36
1 MUMH 5343, Fall 2018, Dr. Notley Music History after 1900 Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9:30–10:50, Room 293 Music Building Office: Room 319 Music Building; Phone: 565–3751; E-mail: [email protected] Hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 11–12; and by appointment Course Description: This course is concerned with Western concert music after 1900. It is divided into three units: 1) New Worldviews and New Sources of Inspiration; 2) Radical Experimentation / A Search for Order; and 3) Modernism and Postmodernism. Part of the assignments will involve listening to music and studying scores; other parts will require students to read a variety of sources, including source materials and scholarly articles. Course Objectives: The goals of this course are for students to do the following: 1. Grasp broad trends that have been construed in historical accounts of music after 1900 2. Understand more particular studies of that music 3. Improve their ability to work closely with scores from this period 4. Improve their ability to write clearly and effectively about music Attendance and Grading Policy Students learn from preparing for class and engaging in discussion about the assigned materials and questions and are therefore expected to be present and prepared for each class. The university’s attendance policy is available at http://policy.unt.edu/policy/15-2-5 . I must receive proper documentation for the types of excused absences described there.

s3.amazonaws.com€¦ · Web viewMUMH 5343, Fall 2018, Dr. Notley. Music History after 1900. Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9:30–10:50, Room 293 Music Building. Office: Room 319 Music

  • Upload
    vudieu

  • View
    213

  • Download
    0

Embed Size (px)

Citation preview

1

MUMH 5343, Fall 2018, Dr. NotleyMusic History after 1900

Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9:30–10:50, Room 293 Music Building

Office: Room 319 Music Building; Phone: 565–3751; E-mail: [email protected]: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 11–12; and by appointment

Course Description: This course is concerned with Western concert music after 1900. It is divided into three units: 1) New Worldviews and New Sources of Inspiration; 2) Radical Experimentation / A Search for Order; and 3) Modernism and Postmodernism. Part of the assignments will involve listening to music and studying scores; other parts will require students to read a variety of sources, including source materials and scholarly articles.

Course Objectives: The goals of this course are for students to do the following: 1. Grasp broad trends that have been construed in historical accounts of music after 1900

2. Understand more particular studies of that music

3. Improve their ability to work closely with scores from this period

4. Improve their ability to write clearly and effectively about music

Attendance and Grading PolicyStudents learn from preparing for class and engaging in discussion about the assigned materials and questions and are therefore expected to be present and prepared for each class.

The university’s attendance policy is available at http://policy.unt.edu/policy/15-2-5. I must receive proper documentation for the types of excused absences described there. Absences for auditions and other important events may also be considered excused, but you must check with me ahead of time!

Roll will be checked each class period in this course. Students are allowed a total of no more than 3 excused absences. More than 3 excused absences will result in the subtraction of 2 points for each absence. Each unexcused absence will also result in the loss of 2 points. Extreme tardiness will be considered an unexcused absence.

Oral requirements:Attendance and class participation 40 %:

this includes three group presentations as well as participation during each class period

Written requirements:Three article reports 30 % (10 % each)Final research paper 30 %, divided into three stages: details will be given

in a separate document

2

Writing ResourcesVisit the UNT Writing Lab for tutoring, workshops, and more: writinglab.unt.edu. More UNT Writing Resources are at this link: https://tsgs.unt.edu/new-current-students/writing-resources.

Required Text: Students must purchase Anthology of Twentieth-Century Music, ed. Robert P. Morgan.

Other Course Materials: My carrel in the music library is 404. Other course materials are accessible electronically through the UNT library website, and I will post additional materials as PDFs on Canvas.

The following abbreviations will be used on the weekly assignments:

AA = Joseph Auner, Anthology for Music in the Twentieth and Twenty-first CenturiesAuner = Joseph Auner, Music in the Twentieth and Twenty-first CenturiesMA = Morgan anthology (required purchase)Morgan = Robert P. Morgan, Twentieth-Century Music: A History of Musical Style in Modern

Europe and AmericaSimms = Bryan R. Simms, Music of the Twentieth Century: Style and Structure, 2nd ed.SSE = Supplementary Score Excerpts (on Canvas))SR = Supplementary Readings (on Canvas)Watkins = Glenn Watkins, Soundings: Music in the Twentieth Century

Overview of Unit 1: Changed Worldviews and New Sources of Inspiration

Aug. 28 Introduction: Approaches to Writing a History of Music after 1900

Aug. 30 Mahler and Vienna at the Turn of the Century

Sept. 4 Ultra-Chromaticism and Turn-of-the-Century Decadence: Salome

Sept. 6 Schoenberg before and after His “First Step on a New Path”

Sept. 11 Tonal and Post-Tonal Gestures in Lieder by Webern and Berg

Sept. 13 Paris at the Turn of the Century: Ravel and Debussy

Sept. 18 Bartók and Stravinsky before World War I

Sept. 20 Ives and American Music before World War I

Sept. 25 Article report #1 is due; all students will participate in group presentations

Overview of Unit 2: Radical Experimentation / A Search for Order

Sept. 27 France during and after World War I

Oct. 2 American “Ultra-modernism”

Oct. 4 Stravinsky and Hindemith and the Issue of Neoclassicism; final paper topics due

3

Oct. 9 Bartók’s Symmetries

Oct. 11 Twelve-Tone Music by Schoenberg and Webern

Oct. 16 Berg in the 1920s

Oct. 18 Music and Politics in the United States

Oct. 23 Article report #2 is due: all students will participate in group presentations

Overview of Unit 3: Modernism and Postmodernism

Oct. 25 A Twentieth-Century Operatic Anti-hero: Britten's Peter Grimes

Oct. 30 Just the Notes: Trends in Avant-Garde Music of the Early 1950s

Nov. 1 NO CLASS BECAUSE I HAVE TO ATTEND A CONFERENCE

Nov. 6 New Approaches to Time, Rhythm, and Texture

Nov. 8 Compositional Reception of Mahler

Nov. 13 Ligeti’s Approaches to Traditions in the 1970s and 1980s

Nov. 15 Soviet Avant-Garde Composers in the 1980s

Nov. 20 Opera in a New Century

Nov. 22 NO CLASS BECAUSE OF THANKSGIVING

Nov. 27 Article report #3 is due; all students will participate in group presentations

Nov. 29 Writing workshop

Dec. 4 Writing workshop

Dec. 6 Writing workshop

Dec. 11 Research paper final version due by 4 p.m.

4

ACADEMIC INTEGRITYStudents caught cheating or plagiarizing will receive a "0" for that particular assignment or exam [or specify alternative sanction, such as course failure]. Additionally, the incident will be reported to the Dean of Students, who may impose further penalty. According to the UNT catalog, the term “cheating" includes, but is not limited to: a. use of any unauthorized assistance in taking quizzes, tests, or examinations; b. dependence upon the aid of sources beyond those authorized by the instructor in writing papers, preparing reports, solving problems, or carrying out other assignments; c. the acquisition, without permission, of tests or other academic material belonging to a faculty or staff member of the university; d. dual submission of a paper or project, or resubmission of a paper or project to a different class without express permission from the instructor(s); or e. any other act designed to give a student an unfair advantage. The term “plagiarism” includes, but is not limited to: a. the knowing or negligent use by paraphrase or direct quotation of the published or unpublished work of another person without full and clear acknowledgment; and b. the knowing or negligent unacknowledged use of materials prepared by another person or agency engaged in the selling of term papers or other academic materials.LINK: http://vpaa.unt.edu/dcgcover/resources/integrity

STUDENT BEHAVIORStudent behavior that interferes with an instructor’s ability to conduct a class or other students' opportunity to learn is unacceptable and disruptive and will not be tolerated in any instructional forum at UNT. Students engaging in unacceptable behavior will be directed to leave the classroom and the instructor may refer the student to the Dean of Students to consider whether the student's conduct violated the Code of Student Conduct. The university's expectations for student conduct apply to all instructional forums, including university and electronic classroom, labs, discussion groups, field trips, etc. LINK: Student Code of Conduct - https://deanofstudents.unt.edu/conduct

ACCESS TO INFORMATION – EAGLE CONNECTYour access point for business and academic services at UNT occurs at my.unt.edu. All official communication from the university will be delivered to your Eagle Connect account. For more information, please visit the website that explains Eagle Connect. LINK: eagleconnect.unt.edu/

ODA STATEMENTThe University of North Texas makes reasonable academic accommodation for students with disabilities. Students seeking accommodation must first register with the Office of Disability Accommodation (ODA) to verify their eligibility. If a disability is verified, the ODA will provide you with an accommodation letter to be delivered to faculty to begin a private discussion regarding your specific needs in a course. You may request accommodations at any time, however, ODA notices of accommodation should be provided as early as possible in the semester to avoid any delay in implementation. Note that students must obtain a new letter of accommodation for every semester and must meet with each faculty member prior to implementation in each class. For additional information see the Office of Disability Accommodation.LINK: disability.unt.edu. (Phone: (940) 565-4323)

5

2018-2019 Semester Academic Schedule (with Add/Drop Dates)http://catalog.unt.edu/content.php?catoid=20&navoid=2120

Academic Calendar at a Glance, 2018-2019https://www.unt.edu/catalogs/2018-19/calendar

Final Exam Schedulehttps://registrar.unt.edu/exams/final-exam-schedule/fall 

Financial Aid and Satisfactory Academic ProgressGraduatesA student must maintain Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP) to continue to receive financial aid. Students must maintain a minimum 3.0 cumulative GPA in addition to successfully completing a required number of credit hours based on total registered hours per term. Music scholarships require a 3.5 cumulative GPA. Students cannot exceed maximum timeframes established based on the published length of the graduate program.  If a student does not maintain the required standards, the student may lose their financial aid eligibility.

If at any point you consider dropping this or any other course, please be advised that the decision to do so may have the potential to affect your current and future financial aid eligibility. It is recommended you schedule a meeting with an academic advisor in your college, an advisor in UNT-International or visit the Student Financial Aid and Scholarships office to discuss dropping a course.LINK: http://financialaid.unt.edu/sap

RETENTION OF STUDENT RECORDSStudent records pertaining to this course are maintained in a secure location by the instructor of record. All records such as exams, answer sheets (with keys), and written papers submitted during the duration of the course are kept for at least one calendar year after course completion. Course work completed via the Blackboard/Canvas online system, including grading information and comments, is also stored in a safe electronic environment for one year. You have a right to view your individual record; however, information about your records will not be divulged to other individuals without the proper written consent. You are encouraged to review the Public Information Policy and the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) laws and the university’s policy in accordance with those mandates.Link: http://ferpa.unt.edu/

COUNSELING AND TESTINGUNT’s Center for Counseling and Testing has an available counselor whose position includes 16 hours per week of dedicated service to students in the College of Music and the College of Visual Arts and Design. Please visit the Center’s website for further information: http://studentaffairs.unt.edu/counseling-and-testing-services. For more information on mental health issues, please visit: https://speakout.unt.edu.

The counselor for music students is Myriam Reynolds: Chestnut Hall, Suite 311 / (940) 565-2741 / [email protected].

6

DETAILED WEEKLY ASSIGNMENTS

Assignment for Thursday, 30 August: Mahler and Vienna at the Turn of the CenturyThis is a big assignment, but please try to complete it. We’ll be coming back to the materials at the end of Unit 1. The questions are intended to stimulate your thinking and to provide a basic structure to the class. There is usually no one correct answer to the questions I give on the daily assignments.

Listen to these three pieces by Mahler: “St. Anthony’s Sermon to the Fish,” from Des Knaben Wunderhorn (SSE 1, 1893); Second Symphony, third movement (SSE 2, 1895); and “Der Einsame im Herbst” from Das Lied von der Erde (SSE 3, 1909). The scores for the pieces are on Canvas, as are the texts for the first and third pieces; the text for the first piece is in Watkins, 6-7, as well

Read Watkins, 4-11, and Carl E. Schorske, “Gustav Mahler: Formation and Transformation,” a chapter from his book Thinking with History: Explorations in the Passage to Modernism (SSR 1), both of which are on Canvas. Mark any references in Schorske’s chapter that you don’t understand, but read it to the end; this will be one of the selections for the Unit 1 article reports.

1. How does Schorske differentiate his view of Mahler’s modernism from the views of other scholars?

2. Neither of the texts can be considered “authentic,” as we understand the word today. What might the appeal of the selection from Des Knaben Wunderhorn have been for Mahler? What are some of the musical features of his setting?

3. How, then, did Mahler use the musical material for the symphonic movement you’ve been assigned?

4. In choosing the texts for Das Lied von der Erde from an “exotic” source, Mahler was following in the footsteps of many earlier artists. An additional factor to be considered is his knowledge of the relatively new field of musicology and his close friendship with one of its early practitioners, Guido Adler, who lived in Vienna.

Mahler may have heard early field recordings made by pioneer ethnomusicologists. In any case, through what musical elements does Mahler seem to be trying to evoke the Chinese culture in which the text of “Der Einsame im Herbst” originated? Use your own hearing to answer this question.

5. What aspects of these works make them sound “modernist” to your ear, if in fact they do? Again, formulate a subjective response; there is no one correct answer.

Assignment for Tuesday, 4 September: Ultrachromaticism and Turn-of-the-Century DecadenceListen to Strauss, Salome (1905), Scene 1 (MA 2) and end of Scene 4 (SSE 4). Read Watkins, 130-141; a handout on one-act operas based on an article by Winfried Kirsch; and another

7

handout that points out cadences and leitmotifs in the final scene. Make sure that you can recognize the leitmotifs numbered by Watkins as 1 (Salome), 7 (Salome’s Lust), and 9 (Kiss).

Read the English translation for each of the selections, given in each case beneath the original German in the score. You have all of Scene 1 and the lengthy conclusion of Scene 4. The opera opens with the following dramatic situation already in place: Narraboth, captain of the guard, is smitten with Salome, as is her stepfather, Herod. Herod (the Tetrarch) has imprisoned Jokanaan (John the Baptist) in an empty cistern. After the first scene--thus after your first selection--Salome persuades Narraboth to bring Jokanaan up from his prison against Herod’s orders. Salome finds the prophet beautiful, but he refuses to look at her. Narraboth commits suicide because Salome is oblivious to him. Herod orders the beheading of Jokanaan so that Salome, his stepdaughter, will dance for him: she is unwilling to dance for any other reward. At the end of Scene 4--which is the second selection that you have--Salome is addressing Jokanaan’s severed head, as should be abundantly clear to you, while Herod and Herodias, his second wife and also Salome’s mother, watch from a distance.

1. What are the contexts for the versions of Salome by Oscar Wilde and Richard Strauss, in Glenn Watkins’s account?

2. In what specific ways do the dialogue and dramatic situation in Scene 1 correspond to Winfried Kirsch’s general remarks about twentieth-century one-act operas?

3. What does Strauss manage to suggest in the first scene about the characters and the nature of the action that will unfold in subsequent scenes?

4. At the end of Salome Strauss takes post-Wagnerian chromaticism to a new level, while still making strategic use of tonics and dominants. At what points in Salome’s monologue does he clarify the harmonic language and create cadences? (Answer this by listening to the ending a couple of times.)

5. How, in particular, does Strauss use cadential six-four chords toward the end? What kinds of associations do these chords bring to your mind?

6. How do you interpret the drawn-out, seemingly conclusive ending in C-sharp major and the second, abrupt ending in C minor that follows?

Thursday, 6 September: Schoenberg before and after His “First Step on a New Path”Listen to the first movement of Schoenberg’s String Quartet in F-sharp Minor, Op. 10 (1908, SSE 6) and to two of his Op. 16 Orchestral Pieces (1909, MA 4a and SSE 5). Read SSR 2 and Watkins, bottom of 32–36.

1. As you listen to the quartet movement, focus on the polyphonic writing and the development of motives, both of which are prominent features of traditional string quartets. To what extent, in comparison with these factors, does functional harmony promote coherence in your hearing of the piece?

8

2. Schoenberg considered his first movement to be a sonata form piece. Where are the sonata form sections in your hearing of the movement?

2. Does Op. 16 No. 1, composed not long after the string quartet, sound radically different? Do Schoenberg’s comments in the first letter to Busoni effectively negate the possibility of “motivic working out”? Or does the persistence of contrapuntal and motivic techniques help you follow the movement’s course? Compare the expressive quality in the quartet movement with that in the orchestral piece. How do you understand his comment in the second letter that “when a new art seeks and finds new means of expression, almost all earlier techniques go hang”?

4. Does the pedal chord of D, A, and C-sharp in Op. 16 No. 1 imply D minor to your ear? Consider this in light of this comment in Schoenberg’s second letter: "I have long been occupied with the removal of all shackles of tonality. And my harmony allows no chords or melodies with tonal implications any more."

5. Study Watkins's sketch of Op. 16 No. 3 on p. 35. (It has a typo: the sharp in m. 35 should be placed before the G rather than the F.) As shown in this sketch, paired instruments participate in a canon on a three-note motive. Faster motivic development in the middle section leads to a final section with a canon based on the inversion of the opening motive. Does Schoenberg’s use of these traditional devices help you follow the piece? Are they compatible with the comments in his letters to Busoni?

6. This piece begins and ends on the same five-note chord. Does this create a sense of a tonal center to your ears? How strong a factor for you is the Klangfarbenmelodie aspect?

Assignment for Tuesday, 11 Sept.: Tonal and Post-Tonal Gestures in Lieder by Webern and BergReview Schoenberg’s Op. 16 Orchestral Pieces (1909, MA 4a and SSE 5), and listen to Webern, Op. 3 No. 1 (1909, MA 11a) and Berg, Op. 4 No. 5 (1912, MA 14b). Read Morgan, middle of 76–bottom of 80, and Watkins, 52–bottom of 55.

You are to read the poems (placed after the scores in MA) before you listen to the songs, and to study the analytic commentary that Morgan has written about each song in the anthology. We’ll devote most of the class time to looking closely at the scores and listening closely to the music. Be sure to prepare responses to all of the questions below.

1. Regarding the two songs: how has each composer responded—or not responded—to structural and expressive qualities in the text?

2. How do these songs relate or not relate to the other Austro-German pieces we have studied so far? Be prepared to cite specific stylistic features.

3. The singer’s first seven notes are the basic motive in Webern’s song. Listen first for transformations of the motive in the vocal part, then listen to its appearances in the piano part. Does the song sound coherent to you? What traditional features do you hear in it?

9

4. Look at the themes for Berg’s song, as given on p. 232 of the Morgan anthology, and then at some of their appearances in the song. Consider the overall shape of the song. Where is the climax? Does the phrase-structure sound like that of tonal music? If so, how has Berg achieved the effect? Do you discern remnants of functional harmony? If not, has he found effective substitutes?

Assignment for Thursday, 13 September: Paris at the Turn of the Century: Ravel and DebussyRead Glenn Watkins, “And the Moon Descends over the Temple that Was,” a chapter from his Pyramids at the Louvre: Music, Culture, and Collage from Stravinsky to the Postmodernists (SSR 3). Skim the discussion of La soirée dans Grenade in MA, 6–8.

Listen to Ravel, Jeux d’eau (1901, SSE 7) and “Asie” from Shéhérazade (1903, SSE 8) and to Debussy, La soirée dans Grenade (1903, MA 1) and Et la lune descend sur la temple qui fût (1907, SSE 9). Before you listen to Ravel’s song “Asie,” read the translation of the text on Canvas.

1. In what respects do the assigned pieces for today resemble the Austro-German works that we have been studying? In what respects do they seem significantly different? Try to be specific.

2. Be prepared to discuss the chapter from Pyramids at the Louvre. What was the context for both composers’ interest in “oriental” culture? How did this manifest itself in Ravel’s song and Debussy’s 1907 piano piece? Is the style of these two pieces different from the other two pieces? (One of these refers to Spain in its title, whereas the other discloses no ethnic affiliation in its title.)

3. How does Debussy establish La soirée dans Grenade as a “Spanish” piece? Do you think that cultural appropriation (broadly speaking, “Orientalism”) is an issue here? Morgan's discussion on pp. 6–8 of MA minimizes the importance of dominant-to-tonic motion in establishing key areas. How do you hear this aspect of the piece?

4. In most editions, Jeux d’eau includes an epigraph taken from a poem by Henri de Régnier, which translates more or less as “god of the river laughing at the water that tickles him.” Does Ravel convey this scene and, if so, how?

5. Ravel considered Jeux d’eau to be in sonata form. What aspects of sonata form appear to have been most important to him? Where is the “second theme” and where does he recapitulate it? How does he achieve the effect of recapitulation when the first theme returns? Listen and look for whole tone and pentatonic elements. How do these interact with or substitute for elements of functional harmony? (I don’t expect a high-level theoretical response. Just listen and report what you think you’re hearing.)

Assignment for Tuesday, 18 September: Bartók and Stravinsky before World War IListen to Nos. 1 and 4 of Bartók's Fourteen Bagatelles (1908, SSE 10); the opening of Bluebeard’s Castle (1911, (MA 7); and the selections from Rite of Spring (1913, MA 9).

10

Review the handout on one-act operas, and read Morgan, bottom of 95–110; and SR 4, which is an essay by Bartók. Study the musical examples and formal sketch given in Watkins, 218–220. Before listening to Bluebeard’s Castle, be sure to read the synopsis of the plot on p. 90 of the Morgan anthology. The text for the opening is translated with the score excerpt in the anthology. The opera opens with a Prologue, the first two stanzas of which are as follows:

The tale is old Let the song speak, I pray,that shall be told, We will watch together.but where does it belong: within? without? Our eyes are open wide:How shall I tell the story, but where is the stage: within? without?ladies and gentlemen? ladies and gentlemen?

1. According to Bartók's essay, how do twentieth-century applications of folk music differ from earlier ones? What are the various ways in which “peasant music” may be used in “modern music”? How has he used folk music in the two bagatelles?

2. The end of the Prologue to Bluebeard’s Castle is spoken over the opening phrases of the music given in the anthology. What kind of story do the stanzas given above suggest? Consider both the imagery and the style of the poetry.

3. How does the dramatic situation in Bluebeard’s Castle exemplify the general trends in one-act operas that Winfried Kirsch discusses?

4. Except in two sonatas for violin and piano from the early 1920s, Bartók considered himself to be a composer of tonal music. Not only is Bluebeard’s Castle organized around tonal centers, but also it contains remnants of functional harmony. Where does he apply them and to what dramatic ends?

5. Study the technical aspects of Rite of Spring mentioned by Morgan—the textures, rhythmic organization, and melodic style. In what respects are these innovative? How has Stravinsky used the folk sources that Watkins cites?

6. In these pieces both Bartók and Stravinsky drew on but also radically transformed types of folk music. Consider the dramatic situations in the two pieces. Do the two compositions bear comparison with each other with respect to both their dramatic situations and the composers’ use of folk sources? Be prepared to elaborate on your answer.

For Thursday, 20 September: Ives and American Music before World War IListen to Ives, General William Booth Enters into Heaven (MA 6) and “Argument,” from his Second String Quartet (SSE 11). Skim Morgan’s commentary on the song, which follows the score in the anthology. Read, as well, an article by Morgan, “Ives and Mahler: Mutual Responses at the End of an Era,” 19th-Century Music 2, no. 1(July 1978): 72-81. *

1. How has Ives integrated the quotations from other songs into his own song--or has he? How does he move between the harmonic language of the source songs and specifically twentieth-century idioms in his own song? Try to characterize the tone in Ives’s song.

11

2. Do you hear quoted material in the string quartet movement? If so, what is the effect there? Try to characterize the tone in the movement.

3. Late eighteenth-century writers sometimes likened the Classical string to a conversation. How does Ives’s string quartet movement fit or not fit into this tradition? What aspects of a string quartet would promote the image of a conversation? Does the image suit the string quartet movement by Schoenberg that we studied recently?

4. Do you hear the process that Morgan calls “defamiliarization” at work in these two pieces by Ives and, if so, how and where? Do you hear it in the particular movements by Mahler that we studied?

*You can access this article through the online catalog of the UNT library. Go to http://www.library.unt.edu/ and select Books & More. On the pulldown menu choose Journal Title and type in 19th-Century Music. Find the correct issue and then the article, which you should download and probably print out.

For Tuesday, 25 SeptemberYour article reports are due today. Today’s class will be devoted to the group reports based on the individual versions that you turn in.

For Thursday, 27 September: France during and after World War IListen to Debussy, Sonata for Flute, Viola, and Harpsichord / 1 (1915, SSE 1); Satie, Parade excerpts (1917, SSE 2); Milhaud, “Botafogo” from Saudades do Brazil (1920, SSE 3); and Ravel, “Aoua!” from Chansons madécasses (1925, SSE 4). Read Watkins, 263–top of 266; excerpt by Jean Cocteau (SSR 1); and Simms, 259–262.

1. In what respects does Debussy’s sonata resemble, and in what respects does it differ, from the piano pieces by him that we have already studied? Consider features such as harmony, form, and texture.

2. How does the stance articulated by Cocteau in the source reading compare with attitudes toward music that we have already encountered? What kinds of music does he see as potential sources of renewal?

Cocteau refers a number of times to Satie’s music for Parade, subtitled “realist ballet on a theme of Jean Cocteau.” He and Satie collaborated with other stellar artists: Picasso created the curtains, sets, and costumes, Massine choreographed the ballet, and Diaghilev directed it. The ballet's subject matter concerns sideshows and the managers' attempts to hustle a crowd into the theater by offering brief displays outside it of acts by a Chinese conjurer, a young American girl, and acrobats. (The word “parade” designates the makeshift stage on which a sideshow takes place and by extension a sideshow itself.) This is the end of Cocteau’s scenario:

Nobody enters.

12

After the last number in the sideshow, the exhausted managers collapse in each other’s arms. The Chinese conjurer, the two acrobats, and the young American girl emerge from the empty theater. Seeing their manager’s supreme effort and its failure, the three try to explain to the crowd that the performances take place inside the building.

3. How would you characterize Satie’s music in the assigned selections from Parade? What are the sources of the unusual sounds in these excerpts?

4. Where did Milhaud find inspiration outside the common-practice mainstream? How did he coordinate the two keys in his piano piece? In other words, to what extent is it “bitonal”? As you consider this question, remember the first Bagatelle by Bartók.

5. Is Ravel’s song more or less bitonal than Milhaud’s piano piece? Why would Ravel have experimented with bitonality in the assigned orchestral song (the text is given below)? What else do you notice about his setting of the text?

Aoua! Aoua! Aoua! Aoua!Méfiez-vous des blancs, habitants du rivage. Do not trust the white men, dwellers on the coast. Du temps de nos pères, In our fathers’ lifetime,des blancs descendirent dans cette île; white people came to this island.On leur dit: Voilà des terres— We said to them: here is land—que vos femmes les cultivent. your womenfolk will cultivate it.Soyez justes, soyez bons et devenez nos frères. Be just, be good, and become our brothers.

Les blancs promirent, et cependant ils faisaient The white people promised, and yet they builtdes retranchements. Un fort menaçant s’éleva, fortifications. A menacing fort was erected,le tonnerre fut renfermé dans des bouches d’airain. they enclosed thunder in mouths of brass.Leurs prêtres voulurent nous Their priests wanted to give us donner un dieu que nous ne connaissons pas. a god that we did not know.Ils parlèrent enfin d’obéissance et d’esclavage: They spoke finally of obedience and slavery:Plutôt la mort! Far better to die!

Le carnage fut long et terrible. The carnage was long and terrible.Mais, malgré la foudre But, despite the thunderQu’ils vomaissaient, et qui écrasait that they vomited and that erased Des armées entières, ils furent tous exterminés. entire armies, they were all slain.

Aoua! Aoua! Méfiez-vous des blancs! Aoua! Aoua! Do not trust the white men!Nous avons vu de nouveaux tyrans, We have seen new tyrants,plus fortes et plus nombreux, stronger and more numerous,planter leur pavillon sur le rivage. plant their colors on the coast.Le ciel a combattu pour nous: The sky fought for us:Il a fait tomber sur eux les pluies, It sent down rains, Les tempêtes et les vents empoisonnés. storms and poisonous winds.Ils ne sont plus, et nous vivons libres. They are no more, and we live, free.

Aoua! Aoua! Méfiez-vous des blancs, Aoua! Aoua! Do not trust the white men,habitants du rivage. dwellers on the coast.

13

Assignment for Tuesday, 2 October: American “Ultra-modernism”Read SSR 2 and SSR 3, chapters 8 and 9 from Carol J. Oja, Making Music Modern: New York in the 1920s (1998). Listen to Varèse, Hyperprism (1923, MA 13); Crawford, Andante from String Quartet (1931, SSE 5); and Cowell, Dynamic Motion (1916, SSE 6) and Voice of Lir (1920). The entire score of Voice of Lir is in SSR 3. Read the discussion of Hyperprism after the score in MA closely enough to understand the major points that Morgan is making.

If you would like to do additional reading on dissonant counterpoint, I suggest Charles Seeger, “On Dissonant Counterpoint,” Modern Music 7/4 (1930): 25–30. The music library has a complete run of this journal; it is also available on RIPM. Seeger was the teacher of Cowell and then of Crawford, who also became his wife.

1. Do these pieces resemble any of the European music we have studied so far? In what respects do they differ from or resemble other music that we have been studying?

2. To what more specifically is Morgan referring when he writes about “Varèse’s tendency to view musical progression and development in textural and ‘spatial’ rather than linear terms”?

3. Consider the attitudes toward dissonance expressed in the two chapters from Carol Oja’s book. What kinds of significance did Cowell and his contemporaries find, in particular, in his cluster compositions?

4. How have critics divided up Cowell’s cluster compositions? Which type best suits each of the assigned piano pieces by him? Be prepared to discuss Oja’s observations about each piece.

5. Cowell considered Crawford’s String Quartet to be the finest example of the genre composed thus far by an American. What is she doing in the Adagio that might make her work appealing to so avant-garde a composer as Cowell? What is the overall shape of the movement? What is the significance of overtones here?

Assignment for Thursday, 4 October: Stravinsky and Hindemith and the Question of Neoclassicism

You are to send the topics for your final papers by today. There are no rules about how to do this, but the more specific you can be, the more I will be able to guide you in further defining the topic and finding the best sources for exploring it.

Listen to Stravinsky, the first movements of the Octet (1923; SSE 7) and the Concerto for Piano and Winds (1924; MA 10); and Hindemith, “On the Death of Maria I,” from Das Marienleben (1923; SSE 8). I have posted a translation of the text that Hindemith set in this song. Read Morgan, 168–middle of 174; Simms, 246–top of 249; and Stravinsky’s article “Some Ideas about My Octuor” (SSR 4). Skim Morgan's discussion of Stravinsky's concerto movement in MA, 171–73.

1. Does Stravinsky’s aesthetic, as expressed in the article, correspond to the sound of his Octet? Consider, in particular, the tone of both the article and the Octet movement.

14

2. Do the first movements of the Octet and the Concerto for Piano and Winds sound as if they are by the composer of Rite of Spring? Explain your response.

3. Morgan writes of “Stravinsky’s interest in working with given musical types, treated much like existing ‘objects’ to be subjected to external manipulation.” Can you hear this in the two first movements? Consider this on both the smallest and larger levels of the works.

4. What kinds of music does Hindemith reject in the comments quoted by Simms? Please note that Hindemith’s song is not an example of Gebrauchsmusik; it does, however, exemplify “new objectivity” (neue Sachlichkeit). Does Hindemith’s song sound like any other German songs that we have studied so far in this course?

For Tuesday, 9 October: Twelve-Tone Music by Schoenberg and Webern Listen to Schoenberg, Piano Piece, Op. 33a (1929, MA 5); and Webern, String Quartet, Op. 28 / 2 (1938, MA 12), and review the pieces by the two composers that we studied in Unit 1. Read Morgan, 187–top of 194. Study the musical example and tables in the “Analytical Comments,” MA, 68 and the entire “Analytical Comments” in MA, 184–86. When you listen, try to forget, at least initially, that the composers used twelve-tone techniques.

1. What does Schoenberg appear to be trying to accomplish in the excerpt from the essay that you have been asked to read? What is the tone of the excerpt?

2. What sounds familiar and what sounds different in this music? Consider aspects of the music such as phrase-structure, texture, and patterns of repetition (including sonata form, of course), and be prepared to discuss them.

3. In the case of Webern’s movement, think as well of the genre and movement type and of the other string quartet movements we have studied so far (by Schoenberg and Ives). Does this one display traditional characteristics of the scherzo and string quartet types?

For Thursday, 11 October: Berg in the 1920s Listen to Berg, Wozzeck Act 3 scene 4 and the succeeding interlude (1925, SSE 12); and Lyric Suite / I (1926, MA 15). Skim the commentary but study the Examples and Tables in the “Analytical Comments” that follow the score for the Lyric Suite, MA, 242–248. Read Morgan, 210–216, and the entry for Wozzeck in Grove Online. (Note that Morgan twice refers to Act 3 scene 4 inaccurately.) A translation for Act 3 Scene 4 of Wozzeck is on Canvas.

1. Berg’s opera is his last “free atonal” or “expressionistic” work. Does Berg make you feel sympathetic to Wozzeck, even though he is a murderer? If so, how does he do so? If not, why?

2. This will vary from person to person most likely, but how audible is the six-note chord that pervades Act 3 scene 4 of Wozzeck? Does the scene sound musically coherent? How tonal is the interlude after Act 3 scene 4 in your estimation?

15

3. In what ways does Berg’s application of the twelve-tone idea in the Lyric Suite movement resemble his approach in his “free atonal” music? Has using the new approach had a discernible effect on the sound of his music?

4. Listen for aspects of the music other than the twelve-tone basis. Do factors such as texture, phrase-structure, etc. allow you to follow the course of the music?

5. Consider the movement from the Lyric Suite in light of the other string quartet movements that we have studied. Does this movement have traditional characteristics of the genre?

Deadlines to keep in mind

Tuesday, 23 October: this is the day for the second article reports and group presentations

Tuesday, 30 October: you must submit your final paper topic and preliminary bibliography

For Tuesday, 16 October: Music and Politics in the United States Listen to Copland, Short Symphony (1933; SSE 9) and the excerpt from Rodeo (1942; MA 19). Skim the discussion of Rodeo in MA, 298–300. Read the “Life” portion of the Grove Music entry for Copland (2013) and about Ruth Crawford Seeger’s life in the entry for her (also 2013), the account of “Bonyparte” in “White Dance Tunes” from Alan Lomax’s Our Singing Country (SSR 6), and Ruth Crawford Seeger’s “A Note on Transcription,” intended to form part of a preface to Lomax’s 1941 collection (SSR 7). Note Copland’s use of her transcription.

1. Copland wrote the Short Symphony shortly before he felt compelled to change his attitude toward composition. As you listen to the Short Symphony and the excerpt from Rodeo, pay attention to texture, motivic work, patterns of repetition, and rhythmic style. Do the two compositions sound markedly different in style to you and, if so, how?

2. How did Copland integrate the three movements of the Short Symphony beyond the attacca connections between successive movements?

3. Crawford Seeger transcribed and edited the folk songs that Lomax and his son had collected. Because she did much more than they had expected, her very lengthy preface did not make it into print until about fifteen years ago. What does the portion that you have been assigned to read suggest about her attitude toward her task?

For Tuesday, 18 October: Bartók’s SymmetriesListen to the second, third, and fourth movements of Bartók’s String Quartet No. 5 (1934, SSE 10). Study carefully Bartók's own “Analysis of the Fifth String Quartet,” taken from Béla Bartók Essays, ed. Benjamin Suchoff (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1976), 414–15 (SSR 8); and read his essay “The Relation of Folk Song to the Development of the Art Music of Our Time” (SSR 9).

16

1. Study Bartók’s analysis of the Fifth String Quartet and mark the sections that he gives in your scores for the second, third, and fourth movements. In what respects can the “tonalities” of the three movements be considered to be those he shows in his overview?

2. In this period of his career Bartók showed a marked interest in symmetry on the level of the motive as well as on that of the entire multi-movement work. Listen and look for symmetrical structures throughout these movements. Where do you discern these structures?

3. Does Bartók’s use of the string-quartet medium resemble that in the other quartets we have studied?

4. What qualities does Bartók attribute to peasant music, and what does he consider to be their source? How does he account for changes that folk music inevitably must undergo?

5. What methodologies is he advocating for collecting and preserving folk music? In what respects does his attitude resonate—or not—with the attitude that comes through in the essay by Crawford Seeger we just read?

6. Be prepared to recount Bartók’s concise history of the use of peasant music by composers of concert music. What is his explanation for their intensified interest in it in the twentieth century? How does he classify the use or non-use of folk music by significant composers of concert music in his time?

For Tuesday, 23 OctoberThe second article reports are due before class. Today’s class will be devoted to the group reports based on the individual versions that you turn in.

For Thursday, 25 October: A Twentieth-Century Operatic Anti-hero: Britten's Peter GrimesListen to Britten, Peter Grimes, Interlude 4 and Act II, Scene 2 (1945, MA 22). Read the discussion of the excerpt in MA, 346–49, and read the synopsis of the plot in the online Grove Dictionary.

1. Britten, like Berg, has an anti-hero at the center of his opera. Does the assigned interlude in Peter Grimes make a similar impact to that made by the final interlude in Wozzeck?

Do the two composers appear to give the interludes equivalent weight?

Are the dramatic situations comparable, in particular regarding the place in the plot at which each interlude appears?

2. How did Britten compose the music that follows the interlude to dramatize the words and action?

3. What is the effect of the changing degree of lyricism in Britten’s scene?

17

4. Britten and his librettist included two characters sympathetic to Grimes, one of whom appears, along with other characters who are intent on murdering Grimes, at the end of the scene. What do you think is the effect of including characters who care about Grimes? (The other character is Ellen Orford.)

5. Why might Britten have written the child’s role as a non-speaking, non-singing part?

Assignment for Tuesday, 30 October: Just the NotesYou are to submit your preliminary bibliography today.

Listen at least twice to Copland, Piano Quartet / 1 (SSE 1, 1950); Stockhausen, Introduction and first section from Kreuzspiel (1951, MA 25); and Cage, Book I from Music of Changes (SSE 2, 1951). The first time that you listen, do it without any preconceptions about these pieces. Then read Copland, “The Composer in Industrial America” (SSR 1, 1952); Boulez, “Schoenberg is Dead” (SSR 2, 1952); Morgan 359–64; and the commentary in MA, 381–82 (skim the rest of it).

1. What are the terms Copland uses to describe the position of composers in America? How does he view Ives’s achievements? How does he present the dichotomy often perceived in his own output between more difficult and more accessible works?

2. Consider the following observation made by Copland in 1957, “As I see it, twelve-tonism is nothing more than an angle of vision. Like fugal treatment, it is a stimulus that enlivens musical thinking, especially when applied to a series of tones that lend themselves to that treatment. It is a method, not a style, and therefore it solves no problems of musical expressivity.” What does this statement suggest to you?

3. Copland’s opening theme is, so to speak, a “eleven-note row.” Be prepared to discuss characteristics of this theme.

4. Some critics have considered the movement by Copland to be in a kind of sonata form. How much does that view of the movement’s shape explain? In your experience of the movement, where are the expressive high points and what contributes to their effectiveness?

5. Why did Boulez take such a harsh position in “Schoenberg is Dead”? What does he mean by “a yawning chasm opens up between the infrastructures of tonality and a language whose organizational principles are as yet but dimly perceived”?

5. Morgan asserts that Stockhausen’s movement “follows a simple underlying plan whose general outline can easily be followed by the listener” (MA, 381). Do you agree? In other words, can you hear the form of Kreuzspiel?

6. Does Kreuzspiel have any appeal to you beyond that of the rigorous premises, outlined below, upon which it has been based? If so, does the appeal stem from those premises?

7. What philosophical stance underlies Cage’s approach in Music of Changes?

18

8. What are the implications of indeterminacy in the compositional process as opposed to improvisation as a performance possibility?

9. How do you interpret the instructions at the beginning?

10. Have the compositional procedures of Stockhausen and Cage resulted in pieces that sound distinctly different in their organization?

Notes on Stockhausen’s Pre-Compositional Strategies in Kreuzspiel In this piece, each pitch is associated with a particular multiple of 16th-note triplets and a particular dynamic marking. Row-forms I and XII are given below:

I= Eb Db C D Bb F B E G A Ab Gb

Numbers of triplets 11 5 6 9 2 12 1 10 4 7 8 3 Dynamic marking sfz mf mf p ff pp ff p f mp mp f

XII= B E G A Ab Gb Eb Db C D Bb FNumbers of triplets 1 10 4 7 8 3 11 5 6 9 2 12Dynamic marking ff p f mp mp f sfz mf mf p ff pp

Pitch, register, rhythms, dynamics are all serialized, and the large-scale form derives directly from manipulations of these pre-compositional materials. The hexachords of the original row-form undergo a complicated twelve-stage rotation that concludes with the pitches of each hexachord in the original order, but the hexachords themselves reversed. Each of the twelve statements of the row lasts exactly six-and-a-half measures.

The large-scale formal process that gives the movement its shape involves not only the twelve-stage rotation of the pitch series but also changes in timbre and register. The piece opens with two six-note groups of notes polarized at the piano’s extreme registers. Those notes undergo a gradual process of redistribution over the entire range, with notes in the middle range given to bass clarinet and oboe.

No class on Thursday, 1 November, because I am going to a conference.

Assignment for Tuesday, 6 November: New Approaches to Time, Rhythm, and TextureListen to Messiaen, Quartet for the End of Time / 6 (SSE 3, 1940); Et exspecto resurrectionem mortuorum / 2 (SSE 4, 1964); and Penderecki, Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima (1960, MA 27). The second piece by Messiaen is notated as a C score; observe Messiaen’s use of the word “simhavikrama,” a word that designates a Hindu rhythmic pattern. Read Morgan, 335–337 and 386–90, and the analytical comments in MA, 410–11.

1. What are “nonretrogradable rhythms”? What are “added values”? Note the appearance of both in the movement from the Quartet for the End of Time. What is the audible effect—if any—of these rhythmic innovations on that movement?

19

2. The subject of Et exspecto resurrectionem mortuorum is Christ’s resurrection. What is the form of the second movement?

3. In a note on the bottom of the first page of Et exspecto, Messiaen refers to what has appeared thus far as a “melody by losses.” Try to understand what he might mean by this. How are measures 3–7 connected to the preceding two measures?

4. Morgan describes passages in Threnody as based on kinds of imitative counterpoint. How many kinds do you discern?

5. How would you characterize the form of each of the three movements for today? What role does texture play in clarifying the form of each?

Assignment for Thursday, 8 November: Compositional Reception of Mahler (Crumb and Berio)Listen to Berio, Sinfonia / 3 (1969); and Crumb, Night of the Four Moons / 1 and 4 (1969, MA 26 and SSE 5). Read Schwartz and Godfrey, Music since 1945, 375-378; Berio, “Meditations on a Twelve-Tone Horse” (SSR 3); and the analytical comments in MA, 390–92. Refresh your memory of the works by Mahler we studied and what is typically said about them, and listen again to the selection from Wozzeck we studied in this unit.

1. How might the works by Berio and Crumb be considered to relate aesthetically to the oeuvre of Mahler?

2. Through what means has Berio connected the various textual and musical sources in the third movement of his Sinfonia?

3. Be prepared to discuss this quotation from Berio’s essay. “The ideology of the culture industry tends to freeze experience into schemes and manners: formation becomes ‘form’; an instrument, ‘gadget’; a social ideal, ‘party.’ Schoenberg’s and Webern’s poetics, the ‘twelve-tone system.’” What is Berio’s purpose in making these oppositions?

4. Why is Berio opposed to twelve-tone composition in this essay? What is his attitude toward music theory? Why does he end with the following: “an ideological war long since fought and won by responsible minds like Schoenberg, with neither systems nor scholarship for armor”?

5. Read Morgan’s description of the form of the first movement from Crumb’s Night of the Four Moons on p. 390 of the anthology. Does the description seem accurate? If so, what is the effect of the formal processes that Morgan describes?

6. Crumb has connected the fourth movement of Night of the Four Moons to the final movements of Mahler’s Lied von der Erde and Haydn’s Farewell Symphony. For students who know these movements, what kinds of connections exist between Crumb’s finale and the other two last movements?

Assignment for Tuesday, 13 Nov.: Ligeti’s Approaches to Traditions in the 1970s and 1980s

20

Listen to these selections by György Ligeti: Car Horn Prelude and Scene 1 of Le Grand Macabre (1977; revised 1996); Horn Trio / 1 (1982, SSE 6); and Wenn aus der Ferne (1983, MA 24). Read the online Grove’s entry for Le Grand Macabre, review the reading on “textural music” in Morgan, 386–390, and read the commentary on Wenn aus der Ferne in MA, 372–375 and the notes on the Horn Trio given below.

1. You will recall that we have listened to excerpts from these operas: Richard Strauss’s Salome, Béla Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle, Alban Berg’s Wozzeck, and Benjamin Britten’s Peter Grimes. Ligeti referred to Le Grand Macabre as an “anti-anti-opera.” He was calling attention to the disdain that many avant-garde composers felt for opera in the 1960s and 1970s. Instead of composing operas, they composed musical theater, works without the lavishness typical of opera: anti-operas. What features of Le Grand Macabre might be considered to go against the trend toward musical theater as I have just described it?

2. Be prepared to describe the various types of music that you hear in the excerpts from Le Grand Macabre.

3. Ligeti entered “Hommage à Brahms” on the score of the Horn Trio, which he completed in 1983, the 150th anniversary of Brahms’s birth. About the reprise of the A section, one critic writes “it begins as if it has inaudibly already begun before.” Does the way Ligeti handles this part of the form sound like the approach of, for example, Brahms or Mahler?

4. About the first movement’s ternary form Ligeti wrote “I broke with a taboo of the New Music, that one cannot write an A-B-A form.” Why would there be such a taboo? Has Ligeti composed a convincing ternary-form movement, or is there a dissonance between the content of the movement and that form?

5. Ligeti wrote Wenn aus der Ferne more than twenty years after he composed Atmosphères and Penderecki wrote Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima. Using the description of Atmosphères in the excerpt from Morgan’s book as your guide, try to gauge how his approach to micropolyphony has changed in the meantime. Is Wenn aus der Ferne textural music in the same sense that the other two pieces are?

6. What aspects of Wenn aus der Ferne are traditional, and which are innovative?

Notes on the First Movement of Ligeti’s Horn Trio

Ligeti calls for natural harmonics from the horn some of the time—in the first movement, for example, for an upward flourish (e.g. in m. 41)—against equal temperament in the other instruments.

One critic noted the following dichotomy in the Horn Trio: “on the one hand, the timbre in which without question the entire Romanticism of the natural horn lives on, and on the other, untempered constellations of natural harmonics, which produce an unregulated microtonality.”

21

The form of the first movement is ternary—A+B, C, A+B—with each of the large parts divided into smaller subsections:

A: mm. 1-12, 13-22, and 23-40

B: mm. 40-43, 44-53, and 54-61

C: mm. 62-67, 68-75, and 76-85

A: mm. 86-93, 94-102, and 103-119

B: mm. 119-22, 123-31, and 131-43

Assignment for Thursday, 15 November: Soviet Avant-Garde Composers in the 1980sListen to Alfred Schnittke, String Quartet No. 3 (1983) and Sofia Gubaidulina, Sieben Worte / 6, 7 (1984). From the library’s web site, download these two items: John Webb, “Schnittke in Context,” Tempo No. 182 (1992): 19–22; and pp. 5-middle of 26 from “Sofia Gubaidulina: ‘My Desire is Always to Rebel, to Swim against the Stream!’” The latter, an interview with the composer conducted and translated from the Russian by Vera Lukomsky, appears in Perspectives of New Music 36/1 (Winter 1998).

Webb’s article provides a useful overview of aspects of music history between Mahler and Schnittke as well as draws connections between the composers.

1. According to Webb, what is the difference between stylistic pluralism and polystylism?

2. Do you agree with Webb’s conclusions about inherent contradictions between polystylism and the spirit of both serialism and neo-classicism?

3. “Intonazia” is closely associated with Socialist Realism. What is this concept? Why would Mahler’s music have been more continuously important to composers in the Soviet Union than it was to composers in the West?

4. At the beginning of the Third String Quartet Schnittke quotes three composers from diverse periods. These quotations recur throughout all movements of the quartet. How do the three quoted passages relate or not relate to each other? What happens to the quoted material in the course of the composition?

5. We have listened to string quartet movements by Schoenberg, Ives, Crawford, Berg, Webern, and Bartók. Does Schnittke’s quartet resemble any of these movements? Prepare to discuss this question in detail by listening to all of the movements again.

6. Gubaidulina’s piece is a setting of the seven last words Christ spoke on the cross. What does she mean when she refers to “crucifying” strings? What other kinds of cross symbolism does she use in these movements?

22

Assignment for Tuesday, 20 November: Opera in a New CenturyIn today’s assignment, you will focus on Kaija Saariaho’s first opera, L’amour de loin, which she completed in 2000. Read the notes from a DVD performance I’ve posted on Canvas, which include a synopsis of the action in each scene of the opera’s five acts. I’ll play some of the DVD in class.

As you can see from the DVD notes, the opera is set in the 12th century and moves between Blaye, in southwestern France, and Tripoli (the librettist is referring to a city in Lebanon rather than the city in Libya). The opera has three characters: Jaufré Rudel, based on a historical troubadour of that name; Clémence, the woman he has fallen in love with without ever having met her; and the Pilgrim (le Pélerin), who is the go-between in this courting from a distance. Saariaho makes extensive use of both male and female choruses, and as you will hear, she has composed music for traditional instruments but also live electronics.

You are to listen to the recording on Naxos. I have posted three excerpts from the vocal score along with the libretto and a translation for the entire opera. You are to focus on Act 2 scene 2 (CD 1, tracks 8 and 9); Act 4 scene 3 (CD 2, tracks 6 and 7); and Act 5 scene 3 (CD 2, tracks 13–15). These scenes appear on pp. 11–13, 26–27, and 35–38 in the libretto.

1. The author of the DVD notes, who is a musicologist, briefly positions L’amour de loin within Modernism and as an opera. What points does she make when she does this? Try to amplify her remarks with your own observations.

2. Compare Saariaho’s apparent stance with respect to the genre of opera to that of Ligeti in Le Grand Macabre. Where do you discern differences or similarities?

3. Focus now on the music. Listen closely to the Pilgrim’s music in Act 2 scene 2 with words placed within quotation marks (mm. 374–464 and elsewhere in the scene). Here the character is recalling music that he (this is a trouser role, a male role sung by a woman) heard Jaufré sing in Act 1. How does Saariaho evoke the time and place in which she has set her opera?

4. Does Saariaho’s procedure in this scene resemble the eclecticism we have encountered to varying degrees in music by other composers in unit 3? Consider in particular the works by Berio, Crumb, Ligeti, and Schnittke.

5. Act 4 scene 3 features a lament for Jaufré that the libretto designates a “complainte.” Listen for how Saariaho has set his lament in mm. 391–97, 426–49, and 485–573, as well as more specifically how she has set the words “l’amour de loin” (love from a distance).

6. Be prepared to discuss how Saariaho uses the choruses in each of these three scenes. You do not have to come up with a sophisticated response, but do have something to say about the choruses in each scene.

Thursday, 22 November, is Thanksgiving. On Tuesday, 27 November, the third article reports are due, and you will present as groups on them in class. As before, send your report to me, with the filled in cover sheet, as an email attachment.

23

The final three classes of the semester, 29 November, 4 December, and 6 December, will be devoted to the writing workshop. Please see the document “final project, details” for more about this requirement. The groups for these days are as follows:

November 29: Alexandra, Kristen, Ethan, Olivia

December 4: Gail, Brittany, Dani, Cole

December 6: Aaron, Jiyoung, Makana, Victoria

Please let me know if you have questions about this component of the course requirements.

Your final papers are due on Tuesday, 11 December, by 4 p.m. This time you are to submit hard copies of your papers with the cover sheet stapled on top.