German electronic music is a broad musical genre encompassing specific styles such as Electroclash, trance, krautrock and . It is widely considered to have emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s, becoming increasingly popular in subsequent decades. Originally minimalistic style of electronic music developed into psychedelic and prog rock aspects, techno and electronic dance music. Notable artists include Kraftwerk, Can, Tangerine Dream and Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft. German electronic music contributed to a global transition of electronic music from underground art to an international phenomenon, with festivals such as Love Parade, Winterworld and MayDay gaining prominence alongside raves and clubs.
Characteristics
Musical elements
Electronic music is itself a broad term, characterised only by the specific use of electronic or digital musical instruments. German electronic music hence lacks distinctive musical characteristics other than varying usage of circuitry-based technology. Generally, polyphonic synthesisers, electronic drums, turntables and drum machines were frequent. The musical elements of German electronic music are very specific to the style and artist. Krautrock, a genre of electronic rock, involved experimental mixes of psychedelic and progressive rock with ambient music, electronic sounds, minimalist avant-garde musique concrete and jazz. Kraftwerk, a famous German electronic band, utilised metronomic melodies, while Faust, another musical group, maintained minimalism by using one or two chords or riffs played at high volumes. In contrast, electroclash fused musical elements of electro, techno, new wave, punk, synth-pop and performance art to form their sounds.
Local scenes
Clubs in Berlin are allowed to stay 24 hours a day, as a legacy of competition between the Allied sectors and Russian-controlled East Berlin in the late 1940s. German electronic music was characterised originally by illegal underground scenes of raves and parties. Immediately following the fall of the Berlin Wall, industrial ruins and unconventional venues became unregulated centres of raw techno music. Taking DJs from Detroit techno and Chicago acid house while emulating the free-spirited party cultures of Ibiza and Manchester's Hacienda Club, German electronic music was characterised by a culture of youth, nightlife and freedom. As German electronic music developed, it maintained this intrinsic characteristic, developing techno and electronic dance music into international phenomenon, with festivals such as Love Parade, Winterworld and MayDay gaining prominence.
History
Origins
The foundations for electronic music were formed from 1948 to 1953. German, French and American figures, including Ferruccio Busoni, Arnold Schoenberg, Edgard Varèse and John Cage, formulated new compositional procedures utilising developments in science. Electronic music was driven by composers striving to directly manipulate sound; experimenting with electronic circuitry, amplifiers and loudspeakers. Post-WW2 electronic music began developing rapidly, starting in Cologne 1952-53. Karel Goeyvaerts and Karlheinz Stockhausen experimented with the earliest sound-compositions using sine tones. Drawing from the tape music of Vladimir Ussachevsky and Otto Luening and first sound experiments by Werner Meyer-Eppler, Stockhausen's Studie I was the first composition to use synthetic sounds from sine tones. In May 1953, Stockhausen, Herbert Eimert and showcased the first compositions of electronic music at the Cologne International Festival of Contemporary Music. They utilised a melochord, trautonium, ring modulators, octave and radio filters and tape recorders. In 1955, Eimert and Stockhausen edited the first volume, Elektronische Musique, and articles on electronic music, Texte I and II. Throughout the 1950s, tape music primarily utilised, but this quickly developed into electronic amplification instead of magnetic recordings by the 1960s.