Horatiu Radulescu

Horatiu Radulescu was a Romanian composer known for his use of the spectral compositional technique. His music utilizes upper partials of the harmonic series and changing registers and textures, and he drew inspiration from Romanian folk music and the Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu. Radulescu was born in Bucharest in 1942, and he received violin lessons from Nina Alexandrescu throughout his childhood. Later, he studied composition with Ștefan Niculescu, Tiberiu Olah, and Aurel Stroe at the Bucharest Academy of Music. After he completed his M.A. in 1969, he sought further instruction and development at the Darmstadt summer courses, where he attended the classes of Xenakis, Stockhausen, Cage, and Ligeti. He also studied with Ferrari and Kagel in Cologne, and by 1974 he had settled in Paris and become a French citizen. It was during this period that Radulescu composed his first works that used the concept of spectral music, such as Credo for nine cellos and Everlasting Longings for strings. In 1975, he explained his compositional philosophies in the book Sound Plasma: Music of the Future Sign. He also explored large and unique instrumentations, like in String Quartet No. 4 for nine string quartets, Wild Incantesimo for nine orchestras, and Byzantine Prayer for 40 flutes. From 1979 to 1981, he attended the Institute for Research and Coordination in Acoustics and Music, where he studied psychoacoustics and computer-assisted composition. Two years later in Paris, Radulescu formed the European Lucero chamber ensemble to perform his compositions. The group was a flexible and variable collective of accomplished soloists who specialized in extended techniques. Although he kept a residence in Versailles, he was mainly based in Germany in the '80s. After a few years in Freiburg, he moved to Berlin in 1988, followed by residencies in San Francisco and Venice. Some of his works from around this time were inspired by Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching, including the piano sonatas Nos. 2-6, and his fifth and sixth string quartets. He also drew inspiration from Romanian folk melodies, which can be heard in The Quest piano concerto from 1996, and the second and fourth piano sonatas. Since Radulescu found standard musical notation to be limiting and inadequate, he developed his own proprietary notational system that utilized color, geometric shapes, and other symbols. Some of the key elements of his music are texture, changing registers, and spectral and timbral development, as opposed to the conventional use of melody, rhythm, and harmony. Radulescu lived in Switzerland in the late '90s, and he passed away in 2008 in Paris.
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