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... Breiling
HISTORY OF ELECTRONIC AND COMPUTER MUSIC
INCLUDING AUTOMATIC INSTRUMENTS AND COMPOSITION MACHINES
Introduction
Electronic music and particularly Computer music has a relatively short history
beginning around the turn of the 20th century, with most of the major developments
occurring in the last 30 years. The many and rapid developments in electronics
technology during this period have led to a great variety of electronic sound production
methods. In order to gain an understanding of the current state of electronic music
technology, students should be familiar with these major developments and the people
who brought them about.
Goal
The goal of this paper is to present a brief history of the major developments in
electronic music instruments, the major contributors, and key terminology related to
these developments. ... "ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 2
890 AD Banu Musa was an organ-building treatise; this was the first written
documentation of an automatic instrument. ... Music was
developed by the different permutations of pitch and rhythmic values. ...
1600s Athanasius Kircher, described in his book, Musurgia Universalis (1600), a
mechanical device that composed music. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 3
1738 Mechanical singing birds and barrel organs were in existence. ...
1863 Hermann Helmholtz wrote the book, On the Sensations of Tone as a Physiological
Basis for the Theory of Music. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 4
1876 Elisha Gray (an inventor of a telephone, along with Bell) invented the
Electroharmonic or Electromusical Piano; this instrument transmitted musical tones
over wires. ... There are several recordings of Carillos music, especially the
string quartets.ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 5
1897 E. ...
The British physicist William Duddell was appointed to solve the problem in London in
1899 and during his experiments found that by varying the voltage supplied to the
lamps he could create controllable audible frequencies
1906 Thaddeus Cahill invented the Dynamophone, a machine that produced music by
an alternating current running dynamos. ... Articles appeared in McClures Magazine that stated
"democracy in music. ... "ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 6
Lee De Forest (1873-1961) invented the Triode or Audion tube, the first vacuum tube.
1907 Ferruccio Busoni (1866-1924) believed that the current musical system was
severely limited, so he stated that instrumental music was dead. His treatise on
aesthetics, Sketch of a New Music, discussed the future of music. ... "
Henry Cowell (1897-1965) introduced tone clusters in piano music. ...
1914 The first concert of Futurist music took place. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 7
1920 Lev (Leon) Theremin, Russia, invented the Aetherophone (later called the
Theremin or Thereminovox). ...
1926 Jorg Mager built an electronic instrument, the Spharophon. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 8
Jörg Mager
playing the Kurbel-Spharaphon (1923) Jörg Mager at the Partiturophon
George Antheil (1900-1959) composed Ballet Mechanique. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 9
1929 Laurens Hammond (b. ...
Jorg Mager (Germany) was commissioned to create electronic bell sounds for the
Bayreuth production of Parsifal
1935 Allegemeine Elektrizitats Gesellschaft (AEG), built and demonstrated the first
Magnetophon (tape recorder). ...
1944 Percy Grainger and Burnett Cross patented a machine that "freed" music from the
constraints of conventional tuning systems and rhythmic inadequacies of human
performers. Mechanical invention for composing "Free Music" used eight oscillators
and synchronizing equipment in conjunction with photo-sensitive graph paper with the
intention that the projected notation could be converted into sound.ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 10
1947 Bell Labs developed and produced the solid state transistor. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 11
The Clavioline was a monophonic, portable, battery powered keyboard instrument
designed by M. ...
1948 John Scott Trotter built a composition machine for popular music.
Hugh LeCaine (Canada) built the Electronic Sakbutt, an instrument that actually
sounded like a cello. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 12
Olivier Messiaen composed his Mode de valeurs et dintensities (Mode of Durations and
Intensities), a piano composition that "established scales not only of pitch but also of
duration, loudness, and attack. ...
John Cages use of indeterminacy culminated with Music of Changes, a work based on
the charts from the I Ching, the Chinese book of Oracles. ...
Louis and Bebe Baron set up a private studio in New York, and provided soundtracks
for sci-fi films like Forbidden Planet (1956) and Atlantis that used electronic sound scores.ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 13
Otto Luening (b. ...
1954 The Cologne Radio Series "Music of Our Time" (October 19) used only
electronically-generated sounds by Stockhausen, Eimert, Pousseur, etc. ...
1955 Harry Olson and Belar, both working for RCA, invent the Electronic Music
Synthesizer, aka the Olson-Belar Sound Synthesizer. ...
Lejaren Hiller (1924-92) and Leonard Isaacson, from the University of Illinois composed
the Illiac String Quartet, the first piece of computer-generated music. ...
1956 Martin Klein and Douglas Bolitho used a Datatron computer called Push-Button
Bertha to compose music. ...
Tokyo at Japanese Radio, an electronic studio established.
Luening and Ussachevsky wrote incidental music for Orson Welles King Lear , City
Center, New York.ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 14
1957 Of Wood and Brass was composed by Luening. ...
Warsaw at Polish Radio, an electronic studio established.
Munich, the Siemens Company, an electronic studio established.
Eindhoven, the Philips Company, an electronic studio established. ... Electronic manipulation was never really used again in rock for about ten years. ...
Max Mathews, of Bell Laboratories, generated music by computers. ...
London, BBC Radiophonic Workshop, an electronic studio established.
Stockholm, Swedish Radio, an electronic studio established.
The Studio for Experimental Music at the University of Illinois established, directed by
Lejaren Hiller.
Pierre Henry leaves the Group de Musique Concrete; they reorganize as the Groupe de
Recherches Musicales (GRM)
Gordon Mumma and Robert Ashley founded the Cooperative Studio for Electronic
Music, Ann Arbor , MI (University of Michigan). ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 15
1958-9 Mauricio Kagel, an Argentinian composer, composed Transicion II, the first piece
to call for live tape recorder as part of performance. ... Music IV and Music V were
written in FORTRAN. ...
The Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center was formally established. The group
had applied through the Rockefeller Foundation, and suggested the creation of a
University Council for Electronic Music. They asked for technical assistants, electronic
equipment, space and materials available to other composers free of charge. ...
The RCA Mark II synthesizer was built at Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center
(the original version was built for the artificial creation of human speech). ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 16
1960 Composers of more traditional orchestral music began to rebel. Many composers
tried to get quasi-electronic sounds out of traditional instruments. ... A whole new breed of
musical instrument was beginning to appear on albums and in concerts - the electronic
synthesizer. ...
Morton Subotnick, Pauline Oliveros, and Ramon Sender established the San Francisco
Tape Music Center.
John Cage composed Cartridge Music, an indeterminate score for several performers
applying gramophone cartridges and contact mics to various objects.
1961 The first electronic music concerts at the Columbia-Princeton Studio were held; the
music was received with much hostility from other faculty members. ...
Fortran-based Music IV was used in the generation of "Bicycle Built for Two"
(Mathews). ... There are many word-like passages, but only one word isഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 17
spoken during the entire composition (actually heard twice), parole (Italian for word). ... Two performers play a large tam-tam, while two others move microphones
around the instrument to pick up different timbres, and the final two performers are
controlling electronic processing. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 18
1965 Hi-fi gear is commercially produced. ...
1966 The Moog Quartet offered world-wide concerts of (mainly) parlor music. ...
Iannis Xenakis wrote Musiques Formelles (Formalized Music). ... Both albums made extensive use of electronic
manipulation. ...
Morton Subotnick composed The Wild Bull
Hugh Davies compiled an international catalogue of electronic music. ... The Sal-Mar ConstructionഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 19
weighed over fifteen hundred pounds and consisted of "analog circuits controlled by
internal digital circuits controlled by the composer/performer via a touch-control
keyboard with 291 touch-sensitive keys."
Godfrey Winham and Hubert Howe adapted MUSIC IV for the IBM 7094 as MUSIC4B
was written in assembly language; MUSIC4BF (a Fortran-language adaptation of
MUSIC4B, one version was written by Winham, another was written by Howe).
Music V variants include MUSIC360 and MUSIC11 for the IBM360 and the PDP11
computers, these were written by Barry Vercoe, Roger Hale, and Carl Howe at MIT,
respectively. ... ഊHistory of Electronic Music
Page 20
Incorporation of Programmable Memory
After polyphony, perhaps the next most important advance in early synthesizer
technology was the incorporation of programmable memory into instruments.
Approximate Word count = 7100
Approximate Pages = 28.4
(250 words per page double spaced)
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