From the back cover notes (enclosed):
Gyorgy Ligeti-Atmospheres:
"My most basic aim as a composer is the revivification of the sonorous aspect of musical form.Those factors of contemporary composition which do not manifest themselves directly as acoustical experience seem to me of only secondary importance. However, this emphatically does not mean that I intend to limit myself to the invention of new tone colors or other sound phenomena.It is much more important to me to discover new musical forms and a new manner of expression...Tone color, usually a vehicle of musical form, is liberated from form to become an independent entity."
Each instrument in the 87-member orchestra is considered independently and produces an individual sound line.The various tones and strands of sound, melting and repelling, are mixed together and transformed into a shifting expanse from which, not elements, but their momentary combinations emerge. The music reverberates in seeming chaos,its substance lithe and intense.
Toshi Ichiyanagi-Life Music:
The original version of this piece was composed on magnetic tape in 1964.In the version recorded here, the taped segments are played through large speakers situated behind the orchestra, which performs and interacts with the taped sounds. The "live" performers are picked up with contact microphones attached to their instruments. This is amplified and electronically processed for a modified quality.The result is music consisting of several elements-The unmodified "Live" orchestra, that sound mixed with its own processed sound and any combination of the two played with the taped material. This results in many possible combinations intermixed in continually varying ways.Accompanied by coordinated,shifting light effects on stage,the effect is a striking one.The "chance" element in the music is expressed through the use of silences as well as the fluid give-and-take juxtapositions of live,recorded, and live/processed sounds.
Toru Takemitsu-Arc For Piano and Orchestra:
As organizer of "Orchestral Space I" Toru Takemitsu's reputation as one of the most innovative contemporary composers is secure.
This performance of Arc uses the original score-an augmented version also exists.The piece features various instrumental combinations which are both separate musical entities and portions of a greater whole which interact with one another.The piano is situated center-stage with, initially, strings and horns gathered around it.The other instruments are divided into four groups surrounding this central nucleus.These groups go their separate ways in terms of tempo etc, yet criss-cross and intermingle ("Like fish in an aquarium" as the original Japanese notes put it) so that the whole work is more than the sum of its parts. Yet those parts retain their independence as musical "events".
Iannis Xenakis-Strategie:
Strategie is a unique work in which the composer employs a method which he calls "strategie musicale". He applies the mathematical "theory of games" to music in order to demonstrate a logical principle of behaviour.
Two 44-member orchestras are seated, one at the left and the other at the right of the stage.Each conductor chooses one (or two) at a time of the seven sound structures given by the composer (including one of silence). The seven basic sound structures or "strategies" can be characterized as follows: 0-silence, 1-wind instruments, 2-percussion, 3-striking the bodies of the string instruments, 4-pointillistic string sound, 5-string glissandi, and 6-harmonics (winds and strings) with organ points.
Each conductor signals his strategy with his hand, to his orchestra. A large score-board is set at the end of the stage.Each possible combination has already been assigned points based on the composer's calculations.So the points acquired by a conductor can be shown at once on the scoreboard by a scorekeeper. Thus two musical teams compete in a game of musical tactics.The audience hears music born of the unpredictable combinations of the strategies.
Strategie was composed in 1962 and was first performed at the Venice Festival in 1963 under the direction of B.Maderna and K.Simonovic (Maderna won the game). At "Orchestral Space I" Japanese conductors Seiji Ozawa and Hiroshi Wakasugi competed with the victory going to Wakasugi."However", Xenakis says, "a defeated conductor should never be thought inferior to a winning conductor.The latter won the contest only because he was better at following the rules of the game as determined by the composer."
-Based upon notes by Kuniharu Akiyama
Orchestral Space:
Side One:
a1-Gyorgi Ligeti- Atmospheres (1962) 8:11
a2-Toshi Ichiyanagi- Life Music,for Various Modulators,Magnetic Tape and Orchestra (1966) 16:57
Side Two:
b1-Toru Takemitsu- Arc,for Piano and Orchestra (15:00)
(Yuji Takahashi-Piano)
b2-Iannis Xenakis- Strategie (1962) 13:24
Seiji Ozawa conducting, Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra
Hiroshi Wakasugi, 2nd conductor on "Strategie".
(1) or (1)
Please Note: This record has a slight warp at the edge which results in some noise for the first minute or so of each side.It is most noticeable in side B.
