György Ligeti - Poème Symphonique For 100 Metronomes

The Hungarian composer György Ligeti composed Poème Symphonique for 100 metronomes in 1962, during his brief acquaintance with the Fluxus movement.

The piece requires ten "performers", and most of their efforts take place without the audience present. Each of the hundred metronomes is set up on the performance platform, and they are all then wound to their maximum extent and set to different speeds. Once they are all fully wound they are all started as simultaneously as possible. The performers then leave. The audience is then admitted, and take their places while the metronomes are all ticking. As the metronomes wind down one after another and stop, periodicity becomes noticeable in the sound, and individual metronomes can be more clearly made out. The piece typically ends with just one metronome ticking alone for a few beats.

The piece has been recorded several times, but performed only occasionally due to the obvious difficulty of procuring such a large quantity of machines. A memorable performance took place in the foyer of the Royal Festival Hall in 1990, with metronomes being provided by volunteers solicited via radio appeals. Nearly half were lent by collector John H Davies


György Sándor Ligeti -pronunciado lígueti- (nacío en Dicsőszentmárton, la actual Târnăveni, Rumania, el 28 de mayo de 1923 y falleció en Viena el 12 de junio de 2006), fue un compositor rumano de origen judío (que residió en Austria y luego se naturalizó), ampliamente considerado como uno de los más grandes compositores de música clásica (sobre todo instrumental) del siglo XX.

No sólo es conocido en los círculos musicales clásicos, sino también por el gran público, sobre todo gracias a que el director de cine Stanley Kubrick usó sus obras como parte de la banda sonora de varias de sus películas: 2001: Una odisea en el espacio, El resplandor y Eyes Wide Shut. También es conocida su ópera Le Grand Macabre. Numerosas bandas reconocen la influencia de su obra en sus composiciones, entre ellas Radiohead.

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