George Frederick McKay · section 97 of 111

“music concrete”

The term music concrete refers to a music which makes use of sounds recorded from nature — bird calls, waterfalls, car brakes screeching, water gurgling out of a bottle, etc. These sounds are transformed by tape recorder techniques. New effects are created by transposing realistic sounds to higher and lower octaves. This distortion, by slowing down and speeding up the vibration, results in a new, sometimes sensational and grotesque tonal character. The Louisville recording Music for Tape Recorder and Orchestra, by Ussachevsky and Luening, is an attempt to reach out in this direction.