Poème électronique
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Poème électronique (English Translation: "Electronic Poem") is a piece of electronic music by composer Edgard Varèse. Varèse composed the piece with the intention of creating a liberation between sounds and as a result uses noises not usually considered "musical" throughout the piece. It was written for the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair.
Sirens were used as musical instruments.
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The Performance
- "Poème électronique is the first, electronic-spatial environment to combine architecture, film, light and music to a total experience made to functions in time and space. Under the direction of Le Corbusier, Iannis Xenakis' concept and geometry designed the World's Fair exhibition space adhering to mathematical functions. Edgard Varèse composed both concrete and vocal music which enhanced dynamic, light and image projections conceived by Le Corbusier. Varèse's work had always sought the abstract and, in part, visually inspired concepts of form and spatial movements. Among other elements for «Poème électronique» he used machine noises, transported piano chords, filtered choir and solo voices, and synthetic tone colorings. With the help of the advanced technical means made available through the Philips Pavilion, the sounds of this composition for tape recorder could wander throughout the space on highly complex routes." --[1]
For the performance, 425 loudspeakers, placed at specific points in Le Corbusier's Philips Pavilion were triggered to sound at specific intervals (as a result, the performance never sounded exactly the same in any specific location).
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