Cassettes 100
In 1971, Cassettes 100 premiered at the Cultural Center of the Philippines in Manila. It was the Filipino composer José Maceda's first attempt at using an electronic device in his compositions. Dr. Biales invited Maceda to present the program at the College of St. Catherine as the United States premiere.
Dr. Ramon P. Santos notes in his book “Tunugan: Four Essays on Filipino Music”, that Maceda's work “symbolized the participation of local peoples in a modern technologizing world, in which the cassette tape recorder represented an easily affordable tool for ordinary ‘third world’ societies in gaining access to artificially reinforced forms of human communication."
Speaking about the event, music department chair Al Biales urged people not to view the program as strange, but as an avant-garde experience: "the program is a way for people to become involved in a musical experience without knowing a great deal about music.
The performance of Cassettes 100 involves one hundred musicians (participants) carrying tape cassette players and weaving in a simple choreography through an audience (bystanders) with an intent to erase the lines between performer and audience.
Instead of using instruments, each participant is provided a pre-recorded tape of such sounds as gongs, buzzers, harps, human voices, flutes, sticks, zithers, clappers and blocks
Speaking about the performance Al Biales said, "Together these sounds will make one complete music based not on melody, but on densities, permutations, filters, windows and screens. No one plays a musical instrument — the recorders take their place.
References
Onda, A. (2019, April 29). Everywhere at Once: José Maceda’s Musical Territory. BOMB Magazine. Retrieved May 13, 2020, from https://bombmagazine.org/articles/everwhere
Pineda, H. (2017, March 6). Cassettes 100: Maceda comes alive. UPDate Diliman. Retrieved May 13, 2020, from https://upd.edu.ph/cassettes-100-maceda-comes-alive/