Biography
Kenneth Kirschner was born in 1970 in Princeton, New Jersey, and began
studying piano at the age of 5. Starting to study Composition at College
briefly he found the academic atmosphere of the time (1988) to be too
conservative and stifling, with little for electronic music or
for experimental approaches. He therefore gave up studying Music
academically and moved to New York City to develop his work on his own.
Kenneth spent the 1990s composing and developing his style, while doing
occasional commissions for ballet and modern dance. Being aware that
soon the technology would exist to allow the online distribution of
music, it was Kenneths ambition to make his work freely available
online. He therefore turned to his old friend Taylor Deupree of 12k, and
began a series of CD releases - all under open licenses - that have
included post_piano, September 19, 1998 et al., and a number of
forthcoming CDs, all of which have been a great help in raising
awareness of his work. Being asked on how he consequently labels
all of his works with dates, Kenneth comments that when he was very
young, he used to make up titles for his pieces which were terrible
from Kenneths point of view: Just pretentious and awful, I thought. At
times they even seemed to "damage" the music itself. I wanted my work to
remain purely abstract, and for listeners to be able to bring whatever
meaning or interpretation they wanted to it. In 1989, Kenneth ultimately
decided to start using the dates on which the pieces were begun, and
it's a system he has pretty much stuck with ever since. It causes a lot
of chaos, of course, as even I sometimes can't tell which pieces are
which! But it's something that I'm very happy with philosophically.-Archive.org
studying piano at the age of 5. Starting to study Composition at College
briefly he found the academic atmosphere of the time (1988) to be too
conservative and stifling, with little for electronic music or
for experimental approaches. He therefore gave up studying Music
academically and moved to New York City to develop his work on his own.
Kenneth spent the 1990s composing and developing his style, while doing
occasional commissions for ballet and modern dance. Being aware that
soon the technology would exist to allow the online distribution of
music, it was Kenneths ambition to make his work freely available
online. He therefore turned to his old friend Taylor Deupree of 12k, and
began a series of CD releases - all under open licenses - that have
included post_piano, September 19, 1998 et al., and a number of
forthcoming CDs, all of which have been a great help in raising
awareness of his work. Being asked on how he consequently labels
all of his works with dates, Kenneth comments that when he was very
young, he used to make up titles for his pieces which were terrible
from Kenneths point of view: Just pretentious and awful, I thought. At
times they even seemed to "damage" the music itself. I wanted my work to
remain purely abstract, and for listeners to be able to bring whatever
meaning or interpretation they wanted to it. In 1989, Kenneth ultimately
decided to start using the dates on which the pieces were begun, and
it's a system he has pretty much stuck with ever since. It causes a lot
of chaos, of course, as even I sometimes can't tell which pieces are
which! But it's something that I'm very happy with philosophically.-Archive.org
