Listening to the Music Itself

Abstract

In “Music and the Time Screen” (1976), Elliott Carter outlines rhythmic procedures in several of his pieces, and then indicates that he has discussed only “the outer shell” and remained silent on “the issues and visions most important and significant during the act of composing.” Following up on these comments, I present a two-part analysis of his “In Genesis” from In Sleep, In Thunder (1981). Part I (“The Shell”) focuses on techniques emphasized in Carter’s writings—large-scale polyrhythms, metric modulations, notated accelerandi and all-interval twelve-tone chords. Part II (“Breaking Through”) deals with other topics: pitch relationships involving the perfect fifths that articulate the large-scale polyrhythms and notated accelerandi, focal pitches that encapsulate the divinity/humanity dichotomy in the poem, motivic unity in the vocal line, and other spontaneous interrelationships that contribute local and long-range coherence.