THE MUSIC OF ERNST BLOCH

The aim of this study is to present information about the life, works and composition of composer and music educator Ernest Bloch. In this context, in this research designed as a qualitative study, the information obtained from the literature review in Turkish and English about the composer's life, style and works were compiled by making descriptive analysis. As a result of the research; Although Ernest Bloch was born in Switzerland, he is known as an American composer because he spent the most productive years of his artistic life in America, he consciously used Jewish cultural elements in his music and thought that a composer should not be independent of his own roots, that he was a good music educator besides his composing. It has been seen that he has articles on education, in addition to the influence of his national identity in music style, he uses descriptiveness as a harmonic language, he uses various styles such as tonal sets, serial and modal harmony, the use of harmony with percussion, and he uses independent forms as a form style, being aware of the traditional. It is thought that this study will be a source for other studies about Ernest Bloch, since no other source can be found in Turkish about the composer. Keywords: Ernest Bloch, American composer, Jewish composer, composing style, contemporary period

Mode Harmonic Concept of Oleksandr Cherepnin’s Composer Creativity

The relevance of the topic is determined by the existing contradiction between the great importance of Olexandr Cherepnin’s compositional works, which are widely recognized in the modern cultural world and contain many innovative artistic and theoretical ideas, and the lack of proper coverage in the scientific literature. The analysis of the array of musicological literature devoted to the peculiarities of the musical culture of the XX century proves the fact that the artistic personality of O. Cherepnin and his life and creative path still generally remain beyond the attention of researchers. The purpose of the article is to reveal the meaningful and terminological features of the mode harmonic concept of O. Cherepnin’s compositional works. The methodology. The main methods applied in this study are systematic approach and methods of comparative and musicological (mainly mode harmonic) analysis. The results. O. Cherepnin’s musical language has overcome a long way before it was formed into a single mode harmonic concept. This mode harmonic concept of the artist’s works was first embodied in many of his works, and then was theoretically comprehended by him and given in the article “Basic Elements of My Musical Language” (1962). Therefore, from the beginning, the features of the composer’s mode harmonic language were formed under the influence of artistic necessity and were not subjected to theoretical conceptual principles. The mode harmonic concept of the artist, which became a generalization of his creative activity and artistic ideas, is based mainly on the theory of ambivalence of major and minor. At the same time, the composer does not use the major­minor as the mode basis for his works, basing (as the author himself and researchers of his work emphasize) primarily on the theory of modality. Cherepnin’s mode harmonic concept of musical language is based on a nine­stage scale, which is considered by the composer as universal and is found in most of his works. The most separate and independent components of the nine­stage scale are the three major­minor tetrachords and the two hexachords. The presence of different pitch positions of the scale allows to determine the tonal center at the level of separate fragments of the musical fabric of the work. The harmonic vertical (harmonic structure) of the majority of O. Cherepnin’s works is also formed on the basis of the vertical segments of the specified nine­stage scale. Such mode segments, which in separate works of the composer or their parts play the role of mode harmonic basis, are defined by us as “submodes” (my term — Ch. H.). The most common are tritone consonances, and each “submode” has its own chord that performs the function of the tonic one. The most important among them, according to the composer’s point of view, is a major­minor tetrachord, i.e. vertical four­tone chord. All these consonances are very diverse in their interval structure and intensity of sound. Five­ and six­tone chords are used by the artist much less due to their intense phonism and the need for at least an acoustic solution. Pentatone scales, which are constantly presented in an incomplete form (with the omission of one or two tones), and symmetrical modes are also widely used in O. Cherepnin’s works. Bright ethnic elements of the composer’s mode harmonic concept, which are widely used in his works, are the specific tritone consonances, called by O. Cherepnin as “Georgian trisounds”. The topicality of the study lies in the disclosure of one of the main conceptual foundations of the multifaceted musical language of O. Cherepnin — his mode harmonic component, which has not yet been sufficiently studied. The practical significance. The obtained results of the research allow to reveal the world importance of O. Cherepnin’s artistic figure and composer’s works, to highlight his innovative musical­theoretical ideas and to determine the special place of the artist in the constellation of contemporary composers who actively experimented with tonal­harmonic systems. The obtained conclusions generally expand the view on the nature and structure of mode harmonic thinking of composers of the XX century.

"A Lot of Different Streams": Questioning "Jazz" and Composing Beyond Genre

<p><b>Many composers currently prominent in the jazz world draw upon multiple musical traditions or genres to create their work. The varied compositional activities of composers Nicole Mitchell, Tyshawn Sorey and Wayne Horvitz problematize attempts to classify their work as belonging to a single genre. Drawing on my interviews with these three composers and my analysis of selected works, I seek to understand how they conceptualize their compositional work and its relationship to the various musical traditions that have influenced them. Using Fabian Holt’s genre framework and George E. Lewis’s concept of the Afrological as critical tools, I propose that the work of these composers prioritizes spontaneity and agency, foregrounding process and transformation instead of a more fixed work concept, and claiming a mobility of practice that connects them strongly to the legacy of the AACM. I also use these concepts as ways to reflect on my own creative work developed throughout the DMA, and my relationship to the genre label of jazz.</b></p> <p>The creative portfolio developed as part of this research incorporates influences from multiple streams of music-making, particularly the traditions of jazz, creative music and Western classical music. The submitted works include Cerulean Haze, for jazz octet and 5-piece chamber ensemble (13:00); Sanctuary, a suite in three movements for 11-piece ensemble (18:49); “Noche Oscura” for 10-piece ensemble (6:48); “Moorings (Titahi Bay)” for chordless jazz quartet (6:00); “Jimmy,” “Nuevo Azul,” “Neither Here nor There” and “Metamorphosis” for improvising quartet. These works explore extended jazz and modal harmonic language; strategies for extending songform-derived compositional forms into larger, through-composed works; and varying degrees of notational specificity. The inclusion of improvisation is prioritized in each work.</p>

“...Against the Background of the Russian Landscape” by Roman Ledenev: Features of the CompositionaL Structure

Баян, имея богатую фольклорную историю и оркестровый арсенал средств музыкальной выразительности, за последние 30 лет стал одним из главных проводников идей современных композиторов во всем мире. Данная статья знакомит читателей с баянным творчеством Р. С. Леденёва (1930-2019), в частности с неоконченным циклом для баяна «...на фоне русского пейзажа» op. 50 (1996-2007). Особое внимание уделено анализу жанровой основы, мелодического и гармонического языка, композиционной техники, формы, образного строя, драматургии сочинения в контексте общих творческих ориентиров композитора, наиболее полно раскрывающихся в произведениях для хора и оркестра. В статье предлагается реконструкция условной программы цикла с учетом неоконченной третьей части. Bayan, having a rich folklore history and an orchestral arsenal of musical expression tools, has become one of the main conductors of the ideas of modern composers around the world over the past 30 years. This article introduces readers to the bayan work of Roman Ledenev (1930-2019), namely the unfinished cycle “.against the background of the Russian landscape” ор. 50 for bayan (1996-2007). Special focus is given to the analysis of the genre basis, melodic and harmonic language, compositional technique, form formation, figurative structure, and dramaturgy of the composition in the context of the composer's general creative guidelines most fully revealed in works for chorus and orchestra. The reconstruction of the conditional program of the cycle is presented, taking into account the unfinished third part.

"A Lot of Different Streams": Questioning "Jazz" and Composing Beyond Genre

<p><b>Many composers currently prominent in the jazz world draw upon multiple musical traditions or genres to create their work. The varied compositional activities of composers Nicole Mitchell, Tyshawn Sorey and Wayne Horvitz problematize attempts to classify their work as belonging to a single genre. Drawing on my interviews with these three composers and my analysis of selected works, I seek to understand how they conceptualize their compositional work and its relationship to the various musical traditions that have influenced them. Using Fabian Holt’s genre framework and George E. Lewis’s concept of the Afrological as critical tools, I propose that the work of these composers prioritizes spontaneity and agency, foregrounding process and transformation instead of a more fixed work concept, and claiming a mobility of practice that connects them strongly to the legacy of the AACM. I also use these concepts as ways to reflect on my own creative work developed throughout the DMA, and my relationship to the genre label of jazz.</b></p> <p>The creative portfolio developed as part of this research incorporates influences from multiple streams of music-making, particularly the traditions of jazz, creative music and Western classical music. The submitted works include Cerulean Haze, for jazz octet and 5-piece chamber ensemble (13:00); Sanctuary, a suite in three movements for 11-piece ensemble (18:49); “Noche Oscura” for 10-piece ensemble (6:48); “Moorings (Titahi Bay)” for chordless jazz quartet (6:00); “Jimmy,” “Nuevo Azul,” “Neither Here nor There” and “Metamorphosis” for improvising quartet. These works explore extended jazz and modal harmonic language; strategies for extending songform-derived compositional forms into larger, through-composed works; and varying degrees of notational specificity. The inclusion of improvisation is prioritized in each work.</p>

“The Frog’s Courtship” and Other Sources

The stanzaic form of “The Frog’s Courtship” represents a second major branch in the lineage of the “Sweet Thing” scheme. Chapter 2 concerns its progress from Elizabethan England all the way to late nineteenth-century ragtime and early twentieth-century blues and country music. The stanzaic form appears in the United States by the early nineteenth century and then largely disappears from print until reemerging in several songs collected by folklorists in the early twentieth century, demonstrating its strong endurance in oral tradition. More often than “Captain Kidd,” this second stanzaic form appears in extensively abbreviated versions, reflecting its oral mode of transmission, which allows for more flexibility in length of bars. In early ragtime, the form unites with the harmonic language of contemporaneous popular music and acquires melodic and textual content that subsequently imbues early blues and country music as pervasive elements of the twentieth-century “Sweet Thing” scheme.

Harmonic Progressions

Chapter 4 explores the combination of the poetic forms and rhythmic types with the harmonic language of early blues, country, and gospel music. The main harmonic building blocks of these genres are the major tonic (I), subdominant (IV), and dominant (V) chords, and these are the chords that make up the harmonic progressions in most realizations of the “Sweet Thing” scheme. The harmonic element of the “Sweet Thing” scheme is highly flexible, but this chapter demonstrates that its progressions nonetheless divide into broad comprehensible categories—namely blues-like progressions, periodic progressions, fragmented progressions, and amalgamated progressions—and that the harmony is always closely intertwined with text and rhythm.

Reverie, Schmaltz, and the Modernist Imagination

In a review of 1895, Henry Gauthier-Villars described Claude Debussy’s Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune as “musique de rêve,” a descriptor that has been attached to Debussy’s style ever since. Partly because of the importance of the Prélude within his compositional development, the distinctive sound of Debussy’s “dream music” has often been understood as a response to the hermetic and difficult literary style of French Symbolists, especially that of Stéphane Mallarmé. Yet Gauthier-Villars’s appellation of “musique de rêve” also invoked a specifically sonic (and largely forgotten) set of cultural reference points, an aural backdrop crucial for understanding Debussy’s early style in the 1880s and early 1890s—the widespread cultivation of the topos of reverie in French music in the final two decades of the nineteenth century. Settings of Baudelaire, Verlaine, and Mallarmé by Debussy and his young contemporaries around 1890 were infused with signifiers of dream and reverie that trace back to salon genres of the 1870s and that cross-pollinated with the harmonic language of the newly fashionable valse lente in the early 1880s. Hearing Debussy’s early works in the context of this reverie topos and its aural kinship to the popular valse lente sheds light on the extent to which the radical idiosyncrasy so vaunted by modernists was constantly evolving in tandem with—and could never truly free itself from—an aural culture defined by mass production, repetition, and cliché.

Jazz

This chapter examines the practices that define jazz as an art form, including its rhythmic character, its harmonic language, and its distinctive approach to melody. Issues of swing, of the creativity of jazz that is found within its harmonic realization and chord voicings, and of the character of melodic invention in jazz are all considered. The nature of improvisation as a form of pathfinding is also discussed, with particular foci including ethical issues in performance and the artistic obligations under which jazz players perform, group attention and the way attention is distributed across players, jazz as a representational art and the ways we can see representational content within it, the special way that collective intention and distributed creativity work within an improvising ensemble, and relations between jazz and another great American contribution, philosophical Pragmatism.