Studie I (English: Study I) is anelectronic music composition byKarlheinz Stockhausen from the year 1953. It lasts 9 minutes 42 seconds and, together with hisStudie II, comprises his work number ("opus") 3.
The composition was created in theStudio for Electronic Music of theNWDR in Cologne between July and November 1953.[1] In the final stages of editing, Stockhausen commemorated the birth of his first daughter, Suja on 25 September 1953 by inserting a "serially unauthorized" 108 Hz (in a phrase attributed toRichard Toop), "one-gun salute".[2] The world premiere took place in Cologne on 19 October 1954 in the concert series Musik der Zeit, together with Stockhausen'sStudie II and works byHenri Pousseur,Karel Goeyvaerts,Herbert Eimert, andPaul Gredinger.[3]
The work was important amongst other reasons because it was made (as were the works by Pousseur, Goeyvaerts, and Gredinger) not with the use of (electronic) instruments, like theTrautonium orMelochord, but rather out of puresine tones. For the first time, complete compositional control was achieved, even overtimbre. The ideal was to produce each sound synthetically and thus separately determined in its details: "The conscious organization of music extends to the micro-acoustic sphere of the sound material itself";[4][5] It isserially organized on all musical levels.[6][7]
UnlikeStudie II, the score has never been published, apart from the first page as an illustration to Stockhausen's analysis of the piece.[8][9]
Tone proportions in Stockhausen'sElektronische Studie I,[10]
The fundamental hypothesis forStudie I was that its serial system should begin in the middle of thehuman auditory range and extend in both directions to the limits ofpitch perception. Durations andamplitudes are inversely proportional to the distance from this central reference, so the sounds become both shorter and softer as they approach the upper and lower limits of pitch audibility.[11]
Sets of six values determine the entire work. Pitches are drawn from a series ofintervals: a fallingminor tenth, risingmajor third, fallingminor sixth, rising minor tenth, and falling major third. Expressed asjustly intoned numeric ratios, these are 12/5, 4/5, 8/5, 5/12, and 5/4. Starting from 1920 Hz, near the upper threshold of pitch audibility, thirty-six series of six pitches each are projected, starting with 1920, 800, 1000, 625, 1500, and 1200. The lowest value of 66 Hz is reached at the fourth value of the twenty-second series: 203, 84, 105, 66, 158, 127.[12] All of these ratios are derived from the 5:4 major third, and the resulting timbral combinations resemble the pleasant chiming of a crystal goblet or the combination ofvibraphone andglockenspiel – sounds which Stockhausen had previously employed in 1952 in his orchestral compositionsSpiel andFormel, respectively.[13]
Studie I is composed with "groups". Like the table of pitches, these groups are also constructed from sets of six numbers so that, for example, the first six "vertical" groups of the composition contain 4, 5, 3, 6, 2, and 1 notes each. Stockhausen calls these note groups "note mixtures", and extrapolates the same grouping principle to the formal structure of the entire work: successive note mixtures form horizontal sequences, groups of these sequences form "structures", and these structures are organized into one large "group series" that produces a unifying proportion series for the entire work.[14] In order to increase the contrast between the note groups, a set of sixenvelope curves was added: steady amplitude, increasing amplitude to a sudden cut-off at the specified maximum, and a gradual decrease from the specified maximum; each of these occurs with and withoutreverberation to produce six forms in all.[15]
Karlheinz Stockhausen.Studie I,Studie II,Gesang der Jünglinge I. Ten-inch mono LP recording.Deutsche Grammophon DGG 16133. [Hamburg]: Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft, 1959. Also released as DG LPE 17 243 (UK 10 inch mono LP). LG 1055 (Japan 10 inch mono LP).
Karlheinz Stockhausen.Elektronische Musik 1952–1960 (Konkrete Etude,Studie I,Studie II,Gesang der Jünglinge,Kontakte—version for electronic sounds only). CD recording. Stockhausen Complete Edition CD 3. Kürten: Stockhausen-Verlag, 1991.
Decroupet, Pascal, and Elena Ungeheuer. 1994. "Karel Goeyvaerts und die serielle Tonbandmusik".Revue Belge de Musicologie 48:95–118.
Maconie, Robin. 2005.Other Planets: The Music of Karlheinz Stockhausen. Lanham, Maryland, Toronto, Oxford: Scarecrow Press.ISBN0-8108-5356-6.
Morawska-Büngeler, Marietta. 1988.Schwingende Elektronen: Eine Dokumentation über das Studio für Elektronische Musik des Westdeutschen Rundfunks in Köln 1951–1986. Cologne-Rodenkirchen: P. J. Tonger Musikverlag.
Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1954a. "Komposition 1953 Nr. 2".Technische Hausmitteilingen des nordwestdeutschen Rundfunks 6, nos. 1–2. Reprinted in Stockhausen 1964, 23–36.
Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1954b. "Une Expérience Électronique". InLa musique et ses problèmes contemporains, 81–93. Cahiers de la compagnie Madeleine Renaud–Jean-Louis Barrault 2, no. 3. Paris: René Julliard. French translation ofStockhausen 1954a. Reprinted inLa musique et ses problèmes contemporains 1953–1963, with an introduction bySimone Benmussa, 91–105. Two vols. in one. Cahiers de la Compagnie Madeleine Renaud–Jean Louis Barrault, no. 41. Paris: René Julliard, 1963. Reprinted Amsterdam: Swets & Zeitlinger, 1969.
Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1964.Texte zur Musik 2, edited byDieter Schnebel. DuMont Dokumente. Cologne: Verlag M. DuMont Schauberg.
Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1992. "Studie I (1953): Electronic Music", translated from Stockhausen 1964 byRichard Toop. Text booklet for Stockhausen Complete Edition CD 3, pp. 101–121.
Heikinheimo, Seppo. 1972.The Electronic Music of Karlheinz Stockhausen: Studies on the Esthetical and Formal Problems of Its First Phase, translated by Brad Absetz. Acta Musicologica Fennica 6 (ISSN 0587-2448). Helsinki Suomen Musiikkitieteelinen Seura / Musikvetenskapliga Sällskapet. (Originally a thesis, Helsinki University.)
Hilberg, Frank, and Harry Vogt (eds.). 2002.Musik der Zeit, 1951–2001: 50 Jahre Neue Musik im WDR: Essays, Erinnerungen, Dokumentation. Cologne: Wolke Verlag.ISBN3-923997-98-1.
Kölner Gesellschaft für Neue Musik (ed.). 1991.Klangraum: 40 Jahre Neue Musik in Köln 1945–1985: Komponistenlexikon und Veranstaltungschronologie. Cologne: Wienand Verlag.ISBN3-87909-261-3.
Silberhorn, Heinz. 1978.Die Reihentechnik in Stockhausens Studie II. Herrenberg : Musikverlag Döring. Reprinted, [Rohrdorf]: Rohrdorfer Musikverlag, 1980.ISBN3-922438-10-5.
Stockhausen, Karlheinz. 1963.Texte zur Musik 1, edited byDieter Schnebel. DuMont Dokumente. Cologne: Verlag M. DuMont Schauberg.
Straebel, Volker. 2008. "Das Altern der Elektroakustischen Musik: Anmerkungen aus archivarischer Sicht",Forum Musikbibliothek: Beiträge und Informationen aus der musikbibliothekarischen Praxis 29, no. 4:327–334.
Ungeheuer, Elena. 1992.Wie die elektronische Musik 'erfunden' wurde...: Quellenstudie zuWerner Meyer-Epplers Entwurf zwischen 1949 und 1953. Kölner Schriften zur Neuen Musik 2, edited byJohannes Fritsch andDietrich Kämper. Includes CD recording. Mainz: B. Schott's Söhne.ISBN3-7957-1891-0.
