Description
For a decimated post-war West Germany, the electronic music studio at the WDR radio in Cologne was a beacon of hope. Jennifer Iverson's Electronic Inspirations: Technologies of the Cold War Musical Avant-Garde traces the reclamation and repurposing of wartime machines, spaces, and discourses into the new sounds of the mid-century studio. In the 1950s, when technologies were plentiful and the need for reconstruction was great, West Germany began to rebuild its cultural prestige via aesthetic and technical advances. The studio's composers, collaborating with scientists and technicians, coaxed music from sine-tone oscillators, noise generators, band-pass filters, and magnetic tape. Together, they applied core tenets from information theory and phonetics, reclaiming military communication technologies as well as fascist propaganda broadcasting spaces. The electronic studio nurtured a revolutionary synthesis of science, technology, politics, and aesthetics. Its esoteric sounds transformed mid-century music and continue to reverberate today. Electronic music-echoing both cultural anxiety and promise-is a quintessential Cold War innovation.
About the Author
Jennifer Iverson is a scholar of twentieth-century music, with a special emphasis on electronic music, avant-gardism, and disability studies. Jennifer's work crosses freely between music theory, musicology, sound studies, and cultural history, drawing together analysis, archival research, and intellectual discourse. Her articles appear in journals such as Music Theory Spectrum, Journal of the American Musicological Society, twentieth-century music, and Music Theory Online. In 2015-16 she was a faculty fellow at the Stanford Humanities Center and now teaches at the University of Chicago.
Reviews
Electronic Inspirations offers a number of interesting and worthwhile insights into the avant-garde electronic music of the 1950s, both in terms of historical detail and theoretical interpretation, synthesizing a great deal of published and unpublished material. * Sam Ridout, Transposition *
This book is addressed to an audience not only of experts but also of students and music lovers. Iverson's effort to introduce the actors, networks, and music to all kinds of readers in an astute way is very compelling. Anyone interested in electronic music and its networks will find much to enjoy in Iverson's work. * Joao Romao, Revue de musicologie *
A brilliant book, pulsating with excitement: Iverson makes instant connections faster than an electric circuit, transmits information more accurately than magnetic tape, and creates a network of actors more complex than the Cologne Radio Station. * Alexander Rehding, Fanny Peabody Professor of Music, Harvard University *
This fascinating account of the Cologne West German Radio Station and its famous underground electronic music studio traces how international networks, surplus cold war technology, and cybernetic visions and imaginaries shaped and inspired the new genre. Born from repression, the dance of agency between humans and technology, Iverson argues, is the key to understanding how this music developed. Ironically it would eventually transmogrify into today's joyous Electronic Dance Music - capital city: Berlin! * Trevor Pinch, author of Analog Days: The Invention and Impact of the Moog Synthesizer *
Taking the studio as an object of scholarly inquiry...helps to make legible a dynamic that is often only dimly discernible. * Matthew Mendez, Yale University, Society for Music Theory *
The greatest achievement in Iverson's book is that she documents and brings into focus the collaborative spirit of larger networks of actors and institutions, with regards both to the activities in WDR and the discourse between composers internationally...This makes her book a very worthwhile read for all interested in the early foundations of electronic music and for all engaged in the contemporary development of a plurality of new electronic music dialects. * Joran Rudi, Organised Sound *
Book Information
ISBN 9780190868208
Author Jennifer Iverson
Format Paperback
Page Count 320
Imprint Oxford University Press Inc
Publisher Oxford University Press Inc
Dimensions(mm) 155mm * 234mm * 23mm
About the Author
Jennifer Iverson is a scholar of twentieth-century music, with a special emphasis on electronic music, avant-gardism, and disability studies. Jennifer's work crosses freely between music theory, musicology, sound studies, and cultural history, drawing together analysis, archival research, and intellectual discourse. Her articles appear in journals such as Music Theory Spectrum, Journal of the American Musicological Society, twentieth-century music, and Music Theory Online. In 2015-16 she was a faculty fellow at the Stanford Humanities Center and now teaches at the University of Chicago.
Reviews
Electronic Inspirations offers a number of interesting and worthwhile insights into the avant-garde electronic music of the 1950s, both in terms of historical detail and theoretical interpretation, synthesizing a great deal of published and unpublished material. * Sam Ridout, Transposition *
This book is addressed to an audience not only of experts but also of students and music lovers. Iverson's effort to introduce the actors, networks, and music to all kinds of readers in an astute way is very compelling. Anyone interested in electronic music and its networks will find much to enjoy in Iverson's work. * Joao Romao, Revue de musicologie *
A brilliant book, pulsating with excitement: Iverson makes instant connections faster than an electric circuit, transmits information more accurately than magnetic tape, and creates a network of actors more complex than the Cologne Radio Station. * Alexander Rehding, Fanny Peabody Professor of Music, Harvard University *
This fascinating account of the Cologne West German Radio Station and its famous underground electronic music studio traces how international networks, surplus cold war technology, and cybernetic visions and imaginaries shaped and inspired the new genre. Born from repression, the dance of agency between humans and technology, Iverson argues, is the key to understanding how this music developed. Ironically it would eventually transmogrify into today's joyous Electronic Dance Music - capital city: Berlin! * Trevor Pinch, author of Analog Days: The Invention and Impact of the Moog Synthesizer *
Taking the studio as an object of scholarly inquiry...helps to make legible a dynamic that is often only dimly discernible. * Matthew Mendez, Yale University, Society for Music Theory *
The greatest achievement in Iverson's book is that she documents and brings into focus the collaborative spirit of larger networks of actors and institutions, with regards both to the activities in WDR and the discourse between composers internationally...This makes her book a very worthwhile read for all interested in the early foundations of electronic music and for all engaged in the contemporary development of a plurality of new electronic music dialects. * Joran Rudi, Organised Sound *
Book Information
ISBN 9780190868208
Author Jennifer Iverson
Format Paperback
Page Count 320
Imprint Oxford University Press Inc
Publisher Oxford University Press Inc
Dimensions(mm) 155mm * 234mm * 23mm
