster glissandos display more violence pivotal to the enjoyment of this work, but none of the indescribable effect as the clusters decompose continuously from opacity to transparency can be heard. An eerie and unexciting dead silence immediately follows the clusters with the absence of the crucial in-between. Without the aurally perceivable transition between the extreme contrasts, this piece cannot be fully appreciated.
Cited by Ian Pace as one of the transcendentally difficult works, one must substitute the traditional habit of searching for harmony and counterpoint to that of enjoying musical gestures for their own sake. Perhaps no piano work in the second half of the twentieth century has been wildly inventive as this. Maurizio Pollini recognizes it as an accomplishment equal to the monumental efforts of the great 19th and early 20th century composers, rivaled only by Boulez amongst his contemporaries. Kontarsky's recording is also accompanied by Stockhausen's humorous and meticulous observations on Kontarsky's gastronomical preoccupation and its supposed effect on the entire recording process. The price is reasonable and well worth what can only be coined a ride. Get it while you can!
Gramophone (Mikrophonie I):
The disc title here, "Music for our time", begs a big question—and I'm not just being stupidly snooty or reactionary. Though musical elements, however bizarre and fleeting, are incorporated in Mikrophonie Mikrophonie I is a pure study in sounds which only by an extension of linguistic meaning could be termed musical. Small boys the world over enjoy rattling a stick along iron railings, and later find pleasure in, for example, sounding a tuning-fork against their teeth, a piece of paper, and so on. Some similar impulse seems to have activated Stockhausen in his Mikrophonie I, which is played as follows: two people excite a tamtam with various materials and in various ways (striking, scratching, rubbing, etc.) ; each is picked up by a directional microphone which is held nearer or further away from the source of sound, or moved about (thus changing dynamics, timbre and perspective) by another person; and in turn the sound from each channel is manipulated by someone operating an electronic filter and a potentiometer (thus further affecting timbre and pitch). Every operator has a detailed plan to follow, and the relationship between them all is worked out in a complicated scheme. All very ingenious in terms of sonority: who would have thought (as Macbeth remarked of Duncan) that it had so much in it? But unfortunately the structural plan is not perceptible to the ear; and the succession of noises—some disconcertingly like barking dogs or mewing cats, though towards the end human voices momentarily intervene—cannot be referred to any known aesthetic criterion.
One is forced to much the same conclusion with Mikrophonie II, in which the sounds of four groups of singers (with the occasional addition of a Hammond organ) are fed via ring-modulators back to mingle with the natural live sounds. Awareness of the intellectual concepts behind it all does not, unhappily, help in any artistic appraisal of the result, which to the innocent ear sounds rather like the soundtrack to a film of Hieronymus Bosch pictures. In short, 'reviewing' this disc is impossible: I can but draw attention to its existence.
Gramophone (Klavierstücke):
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