“I believe that the use of noise to make music will continue and increase until we reach a music produced through the use of electrical instruments which will make available for musical purposes any and all sounds that can be heard.”
— John Cage, “The Future of Music: Credo” (1937)
John Cage’s powerful insight has been a driving force behind the music of composers as varied as Messiean, Stockhausen, Xenakis and Hendrix. My personal passion for music arises from the belief that music is one of the most powerful ways of communicating ideas. People back in l937 reading Cage’s quote must have found his thinking flawed and absurd. The means of producing and manipulating sounds electronically were still primitive. Pierre Schaeffer later called this idea “musique concrete.” I have long been drawn to musique concrete or “found sound” music, which is predicated on first establishing the quality of an idea for a composition, and then searching for and constructing the musical context around it; a true improvisational process from start to finish.
It would seem that making music out of “found sounds” wouldn’t require formal musical training. Quite the contrary–understanding music theory and composition is essential.
More and more often, over the past several years, our clients, producers of feature films, trailers, TV shows, and TV & web spots, have come to us requesting that we incorporate random sounds into the music we craft for their projects. For example, I was recently asked, “Can you make a bunch of dogs sing the Star Wars ‘Imperial Death March’?” The challenges this kind of question presents can only be addressed in the context of a musical process. The results of this process are in our VW spot “The Bark Side.”
When applying “real-world” sounds to musical compositions, there are three basic tenets I follow:
1. The key to finding the music in everyday sounds is finding the way a sound interacts rhythmically with its environment.
2. Actively integrate traditional music concepts like melody and harmony. Obviously, in the spirit of “musique concrete,” harmony and melody cannot be applied here in traditional ways. The challenge (and the reward) is in the process of discovering how to meld these divergent approaches. What makes things interesting is how you eventually discover they do apply.
3. Phrase is everything. When I began practicing the art of sound design, it never occurred to me that it had anything to do with “sound effects.” I approached sound design as an art form that was concerned with digitally manipulating musical samples and phrases. This is an essential approach when dealing with musique concrete. To ensure the listener’s ears will trust the authenticity of the sounds, it is necessary to have unedited “phrase samples” accompany the highly manipulated and “performed” sounds.
The ultimate challenge of writing in this fashion rests in composing an original piece of music that potentially reflects a whole new genre. It is in this spirit that I offer one final quote from Mr. Cage: “Wherever we are, what we hear is mostly noise. When we ignore it, it disturbs us. When we listen to it, we find it fascinating.”
Composer Jeff Elmassian is founder of music/sound house Endless Noise.
Gene Hackman Died Of Heart Disease; Hantavirus Claimed His Wife’s Life About One Week Prior
Actor Gene Hackman died of heart disease a full week after his wife died from hantavirus in their New Mexico hillside home, likely unaware that she was dead because he was in the advanced stages of Alzheimer's disease, authorities revealed Friday. Both deaths were ruled to be from natural causes, chief medical examiner Dr. Heather Jarrell said alongside state fire and health officials at a news conference. "Mr. Hackman showed evidence of advanced Alzheimer's disease," Jarrell said. "He was in a very poor state of health. He had significant heart disease, and I think ultimately that's what resulted in his death." Authorities didn't suspect foul play after the bodies of Hackman, 95, and Betsy Arakawa, 65, were discovered Feb 26. Immediate tests for carbon monoxide poisoning were negative. Investigators found that the last known communication and activity from Arakawa was Feb. 11 when she visited a pharmacy, pet store and grocery before returning to their gated neighborhood that afternoon, Santa Fe County Sheriff Adan Mendoza said Friday. Hackman's pacemaker last showed signs of activity a week later and that he had an abnormal heart rhythm Feb. 18, the day he likely died, Jarrell said. Although there was no reliable way to determine the date and time when both died, all signs point to their deaths coming a week apart, Jarrell said. "It's quite possible he was not aware she was deceased," Jarrell said. Dr. Michael Baden, a former New York City medical examiner, said he believes Hackman was severely impaired due to Alzheimer's disease and unable to deal with his wife's death in the last week of his life. "You are talking about very severe Alzheimer's disease that normal people would be in a nursing home or have a nurse, but she was taking care... Read More