Abstract
In August 1969, the music documentary series Workshop (1964–78) focused on electronic music in a 55-minute-long film titled ‘The Same Trade as Mozart’. Produced and directed by David Buckton, the film included interviews with composers Karlheinz Stockhausen, Tristram Cary and Justin Connolly; BBC Radiophonic Workshop staff Desmond Briscoe, David Cain and John Baker, and the Workshop’s founder, Daphne Oram; and Peter Zinovieff, director of EMS (Electronic Music Studios). It presented electronic music in a number of contexts, such as education, pop production and live performance. Technological change in music has often provoked hostility among the public and critics, and the rapid advancement of electronic music post-Second World War was no exception. Adopting a mode of analysis more commonly encountered in studies of the public communication of science, this article considers ‘The Same Trade as Mozart’ as an attempt by electronic music’s advocates, such as those listed above, to convince sceptics of its value. While sceptical responses to the presence of new technologies in music have been widely noted and theorized by scholars in science and technology studies, we call attention to the strategies employed by the advocates of such technologies to defend themselves against such criticisms, including humour, heuristic explanations and a focus on electronic music’s educational and thus social value. The use of computers in electronic music was a new and contentious development in the field, requiring a greater degree of advocacy from its proponents. We examine how the computer’s role in composition is presented in ‘The Same Trade as Mozart’, compared with other media portrayals of computing in the 1960s. Drawing on theories of filmed musical performance, we discuss how visual tropes of ‘classical’ music are used in ‘The Same Trade as Mozart’ to challenge preconceptions about the relationships between composers, musicians and new technologies.
Highlights
In this paper we discuss a television documentary film, The Same Trade as Mozart, which was produced and directed by David Buckton as part of the BBC television series Workshop and first aired in August 1969
The film introduces the topic of electronic music – music created with, and exploring the musical potential of, electronic sound technologies – through interviews with composers and technologists, including Tristram Cary, Daphne Oram, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Peter Zinovieff, as well as showing footage of electronic techniques being used in popular music and education
Two performances of experimental electronic music are shown in The Same Trade as Mozart: in the first, an ensemble of mixed electronic and acoustic instrumentation led by Stockhausen performs ‘Es’, a piece from the Stockhausen’s () recently completed suite Aus den Sieben Tagen (From the Seven Days) to a small audience; while in the second, M-Piriform (1968), a composition for voice, viola, flute and computer-controlled electronic sound by Justin Connolly and Peter Zinovieff, is performed in an empty building. We focus on the latter performance, drawing on theories of filmed musical performance to demonstrate how electronic music is portrayed in The Same Trade as Mozart as novel, unfamiliar and exciting, while at the same time adhering to certain conventions of classical music performance and its presentation on television
Summary
In this paper we discuss a television documentary film, The Same Trade as Mozart, which was produced and directed by David Buckton as part of the BBC television series Workshop and first aired in August 1969. Released in 1968, Wendy Carlos’s hugely successful album Switched-On Bach (Columbia Masterworks, 1968) suggested that the new synthesizers might be used in more traditionally musical ways – as opposed to the unfamiliar sound-worlds of musique concrète and elektronische Musik – and the availability of portable synthesizers such as the EMS VCS3 meant that, for the first time, electronic musical instruments could be taken on stage, and on tour, by popular musicians Bands such as Pink Floyd and The Beatles had already introduced pop music listeners to the idea that the recording studio could be a place of sonic experimentation, using electronic effects and tape manipulation techniques similar to those used in musique concrète on albums such as Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (EMI, 1967), whose album artwork famously includes Stockhausen in its photo-montage of well-known public figures. Zinovieff’s advocacy for the computer, and The Same Trade as Mozart’s implicit support of his position through its sympathetic portrayal of computer music, demonstrate that, while computer technology was still thought by many to present the greatest threat to creativity, attitudes towards computers were gradually shifting
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