Stockhausen Anyone?

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I heard an interview very early Sunday morning with Karlheinz Stockhausen on the radio in commemoration of hi 75th birthday. He sounded like a very pleasant chap, who also had a great opinion of himself as well as asense of humour. He spoke at length about his music and philosophies of life and music. Anyhow it was 3am and I'd had an intense night before but I heard some amazing music. I wrote down Stimmung and Zodiac on the paper next to my bed before falling asleep.

Stockhausen has always appeared very forbidding to me, although I had never heard his music.

Anyone recommend any other music of his, books, websites? Mine interest has been tickled.

― mentalist (mentalist), Monday, 13 October 2003 08:39 (twenty-one years ago)

Stimmung is fantastic. A very physical/visceral experience.
The rest that I've heard didn't really grab me.

― Baaderist (Fabfunk), Monday, 13 October 2003 08:46 (twenty-one years ago)

I wrote this brief guide to KS earlier in the year at Nathalie's request. Not exhaustive but might be a good place to start...

― Marcello Carlin, Monday, 13 October 2003 09:40 (twenty-one years ago)

Great start. Cheers. One thing I remember him saying is that he saw himself in the tradition of Romanticisim. He spoke about how music is the key to releasing our spirit from our corporeal bodies. Something like that. Maybe that's related to his Catholicism, I wouldnae know. It sounded all very moving and interesting in my post-festive state.

― mentalist (mentalist), Monday, 13 October 2003 10:12 (twenty-one years ago)

He sounded like a very pleasant chap, who also had a great opinion of himself as well as asense of humour.

Not sure about the pleasant bit and the sense of humour bit but he certainly has a very high opinion of himself!

Let's begin with his electronic music, which is all absolutely essential. The two most accessible pieces are "Hymnen" and "Telemusik" but "Gesang der Junglinge" and "Kontakte" are probably greater achievements. A very accessible piece of music if you're just dipping an exploratory toe into his soundpool is "Refrain" - it's one I always recommend. I'm not an expert on his orchestral music which I think can be quite problematic for neohpytes the biggies are "Gruppen", "Momente", "Carre" but I'm partial to "Punkte" and "Trans" meself. As for his "intuitive" music of the late 60s, many people seem rather sniffy about this but I love it. Actually, there's so many areas to cover and I haven't got the time!

― Dadaismus (Dada), Monday, 13 October 2003 11:12 (twenty-one years ago)

Nice job Marcello.

― Disco Nihilist (mjt), Monday, 13 October 2003 21:28 (twenty-one years ago)

eight months pass...

Why is "Hymnen" out of print when there are $60 remastered versions of everything else? Did he repudiate his earlier work or something?

― Lukas (lukas), Wednesday, 23 June 2004 03:31 (twenty-one years ago)

It looks like Hymnen is still available from Stockhausen's own label:

http://www.stockhausen.org/cd_catalog.html
http://www.bernardp.dsl.pipex.com/ksce10.html

― Captain Sleep (Captain Sleep), Wednesday, 23 June 2004 03:43 (twenty-one years ago)

Dunno If I've mentioned this before but has anyone noticed the resemblance between the music teacher in the Simpsons opening credits and Karlheinz himself? Even his cardigan is the same.

― mzui, Wednesday, 23 June 2004 06:53 (twenty-one years ago)

Thanks, cap'n. I'm sure Karlheinz thinks it's entirely appropriate that I should have to go to a little more effort and expense to secure His work. Grumblegrumble.

― Lukas (lukas), Wednesday, 23 June 2004 16:09 (twenty-one years ago)

three years pass...

Got my tickets thru the other day, get in there quickly, should be great.

Meanwhile, not sure if there are more events planned here, not much of a festival is it's only one concert!

― Tom D., Thursday, 22 May 2008 15:09 (seventeen years ago)

All good stuff, but if only someone had organised a Scooter Salutes Stockhausen night.

― Dingbod Kesterson, Thursday, 22 May 2008 15:12 (seventeen years ago)

I celebrated finishing some school exam or other by getting 'Musik Im Park' from the library, setting up my parents' quality record player in the garden, and sprawling on the grass as if I'd been at the original concert. Not a great afternoon, to be honest. It was only redeemed when I switched it off and went with 'The Song Remains The Same' instead.

Since then I haven't paid much heed to Mr Stockhausen. But I did enjoy reading a post by a guy who'd been hired to run the mixing desk at a more recent event: "I got there to find forty musicians and a ream of sheet music. The whole thing had been scored to the millisecond with unbelievable complexity. I lost track after about thirty seconds and spent the evening just shoving the faders up and down at random as seemed best fitting to me. The Times review the next day described the performance as 'a tour de force'."

― Ismael Klata, Thursday, 22 May 2008 16:29 (seventeen years ago)

four years pass...

Helicopter Quartet - live feed!!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/interactive/2012/aug/22/karlheinz-stockhausen-helicopter-string-quartet-watch-live

― bulge renaissance (+ +), Wednesday, 22 August 2012 18:13 (thirteen years ago)

with slightly salesman-like presenter. ugh.

― bulge renaissance (+ +), Wednesday, 22 August 2012 18:17 (thirteen years ago)

one month passes...

Whoa I'm only finding out now that Mittwoch was performed back in August

(finally made it to the Alex Ross review in the NYer)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReEnAeyS3rc

― Brakhage, Tuesday, 9 October 2012 18:53 (twelve years ago)

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