Kid Baltan – Electronic Music

Kid Baltan (Dick Raaijmakers) produced "Song of the Second Moon" alone in October 1957. Tom Dissevelt was not involved. The B-side of this 7", "Colonel Bogey" (an arrangement of a composition by Alford) was produced by Raaijmakers in April 1958, so the release of the 7" can't be earlier than that.
Dissevelt was invited to the electronic music studio at Philips Research Laboratories in 1958, to continue the Popular Electronic Music project. "Whirling" (US title "Sonik Re-Entry" was composed by Dissevelt and produced together with Kid Baltan (who did most of the technical work) in August 1958, followed by "Syncopation" (US title "Orbit Aurora") in November 1958, and "Drifting" (Us title "Moon Maid") and "Vibration" (Us title "The Visitor from Inner Space" in October 1959. These four compositions were released on the EP Electronic Movements. (These dates come from an original Philips production list kept by Roelof Vermeulen, head of the Acoustics Department at Philips Research Laboratories.)

Dick Raaijmakers died on 4 September 2013 at the age of 83.

Edgar Varèse worked in Eindhoven on the music for the Philips Pavilion from 2 September 1957 until 8 April 1958. This production had nothing to do with the electronic music activities at Philips Research. The music for the Philips Pavilion was produced in a temporary studio set up in a garage at Strijp 3 by Philips' product division ELA.

6 september 2013 at the age of 84 this genius died.
R.I.P.

Beautiful, unbelievably influential electronic music.Impossible to calculate just how it changed the musical landscape.
Unlike most electronic music,this has the element of Jazz to it and not just European classical influences.

In the Fifties, very few centers were pushing music forward. A new generation of ground breakers in the world of the rising electronic music and Musique Concrete: among them, Pierre Schaeffer’s Studio d'Essai (FRA) since late 40s, WDR Studio für elektronische Musik (Cologne/GER), Columbia Princeton (US), Milan Electronic Music Studio’/”RAI Studio of Phonology’ (ITA), and Philips Natuurkundig Laboratorium [NatLab] in Eindhoven/HOL. The Dutch one in particular counted on a duo of extremely bold avant-garde minds — Dick Raajimakers (Kid Baltan) and Tom Dissevelt. Baltan in particular was responsible for the classic 'Song Of The Second Moon' as early as 1957, released around a year after in this ‘Electronic Music’ 7". ‘Song of the Second Moon’ would become a cult classic in the history of electronically produced music.

More than a decade before Kraftwerk, Kid Baltan (a pseudonym created by the spelling of his name Dick and Natlab - his working place - backwards) was, together with Tom Dissevelt, behind some of these early contemporary Electronic Music compositions, more precisely between 1957 and 1959, when the duo composed through the use of tapes and oscillators timeless.
Even before the landing of men into the Moon or any Space travels, majestic 'Song Of The Second Moon' captured the essence of the space mood and Science Fiction esthetic. 'Song Of The Second Moon' was the blueprint for a future sound, later recognized as 'Electronic Music'.
On the cover of the seven inch single first pressing on Philips, you could read 'Electronic Popular Music', and there was an astonishing text about the 'new possibilities of expression' concerning the Electronic Music and the independance between the spirit of the composition and the medium of its expression. (Don't miss the chance to read and realize how modern this concepts are).