Ussachevsky, Vladimir (Alexis)

(b Hailar, 3 Nov/21 Oct 1911; d New York, 4 Jan 1990). American composer of Manchurian birth. He emigrated to the USA in 1930 and received the BA from Pomona College in 1935; he later studied under Bernard Rogers and Howard Hanson at the Eastman School of Music (MA 1936, PhD 1939). After wartime service in the Office of Strategic Services and State Department, he undertook postdoctoral work at Columbia University with Luening and joined the faculty, eventually becoming professor of music. In 1951 he began the earliest American experiments in the electronic medium (excluding attempts at synthetic music before the advent of magnetic tape recording), shortly thereafter collaborating with Luening in a series of electronic works, not joint compositions but rather amalgamations of independently created sections, both live and electronic, by each composer. Only later did he become aware of the slightly earlier activities of the Parisian musique concrète group. In 1959 Ussachevsky, with Luening, Babbitt and Sessions, founded the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center (New York) and became chairman of its committee of direction. For regular periods from 1970 he served as composer-in-residence at the University of Utah (he taught there from 1980 to 1985), and in 1973 was elected to membership in the National Institute of Arts and Letters. He retired from Columbia University in 1980 as professor emeritus. He wrote and lectured widely, in the Americas and Europe, on electronic music.

Ussachevsky’s works divide into two principal genres: the electronic and the choral. Brought up in the Russian Orthodox Church (as a youth he served as reader and altar boy), he acknowledged a profound influence from Russian liturgical music. His choral works stem directly from the 19th-century tradition of Russian choral liturgy (the tradition of Grechaninov, Tchaikovsky and Musorgsky) and in many ways offer a sharp contrast to his electronic music. The ‘stylistic’ distinction between the two genres persisted even after 20 years’ work in the electronic medium, as can be seen from the Missa brevis for chorus and brass (1972). In his electronic works Ussachevsky consistently maintained a flexible attitude towards sound sources: recordings of live sounds (‘musical’ and otherwise), analogue studio and computer-generated material all feature in his works. (This catholicity distinguished American electronic music from the originally more restrictive French and German types, and gave rise to the designation ‘tape music’.) But Ussachevsky is noted particularly for the transformation of pre-existing material rather than for electronic synthesis, and his greatest skill lay perhaps in the mutating of sound from instrumental sources, as in Piece for Tape Recorder (1956) and Of Wood and Brass (1964–5). Not surprisingly, therefore, he also tended to take over material from one work to the next – a practice that is particularly significant in ‘tape music’, for here the processes of composition and electronic realization are simultaneous: the work is created directly on tape, frequently by manual operations on the constituent recorded sound materials. This mode of electronic composition, which became known as ‘classical studio’ technique, recognizes Ussachevsky as one of its most distinguished exponents. In the late 1970s he began writing music for instruments accompanied by tapes of those same instruments (or same class of instruments) transformed through sophisticated ‘classical studio’, techniques. During his final decades he wrote several compositions for EVI (Electronic Valve Instrument), which allowed live performance in real-time within an electronic medium. He also returned to conventional media, particularly works for chorus, brass and piano.

WORKS

Principal publishers: American Composers Edition, Peters

Traditional media

Film score: Circle of Fire, 1940

Orch: Theme and Variations, 1936; Solemn Prelude, 1937; Piece, fl, chbr orch, 1947; Miniatures for a Curious Child, 1950; Intermezzo, pf, orch, 1952; Dances and Fanfares for a Festive Occasion, 1980

Vocal: If I Had a Spoon, chorus, ?1932; Praise Ye O Lord (cant.), S, A, T, B, chorus, org, 1936; Jubilee Cantata, reader, Bar, chorus, orch, 1937–8; Lord’s Prayer, male vv, 1938; Songs (E. Dickinson), 1946; Ps xxiv, chorus, org/(5 brass, org)/7 brass, 1948; 2 Autumn Songs (R.M. Rilke), S, pf, 1952; Missa brevis, S, chorus, brass, 1972; To the Young, chorus, orch, 1988

Chbr: Legend, vn, pf, 1932; Rondo, vn, pf, 1934; 2 Dances, fl, pf, 1948 (arr. for EVI, pf, 1983); Suite of Moods and Dances, fl, pf, 1949; Inauguration Fanfares, brass, timp, 1973 [based on Byrd: The Earl of Oxford’s March]; Suite, trbn ens, 1980; Triskelion, ob, pf, 1982; Anniversary Variations, brass qnt, 1985

Pf: Ghost Dance, 1932; The Question, 1932; Classical Suite, 1935; 2 Minuets, ?1935; Pieces, 1939–47; Miniatures for a Curious Child, 1950; 11 Short Pieces, 1984–5; Sonata, 1984, unfinished; Episodes, 4 hands, 1985, unfinished

Electro-acoustic

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