Experimental music

Experimental music is any music that challenges the commonly accepted notions of what music is. There is an overlap with avant-garde music. John Cage was a pioneer in experimental music and defined and gave credibility to the form.

Techniques

Some of the more common techniques include:

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• Extended techniques: Any of a number of methods of performing on a musical instrument that are unique, innovative, and sometimes regarded as improper.

:* "Prepared" instruments?ordinary instruments modified in their tuning or sound-producing characteristics. For example, guitar strings can have a weight attached at a certain point, changing their harmonic characteristics (Keith Rowe is one musician to have experimented with such techniques). Cage's prepared piano was one of the first such instruments.

Related Topics:
Keith Rowe - Prepared piano

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:* Unconventional playing techniques?for example, strings on a piano can be manipulated directly instead of being played the orthodox, keyboard-based way (an innovation of Henry Cowell's known as "string piano"), a dozen or more piano keys may be depressed simultaneously with the forearm to produce a tone cluster (another technique popularized by Cowell), or the tuning pegs on a guitar can be rotated while a note sounds (called a "tuner glissando").

Related Topics:
Henry Cowell - "string piano" - Tone cluster - Glissando

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• Incorporation of instruments, tunings, or scales from non-Western musical traditions.
• Use of sound sources other than conventional musical instruments such as trash cans, telephone ringers, and doors slamming.
• Playing with deliberate disregard for the ordinary musical controls (pitch, duration, volume).

While much discussion of experimental music centers on definitional issues and its validity as a musical form, the most frequently performed experimental music is entertaining and, at its best, can lead the listener to question core assumptions about the nature of music.

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The London based independent radio station Resonance FM, founded by the London Musicians Collective, frequently broadcasts experimental and free improvised performance works.

Related Topics:
London - Radio - Resonance FM - London Musicians Collective - Free improvised

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The Experimental Music Catalogue, founded in 1968 by Christopher Hobbs, publishes scores and recordings of experimental music.

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David Cope (1997), describes experimental music as that, "which represents a refusal to accept the status quo." He describes a "basic outline" from "simple to...complex":

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• Situation and circumstance music
• Soundscapes
• Biomusic
• Antimusic