The idea at the time, according to two Frenchmen named Baschet, was that Western music was mired in an instrumental tradition that was as inappropriate to the age of science as it was superbly sympathetic to the eighteenth-century, in which it mostly was developed. Beginning in the mid-1950’s , the freres Baschet, one a sculptor and sometimes musician, the other an engineer, joined talents with the composer Jacques Lasry and his wife. The four assembled a surrealist consort of more than thirty “structures sonores” as an remedy for the anachronisms they found in contemporary music. ….
"Franois and Bernard Baschet started creating metallic sound sculptures in the 1950s (also known specifically as Structures Sonores). Interestingly, none of the brothers had musical background ; Franois studied sculpture in art school when he came back from war and Argentina and Bernard (pictured above with Thomas Bloch) was an engineer. Their unusual music instruments gained immediate recognition and fame among musicians and the audience. During the 1970s, they had exhibitions in New York, Tokyo, Osaka, Mexico, Stokholm, etc. The Baschets also created outdoor sculptures, decorative art, special outfits (e.g. Who Are You, Polly Maggoo?, William Klein, 1966) and nowadays educational workshops for children. From the start, they had contemporary composers writing music for their instruments, more often than not Jacques Lasry and Michel Deneuve...." read more: http://modisti.com/musicbox/?p=1719
Francois Baschet: ” I knew a guitar was like a banjo. The banjo’s sound is produced by a membrane stretched over a metal frame and it’s the frame that’s heavy and awkward. I needed to find a replacement and thought of an inflatable plastic balloon. The air was enough to keep the membrane taut while the balloon was light and could be deflated when travelling. The neck still had to be constructed of wood, but I hinged it so I could fold it in two and added a flat bridge to transmit the sound. When the balloon was deflated, I could pack the entire instrument in my suitcase and carrying it everywhere was easy. The inflatable guitar continued to serve me well once I returned to Paris. It allowed me to earn a living playing in the cabarets where I parodied the songs I’d learned in all the countries I’d been to….
"A little rarity from the Baschet Brothers, here joigned by the Lasry family (Yvonne, Jacques and Teddy) to form the classic Structures Sonores Orchestra circa late 1950s-early 1960s. Everyone plays the Structures Sonores except Teddy (aged 15) who is on clarinet on the delicious title track, an evocation of a New Orleans slow blues number. In 1973, Teddy Lasry was a founding member of French progressive rock band Magma. All tracks composed or arranged by Jacques Lasry. Instruments on this single include several Crystals (glass rods with plastic cushions or metallic cones as resonators) and percussion on tracks #1 and 4...." read more: http://continuo.wordpress.com/category/sound-sculpture/
This was the extremely creative era of “the roaring 50s” in the Latin Quarter, when post-war Paris enjoyed an outburst of artistic activity similar to the 1920s described by Hemingway. I shared billing with other young performers, one of whom was a tall Belgian who also sang and accompanied himself on a guitar. His name was Jacques Brel. My inflatable guitar was a technical mystery. String instruments like the violin and cello have openings from which the sound issues. The plastic balloon had none. I sought the answer to this mystery. Since my life as a cabaret performer left my days free, I used the time to take sculpture courses and haunt the technical libraries to study acoustics. I learned that the 18th and 19th century experts had discovered a large number of acoustical phenomena that had only been applied to the saxophone and several electrical acoustic instruments so that 20th century music was being regularly played on 18th century instruments. It was like travelling by horse-drawn carriage in the era of air planes. My brother, Bernard, a great music lover, said to me, “Since these acoustical phenomena have been classified, why not apply them to your ideas for sculpture.Read More: http://francois.baschet.free.fr/story.htm a
"The Cristal Baschet is a musical instrument that produces sound from oscillating glass cylinders. The Cristal Baschet is also known as the Crystal Organ and the Crystal Baschet, and composed of 54 chromatically-tuned glass rods. The glass rods are rubbed with moistened fingers to produce vibrations. The sound of the Cristal Baschet is similar to that of the glass harmonica...." read more: http://www.forensicgenealogy.info/contest_174_results.html
The Baschet-Lasry instruments were radical in appearance , but they are tuned to the conventional tempered scale and, except for a “grille rhythmique” , played from conventional scores. Thus, their programs regularly mixed Bach and Bartok with works created especially for the new sonorities. The difference lies in the timbre. Sounds are produced by using unorthodox vibrating elements: glass rods, metal bars, and wires replacing strings and reeds; inflated cushions of red plastic and huge metal reflectors provide the amplification normally entrusted to wood and brass. Although the sound sometimes suggests electronic music , it is produced and amplified by purely mechanical means. Hammer tapped on metal bar, dampened finger stroked along glass rod, metal wand bowed across wire-whatever the mechanism, the musician is still very much involved and in control.
The team also provided the score for several documentary films, including “The Sky Above- the Mud Below” . For all the unconventionality of their appearance, the “structures sonores” are like most conventional instruments in this repsect: they are beautiful in themselves.
"This piece of music haunted me as child and I still find it eerie as an adult. The music is entitled "Manache" by Lasry-Baschet. It was used as the theme for an ITV children's educational programme which was aimed at five to eleven year olds. Years later, after an internet trawl, I located a little 10" record of this music. It's all very odd. Even the instruments are odd. Another reason I find this odd, is that one of the musicians is flying through the air...." read more: http://fingersports.blogspot.com/2010/04/sculpture-sonores.html
“Our instruments are based on another principal. They create vibrations along heavy metal rods. Additional metal elements placed on the rods produce accessory sound, such as harmonics, echoes and resonance’s. This allows us to “cook” the sound the way one adds fine herbs to a lamb stew. This specially seasoned sound is amplified by cones much like a trumpet’s bell but enlarged to accommodate the sculpture. The larger surface and it’s elasticity create ample vibrations that play the role of the above-mentioned fan. By changing the vibrating elements, one obtains an acoustical synthesiser. But the form, the size, the material from which the cones are made also influence the sound. This allows for an infinite variety of possibilities. Furthermore, there is enough liberty in choosing the form of the cones to bring them into the realm of visual aesthetics thus qualifying them as sculpture….
…From our very first concerts in 1955, we’ve noticed that our audiences have been as interested in the sounds and music as in the structure and function of our sculptures. We began to invite the audience to come up on stage after our concerts for a chance to try the instruments out. … Read More: tp://francois.baschet.free.fr/story.htm">http://francois.baschet.free.fr/story.htm a
---Live on stage at 11 PM, Bootie is proud to present MOLDOVER -- the trailblazing inventor and master of "Controllerism," the new digital DJ style that uses technology as a musical instrument, using hacked controllers and software to manipulate music live and on the fly. He'll be showcases his latest musical DJ invention, "The Mojo," with a special dance-floor-friendly show featuring a slew of surprise guests!--- read more: http://sanfrancisco.going.com/event-741494%3BBOOTIE_-_Moldover_The_Mojo_Show_DJ_Tripps_B-Day
…We took a certain risk when we decided to stop concentrating on art aimed at the collector. But when we watch the reaction of people as they discover our sound structures, as well as their own artistic and personal potential, we know the risk was worth it. We are asked why we don’t use electronics. We think there is more poetry, more sincerity, in natural sounds. All natural sounds — bells, bird song, echoes among the mountains — are connected to some unconscious memory. Electronic music is to acoustical music what chemistry is to cooking. It is acoustical music that nourishes the soul. Read More: http://francois.baschet.free.fr/story.htm a
ADDENDUM:
Contollerism is certainly not natural sound. The “chemistry is to cooking” analogy may not even touch the surface here of this synthetic music that is software generated. Russell Smith:
A new form of live musical performance, involving a new kind of instrument, raises questions about what being a musician, or playing an instrument, actually means. It’s called controllerism, and it has arisen only in the past five years because of revolutionary developments in the abilities of machines that can manipulate digital sounds. Controllerism embodies a lot of important trends in art generally and, as music controllers become easier to use and cheaper, they will start to be considered musical instruments in their own right – instruments that only play other instruments.
A controller is a console with a lot of knobs on it that you hook up to a computer. The computer has a lot of pieces of music stored on it in digital form; the music can come from anywhere. The computer has software that can play several pieces of music at the same time. The software can also detect the rhythm and tempo of all of the pieces and synchronize them. read more: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/arts/russell-smith/controllerism-a-new-kind-of-music-using-a-new-kind-of-instrument/article1858787/
It presents them on your screen as wave patterns. It can isolate short fragments of these pieces – “loops” – and repeat them indefinitely, without missing a beat. It can change the sound of these pieces using a variety of effects. You can play your library of sounds – particularly the percussive sounds – simply by drumming on pads with your fingers. Every new sound you create can be stored and repeated. You play the controller as one would play a complicated organ, building a tapestry of fragments…. Controllers emerged from dance club DJ culture to facilitate the synchronizing of repetitive electronic music, and that’s largely the music that controllerists choose to play with, but there is nothing to stop you from reworking jazz or medieval chamber music. One controllerist wizard called Moldover shows off on YouTube by mixing Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony with the Charlie Brown Christmas jazz by Vince Guaraldi…. Read More: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/arts/russell-smith/controllerism-a-new-kind-of-music-using-a-new-kind-of-instrument/article1858787/
The art form owes a lot – some might say everything – to turntablism, the 1990s craze that originated in hip-hop clubs. Turntablism is a display of virtuosity in manipulating vinyl records, spinning in synch on turntables. The DJ creates a variety of sounds by scratching, and by manipulating the controls on his mixer.
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