Composition / Musique Concrète

Earlier this year, Deutsche Grammophon announced and delivered one of the most exciting initiatives in recent memory: a brand-new audiophile vinyl reissue series dedicated to crucial avant-garde and experimental works from its own extensive catalog. Beginning with Luc Ferrari's Presque Rien No.1 / Société II (1970), Mauricio Kagel's Acustica (1972), and Tōru Takemitsu's Quatrain / A Flock Descends Into The Pentagonal Garden (1980), these deluxe limited editions completely blew us away, returning…

Documenting a reunion of Musica Elettronica Viva's founders Frederic Rzewski (piano and vocals), Richard Teitelbaum (keyboards and computer) and Alvin Curran (keyboards, computer and shofar) at the 32nd International Festival Of Current Music in Victoriaville, Canada in 2016.

Big tip! *2025 repress. 250 copies limited edition* Metaphon is thrilled to present this collection of 14 phenomenal electronic and electro-acoustic works by French composer Fernand Vandenbogaerde, realized between 1967 and 1984. After his science studies Fernand Vandenbogaerde (1946) studied at the Conservatoire de Roubaix and did various classes and courses with a.o. Jean-Etienne Marie, Olivier Messiaen, Pierre Schaeffer, György Ligeti, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Bruno Maderna. He wrote analyti…

Tip! *300 copies limited edition* Robert Nasveld (born 1955) studied piano at the Utrecht Conservatory and specialized in the twentieth-century repertoire, with a particular focus on Dutch, Russian, and American music. He thoroughly immersed himself in the piano works of the American composer George Crumb with concerts in Europe, Russia, and the United States. As a composer he also studied electronic music with Ton Bruynèl and recorded a handful of tape pieces which are collected on this LP. The…

Tip! Marja Ahti is a Swedish artist living in Turku, Finland. She works with found sounds, objects and electronics, creating auditory assemblages that reveal a profound sensitivity to sound’s tactile potential. This new record sees her palette expand to include more recognisable acoustic instrumentation, albeit working in collaboration with musicians who are already reconfiguring how those instruments can sound. Touch This Fragrant Surface of Earth has its roots in a tape piece presented at Lamp…

The complete electronic works of Dutch composer Ton de Leeuw, eight pieces from 1956 to 1982 restored from the original tapes, including the Prix Italia oratorio Job and Chronos, rediscovered in an archive.

*2024 stock* Computer Music serves as the official musical documentation of the November 1981 International Computer Music Conference, held at North Texas State University in Denton, Texas. The album features five compositions with music that ranges from electronic sounds to female vocals, flute and horns, stringed instruments, and percussion. The composers include Larry Austin, whose early works were recorded with the help of Leonard Bernstein; Bruce Pennycook, who now teaches music at the Butl…

Nippon Cultural Broadcasting (= Bunka Hōsō) is known for airing Toshiro Mayuzumi’s composition for “Works for musique concrète X.Y.Z.” the very first Japanese work of musique concrète. Now, for the first time, the long-lost broadcast recordings produced by the director of that era are being released! These include a piece by Yori-aki Matsudaira's father, Yoritsune Matsudaira, created by repeatedly dubbing instrumental material, as well as an experimental work unique to Bunka Hōsō, produced throu…

Limited and numbered edition, featuring original artwork and a newly designed, beautifully crafted collector’s sleeve with new liner notes by Bradford Bailey, and pressed on 180g vinyl. Includes hi-res audio download. Among the most playful and pointed entries in Deutsche Grammophon's legendary Avantgarde series, Mauricio Kagel's Exotica returns to vinyl - a work that turns the Western fascination with the music of elsewhere into a piece of high comedy and, beneath the laughter, a quietly devast…

Two works by the Romanian composer Octavian Nemescu, Passages (1981) and À travers le temps (1983), written during the communist years: spectral music built on harmonics and on the perception of time.

Before spectral music had a name, Romanian polymath Corneliu Cezar was crafting electro-acoustic revelations. Ziua fără sfârșit collects his 1967-75 recordings - radical explorations of natural resonance that predate Western spectralism by a decade.

Originally released by CRI in 1974 and now reissued on vinyl for the first time by Death Is Not The End, Music by Earle Brown is a concise overview of the composer's landmark early experiments with graphic notation, open form structures and magnetic tape.

2025 stock 1992 release. Flutist Barbara Held presents works by Alvin Lucier, Nils Vigeland, and Yasunao Tone and a composition of her own. Known for her collaborations with composers, Held has beautifully chosen and performed this wide-ranging sampling of contemporary musical styles. Vara features Joseph Kubera on piano.

Unreleased material composed by Bernard Parmegiani in 1992

'I believe Jacob's Room is one of the most extraordinary examples of extended vocal techniques that I have ever heard. Touch is the child of the original Buchla electronic music triumvirate that included Silver Apples and Wild Bull. Its exploration of the sound and texture possibilities of electronic music is a variation on the two previous compositions. Jacob's Room is a vehicle for Subotnick's wife, Joan LaBarbara to demonstrate why she is universally considered the master of extended vocal te…

*2022 stock* Morton Subotnick achieved fame in the field of electronic music with Silver Apples of the Moon and The Wild Bull, his best-known tape works of the late 1960s. Since then, he has been active combining electronics with other media, notably employing gestural sketches on tape to alter sounds produced by voices and instrumentalists. The two works on this 2015 Wergo release are representative of Subotnick's methods, using a trumpet with a chamber ensemble in After the Butterfly, to reali…

Trifold glossy slipcase includes two CDs, label catalogue and 16-page booklet of liner notes and images. For new initiates and avant-garde fiends alike, this Iannis Xenakis collection renders a breathtaking survey of works by the radical composer, theorist, architect and engineer, spanning the period 1956-1974 and featuring some of the greatest works of the 20th century, including the awe-inspiring sonic architecture of ‘Persepolis’.Inarguably one of the most important composers to blend electro…

"Hyperrealist Music, 2011-2015" is a selection of late masterpieces by Noah Creshevsky, a proponent of "Hyperreal Music," which opened a new door to cyber-human music.

Enclosed in a 336 pages book published by Sveriges Radios Förlag (ISBN: 91-522-1817-1). It is written in Swedish and English by Teddy Hultberg. The CD's were released by Fylkingen Records only together with the book. The book itself is enclosed in a slipcover. The Swedish texts on the recordings are translated into English in the book. "Birds In Sweden" (1963) was produced by Öyvind Fahlström in collaboration with sound engineer Erik Winlöf at the Swedish Radio studios in the second half of 1962…

Live electronic compositions from 1993-2005 by composer Agostino Di Scipio, using acoustic instruments and digital sound processing to create unusual and previously unheard sound worlds.

Recordings from the Elektronic Studio at the TU Berlin, the Studio of the Institut International de Musique Electroacoustique de Bourges, and at Patrick Kosk's own studio

Milestone release! David Tudor's (1926-1996) identity morphed seamlessly from interpreter of mainly acoustic music to composer-performer of predominately electronic music over a period of about ten years, from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s. This set of seven CDs, the first truly comprehensive survey of Tudor's work as a composer, goes beyond any previous attempt to document that process of transformation. It captures his touch and sensitivity and offers an expansive, previously unavailable view…

Over the course of a nearly 50 year romantic and creative partnership sound artist Annea Lockwood and the late pioneering electronic composer Ruth Anderson have shared space on a number of significant releases of early electronic and tape music, including Charles Amirkhanian’s trailblazing 1977 anthology of women electronic composers New Music for Electronic and Recorded Media, a 1981 split LP on Opus One, a 1997 CD for Phill Niblock’s XI imprint, and 1998’s Lesbian American Composers compilatio…

Reinhold Weber, born in 1927, was known as a pioneer of electronic music. In his compositions, Weber placed a focus on twelve-tone music, he became increasingly fascinated in the field of computer music since the 1970s. He produced numerous works at the Studio for Electronic Music at the University of Karlsruhe.

“Mapping” here refers to the interest of composer Larry Austin (1930–2018) in the adaptation of external structures (such as mathematical figures or shapes observed in nature) for the purpose of generating compositional material. This concern was shared by his PhD composition students at the university of North Texas, three of whom—Rodney Washka II, Gene De Lisa, and Robert Michael Keefe— are represented on Cartography. Each experimented with the possibilities of the Synclavier digital music sys…

This long-awaited reissue of the CRI recording of Earle Brown’s (1926–2002) music is the best overview of his seminal early works. “It is obviously a great pleasure for me that Cri is re-releasing its 1974 recording of my work, and an even greater pleasure that I am able to add to the repertoire. The performance of Times Five and Novara still seem very fine representations of the works and are performed brilliantly by the Dutch musicians. December 1952 as realized by the late, brilliant pianist …

*300 copies limited edition* Students of Decay presents "Kaivajaiset" by Finnish composer Niko-Matti Ahti. Best known for his work alongside his partner Marja as Ahti & Ahti, Niko-Matti has been an active participant in the Finnish underground since the late 1990s. "Kaivajaiset" is his first solo recording and was originally conceived of as an installation. Part horspiel, part musique concrete, it is a piece of music that draws comparisons to the work of pioneering avant-garde composers such as …

*300 copies limited edition* Patience is the debut full-length album by Sante Fe-based artist Theodore Cale Schafer. Alternately murky and narcoleptic and bristling with grit and light, this collection of eight pieces is a delicate play of contrasts. Impressionistic settings unfurl with an unhurried gait, opening with the dream-like disorientation of "Gold Chain" in which a degraded location recording gives way to a soft web of treated piano motifs. Schafer's compositions are sumptuous yet unfus…

Big tip! *300 copies limited edition* First LP in the ‘Signature Series’, a small new series in the Metaphon catalog, documenting previously unreleased archive works of less known composers. Metaphon presents their ‘signature’ in the most personal and elementary way. Raoul De Smet (1936), mainly known for his numerous instrumental and chamber music works, started composing in the early 1960’s. Between 1974 and 1989 he also recorded several electro-acoustic compositions at the IPEM in Ghent, one …

Two first recordings of electroacoustic works by Gerard Pape for 8-channel tape: Vers la lumière II, dedicated to Ana-Maria Avram, and Héliophonie, written for the solar eclipse of 29 March 2006. Binaural release, stereo compatible.

Three works by Luc Ferrari: Visage 2 (1955-56) and Après presque rien (2004), both first recordings with Musiques Nouvelles and Art Zoyd, and Madame de Shanghai for three flutes and digital sounds.

Five chamber works with tape and electronics composed by Gerard Pape between 1993 and 1997, performed by soprano Janet Pape, the Arditti Quartet, bassist Nicholas Isherwood, Vox Nova, saxophonist Daniel Kientzy and Ensemble 2e2m.

Near Distant by Michelle Lou explores the intricate interplay of stasis, time and perception. Lou’s compositions challenge conventional interpretations, presenting music as a constantly evolving landscape. Through “static” or “stasis-variation” she reveals the complexity within seemingly unchanging sounds, inviting listeners to explore subtle transformations in pitch, timbre and dynamics. This album embodies Lou’s unique approach, emphasizing our active role in perceiving and transforming the in…

Program notes in German and English in 200-page booklet. Karlheinz Stockhausen personally mixed down and mastered these recordings from the original analogue tapes for this CD edition.  Karlheinz Stockhausen –“Mikrophonie I” (1964) for tam-tam, 2 microphones, 2 filters with potentiometers (6 players) / “Mikrophonie II” (1965) for choir, Hammond organ, 4 ring modulators / “Telemusik” (1966) (electronic music).  Together with Stockhausen's immediately preceding work Mixtur, for five orchestra grou…

*2024 stock* In this 1982 Folkways release, Jon Appleton plays four compositions written for the Synclavier, a digital synthesizer he helped to develop in the late 1970s. “The Sweet Dreams of Miss Pamela Beach” was recorded in a studio using a 24-track recorder to “layer” portions of the music. The remaining three pieces were performed live with “some small sections and accompaniments contained in the digital memory of the instrument at the time of performance.” Liner notes contain brief descrip…

*2024 stock* Arne Nordheim might not be the best known early electronic music composer, but with this fabulously presented double disc of work it should help his music achieve at least a little wider recognition. He might be best known (at least outside his native Norway) for the discs on Rune Grammofon, but here we get some of his earliest tape work from the 1960s, possibly his most interesting period, at least to me. As a die hard Radiophonic Workshop enthusiast this collection seems to come f…

*2024 stock* A 1983 Folkways release, Computer Music from the Outside In showcases three composers narrating the ideas and processes behind their computer music compositions, as well as the compositions themselves. The first two pieces are by Barton McLean: “Etunytude” is an etude-like piece made of gradually changing harmonic sounds, and “The Last Ten Minutes” is meant to be an abstract representation of the devastation of “the last nuclear holocaust.” “The Whistling Wind,” by Karl Korte, is ba…

1990 release. Six compositions by the German composer Mathias Spahlinger: ("Morendo" for orchestra), ("Yon Hier" for string quartet), ("Vier Stücke"), ("Entlöschend"), ("Storung" -- electronic music), ("Sotto Voce" -- choral work).Mathias Spahlinger is a composer. His compositions play out in the area of tension encompassing the most diverse musical influences and style directions: Spahlinger’s works portray conflicts for which there are no defined models as such, between Renaissance and jazz…

A documentary of pieces performed at the Inventionen Festival in Berlin, 1998. Features: Unsuk Chin, Patrick Kosk, Werner Cee, Francois Donato, Robin Minard, Wolfgang Mitterer, Francis Dhomont, Erik Mikael Karlsson, Trevor Wishart. "Not as much as a bringer-up to speed (or yet another history lesson at that) as a fine cache of current keepers of the crop. New ('93-98), complete pieces from Trevor Wishart (northern-UK composer/programmer known and loved these days for his mid-70's works such as M…

Passionate about music from childhood, it wasn't until later, at the age of 22, after reading À la recherche d'une musique concrète by Pierre Schaeffer, that she decided to study composition. After classical training in harmony, she met Michel Puig, a pupil of René Leibowitz, who taught her writing and analysis upon Schönberg Theory. In 1970, she began a two-year internship at the Research Department of the ORTF under the direction of Pierre Schaeffer. Between 1973 and 1975, she took part in a r…