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"Igor´s Smile" (1993)

tape music

tape: 2 channel, CDR/DAT

This piece can be interpreted as bridge and metamorphosis between digitally mastered tape-recorded music and a radio play. The theme of the piece is theosmosis of language and music - and of narrative linearity and purely tonal speech material. The musical sections are created through the medium of a sampler.
Brief interludes of Igor Stravinsky´s most well-known ballets are sampled, partially transformed and varied by way of a number of different transpositions and loops. In each case the individual passages from various pieces are moulded into a specifically adapted harmonic context within the respective position.The linguistic plane is represented by Stravinsky´s original voice from interviews and rehearsals (recorded between 1962 and 1965) as well as by commentaries of the premiere performance of "Sacre du printemps" in Paris (1913) which play a key role here. In turn, striking woodblock sounds serve as mediation between the two planes, accentuating the beginning or end of tones as well as to creating the third, superordinate plane distancing the audience from the historical material. The piece was produced at the Synclavier System of the Academy of Music and Performing Arts in Frankfurt.

 

List of orchestra samples:

sample 1: "Firebird" - "Infernal Dance" measure 1

sample 2: "Firebird" - "Infernal Dance" [15] m1-m4

sample 3: "Firebird" - "Finale" [16] m3/4, [17] m1

sample 4: "Petrouchka" - Part 1, "Dance Russe" m1-4

sample 5: "The Rite of Spring" - Part 1 (Adoration of the Earth, "Ritual of the Rival Tribes") [57] m1/2