Karlheinz Stockhausen

Icelandic original Björk has penned an interesting essay for the Guardian that looks at why she loves Karlheinz Stockhausen. 

Here’s an excerpt:

For my generation, Stockhausen’s published lectures had unbelievable impact. He was the most hopeful of figures: the 21st century was going to be great. The classical teachers in my school, meanwhile, kept moaning about the good old days of music and changing the masses of music pupils into slave performers, putting to sleep any creative thought or the will to make new things.

I remember sitting in his studio in Cologne, surrounded by 12 speakers, him creating a current traveling up and down, swirling around us like the force of nature that electricity is, my insides pulsating to his noise – primordial, modern and futuristic. He celebrated the sound of sound, in both his electronic music and his acoustic music. For example, my favourite piece of his, Stimmung, is vocal only, using the voice as a sound and exploring the nuances of it in a microscopic way, rid of the luggage of the opera tradition or any other vocal disciplines, styles or techniques.