Antheil/Brant: Modern American Music Series

George Antheil/Henry Brant - Modern American Music Series

LP format

Ballet Méchanique composed by George Antheil

performed by the New York Percussion Group conducted by Carlos Surinach

My Ballet Méchanique was composed in Paris during 1924. It had various performances in Paris during 1925, 1926, and was performed in Carnegie Hall on April 10, 1927, for the first time in the United States. Vladmir Golschmann conducted in Paris; Eugene Goosens conducted in New York.
All the concerts above were riotous in some way, the Paris performances having fist fights in the audience, and the New York performance less so, but nevertheless it is said that the New York concert was as scandalous as New York has witnessed. It therefore early became a very notorious piece, much talked about but little played.

The Ballet Méchanique as now recorded (very faithfully, and according to my every original idea of it) by Carlos Surinach, is substantially the same as the version first presented in Paris, with this exception. The original version had eight pianos and, but not played simultaneously, a player piano. I have reduced these to four pianos, which was the original number of piano parts written for; with our present technique with microphones, it was not necessary to double the pianos in order to obtain the required sonority. Also, some cuts have been made, but not many; as the work was originally written to accompany an abstract motion picture by Leger, some measures were repeated -- and these repeats, for the main part, have been eliminated in this version. A glockenspiel, also not in the original version, has been added for highlighting. Otherwise this work is, 99% exactly as it was in 1924.

To those who might wish to understand the intentions and aesthetics of Ballet Méchanique from my point of view, the most important thing I think I can say about it is that it is somewhat like modern architecture. It uses both (a) new methods of musical engineering and (b) new materials. The engineering principle (which, I believe, I was the first to originate, explore) is called TIME-SPACE and is closely aligned to the introduction of the "cantilever" principle in modern architecture. I was not the first to use purely percussive materials (Varese preceded me but, I believe, no one else); however I used these materials in a new way, in juxtaposition to one another.

People have asked me why, for instance, I have used the sound of airplane propellers. They wish to know whether I intend some sort of program, an air-raid, etc.? I wish, for sake of interest in the piece for some people, I could say "yes"; but, actually, I have only used these sounds because they are part of the musical sound of our modern life; they are part of the vast new material of sound, musical sound, as steel and aluminum are now part of the facing, material, of modern buildings; in short, the approach is abstract, not realistic.
Ballet Méchanique is an approach to a new aesthetic in music. If one has a mind to understand it, let him listen with new ears, as he must look at a piece of modern architecture with new eyes. Rhythmically, aesthetically, materially and constructively it is, I feel, aligned with our modern life. When one considers when it was written - 1924 - I believe it may also have a bit of prophecy in its pages. (George Antheil)

Signs and Alarms and Galaxy 2 composed by Henry Brant

(information below from the liner notes)

Signs and Alarms (1953) was first performed in New York under Leopold Stokowski's direction. The music, in one movement, calls for piccolo, two clarinets, two horns, solo trumpet, solo trombone, tuba, marimba and xylophone, and four timpani.
Galaxy 2 (1954), also in a single movement, was written as a companion piece to Signs and Alarms and requires piccolo, clarinet, two solo horns, trumpet, trombone, glockenspiel and six timpani.
To meet the exacting demands on individual playing made in these two works, a hand-picked virtuoso group was assemble for the present recording under the composer's direction. They are:Harry Moskovitz - piccolo
Herbert Tichman - clarinet
Thomas Parshley - clarinet
Fred Klein - horn
Tony Miranda - horn
Theodore Weis - trumpet
Frederick Snyder - trombone
Don Butterfield - tuba
Alfred Howard - timpani
Morris Goldenberg - glockenspiel, xylophone and marimba

Virgil Thomson writes of Signs and Alarms: "The piece is at once a comical joke and a highly expert study in instrumental sonorities. Every part is a piece of virtuoso writing, and the whole is an exciting extension of instrumental customs, as well as an entertaining pleasantry. Especially original and effective are its researches into the acoustical affinities of tuba with kettledrum and of xylophone with piccolo, the former duet accompanying a hair-raising trombone solo, the latter a side-splitting passage for trumpet." (New York Herald Tribune, February 23, 1953).

Tracklisting:

Side 1

1. George Antheil - Ballet Méchanique {17:07}

Side 2

1. Henry Brant - Signs and Alarms {9:00}

2. Henry Brant - Galaxy 2 {5:14}

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