Gottfried Michael Koenig (1926) collaborated intensively with Karlheinz Stockhausen in the 1950s in the Electronic Music Studio of the WDR in Cologne, where he himself also produced several landmark pieces of electronic and serial music. He moved to the Netherlands in 1964 to become the artistic director of Utrecht University“s Studio for Electronic Music, which in 1967 became the Institute of Sonology. Under Koenig“s supervision, the institute played a pioneering role in the development of new production techniques for electronic music, including digital sound synthesis, and programs for computer-assisted composition. He has continued to compose electronic music as well as music for solo instruments and ensembles, each work representing a further step in a highly original and radical thought process. The present volume of writings and conversations (1954–2001) – most of which appear in English translation for the first time – document Koenig“s systematic exploration of serial and aleatoric techniques, relationships between technology and music, algorithmic composition and reflections on music by others. Koenig“s music and writings are the ideal subjects for a reorientation regarding 20th century musical composition, of which many ideas are still at the beginnings of their full exploration.

Paperback, published in 2018, 320 pages.
Edited by Kees Tazelaar, Translated by Richard Barrett.

Table of Content:

Editor’s Note (Kees Tazelaar) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Autor’s Note . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Translator’s Note (Richard Barrett) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Preface: Koenig’s Actuality (Horacio Vaggione) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

1 On Musical (Artistic) Inspiration (undated) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

2.1 Progressing in Stages (1999) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

2.2 Musica e Numero (2001) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

3.1 Interview with Ursula Stürzbecher (1971) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

3.2 Interview with Heinz-Klaus Metzger (1971) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

3.3 From Conversations on Webern (1973) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

3.4 Interview with Patrick Fleury (1988) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

4.1.1 Music and Number (1958, translated by Cornelius Cardew) . . . . . . . . 80

4.1.2 Complex Sounds (1965, translated by Ruth Koenig) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

4.1.3 Serial and Electronic Methods in Electronic Music (1965). . . . . . . . . 122

4.2 Bilthoven Course 1961/62 (1961) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138

4.3.1 Notes on Musical Economy (1961) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

4.3.2 Genesis of Form in Technically Conditioned Environments

(1986, translated by Ruth Koenig) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196

4.3.3 The Word-Sound Problem (1961). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207

4.4 Chance Decisions in Musical Composition (1968). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218

4.5 My Experiences with Programmed Music

(1975, translated by Ruth Koenig) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

5.1 Problems of Electronic Composition (1962) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234

5.2.1 Condition – Instruction – Execution

(1968, translated by Ruth Koenig) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241

5.2.2 Some Observations on the Impact of Technology on Music

(1982, translated by Ruth Koenig) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246

5.2.3 Between Music and Technology: A Field of Tension (1990) . . . . . . . . 254

5.3 Studium im Studio (1959, translated by Leo Black). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262

5.4.1 Studio Technique (1954, translated Hans G Helms) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274

5.4.2 Via Electronica (1960) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277

5.4.3 Remarks on Compositional Theory

(1968, translated by Ruth Koenig) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289

Discography. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313