Karlheinz stockhausen biography of alberta

Karlheinz Stockhausen is one of modern music’s most controversial figures. He was at the centre of the post-war generation’s reinvention of art music in the 1950s and 1960s.

By the 1970s he had become a cult figure, attracting mass audiences. His commitment to avant-garde aesthetics and religious mysticism continues to elicit extreme responses.

Karlheinz stockhausen biography of alberta canada

To some, he was a fantasist whose musical gifts were less substantial than his charisma. To others, his commitment to technological innovation, particularly in electro-acoustic musical techniques, has ensured a legacy of lasting influence.

Stockhausen understood his musical ambitions as an attempt to restore music to the position of philosophical and ethical significance it held in the ancient world. Recalling the ancient Greek conception of music, he remarked that ‘the highest calling of mankind can only be to become a musician in the profoundest sense; to conceive and shape the world musically.’ He argued that human imagination a