STOCKHAUSEN'S ORIGINALE ORIGINALE

Just in case you thought the bizarre theatrics of LICHT were somehow new terrain for Stockhausen:

The stage actions consisted largely of normal activities undertaken by actors who were basically playing themselves: a poet played himself as "the poet," reading poetry on stage; a "painter" paints; a "film man" and "lighting man" and "models" go about their normal business, all within their allotted times (hence the title of the piece: "originals" playing themselves). A visual and aural complexity was created by the juxtaposition of these simultaneously occurring activities, creating an aura of absurdity which contrasted with the normality of the events themselves. In addition, some of the performers, such as the explosive performance artist Nam June Paik, went the opposite direction, performing bizarre actions within their roles. And certain elements of the set, such as goldfish swimming in a bowl hanging from the ceiling, contributed to this contrast between the mundane and the absurd.

Stockhausen added another layer of irony to the title by basing Originale on his previous work, Kontakte, rather than composing new music for the piece. So, at the beginning of Originale, we see a pianist and a percussionist (playing themselves, of course) performing Kontakte. However, there is a film camera and a tape recorder present, as well as a stage manager shouting instructions over the music. After a few minutes, the players stop and the tape of their performance is heard, along with the recorded shouts of the stage manager. Thus we see a pianist and percussionist, recording and filming themselves playing a composition which itself contains prerecorded sounds - performances within performances, by "originals" playing themselves...

...at one performance Paik was suddenly handcuffed to the scaffolding by a well-coordinated group of audience members who then disappeared. Everyone thought it was part of the show until Paik called "feebly but only half-intelligibly about his inability to get to the piano." For his part, Paik varied his performance each night, as he had done in Cologne, throwing curve balls to the cast and audience.

Adding to the general unpredictability was the concurrent protest undertaken outside the concert hall by a number of New York artists, including Henry Flynt, Tony Conrad, and George Maciunas, who collectively denounced Stockhausen as a "cultural imperialist." (Maciunas, the leader of the Fluxus art group, also considered Moorman something of a rival within the New York art world, though other Fluxus members were performing in the show.) -- From Ubuweb.

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