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THE NEW YORK TIMES

NOVEMBER 3, 1968
Switching On to Mock Bach - by DONAL HENAHAN

If a friend offered, or threatened, to play for you a record called Switched-On Bach, kindly warning that it included the Third Brandenburg Concerto as rendered by an e1ectronic synthesizer, you might suddenly remember a previous appointment, might you not? If so, you would miss an astonishing experience, and possibly one of the year's most significant records (Columbia MS-7194, stereo).

Despite its misleadingly hip title, this disk rates the most serious attention musicians and musicologists can give it, for it raises issues that go to the root of their art. The disk also suggests that electronic instruments have reached a degree of sophistication most of us probably have not suspected. We have been hearing for years about the possibility that the symphony orchestra and traditional instruments may soon be obsolete; composers, it has been said, will be able to create any imaginable sound directly on tape by using electronic synthesizers. Until now, results have been no more than mildly impressive, owing to the primitive state of the sound-synthesizing craft. But here, almost at one leap, is the much promised revolution: not only can traditional sounds be imitated but new sounds found that prove to be musically valid

Besides the Brandenburg concerto, nine Bach pieces are performed, ranging from several Two-part Inventions to the Sinfonia to Cantata No.29. The musicians are Walter Carlos and Benjamin Folkman. Carlos persuaded Robert Moog, inventor of the keyboard synthesizers that carry his name, to add sophistications to his machine so that truly musical nuances could be achieved. Since two pairs of hands and feet are needed to play the synthesizer, it may fairly be compared to a great organ (an assistant to pull stops for a busy organist is allowed even in the most virtuosic circles), or to a piano played four-hands. The Bach one hears, of course, is transcribed Bach, but it is astonishing how genuinely baroque in sound and style these performances are. No musician would yet, be fooled, but it takes only a few moments of listening to realize that, having taken this great step, electronic synthesizers are limited now only by the musical talent and scientific expertise of their manipulators. Amazingly lifelike baroque trumpet and oboe sounds are produced, for instance, and a fine evocation of the baroque organ, complete with tracker-action clicks.

When the performers reach the celebrated pair of cadential chords that separates the first and last movements of the Third Brandenburg, they break into an improvised cadenza, as scholars insist was intended. No doubt by design, the cadenza veers away from a baroque sound almost entirely, and carries on floridly in an idiom one identifies with "electronic music." The result is jarring, though not without logic.

The entire record, however, raises serious questions. Musicologically, is there justification for transcribed Bach at this stage of history? If so, what standards of performance virtuosity are we to apply? Unquestionably some things must be harder to do on a synthesizer than others, but how do we know, for instance, that the runaway tempo at which the Two-part Invention in F is taken is not simply a matter of turning up a tempo knob?

Esthetically, we are being plunged into deep waters. When one listens to the C minor Prelude and Fugue from the "Well-Tempered Clavier" (Book I) on traditional harpsichord, or even on the modern piano with its technical improvements, much of our enjoyment comes, from knowing how hard the piece is to play and hearing its technical difficulties overcome. Moreover, part of the point of the Inventions and of the 48 Preludes and Fugues was to teach the musician to master a keyboard. With the new synthesizers, new modes of mastery will come into being, and certain of our older concepts of pleasure will be subtly broken down.

However, it is essential to note that the essence of Bach's musical thought is retained in this recording-his structural design, his elan, his grandeur. What is sacrificed as in the comparable transcriptions of Bach by Busoni, is the authenticity that musicology has been working for a century to restore. However, like Busoni, an electrical musician could be wrong and still be important.

Although it is not necessarily so for the future, virtuosos on the synthesizer are still mostly composers, as in the fruitful early years of the piano. Morton Subotnick, whose "Silver Apples of the Moon" found a surprisingly large market when it was released last year, offers another strong contender for the favor of the electronic music audience. Like "Silver Apples," The Wild Bull, was written on commission from Nonesuch specifically for records, and composed on a modular electronic synthesizer built for Mr. Subotnick by Donald Buchla at the San Francisco Tape Music Center. "The Wild Bull"(Nonesuch H-71208) is an 18-minute work, part of which was previewed last summer in the Electric Ear series at the Electric Circus. With perhaps the best combination of electronic technique and musical ability since Varese, Mr. Subotnick exploits both pitched and unpitched sounds, microtones, jazzy syncopations, Ostinato devices and even fugue-like textures. Far more than other electronic composers, Mr. Subotnick gives his music rhythmic interest and coloristic variety. He has also found ways, without reviving the old method of harmonic modulation, to make his music move ahead.

The album's title is based on a 3,000-year-old Sumerian poem, printed on the sleeve, and was conceived after the fact, like the titles of Debussy's Preludes.