Spectralism - a short introduction to spectral music

[@zkkrhfhska]

im sad i only found your content years after you made it. this is fantastic.

[@Multi-Waves_Music]

I am speechless, how do you only have 1 sub?! You spoke so clearly, it has been recorded well and you are an awesome teacher I'll be telling my friends about you.

[@liamcarey8809]

Thank you very kindly. I'm enjoying your videos too!

[@Multi-Waves_Music]

@@liamcarey8809 you checked my channel out? That means so much! Thank you ❤️

[@stephenjablonsky1941]

This is an excellent explanation of a musical style that emphasizes timbre and completely rejects the traditional function of Western classical music which was to recount a musical narrative in which we follow the development and variation of musical ideas. The spectralists often skated on the thin ice between music and noise and asked us to reconsider of definition of beauty.

[@johnstag1391]

This resonates with me (or viceversa) given that as a five year old I was fascinated by the absorbing sound of EPNS forks when struck.

[@sodaverde]

You should make more of these. This was an exceptional video.

[@liamcarey8809]

Thank you - glad you enjoyed it.

[@mattkriese7170]

Excellent. I had no idea that a big part of music that I loved in scoring in films was spectralism after all. Such beautiful and ominous sounds. All kinds of tension with such simplicity at the root of it all. Thanks for the vid!

[@davisatdavis1]

I love how you get straight to the point. Not something you find a lot now days, if at all. Great job.

[@alequaranta]

Lovely introduction. Thanks for your time!

[@raphaelnigoghossian3165]

Thank you for giving us a glimpse of this fascinating new world

[@musimedmusi8736]

Wonderfully informative.

[@spacealienjesus709]

Thank you for taking the time to make this..very well done..

[@liamcarey8809]

You're very welcome. Thanks for watching it.

[@Kevinfordsynthesizers]

Thank you for this, fascinating and you explain it with absolute clarity. A new musical journey for me.

[@orionoverstreet11]

So awesome!!!! incredible teaching and valuable source of information! I super appreciate you taking the time to make this and thank you for the extra composers down below!! You rock man.

[@ThankYouKiwi]

This is just what I needed. Many thanks

[@astrocat2008]

😊 Very nice informative video. I was introduced to the principles of "spectral music" and/or "polychromatic music" 5 years ago, through the digital works of Dolores Catherino and the hundred year old quarter tone piano works of Ivan Wyschnegradsky... As an aficionado of electronic music it's very nice to see that quite a few "classical" music composers have worked on tone and timbre in multiple ways... My very very first "meeting" with "different music" was, as an 8 year old child, watching 2001, a Space Odyssey, and hearing György Ligeti's music 😅Quite the experience!

[@pinarozasln]

Great video! 👏👏👏

[@liamcarey8809]

Thank you, really glad you enjoyed it!

[@janvandyck9375]

This is a super informative video on a fascinating topic. Thank you so much!!!

[@liamcarey8809]

You're very welcome! Thanks for watching.

[@goosegoose8982]

What an absolutely excellent video, and wow that quartet is simply breathtaking

[@younjecho]

Thank you so much for making this video. It's really helpful for me to easily understand the concept of spectralism, which I have been alb confused about so far. Your explanation is so clear, and the references you brought here are what I've already known, leading me to understand more smoothly. I very much appreciate it!

[@risvegliato]

Interesting! I've always liked this sort of composition based on the harmonic series. I find it very relaxing to listen to. Maybe because the mathematical relations of the tones are 'just' and incredibly satisfying to listen to. Never realised it had a 'genre' name (spectralism). I would recommend Tom Heasley's 'On the sensations of tone' which uses a tuba very rich in harmonics.

[@alirezaghader5872]

very nice explanation...thank you

[@liamcarey8809]

You're welcome. Glad your found it useful.

Very informative video, Thank you so much! I hope your channel grows bigger, it really deserves it!

[@liamcarey8809]

Thank you so much Eric and thanks for watching.

[@alices.8356]

Great video, thank you very much!

[@QuidProQuoGroup]

Thank you for nice introduction!

[@liamcarey8809]

You're welcome. Thanks for watching it!

[@JordanMHollowayComposer]

This is really awesome, thanks for making this!!

[@liamcarey8809]

You're welcome. Thanks for watching it!

[@chrispidicello]

perfect lesson, thank you

[@antoninoabate1376]

Amazing video!

[@marcbrasse747]

Thanks for this great video!

[@liamcarey8809]

You're welcome Marc. Thanks for watching!

[@marcbrasse747]

@@liamcarey8809 I have become interested in this via my many synthesis forrays. The integration of the physics of sound an instrument design has of course a big but often underestimated tradition. Pipe organ, Cahill's monster, Theremin, Onds Martenot, Trautonium, Sowjet ANS synthesizer, Le Caines Electronic Sackbut etc.. These inspirations have by now at last led to technology that makes about everything possible one can imagine. If only the music, composers, listening public would catch up. For me the discovery of spectralism as a style is another piece in that puzzle. But I am probbaly not telling you anything new! :-) In case you are interested in my own connections with the subject you can however visit www.brassee.com

[@godblessourdeadkotatsu8331]

Very good explanation!

[@liamcarey8809]

Thank you. Glad you found it helpful.

[@JosephPerkinsMusic]

These are great, thank you!

[@liamcarey8809]

Thank you so much. Really glad you enjoyed the video.

[@colindelamberterie2239]

Thank you, it was very clear.

[@guidejazzchristianlewis]

Thank you for this excellent summary ! / Merci pour cette excellent synthèse !

[@JohnathandosSantos]

Amazing content! Thanks for all the work you put into it

[@emanuellandeholm5657]

Came here from Adam Neely. This is really interesting to me, thanks for the video! I really love the interval between the major sixth and the perfect fourth. 5:3 to 4:3. This is a harmonic interval (5:4) and it kind of sounds like an engine to me. Someone, who isn't me, should make music from that! :)

[@liamcarey8809]

Hi, thanks for watching. But why not you? Like Toni Morrison said 'If there's a book you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it'.

[@TheMotherOfBambi]

Very nice explanation :)

[@liamcarey8809]

Glad you liked it, and thanks for watching.

[@emiliocasaburi1939]

very useful!!

[@liamcarey8809]

You're welcome. Thanks for watching.

[@AndreiaGoncalves-kf8gl]

ahh lovely video

[@alena.davis.official]

What was the graph you showed at the end of the video?

[@drlostcause4427]

Heyyy! Thought this was something really on make spectral music but I’m not disappointed. Great work! I’ve been searching for information after listening to aphex twin’s spectrum track. It’s really crazy and has a bit of spectral synthesis. Would love to know more about these kind of things. Thank you!

[@martonszives5264]

Please tell us the spectral analysing program you show in the beginning!

What is the spectrum analyser plugin used in tbe vídeo?

[@daammobandito7961]

Here from mister Multi - fascinating video!

[@liamcarey8809]

Thank you very much!

[@epiphoney]

Is spectralism like just intonation? JI (Jon Catler) is kind of the same thing with the harmonics moved to lower octaves.

[@ermesrosina8484]

what about James Tenney?

[@jiujits13]

Makes me think of singing bowls

[@etiennelassal2149]

Hi, What software did you use to get the fundamental and the overtones at the start of your video ?

[@zoid3515]

SPAN, it's free

[@harmony2368]

what's the difference between granular synthesis vs spectralism?

[@liamcarey8809]

Hi. Granular synthesis is when electric sounds are broken into short (i.e. less than 100ms) lengths and then clusters of these are used to create textures. This kind of thing: kzbin.info/www/bejne/p4mtqp5md8qtd5I It's a really interesting technique and can make some amazing textures. Spectralism is primarily composition (electronic or acoustic) with overtones as the organising principle. You can granulise spectral sounds, and you can make spectra out of grains, so it is possible to overlap them.

[@jean-francoisbrunet2031]

Typo: Tristan Murail not "Tristan Murial".

[@Gilangr662]

How to make Music Spectral? S

[@FredMurray]

Study the sheets music from spectral composers.

[@ideologikal]

spectral is the same with drone music?

[@FredMurray]

?? Is spectralism same as drone music ? Absolutely NO.

[@mahallati]

Thank you for creating this video. My understanding of spectralism is very limited. Your video helped me understand the basics of spectralism. What I don't understand is how is spectralism different from 12-tone music? Both of them are meant to incorporate the most remote overtones. It seems that the only thing that makes spectralism different is the use of microtones. Does that mean that a spectral music that doesn't use microtones, is just 12-tone music? Also, why are the composers, featured in the video, having a tone's overtones reproduced repeatedly? Bach never wrote a piece, in which a C was played and then its overtones in the form of the CMaj chord were played repeatedly. Thanks.

[@liamcarey8809]

Hi, thanks for watching my video. Sorry about my late reply. In answer to your first point about the difference with 12-tone music, I think the difference is that Spectralism uses all of the overtone series, not just the remote higher intervals. In the 12-tone music of composers like Webern, Boulez, and Babbitt there is a deliberate avoidance of intervals with tonal associations, i.e. octaves, perfect fifths, major thirds. Whereas Spectralists will use the full range of the harmonic series, both the lower 'tonal' intervals and the upper, more remote intervals. If anything, part of the point of Spectralism was an attempt to bring those basic harmonic intervals back into use. In answer to your second point - I don't think harmonic movement is always a necessary feature of music. Yes it's a typical feature of Western classical music up to 20th century, but it's by no means a universal. Indian Classical music, Scottish bagpipes, Mongolian throat singing, Central European Hurdy-gurdy music, the Minimalism of La Monte Young and Terry Riley: all of these use static drones rather than regular chord changes. A number of Spectralist composers (Murail, Saariaho) have spoken about their interest in non-Western music, perhaps use of drones is a clear sign that influence. All the best

[@amirmahallati3414]

@@liamcarey8809 Thank you for your reply and clarification. After the untimely death of Saariaho, just recently, I've found a renewed curiosity about spectralism. That is why after 2 years I returned here to reread your response to my questions to help me refresh my understanding of spectralism.

[@franciscodanieldiazgonzale2096]

Fantastic response that adds pedagogical value to a great video

[@julzpaula]

interesting

[@rxhx]

seems like drone genre

[@AC-ly7wf]

Don't bore us, get to the Chorus!

[@Whatismusic123]

I 😍 Random Noise I 🤮 Music

[@christophermorgan3261]

One needs to be a musicologist or advanced student to follow the terminology here. How many have those qualifications? No doubt your presentation is professional, and accurate, but as common listener, I feel one needs to make a substantial cognitive effort to appreciate Spectralism. Not the case with minimalism like Steve Reich which gives immediate emotionally engagement. What do these two styles come from historically, do they overlap? Where have I gone wrong? Thank you.

[@franciscodanieldiazgonzale2096]

In my opinion, there is a case for sound sensual appreciation without the need of a story behind. Minimalistic music can be easier because we all are exposed to it daily without knowing and they use in general well known instruments pitched in conventional ways. There are not many parameters for your mind to tune to that music outside our common experience and also its proper language, i.e., structures, simetries, shapes and schemas are not far from other more common music. So it sounds familiar more than new. When you start to add more new structures and techniques to a sound piece that are less used or common you are adding more work to do. And sometimes there is a magic moment of realisation and everything comes together in a new wave of sensual appreciation. But we need to realise that appreciation comes with exposing ourselves to the new stimulus in a good environment and moment and with familiarity and memory.

[@christophermorgan3261]

Wow thanks for the response! I made that comment several years ago, well better late than never. You write like a professional and emphatically I am not. But i understand and appreciate your remarks. This one could boil down to the Modernist credo "make it new." and this applies to all the arts. But doesn't the listener find the music they love compulsively listenable? We never get tired of the "story" to use your term.

[@franciscodanieldiazgonzale2096]

@@christophermorgan3261 It is my understanding that art as a job mapped to new creations or unique things is a concept that was born in the renaissance. Before what they called artist, we called now artisan, as it is skills more than novelty what it was about. Anyway that was then. The issue for many listeners it seems to boil down to understand a piece of sound not only as an abstract entity with its own life as a sensual perception that maybe triggers in you (in your mind) several other things, it has to have a rationale, and I don't mean a criteria, but a story behind, a purpose, a transcription. Something that you can explain using human language. That is not what music was about at least since mid-Mahler period. So, it is no wonder composers dealing with only sound shaping, sound awareness, using any material and arrangements, any technique and any kind of structured shape are lost for most listeners. And they carried on like the public is following them, so they challenged each other, they dropped old techniques from previous generation to new soundscapes etc. Now after more than a century, it is understandable, there are few hooks or motivations to deal with this music. And it is a pity. You don't need to learn anything about the music being performed before being performed, same as before. You just have to have an open mind and be able to feel and to reason about your feelings and whatever the music triggers. If the tonality or harmonics is too alien, the usual trick of half the loudness, play in the background, do something else, will ever work. Just, let the sounds to be familiar, and people can, in my opinion, have a better picture of what is there that has beauty or value, or not (there are still bad composers).

[@OwlThrower]

came here from the /mu/ genre obscurity charts

[@santiagopintosoto5066]

Y esa surrada

[@interwebzful]

definitely great vid. but a little euro-centric. you missed james tenney, for example

[@jaspernatchez]

"music" with just long notes is boring. I wonder why anyone who truly loves real music would want to spend time listening to this stuff.

[@Whatismusic123]

Because they don't love music, they just love pretending to

[@jaspernatchez]

@@Whatismusic123 Correct. Why should anyone assume that music can succeed with the absence of the all elements (except color) that have made European art music great for eight centuries - melody, harmony, interesting rhythms, harmonic rhythm, strong, memorable melodic themes, and in so much but not all of what we consider great music, form based on key and theme and the tonal harmonic language? All of this data that provides the brain with the opportunity to form patterns and comprehend the logic of the music on many levels and time spans, which is the reason we listen to music in the first place, is nowhere to be found with this nonsense. How convenient for the person unable to comprehend harmony, unable fo invent interesting, beautiful melodic themes, clueless about counterpoint, clueless about the narrative and dramatic progression of good music, even clueless about the need for continuity and contrast to be in flux in any work of art, and only minimally skilled in manipulating instrumental color - yes, now you too can be a composer!

[@Whatismusic123]

@@jaspernatchez in the words of schönberg, "when you can't succeed, start a cult!"

[@RocknRollkat]

Music should swing. This stuff doesn't. Bill P.