Developing Variation and Schoenberg's Serial Music

Autism and twelve-tone serial music are related, mutually reinforcing forms of cultural modernism. Both have been understood as excessively isolated or alone, with each entity self-contained and self-enclosed; as uncommunicative, or communicating in atypical ways, with an excess of private meanings and self-references; as demonstrating an unproductive preference for routines and rituals; as incongruously hypertrophied in certain respects (often hyperrational) and atrophied in others (often emotionally or expressively defective). They have also been understood as inaccessible fortresses; as incomprehensible aliens; as cold, unfeeling machines (especially computational machines); and as idiot savants (with isolated islands of excellence in a sea of cognitive deficiency).

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Brahms and the Principle of Developing Variation

Music Analysis ◽

10.2307/939249 ◽

1988 ◽

Vol 7 (1) ◽

pp. 99 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

V. Kofi Agawu ◽

Walter Frisch

Keyword(s):

Developing Variation

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Statistical gestalts — Perceptible features in serial music

Music, Gestalt, and Computing - Lecture Notes in Computer Science ◽

10.1007/bfb0034110 ◽

1997 ◽

pp. 103-113 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Elena Ungeheuer

Keyword(s):

Serial Music

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Handel’s Transformative Compositional Practices

Journal of Musicology ◽

10.1525/jm.2021.38.4.479 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 38 (4) ◽

pp. 479-502

Author(s):

David Ross Hurley

Keyword(s):

Eighteenth Century ◽

Vocal Music ◽

Original Music ◽

Developing Variation ◽

Compositional History ◽

Early Eighteenth Century ◽

Musical Transformations ◽

The Aesthetic ◽

First Time ◽

Variation Process

In recent decades singers of Handel’s music have made great strides in recapturing the art of embellishing his music, thus breathing new life into forms such as the da capo aria. Yet Handel’s own “variations”—his development and transformation of musical material in his vocal music, important for understanding his compositional practice with borrowed as well as (presumably) original music—are not yet fully explored or appreciated. Admittedly, scholars have discussed musical procedures such as inserting, deleting, and reordering musical materials, as well as other Baroque combinatorial practices in Handel’s arias, but the musical transformations I discuss here are closer to a specifically Handelian brand of developing variation. To my knowledge, the concept of developing variation has never before been applied to early eighteenth-century music. I explore the relation of developing variation to drama (also rarely done) in two of Handel’s arias, providing a close examination of “Ombre, piante” from the opera Rodelinda and new thoughts about “Lament not thus,” originally intended for the oratorio Belshazzar. Although these arias belong to different genres and different stages of Handel’s career, they both exhibit material that undergoes a kind of progressive variation process that has tangible musical and dramatic ramifications, of interest to opera specialists and performers. Furthermore, both arias have a complicated compositional history; I offer fresh insights into the aesthetic qualities of each version, thereby throwing light on Handel’s possible compositional intentions. This article also discloses for the first time some recurring musical passages shared between “Lament not thus” and other pieces that could influence the listener’s interpretation of certain musico-dramatic gestures.

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Serialism

Music ◽

10.1093/obo/9780199757824-0265 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Zachary Bernstein

Keyword(s):

English Language ◽

Arnold Schoenberg ◽

Twelve Tone ◽

Historical Perspectives ◽

Critical Commentary ◽

Serial Music ◽

New Students ◽

The Many ◽

Definition Of ◽

Fruitful Research

Since Arnold Schoenberg developed the twelve-tone system in the early 1920s, serialism has been the subject of a continuous torrent of scholarship. At least in part, this is the result of an experimental attitude that has marked serialism since its inception. No two major serial composers have used the same set of tools; indeed, the creation of new serial techniques seems to have been a necessary stage in the growth of a serial composer. This individuality naturally has consequences for scholarship. For one, it has meant a profusion of writing by composers. Some of this writing comes as compositional theory, as composers—from some mixture of a desire to share fruitful research, to facilitate the comprehension of their music, and to stake claims on their inventions—have written about serial procedures that interest them creatively. Some comes as aesthetic manifesto, as composers seek to justify their unique approaches. The great diversity of serial compositional techniques and aesthetics has also led to a flourishing of analysis, as analysts work to define and interpret the many separate practices composers have developed. Yet serialism’s individuality has also contributed to dramatic critical pushback: a running theme among commentators has been that serial music is inaccessible to nonspecialists. The prose written by serial composers has also generated much critical commentary, for many justifications given for their work have been shown to be problematic from political, cultural, and historical perspectives. The sources included in this bibliography give a sampling of the best work from all of these discursive branches as well as a selection of more general resources to help new students of serialism find their footing. Finally, a word about the scope of the article is in order. In the English-language literature, “serialism” and, interchangeably, “serial music” refer broadly to music based on systematic permutations of pitch classes or other elements. Twelve-tone music, accordingly, is the first prominent instance of serialism. French scholarship uses a similarly broad connotation of “musique sérielle,” which encompasses “Le dodécaphonisme” or “musique dodécaphonique” (i.e., twelve-tone music). German scholars, in contrast, have tended to differentiate between “Zwölftonmusik” (twelve-tone music) and “serielle Musik,” the latter distinguishing itself by the application of serial techniques to rhythm, timbre, intensity, and other musical dimensions. This article adopts the English-language definition of serialism.

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