Musique concrète

Roots · 1948 · also known as Concrete Music, Musique Concrete

Musique concrete began in Paris in 1948, when Pierre Schaeffer recorded trains, cut the tape, reversed it, looped it, and declared that recorded sound itself was material for composition. It invented sampling forty years before the sampler existed and turned the studio into an instrument in its own right. Everything gathered on this card descends, through one route or another, from that founding gesture.

9 reference tracks

1. Pierre Schaeffer: Symphonie pour un homme seul
2. Pierre Schaeffer: Etude aux chemins de fer
3. Pierre Henry: Variations Pour Une Porte Et Un Soupir (1963)
4. Pierre Henry: Psyche Rock (1967)
5. Bernard Parmegiani: L'Instant Mobile (1975)
6. Noise Nazi, Spritzenwirbel: Split Single (2021)
7. catHORSE: Nrwcathorse (2022)
8. Medio Mutante: John Cage Williams Mix 23A (2024)
9. Arvo Zylo: Drive-By Confessions (2026)

At a glance

• First appeared: 1948
• Machines: Magnétophone à bande, Platines vinyle, Phonogène
• The sound: Tourne-disques trafiqués, Sillon fermé (boucle), Montage aux ciseaux
• Labels: Philips, Editions Mego, Recollection GRM, GRM
• Key artists: Pierre Schaeffer, Pierre Henry, Luc Ferrari, Bernard Parmegiani, François Bayle

Producing Musique concrète

There is no dance tempo, this music thinks in durations and gestures rather than BPM, though Schaeffer invented the loop with his closed groove, and a loop has a duration that becomes a pulse. Set the grid to an arbitrary tempo, 100 BPM say, only to keep loops aligned, and let irregularity do the rest, a 1.7 second loop against a 2.3 second one, creating a cycle repeating after minutes. Build rhythm from the sound objects themselves, a locomotive, a creaking door, a sigh, recorded on a phone and dropped into Simpler in Slice mode. Slow any recording two or three octaves with Warp off, like tape run from 38 to 9.5 centimeters per second, for a manufactured bass. The essential gesture stays the scissors: cut recordings into fragments and glue them end to end.

The full production course, in French: tempo, drums, bass, sounds, arrangement, mix, plugins and machines, and a step by step start.

Frequently asked

What is Musique concrète?

Musique concrete began in Paris in 1948, when Pierre Schaeffer recorded trains, cut the tape, reversed it, looped it, and declared that recorded sound itself was material for composition. It invented sampling forty years before the sampler existed and turned the studio into an instrument in its…

Who are the key Musique concrète artists?

Pierre Schaeffer, Pierre Henry, Luc Ferrari, Bernard Parmegiani, François Bayle.

In the same family

• Électroacoustique
• Krautrock
• Kosmische Musik
• Space Music
• Proto-Techno
• Synth-pop
• Early Industrial
• Funk
• Philly Soul
• Dub
• Hip-Hop
• Reggae

Listen to Musique concrète in the atlas · Cette page en français