German Composer Quotations

Never look at the trombones. You'll only encourage them.

People often complain that music is too ambiguous, that what they should think when they hear it is so unclear, whereas everyone understands words. With me, it is exactly the opposite, and not only with regard to an entire speech but also with individual words.

The human voice is the most beautiful instrument of all, but it is the most difficult to play.

But I'm an adventurer. I like invention, I like discovery.

And when they encounter works of art which show that using new media can lead to new experiences and to new consciousness, and expand our senses, our perception, our intelligence, our sensibility, then they will become interested in this music.

Schaeffer gave me permission to work in the studio with a technician, but I've never worked with him.

My interest in his new toy, the Theremin, isn't very big. It simply does not fit into my way of playing music. I do not want to fiddle around with my hands in the air.

But being quiet and meditating on sound is something completely different and will be discovered very soon by a lot of people who feel that the visual world doesn't reach their soul anymore.

For years that may mean imitation. Then, one day, it is like a door opening, and a new thought comes in. Why not try this instead. Suddenly he is doing something original, almost in spite of himself.

Then, in 1983 I went on a very long concert tour all over Europe.

Many works I have composed are only for multiple channel tapes, or for traditional instruments, solo instruments, or groups of musicians.

So, for example, I produced a layer of sounds with the syllables sung by a young boy and elements from an impulse generator with filtered noises.

As I say, this is a new secret science, to master the emptiness and turn it into something that is filled with sound and visual images.

And with every work I have tried to expand my experience, moving sound and space, and finding new ways of superimposing different tempos and rhythms.

Already very early I thought of a microphone as a musical instrument, like a bow or like a percussion instrument, whatever you use.

The more people use modern means of communication, all kinds, they call this the media, the more they are interested in the possibilities.

I knew that the synthesis of sound and space music would be the most important aspect of the music of our time and of the future, since '53.

And now even composers are proud of asking people to experience silent moments up to two or three minutes in a given piece of music.