String Trio Research Articles

Voice Leading, Register, and Contextualization in Three Major-Third Cycles by Mozart

Abstract: While major-third cycles from the nineteenth century are abundant and well studied, they are rare in the eighteenth century and remain poorly understood. Remarkably, we find three major-third cycles in two E♭ major works composed by Mozart in 1788: one in the finale of the Symphony K. 543, and one each in the first movement and the finale of the Divertimento for String Trio, K. 563. In this article, I analyze how Mozart integrates these anomalous equal divisions of the octave into the tonal language of the classical style. In doing so, I further our understanding of eighteenth-century chromatic practice and shine a light on some pitfalls of reductive analysis. Using a combination of Schenkerian and neo-Riemannian tools, I analyze the concrete voice-leading patterns and registral connections Mozart draws out of these abstract structures. I critique existing tendencies to regard these progressions as mere connectors, and caution against premature imposing uninform voice-leading patterns or register on them in analysis. Ultimately, I argue we need to take these oft-neglected parameters into account when assessing how these cycles function in the context of Mozart’s developmental scripts.

10.36871/hon.202402137

This article is devoted to the musical style of Yuri Kasparov (b. 1955), Russian composer and music teacher, Professor at the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory, who writes primarily chamber music. Many of his compositions are scored for a chamber orchestra comprising flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, horn, trumpet, trombone, harp, piano, percussion, two violins, viola, cello and double bass (an instrumentation derived from A. Schoenberg’s Chamber Symphony No. 1). His works include over 80 chamber compositions of different genres written for one to 17 instruments. He tends to use non-standard instrumentation rather than ensembles typical for classical music such as string quartet, string trio, piano quintet, etc. Most of the techniques common to the avant-garde music are found in Kasparov’s works: the twelve-tone technique, sonorism, aleatoric music, electroacoustic music, musique concrète, performance, instrumental theatre, sound collage. Still, he remains quite a traditional composer that does not break down the boundaries of what is considered “musical” and “non-musical” sound. Kasparov’s music is beautiful, emotional, easy to understand, full of melodies and continuous instrumental solos. A simple word “beauty” becomes a stylistic innovation in his music. Kasparov believes that contemporary music can be divided into two categories: sonorism and “musical graphics”. Sonorism is focused on timbre, while “musical graphics” is distinguished by a greater use of pitch. Most of Kasparov’s works can be considered sonoristic, but today he prefers “musical graphics” — “colorless black and white composition” in which “line is important”.

Serenade in D Major for Orchestra by Ethel Smyth (review)

Reviewed by: Serenade in D Major for Orchestra by Ethel Smyth Jennifer Oates Ethel Smyth. Serenade in D Major for Orchestra. Edited by John L. Snyder. Middleton, WI: A-R Editions, 2021. (Recents Researches in the Music of the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries, v. 84) [1 score (xxiv, 190 p.) ISBN: 9781987206302, $425; 1 facsimile (viii, 140 p.) ISBN 9781987206326, $60] John L. Snyder's two-volume critical edition of Ethel Smyth's Serenade in D serves as the first commercial publication of the composer's first orchestral work. The edition consists of two volumes: a critical edition of the score and a reproduction of the manuscript. Each volume has a unique introduction allowing Snyder to maximize the use of his sources. Transcriptions of Smyth's program notes for the premiere, and over two dozen reviews are also included. Performance parts are available for rental via A-R Editions. In addition to this being the first published score of the Serenade, there is only one commercial recording (Ethel Smyth, Concerto for Violin, Horn & Orchestra; Serenade, BBC Philharmonic, cond. Odaline de la Martínez, Chandos CHAN 9449 [2006], CD). Some of Smyth's compositions are available via open-source websites, such as IMSLP, her publisher Universal Edition, or have been published in modern performance editions. At least one facsimile edition of a Smyth manuscript, her String Trio in D (see below), has been published. As far as I can tell, Snyder's marks the first critical edition of a Smyth composition. This is her first appearance in the Recent Researches in Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries series, which includes twelve volumes by British composers (four of which feature the music of Alice Mary Smith). An edition of her music has yet to appear in Musica Britannica. Indeed, no volume of Musica Britannica is devoted to women composers or a single female composer. As a seminal figure in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century music, a critical edition of Smyth's work is overdue. While her so-called "eccentricities" (e.g., being queer, a tendency to dress in a masculine manner, and a penchant for smoking cigars) helped capture the public's attention, her music earned and deserved its place in the concert halls and opera houses of Britain and on the continent. In Britain, she bucked traditions by carving out her own path and finding success without necessarily being a part of the unofficial inner circle of composers and conductors that dominated the musical scene in London. Like many British composers, Smyth benefitted from August Manns's interest. Manns, then conductor at the Crystal Palace and one of the foremost champions of British music at the time, requested an orchestral work after seeing a manuscript of one of her string quartets. She sent him the Serenade in D, her first orchestral work. The composition was first performed under Manns at the Crystal Palace on 26 April 1890. Several months later, he performed her Overture to Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra. While the Serenade in D appears to have been well received at the time, it has not been performed much since then. Smyth's Serenade in D is in four movements, though, unlike traditional symphonies, there is no slow movement. The outer allegro movements are in sonata-form while the inner two are ternary allegro and allegretto movements. The orchestration is sparse by [End Page 660] late nineteenth-century standards: 2 flutes (flute 2 doubles on piccolo at times), 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 3 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and five-part strings (including contrabasses). While Snyder suggests that Smyth chose the title Serenade based on the lack of a slow movement, the composer's program notes clearly explains her rationale: "The claim of the work to the title 'Serenade,' lies chiefly in the fact that the prevailing character of its four movements may be described as respectively lyrical and humorous; and the intention is further carried out in the composition of the orchestra (without trombones) and the dimensions of each individual movement" (p. xv and Plate 1). Locating and identifying the manuscript required significant detective work. Snyder corresponded with Smyth's estate, Universal Edition, librarians, and fellow Smyth...

Dark Virtuosity: Violin Symbolism in Alberto Iglesias's Score for Pedro Almodóvar's Film The Skin I Live In (2011)

AbstractSingled out as one of the finest and most original works by the leading film-music composer Alberto Iglesias, the score for Pedro Almodóvar's The Skin I Live In (2011) stands out for its inclusion of a (neo-baroque) virtuoso part for solo violin with key symbolic functions in the film. This part is largely derived from the composer's post-minimalist string trio Cautiva (c. 1990). The present article analyses Iglesias's reconfiguration of key materials from Cautiva to express the relationship of domination, violence, and desire between the film's villain and the heroine as well as the role played by violin virtuosity in establishing links to the (gothic) horror genre and in the exaltation of the artist's power as creator that Almodóvar ultimately reflects upon in The Skin I Live In. The article adds to recent studies on the centuries-old symbolism of the violin as a topos of the demonic and otherworldly by analysing these meanings in one of the finest contemporary film scores. The study is part of a recent upsurge of critical assessments of Almodóvar–Iglesias's work from cultural and musico-analytical perspectives.

МАКПАЛ БЕКМАГАМБЕТОВА — ИЗ СОЗВЕЗДИЯ ВЫДАЮЩИХСЯ СКРИПАЧЕЙ КАЗАХСТАНА

For the first time under scientific analysis are subjected various activities of the Honoured Artist of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Professor M. Kh. Bekmagambetova: her performing, creative, pedagogical, musical and social work. She is one of the leading violinists of the XXIst century. The violin school of Kazakhstan today is developing dynamically, and the contribution of the students of the Central Music School and the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory is evident. Makpal Bekmagambetova studied under bright representatives of the Moscow violin school (M. V. Kurdyumov, S. B. Bezrodnaya, O. V. Kaverzneva, Z. U. Shikhmurzaeva). The violinist saloed with famous groups of Kazakhstan and Turkey, performed with the conductors F. Sh. Mansurov, T. A. Abdrashev, B. K. Musakhodzhaeva. In the 1990s, Makpal Bekmagambetova was among the first Kazakh musicians to organize chamber commercial orchestras ("Altyn Alma", "Academy of Soloists") and quartets. For 8 years, she successfully worked as an accompanist at the Süreyya Opera House (Istanbul, at the invitation of the Turkish side). The violinist has a characteristic feature of bringing together bright representatives of the Turkic world into a single musical space. It was Makpal who initiated the String Trio consisting of M. Bekmagambetova (violin), A. Mukanov (cello) as a family duo, and professor Eser Bilgeman Shakir (piano) from Istanbul Conservatory. Through her concert and pedagogical work M. Kh. Bekmagambetova made a certain contribution to the development of violin performance in Kazakhstan.

Jonathan Harvey's String Trio: The rustic and the sacred

In his Program Note for the String Trio (2004), Jonathan Harvey noted that this work features "two main (and contrasting) types of music-the rustic and the sacred." Harvey defines his "rustic" style as folkloristic, while the "sacred" is based on his liturgical drama, Passion and Resurrection. In this article, I examine Harvey's use of both conventional and experimental techniques and distinct gestures to examine the two contrasting worlds of the worldly and the ethereal, which ultimately fuse through Harvey's musical and spiritual journey in this work.

Komposition im Medienwandel. Operationsketten als kompositorische Strategien bei Peter Ablinger, Bernd Thewes und Isabel Mundry

The article conceives of composition within the context of a cultural media history. For a better understanding of compositional processes, the media situation of the respective historical period must be considered. The text develops a media perspective of contemporary composition and explores the influence of media practice on compositional processes. This perspective is developed by introducing three compositions that are performed in a traditional concert-situation. Common to all three pieces is a concept based on multiple operational chains that describe processes of medial transfer. Peter Ablinger’s Das Orchester for CD and orchestra (2005) uses computer technology to filter sounds recorded in the city of Graz, Austria into an orchestral piece. His work is media-reflexive since it highlights the disparaties between the medial sound carrier (the sound recording) and the orchestra. Bernd Thewes also uses filtering technology in his Die siebende Gestalt. SPEECH REMIX nach Jakob Böhme for orchestra (2007). Unlike Ablinger, Thewes strives for a compositional situation in which technically supported sound generation and free compositional invention do not diverge. While he interacts with the technical media, subjective decisions within the compositional process are not excluded. Isabel Mundry’s Sandschleifen for string trio, percussion and piano (2003) is equally based on a multiple operational chain, although Mundry does not use technical equipment. The piece transfers a text into music; the text again transfers a picture into words. Mundry stresses the subjective aspects of composition. However, the discussion of her work induces the discussion to what extent her term for compositional transfer-processes “touching” [Abtasten], reminiscent of phonography, betrays a disposition informed by medial technique. The three discussed pieces are examples of the integration of medial transfer – with all its possibilities, its gaps, breaks and limits – into the compositional structure. They exploit new media techniques to create aesthetic experience. This is an important contribution by the arts to contemporary culture understood as media culture. Marshall McLuhan’s argument that the use of media is usually unconscious remains valid. The arts, with their media-reflexive potential, contribute to a better understanding of media. This suggests the necessity of a media-reflexive turn in music theory and musicology.

Violin technique and the contrapuntal imagination in 17th-century German lands

Abstract This article examines the interplay of performing technique and compositional structure in the works of four violinist-composers from late 17th-century German-speaking lands: Johann Jakob Walther, Johann Paul von Westhoff, Heinrich Biber and Johann Georg Pisendel. Focusing on these musicians’ complex polyphonic writing, the article argues that the physical techniques necessary to perform their works—specifically, those developed as a corrective to the challenges of pre-chinrest shifting—are associated with a particular way of conceptualizing and imagining counterpoint on the violin. The article goes on to trace the legacy of violinistic counterpoint in the music of later composers, including in Johann Sebastian Bach’s unaccompanied Sonatas and Partitas, and Ludwig van Beethoven’s String Trio, op.9 no.1. Along the way, the article speculates as to whether the musical imaginations of past composers, performers and listeners are accessible to modern-day enquiry. It concludes by arguing that a lack of explicit documentary evidence need not be an impediment in the investigation of historical practices, providing an alternative to the ‘positivistic’ approach often criticized in recent discussions of historically informed performance.

News

News

Bach in Italy, 22–28 November 2020

Bach in Italy, 22–28 November 2020 Chiara Bertoglio The international conference “Bach and Italy” took place in a digital format from 22 to 28 November 2020. It was co-organized by the Association JSBach.it, founded by Maria Borghesi and myself, by the Conservatory “G. Verdi” of Turin, and by the Istituto per i Beni Musicali in Piemonte, a research institution for the promotion of the musical heritage of Piedmont. The conference committee included Kenneth L. Hamilton (Cardiff University), Michael Heinemann (Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber, Dresden), Stefano Leoni (Conservatory “G.Verdi” of Turin), Michael Maul (Bach Festival and Bach-Archiv Leipzig), Ruth Tatlow (Uppsala University and Bach Network), and Yo Tomita (Queen’s University Belfast and Bach Network), along with Maria Borghesi and myself, representing JSBach.it. The Covid-19 situation led us to consider various options for restructuring an event that had originally been planned in a traditional form. After much pondering, we decided to broadcast the conference on our social media channels, to make it available at no charge, and to maintain an archive of all videos, which will constitute a repository of research, knowledge, and music for all those interested in Bach. Moreover, we decided to extend the conference’s duration from the initial three days to an entire week, in order for the sessions and other events to be more temporally distanced, and thus to allow the audience more time to enjoy the rich program. The result exceeded our expectations in many respects. The artistic and scholarly level of the presentations, roundtables, keynotes, and concerts was very high. Moreover, following the presentations in each session, debate was encouraged by the chairs, and it involved both the session’s speakers (who were virtually gathered in a “room” provided by a videoconference platform) and the audience following the session on social media. Listeners were invited to interact by writing their questions and comments in the social media chat, and this resulted in long and fruitful discussions, frequently longer than one hour. Thus, one of the most important aspects of scholarly gatherings, that is, the discussion and interaction, was not sacrificed due to the need for social distancing. Another unexpected result was that speakers, audience, and [End Page 72] organizers alike distinctly felt a strong “human” component, in spite of the undeniable lack of proximity, and the feedback we received was uniformly enthusiastic. The conference began in the evening of 22 November with an opening ceremony, during which Maria Borghesi and myself briefly discussed the two main currents of research concerning “Bach and Italy,” that is, the inspiration Italy provided to Bach and the Italian reception of his music and figure. Our speeches were framed by excerpts from Bruno Giuranna’s transcription of the Goldberg Variations for string trio, performed by the young musicians of the Trio Quodlibet. The ceremony was filmed in one of the most breathtaking baroque palaces of Piedmont, the Reggia di Venaria Reale. On Monday, 23 November, the day opened with a special episode of “Un caffè con JSBach.it,” a video podcast series started by JSBach.it during the spring lockdown. The day’s guest was Kenneth L. Hamilton, who was interviewed about Liszt’s reception of Bach and who beautifully played Liszt’s version of Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen, Zagen BWV 12. In the afternoon, the first session, conducted in Italian and chaired by Annarita Colturato (University of Turin), was dedicated to Bach’s reception of Italy and included presentations about Bach and the seconda prattica (Enrico Baiano, who presented a lecture-recital at the harpsichord), the origins of the Harpsichord Concerto No. 1 in D Minor BWV 1052 (Fabrizio Ammetto), and a lecture-recital on Bach and Vivaldi (Giorgio Dellarole). The following session, chaired by Valentina Bensi, included a presentation by Beatrice Birardi focusing on Bach’s music in fascist radio broadcasts, and one by Francesco Leprino on a documentary film he created on Bach’s Die Kunst der Fuge. The day closed with a fascinating keynote speech by Michael Maul, who has investigated Bach’s interest in Italian music throughout his creative life, arguing that “Herr Bach” was also, in part, a “Signor Bach.” The following...

Bach in Italy, 22–28 November 2020

Bach in Italy, 22–28 November 2020 Chiara Bertoglio The international conference “Bach and Italy” took place in a digital format from 22 to 28 November 2020. It was co-organized by the Association JSBach.it, founded by Maria Borghesi and myself, by the Conservatory “G. Verdi” of Turin, and by the Istituto per i Beni Musicali in Piemonte, a research institution for the promotion of the musical heritage of Piedmont. The conference committee included Kenneth L. Hamilton (Cardiff University), Michael Heinemann (Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber, Dresden), Stefano Leoni (Conservatory “G.Verdi” of Turin), Michael Maul (Bach Festival and Bach-Archiv Leipzig), Ruth Tatlow (Uppsala University and Bach Network), and Yo Tomita (Queen’s University Belfast and Bach Network), along with Maria Borghesi and myself, representing JSBach.it. The Covid-19 situation led us to consider various options for restructuring an event that had originally been planned in a traditional form. After much pondering, we decided to broadcast the conference on our social media channels, to make it available at no charge, and to maintain an archive of all videos, which will constitute a repository of research, knowledge, and music for all those interested in Bach. Moreover, we decided to extend the conference’s duration from the initial three days to an entire week, in order for the sessions and other events to be more temporally distanced, and thus to allow the audience more time to enjoy the rich program. The result exceeded our expectations in many respects. The artistic and scholarly level of the presentations, roundtables, keynotes, and concerts was very high. Moreover, following the presentations in each session, debate was encouraged by the chairs, and it involved both the session’s speakers (who were virtually gathered in a “room” provided by a videoconference platform) and the audience following the session on social media. Listeners were invited to interact by writing their questions and comments in the social media chat, and this resulted in long and fruitful discussions, frequently longer than one hour. Thus, one of the most important aspects of scholarly gatherings, that is, the discussion and interaction, was not sacrificed due to the need for social distancing. Another unexpected result was that speakers, audience, and [End Page 72] organizers alike distinctly felt a strong “human” component, in spite of the undeniable lack of proximity, and the feedback we received was uniformly enthusiastic. The conference began in the evening of 22 November with an opening ceremony, during which Maria Borghesi and myself briefly discussed the two main currents of research concerning “Bach and Italy,” that is, the inspiration Italy provided to Bach and the Italian reception of his music and figure. Our speeches were framed by excerpts from Bruno Giuranna’s transcription of the Goldberg Variations for string trio, performed by the young musicians of the Trio Quodlibet. The ceremony was filmed in one of the most breathtaking baroque palaces of Piedmont, the Reggia di Venaria Reale. On Monday, 23 November, the day opened with a special episode of “Un caffè con JSBach.it,” a video podcast series started by JSBach.it during the spring lockdown. The day’s guest was Kenneth L. Hamilton, who was interviewed about Liszt’s reception of Bach and who beautifully played Liszt’s version of Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen, Zagen BWV 12. In the afternoon, the first session, conducted in Italian and chaired by Annarita Colturato (University of Turin), was dedicated to Bach’s reception of Italy and included presentations about Bach and the seconda prattica (Enrico Baiano, who presented a lecture-recital at the harpsichord), the origins of the Harpsichord Concerto No. 1 in D Minor BWV 1052 (Fabrizio Ammetto), and a lecture-recital on Bach and Vivaldi (Giorgio Dellarole). The following session, chaired by Valentina Bensi, included a presentation by Beatrice Birardi focusing on Bach’s music in fascist radio broadcasts, and one by Francesco Leprino on a documentary film he created on Bach’s Die Kunst der Fuge. The day closed with a fascinating keynote speech by Michael Maul, who has investigated Bach’s interest in Italian music throughout his creative life, arguing that “Herr Bach” was also, in part, a “Signor Bach.” The following...

Under the sign of playing: C. M. Weber’s Piano Quartet

Under the sign of playing: C. M. Weber’s Piano Quartet

Commissioning Brian Cherney’s String Trio

The author offers a personal account of the events that led him to commission Brian Cherney’s String Trio in 1976 for CBC Radio Music. The trio was first heard on the Two New Hours radio program in 1978, along with solo works for violin, viola, and cello by the German composer Bernd Alois Zimmermann. In 1979 the trio was submitted for consideration to the International Rostrum of Composers, and it was chosen as a recommended work, which resulted in the trio being broadcast in twenty-five countries, significantly enhancing Cherney’s international reputation. The performers who premiered the trio also recorded it, allowing further audiences to appreciate this important work.

Brian Cherney’s String Trio: Transcendent Pedagogy and the Spiritualization of Technique

Brian Cherney’s pedagogical and compositional philosophy is examined from the perspective of transcendent intention. Both in teaching composition and in his own works, Cherney emphasizes technique, attention to details, a convincing formal architecture, and the power of music to give expression to fundamental human emotions and experiences. Drawing upon the philosopher Henri Bergson’s concepts about the “nature of creative consciousness,” the author finds striking parallels between Bergson’s ideas and Cherney’s music. Analytical observations on Cherney’s String Trio are tied to the composer’s pedagogical approach, which profoundly influenced the author both as a composer and as a teacher. Cherney’s String Trio confronts the listener with a work in which the spiritual expression of a universal impermanence is manifested in the music itself in various ways that are illuminated and discussed using specific musical examples.

Symphonies Reframed

Symphonies Reframed recreates symphonies as chamber music. The project aims to capture the features that are unique for chamber music, at the juncture between the “soloistic small” and the “orchestral large”. A new ensemble model, the “triharmonic ensemble” with 7-9 musicians, has been created to serve this purpose. By choosing this size range, we are looking to facilitate group interplay without the need of a conductor. We also want to facilitate a richness of sound colours by involving piano, strings and winds. The exact combination of instruments is chosen in accordance with the features of the original score. The ensemble setup may take two forms: nonet with piano, wind quartet and string quartet (with double bass) or septet with piano, wind trio and string trio. As a group, these instruments have a rich tonal range with continuous and partly overlapping registers. This paper will illuminate three core questions: What artistic features emerge when changing from large orchestral structures to mid-sized chamber groups? How do the performers reflect on their musical roles in the chamber ensemble? What educational value might the reframing unfold? Since its inception in 2014, the project has evolved to include works with vocal, choral and soloistic parts, as well as sonata literature. Ensembles of students and professors have rehearsed, interpreted and performed our transcriptions of works by Brahms, Schumann and Mozart. We have also carried out interviews and critical discussions with the students, on their experiences of the concrete projects and on their reflections on own learning processes in general. Chamber ensembles and orchestras are exponents of different original repertoire. The difference in artistic output thus hinges upon both ensemble structure and the composition at hand. Symphonies Reframed seeks to enable an assessment of the qualities that are specific to the performing corpus and not beholden to any particular piece of music. Our transcriptions have enabled comparisons and reflections, using original compositions as a reference point. Some of our ensemble musicians have had first-hand experience with performing the original works as well. Others have encountered the works for the first time through our productions. This has enabled a multi-angled approach to the three central themes of our research. This text is produced in 2018.

‘THE BRIGHT PLACES OF LIFE AS CLEARLY AS THE DARK’: THE MUSIC OF LINDA BUCKLEY

AbstractLinda Buckley is one of the leading figures in the thriving Irish new music scene, a composer whose work draws together many different elements, from spectralism, to ambient electronica, to minimalism and Irish traditional music. This article uses five works created in the last decade as lenses through which to examine a creative practice in which these apparently disparate elements have become increasingly integrated. From the 2008 string trio, Fiol, to the orchestral work Chiyo (2011), to Torann for large ensemble and electronics (2015), and finally to two works with string quartet, ó íochtar mara (2015) and Haza (2016), these works represent stages within the evolution of a highly distinctive musical language.

On Wuorinen's String Trio: Two Analytic Sketches

ON WUORINEN’S STRING TRIO: TWO ANALYTIC SKETCHES ANTON VISHIO I. A FEW DAYS AGO I WAS STANDING in front of a painted image, measuring two metres by two, of paradise. And after a moment, standing still, gasping a little, I entered it.”1 So John Berger began a late essay describing his immersion in the vibrant painting of a friend. The comparable musical experience, of being inside a composition— literally inside it, observing its unfolding as it envelops me—is one I have had rarely; one particularly memorable occasion was when I served as the second pianist in a performance of Charles Wuorinen’s Percussion Symphony. Towards the end of the first movement, the celesta player introduces a quintuplet figure, a wide turn focused on a central pitch. Gradually, this spreads in some form across nearly the entire ensemble. Just as peak density is attained there is a massive slowing down over the fourfold-repeated final passage; by the end, the tempo has reduced to an astonishing one quarter of its original rate. As the music decreases in speed one feels that it is just on the point of locking in. Indeed, the richly contrapuntal skein seems to begin to separate, allowing one to hear the interaction of the parts more and “ 318 Perspectives of New Music more vividly. But the process never completes; one is drawn farther and farther into the network without feeling that its focus has reached maximal resolution. I have been reminded of my experience of the Percussion Symphony in trying to account for the immersive character at the outset of the String Trio (Example 1). The work begins with what Wuorinen has described as a “drone” on G, upon which the principal materials of the composition emerge; and drones are surely well suited for drawing a listener inwards.2 In an overview of Wuorinen’s compositional trajectory through the 1980s, Jeffrey Kresky mentions this opening and its reversal in the guise of a long stretch of mainly quarter-note motion at the end of the composition as an example of the composer’s “initiating and concluding tendency toward dramatic straightforwardness.”3 JoAnn Kuchera-Morin, in her extended analysis of the work’s serial structure, expands even further on the use of the drone as a formal device: its presence in specific sections helps to demarcate the twelve-part plan she asserts for the entire work.4 Initially I too had heard the drone as a formal element—as something that expressed one end of a continuum of organization. The constant element in the background on this hearing serves as a gravitational point, not only in terms of pitch relationships but also as a kind of stable texture, binding other sonic elements to it even in the absence of a strong rhythmic profile. As Kuchera-Morin observes, “those passages which contain slow unfolding melodies over drones tend to sound senza misura in contrast to the contrapuntal and homophonic passages.”5 In other repertory, I have considered such passages to act analogously to the “tight knit” (as against loose) passages that bear stable, expositional qualities in William Caplin’s theory of formal functions.6 EXAMPLE 1: STRING TRIO, MM. 1–3 Copyright © 1967–68 by C.F. Peters Corporation. All rights reserved. Used by kind permission. On Wuorinen’s String Trio: Two Analytic Sketches 319 But further listenings left me dissatisfied that such an interpretation was warranted. Instead of finding the drone as an initial state of stability from which the work departs, I found it a remarkably active, tensionbearing feature—indeed, not very drone-like at all.7 This is not to deny the idea that the unfolding at the outset of the piece has close analogies to the practice of alap in North Indian music; but the differences remain instructive. The drone in classical Indian music, for instance, is the tone (or the complex of tones) against which other tones create events of tension and release. As N. A. Jairazbhoy, wrote, “the drone affects the dynamic function of notes.”8 And of course in that music the drone is nearly always present in some acoustical form, whether or not our attention is explicitly drawn...

Structure in Charles Wuorinen's <em>String Trio</em>

Structure in Charles Wuorinen's <em>String Trio</em>

Brahms among Friends: Listening, Performance, and the Rhetoric of Allusion by Paul Berry (review)

COMPOSERS Brahms among Friends: Listening, Performance, and the Rhetoric of Allusion. By Paul Berry. (AMS Studies in Music.) New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. [ix, 389 p. ISBN 9780199982646 (hardcover), $47.95; (e-book), various.] Music examples, tables, bibliography, index.Paul Berry's book puts forward two enticing propositions relating to works by Johannes Brahms. Firstly, that certain of Brahms's compositions were directed towards individuals within his social circle, carrying meanings they were uniquely situated to perceive, and secondly, that through musicological inquiry we might excavate these meanings today and imaginatively reconstruct the ways in which Brahms's intended audience experienced his music. Such propositions highlight the importance of Brahms's private social sphere to his compositional activity, something that has largely been overshadowed by the public reception of his music. Berry's ambitious project is to guide his readers towards historically informed understandings of selected lieder, piano and chamber works, compositions that span the duration of Brahms's creative life. To do this he engages an array of primary sources, offers analyses of musical pieces and poetry, and reflects on the physical and aural experiences of playing and hearing Brahms's music.Part I centers on three short works: two lullabies written in the 1860s, and the lied Es liebt sich so lieblich im Lenze dating from 1877. The composition of each of these pieces was triggered by events in the lives of couples close to Brahms. In the cases of the Geistliches Wiegenlied op. 91, no. 2, and the Wiegenlied op. 49, no. 4, this was the birth of children in the families of Amalie and Joseph Joachim and Bertha and Arthur Faber. Es liebt sich so lieblich im Lenze op. 71, no. 1, served as a gift for Clara and Julius Stockhausen on the occasion of the baptism of their third son. Berry examines each work and provides an engaging description of the friendship that occasioned it. The goal of these separate case studies is to deliver interpretative accounts of the individual pieces, showing how poetic texts, borrowed musical materials, and even the required performing forces might have been affectively charged for the works' recipients.In Part II Berry surveys a wider range of Brahms's music, but focuses on a single friendship, that which Brahms shared with the composer Heinrich von Herzogenberg and his wife Elisabeth. Herzogenberg paid homage to his more famous contemporary in his op. 23 piano variations: the work uses an early song by Brahms as its theme and invites comparison with Brahms's variations of the same opus number. Interestingly, Berry suggests that Brahms also occasionally wrote pieces alluding to Herzogenberg's works. In the finale of the String Quintet op. 88 he finds a reference to material from one of Herzogenberg's string trios, while the variation movement within Brahms's op. 87 piano trio takes up the same theme that Herzogenberg had used some years earlier. Brahms's allusions, how- ever, come across as deliberate demonstrations of his more sophisticated compositional technique, and it is perhaps unsurprising that the Brahms-Herzogenberg relationship was put under strain through these musical exchanges. We see here how musical works served as agents of reconciliation and rupture within one of Brahms's most important friendships.Part III sheds new light on Brahms's much-studied relationship with Clara Schumann by considering her reception of a cluster of musical works written in the 1870s. Berry offers detailed interpretations of Brahms's songs Meine Liebe ist grun and Alte Liebe, published respectively in the collections opp. 63 and 72. He argues that both works would have had heighted significance for Clara because of allusions Brahms makes in them to music by himself and her husband Robert-allusions that only she was likely to appreciate. The final chapter of Part III presents a hermeneutic account of the op. …

Review of Jack Boss, Schoenberg’s Twelve-Tone Music: Symmetry and the Musical Idea (Cambridge University Press, 2014)

[1] The 2015 winner of the Society for Music Theory's Wallace Berry Award, Jack Boss's landmark book Schoenberg's Twelve-Tone Music, will positively impact the understanding and appreciation of Schoenberg's serial music. Although Boss focuses upon Arnold Schoenberg's well-known serial compositions, using established terminology of late twentieth-century twelve-tone theory, the holistic analyses he undertakes are imaginative, innovative, and unique within the discipline of music theory. The importance of this work does not reside in the presentation of a new set of theoretical tools for exploring serial music, but rather in providing a new conceptual framework for comprehending large-scale unity and coherence in Schoenberg's serial compositions.(1)At the start of the first chapter Boss establishes his theoretical framework by examining Schoenberg's concept of musical Idea as described in his writings and surveying some musical, philosophical, and historical antecedents, as well as modern scholars' works that have been influenced by the concept of the Idea--and in turn have influenced Boss himself. The remaining seven chapters include chronological (by opus number) in-depth analyses of complete works or movements from some of Schoenberg's most revered compositions, including Suite for Piano op. 25, Piano Piece op. 33a, Moses und Aron, and the String Trio op. 45.[2] The theoretical underpinnings of Boss's rigorous analytic survey of Schoenberg's serial works emerge from the composer's statement that "the only analysis there can be for me is one that throws the idea into relief and shows how it is presented and worked out" (1; Boss cites a letter from Schoenberg to Rudolf Kolisch, in Stein 1965, 164-65). Inspired by Schoenberg's desire for comprehensive analyses that trace the working out of a musical idea, Boss examines and adapts Schoenberg's concept of a tonally-based Idea--which contains three dialectic components (Grundgestalt, compositional problem, and solution)--and convincingly readapts it as a large-scale framework for examining long-range coherence within entire serial compositions or complete movements (7).(2) According to Boss's framework, a typical compositional problem results from a conflict between a symmetrical ideal and passages in a serial work that approximate (but do not fully realize) the ideal at the outset of a composition; as the composition unfolds the conflict is elaborated. The resolution of the conflict generally occurs near or at the end of the composition, when the differences between musical elements are finally reconciled. Boss describes a variety of ways in which the presentation of a problem and the process of its elaboration can unfold within a serial composition, including: symmetrical ideals juxtaposed against non-symmetrical elaborations that only approximate them (op. 25, op. 28, op. 33a, Moses und Aron), conflicts generated through row partitions that seemingly create incompatible elements (op. 26, op. 37), and conflicts that are generated between multiple source rows vying for supremacy (op. 45) (8-10). In general, the conflicts associated with the first two stages of the framework (a problem and its elaboration) are frequently resolved by a musical reconciliation between seemingly disparate or conflicting musical elements undergoing a restorative process; these conflicting elements can often be traced to a unifying and symmetrical musical ideal.[3] Despite the subtitle of the book, Symmetry and the Musical Idea, and the title of the first chapter, "Musical Idea and Symmetrical Ideal," there is a curious omission in the first chapter: Boss does not provide a thorough description of symmetry or the symmetrical ideal. While he asserts that imperfect non-symmetrical configurations of the ideal create conflicts in Schoenberg's serial works in multiple ways, the topic of symmetry in the first chapter is somewhat scattered and surprisingly moot. Moreover, the focal points of the solutions to conflicting musical elements in Boss's analyses do not always reside in symmetry. …