Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Classical Compositions of… the 1960s – Part II (1965-1969)

Seeing that most of my faves will garner enough votes, I'm going with Schnittke's String Quartet No. 1, which I love.

I think one of the thing that makes this period so interesting is how the barriers between notated and improvised and electronic music was pushed/blurred through letting performers have more latitude to interpret, introducing more 'fixed' electronic elements or processing tapes, graphical scores and so on, with lots of people working on both sides of the divide. Listening to Cardew's Treatise and struck by how different the versions are, I don't think anyone would guess they were the same piece if they didn't know. Bits of the score look a bit like the diagrams Xenakis made prior to writing out the scores, making it a sort of half-notated piece. A Rainbow In Curved Air has improvised elements but still has more in common with In C than most electro-acoustic music (and I'd say it's closer to semi-improvised psychedelic stuff like Henry Flynt than to Luc Ferrari). Anyway, a great list despite it being an impossible task

first instinct is Uaxuctum, but there are a lot here that i don't know

― fauci wally (voodoo chili),Thursday, April 9, 2020 9:35 AM (six days ago) bookmarkflaglink

and this is what i went with in the end. towering piece, like a portal into the apocalypse.

I couldn't not vote for Shosty's 14th – overwhelming personal significance wins yet again.

― coviderunt omnes (pomenitul),Wednesday, April 15, 2020 8:32 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

and me

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Guess I'll have to actually listen to that piece.

It's a thing!

recommend the Wyttenbach recording

https://www.discogs.com/ko/Giacinto-Scelsi-Quattro-Pezzi-Per-Orchestra-Anahit-Uaxuctum/release/997365

Onwards, fellow travellers:

Wherein We Elect Our Favourite Classical Compositions of… the 1970s – Part I (1970-1974)

Barraque got given a bit of short shrift here. The equal of Boulez's best work to me.

Also Alois' Intercomunicazione is just so fucking good, this performance is from the classic Siegfried Palm album:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-Zg6ALVqJI

I find the literary and philosophical underpinnings of Barraqué's oeuvre more compelling than the music itself (which I nonetheless enjoy), so I didn't consider voting for him over and above the others.

Agree that Intercommunicazione is excellent. Zimmermann is all too undersung – outside of the German-speaking world, at least.

Found a lot of composers that broke through to new expressive fields post-Boulez, Stockhausen. Guys like Barraque, Maderna, Zimmermann...to me there is an exciting history there.

Of course very little of that has ever come to a concert hall in this country.

Early Nono is incredible in that regard as well, especially Il canto sospeso, which I almost voted for in the 1955-1959 poll.

And if it's any comfort, Britain is a paradise for that stuff compared to Canada.

Yeah Nono is like a bridge for those two periods. That he was able to reinvent even further in the late 70s was remarkable.

"Sinfonia" is a banger and Ligeti is on a roll but would have voted "Aus den Sieben Tagen".