Composers Of To-Day Research Articles

ZEKİ ÂRİF ATAERGİN İN KÜRDÎLİHİCAZKÂR MAKAMINDAKİ ESERLERİNİN MAKAMSAL İNCELENMESİ

The aim of the study is to reveal the musical identity and composition characteristics of creations in the Kurdilihicâzkâr maqam which were the most of his creations of esteemed composer Zeki Atarif Ataergin who learned and performed (without compromising from the classical understanding) XIXth Century classical Turkish music. Ataergin, who was the XXth century’s Turkish music artist, is one of the most important performers and composers. He transferred music education and culture of the XIXth century to the XXth century. Since he concerned about Turkish music drifted into the abyss he tried to produce creations which were the classical form and in the forgotten maqams while his colleagues produced creations that were preferred by the public. The fact that Ataergin had influenced his contemporaries and today's composers with these devoted works, makes important to carry out this research. The Descriptive method was used in the research. In accordance with the Descriptive method, it was made benefit of Survey model and Historical model. It is determined that the composer used kurdilihicâzkâr maqam skillfully expressing all features of it and he emphasized prominently melodic variety by using his own performance in his creations.

Archipel Festival, Geneva ‘Multifaceted Games’

From 10 to 20 March 2016, Geneva was transformed into a giant musical playground of sorts: the title of this year's Archipel Festival was ‘Aires de jeux’. Over its 24 editions, the festival has been a showcase for musical creation and has promoted not contemporary music in a broad sense, but rather the music of our time. In a recent interview, the current festival director, Marc Texier, noted that a common misunderstanding is to ‘consider contemporary music as beginning in the post-war period, 70 years ago. That's quite extraordinary! The music of 1945 doesn't have much in common with what is created today. For today's composers, works from 1945 belong to their grandparents or great-grandparent's generations’.

Nordic Music Days 2015, Copenhagen, Denmark

Nordic Music Days claims to be the longest-running annual music festival in the world, having existed as a showcase for contemporary Nordic composers more-or-less continuously since 1888. This longevity raises some questions of category definition: What might unite today's composers working in Helsinki with their counterparts 1,500 miles away in Reykjavík? Has modern communications technology and international study wiped out national characteristics or amplified them? Does anyone working in this year's host city, Copenhagen, ever make the 30-minute journey over the bridge to check out what's going on in Malmö? What, if anything, does being a ‘Nordic composer’ mean?

Becoming-Composer

BECOMING-COMPOSER BRIAN HULSE The process of self-creation is the transformation of the potential into the actual, and the fact of such transformation includes the immediacy of selfenjoyment .1 —Alfred North Whitehead Appreciate how rare and full of potential your situation is in this world, take joy in it, and use it to your best advantage.2 —The Fourteenth Dalai Lama HIS ESSAY CONCERNS THE RAPIDLY CHANGING FIELD of composition and what this means for composers aspiring to make their way in it.3 I say “the” field of composition, as if it were a unified whole, which it is not, and as if I presupposed that the term composition itself belonged firstly to the loose collection of professionals who would be inclined to read this journal, which I do not. However, my thoughts are directed at this latter group even though the word “composition” is problematic and contestable (considering the number of traditions and cultural practices who may rightly lay claim to the term, and especially the wealth of intercultural connections, references, and influences T 220 Perspectives of New Music one would not be surprised to hear on a given new music concert). That is not to say I think composition is an outmoded term, but rather what the term refers to needs rethinking. For example, there are an increasing number of composers who present their works at so-called new music concerts and yet who do not identify with the Western classical tradition, or not primarily; whose musical-cultural referents are elsewhere. Even in the most venerable institutions the practice of composition can no longer be considered synonymous with the idea of a “vanguard” of Western classical music. There are many more musical traditions from around the world that feed into today’s new music than what is more or less known as the Western canon. And of course this has long been so to a degree. But I daresay that some kind of tipping point has been reached where a growing global network of composers may claim any number of backgrounds or practices or traditions . It is hard to escape the conclusion that composition should no longer be identified with or claimed by any one of them, but by all of them (for our goal cannot be to supersede or oppose traditional musical practices—we need these and the world needs these to thrive. We are artist-nomads, not colonists.) Composer Samuel Adler made the point in a recent interview that “we belong to a tradition, not the tradition.”4 That’s a significant acknowledgement. For of course other traditions have long been known to exist by practitioners of Western classical music. To go further to concede that these traditions are equally valid is, historically speaking, a change. Make no mistake, this is just as much a matter of selfaffirmation and preservation as it is a more liberal attitude toward other musical cultures. Adler is a traditionalist. He is closely linked to the influx of German expressionists to the U.S. in the early and mid twentieth century—who practiced (and many of their students continue to practice) a renowned and rigorous musical tradition. This is to be celebrated and treasured. And composers who belong to this tradition and who intend to foster it rightfully belong at the table with every other practitioner of what I see to be an emerging world composition practice—a practice without a ruling genre but rather one with the capacity to engage any genre or combination of genres. With the above in mind I’d like to address the emerging, “globallyminded ” composers of today, particularly those who study or have studied in traditional Western academic environments. My topics include: 1) issues of composition pedagogy and technique; 2) some of the attitudes and challenges facing emerging composers (including a discussion of some of the results of an anonymous survey I administered at the 2012 edition of the soundSCAPE Festival);5 and 3) larger Becoming-Composer 221 questions about the cultural and artistic significance of “becomingcomposer ” in the twenty-first century. I’ll start with this question: what does it mean to teach—and learn— the craft of composition, especially in light...

"Something Slightly Indecent": British Composers, the European Avant-garde, and National Stereotypes in the 1950s

To Robert P. Morgan The more “advanced” composers of today seem to many people to be concentrating on writing music which the malcontents describe angrily as “cerebral”—a manipulation of notes for pure manipulation's sake, disregardful of any appeal to a public hungry for satisfaction of what it calls its “heart.” To most of this music, and the new values implied in it, the public has long put up, and still puts up, a stubborn resistance. I make no comment on that fact; I simply record it as a fact.1

Scènes De Ballet – Ashton and Stravinsky Modernism

'If God said, you have one left that would be it.'1 It was in these terms that Ashton spoke of his 1948 Scenes de Ballet. To Stravinsky's eponymous score, this ballet for Margot Fonteyn, Michael Somes, a further four men and twelve women, with scenery and costumes by Andre Beaurepaire, has become one of Ashton's most widely acclaimed works. Yet there remains much more to be said about this extraordinarily complex ballet, particularly about its musical aspects and treatment of a score by the twentieth century's most celebrated ballet composer. First, Ashton's ballet can be set in a fuller historical context. In an essay contemporary with the making of the work, Ashton tells us that Stravinsky had 'always been a favourite composer', and 'among the few composers of today who thinks in a really contemporary way'.2 Given Stravinsky's already seminal role as a ballet composer, there might well have been something of an aura attached to the act of setting his music. Ashton particularly admired the work of Balanchine and Nijinska and their Stravinsky ballets that he certainly knew by 1948. He had seen Balanchine's Apollo (1928) and Nijinska's Les JNoces (1923) (and had danced in the latter's Le Baiser de la fee (1928)), and these ballets undoubtedly informed his note that the score 'works up to a true apotheosis in the magnificent style so typical of Stravinsky'. Ashton also claims satisfaction that

‘Music is not a solitary act’: conversation with Luciano Berio

The house is tucked away behind a corner of the road. Once you have passed the gate, the entrance lane, three sleepy dogs, the hall, a spacious living room and the doors to the terrace, you are face to face with the most magnificent Tuscan landscape imaginable. The view of the hills is unspoilt, as is the silence around. It's the ideal place for Luciano Berio to create the colourful, imaginative sound-world that has made him, at the age of 70, one of the most popular and admired composers of today.

Satie's "Entr'acte:" A Model of Film Music

No consideration of film music can afford to overlook the unique contribution of that eccentric genius of the twenties, Erik Satie. Simple, flowing, sometimes ingratiating, his music lends itself well to film, particularly to collage films in experimental cinema.2 Never has the cinematic affinity of Satie's music been better demonstrated than in the score he wrote to accompany Rene Clair's film interlude for Francis Picabia's Dadaist ballet, Reldche (1924).3 It an inventive score without peer, at once durable and distinguished, says Virgil Thomson. Its excellence is due to Satie's having understood correctly the limitations and possibilities of a photographic narrative as subject matter for music.4 Satie's score provides a useful model for today's composers and film makers, especially because it anticipated over 50 years ago some of the structural concepts now in vogue in the arts.5

The Music of Leopold Spinner: A Preliminary Study

Leopold Spinner a composer in a unique position. Can there be another living composer of comparable integrity, mastery and imagination who is so little known and so seldom performed? At the age of 68 he is, I believe, one of the outstanding composers of today; and yet those who have had only a cursory glance at his published scores seem to have dismissed them as mere imitations of his master, Webern. This view misses the point completely; nevertheless one can understand why cursory glances lead to such conclusions. To quote Spinner himself: …more important for me and much more difficult to comment upon is the ‘first and simplest answer’ which ‘leaps from the pages of my published scores’, namely that I revere Webern's music. Yes, this is quite true; I do, very much; and I don't see why it should be a gross impertinence to ask such a question, even if the answer does already leap from the pages of my scores. However, I also have the greatest admiration for the music of Mozart and Haydn, Bach, Beethoven and Schubert, Brahms, Schumann, Bruckner and Mahler, Schoenberg and Berg…. Might it not be that such more or less common characteristics [between related composers of the same period] are not only the expression of personal implications, but are also the reflection of fundamental historical considerations determining the evolution of purely musical concepts? I believe that if the true historic significance of Webern's music were better understood in all its aspects—for instance, the predominance and total engagement of motivic obligation as the structurally unifying factor in a complete fusion between traditional homphonic concepts and the strictest polyphonic presentation—then perhaps it might be possible to refer in factual terms to purely musical concepts and leave all reverence and admiration to take care of themselves.

Composing for Orchestra

THERE IS much discussion these days regarding the future of the symphony orchestra, the future-and indeed, the present-of orchestral music, and the place that both occupy in the view of today's composers. The most pessimistic prognoses predict the imminent demise of the symphony orchestra, or, at best, its maintenance as a mere museum custodian of eighteenthand nineteenth-century European musical repertory. A corollary view claims that ever since the mid-1950's composers have been turning away from the orchestra for a host of practical and musical reasons. A few prominent conductors have even gone so far as to suggest that the young composers of today are no longer interested in writing for the orchestra and that the genre symphonic music has lost the attraction as a performance medium which it enjoyed earlier in the century. Many of these dire prognostications are, of course, utter nonsense. To a large extent, they merely reflect in various ways the confusions and inner apprehensions of those who make such statements. While there are undeniably serious hazards and problems attendant to the performance of new music, which affect composers, performers, and orchestra managements alike, it is simply an irresponsible generalization to say that composers are no longer interested in the orchestra as a medium.

America's Influence on Its Emigre Composers

IN THE wake of the political turmoil of the early 1930's composers began to emigrate from Europe to the United States. The wave of migration reached its peak when Germany, ruled by the National Socialist Party, set out to absorb neighboring territories; it reached its conclusion with the collapse of France. Even while these events were in process, an interest arose in their bearing on the creative work of the composers affected by them. The question was raised to what extent this work was influenced by their more or less forcible, unplanned departure from customary surroundings and by their new living conditions. It might be worthwhile to take up this question once again, for the answers to it today are likely to be different from those of some thirty or more years ago. The very composers in question have been inclined to consider the influence of these events as insignificant. One might explain this as revealing a defensive attitude on their part, a kind of psychological mechanism that comes into play to protect the self-confidence of the emigre. He seeks shelter, it would seem, in convincing himself that the shock of uprooting did not encroach upon his innermost life substance. Guided by this point of view, the emigrant is likely to maintain that he would have composed whatever he did compose after settling in his new milieu even without this change. He is likely to maintain that all deviations from his earlier modes of writing, in the event that such can be observed, are the result of an inner development that has nothing to do with outer circumstances. As a matter of fact, this view is hard to invalidate, for there is no way of setting up an experiment that would demonstrate what a man would have created had he not emigrated. Yet from the present vantage point, the matter seems to take on a somewhat different appearance. The emigration of a group of renowned composers, and a string of lesserknown men, hit America at a time when the appeal for an autonomous musical production became increasingly louder in its formulation. The generation of seventy-year-old composers of today had reached full maturity, coming forth with the demand to be acknowledged as creators of the first original

Letter from Italy

THE assessment of important musical works is less the concern of the chronicler than is the recording of the conventions of a time, those devices that have made their way into the wide band of all who write music at a given period. Such a varied cross-section as was presented at the 25th International Festival of Contemporary Music sponsored by the Biennale of Venice reveals for the chronicler the status quo of music in Western Europe at this time. And it is not too much to say that the works of almost all concerned, from the established figures of the older generation to those young talents just emerging, take their outward garb, though not their point of initiation, from the world wrought by Webern. It is perhaps beside the point to ask what Webern himself would have thought of all of this, for his concerns were far different from those of today's composers who use the kind of musical appearance that he initiated. We know from Webern's familiars that he was most

Some Polish Composers of To-Day

It is ten years since KAROL SZYMANOWSKI died at fifty-four. He was the most prominent representative of the “radical progressive” group of early twentieth century composers, which we call “Young Poland.” In their manysided and pioneering efforts they prepared the fertile soil on which Poland's present day's music thrives.

Composers of Today. A Comprehensive Biographical and Critical Guide to Modern Composers of All Nations. David Ewen

<i>Composers of Today. A Comprehensive Biographical and Critical Guide to Modern Composers of All Nations</i>. David Ewen

'On Inspiration: Being Opinions Expressed by Eminent Composers of To-Day on a Subject of General Interest'

'On Inspiration: Being Opinions Expressed by Eminent Composers of To-Day on a Subject of General Interest'

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. Postludium (Continued)

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. Postludium (Continued)

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. VIII. Vincenzo Tommasini

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. VIII. Vincenzo Tommasini

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. VII: Vittorio Gui (Continued)

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. VII: Vittorio Gui (Continued)

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. VI. Alfredo Casella (Continued)

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. VI. Alfredo Casella (Continued)

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. V. Vincenzo Davico (Continued)

Some Italian Composers of To-Day. V. Vincenzo Davico (Continued)