The Writings of Iannis Xenakis (Starting with "Formalized Music")

Author(s): Sharon Kanach

Source: Perspectives of New Music , Winter, 2003, Vol. 41, No. 1 (Winter, 2003), pp. 154-
166
Published by: Perspectives of New Music

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25164509

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 The Writings of Iannis Xenakis
(Starting with
Formalized Music)
T >"t Jt
*-1 J?/1-u
Sharon Kanach

Xenakis'S
also ofoutput was mostis impressive,
prose. His bibliography prolific,bothnot onlytoofhis musical works but
in relation
contemporaries and from an historical perspective.1 For the moment,
over 160 articles have been identified, 28 of which are still unpublished.
This number is still growing as his personal archives, recently deposited at
the Bibliot?que nationale de France, are sorted.
Although Xenakis was a man of few words in conversation, he obvi
ously felt the inner necessity to write, to commit to paper not only his
theoretical discoveries, but also his artistic and philosophical questionings
as well as, occasionally, his concerns as a profound humanist. Encouraged
early on by his mentor, Hermann Scherchen, Xenakis seems to have

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 The Writings of Iannis Xenakis 155

experienced almost a sense of duty to publish his writings, thereby to

share his findings. After leaving Le Corbusier's Studio in 1959 after
twelve years of loyal employment, Xenakis refused Le Corbusier's pro
posal to return as his head architect.

I told him it was too late to go back. I was sure of one thing; all I
wanted, to do was compose, to think about the problems of music
and to write about them . . . 2

In fact, Xenakis published twelve fundamental articles in Scherchen's

bilingual (German-English) review, Gravesaner Blatter, ranging from
"The Crisis of Serial Music" (1955) to "Towards a Philosophy of Music"
(1966).3 It appears that as these articles were being published, at one
point, the two men were considering the idea of compiling Xenakis's
theoretical writings in French under the title M?canisme d'une musique,
to be published by Scherchen in Gravesano, Switzerland. In a letter to
Scherchen dated May 13, 1960, Xenakis writes:

I am sure of my book. It introduces to music and art in general,

forms of thinking of the richest and most radical kind. In a few years
from now they will be utilized by a growing number of people, for I
am of my time, even with my style which you think dry, and which
in reality is right?full of a new truth.4

Xenakis remained uncompromising, refuting Scherchen's perception that

the work would be too "dry" for most readers. He took the project so
much to heart that he even began writing a prologue (still unpublished)
for the volume as early as 1959.5 In the end, this M?canisme d'une
musique was never published, although Xenakis continued to contribute
articles regularly to the Gravesaner Blatter review.6 Scherchen was also
obliged, apparently for financial reasons, to abandon his project to build
an auditorium that he had asked Xenakis to design for him in 1961 for
his home/art center in Gravesano.7 Every year, Scherchen organized a
symposium there with various composers and researchers that served, in
fact, as the hothouse, the think tank8 for his review.9
In the meantime, Xenakis had been invited by the American composer
Aaron Copland to lecture at Tanglewood at the Academy for Advanced
Musical Training session during the summer of 1963. A summary of the
topics of his seminars there was:10

1 ) Formal and axiomatic tendencies in musical composition

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 156 Perspectives of New Music

2) Determinism and probability in composition

3) Mathematical model for stochastic music

4) Mechanization and computation of stochastic music

5) Theory of Games and musical composition

6) Introduction to Set Theory and Symbolic Logic in musical

compositions
7) Some problems of electro-acoustic music.

Not surprisingly, these topics coincided with subjects on which Xenakis

had written for Scherchen's review, although not all had been published
by that date. Benefiting from live feedback from students, Xenakis clearly
considered this seminar environment a laboratory where he could
develop and test his new ideas. Though always his own first and most
ardent defender of these "new truths," Xenakis's approach was never
dogmatic nor demagogic:

I don't consider what I'm doing to be teaching . . . When I'm lec

turing I talk not about my music but about ideas lying behind it. . . .
I try to get my students to think about certain fundamentals which
can then lead to important conclusions and results. . . . Even if they
don't agree with me they should at least think about it}1

While at Tanglewood, Xenakis was in contact with the editors of the

Perspectives of New Music and was very interested in contributing articles
to this new, receptive, American audience. After his first submission, he
was informed that it would have to go under a "technical review," in
other words, censorship. This infuriated Xenakis who immediately with
drew his submission and sent Mr. Benjamin Boretz, then the editor of
the publication, the following statement:

It is out of the question that I shall submit my writing to the censor

ship of professional referees; this sort of censorship was not under
stood at the start. I was to have complete freedom to develop my
ideas. I would have never have accepted, being a professional referee
myself. Your argument wrongs the full principle of responsibility for
creative work and thought. I would not know how to give way on
this point. My life up to now has been a bitter struggle against com

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 The Writings of Iannis Xenakis 157

promise and untruth and I was quite conscious of my actions and

their consequences.12*

It wasn't until 1990, nearly thirty years later, that Xenakis used PNM as
his chosen forum13 to publish a major theoretical study, "Sieves."14
Upon his return to Paris in the fall of 1963, Xenakis could indeed feel
confident about his writings since his Musiques Formelles, nouveaux princ
ipes formels de composition musicale15 was about to be published. Certain
changes were made in relation to the chapters' original and respective
printings in the Gravesaner Blatter, perhaps due in part to Xenakis's
revised conclusions following his fieldwork on the topics at Tanglewood.
In addition, an entirely new chapter (never published in the Gravesaner
Bl?tter under any form) was added, "Symbolic Music." Today, nearly
forty years later, we can still appreciate this volume's radically new and
original approach not only to music composition, but also to the philoso
phy of music and of the arts in general.
It was not uncommon in France at that time to launch such publica
tions through a private subscription. Xenakis's statement on the "Sub
scription bulletin" is telling on many fronts and merits full quotation
here:16

Subscription bulletin
MUSIQUES FORMELLES
by Iannis XENAKIS

Having been obliged to make a clean sweep of so many subcon

scious or acquired traditions, new points of reference had to be put
on record, in the same manner as my "works" that result from or are
provoked by the same, in order to not forget. For using the ability to
inscribe, that mankind has, is necessary in this tunnel, this darkness.

However, in research for research's sake, there is no necessity to

transmit anything to others; the supreme wisdom would be to
rejoice nude under the rain, facing the cold wind, alone.

*Benjamin Boretz writes (3.11.03): "Sharon Kanach is free to

accept Iannis Xenakis's story at face value, but she should know
better." ? Ed.

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 158 Perspectives of New Music

Yet, trivial umbilical wisdom would be to run and show mother the
amazing pebble found on the beach.

I gave in to both of these axioms since my freedom now enables me.

My liberty has been molded by the instantaneous lives and deaths of
the cycle made up of perpetual "ekkliseis" and "prad??as."

This book is the temporary fruit of reflections, of trials and errors, of

certain thinkings and doings, for example, music. Therefore, it is the
tails of the coin whose heads is my musical work. Thus perhaps it
may be of some pragmatic use.

I. Xenakis

Apart from the addition of the new chapter on "Symbolic Music," the
original "Table of Contents" of Musiques Formelles mirrors in content
(although not in the exact order) the same articles/subjects presented in
the Gravesaner Blatter and at Tanglewood and must be considered the
foundation of Xenakis's early theoretical explorations.
From the very first paragraph of the book, the reader is invited to
indeed "make a clean sweep" of any previous presumptions or know
ledge:

Art, and above all, music has a fundamental function, which is to

catalyze the sublimation that it can bring about through all means of
expression. . . . If a work of art succeeds in this undertaking even for
a single moment, it attains its goal. This tremendous truth is not made
of objects, emotions or sensations, it is beyond these, as Beethoven's Sev
enth Symphony is beyond music. . . . 17

He continues by proposing the creation of new reference points in his

axiomatic "Fundamental Phases of a Musical Work":

1. Initial conceptions (intuitions, provisional or definitive data);

2. Definition of the sonic entities and of their symbolism ... ;

3. Definition of the transformations which these sonic entities must
undergo ... ;
4. Microcomposition . . . of the elements of (the sonic entities) ... ;

5. Sequential programming of (the transformations and microcom

position) ... ;

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 The Writings of Iannis Xenakis 159

6. Implementation of calculations ... ;

7. Final symbolic result . . . (setting out the music on paper in tradi

tional notation, numerical expressions, graphs or other means . . .);

8. Sonic realization ...(... performance,. . . electro-acoustic music,

\ 5518

Although the first fundamental phase, "initial conception

(intuition ...)," appears traditional, recognizable from a classic or even
romantic perspective, it is, in fact already quite revolutionary. The aver
age, first-time reader may be unaware that intuition, according to
Xenakis, is something that can and should be rendered rational through
observation, that is, bringing it to a conscious level. Only once that has
been accepted as the starting paradigm may the reader enter and explore
the vast realm of Xenakian intellectual quests.
Furthermore, the sources of Xenakis's intuitions and inspirations are
often quite alien to music itself. In fact, they also often serve as the requi
site tools for the realization of the subsequent Fundamental Phases 2
through 6. That Xenakis received his formal training as a civil engineer
and not as a musician can only partially explain this phenomenon. We can
discover and comprehend with relative ease examples where he success
fully and elegantly applied architectural models on both macro (composi
tional) and micro (sound) levels of musical composition, as well as the
opposite process, solving architectural problems with musical solutions.19
But Xenakis's thirst for knowledge reaches far beyond any practical
experience.

I became convinced?and I remain so even today?that one can

achieve universality, not through religion, not through emotions or
tradition, but through the sciences. Through a scientific way of think
ing.20

Later, he specifies,

The problem is the same in music as in other forms of artistic expres

sion. It also occurs in other areas of life.21

The sciences and other areas in question are as vast and varied as quan
tum theory, astrophysics, theory of games, group theory, probability,
arborescences, cellular automata, determinism/indeterminism, Fibonacci
series, sieve theory, symbolic logic, time as observed by Piaget in chil
dren, algebra, etc. Although an informal leafing through the pages of

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 160 Perspectives of New Music

Formalized Music may seem intimidating to some, due to the extensive

and sometimes elaborate mathematical formulas presented, college-level
mathematics suffices to understand, use and comprehend their content.
In addition, we must never forget Xenakis's Greek origins and his per
petual love, study and reading of the classics. Mathematics was certainly
central to his own training, but it was the Pythagorean doctrine of num
bers being at the root of everything that guided his conscience. This was
his permanent anchor, his personal "sieve," filtering his own theoretical
propositions.
At the same time, Xenakis never excluded purely musical sources, and
he engaged in studies of Javanese music, Greek and Rumanian folk
music, Byzantine chant, Indian and Japanese music, as well as certain
Western classical composers.22
The reasons behind all such inquiries were two-fold. Not only was
Xenakis seeking a new method of composition for himself that eventually
others could apply to their own expressions. He was also, if not especially,
attempting a formalization of music that would enable us to identify the
basic and necessary rules common to all forms of music, ignoring any
qualitative judgments, hence achieving his goal of true universality.

. . . We shall begin by imagining that we are suffering from a sudden

amnesia. We shall thus be able to re-ascend to the fountainhead of
the mental operations used in composition and attempt to extricate
the general principles that are valid for all sorts of music. We shall not
make a psycho-physiological study of perception, but will simply try
to understand more clearly the phenomenon of hearing and the
thought-processes involved when listening to music. In this way, we
hope to forge a tool for the better comprehension of the works of
the past and for the construction of new music. . . .23

The means Xenakis employed to achieve such formalization is based on

three principles: inference, experimentation, and finally, observation.24"
Through his axiomatics, he renders his chosen scientific or mathematical
materials?which can often be obscure to an average reader, uninitiated
in these realms?relatively accessible, never vulgarized, albeit not without
intellectual challenge. Certainly, a basic background in calculus and prob
ability theory is prerequisite to a thorough understanding of his theories.
Personally, following Xenakis's own recommendation, I have found that
any short-term memory blanks can be resolved by consulting readily
available handbooks, such as specifically related volumes of Schaum's
Outline Series (McGraw Hill).

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 The Writings of Iannis Xenakis 161

As an eternal student of the world at large himself, he considered such

efforts of personal intellectual surpassing quite normal. Throughout his
writings, he pleads for a radical change in existing systems of education,
favoring one that would naturally give exposure to students to the
"many-sidedness of knowledge, of life, that was possible when Leonardo
lived." He implores artists to study forms and he sets his own example.

Forms are present everywhere: in space, on the earth, in fauna, in

society. They're close to musical form, so we have to be able to
"read" them, to understand them?only thus can we work consciously
and create something really new. For that we have to know not only
the forms of the present but also those that existed in the past.
That's why we have to study palaeontology (sic), palaeo-anything.25

This intellectual virtuosity not only makes his music so unique and
powerful, but also represents one of Xenakis's major contributions to the
history of the arts in general. Many of his writings from the late 1950s
through the 1960s can indeed be considered precursory near-manifestos
of current research and realizations in New Media Art. Indeed, he
declared, originally in the early sixties in Scherchen's Gravesaner Blatter
and soon after in Musique Formelles, "Music, by its very abstract nature,
is the first of the arts to have attempted the conciliation of artistic cre
ation with scientific thought."26 Throughout his writings, and firstly in
Formalized Music, Xenakis offers proof, experience, and examples of such
endeavors. The entire text is scattered with proposals to apply the same
principles to other arts, namely, the visual/plastic arts of architecture,
painting and cinema, thereby developing the premises for new aesthetic
laws, leading to an original philosophy of the arts at large.27
In his speech as in his writings, Xenakis never spent words fortuitously.
His writings are therefore dense and profound, sometimes poetically so.
The economy of his chosen scientific readings and research surely influ
enced his efficacious yet provocative style. At times, we can only passively
witness our author "rejoicing nude under the rain, facing the cold wind,
alone." Yet, he is always quick to lend a helping hand to his readers tem
porarily swamped in the wealth of sheer information offered; he wants us
to understand. He wants us to fully appreciate the "amazing pebble
found on the beach." After all, his own insatiable quest for knowledge,
his search for the individual pebbles of his intricate mosaic,28 is the best
proof of his profoundly humanistic motivation.
Is it imperative to read Xenakis's writings in order to understand or
appreciate his music? He states in his "Subscription bulletin" that they
indeed constitute one side of the coin of his musical work. The value of a

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 162 Perspectives of New Music

coin does not change depending on the side we see. But if we want to
truly know the coin, let us say that reading his texts is not formally
required, but highly recommended. Being his "own referee," and since
he chose to write them, "put them on record," publish them (among
others), "inscribe them in this tunnel," then we may safely assume their
relevancy. If, as he said, "Every piece of mine contains a philosophical
question,"29 and every work represents a "temporary fruit of. . . think
ings and doings," we may discover their generative process directly or
indirectly through his writings. Thus the reader may actively participate
in the process of the Xenakian principle of personal surpassing, discover
ing the underlying conceptions and structures behind the perceptible
surface of his works.

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 The Writings of Iannis Xenakis I 63

Notes

A French version of this text has been published in Portrait Iann

Xenakis, ed. Fran?ois-Bernard M?che (Paris: Biblioth?que nationale
France: 2002), 201-13.

1. Cf. Makis Solomos, "Bibliographie comment?e des ?crits de/su

Iannis Xenakis" in Pr?sences de Iannis Xenakis, ed. Makis Solomos
(Paris: Centre de Documentation de la Musique Contemporaine
2001), 231-65.
2. Quoted in Nouritza Matossian, Iannis Xenakis (London: Kahn
Averill, 1986), 144 (emphasis mine).
3. Specifically: Gravesaner Blatter: "La crise de la musique s?rielle,"
(1955): 2-4; "Brief an Hermann Scherchen," 6 (1956): 35-6
"Wahrscheinlichkeitheorie und Musik," 6 (1956): 28-34; "Auf d
Suche einer Stochastischen Musik / In Search of a Stochastic Music
11-2 (1958): 98-122; "Grundlagen einer stochastischen Musik
Elements of Stochastic Music," (in 4 parts): 1) 18 (1960): 61-105
2) 19-20 (1960): 128-50; 3) 21 (1961): 102-11/113-21; 4)
(1961): 131-54; "Stochastische Musik / Stochastic Music," 23-
(1962): 156-84; "Wer ist Iannis Xenakis? / Who is Iannis Xenakis?"
23-4 (1962): 185-86; "Freie stochastische Musik durch den Ele
tronenrechner / Free Stochastic Music from the Computer,"
(1965): 54-92; "Zu einer Philosophie der Musik / Towards a Philos
ophy of Music," 29 (1966): 23-52.
4. Quoted in Matossian, Iannis Xenakis, 143.
5. Cf. related files in Xenakis archives at the Biblioth?que nationale
France (still under inventory).
6. Cf. note 3, above.
7. I have inferred this conclusion of Scherchen's later financial restrain
from related documents in the Xenakis archives at the Biblioth?qu
nationale de France. In addition, this was confirmed to me verbal
during one of our numerous meetings with Iannis Xenakis's wife
Paris in 2000.

8. In various published interviews, especially in Balint Andras Varga

Conversations with Iannis Xenakis (London: Faber and Faber, 1996
Xenakis has mentioned meeting in Gravesano, for example: Werne

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 I 64 Perspectives of New Music

Meyer-Eppler, the co-founder of the electronic music studio at the

WRD, Cologne; Friedrich Trautwein, German sound engineer; A. M.
Springer, responsible for the technology capable of altering tape
speed without changing pitch; and the computer music pioneer, Max
Mathews, etc.
9. Scherchen died in 1966, a few weeks after he premiered his protege's
Terretektorh (1965-6) for eighty-eight musicians scattered among the
audience, at the Festival de Royan.

10. Cf. Matossian, Iannis Xenakis, 165.

11. Quoted in Varga, Conversations, 123 (emphasis mine)

12. Letter dated September 24, 1963, quoted in Matossian, Iannis

Xenakis, 166.
13. Only in 1971, eight years later, did Xenakis submit material to the
publication: twelve elliptical lines written as a "homage" to
Stravinsky ((untitled), Perspectives of New Music 9, no. 2, (Spring
Summer 1971): 130). Nearly 15 years following this censorship inci
dent, in 1987 PNM proposed to its readers "Xenakis on Xenakis,"
(Perspectives of New Music 25 (1987): 16-63), a compilation by
Laurent Bayle of articles and interviews previously published in
French but not in English.

14. "Sieves," Perspectives of'New Music 28, no. 1 (Winter 1990): 58-78.
Xenakis later included this article as a new chapter in the revised edi
tion of Formalized Music (New York: Pendragon, 1992), 268-76. In
addition, he appended "Sieves: A User's Guide," the computer pro
gram enabling A) generation of points on a straight line from the
logical formula of a sieve; B) generation of the logical formula of a
sieve from a series of points on a straight line. (277-88).

15. Iannis, Xenakis, Musiques Formelles, nouveaux principes formels de

composition musicale, La Revue Musicale, double num?ro sp?cial
253-4 (1963) (out of print). New edition, 1981 (Paris: Stock) (also,
unfortunately, out of print).
16.
Bulletin de souscription
MUSIQUES FORMELLES
Par Iannis XENAKIS

Ayant ?t? oblig? de faire table rase de maintes traditions sub

conscientes ou acquises, il fallait consigner des nouveaux points

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 The Writings of Iannis Xenakis 165

de rep?re, au m?me titre que les " uvres" qui en d?coulent ou

qui les ont provoqu?s, pour ne pas oublier. Car, user du pou
voir de "graver," qu'a l'homme, est n?cessaire dans ce tunnel, la
nuit.

Or, dans la recherche pour la recherche, si l'on trouve, point

n'est besoin de transmettre ? autrui; la supr?me sagesse ?tant de
jouir nu de la pluie, face au froid vent, seul.

Or, la sagesse triviale de l'ombilic, est de courir montrer ? sa

m?re l'?tonnant caillou rencontr? sur la plage.

J'ai c?d? ? ces deux axiomes car, maintenant, ma libert? me le

permet. Elle a ?t? p?trie par les vies et les morts instantan?es du
cycle faites d' "ekkliseis" perp?tuelles et de "prad??as."

Ce livre est le fruit provisoire de r?flexions, de t?tonnements et

de voies de pensers et de faires, par exemple, la musique. Il est
donc la face pile d'une monnaie dont la face face est l' uvre
musicale. Aussi peut-il ?tre de quelque utilit? pragmatique.

17. Iannis Xenakis, Formalized Music, Revised Edition (New York:

Pendragon, 1992); 1 (emphasis mine).
18. Ibid., 22.
19. One of the most famous examples, amply documented by Xenakis
himself in his first chapter of Formalized Music, concerns the concep
tion of the Philips Pavilion and his first major orchestral work,
Metastaseis, (6-11). Another example would be his "undulating glass
panes," as developed for Le Corbusier and applied in nearly every
construction by the architect after 1955, the year Xenakis first
invented them. In fact, a comparative chronology of Xenakis's archi
tectural and musical projects, although beyond the scope of this art
icle, would certainly prove revelatory in this aspect.

20. Varga, Conversations, 47 (emphasis mine).

21. Ibid., 112.
22. It would be impossible, in the scope of this article, to cite all of
Xenakis's references to such studies. However, the reader is invited
to consult, among others, Varga, Conversations, 50-60; 144-7.

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 166 Perspectives of New Music

23. Xenakis, Formalized Music, 155 (emphasis mine). Actually, the entire
Chapter VI, "Symbolic Music," deals with this question.

24. Cf. especially Iannis Xenakis, Arts/Sciences: Alliages (Paris: Casterman,

1979) (or Arts-Sciences: Alloys: The Thesis Defense of Iannis Xenakis
Before Olivier Messiaen, Michael Ragon, Olivier Revault d' Allonnes,
Micel Serres and Bernard Teyssedre (New York: Pendragon, 1985)) in
general and Xenakis's concluding Dialogue with Bernard Teyssedre in
particular.

25. Varga, Conversations 126 (emphasis mine).

26. Xenakis, Formalized Music, 133.

27. It would be impossible to enumerate an exhaustive list here of all

related references. However, the reader is invited to examine espe
cially Xenakis, Formalized Music, 10 for his above-mentioned refer
ence to the "composition" of the Philips Pavilion; 39 regarding
"stochastic painting," referring to Michel Philippot's introduction of
probabilities in his paintings; 131 on the alliance of computers with
artistic creation; 178-9, his general Conclusion to the first part of
the book; 204 for his historical comparison of the transformations
between the arts and human thought; and especially 255 where
Xenakis defines a composer as "A thinker and a plastic artistic who
expresses himself through sound beings."
28. This term, this theme of mosaics'^ central to Xenakis's life and works.
He may indeed have first coined the term when defending his disser
tation (in fact, his entire oeuvre) in front of the jury for his Doctorat
d'Etat, awarded in 1976. In his other book, Musique, Architecture,
(Paris: Casterman, revised edition, 1976) Xenakis published a new
article, "Vari?t?," where he actually defines himself as a "mosaic arti
san." A version of this article was published as a "Preliminary state
ment by Xenakis" in his Art-Sciences: Alloys, 1-10. He often repeats
this concept in subsequent publications.

29. Quoted in Matossian, Iannis Xenakis, 107.

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