Milan Knizak
Milan Knížák (1940-2026) was a Czech artist, musician and Fluxus participant, born in Plzeň. In the 1960s he co-founded the Prague group Aktual, which staged actions and demonstrations, and he was named director of Fluxus East. In music he is known for Broken Music, a long series of works made by scratching, puncturing, burning, breaking and gluing together vinyl records and playing the results. Knížák's own account dates his first experiments, records played at the wrong speed, to 1963-64, and the destruction of discs to 1965.
Pieces For Broken Piano
Pieces for Broken Piano turns a weather‑wrecked 1916 Gebrüder Stingl grand into an accidental “prepared” instrument, as Miroslav Beinhauer navigates new works by Terry Riley, Philip Glass, Milan Knížák, Gordon Monahan, Elliott Sharp, Milan Gustar and…
It's Not Quite That Inventive (Sixty Years with Broken Music)
The album, featuring Milan Knížák, Petr Ferenc and Opening Performance Orchestra, includes Knížák's 1973 private recording Broken Music, released as a multiple of forty copies by Armin Hundertmark in 1983 on Edition Hundertmark, and a live version of…
Another State of Stagnation / Piano Pieces (1991-2021)
"My piano compositions are a mixture of musical reminiscences and a confession of my love for disharmonic chords on the one hand, and lascivious melodies on the other. As in the case of almost all my pieces, I wrote them 'dry', at a desk, without usi…
Aktual University
Milan Knízak canonical text Aktual University, dating from 1967, contains ten short lectures outlining the university's character -- On Conflict, On Dreams, On Revolutions, On Love, On Belief, On Art, etc. These lectures were to serve as inspirationa…
Broken Music
Milan Knizak 1979's masterpiece never re-released before. Presented as a gatefold with the original design. Before everyone else - Christian Marclay, Philip Jeck, eRikm, Martin Tétreault, Otomo Yoshihide - there was Milan Knizak. In 1964, Milan Kniza…
String Quartets
Violin was Milan Knizak's first instrument. He has composed hundred of works of this ilk; the first one DHK, 45 years ago. Next to his destroyed works, Milan took notations of different composers, cut them and put them together (with his own score) i…
Broken Re/Broken
Milan Knizak and Opening Performance Orchestra revisit Knizak's 1979 Broken Music (SR 400LP) in Berlin, 2014. "In 2008-9 we transferred the original recording from vinyl records into digital form. As we did so, we weren't interested in the precise, c…