Stockhausen: Helikopter-Quartett

Karlheinz Stockhausen (Composer), Arcadian Academy (Performer), Arditti String Quartet (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Arcadian Academy, Arditti String Quartet
• Composer: Karlheinz Stockhausen
• Audio CD (October 26, 1999)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Disques Montaigne
• ASIN: B0000DETD3
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #45,591 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Helikopter String Quartet (from 'Mittwoch' from 'LICHT'), for 4 helicopters & string quartet

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Sheer Pleasure of Stockhausen, May 29, 2010

By 

[e-mail] "Ramfis S. Firethorn" (Northern California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stockhausen: Helikopter-Quartett (Audio CD)

The enormous intellect that was Stockhausen tends to obscure the outcome that was his aim: to write music that was beautiful. In fact, he sought to move toward an age when we could all perceive every sound in creation as music.

This late work has become very popular among young people, much as his middle works influenced the Beatles. Its materials are simple, but he puts them together in such a way that they are entrancing. Nobody else has blended machine sounds so elegantly with classical musical sounds.

After all the discussion of his methods and his inspiration has finished, one is left with the music itself, which I do find beautiful. I can put this on and listen to it, or I can listen to it as background while I do the household chores. Either way it is intensely pleasurable listening; though frankly, it works best with a good stereo system.

The film that was made about it is a charming and worthwhile thing to see. Now that he is gone, we can no longer experience this strangely gentle visionary in person: but the film will at least give you a taste of him: different in old age from the sexy, arrogant auteur of his youth, he seemed to have evolved toward an almost Platonic plateau of Being.

How I wish i could see one of the operas!

11 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars inquietante grabaciòn, October 17, 2005

By 

Arturo Miranda Videgaray (MEXICO D.F., D.F. Mexico) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Stockhausen: Helikopter-Quartett (Audio CD)

Como siempre, Stockhausen sorprende con sus conceptos.
Excelente disco que muestra la bùsqueda en el campo musical.
Aunque yo esperaba algo màs: tal ves una mayor interacciòn de los helicòpteros con el resto de los elementos, con un tratamiento màs cercano a un instrumento musical, pues a pesar de que su presencia es patente los siento como un fondo, muy planos, sin grandes contrastes.
En ocaciones los colores y texturas de los violines se mezclan con los de los helicòpteros y las voces (eins, zwei, drei,usw) resultando una masa informe de sonido, perdiendo la valoraciòn tonal de cada uno de ellos.

¿Què faltò? no lo se, tal vez considerar a la màquina voladora con otra intenciòn y jugar con otras posibilidades (bloquear su sonido, matizarlo, graduarlo, jerarquizarlo).
Como sea, la grabaciòn bien vale la pena de escuchar varias veces para ir descubriendo sus cualidades.

2 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Aus besten, April 13, 2008

By 

scarecrow "scarecrow" (Chicago, Illinois United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Stockhausen: Helikopter-Quartett (Audio CD)

alone you may not find much interest in this Quartet,string timbre was not a favored environ for Karlheinz,no important work was ever done; it did give Arditti something incredibly exciting to play away from their typically steroid clammee cold abstraktions they admire and market in Europa; each player(s) mounts their own helikopter and must recite at some point counting numbers in German , the way Luzifer does in Samstag,also from LICHT numberings are very important to the cosmological opera LICHT from which this Quartet is from Wednesday, Mittwoch,One opera for each day of the Woche; the piece also requires a technician in each helikopter and one on the ground, to coordinate the proceedings, much like Stockhausen has done admirably thtoughout his life world, again the KonZept alone is worth contemplating, whorling/worlling, horgling, whizzing, bHuzzing,czuZzing,feigning cZorling dirvishes,lots of glissandi, and helikopter machine sounds abound cirling round; Grand Street Mag published this, if you want/care to see the graphic score, nothing too exciting as sTockhausen goes goos . . ., there was also a marketable film made of this . . .