Else Marie Pade became one of Denmark’s earliest major electronic composers during the 1950s and 1960s.
Yet parts of her electronic catalogue came surprisingly close to disappearing.
Dacapo Records’ recent reconstruction of her Complete Electronic Works 1955–2012 includes newly digitised pieces, previously unavailable material and works that remained overlooked for decades. The archive survived partly because a Danish Broadcasting Corporation technician contacted Pade when tapes were at risk and asked whether she wanted to preserve them. More boxes of tape were still appearing as recently as 2024.
I find that frightening.
Electronic music can feel technologically permanent because it belongs to machines.
In reality, magnetic tape is fragile.
A tape can deteriorate.
A machine capable of reading it can disappear.
A label can forget what is stored on a shelf.
The composer can fall out of cultural memory.
Then the music effectively stops existing even though the physical reel remains.
Digitisation therefore does more than improve access.
It can change history.
A work that was absent from the story can suddenly re-enter it.
The strange thing about forgotten art is that rediscovery often makes it seem newly created.
The sound has not changed.
The present finally caught up with the archive.
https://www.dacapo-records.dk/en/recordings/pade-complete-electronic-works-1955-2012
