Musique concrète
Music made from recorded sounds.
What it means
Musique concrète designates a music made from recorded sounds: noises, instrumental tones, voices, everyday sounds are captured on tape and then worked on — cut, reversed, changed in speed, layered. The name points to the fact that one works with concrete sound material, not with abstract notes that first become sound through performers. The movement arose around 1948 in Paris.
Musical use
The fundamental difference from traditional music lies in the way of working. The composer works directly on the sound instead of on signs, and the result is the recording itself; there is no score that others could perform. From this follows a new attention to tone colour, attack transients, and courses. Alongside works played purely from tape, pieces for instruments with tape playback also arose. It differs from the electronic music arising at the same time, which initially worked with synthetically generated sounds, in its starting material; the two approaches soon converged.
Performance practice
With works involving tape playback, clarify technology, loudspeaker placement, and volume relationships early; they belong to the interpretation. Practise with the tape, because it dictates the tempo unyieldingly. Fix entry points and rehearse the start. Check the condition of historical recordings in good time and keep a checked copy ready. With purely electroacoustic works, the setup in the room is the actual performance work: number of loudspeakers, placement, and level decide the result.
Bear in mind that with purely electroacoustic works, the setup in the room is the actual performance work: the number and placement of the loudspeakers, level, and balance decide the result, and the same recording sounds different in two halls. Plan rehearsal time for this. Watch the loudspeaker position, because spatial movement can be part of the composition. Check the condition of historical recordings in good time.
Clarify before the concert who operates the tape playback, and fix how to proceed in case of an error, so that the performance does not break off.
Also check whether the work requires a particular number of channels, because the technology in the hall follows from that.