From Xenakis’s UPIC to Graphic Notation Today – a digital book-release with a talk and Electronic Concerts

Out of the ambition to transform drawings into synthesized sound, an interdisciplinary team led by the composer Iannis Xenakis developed the graphic composition tool UPIC (Unité Polyagogique Informatique de CEMAMu, Centre d'Études de Mathématique et Automatique Musicales) at the end of the 1970s - a custom-made computer that translates graphic notations into sound. The revolution in graphic composition triggered by Iannis Xenakis and carried forward by other established computer musicians such as Jean-Claude Risset or Curtis Roads continues forty years later in modern computer programs.

In spring 2020, the ZKM will release an extensive volume entitled »From Xenakis's UPIC to Graphic Notation Today«. This volume, with 27 richly illustrated articles, is the first to be dedicated to the genesis of this unique computational instrument and traces its technical, social, institutional and educational significance up to the current practice of contemporary composers who work with the idea of UPIC in current computer programs.

The publication has been produced in cooperation with the Centre Iannis Xenakis, contains previously unpublished archive material and is simultaneously made available to the public as a digital version for free download at www.zkm.de/upic.