The UK electronic music scene lost its pioneer Tristram Cary this week, so it’s the perfect time to look back again at the marvels of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. Low-budget but long-running Doctor Who is unlikely to be remembered for breaking new ground in, say, fancy props, sets, or visual effects (though they did plenty with what they had). But when it comes to sound and music, the BBC’s DIY approach to sound, ranging from Who to "serious" classical music (even my composition teacher Thea Musgrave worked there) remains significant today.

The BBC is again offering a look inside the storied workshop, now at its 50th birthday. (As their designs stand the test of five decades, I think perhaps electronic sound isn’t just about novelty after all.)

And one of their best finds? A lampshade.

Four sound effects that made TV history [ BBC News Magazine; happily this video works worldwide]

Thanks to Andy Tekkaz for the tip.

Yes, the green lampshade pictured above was Delia Derbyshire’s favorite toy to sample, a reminder that sometimes the non-electrified object is an electronic composer’s best friend. Other gems: the room for the largest synth the BBC ever owned, ominously titled "The Delaware" like some kind of WWII aircraft carrier, which wouldn’t fit through the door. Or room #12, in which the Doctor Who theme was born. Or what must be the world’s oddest home-built mixer, encased in plexiglass. Or, below, the suitcase synth the Workshop custom-built. (Note the prominence of EMS VCS3 synths, designed by Tristram Cary.) Updated: Okay, I was confused as well by the terminology "custom-built" in regards to the synth (evidently a Synthi-A), but then again, given the relationship between EMS and BBC, it’s possible the Radiophonic Workshop was the initial customer. Anyone have any idea?

Host and Radiophonic vet Dick Mills also settles any lingering controversy about how you make a Dalek voice: it’s what (I think) is a VCS3, a ring modulator tuned to 30 Hz, and a little bass attenuation (Dick corrects his colleague on that). If that doesn’t sound like a Dalek, you’re probably not shouting enough.

There are pioneers and artists — and then there are people whose impact is great enough that they become inseparable with the history of a medium. Bebe Barron, along with husband Louis Barron, was far enough ahead of her time that her ideas remain futuristic today. The Barrons didn’t just produce the first full-length electronic film score with Forbidden Planet; they created an ambient sonic world between music and special effects, and tied it to cybernetic theories. That score stands in contrast to films still dominated by Alfred Newman-style, post-Wagnerian theatrics. Today, artists are only just re-discovering the possibilities of electronic sound without the use of synths and samplers, built from scratch as the Barrons did.

Bebe Barron’s work went well beyond Forbidden Planet, however. She went on to produce music for film, tape, and technology well into her later life. She was an early leader of the Society for Electro-Acoustic Music, and continued — with her husband, and as a solo composer following his death — to lead the way in finding new compositional purposes for electronic sound. (And apparently even seduction through witchcraft! Viva electronics!)

We’ve seen a lot of obituaries in the three and a half years of this site; there’s no question that a generation of composers is passing into history. Bebe died of natural causes at age 82. I was struck by a quote from Barry Schrader, who called her "the last of the pioneering composers of classical studio electronic music." That may be, but listening to Bebe’s sounds and ideas, I wonder what the next generations might still be capable of pioneering, and who will take up the radical element from 1950s and 60s sound and bring it into the coming decades.

The best insight I’ve heard into the Barron’s work comes from a 2005 interview with Bebe on NPR’s Morning Edition:

The Barrons: Forgotten Pioneers of Electronic Music

Matrixsynth has an enormous obituary with lots of background information — a must-read:

RIP Bebe Barron

And here’s Bebe’s last interview, from the beginning of this year, speaking about Anais Nin. That’s poignant to me — my great aunt and uncle were part of the New York circle that ran with Anais Nin and crowd. It’s a reminder to value your crazy and radical creative friends, to keep supporting what they’re doing to enjoy the short time we all have to make art.

Anais Nin has the best quote — she described the Barrons’ music as sounding like "a molecule that has stubbed its toes."

Cornelius’ Sensuous Synchronized tour, with The Cornelius Group, has been stunning American audiences over the past year. I got to a chance to talk to Cornelius, aka Keigo Oyamada, following the New York close to his American trip. The show blew my mind: constant visual stimulation, earnest performances (including audience interaction on Theremin), and perfectly-synced (true to the name) visuals that made the music into a dreamscape you wanted to live in all night. The interview was via email, though, and somehow I got strange and wordy with my questions — I think because I got excited. Cornelius, true to the sharp-edged economy of his music, responded in minimalistic fashion. So, given that too many useless words tend to surround music in general, I’ll be brief:

We all love Cornelius.

The Sensuous Synchronized tour is one of the best audiovisual shows on the planet.

When I feel artistically dry, I watch these videos and feel wonderful.

Cornelius reminds me why I do what I do.

The best way to get Cornelius and share him with friends is to watch the videos.

Go buy the album.

(For more on the visuals in the Cornelius tour, see Momo’s take and discussion on Create Digital Motion)

Now here’s what Cornelius had to say, with some of those videos mixed in because they’re worth countless words:

A massive pioneer in thought about composition and electronic music in particular, an inspiration to rock and pop figures as well as academics, and sometimes a lightning rod for controversy, Karlheinz Stockhausen died this week. (Thank you to everyone who wrote in to let us know.)

Stockhausen’s thinking about sound in all his work has had a deep impact on electronic music, particularly in his influential early works for tape and, by the 1960s, live electronics mixed with instruments. And, of course, aside from earning bonus points for showing up on the Sgt. Pepper album cover (the Beatles were big fans), you have to admire a composer who puts a string quartet in helicopters in order to combine the sound of the machinery with choreographed flybys and live video feeds. If that doesn’t make him a hero of ours, nothing will.

Stockhausen also represents the generation of experimental art that was able to escape the grip of the Nazis — an experience that claimed his mother as a victim and haunted his life. He’s part of the legacy of experimentation that Hitler once tried to silence.

I expect that Stockhausen’s death will mean his quote following September 11 will be trotted out again. Press seized upon the phrase “greatest work of art” to describe those events; Stockhausen for his part says he called them Lucifer’s greatest work of art — an enormous difference, coming from someone who survived Nazi Germany. In the years that have past since that quote, however, I personally feel, as a New Yorker there at the time, a growing sense of a day that transformed how many of us feel about art making.

But I’ll stick with Stockhausen’s one fantasy: dreams of flying. And I hope more people compose for helicopter.

Obituary: Karlheinz Stockhausen “Both a rationalist and a mystic, the composer’s influence stretched from Boulez to the Beatles” [The Guardian]

German composer Stockhausen dies “the composer rejected the idea that he was making the music of the future, writing in 1966: “What is modern today will be tradition tomorrow.” [BBC News]

You can read a strangely bitter obituary from The Times, but I prefer a more thoughtful and historically-informed obituary from Paul Griffiths at The New York Times:
Karlheinz Stockhausen, Influential Composer and Avant-Garde Guru, Dies at 79. I think it balances some of his artistic idiosyncrasies with his importance in history. (Griffiths is a fairly reliable voice when it comes to the history of new music; I may not always agree — but then, new music isn’t about agreement, is it?) He sums things up neatly:

Mr. Stockhausen had secured his place in music history by the time he was 30. He had taken a leading part in the development of electronic music, and his early instrumental compositions similarly struck out in new directions, in terms of their formal abstraction, rhythmic complexity and startling sound.

Karlheinz Stockhausen Official Site, Memorial Booklet (PDF)

Those with thoughts or memories to share, we’d love to hear them. And, as always, our condolences to his surviving family, friends, and colleagues.

Does your brain filter out all elements of the world around you not directly related to electronic music? Do conversations from significant others, business associates, and the like tend to dissolve into “blah, blah, blah …” while you dream of synths and programmed beats? Do you wish your search engine would stop returning lots of irrelevant stuff and accept your major obsession and first love?

Morgan Sutherland has been playing with Google Co-op, a search engine construction technology, and came up with this:

Electronic Music Search

It searches over a hundred sites related to music technology, from music sites to sites like CDM. And, okay, I’m exaggerating: the engine works well for other stuff, too. Because it’s a cooperative engine, you can even contribute to make it better. Give it a spin and let us know what you think, and pass along any custom search engines you’ve got yourself.

As digital musicianship grows, it’s critical to have places like Robotspeak. This small, basement-level music shop on San Francisco’s lower Haight is a brilliant music tech boutique by day. On regular evenings, it becomes a venue, packing in fans of genre-bending electronica. Walk off the street, and you feel like you’re in someone’s basement — someone with lots of toys and a great affection for throwing great musical parties.

I got to play Robotspeak last month on a program with some terrific players: the legendary Daedalus, armed with the prototype device that inspired the Monome, the fabulous Chachi Jones, and the sonic explorations of acoustic ensemble Pineresin. Thanks to the power of video, we can share a little bit of that performance with you, complete with discussion of the tools. Tools are not incidental, either: it’s great to see the range of ways people approach exploring sound and performance, even in this small cross-sampling of artists.

My favorite video it the outtakes, but I’ll resist the temptation to start with that — suffice to say, yes, all of us laptopists face the same problems. Be sure to look to the end for that one.

I had an incredibly great time — there’s nothing like being in a really supportive venue, one that values musicians taking some real risks. Now, the videos:

This week I thought I’d start of with something a little different. An artist that goes by the name Latinsizer of Mil Records (Latinsizer on MySpace). I first discovered Latinsizer via a number of great synth videos on YouTube posted by pepemogt. I personally like nearly all synth videos I see because regardless of the music being played, it gives me a chance to hear what the synth sounds like as well as a peak at its interface, however these videos stood out. They not only showcased a particular aspect of each piece of gear extremely well, but musically they were all interesting - some in ways not typically associated with a given synth. I particularly liked the following video for the Future Retro Revolution. Note the vids are not full tracks, they are just short demos of what the gear can sound like.