Day 297: Electronic lecture and party
36yearsago.com
Vienna 1971—A Student Journal
A year of music, study, travel, sightseeing &
friends.
Day
297 — Electronic lecture and party
25-May-1972
(Donnerstag–Thur.)
TRANSCRIPT
Better day. Piano practice went good [well]. And most
of the horn playing also went good [well].
Read-through with Dr. Paul, the Hindemith horn
Sonata—nice,
and good practice.
At night, an electronic music vorlessung.
Interesting. First time I heard a piece by Xenakis. I
like his idea—looking into one sound texture with
slower, imperceptible change within it. But the
20-minute piece was all f–fff [forte to triple
fortissimo]. Can sort of get loud.
Camilla invited us to her house for a small type of
party—with parents, Kaufmann, and Gottwald. Really
enjoyable. Ate and drank a lot. The whole group knows
how to have a good time. I couldn’t believe Kaufmann
and Gottwald. They’re really wild. Running after
Camilla, and such.
REFLECTIONS
Horn
is back. Well,
today I seem to have some good playing under my belt.
Back and forth ability. Or maybe, it’s not quite so
bad as I imagine. Dr. Paul seems to be a good teacher
who encourages playing, playing, and playing. Good.
Iannis
Xenakis. Today was
my first exposure to Xenakis’ music in Prof.
Kaufmann’s electronic music lecture, and I seemed to
be drawn to it. The music had small perceptible
changes over time and was also very loud. I later
learned that Xenakis’ composition would sometimes be
based on what is termed stochastic theory—randomness
and random variables. His interests also extended to
architecture and mathematics. I remember owning his
book while at Ohio State, which was heavily into
mathematical processes and stochastic theory (too
difficult for me). Xenakis is considered one of the
important composers of the 20th century.
Camilla.
Look at
this. Camilla has invited us to her house to meet her
parents and have some food and drink. How nice.
What’s this about Kaufmann and Gottwald flirting with
Camilla? (I’m certainly exaggerating—I can’t remember
a thing, really.) Camilla was a very, very attractive
girl. Why don’t I have a picture of her? That said,
it is enjoyable to belong to a group of students that
transcends the classroom.
Links.
Xenakis on
Wikipedia
John
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