Image courtesy of Masha Froliak
Entering the darkened auditorium of the Park Avenue Armory’s Drill Hall served as a perfect setting for Karlheinz Stockhausen’s OKTOPHONIE. The audience was immediately invited into a mysterious world where the musical and the visual combined to take one on a meditative journey.
As a pioneer of electronic music, a master of sound manipulations, research scientist, and composer, Karlheinz Stockhausen not only pushed the boundaries of sound limits and capabilities, but also invented a new language of musical aesthetic. OKTOPHONIE is a 70 minute electronic piece which is the second act of Dienstag (Tuesday) from a cycle of seven operas titled Licht (Light), each dedicated to a separate day of the week. This work opened Armory’s 2013 season and once again demonstrated the composer’s fascination with spatial movement.
The audience donned white cloaks and took seats in a circle surrounded by 16 speakers positioned in four corners as if to form a cube. Kathinka Pasveer, a sound projectionist and Stockhausen’s long time collaborator, sat in the middle of the audience and controlled the overall dynamic. Eight different layers of music simultaneously moved through the space, creating an octophonic sound. The specific arrangement of the loudspeakers allowed vertical, horizontal, and diagonal movements which were initially composed by Stockhausen himself.
OKTOPHONIE depicted a battle between two opposing forces, the archangel Michael and Lucifer. Rhythmic pulses of whistling, spinning, and crashing sounds alternated with longer lasting layers of sounds; a dark consistent drone being consistent throughout the whole piece. Strangely the musical composition and the complex variety of sounds did not create an immediate emotional reaction, but rather evoked a hypnotizing sense of desolation and stillness. The dark world filled with sonic invasions could be reminiscent of Stockhausen’s childhood experience of being near a battlefield in Germany during World War II. The composer imagined this piece, as with most of his other works, to be listened to in total darkness or with a little source of light, such as the image of a moon projected on the wall.
Image courtesy of Masha Froliak
The accompanying visual installation by Rirkrit Tiravanija helped shape the overall experience and sent the audience on a journey through space, just the way the composer himself had envisioned. The set was composed of a large disk representing a lunar surface and was designed to hold both the performers and members of the audience. As the music of OKTOPHONIE was filling the house, the lights were beautifully choreographed, moving from darkness, to total eclipse, into blinding light. The embracing form of the stage with the audience adorned in white, that made everyone blend with the lunar surface as the ligthing was projected on it, added a ritualistic aspect to the performance.
The mystical spiritual mood of this massive sound composition was aimed at creating a separate dimension of a transcending character. Having no physical connection to sounds the piece was yet set up for the audience to have a strong sensory experience. Depending on where each person was seating the perception of sounds would differ.
Stockhausen is known for his cosmological ideas and interest in universal wanted to expand and train our perceptual senses with his music. The only way to better understand it was to listen.
As the last notes of OKTOPHONIE, which was composed by Stockhausen 23 years ago, filled Armory’s Drill Hall the lights illuminated the stage bringing us back to the worldly reality. The musical spatial journey that tested our perception was also a test for the composer, who died in 2007 without experiencing whether the world was accepting of his work.
By Masha Froliak
