THE ELECTRONIC WORKS OF GYÖRGY LIGETI AND THEIR ...

Section C, which sounds like a faint echo of elements of Section B, is a first glimpse at
techniques that Ligeti will use in the second half of the piece, using both retrograded
material and filtering in a combination where the later obscures the presence of the former.
The use of such an “echo” section may be inspired by Karlheinz Stockhausen’s
Studie I, which made use of similar echo sections. Stockhausen first used serial operations
to create collections of sine-tones. A series determined a number of pitches occurring
simultaneously, their relative amplitudes, and elements of their synchronization and
envelope. Stockhausen then presented these “structures,” following each presentation
with an echo-like repetition of the entire structure, transposed to a different speed (also
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serially determined) and with the addition of reverberation. In the spectrograph (Figure
2.7) one can see the lowest and highest strata (events of Type V and I) of the layered
texture of Section B. It appears that, rather than changing the speed or adding
reverberation, Ligeti created this echo section by using a band-stop filter to remove
materials between approximately 600 and 6,000 Hz.
Other particulars of how Ligeti alters his material in this echo section are revealed
in another spectrograph in which the scale of intensity has been altered to a maximum
higher decibel level, thus increasing the sensitivity to softer sounds and visually restoring
the intensity of material that the filtering softened, but not completely removed; this image
(Figure 2.8) presents both Sections B and C together.
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This process is described in more depth by Richard Toop, “Stockhausen’s Electronic Works: Sketches
and Work-Sheets from 1952-1967, Interface 10 (1981), 149-97, as well as in the composer’s extensive
program notes to the compact disc, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Elektronische Musik 1952-60. Stockhausen
Complete Edition, Vol. 3, 1991. Compact Disc.
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