On Technology and Art: Xenakis at Work

Abstract

This paper considers the wider context of Xenakis' highly personal and idiosyncratic design approach to modern technology in music composition. It begins with a brief explication of Andrew Feenberg's critical theory of technology, which outlines necessary social and political parameters for a democratized technology. It then goes on to examine the potential role of the computer in the democratization of technology, both at the social level and at the epistemological level. This potential is realized when the computer is understood as a tool for designing task environments. As such, the signifying imperative of the computer interface becomes a focus of computer-use, not something which is pre-packaged within the computer system itself. Laske used the term "rule-based" design to describe this interpretive approach to the design of computer artifacts. In Xenakis' own rule-based approach to designing musical artifacts, he extended compositional technique into the domain of sound. His approach to sound material as a medium for constructive actuality reflects his more general design approach: sound, at its most elemental level, was already a site for dialectical mediation. In this way, Xenakis' work transcended the rationalist discourse which nevertheless enshrined many of his writings and ideas: his texts reflect, in intimate detail, the technique of his musical thinking, while his musical works, at their most powerful, boldly reflect the technical ideas delineated within his texts. Xenakis' work exemplified the centrality of musical technique in any discussion of music, including its aesthetics. In so doing, Xenakis pointed the way toward an interpretive appropriation of technology more generally, pointing the way to an embrace of its deeply technical requirements while, in that very embrace, compelling a radical reframing of its discourse.