Dick Raaijmakers – The Complete Tape Music of Dick Raaijmakers (1998)

With this post I mean to make an addition to the “The History of Electroacoustic Music”, member caiobarros’s valuable compilation of electronic music from its beginnings to the present age.
It struck me that this incredible 62cd collection has made little mention of the Dutch contributions to the genre so far, whereas these have been many and noteworthy. After all, the Philips studios in Eindhoven were frequented by composers from all over the world; and when Varese had finished his project (Poeme Electronique) for the Brussels World Exhibition, musical activities there didn’t stop. Not for those who came from abroad, nor for the Dutch. To name a few: there’s Tom Dissevelt and Kid Baltan (= Dick Raaijmakers), the two of them responsible for the very first “pop-oriented” composition called “Song of the Second Moon”. It’s here on avax somewhere, and it’s very listenable, for those who’re into Kraftwerk/Tangerine Dream etc. as well as for hard-boiled avant-garde lovers. I’m currently trying to lay my hands on the 4cd compilation “Popular Electronics - Early Dutch electronic music from Philips Research Laboratories, 1956-1963”, which offers a bunch of downright spectacular music, all of it composed more than a decade before the band Kraftwerk even existed. No need to tell you the guys from Kraftwerk must have listened to the LPs of that compilation more than once.

Right, here’s Dick Raaijmakers’s complete tape music. It’s inventive, full of surprises – and yes, hard to stomach here and there. It’s tough stuff. For example, I haven’t been able to sufficiently digest “plumes” on cd 3 as yet, which, according to me, is hardly more than a randomly collected mass of noisy radio signals. You know, when you’re trying to tune into a radio channel and you cannot find any. However, rest assured, there’s a treasury of great music to be found in this set; when it came to electronics, Raaijmakers was no less a composer than Stockhausen (who, by the way, didn’t compose that much purely electronic music).
As for the cover art: horror! Whenever I borrow a set from the library, I usually have to restore the covers. Unfortunately, this time it proved to be an impossible ordeal, for which most probably complex mathematical formulas were needed, hm.
So, staring hard at this graphical bird’s nest of intersecting red lines on a gradient grey-to-white silvery background, and desperately trying to guess the patterns underneath the irremovable stickers, I eventually decided to insert a cobweb of my own invention – well, no more than an inch or so. Therefore, I apologize in advance for the meagre results. The re-release on the Basta label would have given me far less trouble. Those covers are simpler – a couple of large monochrome rectangles. Piece of cake to restore that.
The booklet is a 200pp hardcover novel. All tracks are discussed, and every step Raaijmakers ever did appears to be well-documented. That includes many nice photos.

Tracks

cd1

01. Tweeklank [0:05:00.56]
02. Pianoforte [0:05:06.54]
03. Vijf Plastieken [0:07:46.46]
04. Canon 1, super augere [0:05:14.59]
05. Canon 2, super imprimere [0:05:21.37]
06. Canon 3, super addere [0:02:41.08]
07. Canon 4, super sub-tahere [0:07:01.65]
08. Canon 5, sup 'dis-moi…' [0:06:08.00]
09. Ballade Erlkönig voor Luidsprekers [0:23:49.55]

cd2

01. Filmmuziek I - Mechanical Motions [0:08:20.05]
02. Filmmuziek II - Bekaert [0:07:26.69]
03. Filmmuziek III - Sidmar [0:07:49.38]
04. Chairman Mao is our Guide [0:08:10.22]
05. De Lange Mars [0:21:04.13]
06. Mao Leve! [0:15:08.60]
07. Ach! Ach! [0:06:06.30]

cd3

01. Plumes [0:10:41.45]
02. Flux [0:09:48.42]
03. Lied van de Arbeid [0:02:00.24]
04. Kwartet [0:20:57.44]
05. Ping-Pong [0:04:54.44]
06. Der Fall Leiermann [0:10:13.51]
07. Du Armer! [0:07:02.57]
08. Vier Fanfares [0:06:33.74]

Performers

None.

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