Intuitive Music

Edgar Varèse

Born in Paris 1883, Edgar Varèse is one of the pioneers in electronic music and one of the most important avant-garde 20th Century’s composers who developed a series of acoustic and theoretical principles that defined the boundaries between music and noise, as well as dissonance and consonance.

Edgar Varèse started his music studies in Paris 1903 and later in Berlin, where he met the composers Ferruccio Busoni and Richard Strauss. In 1915, he moved to New York where he started to work a few years later in dissonant harmonies and complex polyphonies. In 1921, Varèse founded the International Composers’ Guild along with Carlos Salzedo performing numerous works for a small ensemble.

Edgar Varèse’s determination to work with electronic sounds was becoming an obsession and, in 1927, he contacted Harvey Fletcher -director of acoustical research of Bell Telephone Laboratories- to try to set-up a studio for the research of electronic music, but his proposal was turned down. In 1932, he offered to work for Bell in exchange for the use of the studio, even sacrificing his career as a composer to find new electronic sounds. During the 30’s, Varèse started a series of works based in the use of electronic instruments, such as the theremin and the ondes martenot.

In 1954, Edgar Varèse produced the percussion and tape work “Deserts” at the famous Columbia-Priceton elcetronic studio, followed by “Poeme Electronique” for the 1957 World’s Fair in Brussels, which was performed on 425 loudspeakers and accompanied by projected images. This was one of the first large-scale multimedia productions ever.

Edgar Varèse died in New York in 1965 at the age of 82. He was a major influence for some of the most innovative pop artists in the 60s, including Frank Zappa, The Beatles, Pink Floyd, and especially the whole electronic experimental scene during the 90’s.