# most innovative, radical music of the 2010s



## science (Oct 14, 2010)

In your opinion, what has been the most innovative music of our present decade?


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## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

From my most recent current listening post, I think you will enjoy this very much:

Zbignew Karkowski & Tetsuo Furudate- World as Will IV (2011)

This is so so energizing. Take Stockhausen and tetrate it. Combines orchestral sounds and computer generated sounds into a wild narrative.


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## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

Peter Ablinger- Points and Views (2014) The _conflict and tension_ between electronics and instruments is incredible.

Georg Haas- String Quartet 7 with electronics (2011) Here, the _harmony and cooperation_ between electronics and instruments is incredible.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

I'll look these up. I'm sure they're great works, but I want to be sure that you think they're _innovative_, ideally even _radical_.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Iancu Dumitrescu - Etude granulaire

Georg Haas - limited approximations (2010)

Murail- Les Sept Paroles (2010)

All of them are innovative branches of spectralism. The Dumitrescu in his use of computer sounds with more traditional instruments, as well as the organic quality of his music.

The Haas in his impressive and massive use of microtones, creating really amazing textures which I never heard before.

The Murail because of the use of electronic sounds and traditional instruments, which blend in interesting ways and provide interesting textures.


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## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

Re science: I'm not entirely sure. A big part of 21st century avant-garde music is the interaction between instruments and electronics. However, I'm not sure that that means _radical_...

But of course radical doesn't always mean electronic. Here's something purely instrumental that I think is innovative in the use of extended techniques:

Andrew Greenwald - A Thing is a Hole in a Thing it is Not (I) (2012)


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## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

aleazk said:


> Iancu Dumitrescu - Etude granulaire
> 
> Georg Haas - limited approximations (2010)
> 
> Murail- Les Sept Paroles (2010)


Yes, more and more exploration of microtonality is a major thing too. What do you think of Young's Well Tuned Piano?

I think that the continuum subdivisions of the piano tunings in Haas's piece is very colorful and has lots of range, but I'm actually much more enthralled with Young's Well Tuned Piano. I think the expressiveness is greater when focusing on a more restricted set of just-tuned intervals, and exploring the resonance produced by this overtone-tuned piano.

Actually, why haven't people explored La Monte Young's tuning _at all_ in future compositions? There's so much that can be done in combination with other instruments (strings, percussion, harps) or electronic sine waves!


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## MagneticGhost (Apr 7, 2013)

aleazk said:


> Iancu Dumitrescu - Etude granulaire
> 
> Georg Haas - limited approximations (2010)
> 
> ...


Man that Haas is good. Shame I don't think I'm getting the full effect on YT. That needs surround sound and a big subwoofer!!


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

SeptimalTritone said:


> Yes, more and more exploration of microtonality is a major thing too. What do you think of Young's Well Tuned Piano?
> 
> I think that the continuum subdivisions of the piano tunings in Haas's piece is very colorful and has lots of range, but I'm actually much more enthralled with Young's Well Tuned Piano. I think the expressiveness is greater when focusing on a more restricted set of just-tuned intervals, and exploring the resonance produced by this overtone-tuned piano.
> 
> Actually, why haven't people explored La Monte Young's tuning _at all_ in future compositions? There's so much that can be done in combination with other instruments (strings, percussion, harps) or electronic sine waves!


I like Young. I wouldn't compare them, though. Their aims are quite different. In the Haas, the idea is to create those amazing 'ocean waves' with the pianos, which give some sort of 'abysmal' quality to the music, like plunging in some deep, 'cosmic abysm'. I find the piece extremely successful in the realization of that idea. I never heard something like that, expressed in that strong way, with those pianos. The effect at some moments is like Ligeti's Requiem to the T.

But, in a sense, yes, it's only useful for that in particular. Sometimes when you want to specialize, you narrow a little your scope. But it's not something I care, we can have both.


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## The nose (Jan 14, 2014)

I think the most innovative thing i've heard in this century it's Igorrr.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

I find the term "with electronics" as problematic. Is there a distinction between electronically generated as opposed to electronically altered? Maybe there needs to be, though I'm definitely not suggesting one is better than the other. It's just that "electronics" is kind of vague. You probably wouldn't for instance write a sonata for acoustic instrument and laptop. You'd write for flute and laptop maybe.

I also wonder how we differentiate these works from the avalanche of ambient music, a sub-genre of electronica. Or do we? Does it matter any more?


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Weston said:


> Does it matter any more?


As I've argued before, with complete sincerity, I believe the traditional genres are dead. There is no more "classical music" or "jazz" or whatever anymore - it's all jumbled, and anything that can definitively labeled one way or another is in that way (if not in others) reactionary.

(I know that "reactionary" has bad connotations for most people, but I don't mean in that way: in the arts I do not see reaction as either a good or a bad thing. In fact, I see _strongly_ valuing either "progress" or "reaction" as wrong - as reactionary in the bad sense! I simply find it the most useful word for what I mean here.)

At some point this post-genre-ism itself will be passé, but I don't think we've reached that point yet. For the foreseeable future (perhaps as long as global capitalism governs the production of so much music) the thesis-antithesis-synthesis cycle of creating genres and then transcending them will continue.


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## MagneticGhost (Apr 7, 2013)

Weston said:


> I find the term "with electronics" as problematic. Is there a distinction between electronically generated as opposed to electronically altered? Maybe there needs to be, though I'm definitely not suggesting one is better than the other. It's just that "electronics" is kind of vague. You probably wouldn't for instance write a sonata for acoustic instrument and laptop. You'd write for flute and laptop maybe.
> 
> I also wonder how we differentiate these works from the avalanche of ambient music, a sub-genre of electronica. Or do we? Does it matter any more?


I thought music created by manipulating sound was Electro-Acoustic. Music created Electronically is called Electronic. Although you can obviously do both things within a composition.
And No , it doesn't really matter anyway.


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## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

Steve Reich's latest albums are pretty innovative as far as I am concerned


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

List of compositions by Anthony Pateras. Local composer where I live, composes very very strange and fascinating music, including a bit of electro-acoustic stuff here and there. The list includes audio samples of some works.


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

SeptimalTritone said:


> From my most recent current listening post, I think you will enjoy this very much:
> 
> Zbignew Karkowski & Tetsuo Furudate- World as Will IV (2011)
> 
> This is so so energizing. Take Stockhausen and tetrate it. Combines orchestral sounds and computer generated sounds into a wild narrative.


I'm tempted to ask why you consider this innovative. To me it's enjoyable but something that sounds like dark ambient (I was adding something else, but actually dark ambient seems to describe it pretty well)


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