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GEORGE CRUMB’S LIBERATION OF SOUND “ Crumb’s music came to the fore in the sixties with darkly evocative timbres and mystical rituals. His music is a rich blend of new and innovative techniques” George Crumb (born 1929), the prominent American composer of the late twentieth century remains relatively distant from his generation in his extraordinary feeling for sonority and development of abnormal, made-up, or even conventional methods of sound. Crumb employs sensitivity to timbre and allows sounds to grow out of obscure forms. In his exploration of individual tone colours, Crumb creates his own independence and individuality. Crumb delves into the many possibilities of pitch and timbre. He explores these evocative potentials with flighty rhythms, delicately exotic embellishments, and fantastical instrumental effects. Two contrasting first movements of Crumb’s, one a vocal piece, “Ancient Voices for Children” (1970*) and the second a chamber work “Vox Balanae” (1972*) will be examined to underline Crumb’s evocative exploration of tonal colours that epitomises his compositional technique. The most prominent feature of this work is Crumb’s investigation into sound possibilities. Crumb sonorist compositional technique is exemplified within his two pieces “Vox Balanae” and “Ancient Voices for Chilren” where Crumb attempts to depict the sounds of the humpback whale and in “Ancient Voices”, life, death, love, the smell of the earth, the sounds of the wind and the sea”.
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