Is modern music still music?
Christoph Grimpe
kind of music is still music. The serial music is a developement
of the 12-tone-music. It's completely without the spirit that
makes up real music. It's totally constructed without thematic
ideas.
What do others think?
Christoph Grimpe 10075...@compuserve.com
Rick
The perennial question of conservatives, "But is it *music*?"
Of course it's music, just not what you think of as 'beautiful.'
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. If you think someone isn't
beautiful, you don't say that they aren't human, do you?
Rick
Ken Booker
Grimpe <10075...@CompuServe.COM> wrote:
> Regarding the modern serial music the question arises wether this
> kind of music is still music. The serial music is a developement
> of the 12-tone-music. It's completely without the spirit that
> makes up real music. It's totally constructed without thematic
> ideas.
> What do others think?
Serialism is only a set of tools. It does not necessarily produce music
that has a certain sound or style. Some of it I love, because it is "in
the spirit that makes up real music." Some of it I can do without, but
it's still music. As far as it being "totally constructed without thematic
ideas," that just ain't true! The basic abstract elements of a serial
piece are, by their very nature, "thematic." It may not be what you would
normally think of as a theme...you probably won't walk away from a hearing
whistling a 12-tone tune.
_____________________________________________________________
Ken Booker
University of Texas at Austin
e-mail: kbo...@mail.utexas.edu
"It's the end of the world as we know it
And I feel fine"
- R.E.M.
TreborK910
>ideas," that just ain't true! The basic abstract elements of a serial
>piece are, by their very nature, "thematic." It may not be what you would
>normally think of as a theme...you probably won't walk away from a
hearing
>whistling a 12-tone tune.
... at least not on first listen. On subsequent listenings, the thematic
material jumps out at you and the piece no longer seems as "arbitrary" as
it might have in the beginning.
I originally though the writer of the original made an error in naming the
thread. I thought he meant to ask "is modern music still *modern*." This
always confused me: 100 years from now will 'modern' music and art still
be called 'modern'? Were baroque musicians and painters called
'modernists' in their time?
Trebo...@aol.com
--
"Idleness is the beginning of all vices and the crown of all virtues"
-SK
"I laugh at your cheese danish and all it stands for."
-Little Pete
David Cleary
: Regarding the modern serial music the question arises wether this
: kind of music is still music. The serial music is a developement
: of the 12-tone-music. It's completely without the spirit that
: makes up real music. It's totally constructed without thematic
: ideas.
: What do others think?
I think you're trolling.
Dave
Matthew H. Fields
Christoph Grimpe <10075...@CompuServe.COM> wrote:
>Regarding the modern serial music the question arises wether this
>kind of music is still music. The serial music is a developement
>of the 12-tone-music. It's completely without the spirit that
>makes up real music. It's totally constructed without thematic
>ideas.
>What do others think?
2 notes.
1, the fad for 12-tone music came and went in the 1950s.
2, I know quite a lot of 12-tone serial music that is completely
saturated with musical spirit, themes, and ideas.
gar...@metro2.k12.mn.us
> Regarding the modern serial music the question arises wether this
> kind of music is still music. The serial music is a developement
> of the 12-tone-music. It's completely without the spirit that
> makes up real music. It's totally constructed without thematic
> ideas.
> What do others think?
>
definition. I can certainly understand that you don't like serial music (or modern jazz, or rock and roll, or long hair music), but I
can't understand the impulse that takes people to deny that their least favorite genre of human-influenced sound is music at all.
What do you find so threatening about serial music (which actually does move me quite profoundly -- certainly more than, say,
Andrew Lloyd Weber!) that you have to excommunicate it from Musicallity itself? ps, since when are thematic ideas the only
way to organize music -- what about Africa drum choirs which use non-pitched drums?
yours
Gary Parker Chapin
Rick
> Gone are the days when I'm inclined to indulge people in the
> belief that ignorant conceits are the same thing as educated
> opinion.
>
Here's one for my save file!
Rick
joseph louis rizzo
Christoph Grimpe <10075...@CompuServe.COM> wrote:
>kind of music is still music. The serial music is a developement
>of the 12-tone-music. It's completely without the spirit that
>makes up real music. It's totally constructed without thematic
>ideas.
>What do others think?
Well, I don't know you or your education. I will take the assumption
that you are asking a serious question, and not a troll.
Serialism is a tool, just like the sonata form, binary form, rondo, et al.
In the hands of a gifted and creative person, a wonderful piece of music
can come out of it. In the hands of an uninspired, unskilled, uncreative
person, it can come out as a bunch of noise. On the other hand, one can
say the same thing about a sonata, rondo, et al.
On the other hand, why don't you go out, get a recording and its score and
study what the composer is doing. I am sure (if you bother) you might
be surprised at the creativity that is involved.
>
>Christoph Grimpe 10075...@compuserve.com
--
J.L.Rizzo II
"You mean we can't play our game anymore?!?"
The birth of UNIX
bruce quaglia
: Regarding the modern serial music the question arises wether this
: kind of music is still music. The serial music is a developement
: of the 12-tone-music. It's completely without the spirit that
: makes up real music. It's totally constructed without thematic
: ideas.
: What do others think?
What do I think? The "question" doesn't arise at all and is
basically asinine and ignorant. This isn't flamebait: when
you make a dumbass statement like this and post it to rec.music.
compose then I assume that either a) you're trolling b) don't
really know much about music and may be excused or c) b is
true and really you thought you were posting to rec.music.classical-
cd-collectors-who-like-to-feign-some-civility-and-knowledge-of-
music.
Ken Booker
jank...@blues.epas.utoronto.ca (Chester Jankowski) wrote:
> > Oh, come on...you mean if I hear Webern's Symphony, op. 21, or his "Wie
> > bin Ich froh" enough times that I'll actually walk away whistling it?
>
> That all depends on your ear-training chops. If you don't think there are
> people out there who can sight-read disjunct, atonal meolodies, think
> again.
You're talking about another matter entirely. I know that there are people
who can do this. Please read what I actually said, in my original posting,
instead of what you apparently wanted me to have said.
Greg Dorter
>In article <jankowsk-011...@ppp03.epas.utoronto.ca>,
>> > Oh, come on...you mean if I hear Webern's Symphony, op. 21, or his "Wie
>> > bin Ich froh" enough times that I'll actually walk away whistling it?
>>
>> That all depends on your ear-training chops. If you don't think there are
>> people out there who can sight-read disjunct, atonal meolodies, think
>> again.
Well, I certainly can't sight-sing disjunct, atonal melodies, and I'm not that good a whistler, but I can certainly hear every note =
of a Webern piece in my head (thought I'm not too familiar with Webern's Symphony, op. 21, or his "Wie bin Ich froh"). As I began r=
eading this thread, the catchy Op. 27 Scherzo got in my head and now I can't get it out. I wrote a paper on Op. 11, and in listenin=
g to that piece a hundred times of so, I can hear it no problem. I can't tap out an African drum rhythm on my desk, but I'm sure th=
ere are a lot of African drummers who can do that.
Watch a conductor rehearse a 20thC score. They'll catch wrong notes in a complex atonal texture and sing the proper lines back to t=
he players. It all depends on how familiar the piece and the style are.
Greg Dorter University of Western Ontario
63 Dean Ave. gdo...@julian.uwo.ca
Guelph, ON N1G 1L3 519-836-2071
CANADA
Ken Booker
to address the person who made the original posting! I said HE would
probably not walk away whistling the tune, not any of you clowns. I also
said that _I_ probably wouldn't. Since we're talking about Webern in
particular, I hear his music as very lyrical, and I might walk away with
an intervallic set in my brain. Overall, though, I tend to hear Webern
more in terms of intertwined "lines," each line consisting of points of
sound that work together to create constantly changing textures...so, I
might find it difficult to walk away "whistling" it.
I may not have worded that very well...Matthew, whadda you think?
Matthew H. Fields
Ken Booker <kbo...@mail.utexas.edu> wrote:
>an intervallic set in my brain. Overall, though, I tend to hear Webern
>more in terms of intertwined "lines," each line consisting of points of
>sound that work together to create constantly changing textures...so, I
>might find it difficult to walk away "whistling" it.
>I may not have worded that very well...Matthew, whadda you think?
I always wished I could whistle quadruple stops so I could whistle Bach
fugues, dig? instead I whistle one melody at a time, and imagine the others.
Have you ever come upon a group of music students humming out the opening of
the Schoenberg piano concerto a capella? I was one of those students---it's
a really funny sound!
Matt
Sam Lorber
: >Oh, come on...you mean if I hear Webern's Symphony, op. 21, or his "Wie
: >bin Ich froh" enough times that I'll actually walk away whistling it? It
: >isn't a question of arbitrariness.
: I never said -all of it-. Alot of the serialist stuff in the 50s (i.e.
: Perle and Babbitt, but let's not open up that scar,) bores me silly. The
: good stuff- yes- you might be able to whistle
Believe it or not, I have a friend who can sing along with Babbitt
the way I would sing along with the Beatles. I was once in a car with
him when he put on a tape of _Philomel_ and started singing along with
Bethany Beardsley. It was pretty amazing.
Matthew H. Fields
>Matthew H. Fields (fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu) wrote:
>: In article <44epfc$cb0$1...@mhafc.production.compuserve.com>,
>: Christoph Grimpe <10075...@CompuServe.COM> wrote:
>: >Regarding the modern serial music the question arises wether this
>: >kind of music is still music. The serial music is a developement
>: >of the 12-tone-music. It's completely without the spirit that
>: >makes up real music. It's totally constructed without thematic
>: >ideas.
>: >What do others think?
>
Hmm, Chris is quoted, not me.
>Of course, it's music. If you can play it on an instrument,
>it is music. What I personally don't like about serial music
>is that it seems to be a mathematically-oriented puzzle.
Like fugue?
>If I wanted to write music using a mathematical approach, I
>would have gone out and purchased a HP calculator. Another gripe
Serialism is not a mathematical approach.
>I have is that if I have written our eleven of the twelve
>tones in a particular line, I am now forced to select a specific
No, you're not. You only are if you make yourself be so.
>tone next. That is not music to me - it's a prison cell. Of course,
>a similar problem exists for the eleventh tone and the tenth tone,
>etc.
If you start building a piece based on happy birthday and the
first two notes are G, the third note is A. Is that a prison cell?
Or is it a _plan_??
>I am not implying that this is not music. I am simply stating
>that I dislike this concept very much.
Hmmm, maybe you haven't seen the _why_ and the _what_for_ of it.
Serialism really isn't a set of rules, it's a collection of tools
for accomplishing particular things.
<a href="http://www.umich.edu/~fields/gems/5.htm">About Serial Materials
</a>
Craig Weston
>Of course, it's music. If you can play it on an instrument,
>it is music. What I personally don't like about serial music
>is that it seems to be a mathematically-oriented puzzle.
>
>If I wanted to write music using a mathematical approach, I
>would have gone out and purchased a HP calculator. Another gripe
>I have is that if I have written our eleven of the twelve
>tones in a particular line, I am now forced to select a specific
>tone next. That is not music to me - it's a prison cell. Of course,
>a similar problem exists for the eleventh tone and the tenth tone,
>etc.
>
>I am not implying that this is not music. I am simply stating
>that I dislike this concept very much.
(I don't write serial music either, BTW)
With all due respect, what you're railing against ("...I am
now forced to select a specific tone next...) is your
misunderstanding of this approach to composition. And who
wouldn't? Any compositional approach which would "compel"
the composer to write something against her/his will would
be idiotic. A serial composer is not compelled to use a
certain row form any more than Mozart was compelled to modulate
to the relative major in the first movement of the g minor
symphony (no 40). He was following a convention, yes, but
that was entirely his choice. Good serial music is the result
of the composer choosing a row and row structure that will
accomplish want s/he wants to do with the piece (notice the
cause and effect here).
All compositional restraints are, after all, voluntary.
What matters is what you do within those voluntary restraints.
Great composers have made great music within all manors of
compositional "systems," just as bad music has been written
in most every conceivable way as well. Whether the music
is serial, minimal, tonal, bisexual, or whatever, it is still
the composer's responsibility to make the music what s/he wants
it to be.
I will concede that composers of serial music seem to have
been especially prone to being seduced by the structure
and forgetting that they still neede to make music within that
structure.
__________________________________________________________________
|Craig Weston--Assistant Professor of Music Theory, Composition, |
| & Electronic/Computer Music, Iowa State University|
| |
|e-mail: cwe...@iastate.edu |
|WWW: http://www.public.iastate.edu/~cweston/homepage.html |
|________________________________________________________________|
Rick
> Believe it or not, I have a friend who can sing along with Babbitt
> the way I would sing along with the Beatles. I was once in a car with
> him when he put on a tape of _Philomel_ and started singing along with
> Bethany Beardsley. It was pretty amazing.
We can't vouchsafe the future of music on the basis of a few idiot
savants. It's pretty pathetic when we have to cite such off-beat cases
to collect some points for music which is basically dull, dry, and
dead.
Rick
Rick
> Favorite fantasy: Get Galileo, Brahms, Assimov,
oops... spelling? ASS-imov?
> Napoleon, Marx, Michael Jackson, Simone de Beauvoir, and a few other
> non-contemporaries together in a Usenet newsgroup.
And then we would find out how really boring they are/were and how
unlike their public images, too. Except for Asimov, of course... :)
Rick
> Another gripe
> I have is that if I have written our eleven of the twelve
> tones in a particular line, I am now forced to select a specific
> tone next. That is not music to me - it's a prison cell. Of course,
> a similar problem exists for the eleventh tone and the tenth tone,
> etc.
>
> I am not implying that this is not music. I am simply stating
> that I dislike this concept very much.
Sounds like Carl Ruggles who, interestingly, often used up to 11
chromatic pitches in sequence before repeating. I think there are
some 12-different-pitch-class 'runs' in his music. He also uses 10 in
sequence, or 9, or 8, or even 2 or 3. Irrelevant. He was guided by
the heart, not the head. It was Ruggles who said, "Systems are
meant to be busted." Good thing he never was in the same room
with Schoenberg, or Babbitt, or Sessions. Or perhaps, too bad...
Rick St. Clair
Matthew H. Fields
Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
>> I am not implying that this is not music. I am simply stating
>> that I dislike this concept very much.
>Sounds like Carl Ruggles who, interestingly, often used up to 11
>chromatic pitches in sequence before repeating. I think there are
>some 12-different-pitch-class 'runs' in his music. He also uses 10 in
>sequence, or 9, or 8, or even 2 or 3. Irrelevant.
Irrelevant in Schoenberg as well.
> He was guided by
>the heart, not the head.
Hmm, funny thing, Schoenberg was always writing about
"heart and mind together"---by implication, rejecting the notion
that they had to be opposed to each other.
> It was Ruggles who said, "Systems are
>meant to be busted." Good thing he never was in the same room
>with Schoenberg, or Babbitt, or Sessions. Or perhaps, too bad...
Or Mozart, or Beethoven...
Favorite fantasy: Get Galileo, Brahms, Assimov, Napoleon,
Rick
> Serialism really isn't a set of rules, it's a collection of tools
> for accomplishing particular things.
Serialism is redefined by each of its users. It consists entirely
of using 'series' of some parameter(s). Arthur Berger's String Quartet
(1957) uses hexachords instead of strict 12-tone rows, though
chromatic saturation is achieved the way he manipulates the hexachords.
That's serialism.
Then there are those nightmarish pieces that claim to
serialize all parameters. Anyway, this is all irrelevant. Serialism
evolved from two places: a desire for systematic atonality and
textural flux, and a desire for internal order. [ cf: Berger's "Ideas of
Order"...interesting introspective and musically self-revealing title
taken from Wallace Stevens' poem by the same name, BTW].
My personal belief is that the obsession with internal order in many
'avant garde' composers of the 1950s and 1960s (and, sadly, even
today) is a compensation for the surface 'disorder' evident
in serial music in general. The more serialized it gets,
the more disordered...therefore, more and more levels of
internal structure are imposed in order to justify the external
disorder. Not a very happy system. But if good music comes out
of it, that's what counts. BTW, I wonder if any good music ever came
out of such manipulations. It's hard to imagine, since the more you have
your mind on graphs and rows of parameters, the harder it is to be
spontaneous and lyrical. Oh, I forgot, we don't want those qualities
do we? <g> Forget I said it.
Rick
John Sheehy
>I am not implying that this is not music. I am simply stating
>that I dislike this concept very much.
So don't use it.
I guess you've never played a snapple cap successfully, have you?
If you can't handle a 2 tone percussive row, noone would expect you to
handle anything more complex.
<>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< ><<> <>>< <>>< ><<>
John P Sheehy <jsh...@ix.netcom.com>
><<> <>>< <>>< ><<> <>>< ><<> ><<> <>><
mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za
>From: fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields)
>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>Date: 3 Oct 1995 01:19:06 GMT
>In article <DFuFF...@sju.edu>, David Vacca <dv06...@sju.edu> wrote:
>>Matthew H. Fields (fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu) wrote:
>Hmmm, maybe you haven't seen the _why_ and the _what_for_ of it.
>Serialism really isn't a set of rules, it's a collection of tools
>for accomplishing particular things.
Okay, what particular things ? My chief gripe about serialism is that it
ignores totally the aesthetic/emotional/communicative (call it what you
will) effects of intervals and harmonies. A major 3rd has a different
emotional impact from a perfect 5th, etc. Intervals aren't pure symbols
totally uncoupled from meaning. The human ear (brain ?) can't help reading
an interpretation into the sounds it hears. Not only does serialism ignore
musical "conventions" (and thus become incomprehensible to the listener),
but, more seriously, it ignores fundamental facts of nature such as the
harmonic series. Certain intervals are more consonant or dissonant than
others because of the interactions of their overtones. Serialism totally
ignores these interactions. Unfortunately, the human ear doesn't.
Not all intervals are created equal.
A similar argument would apply to serialised rhythm, etc., but I haven't
thought about it much yet.
Ken Booker
<an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
> fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields) wrote:
>
> > Favorite fantasy: Get Galileo, Brahms, Assimov,
>
> oops... spelling? ASS-imov?
>
> > Napoleon, Marx, Michael Jackson, Simone de Beauvoir, and a few other
> > non-contemporaries together in a Usenet newsgroup.
>
> And then we would find out how really boring they are/were and how
> unlike their public images, too. Except for Asimov, of course... :)
Yeah...we already know how boring Asimov is.
Ken Booker
mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za wrote:
> My chief gripe about serialism is that it
> ignores totally the aesthetic/emotional/communicative (call it what you
> will) effects of intervals and harmonies.
This is one of the most basic misunderstandings about atonal music. It
isn't really about successions of pitches at all. It's successions of
intervals, which is exactly what you say it isn't. Listen to Berg
closely...you'll find that he was extremely conscious of intervallic
relationship, and especially ones that have tonal implications.
> The human ear (brain ?) can't help reading
> an interpretation into the sounds it hears. Not only does serialism ignore
> musical "conventions" (and thus become incomprehensible to the listener),
> but, more seriously, it ignores fundamental facts of nature such as the
> harmonic series.
Try the Berg Violin Concerto...look at the properties of the row itself,
and you'll see a direct contradiction to what you're saying.
As I've said in this thread, and others have said as well, serialism is
only a set of tools. It isn't a result...it's a process.
Ken
Craig Weston
>Okay, what particular things ? My chief gripe about serialism is that it
>ignores totally the aesthetic/emotional/communicative (call it what you
>will) effects of intervals and harmonies. A major 3rd has a different
>emotional impact from a perfect 5th, etc. Intervals aren't pure symbols
>totally uncoupled from meaning. The human ear (brain ?) can't help reading
>an interpretation into the sounds it hears. Not only does serialism ignore
>musical "conventions" (and thus become incomprehensible to the listener),
>but, more seriously, it ignores fundamental facts of nature such as the
>harmonic series. Certain intervals are more consonant or dissonant than
>others because of the interactions of their overtones. Serialism totally
>ignores these interactions. Unfortunately, the human ear doesn't.
>
>Not all intervals are created equal.
I rejoice when one of my students asks a question like this! (No, I don't
mean that to be patronizing.) What you have just done is eloquently and
succinctly expressed a fallacy. And once that is done, it makes it that
much easier to explain why it is a fallacy.
Where you are confused is this: serialism is not a style, any more than
tonality is a style. They are abstract musical ideas about pitch
organization. Now, that sais, historically, both serialism and tonality
(as well as other such ideas) *have* been *associated* with certain
styles--i.e. serialism is associated with the "second Viennese school"
and later with the dogma-eat-dogma worlds of American "modernism" and
the European "Darmstatt School."
There is no reason why serialism cannot be used within a style which
respects the assumptions about intervals which you gave above (it's
been done, BTW), just like there is no reason why tonality cannot be
used apart from the styles of historical tonal western composers
(that's been done, too).
When you imitate Schoenberg in "twentieth century music techniques"
class, you are doing two separate things--using certains tools of
pitch organization, and imitating a style. All too often the
professor fails to point out (or fails to realize) that either can
be done apart from the other.
(Just as you can use the same ideas of so-called "common
practice tonality" to imitate JS Bach or Schubert, though
their styles are very different.)
Frank Brickle
mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za wrote:
> Okay, what particular things ? My chief gripe about serialism is that it
> ignores totally the aesthetic/emotional/communicative (call it what you
> will) effects of intervals and harmonies.
It sounds like you're reacting to a bunch of rumors and journalistic
fantasies *about* serialism, and not a lot of first-hand experience
with individual pieces.
> A major 3rd has a different
> emotional impact from a perfect 5th, etc. Intervals aren't pure symbols
> totally uncoupled from meaning. The human ear (brain ?) can't help reading
> an interpretation into the sounds it hears.
Sure. But intervals don't have much impact in isolation, either.
It's not too hard to show that the particular impact of an interval
(or a collection of them) comes mostly out of the context in which it occurs.
I'm talking about *any* music here.
> Not only does serialism ignore
> musical "conventions" (and thus become incomprehensible to the listener),
> but, more seriously, it ignores fundamental facts of nature such as the
> harmonic series. Certain intervals are more consonant or dissonant than
> others because of the interactions of their overtones. Serialism totally
> ignores these interactions. Unfortunately, the human ear doesn't.
In the hands of a tin-eared composer, of course. Or in the hands of a
tin-eared listener. However, fortunately, there's a lot more variety
out there than your generalizations would suggest.
Rick
(a)
> There is no reason why serialism cannot be used
> within a style which respects the assumptions about intervals which
> you gave above (it's been done, BTW),
(b)
> just like there is no reason why tonality cannot be
> used apart from the styles of historical tonal western composers
> (that's been done, too).
> Craig Weston
Got any examples of (a)?
Rick St. Clair
KEITH K HARDWICK
> In article <jankowsk-011...@ppp03.epas.utoronto.ca>,
> jank...@blues.epas.utoronto.ca (Chester Jankowski) wrote:
>
>
> > > Oh, come on...you mean if I hear Webern's Symphony, op. 21, or his "Wie
> > > bin Ich froh" enough times that I'll actually walk away whistling it?
> >
I am frequently found wistling 20th cen music. In fact, that's how my wife
finds me in a mall. Some of my Favorites include, Hindemith Bassoon Sonata,
La Sacre, Schostakovitch Symphony #9, Bartok's Conterto for Orchestra. and
almost anything by Varese. I also humm my own tone rows and art songs
-- so much in fact, one morning my wife woke up humming one of my works!
I usually don't wistle Wabern or Berg 'cause the texture is too fragmented
to carry on the line.
Keith
__________________________________________________________________________
Keith Hardwick "Gone are the days when I'm inclined to
Hardwikk@ vax1.acs.jmu.edu indulge people in the belief that ignorant"
James Madison University conceits are the same thing as educated
opinion." --Bruce Quaglia
__________________________________________________________________________
Matthew H. Fields
>I have is that if I have written our eleven of the twelve
>tones in a particular line, I am now forced to select a specific
>tone next. That is not music to me - it's a prison cell. Of course,
>a similar problem exists for the eleventh tone and the tenth tone,
>etc.
Hmmm, is it a rule?
When you're writing tonal music for solo harpsichord, there's no rule
that says you may not suddenly demand that the harpsichordist strike
all keys with their forearms. But depending on the music that you're making,
you may feel quite justified in ruling out that possibility. Has an
arbitary rule been applied to you? Or are you making an aesthetic decision?
There's an infinite number of possible choices to make about music.
One person's choice and preference might well be another person's prison cell.
I can think of few compositional choices more "restricting and imprisioning"
than the twelve-bar blues!---yet look at the wonderful variety of music
that's been composed "within" that "cell".
Rick
> As I've said in this thread, and others have said as well, serialism is
> only a set of tools. It isn't a result...it's a process.
>
> Ken
as is fugue...one may criticize specific fugues but to dismiss fugue
outright is ridiculous
Rick
Matthew H. Fields
>>From: fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields)
>>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>>Date: 3 Oct 1995 01:19:06 GMT
>
>>Hmmm, maybe you haven't seen the _why_ and the _what_for_ of it.
>>Serialism really isn't a set of rules, it's a collection of tools
>>for accomplishing particular things.
>Okay, what particular things ? My chief gripe about serialism is that it
>ignores totally the aesthetic/emotional/communicative (call it what you
>will) effects of intervals and harmonies.
It does? How?
> A major 3rd has a different
>emotional impact from a perfect 5th, etc.
Hmmm, you might bear in mind that the linking of intervals with emotions
is subjective. I grew up with happy music in minor and gypsy modes, sad
music in major modes.
> Intervals aren't pure symbols
>totally uncoupled from meaning.
Actually, they well might be.
> The human ear (brain ?) can't help reading
>an interpretation into the sounds it hears.
No argument one way or another from me on that. I _count_ on the
listener to read an interpretation into my music, tonal, serial, or otherwise.
> Not only does serialism ignore
>musical "conventions"
Actually, serialism grew out of the conventions of motif, chromaticism, and
counterpoint.
>(and thus become incomprehensible to the listener),
>but, more seriously, it ignores fundamental facts of nature such as the
>harmonic series.
The harmonic series really is overplayed in hack literature about tonality.
It does _not_ explain the presense of the note F in the C major scale,
nor does it explain the role of conventional cadence formulas.
> Certain intervals are more consonant or dissonant than
>others because of the interactions of their overtones.
Consonance and dissonance have been variable categories over history.
You do realize, don't you, that for hundreds of years, all 3rds and 6ths
were considered dissonant.
> Serialism totally
>ignores these interactions.
Who says it does?
> Unfortunately, the human ear doesn't.
You mean the human mind?
>Not all intervals are created equal.
Exactly.
>A similar argument would apply to serialised rhythm, etc., but I haven't
>thought about it much yet.
Serialized rhythm is an odder bird, that grows out of Messaien's
experiments with Balinese rhythms. I don't claim to understand the
full plan of it, but serialized self-similar rhythm (on tonal
harmonies) is Michael Torke's key trick.
Rick
> My chief gripe about serialism is that it
> ignores totally the aesthetic/emotional/communicative (call it what you
> will) effects of intervals and harmonies
It sounds to me like you're beefing about specific compositions you've
heard. I might agree if you named names. But I disagree with your
premise. The medieval/renaissance composers used a kind of serialism,
fugues are a kind of serialism, Scriabin uses a kind of serialism
(see George Perle's analyses in his book on serialism), and so does
Bartok for that matter.
I think you are globally judging a process by examples you don't like.
Rick St. Clair
Ken Booker
<an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
> kbo...@mail.utexas.edu (Ken Booker) wrote:
> > Yeah...we already know how boring Asimov is.
>
> Really? Mr. Renaissance-Man-of-the-20th-Century is *boring*?
> What do you call "interesting"?
>
> Rick
OK...snap judgement on my part. I'll admit it...all I've ever read was
"The Foundation Trilogy," which I found to be really dry. It's just me,
probably...if you can reccomend something by him that you think is a
really good example of his work, I'll give him another chance...I've
always wondered if there were other things by him that I might like
better.
There is a book of dirty limericks by him that is pretty good...
TreborK910
>Consonance and dissonance have been variable categories over history.
>You do realize, don't you, that for hundreds of years, all 3rds and 6ths
>were considered dissonant.
Excuse my ignorance, and I know this is an unrelated point, but how could
a third or its inversion have EVER been considered 'dissonant' when the
triad is the basis for all harmony? I've seen this point made before and
it still puzzles me.
Trebo...@aol.com
--
"Idleness is the beginning of all vices and the crown of all virtues"
-SK
"I laugh at your cheese danish and all it stands for."
-Little Pete
Rick
Frank Brickle
Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
>Craig Weston <cwe...@iastate.edu> wrote:
>(a)
>> There is no reason why serialism cannot be used
>> within a style which respects the assumptions about intervals which
>> you gave above (it's been done, BTW),
>
Dallapiccola _Cinque Frammenti di Saffo_, say. _Agon_.
Matthew H. Fields
TreborK910 <trebo...@aol.com> wrote:
>Matthew Fields says:
>
>>Consonance and dissonance have been variable categories over history.
>>You do realize, don't you, that for hundreds of years, all 3rds and 6ths
>>were considered dissonant.
>
>Excuse my ignorance, and I know this is an unrelated point, but how could
>a third or its inversion have EVER been considered 'dissonant' when the
>triad is the basis for all harmony? I've seen this point made before and
>it still puzzles me.
The triad and harmonies based on it was first popularized in ca.13th-century
England in a manner of singing called various "fa-burden" and "Fauxbourdon"
(which only used what we'd now call first-inversion triads, and in which
every phrase always ended with the upper two voices ascending and the
lower voice descending, so the final sonority was an open fifth).
Triadic harmonies that sound familiar to our ears spread from there
in the 14th century, and were pretty firmly in people's ears by the 15th.
Even then, distinctions were made between the perfect consonances (octave
and fifths) and imperfects (thirds and sixths)...with the emergence of
contrapuntal thinking, parallel imperfections were considered contrapuntal,
but parallel perfections were considered non-contrapuntal (exactly the
distinction that lasted into the 19th century).
But written music (where we pretty well can read the notation) goes back
to the 6th century.
Dig some of it out of the library and listen for yourself to how it worked.
How did motets of various medieval centuries work?
How did various kinds of organum work? What was Notre Dame Organum?
John Sheehy
>The harmonic series really is overplayed in hack literature about tonality.
>It does _not_ explain the presense of the note F in the C major scale,
>nor does it explain the role of conventional cadence formulas.
I don't recall it ever being hacked to the point where one would say all
the notes of a major scale are derived from one overtone series. What I've
seen are reference to seven sequential fifths, and small segments of 3
overtone series combined (Fac Ceg Gbd), whose roots are 3 sequential 5ths,
the F effectually making a play at being the root of roots.
But then again, you've probably read a lot more than me, both good and bad
(or rather, both useful and useless).
<>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< ><<> <>>< <>>< ><<>
John P Sheehy <jsh...@ix.netcom.com>
><<> <>>< <>>< ><<> <>>< ><<> ><<> <>><
Ryan Mitchley
>From: fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields)
>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>In article <mtcrya01.3...@scilab.uct.ac.za>,
> <mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za> wrote:
>>In article <44q32a$2...@news.eecs.umich.edu> fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu
>(Matthew H. Fields) writes:
>>>From: fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields)
>>>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>>>Date: 3 Oct 1995 01:19:06 GMT
>>
>>>In article <DFuFF...@sju.edu>, David Vacca <dv06...@sju.edu> wrote:
>>>>Matthew H. Fields (fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu) wrote:
>> A major 3rd has a different
>>emotional impact from a perfect 5th, etc.
>Hmmm, you might bear in mind that the linking of intervals with emotions
>is subjective.
Subjective only to a degree, in the same sense that someone's interpretation
of the word "happy" may well be different from someone else's.
>I grew up with happy music in minor and gypsy modes, sad
>music in major modes.
While this is not unimaginable, I would be very interested to hear what
music you grew up with (particuarly "sad" musc in major modes). Jewish
music, maybe ?
>> Intervals aren't pure symbols
>>totally uncoupled from meaning.
>Actually, they well might be.
Sorry, I disagree. Just how uncoupled is the numeral "1" from the concept of
a unit. A physicist or engineer knows better than to claim that his numbers
are pure symbols and don't refer to reality.
>> Not only does serialism ignore
>>musical "conventions"
>Actually, serialism grew out of the conventions of motif, chromaticism, and
>counterpoint.
True, but it totally ignores conventional concepts of melody and harmony.
>>(and thus become incomprehensible to the listener),
>>but, more seriously, it ignores fundamental facts of nature such as the
>>harmonic series.
>The harmonic series really is overplayed in hack literature about tonality.
>It does _not_ explain the presense of the note F in the C major scale,
>nor does it explain the role of conventional cadence formulas.
Oh, so Pythagoras was a hack author ? The interval of a 4th is consonant (
relatively speaking) because it is defined in just temperament by a
mathematically simple ratio.
>> Certain intervals are more consonant or dissonant than
>>others because of the interactions of their overtones.
>Consonance and dissonance have been variable categories over history.
>You do realize, don't you, that for hundreds of years, all 3rds and 6ths
>were considered dissonant.
If you felt like it, you could define consonance and dissonance
mathematically by considering the ratio of co-inciding (re-inforcing)
overtones to non-co-inciding overtones. This is not as useless an excercise
as it sounds, as it could form the basis of an artificially intelligent
program to compose music.
I have yet to be convinced that serialism is not just another reactionary
movement, albeit a highly intellectualised one.
Personally, I have nothing against atonal music, as such. Some of Bartok's
pieces are amongst my favourites. I have yet to find a serial composition
beautiful or moving, though (without being thrilled to ecstasy by the pure
geometric forms of the tone rows on the printed page). Conceivably, I
suppose, one could. But I haven't found it yet.
I find it hard to see serialism as more than an initially interesting
thought experiment that outstayed its welcome and fell into the hands of the
snobs of the music world.
By the way, I wouldn't consider myself closed-minded when it comes to 20th
century music. There's a lot that I like, and I believe there's a lot of
promise for the future.
Matthew H. Fields
Ryan Mitchley <mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za> wrote:
>In article <44uglo$a...@news.eecs.umich.edu> fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields) writes:
>>From: fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields)
>>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>>Date: 4 Oct 1995 17:35:52 GMT
>
>>In article <mtcrya01.3...@scilab.uct.ac.za>,
>> <mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za> wrote:
>>>In article <44q32a$2...@news.eecs.umich.edu> fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu
>>(Matthew H. Fields) writes:
>>>>From: fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields)
>>>>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>>>>Date: 3 Oct 1995 01:19:06 GMT
>>>
>>>>In article <DFuFF...@sju.edu>, David Vacca <dv06...@sju.edu> wrote:
>>>>>Matthew H. Fields (fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu) wrote:
>>> A major 3rd has a different
>>>emotional impact from a perfect 5th, etc.
>>Hmmm, you might bear in mind that the linking of intervals with emotions
>>is subjective.
>Subjective only to a degree, in the same sense that someone's interpretation
>of the word "happy" may well be different from someone else's.
"h`pi?" Refers to those jade circles in Egyptian tombs.
>>I grew up with happy music in minor and gypsy modes, sad
>>music in major modes.
>
>While this is not unimaginable, I would be very interested to hear what
>music you grew up with (particuarly "sad" musc in major modes). Jewish
>music, maybe ?
Exactly.
>>> Intervals aren't pure symbols
>>>totally uncoupled from meaning.
>
>>Actually, they well might be.
>
>Sorry, I disagree. Just how uncoupled is the numeral "1" from the concept of
>a unit. A physicist or engineer knows better than to claim that his numbers
>are pure symbols and don't refer to reality.
Ah, but we're not making science or engineering. We're moving the
affects.
>
>>> Not only does serialism ignore
>>>musical "conventions"
>
>>Actually, serialism grew out of the conventions of motif, chromaticism, and
>>counterpoint.
>True, but it totally ignores conventional concepts of melody and harmony.
Such as those used throughout the 19th century in Europe?
Where are you getting this concept?
Sorry, you're just plain wrong.
If you don't like the serial music you've heard, that's your business,
but you can't expand your dislike into a universal and justify it by
pseudoscience and expect to be taken seriously.
>>>(and thus become incomprehensible to the listener),
>>>but, more seriously, it ignores fundamental facts of nature such as the
>>>harmonic series.
>>The harmonic series really is overplayed in hack literature about tonality.
>>It does _not_ explain the presense of the note F in the C major scale,
>>nor does it explain the role of conventional cadence formulas.
>Oh, so Pythagoras was a hack author ? The interval of a 4th is consonant (
>relatively speaking) because it is defined in just temperament by a
>mathematically simple ratio.
Surprise, for most of music history--800-1900--the interval of a fourth
above the bass was considered _dissonant_, and led to the expectation
of resolution to the _less-dissonant_ third.
Please go look up consonant and dissonant in Grove. The terms are
cultural, not absolute. The 4:3 ratio does not occur in the harmonic
series. And Pythagorias didn't write anything that scratches the surface
of e.g. Mozart's harmonic practice.
Just consider enharmonicism as employed in Schubert.
We've covered this ground here in rmc before.
>>> Certain intervals are more consonant or dissonant than
>>>others because of the interactions of their overtones.
>>Consonance and dissonance have been variable categories over history.
>>You do realize, don't you, that for hundreds of years, all 3rds and 6ths
>>were considered dissonant.
>If you felt like it, you could define consonance and dissonance
>mathematically by considering the ratio of co-inciding (re-inforcing)
>overtones to non-co-inciding overtones. This is not as useless an excercise
>as it sounds, as it could form the basis of an artificially intelligent
>program to compose music.
_If_ the resulting concepts of consonance and dissonance coincided with
my subjective judgements. Lots of folks have actually attempted to
analyze sound in _just this way_. And it loses the effect of musical context.
>I have yet to be convinced that serialism is not just another reactionary
>movement, albeit a highly intellectualised one.
Hmm, well, I'm not a follower of movements, though I do steal ideas
here and there that I can use. What specific music do you have in mind?
>Personally, I have nothing against atonal music, as such. Some of Bartok's
>pieces are amongst my favourites.
Which? Do you like Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celeste?
> I have yet to find a serial composition
>beautiful or moving, though (without being thrilled to ecstasy by the pure
>geometric forms of the tone rows on the printed page). Conceivably, I
>suppose, one could. But I haven't found it yet.
Start with the Berg violin concerto. Let us know whether you've heard that.
It seems to me more likely that you've been moved to tears by some serial
pieces without being aware that they were serial, and conversely, some pieces
which would otherwise have moved you were blocked because you heard they
were serial beforehand.
>I find it hard to see serialism as more than an initially interesting
>thought experiment that outstayed its welcome and fell into the hands of the
>snobs of the music world.
What are you talking about? Hardly anybody has used it.
Matthew H. Fields
>>From: kbo...@mail.utexas.edu (Ken Booker)
>>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>>As I've said in this thread, and others have said as well, serialism is
>>only a set of tools. It isn't a result...it's a process.
>And could one process conceivably produce better results than another ?
Yes. Any process in the hands of a fine artist will produce better results
than any process--even the same process--in the hands of a lazy bum.
Matthew H. Fields
John Sheehy <jsh...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>fie...@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew H. Fields) writes:
>
>>The harmonic series really is overplayed in hack literature about tonality.
>>It does _not_ explain the presense of the note F in the C major scale,
>>nor does it explain the role of conventional cadence formulas.
>
>the notes of a major scale are derived from one overtone series. What I've
>seen are reference to seven sequential fifths, and small segments of 3
>overtone series combined (Fac Ceg Gbd), whose roots are 3 sequential 5ths,
>the F effectually making a play at being the root of roots.
Hmmm, well, ^3 _is_ supposed to approximate a 5:4 ratio, like a fifth partial,
and only secondarily serve as an upper fifth to ^6...
It's a linguistic convention. There are passages in Daphnis & Chloe where
Ravel actively uses the harmonic series as an orchestral texture...
>But then again, you've probably read a lot more than me, both good and bad
>(or rather, both useful and useless).
Subdominant making a play at... is a neat idea, but isn't intrinsic in
the overtone series of the tonic. It's a convention.
Ryan Mitchley
>From: kbo...@mail.utexas.edu (Ken Booker)
>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>Date: Wed, 04 Oct 1995 10:31:25 -0500
>As I've said in this thread, and others have said as well, serialism is
>only a set of tools. It isn't a result...it's a process.
And could one process conceivably produce better results than another ?
By the way, I'm not confusing serial music with atonal music.
Craig Weston
>Craig Weston <cwe...@iastate.edu> wrote:
>
>(a)
>> There is no reason why serialism cannot be used
>> within a style which respects the assumptions about intervals which
>> you gave above (it's been done, BTW),
>
>> just like there is no reason why tonality cannot be
>> used apart from the styles of historical tonal western composers
>> (that's been done, too).
>
>> Craig Weston
>
>
I don't have the original post anymore, but from what I seem
to remember about his(?) "assumptions about intervals," Berg's
Violin Concerto and pretty-much the whole serial oeuvre of George
Perle would be the obvious examples. Also countless sophomoric
pieces by composition students that discover that just using
triads is a more effecient way to get a lot of thirds and fifths!
Craig Weston
>I am frequently found wistling 20th cen music. In fact, that's how my wife
>finds me in a mall. Some of my Favorites include, Hindemith Bassoon Sonata,
>La Sacre, Schostakovitch Symphony #9, Bartok's Conterto for Orchestra. and
>almost anything by Varese. I also humm my own tone rows and art songs
>-- so much in fact, one morning my wife woke up humming one of my works!
>
>I usually don't wistle Wabern or Berg 'cause the texture is too fragmented
>to carry on the line.
>
Actually, the "thema" from the second movement of Webern's Op. 21
Symphony is immanently wistle-able. (You wistle the clarinat and
harp parts combined.)
If it isn't immediately clear, look at the "anlysis" of those
bars in John Rahn's *Basic Atonal Theory.* That "analysis" is
the highlight of the book, and anyone who hasn't read it should
drop everything right now and do it. Even if you never read the
rest of the book, you have to read that analysis.
Ken Booker
mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za (Ryan Mitchley) wrote:
> In article <kbooker-0410...@slip-11-3.ots.utexas.edu>
kbo...@mail.utexas.edu (Ken Booker) writes:
> >From: kbo...@mail.utexas.edu (Ken Booker)
> >Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
> >Date: Wed, 04 Oct 1995 10:31:25 -0500
>
> >As I've said in this thread, and others have said as well, serialism is
> >only a set of tools. It isn't a result...it's a process.
>
> And could one process conceivably produce better results than another ?
No. It all depends on what you do with it. My defense of atonal procedures
is to say that they are only processes...I never said they were better
than anything, because I simply don't believe that. I tend to use the
tools that will produce the material I need, usually combining atonal and
tonal procedures into a different system for each piece.
Matthew H. Fields
KEITH K HARDWICK <HARD...@vax1.acs.jmu.edu> wrote:
>I usually don't wistle Wabern or Berg 'cause the texture is too fragmented
>to carry on the line.
Hmmm, I caught myself whistling Berg's Lyric Suite on the way to work this
morning... and last night on the way home from work I was whistling some
Webern orchestral movement...hmmm, not from op.10.
Matthew H. Fields
to say something coherent about music without bringing people into the
discussion, and once you do, the wide variability of people is part of
the discussion.
Frank Brickle
mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za wrote:
> In article <brickle-0410...@powermac.ccr-p.ida.org>
bri...@ccr-p.ida.org (Frank Brickle) writes:
> I can't help feeling that a composition that payed as
> much attention to its harmony as to its intellectual antics (inversion,
> retrograde sequence, etc) would be vastly superior to one that didn't.
Agreed. The contention is that there a many such pieces, and they *are*
superior. This doesn't add up to a gripe against "serialism", although
it might be a cause for complaint against some serialists :-)
I'd still say it sounds like a somewhat superficial reaction, anyway.
Rick
> OK...snap judgement on my part. I'll admit it...all I've ever read was
> "The Foundation Trilogy,"
>
> Ken Booker
My wife is the Asimov afficionado in our household. She has read and/or
owns every sci-fi book he ever wrote. He also wrote prolifically about science
and math in ways that laypeople like me can understand. He coined the
term "robotics" which term has been credited by dictionaries, media,
and roboticists in the field.
Asimov was *very* young when he wrote "The Foundation Trilogy".
Asimov must-reads:
short stories:
"I, Robot" [a collection of robot stories]
"The Rest of the Robots" [also a collection of robot stories]
"The Ultimate Question" [a specific short story, considered a classic]
novels:
"The Naked Sun" [a mystery in a sci-fi universe, human-and-robot cop team]
"The Ugly Little Boy" [expanded from a short story by the same name]
"Caves of Steel" [mystery, in a sci-fi universe, same characters as
in "The Naked Sun"]
in "Gold" - posthumous (mostly so-so) short stories and (much better)
previously uncollected essays by Asimov:
good short story:
"Alexander the Greater"
The essays are all excellent.
also:
"Asimov's Guide to the Bible" [not sure of exact title]
Acknowledgements to Janice St. Clair for this information & commentary.
Janice says "I'm a hardcore Heinlein fan, and currently am reading
anything I can find by Spider Robinson."
Rick St. Clair
Rick
> Actually, the "thema" from the second movement of Webern's Op. 21
> Symphony is immanently wistle-able. (You wistle the clarinat and
> harp parts combined.)
Craig, check your thesaurus. *Immanent* is a philosophical term which
means something different from what I think you mean, i.e., "eminently"
[synonyms: foremostly, considerably, extremely, consummately, etc.].
Another frequently mistaken near-homonym, of course, is "imminent" -
which means 'about to occur.'
Rick
[forgive me, I grew up the son of an English professor who was
continually correcting our bad grammar]
Rick
>
> In article <kbooker-0410...@slip-11-3.ots.utexas.edu> kbo...@mail.utexas.edu (Ken Booker) writes:
> >As I've said in this thread, and others have said as well, serialism is
> >only a set of tools. It isn't a result...it's a process.
> And could one process conceivably produce better results than another ?
Processes don't produce *any* results...composers do
Rick
> Yes. Any process in the hands of a fine artist will produce better results
> than any process--even the same process--in the hands of a lazy bum.
I repeat, processes don't produce *any* results...composers do
Rick
>
> In article <44uii2$c...@senator-bedfellow.mit.edu>,
> Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
> >Craig Weston <cwe...@iastate.edu> wrote:
> >(a)
> >> There is no reason why serialism cannot be used
> >> within a style which respects the assumptions about intervals which
> >> you gave above (it's been done, BTW),
> >
>
don't know the Dallapiccola so I can't comment.
Agon? Have you agonized your way through an analysis of this piece?
I haven't in many many years, but my recollection is that Agon's
serialism is on-again-off-again, and the 'pretty, tonal sections'
are non-serial, e.g., the Galliarde and the various fanfare and
interlude sections. Stravinsky seems to use serial technique for
shock value in Agon. In Threni, Movements, and the Requiem he seems to
allot it a deeper purpose, but it borders on academicism and produces
much drier results. I think Stravinsky's Serenade is also a
serial/non-serial hybrid along the line of Agon, but I never
analyzed it.
I'm still waiting for a convincing example of serialism in Craig's
"serialism in a style which respects the assumptions about[tonal]
intervals". Yes, the Berg Violin Concerto partially fills the bill,
but only partially. I don't know about Perle's serial music. If the
piano etude I heard is any indication, I'd say probably not.
Rick St. Clair
Matthew H. Fields
Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
>Processes don't produce *any* results...composers do
Ah, I see, you're not in favor of musical control.
Hmmm, I'm reminded of a passage in Kurtz's ,Ca which calls for a
Tommy-gunner at the back of the orchestra to fire about 800 rounds of
blanks at the audience (after which the headmotif bobs back up---
,Ca is a musical representation of Weebles).
Matthew H. Fields
serial, totally romantic.
Matthew H. Fields
The Desert Music.
William Tsun-Yuk Hsu
>I usually don't wistle Wabern or Berg 'cause the texture is too fragmented
>to carry on the line.
But there are lots of extended Berg sections that are, ummm, whistle-able.
(That's if I can whistle; I hum.) Like Marie's lullaby from Wozzeck,
the string quartet, big chunks of the violin concerto, Lulu...
Bill
Ken Booker
<an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
> Acknowledgements to Janice St. Clair for this information & commentary.
> Janice says "I'm a hardcore Heinlein fan, and currently am reading
> anything I can find by Spider Robinson."
cool list...I also love Heinlein and have read a couple of Spider Robinson
books, several years back...isn't he the guy who wrote the book about the
space sphere built exclusively for the creation of anti-gravity ballets? I
don't remember the name...
Rick
> I find it hard to see serialism as more than an initially interesting
> thought experiment that outstayed its welcome and fell into the hands of the
> snobs of the music world.
It never *was* welcome. Oh well.
Let's replace some words in your sentence:
"I find it hard to see Freud's theory of sexuality as more than
an initially interesting thought experiment that outstayed its welcome
and fell into the hands of the snobs of the psychotherapeutic world."
"I find it hard to see Marx's theory of communism as more than an
initially interesting thought experiment that outstayed its welcome
and fell into the hands of the snobs of the political world."
Hmmmm. You don't have to agree with something to recognize its
importance. Your statement about the history of serialism disregards
its enormous impact on music in this century...an impact which is an
historical fact, whether you choose to acknowledge it or not.
Rick St. Clair
Rick
> serial, totally romantic.
How 'bout his "Paradiso Choruses"? I don't know if they are serial.
Completely romantic, too. If they're serial, another example to
add to the list.
Rick St. Clair
Gregory Taylor
>> > Napoleon, Marx, Michael Jackson, Simone de Beauvoir, and a few other
>> > non-contemporaries together in a Usenet newsgroup.
>>
>> And then we would find out how really boring they are/were and how
>> unlike their public images, too. Except for Asimov, of course... :)
No, no. *Then* we send Janie Austen, Belle van Zuilen, Ginnie Wolf,
Sappho, Sei Shonagon, and Dot Parker in to kick their cyberasses in print.
Given that list of interesting folks, I suppose we could maybe throw in
Ocky Wilde if we *have* to list a boy....
--
I would go to her, lay it all out, unedited. The plot was a simple one,
paraphrasable by the most ingenuous of nets. We life we lead is our only
maybe. The tale we tell is the must that we make by living it. [Richard
Powers, "Galatea 2.2"] Gregory Taylor/Host, RTQE/WORT-FM 89.9/Madison, WI
Craig Weston
I'm never sure about that eminent/iminent/immanent stuff. Given
what passes for the English language on the net, I figured I could
just guess ...
<sarcasm alert>
Maybe someday I'll be able to point out some flaw in one of
your posts in return.
<end sarcasm alert>
Ryan Mitchley
>From: Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi>
>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>Hmmmm. You don't have to agree with something to recognize its
>importance. Your statement about the history of serialism disregards
>its enormous impact on music in this century...an impact which is an
>historical fact, whether you choose to acknowledge it or not.
Umm . . . where did I ever say that serialism didn't have an impact on this
century's music, or that it wasn't important historically ?
Matthew H. Fields
It's been years since I heard that. But I'm pretty sure that
you can trace the row throughout, and show what every note is doing
in a row or two.
Rick
> Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
> >Processes don't produce *any* results...composers do
>
> Ah, I see, you're not in favor of musical control.
Hardly... Composers control processes. When they apply processes
well, the processes work well. An example of a process: Schoenberg's
'method of composing with 12 tones.' Example of that process used
well: Schoenberg's 4th String Quartet. Example of that process not
used well: [insert favorite bad-12-tone-piece here]. Example #2 of a
process: fugue. Example of that process used well: practically any
fugue of Bach. Example of that process not used well: my first fugue.
:)
Rick St. Clair
Rick
> In article <44utbo$4...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
> TreborK910 <trebo...@aol.com> wrote:
> >Matthew Fields says:
> >>Consonance and dissonance have been variable categories over history.
> >>You do realize, don't you, that for hundreds of years, all 3rds and 6ths
> >>were considered dissonant.
Matt, that's only church music. The xtian church had some pretty narrow
definitions about what was good and bad in music, stuff which they
took over from the Greeks, strangely enough. As to the music of the
people, one can only guess, but my guess is that it probably was a
heckuva a lot groovier and had plenty of 3rd, sixths, and probably
2nds and 4ths too.
TreborK910 wrote:
> >Excuse my ignorance, and I know this is an unrelated point, but how could
> >a third or its inversion have EVER been considered 'dissonant' when the
> >triad is the basis for all harmony? I've seen this point made before and
> >it still puzzles me.
Matt again wrote:
> The triad and harmonies based on it was first popularized in ca.13th-century
> England in a manner of singing called various "fa-burden" and "Fauxbourdon"
> (which only used what we'd now call first-inversion triads, and in which
> every phrase always ended with the upper two voices ascending and the
> lower voice descending, so the final sonority was an open fifth).
> Triadic harmonies that sound familiar to our ears spread from there
> in the 14th century, and were pretty firmly in people's ears by the 15th.
> Even then, distinctions were made between the perfect consonances (octave
> and fifths) and imperfects (thirds and sixths)...with the emergence of
> contrapuntal thinking, parallel imperfections were considered contrapuntal,
> but parallel perfections were considered non-contrapuntal (exactly the
> distinction that lasted into the 19th century).
This is all very fine for the church music, and also for the pop music
written by those who wrote music for the church. A straight-laced bunch,
they.
However, even in the church realm, you leave out a huge chunk of pre-faburden,
highly dissonant music -- the polyphony of the 12th and early 13th centuries.
In that era, sometimes called the Notre Dame School and more
comprehensively referred to as the "Ars Antiqua", there are oodles
of harmonies containing shocking discords, shocking even today because
they sound unlike anything before or since. Some of the shorter
3-voice church pieces (forget the technical term here, premature
senility setting in) have really heady dissonances in them. It was
the spread of English faburden into Italy that got the more triad-defined
sense of harmony started which you describe. By then, it was the
Renaissance, and people were more into sensualism (Landini, Machaut, and
later the faburden-influenced fauxbourdon of Dunstable, Dufay and many
others) than the prior dark brooding Notre Dame polyphony. But that's
a jump of 3 centuries in all, and a lot of the music of that time
(the written stuff, of course) has not survived. What was going on
we'll never really know. It's hard to reconstruct history from fossils.
I think there are even some 4-note tone clusters in Perotin's organa.
I'm not swearing to it, but there are some real doozies of dissonance
in Viderunt Omnes and Sederunt Principes.
> But written music (where we pretty well can read the notation) goes back
> to the 6th century.
Neumes mostly up to about the 10th century. If you can read neumes,
you're a better man than me, Charlie Brown.
> Dig some of it out of the library and listen for yourself to how it worked.
> How did motets of various medieval centuries work?
Listen with open ears before you look at the musicological dissertations.
That stuff will bend your mind out of shape and make it impossible
to intuit anything worthwhile from that interesting period of music.
> How did various kinds of organum work? What was Notre Dame Organum?
More interesting, St. Martial organum.
BTW, the 'organa' of Perotin & co. seem to be an updating of the
concept used in comparatively more primitive form in St. Martial and
other schools of the 12th century. Don't know if you're referring to
Perotin's school when you say "Notre Dame Organum". But Perotin School
'organum' is a totally different animal from 'Notre Dame organum' of
the early/middle 12th century, or St. Martial, or others...
Rick St. Clair
Matthew H. Fields
shockingly-dissonant music" was _not_ written by folks who publically admitted
a concept we'd recognize as "chord".
That was what Trebor was talking about, and the concept wasn't around.
Jeffrey Bobis
Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
>Agon? Have you agonized your way through an analysis of this piece?
>I haven't in many many years, but my recollection is that Agon's
>serialism is on-again-off-again, and the 'pretty, tonal sections'
>are non-serial, e.g., the Galliarde and the various fanfare and
>interlude sections. Stravinsky seems to use serial technique for
>shock value in Agon. In Threni, Movements, and the Requiem he seems to
>allot it a deeper purpose, but it borders on academicism
Well, Princeton did commission Requiem Canticles in 1965, so you-know-who
was probably involved in the decision.
and produces
>much drier results. I think Stravinsky's Serenade is also a
I think you might mean Septet instead of Serenade.
>serial/non-serial hybrid along the line of Agon, but I never
>analyzed it.
Actually in the Septet, he does stuff like restrict each instrument to a
single row of notes in the last movement and write with a 16 note series
in the second.
Jeffrey Bobis
KEITH K HARDWICK
>
> Okay, what particular things ? My chief gripe about serialism is that it
> ignores totally the aesthetic/emotional/communicative (call it what you
> will) effects of intervals and harmonies. A major 3rd has a different
> emotional impact from a perfect 5th, etc. Intervals aren't pure symbols
> totally uncoupled from meaning. The human ear (brain ?) can't help reading
> an interpretation into the sounds it hears. Not only does serialism ignore
> musical "conventions" (and thus become incomprehensible to the listener),
> but, more seriously, it ignores fundamental facts of nature such as the
> harmonic series. Certain intervals are more consonant or dissonant than
> others because of the interactions of their overtones. Serialism totally
> ignores these interactions. Unfortunately, the human ear doesn't.
>
> Not all intervals are created equal.
>
A more clear statement would be:
Western ears are trained very early to respond to different
intervals with different "emotional interpretations"
Surely, anyone who listens to Schoenberg knows this-- his music is clearly
romantic! He couldn't help the way he arranged the rows and the harmony--
extreemly romantic.--no?
Keith
__________________________________________________________________________
Keith Hardwick "Gone are the days when I'm inclined to
Hardwikk@ vax1.acs.jmu.edu indulge people in the belief that ignorant"
James Madison University conceits are the same thing as educated
opinion." --Bruce Quaglia
__________________________________________________________________________
Rick
> shockingly-dissonant music" was _not_ written by folks who publically
> admitted a concept we'd recognize as "chord".
From my musicology brainwashing days at Harvard, I recall being told
emphatically that the English faburdenists did *not* think of their
technique as 'chords'. There was a prior organum school which added
a 'vox organalis' in parallel at the perfect fourth above the cantus.
In 14th c. England someone got the bright idea to parallelize with a
third underneath the cantus, thereby stumbling on the now-defined
'first inversion triad'. Thus the 'chord' of this period was viewd by
its practitioners as a purely linear construct, not as a harmonic
construct, though their ears probably told them otherwise. At least that's
the prevailing theory now. The concept of chords did not really arrive,
even as an unspoken rule of thumb until the high renaissance, ca. 1500.
But even in late Dufay, you still see him sliding from chords into open
fifths or octaves to sluff off the offending third. Folks publically
talking about the chord concept came a few generations after that.
> That was what Trebor was talking about, and the concept wasn't
> around.
True, to a point. However, the concept of 'chord' was a long time
a-coming and wasn't really carved in stone until the early basso
continuo days ca./after 1600, with the Monteverdi crowd and a few
precursors of lesser merit.
I thought there was some disbelief in Trebor at the idea that triadic
chords could be considered 'dissonant', and that you were tracing the
historico-aesthetic evolution from a 'perfect concord'-centric musical
universe to an 'imperfect-concord'-centric universe which the former
would have considered (and did consider) discordant and heretical. But
if you are making the defining point the time in history when people
started to *talk* about chords as things, I think you're a few centuries
too early.
Rick St. Clair
Ken Booker
return to an aesthetic as shallow as the 18th Century "Doctrine of the
Affections." This was a beuatifully thought-out system...in their attempt
to codify specific emotions that the different intervals represented, they
were searching for the type of deeper reaching expression found in the
music of the Viennese classics, and moreso with the Romantics.
Rick
Rick wrote:
> >Hmmmm. You don't have to agree with something to recognize its
> >importance. Your statement about the history of serialism disregards
> >its enormous impact on music in this century...an impact which is an
> >historical fact, whether you choose to acknowledge it or not.
>
> Umm . . . where did I ever say that serialism didn't have an impact on this
> century's music, or that it wasn't important historically ?
If it wasn't you, who was it, that said something like serialism was
a brief experiment that wore out its welcome and became the domain
of snobs? That statement pretty much says that serialism wasn't
historically important, to me anyway.
Rick
Matthew H. Fields
musicologists are held to the "brainwashing" requirement of scholarly
honesty. In my opinion, composers thought about what we'd now call
"chords" long before anybody wrote about it---and musicologists can only
document the thinking as definitely having existed by the time somebody
wrote about it.
Ryan Mitchley
>From: Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi>
>Subject: Re: Is modern music still music?
>If it wasn't you, who was it, that said something like serialism was
>a brief experiment that wore out its welcome and became the domain
>of snobs? That statement pretty much says that serialism wasn't
>historically important, to me anyway.
Did you ever do English comprehension tests at school ?
Serialism obviously is of historical importance simply because of the fairly
wide impact it had on 20th century music. I was merely expressing my disdain
at the impact it had (in general).
Let me rephrase that in simple language so that I don't get responses like
this again:
Just because I didn't like something doesn't mean it wasn't important.
Ken Booker
mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za (Ryan Mitchley) wrote:
> An ideal piece of music though, whether serial or not, would be a
> combination of both aesthetic and structural appeal. The two are obviously
> closely linked, but I am doubtful that a music of purely a highly structured
> nature would necessarily have aesthetic appeal.
I agree...but that depends on what the product itself is. I think Boulez's
"Structures I" is beautiful, and it is, at least from what I understand
about the piece, purely the product of a process in which every parameter
is serialized. Some other pieces that can be described in this way,
however, aren't as satisfying.
I guess we can't emphasize enough that serial procedures are only tools.
They aren't products.
Matthew H. Fields
Thanks.
Matthew H. Fields
Ryan Mitchley <mtcr...@scilab.uct.ac.za> wrote:
>the score on paper, then why bother. Someone's sure to bring up fugues round
>about here. As far as I can tell, it's generally easier to appreciate fugal
>devices when simply listening to the piece than with serial pieces.
Of course. But then lots of folks have taken the attitude that fugue
is to be noted by the listener, like the rules of a game; serial materials
are usually construed as _supporting_ the surface, like muscle training and
controlled body form can support expressive dancing.
>An ideal piece of music though, whether serial or not, would be a
>combination of both aesthetic and structural appeal. The two are obviously
>closely linked, but I am doubtful that a music of purely a highly structured
>nature would necessarily have aesthetic appeal.
Right, and on the other hand, I fail to share some listeners' enthusiasm for
Jonathan Richman---"But he's so emotional and sincere, it doesn't matter that
his songs are childish cliches." For me, that music doesn't work.
Heart and mind together. Gotta love it.
Matt
William Tsun-Yuk Hsu
>Obviously there were some serial compositions which were
>constructed with aesthetic appeal in mind, but I believe they were fairly
>rare.
*So*, of the obviously numerous serial compositions that you have
heard, which are the rare compositions that were "constructed with
aesthetic appeal in mind"? (Since they're so rare, surely you can
list them all.) And did you talk to the composers of the
other pieces, and they told you "that's right, I constructed this
piece with no regard to aesthetic appeal"?
>Another doubt I have is how well a human can hear the serial process
>when listening to a piece. If the process can only be revealed by analyzing
>the score on paper, then why bother.
That's a completely separate issue.
Bill
Rick
I think I've covered myself on your arguments, Matt. It was you who
raised the parameter of composers openly talking about chords. What
they thought about and what they said/wrote about it can be worlds
apart. And of course you are right, music theory follows music practice,
though much of the 20th century would have us think otherwise.
Rick St. Clair
Rick
> I agree...but that depends on what the product itself is. I think Boulez's
> "Structures I" is beautiful
Beautiful, perhaps, in the sense that Jackson Pollock is beautiful.
I prefer the phrase, esthetically intriguing. Or better yet, amazing.
Given the limited syntax of pan-serial atonality, Structures I and
some other pieces of that ilk are remarkable. But they don't make me
feel warm and fuzzy, or passionate, or angry, or elevated, or sad, or
anything. Just ... interested, intrigued, diverted, distracted, and in
the end, wondering why this music isn't saying anything.
Rick
Rick
> In article <451dho$b...@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU>,
> Rick <an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
> >In Threni, Movements, and the Requiem he seems to
> >allot it a deeper purpose, but it borders on academicism
> Well, Princeton did commission Requiem Canticles in 1965, so you-know-who
> was probably involved in the decision.
what decision? I saw a picture of Babbitt and Berger & al sitting
at the premiere. Such uptightness. A photo tells a thousand words.
The discomfort vibes that exuded from that photo are beyond imagining
or describing.
BTW, I remember seeing the Requiem score, in Stravinsky's hand (a
blueprint of same) at Harvard a year or two later. Some guy had a
copy and was toting it around the music dept. I thought those Boosey
& Hawkes scores were how Stravinsky looked on paper, until I saw one
of his very own scores. He was just like the rest of us, on that
score.
> >and produces much drier results. I think Stravinsky's Serenade is
> >also a
>
> I think you might mean Septet instead of Serenade.
bingo
> >serial/non-serial hybrid along the line of Agon, but I never
> >analyzed it.
> Actually in the Septet, he does stuff like restrict each instrument to a
> single row of notes in the last movement and write with a 16 note series
> in the second.
>
> Jeffrey Bobis
thanks for the factoids
Rick
Ken Booker
<an23...@anon.penet.fi> wrote:
Sure, I'll agree with that...no argument there. More like Mondriann than
Pollack, though, at least to me...
As far as it's "saying nothing" it doesn't speak to me at all, I guess, I
just think it's a beautiful texture...maybe it doesn't "speak" to us
because there's no real "syntax" to it...at least none that's
percieved...any other thoughts on that? Anyone? I'm just taking a shot...
Frank Brickle
jbo...@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (Jeffrey Bobis) wrote:
> Seriously, though, why do you
> think hanging around Igor would make anyone uncomfortable?
Because by then it also meant hanging around Robert Craft, I suspect.
Osvaldo Quiroga
discussion about serialism. I think it's possible to use serialistic
methods even if your goal is to achieve something that will make people
feel when they listen.
Osvaldo Quiroga
Just Intonation Network
you check out James Tenney's *A History of Consonance and Dissonance*
(University of Toronto Press). Tenney describes five different major
usages of the terms consonance and dissonance (or equivalents) between
classical Greece and the present.
--DBD
KEITH K HARDWICK
> KEITH K HARDWICK writes:
> >I usually don't wistle Wabern or Berg 'cause the texture is too fragmented
> >to carry on the line.
>
I can't believe that I posted "Wabern" to the Global internet. My former
teachers at three big schools across the country have recently recended my
degrees in Music...
Oh my Shame... However to redeem myself I will attempt to spell some other
20th Century composers
Carter
Ives
Berio
Diamond
and a difficult bonus-- Persichetti Ha!
jaq...@en.com
HARDWICK) wrote:
> I can't believe that I posted "Wabern" to the Global internet. My former
> teachers at three big schools across the country have recently recended my
> degrees in Music...
> Oh my Shame... However to redeem myself I will attempt to spell some other
> 20th Century composers
>
> Carter
> Ives
> Berio
> Diamond
>
> and a difficult bonus-- Persichetti Ha!
Ah, but to get fully back into our graces, you must now type Lutoslawski
with the Polish crossed-L thingie.