This book defends musique concrète. The author analyses the art form's characteristics (recording medium, sound recording, editing without image, sound transformations, imaginary sources), investigates various technologies from the birth in 1948 to the digital revolution, presents theoretical issues (internal and external spaces, the listening experience, composers' theories), and compares this art form with the cinema. The last part of this book contains an interview with Michel Chion on his works and a glossary on the most important terms concerning musique concrète.
Table of Contents:
- A music of sound
- Beyond sources
- Ten commandments for an art of fixed sounds
- The “material” in question
- Technique and technology in the music of fixed sounds
- The two spaces
- Listen to it as you hear it
- Cinema for the ears? Parallels and their lessons
- They did not do everything...
- Sounds engraved in oneself