Jacqueline Oskamp's book is one of many that need to be written. Many countries’ histories of electroacoustic music have yet to be published. Fortunately, beyond this text, others are also in the planning stage. Besides the translation given by the publisher, the book's title can also be translated as ‘live’, ‘switched on’ and, literally and thus ambiguously given the unusual added space, ‘under current’. This new book raised some questions that I hadn't considered beforehand.
When writing a book that is going to take on a certain importance as it will be the first of its kind, or at least the first spanning several decades of a nation's electroacoustic music history, it is vital to consider for whom such a book is intended. What level is assumed? In the case of electroacoustic music, how much music analysis, how much detailed technological discussion should it contain and, last but not least, how ‘complete’ should it be?
Oskamp's book is an easy and enjoyable read. The author writes for a number of Dutch periodicals and has a journalist's touch. She lets on immediately that technology is not going to be a focus, but does inevitably discuss different types of apparatus and even on occasion software and hardware developed in Holland. Her artist profiles are very personal. I can attest to their accuracy as a Dutch citizen and someone who knows most of the people presented. Other authors, particularly in other countries, might have been less up-front about personalities and more detailed regarding their musical content, the musicians’ performances and/or their significance.
She has decided to write for a general readership, although now and then you have to be knowledgeable about certain aspects of contemporary musical thought to be able to keep up. As I have described, she only globally describes technology and even skips some nice developments such as analogue modules developed at the Institute for Sonology in Utrecht before it moved to its current home in The Hague. Some of these were fairly unique. Compositions such as Jaap Vink's lovely Waves could not have been composed without them, and I actually had some purchased for the studios at the University of Amsterdam (not mentioned in the book) when they were built.
The author has attempted to cover a wide area based on a modest structure. There are six sections where inevitably things are bunched together, some of which might equally easily be housed elsewhere. Each includes a composer portrait. These are:
• Acoustic Music with Tape (Ton Bruynèl)
• Just Tape (Jan Boerman)
• Conceptual Music (Dick Raaijmakers)
• Live Electronic Music (Michel Waisvisz)
• Sound Installations in Public Spaces (Edwin van der Heide)
• The Arrival of the Laptop (Anne La Berge)
You can notice the journalist's touch looking at the subtitle of a couple of the composers’ portraits. Jan Boerman is a ‘pioneer without influence’, slightly exaggerated, but not entirely untrue either. Some of the musicians of his time (Bruynèl, Ton de Leeuw) were certainly affected by his late romantic sound. Later composers, such as René Uijlenhoet, could not have developed their own aesthetic without noticing how Boerman was elegantly able to combine the old with the new. Dick Raaijmakers is a ‘cult figure in spite of himself’. That one is definitely true. It is only recently that some of his works are finally receiving the attention they deserve. His major writings have yet to be translated, although an English-language volume is dedicated to his work.Footnote 1 I once was asked to invite a small number of Dutch electroacoustic artists to join me to present works at a festival at the Pompidou Centre in Paris in the 1980s. When I asked Raaijmakers whether he would be willing to present one or more of his works, his answer was: ‘Why would I do a thing like that?’
As many early works in The Netherlands were mixed music pieces, the choice for Chapter 1 makes sense. Chapter 3, on the other hand, poses a problem, because the Institute of Sonology's notion of conceptual in the early years was one of formalism, whereas the one at the electroacoustic music department of Royal Conservatoire in The Hague (where it moved to) was a sonic art reflection of concept art of the same era. If anything, they were opposites at the time (and of course they are now both housed at the Royal Conservatoire).
The tone of the book is thus one of a more global contextual discussion than of rigour. This book is a survey with a small number of photos; it is not complete. It does not include a useful bibliography or discography. It avoids much technical or analytical detail. Instead, it provides an attractive portrait of a European country's journey through the developments of electroacoustic music.
I do have a couple of small gripes, however. It is quite Netherlands-centric. Although foreign composers are mentioned, the true extent of crosstalk is not investigated in any depth. What I found particularly curious was that even within the small language area, the Flemish history – which was by no means independent of Dutch, German or French traditions – is hardly mentioned. Therefore, this book is slightly inward-looking, something I was often told that Holland is, too. I have always been of the opinion that this provincial view was false, so was a bit disappointed about this. Holland is a crossroads and certainly does not make art in isolation.
Furthermore, the active electronica scene in The Netherlands hardly features. I suppose there is enough that has not made its way into this book that might form a nice basis for Volume II.
There is also one final, yet important, issue: this book is in Dutch and many Dutch readers will know a good deal of its content already. It is the rest of the world that really needs books like this. It is hoped that, like Peter Schat's Toonklok on his approach to serial composition, this book will also be translated into English one day.
