Luciano Berio died last week.

The news was noticed by a few groups: the contemporary music cognescenti who follow such names as Elliott Carter and Pierre Boulez with a fascination reserved by the general public for J-Lo; people who troll the obituaries for anything unusual or off the beaten path; and ex-hippies. Hippies? Perhaps a personal story is in order. In the fall of 1968, while a senior at Columbia University (read: having survived the rioutous spring when the Weather Undergroudn closed down the campus), I took a course with Vladimir Ussachevsky, one of the fathers of electronic music. Ussachevsky was one of the guardians of a musical movement known as "musique concrete". Begun by Edgar Varese, this movement validated - was based on - incorporating "real-world" sounds in musical compositions. Sirens, bells, and other mechanical noises were given equal footing with instrumental sounds. It was the beginning of a new art form to some, cacophony to others.

Ussachevsky was one of those rare professors who believed in academic freedom. Certainly, he would train a steely eye on those whom he suspected were in search of a "gut", or easily passed course (wonder what phrase today's students use?), but if he detected a real interest in what was then a rather arcane discipline, he was very generous. So, given an assignment to write a term paper about some aspect of modern music, in particular how it might relate to musique concrete, I chose to write a comparative analysis of Luciano Berio and the Grateful Dead.

Berio's pieces were colorful, in fact made me see colors. Time has erased the name of the particular composition that elicited this reaction, though I suspect it might have been "Chemins II for Viola & Orchestra". What I do remember are textures, the same type of textures that shimmered in front of me while I listened to the Dead. Music was an expression, not expressionist, to me. I was playing in rock bands, but also discovering the fabric of John Coltrane, Bach harpsichord concerti, and the Balinese gamelon. So I painted my impressions of these two musical palettes - Berio and Jerry Garcia - and managed a respectable grade. It was a liberating thought that someone could parse my ramblings and see the thread I was trying to weave. Ussachevsky was a nice man, and no doubt understood how I was interpreting Berio, who in turn interpreted a world that bordered on the old and the new. When I heard of Ussachevsky's death in 1990, I had a little pang for the man who'd shown me some kindness during a fairly chaotic part of my life. So, now, the news of Berio brings a similar pang. It reminds me of the days when nothing mattered more than artistic expression. The pang is for more than the passing of a man.

/w