Various Artists
2023
Deutsche Grammophon Avantgarde (1968-1972)
Witold Lutoslawski String Quartet
1-1 – Introductory Movement 8:30
1-2 – Main Movement 15:08
1-3 Krzysztof Penderecki– Quartetto Per Archi 6:56
1-4 Toshiro Mayuzumi– Prelude For String Quartet 11:03
Mauricio Kagel Phantasie Für Orgel Mit Obbligati
2-1 – I 9:48
2-2 – II 2:29
2-3 – III 1:52
2-4 Juan Allende-Blin– Sonorités 8:22
György Ligeti Volumina
2-5 – I 7:45
2-6 – II 9:38
2-7 György Ligeti– Etüde Nr. 1 (»Harmonies«) 9:08
David Bedford Two Poems For Chorus On Words By Kenneth Patchen
3-1 – 1. O Now The Drenched Land Wakes 4:32
3-2 – 2. The Great Birds 8:37
3-3 György Ligeti– Lux Aeterna (For 16-voice A Cappella Mixed Chorus) 7:59
3-4 Arne Mellnäs– Succsim (For A Cappella Mixed Chorus) 6:51
Marek Kopelent Matka (Fresco For Mixed Chorus And Solo Flute)
3-5 – I 5:01
3-6 – II 2:26
3-7 – III 3:01
Vinko Globokar Discours II (For 5 Trombones)
4-1 – I 2:14
4-2 – II 3:39
4-3 – III 1:20
4-4 – IV 1:36
4-5 – V 6:01
4-6 Luciano Berio– Sequenza V (For Trombone Solo) 6:57
Karlheinz Stockhausen Solo Für Melodie-Instrument Mit Rückkopplung
4-7 – I 9:20
4-8 – II 8:18
Carlos Roqué Alsina Consecuenza Op. 17 (For Trombone Solo)
4-9 – I 1:41
4-10 – II 2:57
4-11 – III 5:20
Mauricio Kagel Match Für 3 Spieler
5-1 – I 4:41
5-2 – II 4:07
5-3 – III 1:23
5-4 – IV 2:28
5-5 – V 2:16
5-6 – VI 1:51
Mauricio Kagel Musik Für Renaissance-Instrumente
5-7 – A 4:05
5-8 – B 4:38
5-9 – C 4:28
5-10 – E-G 3:59
5-11 – H-I 3:09
5-12 – J 0:59
5-13 – K 3:50
Improvisationen* «... e poi?»
6-1 – I 2:30
6-2 – II 8:24
6-3 – III 3:07
6-4 – IV 4:02
6-5 – V 5:41
6-6 Improvisationen*– Quasiraga 6:23
6-7 Improvisationen*– Light Music 7:02
6-8 Improvisationen*– Ancora Un Trio 3:27
6-9 Improvisationen*– Credo 7:37
Bernd Alois Zimmermann Présence (Ballet Blanc En 5 Scènes Pour Violon, Violoncelle Et Piano)
7-1 – Scène I: Introduction Et Pas D'action (Don Quichotte) 3:35
7-2 – Scène II: Pas De Deux (Don Quichotte Et Ubu) 2:54
7-3 – Scène II: Solo (Pas D'Ubu) 5:00
7-4 – Scène IV: Pas De Deux (Molly Bloom Et Don Quichotte) 4:29
7-5 – Scène V: Pas D'action (Molly Bloom) 9:50
Bernd Alois Zimmermann Intercomunicazione
7-6 – I 4:19
7-7 – II 3:28
7-8 – III 2:39
7-9 – IV 1:41
7-10 – V 2:32
7-11 – VI 3:12
7-12 – VII 1:39
7-13 – VIII 1:28
8-1 John Cage– Atlas Eclipticalis & Winter Music (Electronically Amplified After Cartridge Music) 30:05
Dieter Schnebel Glossolalie
8-2 – Introduktion Und Teil I 8:23
8-3 – Teil II 13:59
8-4 – Teil III 1:41
8-5 – Teil IV Mit Epilog - Coda 9:04
Mauricio Kagel Hallelujah (For 16 Solo Voices A Cappella)
9-1 – I 5:56
9-2 – II 5:44
9-3 – III 3:53
9-4 – IV 5:35
9-5 – V 3:56
9-6 – VI 3:26
Dieter Schnebel Für Stimmen (... Missa est)
9-7 – 1. dt 31,6 Für 12 Gruppen Von Vokalisten 4:52
9-8 – 2. AMN Für 7 Gruppen Von Vokalisten (Sprechchor) 15:14
9-9 – 3. :! (Madrasha II) Für 3 Chorgruppen 8:46
Gottfried Michael Koenig Terminus II
10-1 – I 1:34
10-2 – II 3:39
10-3 – III 5:28
10-4 – IV 3:57
10-5 – V 2:20
10-6 – VI 2:28
10-7 Gottfried Michael Koenig– Funktion Grün 8:18
10-8 Zoltán Pongrácz– Phonothese 3:34
Rainer Riehn Chants De Maldoror (Rev. Version 1968/69)
10-9 – I 5:44
10-10 – II 4:16
10-11 – III 6:36
10-12 – IV 4:30
10-13 – V 5:26
Mauricio Kagel Der Schall (For 5 Players With 54 Instruments)
11-1 – Part I 14:20
11-2 – Part II 23:06
György Ligeti String Quartet No. 2
12-1 – Allegro Nervoso 5:15
12-2 – Sostenuto, Molto Calmo 4:57
12-3 – Come Un Meccanismo Di Precisione 3:08
12-4 – Presto Furioso, Brutale, Tumultuoso 2:01
12-5 – Allegro Con Delicatezza - Stets Sehr Mild 5:35
Earle Brown String Quartet
12-6 – I 7:28
12-7 – II 2:22
Wolf Rosenberg String Quartet No. 3
12-8 – I 3:03
12-9 – II 7:48
13-1 Luc Ferrari– Presque Rien N°1 (Le Lever Du Jour Au Bord De La Mer) 20:47
Luc Ferrari Société II (Et Si Le Piano Était Un Corps De Femme)
13-2 – I 5:54
13-3 – II 2:11
13-4 – III 3:31
13-5 – IV 5:21
13-6 – V 3:41
13-7 – VI 3:44
13-8 – VII 3:10
Lukas Foss Paradigm ("For My Friends")
14-1 – 1. Session 4:24
14-2 – 2. Reading 3:13
14-3 – 3. Recital 2:44
14-4 – 4. Lecture Part I 1:54
14-5 – Part II 3:32
14-6 – Part III 2:03
Lejaren Hiller Algorithms I, Version I
14-7 – 1. The Decay Of Information 2:05
14-8 – 2. Icosahedron 3:08
14-9 – 3. The Incorporation Of Constraints 4:03
Lejaren Hiller Algorithms I, Version IV
14-10 – 1. The Decays Of Information 2:07
14-11 – 2. Icosahedron 3:09
14-12 – 3. The Incorporation Of Constraints 4:09
14-13 Elliott Schwartz– Signals 9:38
Roland Kayn Cybernetics III
15-1 – I 9:02
15-2 – II 13:56
Luigi Nono Contrappunto Dialettico Alla Mente
15-3 – 1. Il Diletto Delitto Moderno 4:59
15-4 – 2a. Mascherata Dei Vecchietti 3:52
15-5 – 2b. Interludio Dei Venditori Di Soffio 1:14
15-6 – 3. I Cervellini Cantano Un Madrigale 4:31
15-7 – 4. Lo Zio Sam Racconta Una Novella 3:52
15-8 – (Ripresa:) Il Diletto Delitto Moderno 1:24
Franco Evangelisti Die Schachtel
16-1 – Struttura 1-2: A) Società Come Platea Indifferenziata, Placidità Del Proprio Posto, Stimoli tandard, Reazioni Comuni Equicontrollate. 6:33
16-2 – Struttura 3: B) Le Reazioni Liberatrici: 1. La Reazione Intersoggettiva, O Momento Della Libertà ndividuale (Emulazione Automobilistica, Duscorso Sulla Personlità) 5:28
16-3 – Struttura 4: B) Le Reazioni Liberatrici: 2. La Nevrosi Come Evasione Accettabile 5:35
16-4 – Struttura 5: B) Le Reazioni Liberatrici: 3. L'evasione Lirica. Ballata Della Rosa 3:31
16-5 – Struttura 6: B) Le Reazioni Liberatrici: 4. La Reazione Come Risposta Della Psicologia ollettiva 5:37
16-6 – Struttura 7: C) Finale: Glorificazione Del Sistema Immedesimazione Nel Sistema Del Minimo forzo 3:04
16-7 – Struttura 8: Crollo Della Scatola 1:14
Heinz Holliger Der Magische Tänzer
16-8 – Vorspiel 1:25
16-9 – 1. Szene »Solch Ein Krach In Der Nacht« 6:35
16-10 – Zwischenspiel 3:05
16-11 – 2. Szene »Befühle Mich - Ganz Aus Magie Gemacht« 1:29
16-12 – »Ziehe Den Zipfel Des Meeres An Dein Ohr« 7:02
16-13 – »Lass Das Spielen, Rühre Nicht An Die Gestirne« 3:59
16-14 – »Wo Werden Die Toten Lebendig?« 3:00
16-15 – »Ich Schnüre Die Schnüre Auf« 1:10
16-16 – »Watete Durch Die Meere Oklahoma« 3:42
Cornelius Cardew The Great Learning
17-1 – Paragraph 2 21:53
17-2 – Paragraph 7 20:27
Roman Haubenstock-Ramati Symphonie »K«
18-1 – I 7:29
18-2 – II 1:50
18-3 – III 6:15
Vinko Globokar Étude Pour Folklora II (Climats 1-6)
18-4 – I 4:01
18-5 – II 6:56
18-6 – III 5:54
18-7 – IV 4:01
Heinz Holliger Siebengesang
19-1 – Liberamente 2:09
19-2 – Agitato 2:32
19-3 – Molto Liberamente 2:02
19-4 – Rubato Sempre 2:11
19-5 – Quarter = 72 1:00
19-6 – Oboe Solo (Poco A Poco Crescendo) 0:48
19-7 – Molto Agitato 1:29
19-8 – Dolce Legatissimo 1:36
19-9 – Staccatissimo Sempre 0:48
19-10 – Quarter = 48 »Windesstille Der Seele« 5:19
19-11 – Poco A Poco Diminuendo 1:13
Karlheinz Stockhausen Spiral (For A Soloist With Short-Wave Receiver)
19-12 – I 5:40
19-13 – II 3:12
19-14 – III 5:38
19-15 – IV 1:34
Sylvano Bussotti Cinque Frammenti All'Italia
20-1 – 1. Ancora Odono I Colli Per Sestetto Vocale Misto 4:54
20-2 – 2. Solo El Misterio Per Coro Misto 4:28
20-3 – 3. La Curva Dell'Amore Per Sestetto Vocale Misto 6:33
20-4 – 4. Per Ventiquattro Voci Adulte O Bianche 5:53
20-5 – 5. Rar'ancora Per Sestetto Vocale Misto 4:51
Nicolaus A. Huber Versuch Über Sprache (For 16 Solo Voices, Hammond Organ, Double Bass And 2 Obligatory Loudspeaker Channels)
20-6 – I 1:02
20-7 – II 6:30
20-8 – III 10:23
21-1 Leo Küpper– L'enclume Des Forces 13:02
21-2 Leo Küpper– Électro-poème 6:03
Leo Küpper Automatismes Sonores
21-3 – I 9:58
21-4 – II 5:52
21-5 – III 3:09
21-6 – IV 5:13
21-7 – V 1:54
CD1: Recording Berlin, UFA Studio, 12/1967
CD2: Recording Hamburg-Wellingsbüttel, Lutherkirche, 4/1968
CD3: Recording Hamburg-Rahlstedt, 4-5/1968
CD4: Recording Berlin, UFA Studio, 6/1968
CD5: Recording Godorf near Cologne, Studio Rhenus, 4/1967 (Musik für Renaissance-Instrumente) & /1968 (Match)
CD6: Recording Rome, Studio R7 & Laboratorio Elettronico di musica sperimentale, 2/1969
CD7: Recording Munich, 5/1969
CD8: Recording Hilversum, Phonogram-Studio, 5/1969 (Cage); Cologne, Electrola-Studio, 5/1969 (Schnebel)
CD9: Recording Stuttgart, Südwest-Tonstudio, 6/1969
CD10: Recording Utrecht, Rijksuniversiteit, Instituut voor Sonologie, Studio voor Elektronische Muziek, 1966-1967
CD11: Recording Godorf near Cologne, Studio Rhenus, 11/1969
CD12: Recording Munich, Akademie der Wissenschaften, Plenarsaal, 12/1968 (Rosenberg), 3/1969 (Brown), 12/1969 (Ligeti)
CD13: Recording Paris, Studio des Dames Augustines, 12/1969 (Société II); Hanover, Werk I, 2/1970 (Presque Rien N°1)
CD14: Recording Buffalo, University, Creative Arts Center, 6/1969
CD15: Recording Milan, Studio di Fonologia della RAI, 6/1968 (Nono), 10/1969 (Kayn)
CD16: Recording Munich, BR Studio III, 3-4/1968 (Evangelisti); Riehen/Basle, Tonstudio Lussi, 9/1970 (Holliger)
CD17: Recording London, Chappell Studios, 2/1971
CD18: Recording Vienna, Musikverein, Großer Saal, 3/1970 (Symphonie "K"); Philharmonie Ljulbljana, 10/1970 (Étude)
CD19: Recording Godorf near Cologne, Studio Rhenus, 12/1969 (Spiral); Riehen/basle, Tonstudio Lussi, 10:1970 (Siebengesang)
CD20: Recording Hamburg-Wandsbek, Musi-Studio, 3-4/1971
CD21: Recording Brussels, Studio de Recherches et de Structurations Électroniques Auditives, 1-2/1971
Editorial Note:
Three Stockhausen albums, which were part of the original Avantgarde series, have not been included in this edition as we respect the preference of the Stockhausen estate to abstain from such re-release.
The box set includes a CD-sized 186 pp. book with photographies, line-ups, new and old liner notes. All CDs are housed in replicas of the original LP covers.
The missing Stockhausens are "Stimmung", "Telemusik" & "Gruppen/Carre" (but they're still available from the Stockhausen Editions label) -
The legendary DG Avantgarde vinyl series (1968-1971) is turning 55! In order to celebrate this occasion, the series is now released on 21 CDs for the first time. The Avantgarde series serves as a historical document for a time of radical change in musical thinking and the breaking of artistic boundaries. The question "What is music?" confronted many of the composers and musicians involved in the series, and the anti-authoritarian spirit of the 1960s and 1970s was a palpable influence. Deutsche Grammophon's Avantgarde Series reflects all the currents that thus arose, without aesthetic demarcations and across genres and instrumentations: large orchestral works stand alongside chamber music and solo forms, electronic music and improvisations.
The edition is presented in its original colourful designs by renowned graphic designer Holger Matthies, accompanied by a 186-page booklet with original commentaries (available in English & German) by composers and experts as well as photos of the artists from the DG archive. Highlights include canon works by György Ligeti such as his choral work "Lux aeterna," Luciano Berio's "Sequenza V" with Vinko Globokar on trombone, a simultaneous recording of three works by John Cage, and some groundbreaking and monumental electronic works such as Luigi Nono's "Contrappunto dialettico alla mente" and Leo Küpper's "Automatismes sonores."
Between 1969 and 1972 DGG released over twenty LPs with the latest music under the title Avantgarde . Now almost all the records from this series have been collected in a CD box with book (including the original sleeve texts and a new introduction by Paul Griffiths) plus reproductions of the original sleeves. The series can be found on Spotify, among other places, as a playlist ( click here ). Released at the time but not now included in this box are LPs with some compositions by Stockhausen (including Gruppen and Carré ) because the rights now rest with the Stockhausen heirs who like to self-publish recordings of their hero. Incidentally, Stockhausen is not absent: oboist Heinz Holliger plays the composition Spiral , reinforced with electronics .
Listening to the box is impossible without realizing what has happened to this music since 1970. Most composers only live on in the thickest encyclopedias and are probably only known to elderly avant-garde freaks. That a selection has been made in the meantime is also evident when looking at the reissues from this collection: previously released on CDs are most of the recordings of the LaSalle quartet plus works by Holliger, Ligeti, Nono and Zimmermann. What also negatively affects the reputation of this series now is perhaps the fact that several top works from the past are missing, although Paul Griffiths mentions in his introduction as a mitigating circumstance that these top works were often discussed elsewhere at the time: Henze was promoted by Deuthsche Grammophon (which decades later resulted in a beautiful CD box), Boulez, Berio and the minimalists by Sony, Dutilleux by Erato, Ligeti by Wergo and Carter by Nonesuch.
Despite this oblivion, the box is more than a historical document. The sixties in the foreign avant-garde (and in the Netherlands especially the seventies) were the years of experimentation. Failures were part of that, understanding from the public was not a priority, money seemed to play no role and among the listeners there were fanatical enemies as well as nuanced friends. Artistically speaking there was a lot of chaff among the wheat, but this phenomenon, as conservative critics like to forget, is timeless. A customer of the CD shop where I once worked once sighed: 'Recently I heard terrible modern music and in the past you had Mozart and Beethoven.' That statement is completely correct and at the same time completely absurd. A lot of contemporary music is indeed bad and Mozart and Beethoven are indeed great, but 98% of the contemporaries of Mozart and Beethoven are not really worth it and after 1945 there were also giants active like Berio, Carter and Boulez. What may also cloud the view of quality is the fact that the latest music has not yet crystallized into a language full of rules that can be learned and passed on. That conservative remark often indicates more an affinity with a widely used language with which this is possible than a feeling for quality in which language is a secondary point.
If there is one thing that characterizes the avant-garde in this box, it is that various composers liked to tinker with that widely supported language and considered the personal quest more important than the cultivation of a language with which many listeners can do more than just admire the result for its quality. And if that quality lags behind while composers do act arrogantly in the media (the pretension in the sometimes incomprehensible explanations drips from it), that is asking for trouble. And that is what happened and the critics could easily ignore what this avant-garde has produced in the long term. The lesser works, unfortunately the majority in this box, can at best be characterized as the fruits of a laboratory. They sometimes have strong moments, but lack a captivating grip on the architecture and are characterized more by idiom than by personality.
Among the best pieces in the box are some electronic compositions. They have a richness of sound that is much greater than in older work and they were consciously or unconsciously an example for the later application of electronic music in other media outside of 'serious' music.
Another great gain of the avant-garde around 1970 is the integration of humor. In this context, Kagel's name is often mentioned, but unfortunately he is not funny but thought he was funny (and therefore neither his jokes nor his serious works convince). Globokar and the Gruppo di Improvisazione Nuova Consonanza (in which Ennio Morricone played!) could do a better job of dosing this.
The two pieces by Cornelius Cardew are an extreme elaboration of the idea that one should express one's feelings very demonstratively. These are not screams of one moment, but of twenty minutes each. Expression becomes ex-pression: with pressure the inner self is thrown out, as if art were more a series of turbulent gestures from the I-era, as if permanent stormy searching were the constant and normal state of being. Cardew is forgotten, but his attitude has made a name for itself, especially in popular music. And 99% of songwriters have him as their spiritual father.
The size of the project allowed for various approaches. Some records were dedicated to one composer (e.g. Kagel, Küpper, Nono, Holliger, one with Americans), others to pieces for a specific instrumentation (choir, organ, electronic music, string quartet). Despite the various nationalities in the box, the West Germans and other composers are in the majority in their sphere of influence. Seriousness prevails, humour is often hard to find, sonic refinement is not always a priority and non-Western sounds are exotic. The absence of non-Germans (in more than one respect) such as Takemitsu, Messiaen, Denisov and Wuorinen is telling. There is much in this box that I do not need to hear again (including Evangelisti, Schnebel, Huber, Koenig, Mellnas, Riehn and Kopelent), but compositionally their music does not differ much from various pieces that I did find worthwhile. The notes to the original LPs do emphasise the compositional principles in the style of that time, but I was most struck by the sense of structure and character (or lack thereof). That Holliger stands in the tradition of expressionism, that Kagel makes a big deal out of it in the wrong way, that Ligeti combines pointillism with traces of folk music, that Lutoslawski does not deny his classical nature in all avant-gardism (even though one needs a microscope to hear that) and that Cage is more of an ideologist than an artist here, is something the listener must discover for himself. Judgments about the music are (undoubtedly consciously) left out. Also time-bound to the texts is the absence of the role of the musician, unless the score requires great freedom from the musician. Many composers were involved in the recording of their work, and they could count on the support of willing musicians who preferred fidelity to the score and a certain neutrality in the performance to a conscious presentation of their personality (a friend once described the Kontarsky brothers as the Kantoorski's, which in a sense does them justice). The best and most outspoken musicians in this box are, without them aiming for it, Heinz Holliger and the LaSalle Quartet.
A major disadvantage of contemporary music is that the lesser gods have not yet been selected out, which can lead to the misconception that there were more good composers in the past. The biggest disadvantage of the experiment is the chance of failure. If an experiment is a success, it is not because of the idea but because of the person who uses it. And if it is a success, the idea often quickly ends up in the hands of people who do something completely different with it. And unfortunately Griffiths is right when he writes that the best composers from around 1970 were mainly heard outside the box. On the other hand, I immediately feel the great expressiveness when I listen to the best from this box (of indeed the best-known figures: Berio, Ligeti, Nono, Zimmermann). Those figures might have come without these records, but without the music on these records we would not have the craziest, nicest and less nice music of today. The real gods are unrepeatable; from the lesser gods one can draw ideas and give them a more manageable form.
In the current climate this box is probably unthinkable. But much of music and expression today has its roots in the language of this box. Griffiths writes among other things:
'For baby boomers, born in the few years after World War II, these records - available separately to suit student budgets - filled a felt need. We wanted the world to change, and this was the music, along with that of The Beatles or The Stones or Dylan, that was changing it.'
The world and the music have indeed changed, just compare the world of the fifties and sixties with the one after that. Of course, this is not only because of this music, but the fact that the enormous influence of this avant-garde music by and for an elite on the current mass culture is hardly noticeable is due to various factors that deserve more attention in the public debate: the thorough aesthetic transformation that this music has undergone (very clear in Cardew and the electronics), the lack of historical interest among many and thus the unwillingness to relativize their own time and place, the disastrous influence of short-sighted conservative imagery and, it seems, the few public attempts by the avant-garde sector to emphasize the permanent importance and pleasure of experimentation. This reissue can do little to change these factors, but the awareness of these factors makes the box more than a historical document. The power of the box lies not only in the best pieces that are unrepeatable, but also in most of the lesser pieces that were imitated in often unexpected ways.
