Text Sound John Cage+Gysin+Robert Ashley++ electronic

$

26

10 + 2 : 12 American Text Sound Pieces-- Charles Amirkhanian: Just (1972); Heavy Aspirations (1973) / Clark Coolidge: Preface (1968-excerpt) / John Cage: 62 Mesostics Re Merce Cunningham (1971) / John Giorno: Give It to Me, Baby (1967) / Anthony Gnazzo: The Population Explosion (1969, lock groove) / Charles Dodge: Speech Songs Nos. 1+2 (1973) / Robert Ashley: In Sara, Mencken, Christ and Beethoven There Were Men and Women (1973-excerpt) / Beth Anderson: Torero Piece (1973) / Brion Gysin: Come To Free The Words (1962) / Liam O'Gallagher: Border Dissolve in Audiospace (1970) / Aram Saroyan: crickets (1965, lock groove)



label & cat. no.:
1750 Arch 1752 pressed in:
USA date:
1974 format:
LP condition:
Vinyl: vg+ (few light scuffs)
Cover: vg (shelf and edge wear) description:
Fantastic and scarce lp showcasing sound poems of the American members of the text sound/concrete poetry movement influenced by Kurt Schwitters and Raoul Hausmann. Tracks range from recitals of radically experimental text-based scores to electronically cut-up and processed vocal musique concrete to endless locked groove pieces, each an attempt to "free language from the traditional confines of confessional and projective verse" and create "a music composed from speaking." All of the compositions are either for solo voice or tape-manipulated voices, sometimes appropriated from diverse sources. The Coolidge work, for example, takes as its source the strange voice in the spoken introduction to the John Cage electronic music lp Variations IV, systematically (and hilariously) displacing words and phrases to provide, in Coolidge's words, "everything you always wanted to know about John Cage and David Tudor but weren't properly disposed to hear." Amirkhanian's Just takes a more rhythmic approach by arranging tape loops of 4 words into percussive patterns (sometimes sounding similar to Steve Reich's early tape phase-based works), while his Heavy Aspirations creates a portrait in text-sound of composer Nicholas Slominsky by cutting up a recording of his lecture on avant garde music. The piece by beat poet Giorno is a collaboration with Robert Moog and electronically processes a young girl's voice through a Moog synthesizer; Ashley's work also uses a Moog. The unique infinite loop/locked groove pieces finish off each side. This art object record is listed in the Broken Music catalog of artists' record works and should be of interest to collectors of experimental postmodern poetry as well as Fluxus and Dada. Includes insert with extensive notes by Amirkhanian, producer of the album.

artist info from album notes etc.:
Amirkhanian is a composer, percussionist, poet, and experimental dj who worked at Berkeley's KPFA radio (home of Henry Jacobs) producing avant garde radio series. Beat poet Giorno ran the Dial-A-Poem-Poets Giorno Poetry Systems label and worked with Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, Coil, Sonic Youth, Meredith Monk, Arto Lindsay, Psychic TV, and Lydia Lunch. Dodge was a student of Otto Luening, Vladimir Ussachevsky, Gunther Schuller, Darius Milhaud, and Arthur Berger, worked on early computer music at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center and at Bell Laboratories, and researched sound synthesis for IBM. Anderson studied under Cage, Terry Riley, and Larry Austin. Ashley's composing explores experimental uses of language; he was a member of the Sonic Arts Union, a composers' collective that included David Behrman, Alvin Lucier and Gordon Mumma. Cage, arguably the most influential American composer of the 20th century, was known for his innovative use of chance methods, silence, found sounds, and extended playing and electroacoustic treatment techniques on traditional instruments; he studied under Henry Cowell and Arnold Schoenberg, led the New York School of early postwar experimental composers (Earle Brown, Christian Wolff, Morton Feldman), was a contemporary of Karlheinz Stockhausen and Iannis Xenakis, collaborated with Conlon Nancarrow, David Tudor, and Merce Cunnigham, and was associated with the Fluxus 'post-dada' art movement (Yoko Ono, Nam June Paik, George Maciunas, La Monte Young, Milan Knizak, Joseph Beuys, etc.). Should also be of interest to fans of John Oswald, Charles Bernstein, Cris Cheek, Kenneth Gaburo, Jon Appleton, Bengt-Emil Johnson, Lars-Gunnar Bodin, Sten Hanson, Christian Marclay, Mauricio Kagel, Milan Knizak, Henri Chopin, Bernard Heidsieck, Ilhan Mimaroglu, Jackson MacLowe, Tristan Tzara, Pierre Henry, and Lyn Hejinian. Check out my other items for more avant garde/experimental, early electronic/electroacoustic, audiophile, 20th century classical, soundtracks, poetry/spoken word, space age pop, and artist records. US Shipping - Media Mail is $5.00 for 1-2 single records, then $0.65 for each additional; Priority Mail is also available but pricing depends on zipcode (you can check eBay's calculated shipping price at the bottom of this page); other expedited shipping options and insurance are all available on request. Combine multiple items to save on shipping.
International Shipping - 1 12" lp to Europe/UK/Scandinavia/Asia/Australia is $15.00 for First Class Airmail; to Canada is $9.00 for First Class Airmail; to Mexico is $12.53 for First Class Airmail; other international destinations vary, please email for a quote. 7" records will cost less; heavy box sets will cost more. Insured Priority Airmail with tracking and other expedited methods are also available but pricing depends on destination country and will be calculated after auction closes (or you can email me with your address for a quote). Combine multiple items to save on shipping; I can hold paid records to be combined with a future purchase if desired. Note: I can also offer international buyers the slow but super-cheap M-Bag bulk airmail rate for orders of 8 or more lps; to most destinations this costs $40.00 flat rate for up to 16 lps, a huge per-record savings over standard rates for smaller parcels! Feel free to email with any shipping questions. Payment - I accept Paypal (which allows for fastest possible shipment). Please email with any payment questions. If you are paying by Paypal and have won multiple items, please use a single Paypal payment. I will send an invoice email to all winners shortly after my auctions close, and another email after payment has been received to confirm item shipment. Packing - I pack professionally and with the utmost care drawn from years of experience trading vinyl internationally. I use new record mailers from Cameron Packaging (which I have determined are the best and most protective) reinforced with cardboard inserts and bubble wrap padding. All records are shipped with poly plastic sleeves. All packages are completely sealed with strong packing tape covering all openings. Unless requested, no paper invoice is included in the package, both to save trees and to avoid customs difficulties. If you'd like your package done any differently, just let me know. Other Info - Feel free to email me if you have any questions (need more info, want more pictures, etc.); you can use the 'ask seller a question' link above. Records are visually graded unless otherwise noted; my condition rating scale is M (sealed) / NM (unplayed) / EX (barely used) / VG (some evident wear from prior use but no major flaws) / G (major flaws). All included album inserts are pictured in the listing; what you see is what you get, if I know an insert is missing I will mention it in the description. Satisfaction guaranteed; if you have any problems with your order please contact me directly. Enter your email to join the
mailing list: This item description is (c)opyright 2010 keymap records; please contact keymap records for permission before reproducing any text.