Aaron Copland’s Short Symphony and the Challenge to Human Supervision and Control in Music

Abstract

In his early works, in particular, the Short Symphony (1931-33), Aaron Copland engaged in various rhythmic innovations that taxed the ability of conventional musical notation to accurately express his thoughts and that challenged orchestral conductors to supervise and control events. Although he accomplished this in the context of the modernist rebellion against the so-called tyranny of the barline, he did so in ways distinguished from that of Stravinsky and other Europeans. The socio-aesthetic implications of this rhythmic style, in particular, the democratic and antiauthoritarion ethos underpinning it, places this impulse in the context of American music as a whole.