ELECTRONIC MUSIC

any music involving electronic processing, e.g., recording and editing on tape, and whose reproduction involves the use of loudspeakers. Although any music produced or modified by electrical, electromechanical, or electronic means can be called electronic music, it is more precise to say that for a piece of music to be electronic its composer must anticipate the electronic processing subsequently applied to his musical concept, so that the final product reflects in some way his interaction with the medium. This is no different from saying that a composer should have in mind an orchestra when he composes a symphony and a piano when he composes a piano sonata. A conventional piece of popular music does not become electronic music by being played on an electronically amplified guitar, nor does a Bach fugue become electronic music if played on an electronic organ instead of a pipe organ. Some experimental compositions, often containing chance elements and perhaps of indeterminate scoring, permit but do not necessarily demand electronic realization, but this is a specialized situation. Electronic music is produced from a wide variety of sound resourcesfrom sounds picked up by microphones to those produced by electronic oscillators (generating basic acoustical wave forms such as sine waves, square waves, and sawtooth waves), complex computer installations, and microprocessorsthat are recorded on tape and then edited into a permanent form. Generally, except for one type of performed music that has come to be called live electronic music (see below), electronic music is played back through loudspeakers either alone or in combination with ordinary musical instruments. This article covers both early experimentation with electronic sound-producing devices and composers' subsequent exploitation of electronic equipment as a technique of composition. Throughout the discussion it should be clear that electronic music is not a style but rather a technique yielding diverse results in the hands of different composers. Historically, electronic music is one aspect of the larger development of 20th-century music strongly characterized by a search for new technical resources and modes of expression. Before 1945 composers sought to liberate themselves from the main ClassicalRomantic tradition of tonal thinking and to reconstruct their thinking along new lines, for the most part either Neoclassical or atonal and 12-tone, in which a composition is built up entirely from a tone row consisting of all 12 notes of the ordinary chromatic scale. This pre-World War II period was accompanied by substantial experimentation with electrical and electronic devices. The most important outcome for the composer was the development of a number of electronic musical instruments (such as the Hammond organ and the theremin) that provided new timbres and that laid the technical foundations for the future development of electronic music proper from about 1948 onward. The rapid development of computer technology has had its effect in music, too, so much so that the term computer music is replacing electronic music as the more accurate description of the most significant interaction between the composer and the electronic medium. Electronic music is represented not only by a wide variety of 20th-century works, and not only by serious concert pieces, but also by a substantial literature of theatre, film, and television scores and by multimedia works that use all types of audiovisual techniques. Electronic music for theatre and films seems an especially appropriate replacement for a disembodied, nonexistent orchestra heard from a tape or a sound track. Electronic popular music has also won adherents. This mostly has consisted of arrangements of standard popular music for electronic synthesizers, the tentative use of electronic alterations by some of the more ambitious and experimental rock groups, and the preparation of recordings by innovative studio techniques. Additional reading The history of electronic music through the 1950s is covered in Abraham A. Moles, Les Musiques exprimentales (1960); and Fred K. Prieberg, Musica ex Machina: ber das Verhltnis von Musik und Technik (1960). Later books with an emphasis on history or the music itself include Herbert Russcol, The Liberation of Sound: An Introduction to Electronic Music (1972); Elliott Schwartz, Electronic Music: A Listener's Guide, rev. ed. (1975); Jon H. Appleton and Ronald C. Perera (eds.), The Development and Practice of Electronic Music (1975); and David Ernst, The Evolution of Electronic Music (1977). Many how-to books and manuals have been published, most of them emphasizing the use of synthesizers. Typical examples include Gilbert Trythall, Principles and Practices of Electronic Music (1973); and Allen Strange, Electronic Music: Systems, Techniques and Controls, 2nd ed. (1983). A French publication, Michel Chion and Guy Reibel, Les Musiques lectroacoustiques (1976), is valuable because its emphasis is on European rather than American practice. Books that deal primarily with relevant aesthetic problems include John Cage, Silence (1961, reissued 1973); Luigi Russolo, The Art of Noises (1967; originally published in Italian, 1913); Karlheinz Stockhausen, Texte zur elektronischen und instrumentalen Musik, 2 vol. (196364); and Iannis Xenakis, Formalized Music (1971). Electronic musical instruments and their components, many of which were at one time used for electronic music, are discussed in Richard H. Dorf, Electronic Musical Instruments, 3rd ed. (1968); Alan L. Douglas, The Electronic Musical Instrument Manual: A Guide to Theory and Design, 6th ed. (1976), and The Electrical Production of Music (1957); and Werner Meyer-Eppler, Elektrische Klangerzeugung (1949). Discussions of computer music may be found in Herbert Brn, ber Musik und zum Computer (1971); Heinz Von Foerster and James W. Beauchamp (eds.), Music by Computers (1969); Lejaren A. Hiller, Informationstheorie und Computermusik (1964), and, with L.M. Isaacson, Experimental Music (1959, reprinted 1979); Harry B. Lincoln (ed.), The Computer and Music (1970); Max V. Mathews et al., The Technology of Computer Music (1969, reissued 1974); Hubert S. Howe, Electronic Music Synthesis (1975); Christopher P. Morgan (ed.), The Byte Book of Computer Music (1979); Wayne Bateman, Introduction to Computer Music (1978, reissued 1980); and Hal Chamberlin, Musical Applications of Microprocessors (1980). For current articles see Source, Perspectives of New Music, and Journal of Music Theory (all semiannual); Audio Engineering Society Journal (monthly); and Computer Music Journal and Interface (both quarterly). For recordings of electronic and computer music, the reader is referred to Hugh Davies (comp.), International Electronic Music Catalog (1968); Schwann-1: Record and Tape Guide and Schwann-2 supplements; and Ernst (cited above). Sandra L. Tjepkema, A Bibliography of Computer Music (1981), is a valuable reference tool.