PARADE and BRICKLAYING were written in March 1990 to document and demonstrate some of the self-playing machines I built for various performances and installations over the past five years. Microphone placement for recording has significantly altered the audio characteristics of some of the machines from their original usage. All seven machines use metal as their main sound sources. They are all electronically powered, and work like this:
1. Four table tennis balls roll on a rotating metal hot water services lid. A contact-miked bamboo pole positioned like a billiard cue just inside the lid's rim knocks the balls apart when they congregate there.
2. Two wooden beads suspended from a rotating T-arm structure strike 25 tin cans placed in their path. The cans are of different sizes and open or closed. They rest on their sides or ends to maximise pitch and timbral variety.
3. A rotating rubber mat rubs the tightly spiralled end of a suspended contact-miked clock spring. Another shorter clock spring, also contact-miked, hangs alongside and bumps against the first vibrating spring.
4. Two bamboo sticks suspended from a rotating T-arm structure strike the edges of eight cymbals positioned on cardboard cones around the motor. The sticks also bounce off to strike the motor's plastic case.
5. An off-centre post on a rotating turntable pulls a string to set eight tubular aluminium chimes in motion. A wooden bead hangs between each pair of chimes, preventing them from striking each other.
6. Two bamboo sticks suspended from a rotating T-arm structure strike eight aluminium cooking pots (sans handles) in their path. Sometimes a stick bounces across the top of a pot, striking it on both the outer and inner edges.
7. A rotating leather strip rubs the edges of two suspended aluminium rectangles. A suspended wooden cotton reel also strikes a piece of rotating hollow square-section aluminium mounted at the turntable's centre.
PARADE is basically a showpiece: each machine approaches from the right, plays solo, moves left and duets with the following machine, and finally fades out to leave 'centre stage' for its successor.
BRICKLAYING uses all 35 ways of selecting four machines out of seven in equal time segments. The title is derived from the overlapping structure of the units on the four-part linear notation.
Both pieces were recorded at home using simple means, and are presented here with Dolby B and in reasonable stereo.
Ernie Althoff
March 1990
Review: Sounds Australian No. 27, September 1990, p 39.
Luscious percussion
Ernie Althoff is another composer who has taken to producing his own albums. This cassette, in addition to its musical merits, is an audiophile’s delight. I have seldom heard percussion sounds recorded so lusciously as they are here, and the miracle is that Althoff recorded them in his workroom at home with domestic equipment. The extreme care and fastidiousness of his recording technique paid off handsomely. If you have any interest in contemporary music for percussion, this album is a must. For the past 10 years Althoff has been designing and installing “music machines”, self-playing sound sculptures that use cast-off turntables as their power sources. Various percussion instruments are placed around the turntable, and beaters are attached to the turntable in such a way that they swing freely after striking the instruments. Thus, the functioning of the machine is predictable, but perpetually random. This album features seven different sculptures, all of which use metal as their sound sources. Side one, Parade, displays the machines mostly one at a time. Side two, Bricklaying, has a more complex, layered structure. With his elegant use of chance, and his extremely refined timbral ear, Althoff has produced an extremely attractive album.
Warren Burt
Review: Retrofuturism No. 14, January 1991, p 1165.
This work amounts to a demo by Mr. Althoff of seven of the self-playing machines he has built over the years. Mr. Althoff’s machines are indeed self-playing; all he needs to do is set them up, turn them on, and listen. Most of the sounds are generated by metal percussion and are what math types might call “chaotic”; for a contraption such as Machine #1, described as “… four table tennis balls roll on a rotating metal hot water service lid. A contact-miked bamboo pole positioned … just inside the lid’s rim knocks the balls apart when they congregate there …”, the sounds generated are always self-similar but never repeated exactly. It seems Mr. Althoff builds non-deterministic music boxes.
The machines are presented in two ways. On Side one, Parade, each machine enters the stereo field from the left, plays along with the previous instrument (then by itself as the previous instrument leaves), and eventually exits on the right (sic)*. As each machine is presented, its sonic characteristics are easily recognisable (you think “Yeah, I guess that’s what that contraption ought to sound like…”), and yet their common characteristics (metallic quality, disorderliness – yet predictability – and an odd familiarity) remain. On Side two, Bricklaying, the mix segues each possible combination of four Althoff instruments in overlapping segments. Here, the distinctive voices of each instrument merge, and the entrances and exits of each one’s voice into the collective din inform the overall dynamic. Impressive. The liner notes are good too.
Since the early 1980’s, Rik Rue has been composing with environmental and found sounds. He transforms these recordings into
soundscapes that have evolved into radiophonic works, sound installations and live performances.
Rik released numerous cassettes on his Pedestrian Tapes label throughout the 1980s and 1990s, now mostly unavailable. This Bandcamp page will bring that archive back to life...more
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