From Experimental Music To Musical Experiment

From Experimental Music to Musical Experiment
Author(s): Frank X. Mauceri

Source: Perspectives of New Music, Vol. 35, No. 1 (Winter, 1997), pp. 187-204
Published by: Perspectives of New Music
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FROM EXPERIMENTAL MUSIC
TO MUSICAL EXPERIMENT
FRANK X. MAUCERI
Wx
ITH ITS ADOPTION of modern
technology,
music enters new and
complex relationships
with the
society
to which it
belongs.
Both
specialized
scientific research and the
economy
of mass media become
directly entangled
with the
practice
of music
composition.
As a
way
of
analyzing
these new
relationships,
I want to examine the use of the word
"experimental"
with
regard
to music: how this term is used
by composers
and
critics;
how it sets
up
and dissolves historical
opposition
and
catego-
ries;
how it defines music's use of
technology
and
technology's
use of
music.
My goal
in
excavating
the
oppositions implicit
in the
category "experi-
mental music" is not to discredit
criticism, musicology,
or the
unique
contributions of America's innovative
composers.
Like
any
historical
category,
this one is informed
by
a social
agenda.
The
oppositions
it sets
Perspectives of
New Music
up
serve a
particular
social
perspective.
When a term like
"experimental"
is
deployed
as a
category
it not
only
creates
implicit oppositions
but it
also takes
sides,
it
privileges
and
aligns particular
differences.
My goal
is
to examine some of those differences while
tracing
the motivations and
effects of this
word,
"experimental."
EXPERIMENT AS GENRE
The
concept
of
experimental
music is less contentious
today
than it was
in the late
1950s,
when electronic music was
establishing
itself as the van-
guard
of
compositional practice. Often, "experimental
music"
generically
referred to the
contemporary avant-garde
or to electronic music. In
response,
Heinz-Klaus
Meztger
included
experimental
music
among
the
terms he called "abortive
concepts,"
terms which "do not
grasp
their
subject"
but enact a facile identification as a
way
to evade serious exami-
nation of the
subject (Metzger 1959, 21).
Metzger's
criticism would hold
today. Though
its
meaning
has
changed, "experimental
music" is still often used to
loosely designate
a
genre
of works whose common attributes are not denoted
by
that label.
It is instructive to contrast the
deprecating
use of this label
by
music
critics,
as noticed
by Metzger
in
1959,
with the favorable use of the term
in recent reference works.
The New Grove
Dictionary of
American Music
[a.k.a. NGA]
defines
experimental
music as follows:
A tradition of
20th-century
musical
practice (largely
but not exclu-
sively American),
the fundamental characteristic of which is a con-
tinuing
search for
radically
new modes of
composition,
music
making,
and musical
understanding.
. . .
Although experimental
music is related to "conventional"
contemporary music,
the term is
used for a
bolder,
more
individualistic,
eccentric,
and less
highly
crafted kind of musical
exploration. (Hitchcock
and Sadie
1986,
s.v.
"Experimental
Music"
by
John
Rockwell)
The NGA
entry
traces this "tradition"
through
its
exemplars:
the work
of Charles
Ives,
Carl
Ruggles, Edgard Varese, John
Cage,
David
Tudor,
and Earl
Brown; tuning
innovations
by Harry
Partch and Lou
Harrison;
the
pattern
music of
Terry Riley, Philip
Glass and Steve
Reich; popular
and media-influenced music of Brian Eno and Laurie Anderson. Of the
composers
mentioned in the
dictionary entry, only Cage
referred to the
music he
composed
as
experimental
and he
explicitly rejected
the kind of
188
From
Experimental
Music to Musical
Experiment
definition offered above. It is doubtful that
many
of the
composers
listed
would themselves
identify
with the
category
as described.
Neither the critics nor the NGA
entry attempt
to
designate
a charac-
teristic function or
methodology; they
are not
trying
to
distinguish
music
that conducts an
experiment. Instead, they
are
trying
to define some-
thing
like a
style
of music
making,
a
general category
that functions in
opposition
to another
general category,
"classical" music. The
"radically
new" is
opposed
to the old. The word
"experimental"
is chosen in order
to characterize the nature of that
opposition.
One
way
the word
accomplishes
this is
by
the
suggestion
that
"experi-
mental" works are in a some sense
unfinished, merely
trial runs of
untested materials and methods. To the
critics, according
to
Metzger,
"'experimental
music' means music which is still in
baby
shoes and which
has still to become
something genuine" (Metzger 1959, 27).
It
implies
that the
composers
have not mastered their methods as have
composers
of the
tradition; they
are more tinkerers or mad scientists than accom-
plished
artists. The NGA article corroborates this
impression
but
puts
a
positive spin
on it. The
pieces
are "less
highly
crafted" but that
goes
along
with their "bolder" and "more individualistic"
conception.
What
remains unexamined in both cases are the conditions for what constitutes
the
genuine, craft,
or finish. In the
opposition
set
up by
the
category
"experimental,"
these attributes are
clearly positioned
on the side of the
old
against
the new.
The conservative music criticism of the 1950s to which
Metzger
refers
used the term
"experimental"
to
suggest
an
analogy
between the new
music and science. A
survey
of Die Reihe or
Perspectives of
New Music is
sufficient to note that in some
respects
new music invites such an
analogy; language
and
theory
borrowed from the sciences is a
mainstay
of discourse
among composers.
But criticism has
long complained
of
vanguard
music as
dehumanized,
and unnatural.
"Experimental," along
with
adjectives
like
"antiseptic"
and
"clinical,"
contribute to this tradi-
tion of criticism.
Metzger places
the use of
"experimental"
in the com-
pany
of terms such as
"laboratory
music" and
"engineers'
music"
(Metzger 1959, 21).
These modifiers
suggest
that this music substitutes
artificial procedures
and means for the
immediacy
of natural
expression
found in traditional concert music.
Note that an
opposition
between science and nature is
mapped
onto
an
opposition
between
vanguard
concert music and traditional concert
music. The "human" is
positioned
on the side of nature and
tradition,
the side with which this
type
of criticism
clearly
identifies. The "human"
and the "natural" are constructed as normative and as
representatives
of
the tradition. The "artificial" is associated with the new forces of musical
production
manifested
by
the
vanguard.
189
Perspectives of
New Music
The center of the
science/nature opposition
involves a
struggle
over
technology.
Just as modern
technology
causes
upheaval
in social relations
and values
(traditions)
so the new music
represents
the same menace.
New musical
techniques
threaten to
displace
not
only
the
expressive
order but also the values and institutions of the tradition. The
performer,
the
orchestra,
the concert
hall,
and even the music critic were
(and
are
still)
threatened
by
the
appearance
of new
techniques.
Interestingly, recording
and mass-media
technologies
are not
addressed
by opposing
science to nature.
Surely,
these
present
a
greater
threat to the tradition than a
marginal vanguard.
The alienation that is
invoked when
speaking
of a dehumanized music has more to do with our
alienation in the face of
commodity forms,
a
consequence
of mass
pro-
duction and mass
media,
than with our detachment from
specialized
practices
like scientific research. The
category, "experimental
music" con-
structs a weak
antagonist against
which music criticism can authenticate a
waning
tradition.
In the
1960s,
"experimental
music"
began
to be used to set
up quite
different
oppositions
than the ones discussed above.
Today, "experimen-
tal music" is characterized as
radically
new but it is also
posited
as an his-
torical
category,
a tradition in its own
right.1
But as
pointed
out
by
art
critic Harold
Rosenberg,
"The new cannot become a tradition without
giving
rise to
unique contradictions, myths,
absurdities"
(Rosenberg
1959,
9).
The
irony
of this historical
category
is the
attempt
to construct
a
genre
out of work that
by
its own definition is
radically
different and
highly
individualistic.
The foremost contradiction of the NGA
entry
is found in the collec-
tion of
composers;
the list
represents
a wide
variety
of
methods,
influ-
ences,
and sensibilities. The most
interesting aspect
of the list is the
omissions. The
examples given notably
exclude
any major figure
from the
European avant-garde. Presumably,
the contributions of
Stockhausen,
Schaeffer,
Boulez,
Xenakis,
and Pousseur were not as
bold,
as individual-
istic,
as
eccentric,
as their American
colleagues.
The NGA
entry
charac-
terizes
"experimental
music" as a
largely
American tradition.2 In this
regard
the NGA follows Michael
Nyman's
book
Experimental
Music.
Nyman
defines this
category primarily
in contrast to the
European
avant-
garde:
I shall make an
attempt
to isolate and
identify
what
experimental
music
is,
and what
distinguishes
it from music of such
avant-garde
composers
as
Boulez, Kagel, Xenakis,
. . . which is conceived and
executed
along
the well-trodden but sanctified
path
of
post-
Renaissance tradition.
(Nyman 1974, 2)
190
From
Experimental
Music to Musical
Experiment
Nyman attempts
to exclude the
European avant-garde by associating
it
with the tradition of
European
concert music.
"Experimental
music" not
only places
the new in
opposition
to the
old,
but also the new world in
opposition
to the old world.
The motivations and effects of this
opposition
can be traced to cul-
tural, technical,
and institutional differences that are
implicit
in the dis-
tinction between
European
and American
vanguards. First,
the
category
"experimental
music"
attempts
to construct a tradition of
original
Amer-
ican art music that
aspires
to the kind of cultural
authority
that
European
concert music
enjoys.
The
category
asserts a cultural difference
against
a
background
of
European
culture's
powerful
influence and
authority.
The
avant-garde
is an effective area in which to stake such a claim.
Avant-garde
movements in the twentieth
century
have been character-
ized
by
both an
expressed antagonism
toward tradition and an
emphasis
on
originality. "Experimental
music" claims that America is in a
privi-
leged position
from which to
originate
a
vanguard
music
by
virtue of its
apparent
distance from
European
culture's
sphere
of influence.
Cage
was
asked
by
a Dutch musician about the
difficulty
of
writing
music in Amer-
ica,
"for
you
are so far from the centers of tradition."
Cage replied:
"It
must be
very
difficult for
you
in
Europe
to write
music,
for
you
are so
close to the centers of tradition"
(Cage 1973, 73).
What is
silently passed
over is the fact that the
avant-garde gesture
of
rejecting
tradition is a
European
one. Most
explicit
and strident was the
Italian Futurists' call to
forget
cultural
history
and to
destroy
cultural
institutions.
Originality
as a criteria of
authenticity
is borrowed from
European vanguard
art. This is
arguably
not the case for Ives and
Ruggles,
but Varese was influenced
by
the Futurists.
John
Cage
acknowl-
edges
the influence of both Futurism
(Russolo)
and Dada
(Satie,
Duchamp)
on
experimental
music. And
certainly
the
"experimental"
composers
that followed
Cage
were aware of the
importance
of
Europe's
artistic
avant-garde.
In
any case,
the issue is not whether these
composers'
innovations were
motivated
by
a
European
ideal. The
important point
is that the
category
"experimental
music" is motivated
by
a
European
ideal. The
category
draws on the "discourse of
originality"
that characterizes art
theory
and
criticism and has its roots in the
European avant-garde (Krauss 1985,
157).
The
uniquely
American
"experimentalism"
is
legitimated
as an
artistic
category according
to the terms of
European culture;
it tries to
"up
the ante" on
European avant-gardism by claiming
a more radical
originality.
The second difference between
experimental
music and the
European
avant-garde
is one of
technique.
Almost all of the
European vanguard
composers
took serial
(twelve-tone) technique
as their
starting point.
191
Perspectives of
New Music
None of the American
"experimental" composers adopted
serialism as a
model.
Also
important
to the technical
developments
in
Europe
was the influ-
ence of scientific
theory, particularly physics
and information
theory.
Reflecting
these technical
developments
was a
prolific
theoretical dis-
course modeled on scientific
writing.
The
journal
Die Reihe
exemplified
the
adoption
of
terminology
borrowed from the sciences as well as an
emphasis
on formalist
analysis. However, "experimental
music" as an
American tradition refers not to scientific
practice
but more to the
mythology
of American
ingenuity
and invention
(e.g. Franklin, Bell,
Edison).
In this
context, regarding Cage, Schoenberg
remarked: "He is
not a
composer,
but an inventor-of
genius" (Yates 1967, 243-44).
"Experimental" composers
did not write
analyses
of their work or each
others'
work,
with the
exception
of
Cage
whose
prose may
be considered
theoretical but
hardly
scientific.
Journals
like Cowell's New
Music,3
or
Source
(1967-72)
were devoted to
publishing
scores or
documenting
work rather than
fostering analysis.
Finally, "experimental
music" marks a difference between American
and
European vanguards
in their base of institutional
support.
Not
only
does it
operate
outside of the traditional musical forms and
techniques,
but also outside of the traditional forms of
patronage:
Some writers ... drew a useful distinction between the
avant-garde,
working
within the tradition and within
accepted
channels of
communication
(opera houses,
orchestral
concerts, universities,
broadcasting corporations,
record
companies),
and
experimental
composers,
who
preferred
to work in other
ways. (Griffiths 1986,
s.v.
"Experimental Music")
It is debatable that this difference is
entirely
one of
preference;
Amer-
ica's cultural life is more
exposed
to market forces and does not receive
the state
support typical
of
European orchestras, opera companies,
and
radio stations. Those institutions in the U.S. did not
support
an avant-
garde
for fear of
losing
their revenues
along
with their audience. Univer-
sities became a haven for
composers
in the
U.S.,
but the
composers
con-
sidered
"experimental"
were
exactly
those not included in academic
music
departments. Patronage
is an
important enough
issue to merit a
subheading
in the NGA
entry. Experimental
music received much of its
support
from
private
donations and from the dance and visual arts com-
munity.
It
developed
its own venues as well as
taking advantage
of muse-
ums and
gallery spaces.
192
From
Experimental
Music to Musical
Experiment
Central to
"experimental
music" as an historical
category
is its claim to
outsider status. The
struggling (Bohemian) artist,
a
traditionally
roman-
tic
European figure,
is recast in the mold of American
rugged
individual-
ism.
Ives,
the
entrepreneur, pays
for the
performance
of his work from his
business
earnings. Cage peddles
his
wares,
first in the L.A.
suburbs,
and
then to rich
patrons
like
Peggy Guggenheim.
The American universities
reproduced
the
European alignment
of cul-
tural
tradition, serial/scientific paradigms,
and institutional
support.
First,
the
academy
was
strongly grounded
in
European
tradition. This
was
especially
true after the influx of
European composers (Schoenberg,
Krenek, Milhaud, Hindemith)
and
musicologists (Willi Apel,
Curt
Sachs,
Leo
Schrade,
Paul
Henry Lang) during
World War II.
Second, composi-
tion in the universities was
aligned
with both serial
technique (Sessions,
Babbitt, Wuorinen)
and with a theoretical discourse modeled on the
sciences.
Perspectives of
New
Music, largely representing
the academic
vanguard,
continued the formalist
analytic
initiated
by
Die Reihe
and,
at
one
time,
even criticized that
journal
for not
being rigorous
in its use of
scientific
terminology
and
theory (Kerman 1985, 102). Finally,
new
music in the United States
gained
most of its institutional
support
and
cultural
legitimacy
within the universities.
In
many respects,
the
category "experimental
music" marks a more
immediate
struggle against
the
authority
of the
academy
than it does
against
the
authority
of
European
music.
Curiously,
the
period
when this
category began
to be
deployed
coincides with the introduction of
"experimental" composers
into the universities.4 The new
category
was
used as a
way
to
legitimate
these
composers and, thus,
to
bring
them into
the academic fold. After
all,
the
academy
itself
promulgated
the
category;
musicology
sanctioned
"experimental
music" as an American tradition.
The American
avant-garde
outside of the
academy presented
a
greater
challenge
to the musical status
quo
than it would inside. It
developed
new
audiences,
new
venues,
new
techniques,
and new sensibilities. After
nominal
acceptance
into the universities and the established
forums,
crit-
ics could
begin
to
speak
of the domestication or even the death of the
avant-garde
in
spite
of continued
activity
both inside and outside of the
academy.
EXPERIMENT AS
TECHNIQUE
For scientific
practice, "experiment"
does not refer to a historical or
stylistic category. Experiment
is a
technique by
which evidence is
gathered
in
support
of a
theory.
It is a method that tests
hypotheses.
The
193
Perspectives of
New Music
hypothesis
is a
prediction
based on
theory;
the
theory,
a set of formal
generalizations regarding
a
specified range
of
phenomena. By testing
the
prediction,
the
experiment
aims to confirm the
theory.
Benjamin
Boretz
distinguishes
the
composer
from the
scientist,
claim-
ing
that science strives to make each observed event
part
of a data set that
supports
a
general conception
whereas
composition
works to
distinguish
events and to
multiply
their distinctions in contradiction to
any general
conception. "[T]o
learn to hear a
unique thing
as a
categorical thing
is a
net loss for musical
experience" (Boretz 1977, 11).
The
composer
desires
that the musical
phenomenon
be so
experientially
rich as to differentiate
itself and resist
generalizations.
Scientific
theory
is manifested in the
operating principles
of its scien-
tific
apparatus,
in the methods
used,
and in the
expectations
scientists
exercise in the
interpretation
of data. Musical
theory
likewise manifests
itself in
equipment, methods,
and in
expectations.
Scientific
experiment
seeks to confirm its
underlying theory
but
compositional experiment
seeks to differentiate
events,
to
go beyond
the
generalizations
inherent in
theory.
The
composed experiment
is
designed
to transcend its verifica-
tion of the methods
used,
to exceed its
gestural, semiotic,
or formal func-
tioning.
It
preserves
itself as
phenomenal,
an
experience pregnant
with
interpretive
and affective
possibility.
The
question
remains as to whether
musical methods can be
"experimental," especially given
that its
purposes
are at odds with those of scientific methods.
EXPERIMENT AS TECHNOLOGY
Hiller and Isaacson
adopt
the scientific
meaning
of the
experiment
in
reference to the
computer-music
research described in their
book,
Exper-
imental Music
(1959).
Hiller lists a
chronology
of
experiments
related to
composing
the Illiac Suite
for
String Quartet:.
1. To build
up
an
elementary technique
of
polyphonic writing,
a
simplified
version of
first-species counterpoint
was used.
2. To realize cantus firmus
settings, academically correct,
in strict first
species counterpoint.
3.
"[T]o produce
novel musical structures in a more
contemporary
style
and to code musical elements such as
rhythm
and
dynamics."
4.
"[T]o produce radically
different
species
of music based
upon
fundamental new
techniques
of musical
analysis." (Hiller
and
Isaacson
1959, 4)
194
From
Experimental
Music to Musical
Experiment
The first two
experiments
make a
prediction regarding
the
applicability
of
computer technique
to
problems
of established musical
technique.
Hiller
and Isaacson
performed
tests in which
computer programs
were called
upon
to solve
problems
in modal
counterpoint.
The desired outcome of
these tests would not be
novelty
or
originality
but the
predicted
adher-
ence to well-defined rules.
The third and fourth
experiments
seem to contradict the
goals
of sci-
entific
experiment.
The third
experiment proposes
to
"produce
novel
musical structures." This does not
appear
to be a
simple
case of
theory
testing
and confirmation. What is meant
by
"in a
contemporary style"?
If
the
output
is "in a
style,"
does that indicate that it must conform to some
recognizable stylistic
norms? If the
output
was in an "old
style,"
that
would
clearly
fail the test
by
not
being contemporary,
but it is unclear
what other criteria would constitute failure or success. The fourth
experi-
ment also raises
questions
as to whether this is an
experiment
in the sci-
entific sense. It is conceivable that the
experiment
is set
up
to
disprove
an
existing theory,
but it is never stated what the results of this
experiment
are to be measured
against. Clearly,
some
species
of
novelty
is
sought
and
a
simple
test of success or failure is
unlikely.
Regardless
of issues of
testing
or
novelty,
Hiller and Isaacson treat the
output
of the four
"experiments"
as data
representative
of the
techniques
used,
even after it has been
incorporated
into a
piece
of music:
Computer output produced
as a result of
carrying
out these four
experiments
was utilized to
produce
a four-movement
piece
of
music we have entitled the Illiac Suite
for
String Quartet....
The
musical materials in these four movements were taken from a much
larger body
of material
by
unbiased
sampling procedures,
so that a
representative
rather than a
selectively
chosen
musically superior
group
of results would be included in the Illiac Suite.
Thus,
it is
important
to realize when
examining
this score that our
primary
aim
was not the
presentation
of an aesthetic
unity-a
work of art. This
music was meant to be a research record-a
laboratory
notebook.
(Hiller
and Isaacson
1959, 5)
This
piece
of music is considered
primarily
a
representative sample
of an
experimental
data set. The
description
above makes claims to the
objec-
tivity
of the material
selected;
"unbiased
sampling procedures"
were used
to make the selection in order to
prevent
a
"subjective" representation
of
the materials and thus a falsification of the data. The
composer
claims to
be
doing
scientific research.
The
composer suggests
that the Illiac Suite is not
really
a work of art at
all. But as a
laboratory
notebook the
piece
has limited research
utility.
195
Perspectives of
New Music
Without the
complete
data set or a statistical
analysis
we
really
have no
idea how
representative
the Illiac Suite is of the
techniques
used or how
exactly
and
consistently
those
techniques produced
the
expected
results.
At best it is a demonstration of
examples
that would
accompany
a scien-
tific
paper containing
the data
analysis.
Without the
analysis
there is no
sound scientific reason for
examining only
a small subset of the data
taken. If the Illiac Suite is
science,
then it is not
good
science.
It would seem that the Illiac Suite is neither musical art nor science.
What,
then,
does it
accomplish? First,
it serves as a demonstration of cer-
tain new musical
techniques,
but more
importantly,
it serves as an advo-
cate for those
techniques.
The claims to scientific association are
appeals
to the
authority
of science to
legitimate
this
advocacy.
The
promotion
of
technique
is
clearly
stated in Hiller's
description
of
his
piece Computer
Cantata and the
computer program,
MUSICOMP,
used to
produce
it:
Since our
primary purpose
was to demonstrate the
flexibility
and
generality
of
MUSICOMP,
the
Computer
Cantata
presents
a rather
wide
variety
of
compositional procedures.
. . .
[T]he
interested
composer
should find these studies of
significance
as a concrete
demonstration of the
broadening
of the research area of
experimen-
tal
composition techniques
made feasible
by computers
and
by
a
program
such as MUSICOMP.
(Hiller
and Baker
1964, 62)
In this
instance,
the
composer's
stated
purpose
is the
promotion
of a
technique.
The
piece "presents
a wide
variety
of
procedures"
in order to
inventory
the
flexibility
of a
computer program; compositional
decisions
are made with the
objective
of
demonstrating
the
power
of a
technique.
Hiller tells us that
composers
should find this
piece significant. Why?
because it
displays
what is
feasible,
what can be done
by
others. The
piece
functions as an advertisement for the
procedures
that
produced
it.
Likewise,
technique
becomes a
way
of
promoting pieces.
If the
primary
purpose
of the
composition
is to demonstrate a
technique,
as a conse-
quence,
the
primary purpose
of
listening
becomes to hear
examples
of
techniques.
Evidence of this is
commonly
found in
program
notes that
not
only
describe the
procedures employed
but also
inventory
the
equip-
ment used. The audience is
persuaded
that the
technique is,
in
itself,
rea-
son to listen.
Experimental composition
in this sense is not
simply
a
technique,
as it
is in scientific
practice,
but a
technology. By
this I mean that it is not
merely
a tool for some
purposeful
action but an
economy
of
techniques
that
propagates
a set of
tools, practices,
and relations. Consider the
market
dynamics
of
high-tech industry.
New
techniques
are
developed
as
196
From
Experimental
Music to Musical
Experiment
commodities which are desirable in so far as
they
exhibit the latest techni-
cal achievement.
Technology
not
only develops
and
generates
tech-
niques,
but it also
generates
demand for more
techniques. Technology
functions as an advertisement for the
technology
that
produced
it.
By invoking
science in order to
legitimate
musical
innovations,
those
innovations are
transposed
into the social
economy
of
technology. They
are valued more as technical achievements than as contributions to
music. What
may potentially
be radical music is instead
merely
another
step
in the
development
of the latest
synthesizer
or software.5
Vanguard
music is
displaced
from its role as
part
of a
public
cultural life and
becomes a technical
specialty.
Whether or not Hiller's
experiments
were motivated
by
commercial
potential
is not
important.
What is
significant
are the social relations that
music enters into when it is talked about as
technological
research. The
language
of
technology
demands that we value musical works
according
to the
economy
of
technology.
Without
discussing
the
advantages
or dis-
advantages,
one can see that music is relocated in the field of social rela-
tions. The word
"experimental"
is a marker for that relocation.
EXPERIMENT AS FUNCTION
John
Cage
states that "an
experimental
action is one the outcome of
which is unforeseen"
(Cage 1973, 39). Here, "experiment"
is neither
category
nor
technique;
it indicates a
function,
one with an
unpredictable
output. Metzger
(and
Cage also) points
out that musical
experiments
usually precede
the final
composition.
Materials and methods are tried
out and tested before
they
are
incorporated
into a
composition
in order
to insure that the finished work will not be
"experimental."6 Cage's
work
was an
exception
to this. He was interested in finished works that
per-
formed an
unpredictable
action.
Cage's primary
model of
"experimental
music" is the
composition
indeterminate with
respect
to its
performance: open
form works like
Christian Wolffs Duo
for
Pianists II
(1958); graphic
scores like Earle
Brown's December
1952;
score-construction kits like
Cage's
Variations II
(1961).
Each of these
pieces
has the
potential
to be realized in substan-
tially
different
ways
and so each
performance
is an
experiment
in the
sense that the outcome is not
predictable.
For
Cage,
this
unpredictable function, experiment,
became central to
his musical
thinking.
It dissolved the
opposition
between intended and
unintended sounds
implicit
in traditional music. An unforeseen sound
event cannot be one that was intended
by
the
composer, yet
the com-
poser
can
intentionally provide
the
opportunity
for such events. Music
197
Perspectives of
New Music
was no
longer discursive,
or
expressive,
but a constellation of sounds:
"New music: new
listening.
Not an
attempt
to understand
something
that is
being said, for,
if
something
were
being said,
the sounds would be
given
the
shapes
of words. Just an attention to the
activity
of sounds"
(Cage 1973, 10). Cage
saw
experiment
as a
strategy
for
leaving
out the
composer's intention,
for
removing expression
from music.
Cage
connected the
emergence
of
"experimental
music" to the
pos-
sibilities
opened up by
electronic
recording
and
sound-synthesis
tech-
niques.
Traditional
conceptions
of musical sound treat
parameters
such as
pitch, rhythm, amplitude,
et
cetera,
as divided into discrete units. Coun-
terpoint, harmony,
and orchestration are all concerned with
structuring
significant
distinctions within this
grid
of discrete
units,
whereas elec-
tronic
techniques
treat these
parameters
as continuous.
They
resemble
walking-in
the case of
pitches,
on
steppingstones
twelve in number. This cautious
stepping
is not characteristic of the
possibilities
of
magnetic tape,
which is
revealing
to us that musical
action or existence can occur at
any point
or
along any
line or curve
or what have
you
in total
sound-space;
that we
are,
in
fact,
techni-
cally equipped
to transform our
contemporary
awareness of nature's
manner of
operation
into art.
(Cage 1973, 9)
Cage suggests
that technical means draw us closer to sound's real nature.
Natural sound is not divided into
scales, beats, instruments,
and so on. It
does not conform to the necessities of
expressive
means. Musical
experi-
ment, by divesting
itself of the
requirements
of
expression,
is free to
include the sound environment and the unrestricted
(and
unpredictable)
behaviors of natural sound.
Second,
technical means
explode
the sound
possibilities
for
music;
music can now take
place
in a total
sound-space.
All sounds are available.
The
magnetic tape
makes no distinctions between intended and unin-
tended
sound,
between musical sound and noise.
Any
succession or com-
bination of sounds is
possible: "Any
sound at
any point
in this total
sound-space
can move to become a sound at
any
other
point" (Cage
1973,
9).
As a
consequence,
all basis for the
meaningful significance
of
any
musi-
cal event is removed. There can be no context of
meaningful possibilities
when all events are
equally possible, equally unpredictable.
Musical
means are divorced from all conventions of
expression.
In the context of
infinite technical
possibilities,
all sound events are undifferentiated and
thus
meaningless.
Third, Cage
uses the technical
possibilities
to
collapse
the
opposition
of
production
and
reception,
of
composer
and auditor. He doesn't
say
198
From
Experimental
Music to Musical
Experiment
that technical means transform the
composer's
awareness of what can be
made,
or of what can be done. Technical means "transform our . . .
awareness into . . . art." We are all listeners and thus we are all artists.
Technique
is not a means to control sound but rather to
give up
control.
A
way
of
opening up listening
and
filtering
out the exercise of
intention,
"Those involved with the
composition
of
experimental
music find
ways
and means to remove themselves from the activities of the sounds
they
make"
(Cage 1973, 10).
A decisive moment in the
development
of
Cage's thinking
involves an
encounter with
technology. Cage
often told the
story
of how in 1951 he
entered an anechoic chamber-an
acoustically
isolated room
designed
to
minimize sound reflection-and how he heard the sounds of his nervous
system
and
circulatory system (Cage 1973, 13).
He entered in search of
silence
only
to discover that we are
always
in the
presence
of sound. He
realized that silence consists of all those sounds that we do not intend to
hear,
the sounds that we
ignore.
The
concept
of silence is an
abstraction,
not a matter of the absence of sound but rather of the absence of atten-
tion. Sounds that occur
apart
from
purposeful
action
(including purpose-
ful
hearing)
are not
there, they
are
silent,
but
only
with
reference
to
purposeful
intention.
The concert
hall,
like the anechoic
chamber,
is a
space engineered
in
order to isolate sounds for
intentionality.
All sound
activity peripheral
to
the music on
stage
is
absorbed,
either
physically (by
the hall
acoustics)
or
socially (by directing
and
conditioning
audience
response).
In the con-
cert hall one is surrounded
by
silence so that one can focus on the music.
In the anechoic chamber one is surrounded
by
silence so that one can
focus on an acoustics
experiment
or test. Both are
technologies
of listen-
ing.
In
both,
silence is the
margin
of
perceptual
focus
(Ihde 1976,
111-
13).
Cage's experience
revealed that the silence in both situations was a
function of intention and that intention
functions
to
filter
out
perceptions
not relevant to intention's
purposes.
The anechoic chamber
provided
the
opportunity
for an
experiment,
an
unpredictable
situation. The chamber
is
designed
to serve as a
prosthetic
to
intention,
to filter out unwanted
perception,
to focus attention on a
specified object.
But
Cage
enters the
chamber
anticipating
the
unexpected,
without an
object
or an
objec-
tive-an
experiment. Cage's discovery
results when he uses the
experi-
mental
apparatus
to filter out
purposeful
intention so that
perception
is
unrestricted. The chamber serves
Cage
not so much as an
acoustically
controlled situation but as an
acoustically unpredictable
situation.
Exper-
iment
functions
to
filter
out intention so that
perception
is not restricted to
intention's
object.
199
Perspectives of
New Music
The fact that this use runs counter to the intentions for which the
anechoic chamber was
designed highlights
the dialectic that is at the
heart of
Cage's experiment.
The chamber is like a
listening machine,
an
acoustic
magnifying glass.
But the chamber
presents
itself as a silence
machine; Cage
enters
wondering
what silence will sound like. With this
misunderstanding Cage
turns the machine back on
itself;
he listens to
himself
listening through
a
technology
of
listening. Cage
listens to the
machine,
not
merely
with the
machine,
he looks at the
magnifying glass
rather than
through
it. He notices that the
listening
machine makes
sounds
(for Cage
is a
cyborg,
the chamber is an extension of his ear
(or
is
his ear an extension of the
chamber?));
the ear hears itself.
Cage repeats
the
experiment
in the concert hall. The concert hall
purports
to be a silent
room,
but
Cage
understands that it is
really
a
listening machine,
and he
performs
the same inversion that he
experi-
enced in the anechoic chamber. In 4'33" the concert hall listens to
itself,
to its
ventilation,
to its
breathing
and
coughing,
to its restlessness and its
reverberation
(for
the audience member is a
cyborg,
the hall an extension
of the ear
(or
is the ear an extension of the
hall?));
the ear hears itself.
EXPERIMENT AS HEURISTIC-CONCLUSION
Experiment
as heuristic is the
performance
of this
inversion,
the mecha-
nism
turning
back on
itself,
a moment that sounds forth the contradic-
tions within the otherwise silent
functioning
of a
technique. Techniques
are
designed
to effect an intended and
anticipated end,
to function
smoothly,
to
operate invisibly, silently. Only
when
technique
malfunc-
tions do we attend to it
(the squeaky
wheel . .
.).
In the
experimental
moment we not
only
attend to
sound,
but also to the
theories, opposi-
tions,
and
categories implicit
in the mechanism of a
practice.
Cage
defines
experiment
in terms of function. But
Cage's
definition
precludes functionality
in the sense of technical means.
Experiment
is
dysfunctional
insofar as its
unpredictability
makes it unfit for
purposeful
use;
it cannot be a
goal-oriented
action. And
yet
the
apparatus,
the
instruments,
the
techniques
that
comprise
the
experiment carry
with
them a
history
of
purposeful use,
otherwise
they
would not be
techniques.
The difference between function and malfunction is one of
intention and
consequently
also one of
perception.
This difference is the
locus of
experiment's dialectic,
"the
purposeful purposelessness
or a
pur-
poseless play" (Cage 1973, 12).
Scientific
experiments
are
techniques
executed with an intended
pur-
pose,
to confirm the
predictions
made
by theory.
Scientific
practice
is not
200
From
Experimental
Music to Musical
Experiment
looking
for
novelty
but rather evidence in
support
of its current
paradigm
(Kuhn 1962, 52). Cage's experiment
seems to be headed in the
opposite
direction,
in search of the
unpredictable,
but there is an
interesting point
of intersection.
When scientific
experiment yields unexpected
results,
and it
repeatedly
does, theory
is called into
question.
The
unexpected
must be
explained
by
new
theory; thus,
new theories are invented or discovered:
"Discovery
commences with the awareness of
anomaly" (Kuhn 1962, 52). Cage's
definition of
experimental action,
"one the outcome of which is not fore-
seen"
(Cage 1973, 39), corresponds
to
experimental anomaly
in science.
The unforeseen musical event exceeds our
ability
to "make sense" of
it;
it
ruptures
our
interpretive
framework. For both science and
music,
the
moment of
discovery
is structured in the same
way;
the
experimental
event cannot be accommodated
by
the framework of
meaning-giving
relationships
that
preceded
its
appearance.
Within the
economy
of
technology, experiment
marks the site where
knowledge, practices,
and
techniques
are extended and advanced.
Research and
development
are at the center of
technological expansion.
Consequently,
this is also where there are sufficient flexibilities in the
technological
network to allow new relations to come into
being.
The
social order must restructure itself in
response
to
changes
in the forces of
production.
The music criticism that
Metzger
refers to
speaks
on behalf
of a social order destabilized
by
new
techniques.
So does the
musicology
that would turn various heuristic
anomalies, compositional experiments,
into
examples
of a
genre.
But new relations are thus
reintegrated
into the
overall
network;
their critical difference is
appropriated by
the dominant
order. The link between
experimental composition
and
technology
defines a domain wherein critical relations are enabled and also where
they
are
effaced;
where new
compositional practices
are
empowered
but
also where their effects are neutralized and
dispersed.
The heuristic moment is one of breakdown-the
inadequacy
of
theory,
the malfunction of
technique,
the
rupture
of
interpretive frameworks,
the
dissolution of
categories.
The
question
is no
longer
"what is
experimen-
tal
music,"
but rather "when is music an
experiment";
when is music
heuristic? To use
"experiment"
in this
way
is to include in the discussion
at least some of the conditions that structure the context in which
exper-
iment takes
place. Hopefully, language
about music can then be as heu-
ristic as the musical innovations it
attempts
to describe.
201
Perspectives of
New Music
NOTES
1. Michael
Nyman's
book,
Experimental
Music:
Cage
and
Beyond
(1974),
is
perhaps
the first extended
attempt
to
argue
for
"experi-
mental music" as an historical
category.
His definition differs from
the NGA
entry
and is more
nuanced,
but the nature of the
attempt
is
the same.
2.
"Experimental
music" does not
appear
as an
entry
in the New Grove
Dictionary
of
Music,
only
in the New Grove
Dictionary of
American
Music. The NGA characterization of
"experimental
music" as Amer-
ican is corroborated in other reference works:
"experimental
work
has been much more a feature of American and
English
music than
of mainland
European" (Griffiths 1986,
s.v.
"Experimental Music");
"used to
distinguish
anti-traditional
composers,
such as
Cage,
from
the established
avant-garde
of Boulez and Stockhausen"
(Arnold
1983,
s.v.
"Experimental Music"); "Among
American
pioneers
of
experimental practice
are
Ives, Ruggles, Varese,
and
Cage" (More-
head with MacNeil
1991,
s.v.
"Experimental Music").
3. Cowell and
Strang 1927-1955, sporadic publication
after 1955.
4.
Except
for
Cage's
short
residency
at
Wesleyan (1960-61),
most
"experimental" composers began
their first academic
appointments
in the late sixties:
Cage's
next
appointment
was
University
of Cincin-
nati
(1967);
Gordon
Mumma,
Brandeis
(1966-67);
Earle
Brown,
Peabody Conservatory (1968);
Robert
Ashley,
Mills
(1969);
Lou
Harrison,
San
Jose
University (1967);
Morton
Feldman,
SUNY-
Buffalo
(1972);
Christian
Wolff,
Dartmouth
(1970) (Wolff taught
classics at Harvard before
1970).
The
exception
is Alvin
Lucier,
Brandeis
(1963).
5.
Composers
have had
professional relationships
with Bell
Labs,
Phillips, RCA, Sylvania,
and Yamaha. After the commercial success of
FM
synthesis, composers developing
new
synthesis techniques
remain
cognizant
of the needs of a multi-million dollar
industry.
Sound
synthesis research,
like the
present
interest in acoustic model-
ing,
functions as research and
development
for the music
synthe-
sizer/software industry
and takes
place
under the
auspices
of
university ("experimental")
music studios.
6. Stockhausen
(1960) clearly separates experiments
from the final
composition: "Experiments
were made in the Studio for Electronic
202
From
Experimental
Music to Musical
Experiment
Music at the West German Radio Station in
Cologne
from
February
1958 until Autumn 1959. The score and its
realization,
commis-
sioned
by
the West German
Radio,
took from
September
1959 until
May
1960 to be
completed."
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122-32.
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John.
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From Experimental Music To Musical Experiment

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From Experimental Music to Musical Experiment

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