About this item

Something truly radical happened to the European classical music tradition in the years after the Second World War. At a time when the revolutionary principle of 12-tone composition instigated by Schoenberg was beginning to be regarded among young composers as passé, some had witnessed the horrors of war and for them in particular, the need to make a definitive break with the past and the conventions and conflicts which sprang from it was paramount. Across Europe, composers like the young German Karlheinz Stockhausen, the Romanian-born architect IannisXenakis, and the Frenchmen Pierre Schaeffer and Pierre Henry were among those who began to seek out new ways of organising sound. Some looked to science for inspiration. If, to society at large its logic held out the promise of a new civilisation unsullied by such dark forces as nationalism; might it not do the same for the arts? These composers constructed their music according to differing philosophies, systems, formulae and beliefs. What they had in common was a hunger for new sounds and soundscapes that might celebrate the rejuvenation of civilisation and point to a future where war had no place. No composer had a greater appetite for revolution than Stockhausen, who was embarking on a quest that would occupy him for more than half a century, and which would take in a whole gamut of constantly re-defined objectives - among them "point music", "spatial music" and "multi-formula composition". His early electronic compositions such as the Studies were painstakingly and meticulously constructed using magnetic tape, to be followed over the ensuing decade by the works which ranked among the masterpieces of electronic music, Gesang der Jünglinge (Song of the Youths) and Kontakte (Contacts). All of these unprecedented early electronic works are included in this 3 CD box set presentation 

TRACK LISTING

Disc: 1
1. Étude Aux Chemins De Fer
2. Étude Aux Tourniquets
3. Étude Violette
4. Étude Noire
5. Pathétique
6. StudieNr. 1
7. StudieNr. 2
8. Gesang Der Jünglinge
9. Diamorphoses
10. ConcretPh
11. PoèmeÉlectronique
12. Voile D'orphée (Veil Of Orpheus)

Disc: 2
1. ÉtudeConcrète
2. Nr. 5 Zeitmasse (Time-Measures) For Five Woodwinds
3. Avant "L'artisanatFurieux"
4. Commentaire I De "Bourreaux De Solitude"
5. "L'artisanatFurieux"
6. Commentaire Ii De "Bourreaux De Solitude"
7. "Bel Edifice Et Les Pressentiments", Version Premiere
8. "Bourreaux De Solitude"
9. Apres "L'artisanatFurieux"
10. Commentaire Iii De "Bourreaux De Solitude"
11. "Bel Edifice Et Les Pressentiments" Double
12. Kontra-Punkte
13. Zyklus
14. Refrain

Disc: 3
1. Kontakte (Contacts) (For Electronic Sounds)
2. Orient-Occident
3. Artikulation
4. Cartridge Music
5. Aria With Fontana Mix