Liner notes from WER 60066: Josef Anton Riedl's works are mostly remnants of functional music: when he has to write film or theater music which, as at it is [sic], differs from that generally found in these categories - he composes it in such a way that the music can stand independently. The normal procedure of diluting an autonomous composition to fit a film or play is directly reversed: here one begins with the music and ends with an artificial independent work of art. The accidental motive which determined the choice of material is inherent to this work. In 1966/67 Riedl produced the film "Elektronische Musik" for the NDR in collaboration with Stefan Meuschel. For the documentary part, which dealt with the origin of this newest kind of music, Riedl made a variety of recordings of mechanical musical instruments. For instance he recorded the Wehe-Mignon-piano in the Deutsche Museum in Munich, which had retained many historical interpretations including some from Debussy, but which at the same time produced puffing noises; also the similar pneumatic action Hupfeld-Violine, a glockenspiel roll with Weber's Jungfernkranz music, and a machine which produced sounds by means of rods upon metal discs - and played La Paloma. The laughter and humming of the museum attendants also came into the recording of these singularly unusual instruments. Riedl amalgamated this and other material - chance discoveries and remains of film-work - into an electronic combination of square-wave tones, filtered and frequency-modulated sounds and other material, and added suitable concrete sounds which happened to be at hand (barking dogs, aeroplane noise, mumbling and hissing sounds etc.). By the careful integration of this material, making use of the slightest subtle variations, and by a highly differentiated treatment of the volume which imparted complicated amplitude envelopes to the processes, 'Komposition Nr. 3' was created. The origin of the work - the fortuitous discovery of a colourful world of sound - lends it freedom; the realization by means of integration secures its unity - a unity which combines strictness with sensitivity. Riedl was previously engaged in purely electronic music, in which every single passage must be prefixed and worked out in detail (as in his 'Studien'). Already here dynamic passages occurred which possessed the character of a process to a high degree, and then he worked in recordings of concrete sounds whose unprofiled contours unravelled the strict lay-out of the course - as in the 'Kompositionen 3 and 4/1'. For Riedl, electronic sounds became more and more material reservoir and generator - whether their output was added to film or theater productions, or whether the material was used as part of instrumental or vocal processes. The 'Vielleicht- Duo' (which originated from the sentence "perhaps it is so, but perhaps it is not so" from Buchner's 'Leonce und Lena') is written on the one hand for a vocalist who changes his sounds by means of water - whereby he speaks into a bowl of water or with water in his mouth - on the other hand for electronic sounds which imitate human speech by means of a Vocoder. It is a duet of alienated natural speech and naturalized artificial speech, which comes into being through the reactions of the vocalist to the tape - improvisation to a slightly improvised cantus firmus. Paper Music is composed in a similar manner. Two performers handle various types of paper in various ways until the material has been used up. This is recorded on tape. In performance another set of paper is used up, but this time the performers improvise to their own tape, whereby the control of the reproduction is influenced by the live-performance: improvisation with feedback. Polygonum consists purely of improvisation to an improvisation. Two to four interpreters choose their own sound mediums, play them according to given rhythmic and dynamic structures (as in 'Vielleicht-Duo' and 'Paper Music'). Then they work further with them, invent to the invention. In performance the composition is created by the reactions of the players to previously unknown procedures - Polygonum = knotgrass. The works for a whole concert can be connected in a similar way, in order to avoid a piecemeal programme and to draw a whole concert into one process - which is Riedl's latest tendency. Lighting can also be added to this: slides, films, lightshow, all organized in much the same way as Duo, Paper Music and Polygonum. Then scent and tangible material, the latter having already played a part in the production of the sounds, will soon be added to the play of sound, colour and light. Perhaps there will have to be things to tast - eating and drinking - but perhaps not. However to be as consequent as Riedl, this record should be coloured, perhaps even fluorescent, should smell and in the end be edible, so that it can be consumed in order to make room for something new. Dieter Schnebel Liner notes from Bestellnummer DMR 1022-1024: JOSEF ANTON RIEDL Josef Anton Riedl is a man of many talents. Incidental music and film scores figure as prominently in his oeuvre as do multi-media shows and environmental art. As Dieter Schnebel once wrote: "Josef Anton Riedl's works are mostly cast- off 'Gebrauchsmusik'." He has written pieces for electronic sounds, musique concrete, voices and instruments, particular materials, self-constructed instruments, synthesizers and multi-media presentations. Riedl was born in Munich in 1929. Even in his early childhood he showed considerable talent for the piano, playing by ear everything he heard with great facility. His father was an architect, his mother an amateur pianist. He specialized in improvisation, appearing in concerts both privately and publicly, particularly at his Gymnasium. Long before he enrolled at the Munich Konservatorium he had taught himself the essentials of harmony, music history and musical form. While attending Gymnasium he analyzed works by Reger, Hindemith, Stravinsky, Bartok and Schoenberg. He also took up the organ, developing an equally unfettered manner of improvisation. He studied at a monastery school in nearby Schäftlarn. In the final months of the war he was called up; taken prisoner by the Americans, he was interned in a POW camp in Aix-en-Provence until January 1947. Here his thoughts turned from complexity to clear, simple music, and he began writing songs during his imprisonment. Up to this time he had written quasi- improvised piano pieces, rather weak as far as their form was concerned, but wild and unruly. Then, inspired by Edgard Varese's "Ionisation", he began a long and profound study of the percussion family. He had always been fascinated by the rhythmic side of music, and he took lessons in percussion at the Konservatorium. He also wrote pieces for unaccompanied percussion, most of them for Hermann Schwendtner, a percussionist who at that time was causing a considerable stir. He received encouragement from Carl Orff, but his future career was determined by Pierre Schaeffer, whom he heard for the first time in 1951 during the Aix-en-Provence Festival. He soon began to com- pose studies in musique concrete, joining Schaeffer's research group in Paris in 1953. Thereafter he worked at the electronic studio of the Westdeutscher Rundfunk (from 1955), in Hermann Scherchen's experimental studio in Gravesano (1959), and at the Siemens studio for electronic music in Munich (1960-66), which he organized and directed. Together with Stefan Meuschel he produced a documentary film for cinema and television (1966-7). From the outset of his career Riedl has also been active as an organizer and manager of concerts and programmes. He co-founded the "Jeunesses Musicales" and took charge of its activities in Munich. He was also in charge of the series "Neue Musik", which gave first hearings of major works by Kagel, Schnebel, Cage and others. He also directed the series "Neuer Film" and "Jazz" and edited the periodical "Neue Musik". From 1974 to 1982 he was head of the Bonn Culture Forum, and today still administers the Bonn New Music Festival. Riedl has always been interested in crossing boundaries to other media. He has frequently worked with film directors such as Lenica, Kristi, Reitz, Kluge and Stepan, with theatre people such as Kortner, Meuschel and Wirth, as well as with artists and architects. His showing of experimental films in concerts, eventually led to multi-media presentations. Since 1967 Riedl has devised multi-media compositions, audio-visual concerts, environmental art, happenings, and projects for children and non-musicians, using the group "Musik/Dia/Licht-Galerie" which he himself founded. Riedl has also studied plants since his youth, particularly parasitic plants which develop without harming the host. This interest is reflected in the titles of many of his pieces - Silphium, Salviapratensis, Rhipsalis and Epiphyt - and might even stand as a symbol of his own life and art. Glas-Spiele (Glass Games) The "Glas-Spiele" were sketched in 1974 and composed in 1977 in two versions. Along with "Metallophonic Raum - Klangwerkstatt" (Metallophonic Space - Sound Workshop, 1974), this is one of Riedl's pieces for self-constructed instruments. Here the instruments are as unconventional as the manner of performance: they are made entirely of glass. The composer has described the structure of his work as follows: "Several systems of light metal tubes are placed in adjoining rooms, or in one large room. They are of various shapes and sizes, and resemble scaffolding systems. Glass tubes, plates and rods varying in area (plates), length, thickness and diameter (tubes, rods) are arranged separately or in groups. Either they are freely suspended from the pipes of the system, or they lie on styrofoam in wooden 'caskets'. The latter in turn rest on tables made of light metal pipes etc. which may or may not be part of the system. On different pipes in the system, several paths are constructed from various combinations of straight, U-shaped or other glass tubes. These paths vary in length, and resemble roller coasters. The tubes, plates and rods have pitch, and are placed or suspended in a particular order (e. g. sequences of 'pitch', timbre and noise, continuums from timbre to noise etc.). Tubes and rods of equal length etc. are tied together in bundles. The same is done to tubes and rods of different length (clusters). Glass marbles of various sizes and numbers roll along the paths, falling at the end into glass containers of various shapes and sizes. Tubes are brought into contact by hand, either individually or in groups. They are struck (lightly) against one another. Tubes, plates and rods, both lying and suspended, are struck with one or two glass marbles (per performer) and scraped for various distances (creating 'glissandi' with various numbers of pitches) and at various speeds. Sometimes, instead of marble(s), felt-headed drumsticks are used, one or two per player. The sticks may also be inverted (wood end on glass), or used in various combinations such as one normal and one inverted drumstick, marble plus normal stick, marble plus inverted stick etc. A marble is used to write on a suspended glass plate. The 'writing' may consist of continuous texts such as letters; full stops, colons and semicolons, quotation marks, exclamation points, question marks, commas and dashes; minus, plus, percent and paragraph signs, parentheses, slashes; individual numbers, columns of numbers, addition problem etc. It may also proceed at various speeds such as ritardando, accelerando, very slow, very fast, rubato etc. It is also possible to draw maps, landscapes, faces etc. at a quick pace. One or two marbles are used per player, and the sound is modulated by the different surfaces. The resultant sounds and noises (including those from the containers) are electronically amplified by means of suspended and contact microphones, and are distributed to the rooms (or within the room) by means of a control panel and variously positioned loudspeakers. The amplification should never drown out the original sounds. A tape with music obtained in a similar manner is played at the beginning of the piece. Aluminium-coloured or 'white' metal tubes and transparent or 'white' suspended glass objects are brightly illuminated by several small spotlights attached to pipes in the system. These lights have narrow apertures and illuminate the metal or glass laterally with 'white' light so as to create colour spectra of various lengths (glissandi). Sound/light structure(s), sound/light constructions)." The composition proceeds along four levels. Level A is the tape containing sounds and noises similar to those called for in the piece. Once the tape has finished, level B begins. It is created by one or two players drawing angular lines on plates with marbles and thus defining the structure of the surfaces. These lines are repeated, each time with variations. The players also generate rhythms which are likewise constantly repeated, the rhythm remaining intact while the dynamics and tone colour change. Now Level C is added. It is performed by eight musicians, each playing the same program at different intervals of time. First they strike the suspended plates and tubes, then write and draw with marbles on suspended and lying plates. This leads to a brief, very free passage using all materials in which marbles are rolled in the 'roller coaster' systems. Finally, in level D, noises take the upper hand. The piece ends with the dying out of the last sound or noise, however soft. Ideally, the audience should be able to move about freely in the room, discovering and rediscovering the sounds from different angles. This disc contains an excerpt from "Glas-Spiele". Gisela Gronemeyer (Translation: J. Bradford Robinson)