What on earth is Ferneyhough all about?
Colin Broom
where he's coming from at all. Obviously music either moves you or it
doesn't, I have to admit that what I have heard of Ferneyhough doesn't move
me, but I am willing to accept that there may some important component that
I have overlooked, and this is the reason for this e-mail.
How is the music structured, is it actually classed as atonal or is it just
very secretive about it's key centres.
I look at the score to "La Chute d'Icare, and while I was impressed at the
sheer amount of time it must have taken to notate, it seems to me that you
could change just about any group pitches and it would make very little
difference to the aural experience.
In the second bar there is what could only be described as a "multi-tuplet".
At the bottom is a bracket with the ratio 7:5, above that a bigger bracket
with the ratio 11:9,and above that an even bigger bracket with the ratio
15:9. Now I am really not convinced that any human could ever play rhythms
like that accurately. Is that the point?
What is Ferneyhough's compositional philosophy?
Colin Broom.
I saw a movie on TV the other night, and the only dialogue throughout was
the word "and". The review in the newspaper said it was an "off-beat
comedy".
Chris Long
quite open about his interest in jazz. I agree that it is impossible for a
human to accurately perform such rhythms and it also occurs to me that the
result has to be an approximation. To me, the music can sound improvised, a
little like jazz.
Chris
http://www.calhome.mcmail.com
KSQ
>
> I cannot get a handle on Brian Ferneyhough's music at all, I just don't know
> where he's coming from at all.
[snip]
> In the second bar there is what could only be described as a "multi-tuplet".
> At the bottom is a bracket with the ratio 7:5, above that a bigger bracket
> with the ratio 11:9,and above that an even bigger bracket with the ratio
> 15:9. Now I am really not convinced that any human could ever play rhythms
> like that accurately. Is that the point?
>
> What is Ferneyhough's compositional philosophy?
I've been told that part of his goal is to create "eye music" as well as
"ear music," i.e. a score that *looks*
beautiful/impressive/striking/whatever. Can anyone confirm/refute this?
-- Sam
William J Needham
www.music-online.freeserve.co.uk
Summary:
Serialist who took the technique and applied it to large scale works (one of
the few to do so). Later went on to tackle serious philosophical issues. The
language that serial music promotes is then used as the starting block for
his sound stage which gives a clue to the look and feel of his scores.
Things to listen for:
Clearly it is not possible to reproduce the piece from the score precisely,
Ferneyhough himself does not expect it, rather he expresses the score as an
attempt to direct the nuance of an ideal performance, a task which he claims
is impossible. The complex score, however, does lead to extremely exciting
performance as the musicians have to absorb themselves in total
concentration to trace their way through an often conflicting score.
One can see the serial aspects in his music clearly - extremes of dynamic,
register etc. from one note to the next - cells of notes which are then
transformed and so on. How he actually composes it is a different matter
since it is very obviously "composed" music rather than the "system" music
of 1940's/50s Boulez. Try to think of the music as a vast polyphony (even in
solo music) which is not presented to the listener all at once. Any one
strand of music can be thought of as being composed for the entire duration
of a piece, but only audible from time to time. Although it is crude to
suggest he is fading different tracks in and out of the pieces, it is
perhaps a useful analogy.
Try listening to the Time and Motion studies, Etudes Transcendentales,
Cassandra's Dream Song, Mnemosyne and Funerailles.
Read Paul Griffiths' "Modern Music & After" for a brief sympathetic
appraisal.
All the best,
William Needham
Colin Broom wrote in message <797uee$oum$1...@news7.svr.pol.co.uk>...
>I cannot get a handle on Brian Ferneyhough's music at all, I just don't
know
>where he's coming from at all. Obviously music either moves you or it
>doesn't, I have to admit that what I have heard of Ferneyhough doesn't move
>me, but I am willing to accept that there may some important component
that
>I have overlooked, and this is the reason for this e-mail.
>
>How is the music structured, is it actually classed as atonal or is it just
>very secretive about it's key centres.
>
>I look at the score to "La Chute d'Icare, and while I was impressed at the
>sheer amount of time it must have taken to notate, it seems to me that you
>could change just about any group pitches and it would make very little
>difference to the aural experience.
>
>In the second bar there is what could only be described as a
"multi-tuplet".
>At the bottom is a bracket with the ratio 7:5, above that a bigger bracket
>with the ratio 11:9,and above that an even bigger bracket with the ratio
>15:9. Now I am really not convinced that any human could ever play rhythms
>like that accurately. Is that the point?
>
>What is Ferneyhough's compositional philosophy?
>
David L. Hardie
<co...@broomc.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
Snip
>What is Ferneyhough's compositional philosophy?
Part of it (this is the short version) Since the performer cannot
actually perform it the energy of performance will be created in the
attempt.
That is the theory.
The reality (and I am a tollerant person) is nothing like this at all.
To me it is as relevant as tuning a television to a dead chanel.
David L. Hardie
>Colin Broom wrote:
>>
>> I cannot get a handle on Brian Ferneyhough's music at all, I just don't know
>> where he's coming from at all.
>
> [snip]
>
>> In the second bar there is what could only be described as a "multi-tuplet".
>> At the bottom is a bracket with the ratio 7:5, above that a bigger bracket
>> with the ratio 11:9,and above that an even bigger bracket with the ratio
>> 15:9. Now I am really not convinced that any human could ever play rhythms
>> like that accurately. Is that the point?
>>
>> What is Ferneyhough's compositional philosophy?
>
>I've been told that part of his goal is to create "eye music" as well as
>"ear music," i.e. a score that *looks*
>beautiful/impressive/striking/whatever. Can anyone confirm/refute this?
I'd rather see someone justify it.
Samuel Vriezen
>I look at the score to "La Chute d'Icare, and while I was impressed at the
>sheer amount of time it must have taken to notate, it seems to me that you
>could change just about any group pitches and it would make very little
>difference to the aural experience.
The piece makes a rather precise impression on me, I must say. Very
clear, colourful, and fluid. I think it's one of his best.
>In the second bar there is what could only be described as a "multi-tuplet".
>At the bottom is a bracket with the ratio 7:5, above that a bigger bracket
>with the ratio 11:9,and above that an even bigger bracket with the ratio
>15:9. Now I am really not convinced that any human could ever play rhythms
>like that accurately. Is that the point?
I think generally freedom is the point, paradoxically. The score gives
too many possibilities to base a performer's interpretation on; the
performer then has to choose, and do it real-time. At the same time,
listeners have to find their way through the structure, which is like
a deliberately overelaborated labyrinth, giving the listener, like the
performer, enormous interpretational freedom hence responsibility.
Ferneyhough is technically extremely clever; I do not mean in terms of
serial type techniques, I mean in the sense in which Ockeghem is
technically extremely clever: any aspect of the music you can think of
has been thought about and composed. The density of all this though
hitting you at once can be exhilerating (you have to listen
attentively).
>What is Ferneyhough's compositional philosophy?
Gilles Deleuze!
Samuel
Ken Overton
studying at times with Ferneyhough, although he preferred Joji Yuasa.
Even after being there a couple years, in a phone conversation he could
still be counted on to light into a number of "complexity" composers
(including Elliott Carter, Boulez, Xenakis at times, and others I can't
remember) ...
but not Ferneyhough. He said: "With Ferneyhough it's okay, cause he
actually hears it."
-- kov
Jonathan Kandell
> "Colin Broom" <co...@broomc.freeserve.co.uk>:
> >I look at the score to "La Chute d'Icare, and while I was impressed at the
> >sheer amount of time it must have taken to notate, it seems to me that you
> >could change just about any group pitches and it would make very little
> >difference to the aural experience.
>
> The piece makes a rather precise impression on me, I must say. Very
> clear, colourful, and fluid. I think it's one of his best.
I also had trouble getting a "hook" into his music until I heard "La Chute
D'Icare" performed by Ed Spanjaard/Nieuw Ensemble on Etcetera (KTC 1070).
Suddenly Ferneyhough sounded *distinct*. Someone on the list refered to his music
as sounding like "jazz"--and that's a tad true, in the sense of quick,
by-your-seat, sounding lines. But it sounds too ordered; it ends up being
completely the opposite of jazz. That combination of performance tension and
compositional order is something that immediately stands out in Ferneyhough's
music. I think this is why I never liked him till this disk: if you don't play
him right then you lose one half of the equation. Another thing about his music
is the quite distinct interrelation of the parts. I haven't been able to put my
finger on it yet, but it sounds different than other "complicated" composers
like, say, Babbitt.
The other performances on this disk are also excellent ("Superscripto,"
"Intermedio alla Ciaccona", "Etudes Transcendentales"). This disk was recommended
to me by Roberto; see, this list does occassionally have its merits!
jk
tucson arizona
Samuel Vriezen
Incidentally, I'll second that entirely. It's probably, still, the
best Ferneyhough disc out there - well, there is one by the Elision
Ensemble with solo pieces which is the ultimate deification of
bass-clarinettist Carl Rosman. And I also enjoy what Arditti does to
his quartets.
Samuel
Carl Rosman
> best Ferneyhough disc out there - well, there is one by the Elision
> Ensemble with solo pieces which is the ultimate deification of
> bass-clarinettist Carl Rosman. And I also enjoy what Arditti does to
> his quartets.
>
> Samuel
I'm blushing!
(Is there a smiley for that?)
Carl Rosman
> >D'Icare" performed by Ed Spanjaard/Nieuw Ensemble on Etcetera (KTC 1070).
> >Suddenly Ferneyhough sounded *distinct*. Someone on the list refered to his music
> >as sounding like "jazz"--and that's a tad true, in the sense of quick,
> >by-your-seat, sounding lines. But it sounds too ordered; it ends up being
> >completely the opposite of jazz. That combination of performance tension and
> >compositional order is something that immediately stands out in Ferneyhough's
> >music. I think this is why I never liked him till this disk: if you don't play
> >him right then you lose one half of the equation. Another thing about his music
> >is the quite distinct interrelation of the parts. I haven't been able to put my
> >finger on it yet, but it sounds different than other "complicated" composers
> >like, say, Babbitt.
> >
> >The other performances on this disk are also excellent ("Superscripto,"
> >"Intermedio alla Ciaccona", "Etudes Transcendentales"). This disk was recommended
> >to me by Roberto; see, this list does occassionally have its merits!
>
> best Ferneyhough disc out there - well, there is one by the Elision
> Ensemble with solo pieces which is the ultimate deification of
> bass-clarinettist Carl Rosman. And I also enjoy what Arditti does to
> his quartets.
>
> Samuel
OK, well now I'm over blushing... (almost)
You know the amazing thing about Brian's music? The more you get right, the better it
sounds! There aren't many people writing impossible music I could say that about
(except maybe Barrett, Dench, Finnissy, Dillon...).
I'm lucky enough to be both conducting and playing (clarinet in) La Chute d'Icare this
year, with two Australian groups. If this thread's still active, I'll drop in with any
thoughts on that.
The rhythmic aspect of Brian's music (and other ratio-heavy stuff) stopped being a
philosophical problem for me quite some time back. The thought that a rhythm you play
has to be able to be transcribed to be of musical significance is really not a very
productive one (plenty of arrangements of semiquavers and triplet quavers fail that
test, especially if there isn't an audible pulse going on), so that can be dismissed
from the outset. I find immensely liberating a language which allows rhythmic detail
to be shaped so finely in the individual lines while each being two or three worlds of
ratios away from the abstract tempo of the piece (and really, it's not so difficult to
spread out your material accurately over the bar and meet at the next downbeat, is
it?).
(No. It isn't. Trust me.)
And the same holds for a listener - you can take your own trajectory through a
Ferneyhough piece in a way which you simply can't in a large amount of the repertoire.
Perhaps you can't aurally digest every detail at once - but you can't even in some of
the simplest music anyway.
Ferneyhough's music is for me among the most inclusive there is of the ambiguities of
performing and listening to music. At the end of the day, either you like the
experience or you don't. But if you can participate as fully as possible in it, it
certainly helps...
Samuel Vriezen
>You know the amazing thing about Brian's music? The more you get right, the better it
>sounds! There aren't many people writing impossible music I could say that about
>(except maybe Barrett, Dench, Finnissy, Dillon...).
"O August one..." :-)
My blush smiley would be, 8-x>. Perhaps we could invent an even more
dadaist smiley, like l)(7%!!! - reading that as a face should be an
aesthetic experience worthy of Ferneyhough.
1)(7%!!!
Asides aside, here is the question I have long pondered and wanted to
query thee about.
I never saw the Time and Motion Study score, and ever since hearing
your recording and Sparnaay's I have wondered which is the more
accurate. I know which I prefer. 1)(7%!!! Could you tell us something
about it? And please, no qualms about saying things that aren't
entirely complimentary to mr. Sparnaay or to yourself... WE WANT THE
TRUTH, the whole truth & nothing but the truth (if in the context of
the metastructuralist mazes of Mr. Ferneyhough we could speak of such
an entity).
Best,
Samuel
Samuel Vriezen
>You know the amazing thing about Brian's music? The more you get right, the better it
>sounds! There aren't many people writing impossible music I could say that about
>(except maybe Barrett, Dench, Finnissy, Dillon...).
A PS:
My hunch is that most composers want to have an 'avantgarde' sound:
just any Zeitgerausche will do, any blurt of thick sonic oil paint. So
they squeeze their systems for a couple of thousand tiny notes, beam
the stems together as a collection of rhythmsless gruppetti etc.
In Ferneyhough you can simply see that every single phrase and every
'ornamental' gesture has been considered as a dramatic gesture in
itself. I suppose he sings or whistles everything he writes, to the
tiniest appogiatura.
The opposite case would be Basalt Boy Xenakis who was my teenage hero.
What would you think of the precision required in Ligeti or Boulez? Or
do their pieces not constitute impossibility in music? (some of their
piano writing at least comes close...)
Samuel
Carl Rosman
> your recording and Sparnaay's I have wondered which is the more
> accurate. I know which I prefer. 1)(7%!!! Could you tell us something
> about it? And please, no qualms about saying things that aren't
> entirely complimentary to mr. Sparnaay or to yourself... WE WANT THE
> TRUTH, the whole truth & nothing but the truth (if in the context of
> the metastructuralist mazes of Mr. Ferneyhough we could speak of such
> an entity).
I think that parenthesis maybe tells the story...
I haven't done a back-to-back listen of both Harry's recording and mine either with or
without the score; I don't actually know if the question's answerable! I certainly haven't
done a note count, and I don't know how one would.
I've just spent quite some minutes perusing the Ferneyhough _Collected Writings_ in search
of one of his tremendously pithy quotes on this subject, but I can't find the dang thing -
it had something to do with the difference between "accuracy" and "fidelity". I'll keep
looking for it. To me, as long as (a) the performer isn't slacking off in any way, and (b)
the performer has a certain level of technique and imagination, then the performance is as
faithful as it can be. The tantalising thing is perhaps that there is nothing in the score
that is literally impossible... impractical, maybe, but that's hardly an excuse. We did,
in editing the recording, sometimes choose the faithful over the purely pitch-accurate.
What I can say is that Brian wrote a letter to me in 1993, shortly after I had first sent
him a tape of an early performance of mine, in which he said "I do not remember any other
interpretations I have heard in recent years, whether live or recorded, which do my
original intentions the same degree of justice". That's as immodest as I'm going to get!
And there's also this fragment from a Richard Toop interview:
RT: ...Given that it is almost innate in your compositions that the correlation between
what is written and what is played will not be perfect, what, for you, are the essential
criterian for a good performance of your work?
BF: I would say the establishment of audible criteria of meaningful inexactitude. That is,
from work to work, from one section of a work to another section, from one performer to
another, from one performance situation to another, the level of meaningful inexactitude
is one indication, one hint of the way in which a work 'means'.
RT: So interpretation consists, to some extent, of different intelligent failures to
reproduce a central text?
BF: I would say this was true, yes. Unfortunately the situation today is that the central
text has no long-term text supporting it, in which it is embedded, and which tells us how
to play it.Therefore it is our duty as composers to make the text, the visual aspect of
the text and its musical structure, so self-referential in an enriching sense that the
performer can find some way of plugging it into his own sensibilities - so that he is not
trying to give a generally tasteful rendering of some set of noises, or whatever, but that
these noises are, in a semantically specific sense, interrelated among themselves in such
a way that the performer himself can attempt to take an attitude towards that
relationship.
(Interview with Richard Toop, 1983; published in _Brian Ferneyhough: Collected Writings_
(Harwood Academic Publishers 1995).)
Not the pithy quote I was looking for, but still useful, I hope. The book's worth getting
- I think there's a second edition out.
One little thing more - a high priority in learning the piece for me was to realise the
frequent polyphony of dynamics. It seemed more appropriate to look for some meaningful way
to get that across from the outset than to follow the usual musician's procedure of
learning the notes first and then the rhythms and then getting them up to speed and then
putting the dynamics and articulations in, because of course, I would never have reached
the final stage, in which it seems if anything there is more of the 'meaning' of the piece
than there is in the pitches alone.
Carl Rosman
> just any Zeitgerausche will do, any blurt of thick sonic oil paint. So
> they squeeze their systems for a couple of thousand tiny notes, beam
> the stems together as a collection of rhythmsless gruppetti etc.
Are you referring to Donatoni here?
> In Ferneyhough you can simply see that every single phrase and every
> 'ornamental' gesture has been considered as a dramatic gesture in
> itself. I suppose he sings or whistles everything he writes, to the
> tiniest appogiatura.
Yes, at least in working sessions that's exactly what he does. (But not necessarily with
inhuman accuracy!)
> What would you think of the precision required in Ligeti or Boulez? Or
> do their pieces not constitute impossibility in music? (some of their
> piano writing at least comes close...)
Well, some of the writing in the Boulez second sonata is _literally_ impossible from the
stretch point of view. I've not played any Boulez yet; I've conducted Le Marteau, but
there's nothing impossible there. And some of the writing in the Ligeti Kammerkonzert
(really the only piece of his I'm properly familiar with) could still be said to be
unrealisable almost thirty years later.
The Ligeti is an interesting point, by the way - all he's written is a series of
challengingly fast regular pitches at a constant dynamic. This seems to be harder to
realise meaningfully than a Ferneyhough score with layers of rhythms, articulations and
dynamics over the top - there's nothing to fall back on!
Samuel Vriezen
>Not the pithy quote I was looking for, but still useful, I hope. The book's worth getting
>- I think there's a second edition out.
I have the book and I sometimes leaf through it. There is a lot of
exciting stuff in there, but you probably won't catch me reading it
cover to cover, I read and live in a too chaotic fashion for that.
Right now I'm stuck in at least ten volumes of poetry, seven of
fiction, three of visual art and six about music and I have to catch
up with twelve hundred newspapers (these figures being susceptible to
strange dynamicisms of their own) (can anyone tell me if the Gulf War
is over already?)
The quote you point out I have to thank you for. It may not have been
your original point, but it gives substance to something I had long
been suspecting... that the complex notation is in a way the result of
the instability of the void of avantgarde performance tradition. I
mean, if you listen to an old performance of Beethoven, or to flamenco
music or good rock or whatever, you hear that the performers have
'secret' criteria according to which they shape the notes to
incredible precision.
It's almost as if when you learn to do the noteshaping systematically,
in a reasoned way, which is exactly what professional training teaches
you, something is lost - beyond the grasp of the system you learn.
This is not too bad if the teaching tradition coincides with a
performance tradition such as in the case of Beethoven - the musician
will 'know' how to do it. I have this wonderful recording of the
quartets by the Busch quartet, somewhat out of tune and not always
together in the complex textures, but in a less graspable way it's
musically very precise.
Avantgarde music in Europe however had no performance tradition, also
probably this had to do with the discontinuity due to the Second World
War, but the problem started earlier I think. I got this impression
most strongly from listening to a 'perfect' recording of a choir doing
the 'Lamentationes' of Krenek - brilliant and sterile. They did the
score and had nothing else to do.
I take Ferneyhough to say, 'if we have no style and only a score, why
don't we put the style into the score?'. Probably, the next thing that
happens is paradoxes of the Derrida variety - a text [might (be)
claim(ed) to be] referring only to itself but still it has to be read
& understood, right? Which means that the musical 'style' is really
triggered by the reading of the text, the act of reading itself; the
tension in the performance arising from the friction between the
stylistic nullity and the fact that there is a human being making
something out of it; a sort of transscript of conscious activity
itself - OK, I'm drifting off into vagueness. But it's clear that it's
a highly romantic and exciting activity.
>One little thing more - a high priority in learning the piece for me was to realise the
>frequent polyphony of dynamics. It seemed more appropriate to look for some meaningful way
>to get that across from the outset than to follow the usual musician's procedure of
>learning the notes first and then the rhythms and then getting them up to speed and then
>putting the dynamics and articulations in, because of course, I would never have reached
>the final stage, in which it seems if anything there is more of the 'meaning' of the piece
>than there is in the pitches alone.
I find this very interesting. Are you saying you chose the dynamic
stratification to be the meaning of the piece; or perhaps as your road
'toward' the 'meaning' of the piece (which might be another way of
describing the same thing)?
Samuel
Samuel Vriezen
>> My hunch is that most composers want to have an 'avantgarde' sound:
>> just any Zeitgerausche will do, any blurt of thick sonic oil paint. So
>> they squeeze their systems for a couple of thousand tiny notes, beam
>> the stems together as a collection of rhythmsless gruppetti etc.
>
>Are you referring to Donatoni here?
Haven't seen any of his clickety click clickclick clickety scores. I
was referring especially to some second-rate 60's and 70's scores I've
seen which were IMO too facile in their notations.
>> In Ferneyhough you can simply see that every single phrase and every
>> 'ornamental' gesture has been considered as a dramatic gesture in
>> itself. I suppose he sings or whistles everything he writes, to the
>> tiniest appogiatura.
>
>Yes, at least in working sessions that's exactly what he does. (But not necessarily with
>inhuman accuracy!)
No inhuman accuracy? Perhaps they need to change his batteries! :-)
>> What would you think of the precision required in Ligeti or Boulez? Or
>> do their pieces not constitute impossibility in music? (some of their
>> piano writing at least comes close...)
>
>Well, some of the writing in the Boulez second sonata is _literally_ impossible from the
>stretch point of view.
Are you sure about that? It surprises me. I do know Xenakis has this
problem in Evryali; but I always thought Boulez to be a musician of
the rigorously trained variety who would never let such a thing pass.
I have the score; if you're ever bored, perhaps you could point out
which parts you mean? If you have anything better to do (read usenet,
etc :-)) forget about it, but I have to convince myself of this.
Perhaps it's more similar to some 'impossibilities' which I found in
Beethoven's opus 111 1st movement, which you simply have to be not too
perfectionistic about.
>The Ligeti is an interesting point, by the way - all he's written is a series of
>challengingly fast regular pitches at a constant dynamic. This seems to be harder to
>realise meaningfully than a Ferneyhough score with layers of rhythms, articulations and
>dynamics over the top - there's nothing to fall back on!
Just as I think Gregorian chant is more difficult to do right than an
Ars Subtilior ballade.
What about performing with total exactitude a pulse of MM 10. That can
require some years of schooling...
Samuel
Carl Rosman
> problem in Evryali; but I always thought Boulez to be a musician of
> the rigorously trained variety who would never let such a thing pass.
> I have the score; if you're ever bored, perhaps you could point out
> which parts you mean? If you have anything better to do (read usenet,
> etc :-)) forget about it, but I have to convince myself of this.
I'm positive - it surprised me too. I don't own a score, but there are plenty of 'nose'
chords in the first movement, I remember.
> Perhaps it's more similar to some 'impossibilities' which I found in
> Beethoven's opus 111 1st movement, which you simply have to be not too
> perfectionistic about.
Well, it does partake of the Romantic just-spread-the-darn-thing tradition (like Ysaye's
six-note chords for solo violin and Scriabin's 25-note piano chords).
> What about performing with total exactitude a pulse of MM 10. That can
> require some years of schooling...
>
> Samuel
Total exactitude? A chimaera, methinks.
I'm conducting a piece next year which has me beating crotchet=3 at one point. That will
require not so much schooling as t'ai chi.
Carl Rosman
> your original point, but it gives substance to something I had long
> been suspecting... that the complex notation is in a way the result of
> the instability of the void of avantgarde performance tradition. I
> mean, if you listen to an old performance of Beethoven, or to flamenco
> music or good rock or whatever, you hear that the performers have
> 'secret' criteria according to which they shape the notes to
> incredible precision.
Yes. It would be entirely possible to transcribe a given interpretation of a Bach (or even
more, Chopin) prelude to a Ferneyhoughesque level of complexity.
> It's almost as if when you learn to do the noteshaping systematically,
> in a reasoned way, which is exactly what professional training teaches
> you, something is lost - beyond the grasp of the system you learn.
> This is not too bad if the teaching tradition coincides with a
> performance tradition such as in the case of Beethoven - the musician
> will 'know' how to do it.
Will 'know', or will have learnt and parroted?.... I had very few (but enough) teachers at an
undergrad level who attempted to teach me how to learn, as opposed to just teaching me what to
do in a given situation. I don't really believe the considerations are that complex, either -
just a matter of asking 'why am I doing this?'.
> I take Ferneyhough to say, 'if we have no style and only a score, why
> don't we put the style into the score?'. Probably, the next thing that
> happens is paradoxes of the Derrida variety - a text [might (be)
> claim(ed) to be] referring only to itself but still it has to be read
> & understood, right? Which means that the musical 'style' is really
> triggered by the reading of the text, the act of reading itself; the
> tension in the performance arising from the friction between the
> stylistic nullity and the fact that there is a human being making
> something out of it; a sort of transscript of conscious activity
> itself - OK, I'm drifting off into vagueness. But it's clear that it's
> a highly romantic and exciting activity.
Put some of the style into the score, anyway. Or at least more! I think Ferneyhough would
embrace that paradox - although I don't think he'd make any claims for his texts to be
_entirely_ self-referential. (You can't pin Brian down to anything as simple as that.)
I've had some classes with Richard Toop on how Ferneyhough put his scores together - it's quite
amazing how the method changes as the work is progressing. He doesn't simply start with a plan
and carry it out - the whole piece evolves during the process of writing it down. Spooky.
> >One little thing more - a high priority in learning the piece for me was to realise the
> >frequent polyphony of dynamics. It seemed more appropriate to look for some meaningful way
> >to get that across from the outset than to follow the usual musician's procedure of
> >learning the notes first and then the rhythms and then getting them up to speed and then
> >putting the dynamics and articulations in, because of course, I would never have reached
> >the final stage, in which it seems if anything there is more of the 'meaning' of the piece
> >than there is in the pitches alone.
>
> I find this very interesting. Are you saying you chose the dynamic
> stratification to be the meaning of the piece; or perhaps as your road
> 'toward' the 'meaning' of the piece (which might be another way of
> describing the same thing)?
>
> Samuel
Not unequivocally either; it wouldn't do to be too dogmatic. Just that the usual dissociation
of parameters for learning convenience would have resulted in my missing much of the point for
the first several years of learning the piece, and then I would probably have given up. But I
always used to run ahead of myself when learning Weber, Mozart, Brahms and Spohr as well.
Samuel Vriezen
>> Are you sure about that? It surprises me. I do know Xenakis has this
>> problem in Evryali; but I always thought Boulez to be a musician of
>> the rigorously trained variety who would never let such a thing pass.
>> I have the score; if you're ever bored, perhaps you could point out
>> which parts you mean? If you have anything better to do (read usenet,
>> etc :-)) forget about it, but I have to convince myself of this.
>
>I'm positive - it surprised me too. I don't own a score, but there are plenty of 'nose'
>chords in the first movement, I remember.
Yes, I've checked, I found some of them. It's especially in the 'les 3
parties absolument egales' stuff, I think.
The Xenakis Evryali example I think is far worse because it does in no
way allow for the 'romantic virtuoso pianism' solution. There you get
these quick progressions of stacked minor ninths - up to five of them
- and the relentless 16th note rhythm allows for absolutely no
inexactitude. (Well OK that's a chimaera...)
>I'm conducting a piece next year which has me beating crotchet=3 at one point. That will
>require not so much schooling as t'ai chi.
Great! Now I'll have to rewrite the 'Breathing Cadence' in my ensemble
piece where I wanted this sense of beatlessness... but I thought
half=27 would already do the job. Well, there's no stopping progress.
It's perhaps even impossible to keep level with it...
Samuel
Samuel Vriezen
>I've had some classes with Richard Toop on how Ferneyhough put his scores together - it's quite
>amazing how the method changes as the work is progressing. He doesn't simply start with a plan
>and carry it out - the whole piece evolves during the process of writing it down. Spooky.
That's a good new metaphysical measure... the 'spookiness' of the
writing process. I wonder if Ferneyhough's writing has achieved the
'spookiness' of Granddaddy Complexist Johannes Ockeghem (who as to
spookiness has the distinctive advantage of being highly dead).
Seriously, do you think it relates to the 'spookiness' of Feldmans (or
Varese's or Rihm's) quasi-improvisational writing? I yesterday took it
upon myself to analyse the harmony of Palais de Mari, which you can
describe as a very clear classical phrasing-structure for the first
page (it's in A flat lydian, I think) but as he adduces and mixes in
more permutational elements things become rather gooey and
confusing... but still 'together' of course.
Samuel
Carl Rosman
Samuel Vriezen wrote:
> >I'm conducting a piece next year which has me beating crotchet=3 at one point. That will
> >require not so much schooling as t'ai chi.
>
> Great! Now I'll have to rewrite the 'Breathing Cadence' in my ensemble
> piece where I wanted this sense of beatlessness... but I thought
> half=27 would already do the job. Well, there's no stopping progress.
> It's perhaps even impossible to keep level with it...
>
> Samuel
Well, I have seen a graphic piece where each line (30cm or so) is alleged to take ten hours.
Carl Rosman
Samuel Vriezen wrote:
Well, I'm sure it relates.... but as for how, I'd have to pass on that. (Not my area of expertise.)
MrPye
In article <36CFF7A3...@mail.usyd.edu.au>, Carl Rosman
<cro...@mail.usyd.edu.au> writes:
Pah. Amateurs. I've got a piece which is so slow I *haven't even started
thinking about it yet*.
(Hey, I never knew post-modernism could be such fun.)
Samuel Vriezen
>Pah. Amateurs. I've got a piece which is so slow I *haven't even started
>thinking about it yet*.
>
>(Hey, I never knew post-modernism could be such fun.)
Oh yeah? Well, I've got this piece so slow that even _you_ haven't
started thinking about it yet!
Samuel
Samuel Vriezen
>> >Well, I have seen a graphic piece where each line (30cm or so) is alleged to
>> >take ten hours.
>> >
>>
>> Pah. Amateurs. I've got a piece which is so slow I *haven't even started
>> thinking about it yet*.
>>
>> (Hey, I never knew post-modernism could be such fun.)
>
>If only more post-modernists worked like you...
Hmmm... a case could be made for Ferneyhough being one of the most
postmodern composers. Thing is that composers who call themselves
postmodern most of the time just mix styles, thereby actually
affirming the styles themselves and the metaphysical concept of
'style'. I believe Ferneyhough treats metaphysical issues with much
more critical care.
David L. Hardie
wrote:
>mr...@aol.com (MrPye):
>
>>Pah. Amateurs. I've got a piece which is so slow I *haven't even started
>>thinking about it yet*.
>>
>>(Hey, I never knew post-modernism could be such fun.)
>
>Oh yeah? Well, I've got this piece so slow that even _you_ haven't
>started thinking about it yet!
Oh yeah?! Well I'm got a pice that is so slow that I haven't even
written it yet.
David.
p.s. this may explain a lot of my performing experiances with
composers.
Carl Rosman
MrPye wrote:
> In article <36CFF7A3...@mail.usyd.edu.au>, Carl Rosman
> <cro...@mail.usyd.edu.au> writes:
>
> >Samuel Vriezen wrote:
> >
> >> >I'm conducting a piece next year which has me beating crotchet=3 at one
> >point. That will
> >> >require not so much schooling as t'ai chi.
> >>
> >> Great! Now I'll have to rewrite the 'Breathing Cadence' in my ensemble
> >> piece where I wanted this sense of beatlessness... but I thought
> >> half=27 would already do the job. Well, there's no stopping progress.
> >> It's perhaps even impossible to keep level with it...
> >>
> >> Samuel
> >
> >Well, I have seen a graphic piece where each line (30cm or so) is alleged to
> >take ten hours.
> >
>
> Pah. Amateurs. I've got a piece which is so slow I *haven't even started
> thinking about it yet*.
>
> (Hey, I never knew post-modernism could be such fun.)
If only more post-modernists worked like you...
MrPye
In article <36d0cb1...@news.xs4all.nl>, s...@xs4all.nl (Samuel Vriezen)
writes:
>>Pah. Amateurs. I've got a piece which is so slow I *haven't even started
>>thinking about it yet*.
>>
>>(Hey, I never knew post-modernism could be such fun.)
>
>Oh yeah? Well, I've got this piece so slow that even _you_ haven't
>started thinking about it yet!
>
Curses.