Conlon Nancarrow

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Conlon Nancarrow was born in Texarkana, Arkansas, in 1912 and died in Mexico City in 1997. In his youth he played trumpet in a jazz band, then studied music in Cincinnati and Boston. He joined the American Communist Party and fought in the Spanish Civil War with the International Brigades. In 1940 he moved to Mexico, to escape the harassment in the United States. In 1956 he became a Mexican citizen. He lived there for a long time in seclusion.

Music and breakthrough

In Mexico he made the work for which he became known: Studies for Player Piano. His compositions were so difficult that two human hands could hardly play them. He therefore bought a machine for punching rolls for a mechanical piano. In doing so he followed a suggestion from Henry Cowell's book New Musical Resources. The piano could play complicated rhythms at a speed beyond the reach of humans. Nancarrow was one of the first composers to use self-playing instruments in this way.

Influence

Not until the 1980s did he become widely known. In 1977 the first series of recordings of his piano rolls appeared on 1750 Arch Records, and in 1982 he received a MacArthur Award. György Ligeti called his music the greatest discovery since Webern and Ives. Nancarrow is regarded as a forerunner of later electronic music with extremely fast notes, such as Black MIDI. His entire studio, with the piano rolls, is now held by the Paul Sacher Foundation in Basel.

Listening

Discography

Studio albums

• 1969Studies for Player Piano
• 1990Studies for Player Piano
• 1991Studies for Player Piano
• 1993Studies for Player Piano
• 1996Counterpoint
• 2000Lost Works, Last Works
• 2001Piano Music
• 2004Studies for Player Piano
• 2005Nancarrow: String Quartet no. 3 / Ligeti: String Quartet no. 2 / Dutilleux: String Quarted "Ainsi la nuit"
• 2005Pieces nos. 1 and 2 for Small Orchestra / ¿Tango? / String Quartet no. 1
• 2006Player Piano 1, Volume 1: Studies 1-12
• 2007Player Piano 3, Volume 2
• 2007Quartets and Studies
• 2008Player Piano 7, Volume 4: Studies 42-48
• 2008Studies for Player Piano
• 2010American Counterpoint
• 2011Sonata and Interludes for Prepared Piano: Canons and Studies
• 2012Late and Unknown: Works on Rolls
• 2019American Postcard
• ?Player Piano 5, Volume 3: Studies 33-41c

Mentioned in other articles

• Player piano and piano roll TechnologyLater, Conlon Nancarrow wrote music so fast and complicated that only a player piano can play it.

See also

• Player piano and piano roll