![]() ![]() His experience of this 'schism' or, rather, the fact that he did not experience it as a schism, is increasingly relevant today.Īs you will read, the way he reconciled these two areas of his life had to do with his entire approach to music. But in the early 1960s, Tenney was one of a very few artists in the world in this position. Many artists now are both artistically and technologically sophisticated, and the practice of retaining artists within research settings has become more common. I was interested in finding out how he reconciled these two, apparently disparate worlds, one highly technical, the other senuous, poetic, and political. With many digital artists today moving so easily among the arts, there is good reason to do the same historically.ĭuring this time, Tenney was married to the artist Carolee Schneemann, was close friends with the experimental filmmaker Stan Brakhage, was heavily influenced by the music and thought of John Cage, and could be found among Fluxus and other experimental artists. Given that music was the first art to use computers in a sophisticated way, Tenney could also be understood as one of the first digital artists. Tenney's work from this period can be understood from a larger perspective. Indeed, Meta / Hodos, his Masters Thesis at the University of Illinois, finished just before he arrived at Bell Labs, proposed nothing less than a fundamentally new approach to understanding twentieth century composition (after having a long cult status among composers, Meta / Hodos is increasingly being recognized as one of the most important musical documents of the 20th century). David Lewin preceded him briefly at Bell Labs, but Tenney was the first composer there on a protracted basis, let alone one who could bring such formidable knowledge of the underpinnings of twentieth century composition to bear. While at Bell Labs Tenney worked closely with Max Mathews, John Pierce and others, as one of the first composers to use computer synthesized sound (most of his computer compositions from the time are included on the compact disc, James Tenney: Selected Works, 1961-1969, available from Frog Peak Music, or CDeMUSIC). The following interview with the composer James Tenney concentrates on his work during the 1960s, when he was working at Bell Telephone Laboratories in Murray Hill, New Jersey (September 1961 to March 1964), and participating in the flourishing experimental arts scene in New York City. ![]() Toronto, February 1999 Introduction to interview with Tenney The same issue of LEA included a companion article written by James Tenney, " Computer Music Experiences, 1961-1964," and featuring his illustrations. Douglas Kahn's 1999 interview with James Tenney was published in LEA Vol. ![]()
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