Volume 8 Issue 9 - June 2003

years. This is from speaking to people
who are of a generation a year or
two younger than me, and have what
seems to me a very narrow sense of
history. A lot of people have absolutely
no sense of anything that's happened
outside their lifetime, and
sometimes within the range of their
lifetime. I mentioned Bing Crosby's
l-WUte Otristmas. I use that one specifically
because for close to 50 years
it was the most popular recording, in
terms of sales and airplay, but there's
a whole generation of people who
seem not to recognize it now. That
requirement we talked aboutbefore,
of recognizing the source in the transformation,
in some cases just isn't
there. I didn't expect it would disappear
so quickly from generation to
generation. Perhaps there is a life
span in these pieces, although I think
the appeal might be with a narrower
portion of the population than I've always
thought was possible. I've always
thought that these are potentially
popular pieces in themselves, partly
because of their close proximity to
pieces that have proven to be popular.
STEENHUISEN: As the source
material fades, is it, in fact, your
technique that emerges, or what you
do with materials?
OSWALD: It might be possible because
I think there's lots of interesting
things that go on, not independent of
the source, but as a result of the
source material, that end up probably
being interesting on their own.
STEENHUISEN: Ultimately,
we 're highlighting the fact that they 're
layered. Over time, I think it's inevitable
with any music, but in some
»cys it's more pronounced with
yours, how some layers subside and
others emerge more clearly.
OSWALD: I think with my 'plunderphonics'
oeuvre in particular, it's
less likely to be identified with an
era. There's something less timely
about most of the pieces I've made. ·
They definitely have some degree of
the era of the source because more
often than not we can place a lot of
these very popular examples whether
Beethoven or the Beatles to a given
period down to the decade. But since
I don't think I've been directly influential
to any particular musical styles,
and given that in some cases you
can't tell it's manipulated recordings,
some of them exist out of time. I
think particularly with this other category
of mine, which are just performable
'plunderphonics' pieces that
have been notated and in all cases to
some extent derived from the classi-
20
cal repertoire, particularly the very often than not were originally a
popular classical repertoire, there's straight-ahead4/4.
even less of a sense of what time they STEENHUISEN: But it seems the
were composed in. Some would def- transposition-elongating, or trans-·
initely be accused of being part of the , posing up or down the original, source
post-modern era.
material- conceptually, that's very
STEENHUISEN: "'1zy do you use important.
Beethoven and the Beatles as sound
sources so often?
OS.WALD: Yeah, although it's almost
exclusively transpositions in oc­
OSW ALD: I don't know. The face- taves. I've never really been a samtious
answer is that I start going pier player, and never liked anything
through the alphabet and get them... you do easily on samplers -having a
STEENHUISEN: Why not Boult!'l soum source that goes up and down
then? Or Berlo? Don't enough peo- the chromatic scale, getting shorter
as you go higher, and longer as you
pie know their music?
go lower. Those kinds ofeffects I've
OSWALD: Well, there is that. I used very rarely. It's something that
was very conscious of it when I was overly emphasizes the artificial naworking
with W-ebern's music. It ture of the original recording. More
hadn't risen to the level of any sort of often I tend to revel in illusion.
familiarity with the public. I know STEENmrrSEN: You seem to take
that having grown up with this isola- the origiilal idea as though it's a baltion
of the 20th Century composer
from any sortofpopUiarity inclassi- loon, andyoublowitup. With helical
musical circles, in order to make wn.
music that I thought was ... let's say, OSWALD: Yeah, which is when
useful ... it was necessary to create Dolly Parton sounds like a chipbridges.
One of the most obvious munk. Doing things in registers exwas
Beethoven because he's probably treme from the original, like taking
the most pervasive composer in this the opening of Lohengrin and speeding
society. If I made pieces that sound- it up sixteen times -I think I got the
ed like Beethoven, by the advantage original impulse from the science ficthat
I am using Beethoven's music, I tion writer J.G. Ballard, who enviend
up sounding like Beethoven. Per- sioned a future where people ingested
haps then I wouldn't immediately be Wagner's operas in seconds, at ulbranded
a 20th Century composer trasonic frequencies, arxl discussed
and not experience those kinds of the varying aural ambrosia of differthings
that happen where people leave ent performances. So, I tried that
the hall before the piece begins. Hav- out. Even earlier than that, I'd been
ing said that, I have no particular listening to other thlligs, particularly
great attachment to Beethoven, and I Stravinsky - and some of them have
rarely, if ever, sit down to listen to to do with these cictave transposi-
Beethoven when I don't have to. It tions. It goes back to when I was a
just pops up all over the place. He's kid and had a 4-speed record player
obviously on the same level as the and tended to listen to LPs at 78 rpm.
Beatles by the fact that some of his · It's not exactly an octave increase in
music is so easily recognizable by the speed, but you do have an approxibroad
populace. Tchaikovsky is up mate doubling of speed and the sense
there too. It's easy to say you like of things going by twice as quick,
Beethoven, a bit harder to say you which in some cases I thought was
likeTchaikovsky.
veryexciting. Whenigotaroundto
STEENHUISEN: listening to the doing this on tape recorders it was
'plunderphonics'pieces, your tech- definitely octave transpositions.
STEENHUISEN: "'1zy?
nique is often to contort the expected
beat, but also, rather than processing
or cross-synthesis, to vary the speed,
transpositions of" pitch, duration -effectively,
the scale of the sound:
lWiat 's your goal with these types of"
transfigurations?
OSWALD: People point out the odd
rhythmic aspects of these things quite
often, and I think that's where that
dream sense of improvised music
comes in. The unpredictable, dare I
say organic aspects of rhythm in freely
improvised music having a great
influence on rhythms which more
www.thewholenote.com
OSWALD: Out of curiosity in
part. That's the initial impetus for all
these things, womering what they
soun:l like under different coOOitions.
Quite surprisingly, given the way the
record industry tries to legislate listener
activity, there've never been
commandments printed on records
that say "Do not play this at the other
speeds on your record player." Back
in the old days, when you did have
those choices, to change the speed, I
dd
STEENHUISEN: We listm a very
specific »cy to the 'plunderphonics'
pieces. listming to them can be very
concrete, very comparative and mnemonic.
Is there an element of the abstraction
in your other music that you
wish were in the digital?
r
OSWALD: Very definitely the primary
intent of listening, say, in my
improvised music activity, is to engender
conversation. I have never
really cared too much about how listeners
may hear an improvisatory
perfonnance, and I don't really care
if there are listeners or not - maybe
I've got some kind of allegiance with
Milton Babbitt here. But I do care
in the eXtreme what the person I
might be playing with hears. Aro
how they're responding, and their
sense of what's going oq can only be
read in the way they're playing. So,
it's a direct feedback circuit that gives
me some sort of impression of a listening
activity.
STEENHUISEN: In the midst of all
the samples, transpositions, transformations,
progressions through scale
andfrequency, therecognizedmateri- '
a{s (borrowed or stolen), where are
you?
OSW ALI): I'm on the other side of
loudspeakers along with everybody
else.
STEENHUISEN: lWlere is your
. imprint?
OSWALD: It's something I never
really found appealing in talented people
- that they have a distinct personality
and can ortly play one way, although
some people do that one thing ·
quite wonderfully. I think I've been
able to be quite amorphous in this production
role. If you think of me in the
traditional record producer's role -
the person that cultivates aild brings
along thepersonality in the recording,
whether it's a particular cl:iaracter or
conglomerate of characters or style -
in that respect I think I manage to be
somewhat transparent. At first, I
was dismayed when people would
say, "Your music always has quirky
rhythms." I've got so many different
rhythmic characters I've incorporated
into these pieC:es that I'm disappointed
to be categorized that way.
So, the short answer to the question of
where am I in these things is - I'm
invisible. · I don't think people picwre
me while they're listening to my music
in the same way that they'd be
picturing Glenn Gould slouched over -
the piano while listening to the Goldberg
Variations or even a scowling
Boult!'l hovering over his score. I
don't know if I'm inaudible, but at
least I'm appreciably invisible.
June 1 - July 7 2003