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Text, including the two scores - Columbia University Department of ...

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<strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> strings (from normal, to sul tasto or sul ponticello), which similarly changes <strong>the</strong> relative magnitudes <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> instrument’s frequency spectrum (e.g. <strong>the</strong> end <strong>of</strong> section 6). Note that <strong>the</strong>se rules are not rigid, and that divergences (especially bowing<br />

<strong>the</strong> instruments) and exceptions abound occur. Correlations involving <strong>the</strong> position <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> ‘screen’ shapes, and <strong>the</strong> acoustic instruments, are even more subjective than <strong>the</strong> above list, and variable throughout <strong>the</strong> piece. As in Cardinality Aleph Two, <strong>the</strong> specifications for each pad, within each cue, involving<br />

into polyphonic instantiations <strong>of</strong> modular interface. See figure 5. solidified<br />

Industry paired unrelated audio and image, American Engineer contains an explicit connection between <strong>the</strong> audio and video source materials. All <strong>the</strong> audio and video samples (and <strong>the</strong> title for my piece) come from American Engineer, a corporate-sponsored ephemeral film from 1956, Whereas<br />

extolls <strong>the</strong> glory <strong>of</strong> American industrial ingenuity and resolve. I regret that its glorious Technicolor hues and its fantastically bombastic narration are omitted from <strong>the</strong> concert piece. Visually, it is an absolute feast <strong>of</strong> industrial and mechanical footage: construction sites, quarries, every major mode <strong>of</strong> which<br />

assembly lines, factories, bridges, cities, and pristine highways, upon which <strong>the</strong> viewer would rush to drive a new Chevrolet, lovingly unveiled transportation,<br />

<strong>the</strong> finale. The music is likewise a pure archetype <strong>of</strong> commercialized optimism, redefining grand orchestral gestures into signifiers <strong>of</strong> industrial might: blasting brass fanfares, mechanical percussion, sweeping strings, all culminating into heavenly choirs that announce America's ascension into<br />

in<br />

48

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