Book Review

Paul Lansky. Conversation Pieces. For the Moment. Chords. Now That You Mention It. Same Scene, Nine Years Later. Andalusia. Shadows. Liner notes by Paul Lansky. 1998. Bridge Records 9083.

In common parlance, a conversation piece is something that generates discussion. For Paul Lansky, however, it is a piece generated, literally, from a conversation. Uncommon parlance is the subject of the Princeton composer's 1998 compact disc of computer music, Conversation Pieces, in which instruments speak and human voices are played as if strings, winds, or percussion.

     Lansky has long been interested in using the computer to transform the everyday into music, or perhaps to extract the music from the everyday. His 1992 CD, Homebrew (Bridge Records CD 9035), draws upon the sounds of traffic, a shopping mall, clapping, and his sons clearing the dinner table. More Than Idle Chatter, a 1994 collection (Bridge Records CD 9050), generates extraordinary textures and rhythms from the voice of his wife, Hannah MacKay.