...was the title of The South Bank Show's much-criticised electronic music extravaganza of a couple of months back. Here the programme's musical consultant, composer Tim Souster, argues the case in favour of the show's content.

Wendy Carlos still loves digital synthesis. Through her pioneering soundtrack work on movies like Tron, and her synthesised interpretations of the classics, she has done as much as Jarre, Kraftwerk and Eno in making synthesisers both respectable and popular. She also used to be Walter Carlos. Daniel Rue investigates

Upcoming systems music composer chats to Simon Trask about modern technology, Renaissance music and Belgian pop.

Karlheinz Stockhausen

Annabel Scott sits in on 'Donnerstag aus Licht’, the latest concert excursion from a name dropped more often than milk bottles. It’s four hours long, but it’s only a fraction of the finished article.

Electronics Into Light

Karlheinz Stockhausen has had a profound influence on modern music from the 1950s onwards, and pioneered the use of electronics to create genuinely new music. Mark J. Prendergast reviews his career.

Says it all really

20th Century Experiments

Major influences in 20th century music.

Books

Eddie Cochran-White dispels those post-summertime blues with some cherished memories of recent good reads.

What is 'New Age' music? Who plays it, and why is it apparently so popular? Our resident musicologist Mark Prendergast traces its development back to the work of 'new music' composers Arnold Schoenberg and Erik Satie.

The Virgin Guide To New Music

This month, Elka Eminent to Everitt Orgatron.

People that matter answering questions that don't. This month: Richard Barbieri

University of Surrey Electro-Acoustic Music Studio

A look at the Surrey Sound electronic and computer music studio, scene of the Tonmeister degree course.

Brian Eno and the studio

Intro...

An introduction to a series on "music in which people are doing interesting, and often strange, things".

words for the musician

An overview

Mark Prendergast presents a general overview of record labels, artists, and recordings that make up the exciting area of new electronic and experimental music in the late 1980s.

Can computers improve or even replace current styles of notation?