Momente!

Stockhausen had some really interesting viewpoints on creating a moment and what different ways this can be accomplished. He sees everything as musical or sound related, including referring to the lecture that he was currently presenting at. Just like visual artists, he comes up with rough sketches before completing the final outcome of his sound project. He likes to come up with predefined limits just as students are prompted to come up with a project defined by limitations. The M moments are all linear unidirectional heterophonic sounds. K moments are more complex and can be short abrupt sounds or competing sounds. D moments based on duration seem most relevant to the fragmented sound project that we created because it deals with overlapping, sound fragments, and pieces of silence. They are not all independent and can be merged together at points. The K moments are most always in the center, but M and D can be first or last. The I moments (informal) can be placed anywhere and this category seems more like a catch-all group that wasn't defined by the first three moments. Most of the seeming randomness is still defined within limits. Stockhausen envisions which instruments or vocal ranges would accompany each moment. He uses sounds, instruments, and moments all strung together to tell a story in an unconventional way, so that the music is not created to be enjoyed for the aesthetic of the sound, but for its narrative qualities.
I have never looked this deeply into sound or into music. I am personally much more fascinated by the power of words and icons or the lyrics of a song. I had been in much of a shell for the last eighteen years, enjoying mainstream pop music and The Beatles. I've only very recently become accustomed to music that doesn't make you want to dance or to sing along, but rather tells a story, like Radiohead who sought to take apart and push the limits that the Beatles had set forth on what music needed to sound like. However, I have to be in the right mindset to appreciate it because I used to see music as something to be mindlessly enjoyed not overly engaging of my thoughts. The fragmented sound exercise gave me a new appreciation for sound art. I also really loved that he included my favorite, William Blake's poetry.