Available on Bandcamp and simpleharmonicmotion.org
November 1952 is a graphic score from Earle Brown’s Folio collection. Brown’s notes for the score state: To be performed in any direction from any point in the defined space, lines and spaces may be thought of as tracks moving in either direction. The defined space may be thought of as real or illusory.
This realization of the score is for violin, cello, harp, and electronics. It is performed at a pianissimo dynamic throughout. Key centers were chosen for each instrument. The violin plays notes within an F major tonality, the cello plays within B Major (Lydian), and the harp plays in an Eb Major (Lydian) tonality.
The performance duration was chosen in advance, with a total time of 6 minutes.

A transparency was placed over the score, divided horizontally into six sections. This was used as an overall guide for where sounds could occur in time and gave a sense of how the piece would breathe and use space. However, the parts were not played directly from left to right; rather, they were abstracted from the idea of the score.

John Bickerton created this realization for the album Atlas Eclipticalis, released in 2024 on Simple Harmonic Motion Records.

November 1952 (Earle Brown)

available on Bandcamp and simplehamonicmotion.org
December 1952 – December 1952 became Brown’s most famous graphic score from Folio. It suggests where elements exist in space… space as an infinitude of directions from an infinitude of points in space…to work (compositionally and in performance) to right, left, back, forward, up, down, and all points between. The score is a picture of this space at one instant, which must always be considered as unreal and/or transitory… a performer must set this all in motion, which is to say, realize that it is in motion and step into it.
This recording is a mix of 2 performances. The first was made mainly inside the piano with a plectrum, brushes, timpani mallets, a superball mallet, a rubber ball, and other found objects. The second was played mostly on the piano keys. Sounds are treated electronically with ring modulation, filtering, and delay.

A performance time of 10 minutes was chosen in advance. A transparency overlay determined when sound events would occur in time. For the purpose of this performance, horizontal lines were taken as a sound event’s duration, and line thickness was taken as amplitude. The score was rotated 90 degrees for each take.

John Bickerton created this realization for the album Atlas Eclipticalis, released in 2024 on Simple Harmonic Motion Records.

New tracks tagged #silent piece