ONCE Group - Beginnings

Beginnings

Milton Cohen’s Space Theater was probably the earliest catalyst for ONCE. Milton Cohen (1924–1995) became assistant professor of art at the University of Michigan in 1957. He was best known as a painter in the 1950s, but was becoming increasingly interested in art using light. In a 1963 article in Dimension magazine, a University inter-arts faculty publication, Cohen expressed his interest in art as performance: “I have urgently felt the need for stretching imagery into a format of presentation in real time, real motion, real space.” In 1957 Cohen rented a studio space in Ann Arbor and, collaborating with colleague George Manupelli (b. 1931) and an architecture graduate from the University, Henry Borkin (b. 1934), he began constructing his Space Theater: a twenty-sided hemisphere fifty feet in diameter that would be equipped to manipulate light in an interactive setting. Cohen's goals were remarkably similar to some of the future ONCE composers’ goals and ideals for their festival:

• To exploit contemporary technological means to broaden mystery and subvert the machine.
• To shrink distance between artist and spectator, spectator and spectacle.
• To suggest a museum of creative presence, of living performance, of spontaneous action.
• To machine a tool for visionary exploration.
• To score music, light, poetry, dance, with a single notational system, thus pressing a unitary vision.

To create a lightshow, Cohen used a variety of light-projecting and light-manipulating devices such as slide and movie projectors, prisms, filters, projectors, a color wheel, a variety of lenses, and mirrors. To create a multidisciplinary performance, Cohen was convinced that electronic music would be the best sonic counterpart to the visual component, and he connected with two of the future ONCE composers: Robert Ashley (b. 1930) and Gordon Mumma (b. 1935). Using a variety of equipment such as amplifiers, oscillators, filters, and four-track tape recorders, the two men formed the Cooperative Studio for Electronic Music and began composing electro-acoustic music for over one hundred Space Theater performances presented between 1958 and 1964.

In 1958, composer Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928–2007) lectured at the University and provided some forewarning insight about the future of new music. Finney held a gathering at his home for his students to meet Stockhausen, who was enormously popular with the young composers. At the gathering, Stockhausen encouraged Finney’s students to create performance opportunities for their new compositions and warned the young composers not to rely on institutional support.

In 1960–61, Finney took a sabbatical leave. Spanish composer and visiting professor Robert Gerhard (1896–1970), replaced him for the year, and became another ONCE catalyst. A student of Schoenberg, Gerhard's large reputation preceded his arrival. According to Reynolds, “There was an extraordinary kind of coalescence around presence and the fact that he presented a link to the contemporary European scene that was of a quite different nature than Finney. He became a kind of attractor around which everybody gathered.

Two more events provided the final motivations for the ONCE Festival’s creation: a composition symposium at the University of Illinois at Urbana in June 1960, and the International Conference on Composers in Stratford, Ontario August 7–14, 1960.

The idea for ONCE was conceived in the car on the way home from the Stratford festival. Frustrated by the inaccessibility of contemporary composers and compositions at Stratford, ONCE composers had the idea to “present new music which would not ordinarily receive a hearing in the community.” ONCE composers had two objectives in mind that would accomplish their goal of bringing artistic significance to Ann Arbor: hosting prominent American and European composers to present their works and presenting premieres of works of the local ONCE composers. Meanwhile, Bernard Keith Waldrop (b. 1932), a poet and literature doctoral student and friend of Ashley and Mumma’s, had been an active participant in Ann Arbor’s avant-garde theatre and poetry scene. Waldrop encouraged Ashley to approach the Dramatic Arts Center (DAC), “an independent group of townspeople interested in experimental activity,” for funding for a new music festival. Particularly interested in community-based theatre, the DAC supported Waldrop’s efforts in the 1950s.

In November 1960, Ashley and Reynolds approached the DAC for sponsorship. They met Anne Wehrer (b. 1929), the secretary of the DAC, and Wilfred Kaplan (b. 1915), an important DAC supporter. Anne Wehrer “proved a virtual ONCE dark horse. Lacking any formal credentials in an artistic discipline, she proved an energetic organizer, one of their most potent creative minds, and a consummate theatrical performer.” Besides serving as the secretary of the DAC, she managed numerous festival logistics such as guest housing and venue rental and was a performer with the ONCE theatrical group. ONCE meetings—and parties—were usually at Anne Wehrer's house. Wilfred Kaplan, a University mathematics professor, pianist, and violinist, was also part of the Dramatic Arts Center and proved to be an important part of ONCE’s financial success, both through the DAC and individual sponsorship. Many other individuals and local stores supported ONCE.

With funding secured from the DAC, the first ONCE festival occupied two weekends: February 24–25 and March 3–4, 1961. The two weekends presented contemporary works by prominent composers such as Berio, Cage, Boulez, Stockhausen, and Varèse. The ONCE composers also premiered several of their own works. The main ONCE venue was the First Unitarian Church, and the composers sold out all four performances, convincing the DAC to finance them for another year. ONCE composers continued to be successful, gradually shifting their programming to exhibit more of their own works and more interdisciplinary, theatrical, and probably riskier productions. Press attention, while originally exclusively local, gradually became exclusively national and international.