Duchamp, Marcel

Musical Erratum + In Conversation

Label: LTM Country: France

"Written in 1913, the "Musical Erratum" for piano forms part of the sequence of notes and projects which led to Duchamp's celebrated artwork, La Mariée mise à nu par ses célibataires, même (The bride stripped bare by her batchelors, even, often called The Large Glass). La Mariée... is also the sub-title of the 1913 piano work.

Abstract, elusive and even "inachievable" according to the artist, the Musical Erratum consists of two scores. In the first, notes are replaced by numbered keys, and virtuoso performance is discouraged in favour of novel mechanical instrumentation. The second offers a form of random composition, by which numbered balls are dropped into the moving wagons of a toy train. Famously, Duchamp described the whole as "a very useless performance, in any event."

Two versions are included on this CD, including a conventional (but non-virtuoso) performance on piano, and another on which spinning rotary discs brush the piano strings to produce extraordinary tones. The extended 74 minute CD also includes four spoken word extracts by Duchamp (in the English language), including a fascinating lecture delivered in Houston in 1957, The Creative Act, and a lengthy interview recorded in 1959."-LTM

Born near Blainville, France, Marcel Duchamp is recognized today as a leading artist and theorist of the 20th Century. After early experiments with traditional styles and Cubism, Duchamp abandoned orthodox forms and techniques, and in 1915 relocated to New York. There he worked on provocative 'readymade' artworks such as Fountain (1917), a porcelain urinal signed R. Mutt, and promoted avant-gardism and Dada together with Francis Picabia and Man Ray.

Duchamp produced relatively few paintings, the best known being Nu descendant un éscalier (Nude Descending a Staircase) from 1912. The large stained glass window, La Mariée mise à nu par ses célibataires, même (The bride stripped bare by her batchelors, even, often called The Large Glass), evolved between 1915 and 1923. Other notable works include 3 Standard Stoppages (1913-14), L.H.O.O.Q (1919) and the installation Etant Donnés (1946-66). [...]"-from the liner notes