The Radiophonic Laboratory: Telecommunications,
Electronic Music, and the Voice of the Ether.
The history of electronic music is intimately tied up with the history of radio and telecommunications. Many of the same breakthroughs and devices invented by electrical engineers for communicating in morse code, telephone and radio were adapted for use by musicians. Electricity opened up new worlds of sound beginning in the 19th century. These articles are an exploration of this musical landscape and the voice of the ether.
Note: This is a book in progress. Check back to see what I've added. Not all chapters are written in order. All of these articles have first appeared in various issues of The Q-Fiver, the newsletter of the Oh-Ky-In Amateur Radio Society.
Tuning the Terrestrial Monochord: Music with Roots in the Aether
(Thomas Watson, La Monte Young, Robert Fludd, Harry Smith)
Chapter 1: TELEPHREAQUENCIES
The Musical Telegraph
The Telharmonium
Sounds of the Arc
The Wireless Organ
The Audion Piano & Vladimir Ussachevsky's Wireless Fantasy
Lev Theremin & The Vibrations of the Ether (Part 1)
Lev Theremin & The Vibrations of the Ether (Part 2)
Two Pioneers of Spread Spectrum Radio: Hedy Lamarr & George Antheil
Chapter 2 : THE SYNTHESIS OF SPEECH
The Voder & Vocoder
SIGSALY: Muzak, Turntables & Cryptography
AUDREY: Speech Recoginition
A Bicycle Built for Two
From a Clockwork Orange to DMR
Chapter 3: GLASS BEAD GAMES: INFORMATION THEORY & CYBERNETICS
Games of Dice and Games of Glass
Information Theory: When Data become Dada
Stockhausen, Information Theory & Cycles
Cybernetic Systems
The System of LICHT
Data Sonification: From Mographs to Codes of Soil
Chapter 4: BORDER DISSOLVE IN RADIO SPACE
Imaginary Landscapes: John Cage part 1
Water Walk and Variations: John Cage part 2
Gesang der Jungline, Telemusik & Hymnen: Karlheinz Stockhausen part 1
Kurzwellen & Other Shortwave Works Stockhausen part 2
Holger Czukay: Radio Wave Surfer
Takeisha Kosugi: Wave Catcher
William Basinski's River of Shortwave
Eavesdropping with Scanner
Trawling the Megahertz
Chapter 5: WE ALSO HAVE SOUND HOUSES
Musician of Sounds: Noise, Pierre Schaeffer and Musique Concrete
The Sound-Houses of Daphne Oram
The Spherical Vortices of Delia Derbyshire
The Bell Sound: From Alice to Amy
The Bell Sound 2: Taking it to the Max
The Bell Sound 3: Grooving with Laurie Spiegel
Chapter 6: DO OR DIY
The San Francisco Tape Music Center: Part I
The San Francisco Tape Music Center: Part II
The ONCE Group: Midwest Origin Stories
ONCE Upon A Time in Ann Arbor
The Sonic Arts Union: Part I: The Sonic Poetry of Alvin Lucier
The Sonic Arts Union: Part II: David Behrman's Melodious Electronic Systems
The Sonic Arts Union: Part III: Mumma Drifts: The Cunningham Circus and Cage Reunions
The Sonic Arts Union: Part IV: Robert Ashley at the CCM
The Strange World of F. C. Judd G2BCX
Chapter 7: THE ART OF TRANSMISSION
Telstar: The Bird and the Birdsong
Going Over the Edge: Don Joyce
Teletouring Across the Timezones
The Crystal Psalms of Alvin Curran
The Lunar Phases of St. GIGA
Chapter 8: VOICE OF THE AETHER
Voice of the Aether
A Brief History of Radio Astronomy
On the Unknown Pleasure of Pulsars
The Acoustic Astronomy of Dr. Fiorella Terenzi
Dark Matter with Lustmord
Ylem: Music for an Oscillating Universe
