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Jerry Kohl
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 Posted: Thu Nov 13, 2008 4:31 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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On Nov 13, 1:36 am, mark_stratfor...@yahoo.co.uk wrote:
| Quote: | ben.belin...@googlemail.com wrote:
No Stockhausen Verlag CDs were on sale!
Yes, commercially these guys are **HOPELESS** !!!
They could have cleared up if they'd brought a trunk of CDs of works
being done: Trans, Cosmic Pulses, Freude etc. And a few scores and
books.
Could have got some student from Royal College to sell them in the
foyer plus someone in the festival admin to store them out of hours.
They refuse (last I heard) to give sales discount to retailers - so
high street shops will always have to do a markup on the Verlag
prices.
It makes no sense at all. Don't they want these pieces to be heard?
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It makes perfect sense. The prices are calculated at cost (including
postage), which is comparatively high, given the short runs involved.
It is not a question of 'refusing to give a sales discount'--they are
simply giving that discount to everybody. Of course, they could always
declare a retail price of about double what they are now charging, and
then offer a 'wholesale markdown' to anyone buying them directly from
the Verlag, in any quantity at all. The result would be exactly the
same, only more confusing, an would provoke howls of rage about the
high prices.
However, it is true that there was a table in the Front Room of the
QEH where CDs from Wergo and, I think, several other publishers were
being sold, and it is a pity that a selection of Verlag CDs were not
included.
Jerry Kohl |
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BernardP
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| Posted: Fri Nov 14, 2008 2:02 am Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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On 13/11/08 16:31, in article
00951769-5bb5-4062-8135-037e22f65482@s9g2000prm.googlegroups.com, "Jerry
Kohl" <jeromekohl@comcast.net> wrote:
| Quote: | On Nov 13, 1:36 am, mark_stratfor...@yahoo.co.uk wrote:
ben.belin...@googlemail.com wrote:
No Stockhausen Verlag CDs were on sale!
Yes, commercially these guys are **HOPELESS** !!!
They could have cleared up if they'd brought a trunk of CDs of works
being done: Trans, Cosmic Pulses, Freude etc. And a few scores and
books.
Could have got some student from Royal College to sell them in the
foyer plus someone in the festival admin to store them out of hours.
They refuse (last I heard) to give sales discount to retailers - so
high street shops will always have to do a markup on the Verlag
prices.
It makes no sense at all. Don't they want these pieces to be heard?
It makes perfect sense. The prices are calculated at cost (including
postage), which is comparatively high, given the short runs involved.
It is not a question of 'refusing to give a sales discount'--they are
simply giving that discount to everybody. Of course, they could always
declare a retail price of about double what they are now charging, and
then offer a 'wholesale markdown' to anyone buying them directly from
the Verlag, in any quantity at all. The result would be exactly the
same, only more confusing, an would provoke howls of rage about the
high prices.
However, it is true that there was a table in the Front Room of the
QEH where CDs from Wergo and, I think, several other publishers were
being sold, and it is a pity that a selection of Verlag CDs were not
included.
Jerry Kohl
At an earlier London festival the word was that the UK's VAT rules had made |
the selling of the CDs a little too awkward, so the idea was abandoned. The
priority of the Stockhausen Verlag is to keep these recorded works in print
(which is laudable), but unfortunately there is no equivalent mission to
promote the recordings to a larger audience. |
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Guest
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| Posted: Fri Nov 14, 2008 9:39 am Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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| Quote: | no equivalent mission to
promote the recordings to a larger audience.-
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Yes, that's really what's needed - casual, curious first-time buyers.
I mean old lags like us will keep buying stuff the hard way from
Germany forever.
Anyway, more importantly - where can I get a waistcoat like Nicolas
Isherwood ? He looked sensational in L-Tanz. I think Loco posted
pictures from the summer course of him wearing the same gear.
What did you guys think of the LT performance ? I thought the group
Mexican waves got a bit much was blown away overall.
mark |
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Paul Dirmeikis
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| Posted: Fri Nov 14, 2008 12:29 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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On 10 nov, 22:16, BernardP <nospamqwerty...@hutmail.com> wrote:
| Quote: | Hi,
Did the text sung in "Urantia" appear in any program booklet?
If yes, and if this text isn't too long (but I'd be surprised if it
was), could you let us know its content?
I'm curious to see the precise connections with the Urantia Book.
Since Stockhausen, in 1997, stated during our conversations that this
book didn't mean that much to him anymore, I really wonder why this
Urantia stuff pops out again in his last compositions...
Best regards
Paul
www.dirmeikis.org
The text translated into English (it is sung in German) was in Jerry's
programme note.
--
Rotations Everywhere
URANTIA in the cosmos
Father Son and Holy Ghost
GOD GOD GOD
--
In the original German there are 26 syllables and the short text is revealed
one syllable at a time.
The choice of titles for the final pieces remains a surprise (but " 'Earth'
for Soprano and Electronic Music" might have been less evocative. In the
catalogue of creation that forms the text for Licht-Bilder, none of these
Urantia Book planets gets a mention.-
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Hi,
Thanks for the text, even if it doesn't give any new clarification
about Stockhausen's connection with Urantia.
But will we ever have any ?
Paul
www.dirmeikis.org |
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Guest
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| Posted: Fri Nov 14, 2008 12:58 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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That useful site www.archive.org gives snapshots of selected websites
over the years, and it's interesting to see what Stonebraker's looked
like a decade ago. You can see that Kuerten were selling the Hymnen CD
for a massive $108 back then - so there has been *some* progress on
price.
Re: these 'short runs' - surely they ought to produce bigger runs of
the CDs that get the most interest. HMV records on Oxford St said
that they'd had countless requests for Gesang der J and Hymnen - and
they weren't able to supply them. But their large stack of HSQ, new
Stimmung and other non-Verlag discs sold quickly and well.
We've probably bored ourselves to death over the years now with this
subject ;-0
mark |
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Paul Dirmeikis
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| Posted: Fri Nov 14, 2008 2:28 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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On 11 nov, 14:19, "Daniel Wolf" <djw...@snafu.de> wrote:
| Quote: |
In Richard Toop's description of his time as Stockhausen's assistant (in
MusikTexte 116), he writes (and this is my rough translation from the
printed German):
"And then there was the Urantia Book, which later had an important
influence on many aspects of the Light-cycle. Many times, he passionately
advocated for this book and recommended urgently that we all got copies
(which, given our financial circumstances — mine included — was hardly
possible). As he himself noticed that most of us did not share his
enthusiasm, he took an apparently reluctant retreat: "Well, at least one
can describe it as an absolutely fascinating kind of galactic myth: a kind
of science fiction."
I think that it's an important question, in the case of a composer whose
work claims a certain spiritual viewpoint, to define more clearly what
precisely the belief system is which is conveyed by the work. Even
allowing for the fact that his views changed or even "evolved" over time
and the fact that he sometimes aspired to a universality that encouraged
synchronicity and ambiguity, the lack of clarity on this topic in
Stockhausen's music is frustrating. What did he believe? As I have noted
elsewhere, the serious hole in Stockhausen's theogony and theology is, the
composer himself excepted, a creator-deity.
Daniel Wolf
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Hi,
I totally agree with you.
I've been looking for a clarification about this Urantia/Stockhausen
connection for many years.
During the conversations I had with him in 1997, and which were used
in my book, I wanted to tackle this subject, and I quoted Michael
Kurtz ('Stockhausen - A Biography" - 1992 Faber & Faber p.196) :
"After the summer break in 1974, the dynamic scales for Inori having
been completed, Stockhausen welcomed his students in a most unusaul
way. He came in, placed the The Urantia Book on the table, with a
resounding crunch and said: "If you want to go on being my pupils, you
must read this!"
Stockhausen seemed surprised and upset, as if he had never read the
book, neither the first German 1988 edition, nor Toop's translation
(which would be highly improbable), and immediatly replied : "This is
pure invention! Kurtz made up this whole story!"
Despite this denial, I dared to insist, and pointed out how many
references to The Urantia Book can be found in "Licht". Stockhausen
did acknowledge this fact, but obviously trying to fudge the subject,
explained that all the names, the signs (Michael and Luzifer), all
these references were only a kind of "material" that he have wanting
to use... He said that this book didn't mean very much to him at the
beginning (it had been offered to him by a strange man at the end of
the world premiere of "Hymnen with Orchestra", in New York on the 25th
of February 1971), that Mary Bauermeister was much more interested
than him, and that he only started being interested when reading in
1974 some chapters about Michael: then he felt really resonating with
the book...
I asked: "Would you recommend its reading to anyone wanting to study
the symbolism of "Licht". He answered: "Yes, of course"
I insisted again: "Since this means The Urantia Book is a VERY
important way to approaching and understanding "Licht", why don't you
say it in a more explicite and clear way, for example in the
performance programme texts, or the CD booklets? He answered : "No
one, except you, seems to be interested in this book... So..."
And his tone showed me that I had already been too far, and he was
willing to talk about something else.
That's all I could get from him. This only shows he was reluctant
talking about this subject. I think that so many people, journalists
or even colleagues have mocked him about his "mystical" side (coming
from Sirius, etc.), that he was becoming cautious, and unwilling to
give all his detractors something more to chew over. I haven't read
the whole Urantia Book, but large sections enough to tell you that,
yes, it is assuredly quite barmy and wild...
For those who might be interested, there is a very good book about
this stuff: "Urantia: The Great Cult Mystery" - 1995 - Prometheus
Books, by Martin Gardner.
Maybe did he also feel some kind of bitterness about the Urantia
Brotherhood because they didn't seem to be interested at all in the
way Stockhausen was connecting his music with their book? Let's not
forget they refused permission to having a section of The Urantia Book
printed in "Inori"'s premiere programme booklet.
About two years ago, I had the strange and unexpected opportunity to
meet some hot shots from the French Urantia Brotherhood, and they were
completely unaware of Stockhausen connecting "Licht" with their book.
Anyway, they were even barely aware of Stockhausen himself...
This reminds me another conversation with Stockhausen in Kuerten in
1978, when he told me that after being so interested and involved in
Sri Aurobindo's yoga and philosophy, he had sent to the Sri Aurobindo
Ashram in Pondicherry, almost all of his recordings, especially "Aus
den sieben Tagen", and had never received any slightest thank you.
Someone he knew, and who was an "ashramite", told him, a couple of
years after, that he had seen Stockhausen's LP records all dusty on a
shelf in a closet among thousands of other junk... I remember I have
felt biiterness in his voice when he was telling me this story.
Maybe something similar happened with the Urantia guys? Who knows?
All that I know is that the Urantia "Michael" sign, lightly modified
by Stockhausen (I guess for trademark reasons), is on his tombstone.
And it surely means a lot.
Best regards.
Paul
www.dirmeikis.org |
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Jerry Kohl
Guest
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| Posted: Fri Nov 14, 2008 7:32 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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On Nov 14, 4:58 am, mark_stratfor...@yahoo.co.uk wrote:
| Quote: | Re: these 'short runs' - surely they ought to produce bigger runs of
the CDs that get the most interest.
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A few mathematical facts need to be taken into account. The single
best-selling CD (as of a few years ago) has been the Electronic Music
one, with the two Studies, Gesang, etc. Kathinka told me in 2000 that
this disc was selling about a dozen copies per *year*. Since their
short run was of 1000 units, the supply can be expected to run out
about 83 years after publication, or about the year 2078. Plenty of
time to order up a reprint.
| Quote: | HMV records on Oxford St said
that they'd had countless requests for Gesang der J and Hymnen - and
they weren't able to supply them.
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If 'countless' means 'more than ten', it might not be worth their
trouble to follow up; if it means 'more than 500', then I'm surprised
they haven't ordered at least 25 copies directly from the Verlag, and
notified the customers who asked that they can be had for perhaps a
25% markup over the Verlag prices. It would only be good business to
do so. If those 25 copies were indeed snapped up, perhaps their next
order would be for 50, and the Verlag sales would be unprecedented.
Why have they not done this? The Verlag address is very easy to find,
in contrast to the difficulties with obtaining the Corver/Grotenhuis
Mantra CD.
Jerry |
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Daniel Wolf
Guest
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| Posted: Fri Nov 14, 2008 10:14 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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There is an interesting response by a Urantia follower to an item on my
blog, here:
http://renewablemusic.blogspot.com/2007/12/angelology.html?showComment=1197993060000
Daniel Wolf
On Fri, 14 Nov 2008 15:28:38 +0100, Paul Dirmeikis <Dirmeikisp@aol.com>
wrote:
| Quote: | Maybe something similar happened with the Urantia guys? Who knows?
All that I know is that the Urantia "Michael" sign, lightly modified
by Stockhausen (I guess for trademark reasons), is on his tombstone.
And it surely means a lot.
Best regards.
Paul
www.dirmeikis.org |
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Daniel Wolf
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| Posted: Fri Nov 14, 2008 10:48 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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Although it is often quite difficult — not to mention pricy — for those
with a serious interest in the music of a composer like Stockhausen or,
for that matter, La Monte Young, to aquire scores and recordings, taking a
sober step backwards suggests that perhaps Stockhausen and Young have made
a realistic assessment of their market potential and by the effective
rationing of their materials, they continue to insure a relatively high
unit price and make a modest net profit in the long term on recording
projects that would be great losses if made more immediately available. I
don't have any raw numbers about the cottage industries of either
Stockhausen or Young, so I may be entirely wrong about this and, as the
preferred media are increasingly web-delivered, I suspect that this model
is largely one of the past, with the exception of objects that might be
sold as equivalents to visual arts.
That said, if Young — like Terry Riley — can do PayPal, then the
Stockhausen Verlag should certainly be able to do the same!
Daniel Wolf |
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BernardP
Guest
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| Posted: Sat Nov 15, 2008 4:47 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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On 14/11/08 09:39, in article
65a9e34c-1a04-4b4b-9953-63f03cee1224@40g2000prx.googlegroups.com,
"mark_stratford98@yahoo.co.uk" <mark_stratford98@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
| Quote: |
no equivalent mission to
promote the recordings to a larger audience.-
Yes, that's really what's needed - casual, curious first-time buyers.
I mean old lags like us will keep buying stuff the hard way from
Germany forever.
It would really add to a festival to have the archive library / shop there |
to browse in. They do this at Kurten of course.
| Quote: |
Anyway, more importantly - where can I get a waistcoat like Nicolas
Isherwood ? He looked sensational in L-Tanz. I think Loco posted
pictures from the summer course of him wearing the same gear.
... I had to wear red and black for a concert once, but got a subtle red and |
black design rather than the bright waistcoat and bow tie
| Quote: |
What did you guys think of the LT performance ? I thought the group
Mexican waves got a bit much was blown away overall.
|
It certainly challenges the stamina of the players to keep up the movements
for such an extended time, but adds enormously to the experience of the ten
layers. As we saw in the RFH the face was inverted. With the libretto
revealed above in red, the metaphor was easy to experience nonetheless.
Nicholas Isherwood is phenomenonally good at sustaining his role and as the
one solo singer he could carry the Samstag opera as none other, (with
regards to the impressive Mathias Holle who performed at La Scala). I also
thought Marco Blaauw performed the virtuoso Upper Lip Dance at least as well
as Marcus Stockhausen, expressing all the emotion that it requires.
Along with the other particularly "theatrical" pieces Trans and Himmels Tur,
this was the highlight of the festival for me. |
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mark steven brooks
Guest
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| Posted: Sat Nov 15, 2008 7:55 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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| Quote: | HMV records on Oxford St said
that they'd had countless requests for Gesang der J and Hymnen - and
they weren't able to supply them.
If 'countless' means 'more than ten', it might not be worth their
trouble to follow up; if it means 'more than 500', then I'm surprised
they haven't ordered at least 25 copies directly from the Verlag, and
notified the customers who asked that they can be had for perhaps a
25% markup over the Verlag prices. It would only be good business to
do so. If those 25 copies were indeed snapped up, perhaps their next
order would be for 50, and the Verlag sales would be unprecedented.
Why have they not done this? The Verlag address is very easy to find.
|
I imagine that most anyone wanting these CDs are aware that they can buy
them directly through the Verlag. Why would they be willing to spend
an additional 25% over the already high price? It seems to me if the
Verlag were to lower its prices then they would be compensated by
greater sales. |
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Bernardp
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| Posted: Sat Nov 15, 2008 11:54 pm Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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For a taste of what the future could be like, I hope people have
looked at the LastFM Stockhausen page. Unfortunately, the BUY and
DOWNLOAD buttons don't usually lead anywhere useful, but you can STREAM
a lot of the recordings (including Verlag ones) track by track by
clicking the small play buttons, with all the possibilities that may
open up. This is not just 30 second samples. You can hear the whole
thing.
http://www.last.fm/music/Karlheinz+Stockhausen/+albums?order=reach&page=1
Isn't it great to hear music as esoteric as DoubleBass solo from
Orchester Finalisten on demand!
http://www.last.fm/music/Karlheinz+Stockhausen/_/Contrabass%2BSolo%2B%252B%2BElectronic%2BMusic?autostart |
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BernardP
Guest
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| Posted: Sun Nov 16, 2008 12:05 am Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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On 2008-11-15 17:54:39 +0000, Bernardp <bpnospam1982736@hottmail.com> said:
| Quote: | For a taste of what the future could be like, I hope people have
looked at the LastFM Stockhausen page. Unfortunately, the BUY and
DOWNLOAD buttons don't usually lead anywhere useful, but you can STREAM
a lot of the recordings (including Verlag ones) track by track by
clicking the small play buttons, with all the possibilities that may
open up. This is not just 30 second samples. You can hear the whole
thing.
http://www.last.fm/music/Karlheinz+Stockhausen/+albums?order=reach&page=1
Isn't it great to hear music as esoteric as DoubleBass solo from
Orchester Finalisten on demand!
http://www.last.fm/music/Karlheinz+Stockhausen/_/Contrabass%2BSolo%2B%252B%2BElectronic%2BMusic?autostart
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Apologies.
| Quote: |
SOME of the CDs offer full tracks (quite a lot particularly St |
Verlag)... others only 30 second previews... a bit confusing! |
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Guest
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| Posted: Mon Nov 17, 2008 9:50 am Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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The Sunday Times was a bit luke-warm:
"we heard the premiere of a Southbank commission, Urantia, the 19th
Hour of Klang, consisting of 20 minutes of juddering, eight-track
electronic music (sometimes it made me think of distorted fairground
sounds), combined with a recorded soprano who sings obscurely of
religious revelations, and it was amusing enough. " |
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Guest
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| Posted: Mon Nov 24, 2008 8:37 am Post subject: Re: Klang Festival: London |
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| Quote: | Stockhausen had wanted that possibility [live performance of URANTIA]
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That's promising as I think it could be a devastating piece with a
weightier soprano. To me, Kathinka Pasveer's singing sounds like a bit
of a post-grad student - and I'm glad the piece isn't forever cast in
stone with her as the voice.
I'd love to hear Christine Schäfer (that very fine Lulu) doing it. |
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