ABSTRACT
Interest in electronic music grew rapidly after the establishment of the Paris and Cologne studios. Electronic music provided a clean slate of possibilities and made the choice of which sounds to eliminate as important as that of which sounds to include. Thema–Omaggio a Joyce is remarkable for the gradual transformation of spoken language into increasingly rhythmic, abstract musical material. Thema–Omaggio a Joyce and Visage demonstrated the potential of using speech sounds and vocal patterns as source material for composing electronic music. Talking to composers over the years, especially Americans such as Cage and Ashley, they felt especially welcomed in Milan and were given the freedom to experiment musically as they wished. Unlike Pietro and Zaffiri, whose work took a structured, systematic approach, Rampazzi’s music more freely explored sound densities, drones, textures, and the possibilities of treating sound sources through many variations.
