The Avant Garde Project is a series of 20th-century classical-experimental-electroacoustic torrents digitized from LPs whose music has in most cases never been released on CD, and so is effectively inaccessible to the vast majority of music listeners today. This is wild stuff, so check it out if you've never heard this sort of music before. The analog rig used to extract the sound from the grooves is near state-of-the-art, producing almost none of the tracking distortion or surface noise normally associated with LPs. 

AGP1-84 are now available for direct download in the archive at dream.cs.bath.ac.uk/AvantGardeProject

NOTE: This is the last installment of 2007. I will be taking a few weeks off to celebrate the Feast of Epiphany on Mount Athos, returning probably on January 11, 2008.

MUSIC NEWS: If you're looking for last-minute gifts, a number of multi-CD sets of Pierre Henry's electroacoustic music have been recently re-released and are available through amazon.fr. They include almost all of Henry's major works, including two that I had planned for future AGP releases, using CD transcriptions that had already been sent me through the generosity of an AGP partisan. The prices for these sets are incredibly low. Check out the AGP42 page in the archive for links.

STOCKHAUSEN NEWS: The BBC is broadcasting a tribute to the late Karlheinz Stockhausen in their Hear and Now program on Saturday, December 15. It will be available online till December 22. Google "BBC hear and now" for more details.

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AGP86 features the music of Robert Wittinger, from a long out-of-print Wergo release. Wittinger was born in Austria and grew up in Hungary. He made a splash at Darmstadt and Donaueschingen in the late 1960s, but only a few of his works have been released on CD--some of which are now OOP. His compositional style is representative of that period. This installment features works for cello and orchestra, orchestra alone, cello/piano/percussion, and flute. The torrent includes a PDF file with a scan of the liner notes from the LP release.

Equipment used for A/D conversion: Lyra Helikon phono cartridge, Linn LP12/Lingo turntable, Linn Ittok tonearm, Audioquest LeoPard tonearm cable, PS Audio PS2 preamplifier, Kimber PBJ interconnect, M-Audio Audiophile USB A/D converter. 

01 - Irreversibilitazione [11:51]
02 - Om [11:46]
03 - Tendenze [10:11]
04 - Strutture simmetriche [9:50]

NOTE: To the best of my knowledge, these recordings are currently out of print. If you know otherwise, please let me know ASAP, as I do not wish any artists to be deprived of the royalties that they so richly deserve.