The Romanian spectralist composer Horațiu Rădulescu (“ho-RATS-yoo ruh-doo-LESS-koo”) invented the “sound icon,” a piano lying on its side whose strings are often played in this manner. For 10 points each:
[10e] What extended technique pioneered on piano by Curtis Curtis-Smith and Stephen Scott makes ethereal or eerie sounds on vibraphone bars or cymbal rims? This technique is usually notated by arco or a thin V or thick pi shape.
ANSWER: bowing [or using a violin/cello/double bass bow; or dragging bow hair, horsehair, bundle of hair, single hair, nylon, or fishing line against strings, piano wire, or the edge of a vibraphone’s metal bars; or pulling bow hair threaded between piano strings back and forth; accept bowed piano or bowed vibraphone or bowed cymbal]
[10m] Bowed piano is featured in Fourteen, one of this composer’s many late Number Pieces titled for the ensemble’s size. This writer of “mesostics” (“meh-SOSS-ticks”) printed random words beside graphical scores solicited from 269 composers for his book Notations.
ANSWER: John Cage
[10h] In graphic designer Rainer Wehinger’s (“RY-ner VAY-ing-er’s”) spectrum-like Hörpartitur, or listening-score, for this short electronic piece by Ligeti, colorful dots and combs represent beeps and noise. It was inspired by phoneticist Werner Meyer-Eppler’s artificial speech and aleatoricism.
ANSWER: Artikulation
<VP/OL, Classical Music and Opera>