1977
Max Neuhaus Drawing
Sound Paths, Radio Net, 1977
Paint on cibachrome print 60 x 120 cm
Collection The Estate of Max Neuhaus
Sound work references: Radio Net, 1977, National Public Radio Network, USA
MNE-DRAW Networks: Preliminary Studies By Max Neuhaus Radio Net, NPR Round Robin. 1974
MNE-TEXTS Radio Net (1977).pdf
MNE-WORKS, NETWORKS By Max Neuhaus .pdf
“Radio Net.” For two hours on 200 NPR stations in 1977, sound artist Max Neuhaus conducted a massive experimental audio symphony using processed sound from callers all around the nation. It’s a vivid reminder of the audacious experimental artistic force NPR once was.Previously unpublished video of the preparations for and execution of Radio Net:
Public Supply I - WBAI, New York City, 1966, 2 hours
Public Supply III - WFMT, Chicago, 1973, 2 hours
Radio Net - Continental USA, 1977, 8 hours
Track #1 East transmit loop (New York, WNYC)
Track #2 Midwest transmit loop (Dallas and Chicago)
Track #3 South transmit loop (Atlanta, WABE)
Track #4 West transmit loop (Los Angeles)
Radio Net Classifieds, 90.1 FM
Wabe (Atlanta)- FM, Kera (Dallas)- FM, 1977
"My impetus as a performer for the first work was the mental and manual challenge of assembling a piece instantaneously from unknowable material. The growth of these broadcast ideas over the past thirteen years has been, among other things, the investigation of the processes involved -from the first manual mixer of WBAr's work to the implementation of general processes in the form of electronic realization systems in Radio Net of 1977."
"Other ideas were also inherent from the beginning; an interest in geographic scale (two thousand square miles in Public Supply and three million square miles in Radio Net), the setting in motion of a musical activity with large and diversitied groups of people (thirty thousand in Public Supply and four million in Radio Net), the breaking away from music's rigid and antiquated presentation format of the concert hall and the memories of it, which recordings form), making a piece of music without location and unpreservable.'
The future ideas center on language (that area of sounds with which we function dally, and to which we have, therefore, a highly developed listening acuity. They involve removing its verbal content and transforming it into something we can perceive simply as sound. The works will move from being one time events to becoming regulary reoccurring programs, forming aural meeting places independent of geography."
MN
Photo Max Neuhaus
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These Networks gradually progressed into a series of radio/telephone events, in different cities. In the middle of the seventies I realized one for the whole of the USA with two hundred radio stations and five cities where people called into. I made huge trans-continental loops to transform their sounds.It was called Radio Net.
Max Neuhaus
Location: Radio Station WBAI FM, New York City Dimensions: 20 miles in diameter. Extant: October 8, 1966 8:30 - 10:00 PM - 2 hours.
Video stills featuring Lynn Bennett and Margaret Gregg are part of the documentation for Max Neuhaus's 1977 work, Radio Net.
"A look behind the scenes at Radio Net's realization process, 1977" is the title of a 25-minute, 9-second video that documents the execution of the piece. The video likely includes footage of Bennett and Gregg as participants or collaborators in the realization of the project.
Radio clip with interview on Radio Net, produced by Roman Mars for Re:sound, WBEZ, Chicago, 2005
(audio 11'49" 10.8MB)
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Senior Producer Stephen Mark Rathe
Washington, District of Columbia
Jazz Alive!, Folk Festival USA, Contemporary Music/Events RadioVisions, Max Neuhaus' Radio Net White House Jazz Festival Newport and JVC Jazz Festival broadcasts including "The Blues is a Woman" with Murray Street (since 1981) Paul Winter Solstice / Jazz Riffs / Honky Tonks, Hymns and the Blues / One People, Many Voices Wynton Marsalis - Making the Music
