Thom Holmes - Electronic and Experimental Music: Technology, Music, and Culture

One night many years ago, in the heyday of tape music, British electronic music pioneer Delia Derbyshire was crossing the Putney Bridge in west London with her composer friend Brian Hodgson. Both were employed making theme music and sound effects for the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. They paused while crossing and Derbyshire turned to Hodgson. What we are doing now is not important for itself, she said, but one day someone might be interested enough to carry things forward and create something wonderful on these foundations.

Derbyshires pragmatic and visionary words were spoken more than 45 years ago. A history of electronic music scarcely existed at that time. The intervening years have seen the invention of analog synthesizers, the rise of MIDI as a bridge between analog and digital synthesis, and the adoption of the computer as the key instrument in the creation, editing, and performance of electronic music. What was once an exclusively experimental form of musical expression is now the foundation on which nearly every familiar genre of music has constructed a room of its own.

Electronic and Experimental Music is the story of where electronic music came from and how it has changed over the decades from early analog technology to the present. It is also the story of musical ideas that evolved in parallel with the technology, sometimes inspired by the machine but just as frequently leading to the invention of new technology to fulfill these ideas. This new edition remains an account of the history of technology, musical styles, and figures associated with electronic music, paying particular attention to:

• the invention of the key technologies of electronic music;
• the people who first explored new musical ideas using electronics;
• key works of electronic music, their genesis, and influence;
• the cultural impact of electronic music over the years.

Many questions about electronic music can only be answered historically. What qualities are inherently unique to electronic music? Why do we play sounds in reverse? How did the concept of a sounds envelope become part of the composers toolkit? Why was the music of early practitioners, such as Schaeffer, Stockhausen, Tudor, and Varse, viewed as distinctly different approaches to the medium? What prevented jazz musicians from embracing electronic music as early as musicians in other genres, such as classical, pop, and rock? The answers to these questions have been obscured by many years of established practice in the field. Still, understanding the history of such developments remains essential for todays composers and listeners if we are to fully appreciate and comprehend the beauty, complexity, and scope of this thing we call electronic music.

Woven into this book are three themes that inform and amplify the story of electronic music. The first is that the marriage of technology and music is inescapeable but sometimes imperfect, like any civil union. Rising above dysfunction in this field is a challenge for composers and musicians and also for the instrument makers of electronic music. The history of invention is a second theme of this story, illustrating how the development of new technologies continually benefits but sometimes thwarts the creation of new music. Bringing together the history of electronic music and invention leads to the third theme, the diffusion of electronic music into worldwide musical culture .