Milton Babbitt passes away at 94

Noted composer and one of the original founding co-directors of the Center, Milton Babbitt passed away on Saturday January 29th, 2011, at the age of 94. A full obituary is available on the New York Times web site at this link. Besides his influence and accomplishments generally as a composer, Babbitt was the composer who worked most closely with the RCA Mark II synthesizer at the Center, drawn to the equipment by its ability to precisely specify musical parameters, particularly rhythms.

A fascinating clip of Babbitt discussing his experiences working with the RCA Mark II is available on YouTube, at this link. It appears to be drawn from the online resource "The Video Archive of the Electroacoustic Music", curated by composer Eric Chasalow and  Barbara Cassidy. Their site includes more interviews (it requires Apple Quicktime to view).

WKCR radio is broadcasting a 24-hour memorial marathon of Babbitt's music, beginning tonight (January 31) at 1am (so, actually early in the morning of February 1) and ending at 1am early Wednesday (February 2). Tune in to their broadcast, or online stream, to hear some of this influential composer's many works.

R.I.P. Milton Babbitt

More compostional techniques?

As we've seen with tape splicing, some compositional processes in electronic music in the early days of the Center were time-consuming and painstaking. Unlike today, when audible feedback on compositional choices can be almost instantaneous, much planning would often need to go into the generation of electronic sound.



Many punched paper rolls are found in the archives, apparently used to generate sounds on the RCA sysnthesizer. The edges of the paper rolls are perforated, and holes were punched in the paper to generate sound.



Scattered throughout many of Babbitt's papers and sketches are references to "holes", "ratios", and "gears".



I hope to gain some more insight into these terms by speaking to the Associate Director of the Center. I'm speculating that perhaps "holes" refers to the holes punched in the paper rolls, and that the calculations had to do with tempo. I'm still not sure how "gears" and "ratios" fit in, but it would be interesting to determine if they have any connection to the fractional notations found in some Babbitt scores and sketches.

And, just how might this fit into things!?