IANNIS XENAKIS (1922-2001): Orchestral Works, Vol. 5 - Metastaseis, Pithoprakta, ST/48, Achorripsis, Syrmos, Hiketides.
Catalogue Number: 05J091
Label: Timpani
Reference: 1C1113
Format: CD
Price: $19.98
Description: The latest volume of this pioneering series contains the earliest modernist works, dating from Metastaseis in 1954 to Syrmos of 1959 with the intriguing incidental music for Aeschylus' "The Suppliants" (Hiketides) from 1964. Most use the composer's self-defined "stochastic method" and ST/48 was the first in which he was able to use the power of the new IBM 7090 to calculate the probabilities which make up the score. Metastaseis may be Xenakis' best-known work and Pithoprakta has several recordings as well (it is aptly described here in the notes as "exhilarating savagery" and it is suggested that it was imitated, among others, by Penderecki), but the remaining four are little-known or little-heard and it is a shock to hear, at the end of Hiketides, a modal epilogue in archaic diaphony. Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra; Arturo Tamayo.