Latham_Meglin_CIM04_proceedings.pdf

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Motivic Design and Physical Gesture

in Laprs-midi dun faune

Edward D. LathamEsther Boyer College of Music, Temple University, [email protected]

Joellen MeglinEsther Boyer College of Music, Temple University, USA

[email protected]

In: R. Parncutt, A. Kessler & F. Zimmer (Eds.)Proceedings of the Conference on Interdisciplinary Musicology (CIM04)

Graz/Austria, 15-18 April, 2004 http://gewi.uni-graz.at/~cim04/

Background in music theory, analysis and composition. The two foundational subdisciplines of American musictheory, Schenkerian theory and pitch-class set theory, have historically been viewed as mutually exclusive and largelyincompatible. Nonetheless, they share a common interest in motives at various levels of musical structure (Forte,1988). In recent decades, an interest has developed in applying the results yielded by both approaches toperformance (Berry, 1989).

Background in physiology and biology (of music). The Hungarian choreographer and dance theorist Rudolf vonLaban developed a comprehensive system of dance notation called kinetography, the study of drawing movement(Laban, 1928). Later dubbed Labanotation (Knust, 1979), Labans system became the gold standard of dancenotation systems, enabling choreographers to preserve precisely documented scores of their works that could bereconstructed by later generations of dancers without having to rely on the inconsistent memory of individual dancers(Maletic, 1987).

Aims. Using an analysis of both Nijinskys reconstructed dance score (Guest and Jeschke, 1991) and Debussys music

for Prlude Lapres-midi dun fauneas an example, we aim to provide a synthesis of dance and linear analysis

whose results differ significantly from those produced by a purely musical analysis (Brown, 1993). In our examination

of Nijinsky as choreographer-analyst, we aim to reverse the directional arrow between analysis and performance,establishing the performance as a potential starting point for interpretation.

Main contribution. Our paper will present linear-gestural analysis, a synthesis of the insights provided by

traditional linear analysis and the analysis of the dance score, as an alternative to traditional forms of musical

analysis. Rather than attempting to artificially separate the two analytical processes and simply compare the results

side by side, the new analytical method will allow the insights gained from each analysis to interpenetrate and

influence the results of the other. In the case of our analysis of Debussy and Nijinskys Faune, this leads to a different

interpretation of the work than that offered most recently by music theorist Matthew Brown (1993), one that takes

the visual and aural aspects of the ballet equally into account.

Implications. By providing a new method for examining choreographed works, we will provide musicologists with

the means to create interpretations that are more relevant to the performers that interact with those works on a daily

basis. Likewise, our use of performance as a starting point for interpretation will enable musicologists to create new

and innovative studies of important works. Both outcomes will positively affect the relationship between musicologyand performance.

Music theory has always taken inspirationfrom other academic disciplines. Untilrecently, however, most of that borrowing hasbeen from the natural and social sciences,and not, as one might expect, from thehumanities or the arts. One need only think ofSchenkers tortuous attempts to derive thefundamental principles of his system from theovertone series, or his desire to tout it as an

organic system, to realize the sacred placethat the hard sciences have traditionallyheld in the development of music theory asan academic discipline. In the mid-twentiethcentury, this affinityfor mathematics, inparticularwas amplified by music theorysdesire for institutional acceptance. It was onlyafter the pioneering efforts of scholars suchas Milton Babbitt, Allen Forte, and others,


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CIM04 - Conference on Interdisciplinary Musicology - Proceedings

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efforts that established it as a reputable andscientific discipline within the academiccommunity, that music theory could allowitself the luxury of looking again to otherdisciplines for inspiration.

Academic security, moreover, came at aprice. In order to found itself upon a bedrockof scientific objectivity, American musictheory was forced to distance itself from itssister disciplines within the fine andperforming arts, including not onlycomposition and performance, but alsotheater, dance, and the visual arts. Evenliterary criticism, a longtime friend of musictheory (think of Tovey and his purplepassages) became estranged as it grappledwith postmodernism while theory remained

mired in formalism and the music itself.In the last two decades, however, musicanalysis has become more amenable toinfluence from at least one artistic discipline,albeit the most academically establishedonenamely, literature. From Jean-JacquesNattiez and Robert Hattens appropriation ofsemiotics to Joseph Straus and Kevin Korsynsapplication, or misreading, of Harold Bloomstheory of influence, linguistics and literarycriticism have proven fertile soil for thegrowth of interdisciplinary approaches inmusic theory. More puzzling is the

comparative dearth of approachesincorporating ideas from the more closelyrelated performing arts disciplines, theaterand dance. In his dissertation and in severalpast conference papers, Edward D. Lathamdeveloped an interdisciplinary approach to theanalysis of opera that combined musical anddramatic analysis, drawing upon the work ofConstantin Stanislavsky, the Russian actor,director, and teacher who co-founded theMoscow Art Theatre (Latham, 2000). He hassince expanded this method to include theanalysis of musical theater and the Romanticsong cycle. It is our intention here to make afirst attempt at a similar interdisciplinaryanalytical approach for ballet, drawing uponthe work of the Hungarian choreographer anddance theorist Rudolf von Laban.

Laban and Labanotation

Laban was born in 1879 and spent his youthtraveling throughout the Austro- HungarianEmpire with his father, a military governor(Maletic, 1987). After abandoning the militaryacademy in which his father had pressed himto enroll, Laban traveled to Paris, familiarizing

himself with the early dance notation systemof the eighteenth-century Frenchchoreographer Raul-Auger Feuillet, andstudying dance, art and architecture. He latermoved to Munich, Zrich, and, after enduringpersecution under the Third Reich, settled in

London. He published ten books on dance,including his Schrifttanz of 1928, his mostimportant and influential work, and foundedseveral dance institutes and organizations. Hedied in Surrey, England in 1958.

The most significant accomplishment ofLaban, who is to dance theory what Schenkeris to music theory and Stanislavsky is todramatic theory, was the development of acomprehensive system for the notation ofchoreography, which he called

kinetography, or the study of drawing

movement. Later, American proponents of hisnotational system dubbed it Labanotation,and it rapidly became the gold standard ofdance notation systems. As structured byLaban, a kinetogram, or dance score, iswritten on a three-line staff adapted from thestandard five-line staff used in musicalnotation (Knust, 1979). The second andfourth lines are omitted for the sake of visualclarity, but the insertion of the subsequentsymbols is carried out with these hidden linesin mind. The staff is arranged vertically, in

order to show forward progression ormomentum, but can be rotated ninetydegrees to run parallel to the music, ifnecessary.

In the introductory section of his dictionaryof Labanotation, Albrecht Knust, one ofLabans foremost students and collaborators,provides an elegant outline of the basicaspects of Labanotation: Knust notes that in adance score, a center line divides the dancersbody into left and right halves, withmovements performed by the right side of the

body (that is, the dancers right) notated tothe right and vice versa. Leg movements arenotated immediately to the right and left ofthe center line if they support the weight ofthe body, as in walking, and in the nextcolumn if they do not, as in a gesture like thetendue. Movements of the upper torso andarms are notated in the outer columns. Thebasic symbols for direction and height areshaded triangles, with direction indicated bythe shape of the symbol (as in the trianglepointing to the right), and height indicated by


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shading (hatched for high, blank with a dotfor medium, and filled for low). The length ofa particular symbol on the staff represents itsduration.

Although space does not permit us toexpound upon them here, there are eightother categories of symbols, in addition to thedirection signs, including position signs, bodysigns, and relation signs, among others.Perhaps the most interesting of these are thepreliminary indications, or presigns given inthe choreographical score before the dancebegins, two categories of which are likened byKnust to the key signature and clef in musicalnotation.

Nijinsky and dance notation

One of the primary purposes of Labanotationis the preservation and reconstruction ofhistorical choreography, the finer details ofwhich would eventually be lost due to thevagaries of the oral tradition of passing themfrom teacher to student (think of a game ofTelephone!). It is for this purpose that AnnHutchinson Guest and Claudia Jeschkecreated their dance score for DebussysPrlude laprs-midi dun faune, aschoreographed by Vaslav Nijinsky (Guest andJeschke, 1991). Unlike memory-basedLabanotation scores that represent the

culmination of an oral tradition, however,Guest and Jeschkes score of Faune is atranslation of Nijinskys own notated score,which he created in 1915 using a system hedeveloped himself.

Intriguingly, Nijinskys system, likeSchenkers, borrows elements of musicalnotation for many if its symbols. Duration ofgestures, for example, is indicated usingtraditional note values on a five-line staff.Based on the Stepanov system taught to himas a student at the Maryinsky Theater School

in Russia, Nijinksys system neverthelessincludes some significant improvements,including the use of a separate staff for eachsection of the body, the use of rests for exitsand ties to indicate the retention of aparticular gesture, and, perhaps mostimportantly, the use of ascending ordescending pitch to indicate the angle ordirection of a gesture.

Because it is difficult to scan quickly andinterpret accurately, however, it is doubtfulthat Nijinskys system will replace

Labanotation as the primary system of dancenotation. Nonetheless, Guest and Jeschkesresearch into his score for Faune reveals apreviously hidden aspect of Nijinskysprofessional persona: that of the theorist and

analyst. It is this aspect of Nijinsky that wewish to explore now, with respect to his scorefor Laprs-midi dun faune.

Afternoon of a Faun: analysis

In creating his now-famous interpretation ofDebussys Faune, from which musicalelements did Nijinsky draw his inspiration,and how does his choreography interact withthe music? An examination of Laprs-mididun faune, the 1867 eclogue by StephaneMallarm to which Debussys title makesreference, reveals only general

correspondence between it and Nijinskysballet (i.e., the faun as central character, hisencounter with the nymphs, and the use ofgrapes); in its details, the poem differsmarkedly from the story created by Nijinsky.In the eclogue, the faun meets only twonymphs, for example, not seven, and hissubsequent mnage--trois with them hasmuch more explicit and graphic sexualovertones than the comparatively innocentnarrative portrayed in the ballet. It is ironic,then, in retrospect, that the ballet, andparticularly its closing scene (where the Faun

caresses the dress left behind by his Nymph),created such an uproar when it waspremiered in Paris in 1912.

The disparity between Mallarms andNijinskys versions of the story highlights aninteresting ambiguity in Debussys title:interpreted literally, Prelude to the Afternoonof a Faun could signify music that describesan episode prefiguring the fauns afternoonadventures. Perhaps the Faun, inspired by hisencounter with the Nymphs as portrayed byNijinsky, returns later to seek them out, asportrayed by Mallarm. Yet, it is equally

possible that the title is meant to infer a moredirect connection between the music andMallarms eclogue, as in music for theafternoon of a faun. It is to Debussys musicand Nijinskys choreography that we mustturn to give preference to one interpretationor the other.

As is often the case with Debussy scholarship,the analytical work that has been done on thePrelude divides into two camps. On the onehand, there are those, chief among themRichard Parks, who would claim it is an earlywork by Debussy the modernist: they tend to


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minimize its diatonic elements in favor of itsmotivic intervallic structures andchromaticism and generally prefer pitch-classset theory to tonal theories. On the otherhand, there are those, including Felix Salzer,Charles Burkhart, and Matthew Brown, who

would argue that it is the work of Debussy theLate Romantic: they tend to maximize itsdiatonic elements, absorbing as much of itsrecalcitrant chromaticism as possible with theporous sponge of Schenkerian theory. In thecase of the Prelude, we tend to cast our lotwith the sponges: in his zeal to unearthcomplement relations, 4-17/18/19complexes, and the like (Parks, 1989), Parksseems to overlook a defining feature of thePreludes musical structurenamely, itsrestless search for, and drive toward, theroot-position tonic E major triad that arrives

only ar m. 106, four bars from the end of thepiece.

The Schenkerian studies of the Prelude arelargely in agreement on its broad formal andharmonic outlines: each of them chooses Emajor as the works tonic key, and none ofthem departs radically from the formal planproposed most recently by Matthew Brown in1993. They do differ, however, in both thescope of their analyses and the degree towhich they are willing to subsume the Bsection of the Prelude (which outlines DbMajor) under an E-major background

structure. Salzer, for example, analyzed onlythe first thirty measures of the piece,stopping conveniently short of the first majorchromatic episode in mm. 31-36 (Salzer,1962). Burkhart, too, tackles only a portion ofthe work (mm. 37-55), though his illustrationof the chromatic ascent B-C-Db as anenharmonic motivic enlargement of the B-B#-C# ascent of mm. 1-2 lays importantgroundwork for Browns subsequent analysisof the complete piece (Burkhart, 1978).

Matthew Browns analysis is by far the mostdaring. Not only does he analyze almost

every bar of the Prelude (mm. 14-20 beingthe notable exception), he accounts for thethorny chromatic episode of mm. 31-36 byrelating it to the two occurrences of thestructural dominant that surround it in mm.30 and 37, and he incorporates Burkharts B-C-Db as a transition section to the secondarykey of Db major. The key to Browns analyticalsuccess is his enharmonic reinterpretation ofDb as C#, an upper neighbor to the primarytone B (scale-degree 5) that becomes part ofan expanded 5-6-5 melodic progression. C#as upper neighbor to B is also the primary

focus of Salzers analysis of mm. 1-30, andthe two analyses complement each other verywell.

While we find Browns analysis convincing inmany respects, it contains four major flaws.

First, the 5-line he proposes as a backgroundstructure, the entire descent of which takesplace in the span of three measures, containslittle harmonic support for scale-degree 3.Though he shows scale-degree 3 as supportedby the cadential six-four in m. 105, aparadigm well documented by David Beach,the B shown in the tenor is actually an A anda C# in the music, severely weakening thesense of tonic harmony in the first part of thei measure and privileging V9 instead. Second,Brown does not provide an analysis of mm.14-20, which contain an important secondarytheme, and which mark the motion G#-A-A#

as a transposed instance of Burkhartsascending chromatic motive, now in a moreprominent register. Third, in his eagerness toshow Burkharts motive in its most flatteringlight, he obscures several important structuralharmoniesnotably the E-major tonic in m.39, the Db-major tonic in m. 47, and thedominant of Ab major in m. 50. Finally, hisreading of the Db-major section disregardsthe registral significance of ab2, the head noteof the B-section theme, marking it as a covertone, and assigning greater weight to theinner-voice Db.

We would like to suggest an alternativereading of the Prelude as a 3-line. LikeBrowns reading, ours also depends on anenharmonic transformation: the primary toneG#, prolonged via an upper-neighbor A# in m,17 and an upper-neighbor A in mm. 23 and42, becomes Ab at m. 45. Ab is thenprolonged by two middleground descents to F(mm. 45-55 and 63-74), and anenharmonically re-spelled lower-neighbor Gb(m. 62). The return of the home key at m.79 brings with it a prolongation of E, scale-degree 1, via a lower-neighbor Eb, and the

eventual reinstatement of G# as primary toneat m. 94. The fundamental line closes to thetonic at m. 106.

In addition to accounting for the aurallysalient head note of the B-section theme, the3-line reading incorporates the missingmeasures 14-20, which, rather than beingmerely transitional, constitute an importantprefiguration of both the bathing theme atm. 37 and the B-section theme at m. 55.These three themes are connected to theopening measure of the Prlude, and to eachother, through their prominent use of pitch-


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class set 3-7 [025], the set-class form ofMlisandes motive. The dates of compositionfor the opera and the ballet overlap: Debussybegan working on Pellas et Mlisande inSeptember, 1893 and had finished a completedraft by August 1895; the Prlude was begun

in 1891, and premiered in December 1894.Set class 3-7, then, along with set-classes 4-27 and 5-34, both used extensively in Pellasto signify Golauds passion for Mlisande, canbe seen as intertextual symbols of desire,resonating in both works.

In Nijinskys setting of the Prlude, the eroticconnotations of 3-7 and 4-27 are madeexplicit. Whereas for the majority of theopening A section the Faun mimes playing theflute theme onstage, when 4-27, the A# half-

diminished seventh chord, is arpeggiated inmm. 4 and 7 he stops and turns to lookoffstage, as if checking to see whether hissinuous melody has borne fruit. His longing isexpressed in the subsequent arpeggiation of3-7 as part of the Bb dominant seventh chordin mm. 8-10, as he slowly returns to hisoriginal posture. Again, in mm. 14-20, as 3-7returns in the melody, he puts down the flute,and picks up some grapes as if to devourthem.

For the most part, the divisions in Nijinskysplot correlate with the large-scale formal

divisions proposed by Brown. The Faun beginsalone on stage, and is joined by the Nymphsin mm. 21-28. The whole-tone episode inmm. 31-36 creates an appropriatelymysterious and exotic atmosphere for theunveiling of the head Nymph, who beginsbathing at m. 37. The encounter, andsubsequent pas de deux, between the Faunand the head Nymph takes place during the Bsection, mm. 55ff, and the Faun returns to hisrock alone during the A section, at m. 94.

What is not shown in Browns formal scheme,however, is Nijinskys response to the

cadential evasions in the B section. Though itbegins in Db Major, the B Section soon movesto V9 of E major at m. 60. Resolution to thetonic is evaded, however, by a motion to iv64,an A-minor chord in second inversion, at m.61, which coincides with the head Nymphsfirst rejection of the Fauns advances. TheFaun then leaps into the air in m. 62,beckoning to her again as the harmony shiftsto V9 of G major. As this new dominant ninth,enharmonically reinterpreted as being built onEbb, again evades resolution by moving downby step to a Db-major triad, the Nymph

rejects the faun again. The culmination oftheir battle of wills occurs in m. 73, wherethey finally embrace by linking elbows (seeFigure 12). It is important to emphasize thatNijinsky chooses not to have their union occuron the resolution to the Db-major tonic in m.

74. Rather, he acknowledges the unfinished,interrupted nature of their encountertheother Nymphs enter, Donna Elvira-like, andspoil the Fauns funby breaking theembrace at m. 74. Frustrated, the Faungestures defiantly at the Nymphs and movesaway from the head Nymph.

Clearly, Nijinsky was responding not only toDebussys manipulation of tonality andcadence, but also to his motivic use ofharmony and very short, almost anti-Wagnerian, melodic ideas, techniques that

were to become a hallmark of Pellas etMlisande. Although space does not permit usthe luxury of doing so here, we believe thatundertaking a detailed analysis of theforeground gestures used by Nijinsky in hissetting ofFaune (the types of steps used foreach character, for example) will revealfurther correlations, as well as points ofdisjunction, between the ballets musical andchoreographical structure. Like the use ofdramatic theory for the analysis of vocalmusic, the kind of composite analysis wehave proposed here has the advantage ofbeing directly relevant to those individualsmost intimately acquainted with the worksbeing analyzednamely, the performers andconductors engaged in rehearsing thoseworks, and we hope it may prove useful tothe reader as well.

ReferencesBerry, W. (1989). Musical Structure and

Performance. New Haven: YaleUniversity Press.

Brown, M. (1993). Tonality and Form inDebussys Prlude Lapres-midi dunfaune.Music Theory Spectrum 15/2,127-43.

Burkhart, C. (1978). Schenkers MotivicParallelisms.Journal of Music Theory15/1, 120-45.

Forte, A. (1988). New Approaches to theLinear Analysis of Music.Journal of theAmerican Musicological Society41/2,315-48.

Guest, A. & Jeschke, C. (1991). NijinskysFaune Restored. Language of DanceSeries: Vol. 3, ed. Anne HutchinsonGuest. Philadelphia: Gordon and Breach.


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Knust, A. (1979). Dictionary of KinetographyLaban (Labanotation), 2 vols. Plymouth:MacDonald and Evans.

Laban, R. (1928). Schrifttanz. Wien:Universal Edition.

Latham, Edward D. (2000). Linear-Dramatic

Analysis: An Analytical Approach toTwentieth-Century Opera. Ph.D. diss.,Yale University.

Maletic, V. (1987). Body, Space, Expression:The Development of Rudolf LabansMovement and Dance Concepts. NewYork: Mouton de Gruyter.

Parks, R. (1989). The Music of ClaudeDebussy. New Haven: Yale UniversityPress.

Salzer, F. (1962). Structural Hearing: TonalCoherence in Music. New York: Dover.

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