Hear This

Gordon Mumma
Renowned composer, educator, pianist, and electronic music engineer Gordon Mumma doesn't think of himself as an avant-garde artist, just a musician dedicated to going his own way. Yet his pioneering work begun in the 1950s -- using machine-generated sound as a compositional device -- contributed to a musicmaking revolution that, while still considered dubious in some circles, is arguably more relevant today than ever. The idea of designing a song from electronic source materials, manipulated acoustic instruments, or prerecorded tape montages (aka musique concrète) was seen as blasphemous by the cultural gatekeepers in the halls of academia, where much of that "new music" was born. The University of Michigan even went so far as to ban Mumma's infamous ONCE Festival of Contemporary Music from its performance venues, while also discouraging local press coverage. Yet in the end, the event earned international acclaim.

J.M. Gleisner

Details

performs a "Retrospective Concert of Music for Chamber Ensembles, Pianos, and Electronic Media" on Saturday, April 8, at 8 p.m. at Mills College, Concert Hall, 5000 MacArthur Blvd., Oakland. Tickets are $10, $5 for students and seniors; call (510) 430-2296

Related Content

• Mixtape of the Day: Ghostly International's TED Compilation, "Music For Ideas"
  April 13, 2011
• Everyone Loses Out When School Lunch Is Privatized
  December 5, 2011
• From John Cage to Thom Yorke, Via Pootie Tang: The Sounds of Silence
  November 30, 2010
• Three Minutes and Fourteen Seconds:A Musical Tribute to Pi Day
  March 14, 2011
• A Seminar in Getting High to a Cassette Tape, Thanks To I Am the Dot's The Bridges EP
  February 22, 2011

More About

• Gordon Mumma
• Robert Ashley
• John Cage
• David Tudor
• Electronic Music

Like this Story?

Sign up for the Music Newsletter: Keep your thumb on the local music scene with music features, additional online music listings and show picks. We'll also send special ticket offers and music promotions available only to our Music Newsletter subscribers.

Privacy Policy Cancel Continue

Since popular acceptance was never their goal, Mumma and visionary colleagues like Robert Ashley (and later, John Cage and David Tudor) took these roadblocks in stride. In fact, Mumma has stated that his five-decade commitment to composition is a largely personal exploration: "In certain ways, I'm not concerned about the audience." It's precisely this indifference to the whims of public perception that gives Mumma's music a fully fleshed, distinctly human character all its own. "Pontpoint," a 16-minute electronic piece that took 14 years to complete, ripples with serene and sensual sonic patterns, conjuring images of lovemaking among the post-apocalyptic ruins. Realized with great precision and sensitivity, it's an exceptional work that manages to imbue cold technology with a rare naturalness. Avant-garde or not, Mumma's soundscapes are a model for 21st-century composition.