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Article: Sharp focus on Iannis Xenakis: ... a hugely influential musical innovator.
- Article from:
- New Internationalist
- Article date:
- October 1, 2000
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2000 New Internationalist Magazine. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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`music is not a language: it doesn't have the task of expressing something through sounds and symbols. Music stands by itself, there's nothing beyond it.'
Accustomed as we are to using music both as means and end, such a statement is a formidable challenge, asking us to engage without simultaneously striving after meaning. It suggests an impossible abstraction -- the value of music being in the music itself, not in the subjective props one normally uses to enjoy it.
But listen to the music of Iannis Xenakis and you will be struck by its otherness, as autonomous and distinct as a drop of water. `I am not interested in repeating myself or other people's ...