MUS434-571.3 Music of the Modern Era
1950s Ivory Tower, Modernism, Birth of the Avant-Garde Mar. 5, 2013
The 1950s: Cold War Era
• Rebuilding Europe / Asia • Booming American economy – Rise in middle class • Military industrial complex and manufacturing • New technology / electronics (transistor) • G.I. Bill, Social Security expansion, Interstate Highway
System • Consumerism, credit cards, low-interest home loans
Pierre Boulez – Le Marteau sans Maître (1955)
• “The Hammer without a Master” • Contralto, alto flute, viola, guitar, vibraphone,
xylorimba, percussion – Different combinations each movement
• Surrealist poetry of René Char • 9 movements, grouped in 3 sets – I, III, VII "l'artisanat furieux”(furious craftmanship) – II, IV, VI, VII "bourreaux de solitude” (hangmen of
solitude) – V, IX "Bel édifice et les pressentiments” (stately
building and presentiments)
Pierre Boulez – Le Marteau sans Maître (1955)
• Total Serialism (works from early 50s) – Pitch, dynamics, rhythm all serialized
• Pitch Multiplication – Start with tone row
• 3 5 2 1 T E 9 0 8 4 7 6 – Groups pitches from row
by pattern 2–4–2–1–3 • Each group a “harmonic field”
– Find sum of every possible pair of clusters • (2 1 10 E) + (9 0) = ((2+9) (1+9) (T+9) (E+9) (2+0) (1+0) (T+0) (E
+0)) = (E T 7 8 2 1 T E) • Eliminate duplicate pitches = (E T 7 8 2 1)
Pierre Boulez – Le Marteau sans Maître (1955)
• Premiered at Baden-Baden Festival (representing France)
• Highly structured around mathematical relationships, process of pitch multiplication
• Clear influence of Pierrot Lunaire – Disjunct vocal melodies, humming, Sprechstimme, vocal
noises • Influence of modern jazz, African balafon (xylorimba),
Balinese Gamelan (vibraphone), guitar (Japanese koto) + percussion
Elliott Carter – String Quartet No. 2 (1959)
• Four movements with introduction, conclusion, and solo cadenzas as interludes – I. Introduction – II. (I) Allegro fantastico – III. Cadenza for Viola – IV. (II) Presto scherzando – V. Cadenza for Cello – VI (III). Andante espressivo – VII. Cadenza for 1st violin – VIII. (IV) Allegro – IX. Conclusion
Elliott Carter – String Quartet No. 2 (1959)
• Each instrument conceived as a character, exemplified by interval content, articulation, etc. – Violin I: virtuosic, assertive and fantastical (m3, P5, M9) – Violin II: regular rhythms throughout, the character of its part
described by Carter as "laconic, orderly...sometimes humorous” (M3, M6, M7)
– Viola: expressive, doleful lines; odd rhythmic relationships (tritone, m7, m9)
– Cello: impetuous, frequent acellerandi and ritardandi (P4, m6, Octave+tritone)
• Each instrument in turn 'leads' a movement, the others interpreting the gestures of the leader in terms of their own repertoire of intervals and articulations
Elliott Carter – String Quartet No. 2 (1959)
Elliott Carter – String Quartet No. 2 (1959)
• Relationships between characters change throughout piece, becoming more unified as movements progress, more combative in solo interludes
From The Music of Elliott Carter by David Schiff
Elliott Carter – String Quartet No. 2 (1959)
• All-Interval Tetrachords (0146) and (0137)
From The Music of Elliott Carter by David Schiff
Elliott Carter – String Quartet No. 2 (1959)
• Influence of Boulez, highly structured modern music with crafted complex relationships
• Multiple musics at once (Ives, Milhaud) • Highly contrapuntal despite fragmentation
Conlon Nancarrow – Study for Player Piano No. 21 (Canon X) (year uncertain) • Canon in which voices accelerate and
decelerate at varying rates • Complex polyrhythms unplayable by humans • Influenced by jazz (Art Tatum, Earl Hines),
isorhythmic medieval music, Indian classical music
• Moved to Mexico in 1940 to escape anti-Communist American sentiment
Grazyna Bacewicz – String Quartet No. 4 (1951)
• Studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris • Won first prize International Composers’
Competition in Liège for this piece • Neo-classicism with more modern harmonic
language: Eastern European influence, use of folk material (especially during Stalin’s reign)
• Made career as composer, influential in Poland and beyond
• String Quartet No. 4 more expressive, more loosely structured than many of her later works
Summary
• Avant-garde / ultramodern music of 1950s – New highly structured processes and systems of
organization with connections to traditional form – Isolation of “serious” composers doing “research”
in music within academia – Increasing influence of technology and interaction
with “foreign” music / ideas – Influence of Second Viennese School – Cold War influence (competition, invention,
identity, Communist sympathizers leave US)