Charles Wuorinen: Time’s Encomium [w/ “score”]

Charles Wuorinen // Time’s Encomium (1969) Realized on the RCA Mark II at the Columbia–Princeton Electronic Music Center Wuorinen won the Pulitzer Prize with this highly serialized composition in 1970 (the only fully electronic piece to do so). When I was making my Classical Nerd documentary, “The Fractal Music of Charles Wuorinen,” [   • The Fractal Music of Charles Wuorinen  ] I was delighted to find a score ... which was basically impossible to follow. The score is a reproduction of Wuorinen's handwriting, which is legible enough note-wise, but contains so many scribbles to himself about the secondary processing stage that it renders traditional score-following impossible. Lines in the score denote breaks in the action, where the synthesized sound (depicted in notes) is interrupted by more heavily processed sound. Side I is more straightforward than Side II, which borrows heavily on earlier processed material. If anyone feels that they can do a significantly better job at synchronization, be my guest!