“In Terms of the Inner Voices”

Some of the most important ideas I learned while studying with Gregory Proctor involved the power of voice leading. I also became intrigued with the careful explanation for every single pitch in a piece as graphically analyzed by my colleague David Tomasacci. These ideas have been a central pursuit in my own compositions over the past two or three years. One further impetus for a careful interest in voice leading was described by Brown:

… [A]lthough certain aspects of tonal motion are controlled by the outer voice counterpoint, others can be understood only in terms of the inner voices. When graphing a particular piece, the analyst should not simply trace the motion of the soprano and bass voices; he or she should also monitor the behavior of the tenor and alto voices. … In parcitular, we found that bass motion by fifth inevitably arises when the upper voices move by step in a single direction by parallel thirds or sixths. (136)

I was somewhat surprised to realize that if you take “voices mov[ing] by step in a single direction by parallel thirds or sixths” you must generate a sequence in order to maintain good counterpoint with a third voice and that all of the typical tonal sequences can come about as such.

Furthermore, given that “voices mov[ing] by step in a single direction by parallel thirds or sixths” can simply be understood as a harmonized Zug (“a direct, unimpeded motion from one place to another,” Snarrenberg), they can be readily related to activity over a pedal tone—a relationship that Brown makes quite obvious. I find this interesting given that I tend to find sequences as the most direct way of experiencing prolongation despite the constant activity. While I could explain that sensation through the incessant repetition and the lessened impact of a clear end-goal through endless cycling, I find this tonal explanation much more salient.

I recently found myself encouraging a composition student to generate this sensation of what I described at the time as “floating.” I felt that the piece could use some breathing space from its harmonic motion. The solution was to lift the bass voice up into a more tenor-like range. I can’t help but wonder now if the result (which worked well) could have been playing off of inner-voice motions with an implied pedal. I find this idea of the bass part leaving the bass voice to join with inner-voice motions as a means of suspending harmonic motion in time worth further consideration.

“The Myth of Scales”

Also in part due to Tomasacci and Proctor, I have remained interested in the viability of scale-like pitch collections that can be used in a prolongational manner. Tomasacci has uncovered an interesting phenomenon in the harmonic bass motion of Skryabin’s music that works rather well. However, the upper voice is consistently best explained in terms of an octatonic scale that lacks the specificity of a asymmetric scale. Proctor dealt with this scale in terms of a ‘transposition operation’ rather than a harmonic-contrapuntal process.

Brown notes that in general, “scales have only limited explanatory power.” (169) He quotes Mary Louise Serafine as saying that:

[S]cales… have figured disproportionately in music research, chiefly through their influence on the design and conception of studies.

and David Huron as noting that:

In comparison to most of the world’s music, Western music tends to be highly harmonically oriented. Where scales provide the basis for predominantly melodic music, explaining the harmonic properties of these scales may be inappropriate.

But he begins his demonstration of the limited explanatory power of scales with a quote by Taruskin:

Just as we get our sense of Mozart’s C major not only from his use of the “C scale on C” but also from the way the “black keys” are related hierarchically to the tones of the scale, so, if we are able to conceive of the octatonic collection as a tonality, we must be able to account for the use of the “other” four tones in relation to it.

This quote captures two important concepts on opposite ends of musical complexity. On the basic level, it is simply unhelpful to use scale-membership as a means to determine key. Brown explains further:

Even on an intuitive level, we know that scale membership is neither necessary nor sufficient for determining the tonality of a passage or piece. … It is easy, for example, to imagine how a key might be defined by progressions that do not contain every note of the relevant scale. … Similarly, the mere presence of a given scale need not guarantee that a passage is “in” the corresponding key. … To complicate matters further, we can also establish a tonality using progressions built from pitches outside the diatonic collection. … [T]onality does not simply depend on the presence of the “right” notes, but rather on the fact that particular notes appear in the “right” order according to some general laws of tonal voice leading and harmony. (144)

And yet, basic theory courses most often associate scale and key as interrelated concepts. It’s no wonder why students can sometimes get so confused when they are first asked to determine the key of a passage that does not reflect the key signature. For that matter, I suppose it should not be a surprise that students often forget to raise leading tones as those notes are not in the key signature. It might be worth discussing keys divorced from key signatures just to keep separate the idea of scale or mode and key.

On the more complex level, I find the Taruskin quote interesting due to what it says about the “other” four pitches not in the octatonic scale. It brought to my attention the fact that when I come across a passage that can be described as octatonic (or possibley whole-tone or pentatonic and the like) it is almost inevitably limited to the pitches of that particular scale. That is very different from what we experience in tonal idioms. As Brown put it:

The beauty of Schenkerian theory is that it is powerful enough to explain surfaces that are almost continuously dissonant and chromatic. (186)

I find the lack of some way of interpreting those “other” four tones outside of an octatonic scale—or some other complementary set to another scale form—an intriguing difference from tonality. This is also not merely a result of modern constructs given that modal music likewise used a limited set. Rather, it would appear that tonality is rather unique in having a set of behavioral expectations (depending on context) for each pitch of the 12-tone aggregate.

This last point may be one of the more interesting facets of tonality that permeated Brown’s book: the uniqueness of tonality may be more a result of particular behavioral expectations than anything related to pitch content. Not only does each pitch have particular behavioral expectations, but also, tonal music exhibits recursive applications of such behaviors. This is not inherently necessary, nor is it necessarily impossible with other pitch collections. Rather, these recursive strings of simple relationships simply make for a unique idiom that allow for some fascinatingly organic constructions.

Proctor and Huron

Finally, I just want to note how incredible it is to have studied/worked with two musicians who would show up in important ways throughout a book that is trying to “explain tonality.” I have truly been blessed!

Google “Disgusted” With Record Labels

I was surprised to learn this tidbit about the scope of the market from a story about Google’s imminent venture into the music industry:

The latest rumor to emerge from the Google campus is that the company’s much anticipated music service is just about at the end of their rope with the major label licensing process. A source close to the negotiations characterizes the search giant as “disgusted” with the labels, so much so that they are seriously considering following Amazon’s lead and launching their music could service without label licenses.…

Google may be starting to think that if the industry weren’t going to sue Amazon, then why would they take on Google? After all, who needs whom the most in this scenario? Could you even wrap your brain around the legal costs? As a source pointed out to me, “Larry, Serge and Eric could buy the entire music industry with their personal money.”

An analysis of Google’s position points to the following:

The fact that this is literally true tells us something that is often overlooked: the music industry is economically quite small and unimportant compared to the computer industry. And yet somehow—through honed lobbying and old boy networks—it wields a disproportionate power that enables it to block innovative ideas that the online world wants to try.

On a rational basis, the music industry’s concerns would be dwarfed by those of the computer world, which is not just far larger, but vastly more important in strategic terms. But instead, the former gets to make all kinds of hyperbolic claims about the alleged “damage” inflicted by piracy on its income, even though these simply don’t stand up to analysis.

IMSLP & the Music Publishers Association

Meanwhile, I was even more shocked by the sudden takedown of the website for the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP). IMSLP came under attack by the Music Publisher’s Association of the UK (MPA):

Today, the registrar of our domain, a division of Go-Daddy, froze our domain name (imslp.org) due to a complaint issued by the Music Publisher’s Association of the UK, who made two assertions in their complaint:

1. Rachmaninoff’s work The Bells, Op.35 is under copyright in both the United States and the EU.
2. IMSLP is somehow responsible for enforcing EU copyright terms upon the entire world (the same claim UE attempted back in October 2007).

Go-Daddy (a registrar based in Scottsdale, Arizona), apparently reacting to the DMCA complaint due to its assertion of US copyright violation, took the drastic and harmful step of freezing our domain name without first notifying us of the British MPA’s nonsensical assertions.

IMSLPs position on the takedown can perhaps be best described in these creative terms:

Too bad that a gang of dying companies running on a failed business model can’t find anything more productive to do with their time (like maybe promoting the works of living composers, instead of playing lawyer over ones dead since 1943).

[Fortunately, the site seems to be back up and running again.]

The Music-Industry Delusion

On the one hand, there is MPA fighting hard against IMSLP to protect the ideals of copyright protection; on the other, the realization that the entire music industry is hardly worth Google’s effort to even put up a fight.

I find myself getting caught up in the survivalist thinking of earnings and artistic protection from time to time. While some contemporary composers have made all of their scores available for free online, I—like many others—still provide only excerpts or partial scores to peruse before purchase. And yet, I—again, like many others—am hardly making anything directly from my compositions or performances. Still, I have yet to meet the composer who would give up composing if they could not make money at it.

The World Intellectual Property Organization makes it clear that the purpose of copyright is “to encourage a dynamic creative culture, while returning value to creators so that they can lead a dignified economic existence, and to provide widespread, affordable access to content for the public.” We must not lose sight of the delicate nature of a dynamic creative culture in our eagerness to return value, especially when the value does not or can not return to the creators.

Can you imagine if IMSLP’s hypothetical was reality? Instead of an industry that puts all of its energy into limiting access to music and art, could we have one that put all of its energy into promoting the works of living artists? An awful lot of work is put into the current model without much return; it couldn’t hurt to try a new paradigm. It will always be difficult to find the perfect balance, but I would think that the stories above clearly suggest that the current imbalance is unsustainable.

1. Would the Bard Have Survived the Web? (14 February 2011)
2. Free Trove of Music Scores on Web Hits Sensitive Copyright Note (22 February 2011)

The first might be considered more of a philosophy of copyright law, whereas the second deals with practical issues. If not for both sides of this same coin, this might be a much easier issue to ignore.

Copyright: Then & Now

Shakespeare is cited in the first article as a benefactor of an incipient profit-protection plan for artists:

When William Shakespeare was growing up in rural Stratford-upon-Avon, carpenters at that East London site were erecting the walls of what some consider the first theater built in Europe since antiquity. Other playhouses soon rose around the city. Those who paid could enter and see the play; those who didn’t, couldn’t.

By the time Shakespeare turned to writing, these “cultural paywalls” were abundant in London: workers holding moneyboxes (bearing the distinctive knobs found by the archaeologists) stood at the entrances of a growing number of outdoor playhouses, collecting a penny for admission.

Further along, the author draws the conclusion that “money changed everything…. As with much else, literary talent often remains undeveloped unless markets reward it.” The argument here is that if artists are not paid for their work, they will simply stop producing. If we want and value art, we need to protect the income of artists.

While being a good start for a philosophy of copyright, the unfortunate end result of copyright thinking results in the situation described by the second article:

“In many cases these publishers are basically getting the revenue off of composers who are dead for a very long time,” Mr. Guo said. “The Internet has become the dominant form of communication. Copyright law needs to change with it. We want people to have access to this material to foster creativity. Personally I don’t feel pity for these publishers.”

Economics of Art (Some Initial Thoughts)

A simple argument could be put forward: Everyone needs the means to obtain life-sustaining goods. An individual’s productive energy and time can be spent 1) cultivating life-sustaining goods; or 2) performing an activity in exchange for the means to obtain life-sustaining goods. If we (society) wish to have artists spend all of their productive energy and time producing art, they must be able to obtain life-sustaining goods in exchange for their time and effort producing art.

In contrast, it has been a formidable challenge to determine how best to coordinate an economy of artistic production:

• Artists can earn some income for direct exchange of an original product of art, e.g., a commission. The problem is that it would be difficult to piece together a living off of commissions alone.
• Artists can earn income from related activities—such as teaching—one of the most likely scenarios. And yet, if the goal is to provide the artist with maximum time to produce, how does this help?
• Artists can be supported by a regular salary from an institution—such as a government or church—to produce art on an ongoing basis, which gets more complicated when it takes larger organizations to be able to afford such an endeavor that would likely be unable to agree on aesthetics or goals.
• Artists can earn derivatives from prior work via copyright laws.

And none of these take into consideration the great likelihood that many artists make most or all of their income from some completely unrelated employment.

A World without Copyright…

The heart of the argument for copyright law in the first article is “centuries of scientific and technological progress based on the principle that a creative person should have some assurance of being rewarded for his innovative work.” We are to believe that if there was no copyright protection, artists would simply stop producing art.

I somehow doubt the story would end there. If that were entirely true, we would never have had artists before copyright law. For that matter, the practice of Shakespeare’s day was not copyright, but rather something a little closer to earning income for direct exchange of an original product of art, a performance. If a derivative production of a Shakespeare play were to come about that was equally good and yet charged less, the Bard would have to simply write something new and try again.

What would happen if copyright law were suddenly nullified? The first likely thing to happen would be a continuation of the present: consumers would download all sorts of music and books for free via the internet. Then, artists would likely find it unsustainable to continue spending their time producing art. But, it wouldn’t stop with this defeating blow to the arts. At some point, someone would want to support an artist again. According to Google’s autocomplete function, “without art life is” … “stupid.” [I'm sure there is a more eloquent way of putting this, but the irony of this made me smile ;)]

Respecting the Arts

Why do so many consumers—as the first article puts it—”transmit and receive copyrighted material without the slightest guilt”? I believe it may come from a sort of extended adolescence that is pervasive in many arenas of life. One historian [with whom you do not necessarily have to agree politically to get the point of the description] describes The Rise of the Adolescent Mind:

We live in a therapeutic age, one in which the old tragic view of our ancestors has been replaced by prolonged adolescence. Adolescents hold adult notions of consumption: they understand the comfort of a pricey car; they appreciate the status conveyed by a particular sort of handbag or sunglasses; they sense how outward consumption and refined tastes can translate into popularity and envy; and they appreciate how a slogan or world view can win acceptance among peers without worry over its validity. But they have no adult sense of acquisition, themselves not paying taxes, balancing the family budget, or worrying about household insurance, maintenance, or debt. Theirs is a world view of today or tomorrow, not of next year—or even of next week.

Because copyright law ensures sufficient “assurance of being rewarded for [an artist's] innovative work,” it hardly matters if individual consumers actually support artists. “Someone will pay for it,” they argue. And they are right. Copyright law catches enough dissidence to scare most people into respect of the law. The question is, do consumers respect the artist? I would venture to say that the ubiquitous search for free downloads would suggest otherwise.

Concluding Thoughts

I’ll reiterate what I noted above: If not for the philosophical and practical sides of this same coin, this might be a much easier issue to ignore. Surely, IMSLP’s free hosting of public domain music does not deprive any artists from their due. Even the publisher’s admit that “there’s room for both of us.” The problem comes with the practicality of living artists earning their due. Even completely eliminating copyright law would likely make things worse before there was any chance of getting better (as I predicted above). And yet, I can’t help but see a lack of respect for art that I believe would be alleviated if consumers recognized that not paying for the art reduces the likelihood of future availability.

1. Defining “New Music”

“New Music” has been loosely used to refer to music written as long ago as the turn of the twentieth century. I would suggest that music that has been around longer than it takes a person to be born and earn a doctorate in new music composition can simply not be called “new.” Pick a cut-off date and try to stick to it. How about even as many as 25 years ago? Even with such a loose definition of “new,” try to include more music written in the past five or ten years such that it occupies a majority of the space on the program.

I realize that much of the music written between 1920 and 1980 tends not to get played very much because it’s too “modern” to be classic and too old to receive the boost of a premiere. One could argue that this music has failed the test of time, but I will give it the benefit of the doubt and suggest audiences haven’t heard enough of this music to make it familiar. And yet, this still does not mean we should refer to it as “new music.”

2. Plan on Variety

Within the great variety of new music, there are clear trends and “schools” of composing. For the simple sake of giving exposure to a broad range of new music, why program several pieces that are in many ways similar?

More importantly, it’s tiring to listen to a lot of the same thing. I love Beethoven, for example, but it’s very difficult to listen to more than one of his quartets or sonatas on a single concert. More than two pretty much kills the evening for me. Perhaps one of the most tiring experiences can be an entire evening of only one composer or very similar composers. Given all of the variety available, why not program a balanced and contrasting concert?

3. Local New Music

Supporters of new music in the past were in many ways local. Given the number of composers today, there is no reason that new music could not still be primarily local. Granted, the internet gives us wonderful access to music from around the world that we may not otherwise encounter. And yet, why not support local composers as much as possible?

A local new music ensemble—i.e., one that does not travel—could really be a driving force behind the growth and support of new music. Composers generally do not make it big on a national or world scale before doing well locally, except for those who are the exceptional one-in-a-million. This could really be a compounding force for new music as more composers find support locally, resulting in more new music gaining recognition and acknowledgment.

4. The Audience’s Timing

Modern concerts of “serious” music from any time period are generally structured in similar ways. The two halves of the concert generally feature two or three pieces each, only one of which is a “major” work. Overall, the concert is likely 1.5-2.5 hours, including intermissions and breaks. This works well because it plays into how long an audience can sit comfortably with rapt attention. Why would a new music ensemble think that an audience would want to sit longer? Or listen to music during the intermission? Or otherwise have their sensory inputs filled to the limit and beyond?

This assumes that the music is the only focus. Another model could be that of dinner and music. The divided attention that the dinner requires could allow for more music. I think the same thing is true for all performances. I can listen to jazz music at a bar or club for hours on end, but put it on a stage and I can only listen to so much.

5. Intrigue, Don’t Alarm

I don’t think that it is any (or at least most) new music ensemble’s intent to alienate the audience. It’s a fine line between broadening an audience’s horizon or making a philosophical statement and simply pushing the audience away. I don’t think this issue necessarily even ever involves the music itself. I see a lot of new music ensembles try to catch audiences off-guard with performance logistics such as lighting, timing, etc. that deviate from concert norms. Do we really need or want to have audiences feel uneasy during performances of new music? Isn’t it enough that they are listening to new music?

I’ll also note that it is the philosophical intent of some composers to alarm their audiences in a very real sense. There will likely always be a market for this, but it should be no surprise if it drives away a large part of an audience that may otherwise be interested in new music.

Tid-bits

It’s been my impression that “new-music-black” references the Avant-garde of the mid-twentieth-century more than some want to admit. The professional ensembles that specialize in new music that I see generally dress in a trendy, clean fashion. That often includes jeans, but need not do so. The familiarity of jeans is welcoming to audiences, but the neatness and trendiness generally makes a clear separation from performers and audiences. “New-music-black” is sometimes just a bit ominous.

Also, I suspect that the audience we want to attract for new music ensembles is accustomed to the professionalism of the symphony or local chamber groups that have been around for quite some time. That means program books have to be clear and engaging, posters have to be sharp and well-made. I truly believe that professionalism could easily put a new music ensemble on par with any other local ensemble. Audiences want to know they can expect good things.

Concluding Thoughts

I decided to go forth with publishing this as is, even though I suspect I may have further thoughts down the road. I would also like to see any responses to the ideas listed above that I can incorporate. I tried to make this as general as possible, but I do suppose there will likely be exceptions.

Thoughts?

Audience-to-Artist Conversion

Freeman is driven by his desire that “everyone could share in this experience [composition] that I find so fulfilling” because he believes that “all of us are musically creative and have something interesting to say.” However, he laments that so few actually compose music despite increased music consumption. He cites the NEA 2008 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, which found that only 12.7% of American adults play a musical instrument at least once each year. Freeman reasonably assumes (although it was not part of the survey) that those who compose would be fewer.

What Freeman does not seem to note is that this is the highest rate of participation among the performing arts. Only 2.1% of adults participate in dance related activities in a given year and merely .8% participate in non-musial theater (.9% participate in musical theatre). Individual visual arts fare little better with only, for example, 9% who paint/draw/sculpt, although the overall participation in visual arts appears to be higher with 6% in pottery/jewelry, 13.1% weaving/sewing and 14.7% photography/movies. Furthermore, creative writing holds at 7% despite the fact that most adults can at least compose in English.

What is it that keeps an audience member from becoming a participant? Given the statistics for other, non-musical artistic endeavors, the lack of participation in music appears to not merely be an issue of being too difficult for the layman to approach. Most Americans can effectively use the English language and understand what many words mean and yet they do not use this knowledge toward creative or artistic ends.

Denatured Musical Language

And yet, Freeman’s solution to increase audience-to-composer conversion was to simply denature composition into a pseudo-visual/auditory task of piecing together blocks of musical gestures in a web-based platform called Piano Etudes. The approach resembles Earle Brown’s Available Forms I. However, the ‘composer’ need not read music, given that all of the musical fragments are represented visually by pseudo-registral/durational notation.

Western musical notation has been a long time in development. However, the more-or-less standardized notation of the modern era is hardly an obvious choice for the music it is employed to represent. For example, most of our modern music relies on equal temperament (i.e., all adjacent tones are equivalent). And yet, it hardly appears that the interval between D-sharp and F-flat would sound the same as E-flat and E-natural despite the equivalent aural result.

One solution to represent modern music would be a graphic notation where notes can be plotted against an x-axis representing time and a y-axis representing pitch. The visual representation would be easily understood as analogous to the aural realization. Freeman uses precisely this notation.

While this approach has its advantages for visual representation, it also lacks in its convenience for reading. The standard five-line staff groups pitches and allows us to easily recognize pitches in reference to a fixed point. It becomes difficult to maintain a reference point on an equally-spaced graph across groups of 12 lines.

Need Music Participation be User-Friendly?

Perhaps one of the most unfortunate cultural shifts in the past century was the move away from the ubiquitous teaching of our children how to read music. In years past, such knowledge could be assumed and would allow for the participation in amateur performance, composition and the like that is not approachable by those with little to no knowledge of the musical language.

And yet, I also do not think that familiarity with the musical language would result in any more participation. Given the rates of participation across all of the Arts, I believe we are in a crisis of leisure. Average Americans are more likely to consume art than make it.

The question of whether it is worth making music more user-friendly seems to hinge not on those who do not currently participate and are unlikely to start, but rather on the efficacious nature of musical notation for those who would otherwise be currently involved. If I’m right about that, then I would suggest we are right on track. Experiments with other methods of representation don’t hurt, but we should not kid ourselves about increasing Arts participation by dumbing-down its means.

@fEARnoMUSIC: Hey composers! Please don’t put bowings in unless you have played the instrument you are bowing for for at least 30 years. Thx! Mwah! Luv u!

@ElissaMilne: Really?! (re no bowings!) I’m assuming you mean up/down indications, not all slurring?!!

@harryfiddler: Articulation, yes. Bowings, no. Unless you want a particular effect, in which case you get a string player to help you.

@harryfiddler: I guess it’s like fingering on a piano? You wouldn’t presume to dictate fingering, although you do indicate articulation.

@fEARnoMUSIC: Yes, I’m talking about up/down bow indications. Let us figure out our own bowings based on your articulation/dynamic markings.

So, is it really so bad for composers to mark bowings?

I can understand that string players will undoubtedly have more familiarity with what is comfortable or familiar than non-string-playing composers. Surely, putting bowings in scores just for the sake of thoroughness (or whatever else) without caring much about any particular outcome is overkill.

However, I’m intrigued by @harryfiddler‘s comparison to fingerings on a piano. Is it true that one “wouldn’t presume to dictate fingering”? Schenker’s Art of Performance describes a variety of ways in which performance issues can relay interpretive information and may therefore may facilitate a more accurate conveyance of a composer’s intent (supposing an appropriate interpretation). Schenker’s editions of the Beethoven piano sonatas are not merely clean copies; they are interpretations. Fingerings matter because they can facilitate the portrayal of grouping and signaling information to audience members (as my Keyboard Harmony students are [hopefully] well aware).

Are not bowings akin to fingerings in this sense? The selection of bowings is an interpretation of sorts. If a composer puts in bowing markings that seem unnatural to a string player, could it sometimes be that the string player simply does not understand the music the way it was intended? I have no doubt that unnatural bowings may actually hinder an accurate portrayal, despite the intentions of the composer. And yet, is it so awful for string players that they do not wish to even try the bowings suggested by a composer “unless you have played the instrument you are bowing for for at least 30 years”?

• http://balldroppings.com/js/ (my personal favorite)
• http://www.incredibox.fr/
• http://www.optuswhalesong.com.au/
• http://www.whitevinyldesign.com/solarbeat/ (thanks to Erin Gamble!) (not really composition per se, but it is fun…)

But then I got to thinking about the music-making involved and started asking myself questions such as “What does it to take to make an application that can generate more-or-less pleasing music regardless of musical ability on the part of the ‘composer’?” That’s just about when I began reading Jason Freeman’s NYTimes opinion piece “Compose Your Own, Part 2” and its prequel “Compose Your Own.” This led to a number of other questions that I will address in separate posts in the upcoming week.

The ‘Building Blocks’ of Music?

As I pondered what makes composition apps work in a musical sense, my attention was drawn to the issue of sequence or—perhaps more appropriately—the lack thereof. The composer/designer of the app relinquishes the decision-making power over the order of musical events and must therefore accommodate the potential musical outcomes. Each app is designed in such a way that more-or-less pleasing music will result regardless of the actions of the user.

Such an approach to composition is by no means novel. In many ways, these apps conceptually resemble Earle Brown’s Available Forms I, in that the lines between audience, performer and composer are blurred by giving more responsibility for the sequence of musical events in the final musical product to someone other than the initial composer (Überkomponist?). In this sense, the initial composer has produced musical ‘building blocks’ that may be put together in any ‘legal’ (i.e., permitted by the rules of the initial composer) way such that the result will always be effective.

Freeman’s app is perhaps the most clear realization of this conceptual approach. He denatured composition into a pseudo-visual/auditory task of piecing together blocks of musical gestures in a web-based platform called Piano Etudes. Unlike Brown’s piece, however, the ‘composer’ need not read music given that all of the musical fragments are represented visually by pseudo-registral/durational notation.

Beyond Musical Sequence

The simplistic impression suggested by the ‘building block’ analogy is perhaps misleading. Much Western music written before the twentieth century has some significant sequential component that cannot be arbitrarily dismissed. An obvious example might include the so-called ‘sonata form,’ with the resolution of secondary material in a principal key area upon its return. In any other sequence, it would simply not be a sonata (especially by definition, although the musical impact would also be lessened).

Even the popular music of earlier times had specific sequential determinants. A performer could not simply piece together the various phrases from a Baroque dance suite and hope that the outcome would make sense. Rather, the harmonic and cadential schemata require accurate sequencing. This differs greatly from modern popular dance music. If there happens to be a differentiation between ‘verse’ and ‘chorus,’ the order of presentation likely makes little difference. Even more explicitly sequence-free is the product of the live DJ that combines various repetitive patterns in overlapping layers with other musical gestures that need not suggest any particular musical event.

The composition of musical fragments that can truly go in any order is an entirely different matter.

Non-Sequential Music and the Audience

Music that can come in any sequence must essentially be more-or-less effective regardless of when the audience begins listening to the materials. In this sense, the listening should be able to begin at any point. An audience member could theoretically walk in during the middle of a performance and still appreciate the music because any component can sound like a ‘beginning’ just as much as an ‘ending.’ That is, no component of the music will rely on any previous component and can thereby serve as an entry or exit point to the audience’s attention.

This seems to have great implications for keeping an audience in their seats according to the traditional model. Part of the value of sitting through an entire classical symphony, for example, is hearing the logical conclusion of that which comes before. Missing some earlier portion of the music may preclude appreciation of a later portion. Therefore, rapt attention is incredibly useful, if not necessary. If there is no sequence to be perceived, is such rapt attention the most useful audience model? And yet, much can be appreciated in each new performance of such a work.

As many new music ensembles seek to maintain or increase audiences, one notable trend is the shifting of attention away from the music. Such ensembles play in bars or clubs where talking and mingling is not only accepted, but also encouraged. Concerts are paired with dinners or other artistic endeavors that deserve their own attention. Music is no longer the focus at such events, so much as is the sensory experience.

In a way, this also reflects popular consumption. Students listening to their iPods between classes are by no means paying rapt attention to the music. Music is everywhere and paired with every sort of experience from movies to museums, elevators to telephones, and the like. Even classical music on NPR is often transformed into ‘background’ music that can be entered into or exited from with ease. Without understanding the logic and sequence of the music, it too becomes non-sequential.

Could it be that listening habits are changing to better appreciate the music? Does the music change to meet the listening habits? It’s hard to know for sure, but musicians and music advocates alike must take these issues into consideration.

Sequence vs. Non-Sequence

I will not suggest that either sequence-dependent or non-sequential music is somehow superior [I definitely enjoyed BallDroppings!]. Rather, I merely want to examine the related issues. However, what I will end with is an interesting note from the results of Freeman’s project. He allowed users to submit ‘compositions’ to be judged (by himself). The winning ‘compositions’ would then be prepared for performance and recorded (you can hear the results in the NYTimes article).

Two interesting features emerged in the winning ‘compositions’: 1) minimalistic repetition; 2) goal orientation. On the one hand, this could simply reflect Freeman’s tastes as a composer and audience. However, the comments of the ‘composers’ were also rather revealing in these respect:

“I’m interested in patterns in nature, and I was thinking about them when I composed the etude. A pattern is a sequence that repeats in time, space, or both. Because our world is finite, patterns must have boundaries. What does the edge of a pattern sound like? What about the boundary between related but different patterns?”

“I began with what I felt like were the more ‘pop’ elements of the score and created a loose musical narrative around those ideas.”

“I organized the material to create shifting states of rhythmic and harmonic tension within an overall hypnotic, pensive space. My intention was to allow this ebb and flow of tension to gradually unwind into a closing series of calming, pacific breaths.”

“I actually took a course from John Cage in the ’60’s at UC Davis, and am familiar with such ‘alternate’ forms of composition. … The choices were made with an aesthetic in mind — definitely not aleatoric!”

It is intriguing to me to see these ‘composers’ describing the opposing forces of order and chaos, sequence and non-sequence as they composed. They were interested in the moods created by repetition and yet were driven to seek some goal. There seems to be a satisfaction in both the appreciation of a single item in detail just as there is in recognizing global relations over the scale of a composition. Semper idem, sed non eodem modo (always the same, but not in the same way), invoking the memory of Schenker.

Before the performance began, Emily and I were looking over the schedule for the season and in particular discussing one of the upcoming CMC concerts featuring John O’Conor on piano (3/6/10). One of the potential difficulties of listening to an evening of piano music is that it can become tiresome with the lack of variety in terms of timbre and dynamic envelope available to the pianist. Whereas many other instruments and the voice can vary these parameters in a variety of different ways, the pianist makes musical gestures out of a different set that, for example, includes intensity of attack, but not dynamic envelope.

This is worth mentioning as these thoughts were fresh in my mind as the Ying Quartet began Schumann’s Quartet in A Major, op. 41, no. 3. I was amazed at the unity of interpretation and technique with which the ensemble played that might only be expected by a solo pianist—only now, with a wide range of expressive timbres and dynamic possibilities. Granted, it might have something to do with the fact that the ensemble only recently added Frank Huang (violin) into what has been an all-sibling quartet since 1992. That said, it is hard to imagine such a unified sense of time, as is necessary for a movement such as the delightful variations in the Assai agitato second movement. [As a side note: I was particularly drawn to this movement and recognized some familiar metric displacements that were similar to those used in my own quartet writing last year. I figured that I must have studied it around that time, but as I look at the score today, I do not think that I have ever seen it before. Perhaps I had heard it somewhere? Either way, I must say that I enjoy the scherzando-like way in which each figure reaches across the barline and never literally articulate the meter.]

The ensemble also played a recently commissioned piece, Next Atlantis, by Sebastian Currier involving electronics that for the most part depicted water sounds of various sorts. Phillip Ying, the violist, took the opportunity to explain the piece ahead of time, which initially suggested to me that they figured it might be a hard sell to an audience that is not only unfamiliar with electroacoustic music, but also predominantly interested in the classics of the Western repertoire. He also noted that it was a first for the ensemble, as they had never worked with prerecorded material before. In the end, I suspect the announcement might have been more related to the latter as I consistently felt slightly on edge as I attempted to discern the relationship between the live and prerecorded materials. It was only by the end that I really felt like the two were dove-tailing, as I suspect was intended throughout. It was hard to tell what was at the root of the slight delays and awkward silences that were making me uneasy. I did not necessarily hear a great number of audible cues in the prerecorded materials, yet the ensemble seemed to be locking in with certain acoustical events that were surprisingly aligned. On the other hand, it was hard to imagine that the incredibly unified voice that played the Schumann would now seem somewhat misaligned as it worked together with the tape.

My initial impressions of the ensemble as an incredibly unified voice were reconfirmed by the performance of Beethoven’s Quartet in C major, op. 59, no. 3 to end the concert. They launched into the fastest rendition I had ever heard of the final Allegro molto while maintaining an utter clarity and preciseness that was remarkable. As scalar fragments passed from one player to another, I could hardly believe that I entirely missed the switch-off—every single time. Also notable was the ensemble’s great sense of what might be termed by some the grande ligne or by others the Urlinie: while each note was precisely in its proper place, they all signaled the overall directionality that pointed to the final cadence. This was perhaps most noticable in the final moments of this piece as Beethoven delays the cadence through one false ending after another until you lose any surety of when the cadence might actually arrive.

The Ying Quartet definitely lived up (and perhaps even surpassed) the high expectations I have for the artists that Chamber Music Columbus hosts each year. Even as think about how much I enjoyed watching them live at the Southern Theatre, I am already looking forward to seeing the Jupiter Quartet on November 7. I hope to see you there!

“Love the Art; Hate the Artist?” by John Schaefer

In Israel you still won’t hear the music of Richard Wagner in concert. The music sounds just as glorious there as it does anywhere else, but the Nazi’s appropriation of his music and of some of his anti-Semitic writings make it a painful listening experience for many Israelis who survived the Holocaust and settled there.…

If we remove all the art by artists of bad character from our lives, who are we hurting? Not a long dead composer… We’re just denying ourselves the good—in some cases, perhaps the only good—that these people did.

“Blackface, Reconsidered” by Jody Rosen

What really troubles me… is this question of whether Sophie Tucker is “worthy of consideration.” Are we to conclude that had Tucker not stopped performing coon songs, she would be unworthy of consideration? What about an entertainer like Al Jolson, one of the greatest and most influential singers of the 20th century, whose landmark performances took place behind the blackface mask? What, for that matter, about Bert Williams, the first African-American pop star, who smeared burnt cork on his own brown skin? Are they beyond the bounds of acceptability?…

Yes, blackface comedy was racist and appalling, and people should never stop saying so. It is also a key to cracking the code of American culture.

It’s especially important to understanding popular music, whose history—from Stephen Foster to Tucker to Bing Crosby to Janis Joplin to Mick Jagger to Eminem and on and on ad infinitum—is enmeshed with blackface tradition. For years, minstrelsy was such a hot-button topic that scholars dared not touch it. This is one reason why important musicians like Tucker have received little serious attention in the last many decades.

“‘I am a pianist, not a spokesperson’” by Arminta Wallace

In a way, [Palestinian-Israeli pianist Saleem Abboud Ashkar] has become a spokesperson for Palestinian artists in the wider world, certainly in Europe. As a pianist, does he feel this is a role which has been thrust upon him? “Yes and no,” he says. “The role of a spokesperson is inevitable. I always stress the fact that I am a pianist and not a spokesperson—but the more I stress that, the more my role as a spokesperson becomes even stronger. But I don’t want to put on any uniform. If anything, what I speak for is our wish to develop our lives and to live in a way that is with dignity. To express our potential as individuals. The more I do what I do, the more that becomes clear by itself.”

What all of these articles have in common is some attribute placed on the music or musician that is derived from something extra-musical regarding the nature or character of the artist. I think they all pose good questions:

• If we remove all the art by artists of bad character from our lives, who are we hurting?
• Are such artists unworthy of consideration?
• To what extent do artists become spokespersons for all people like them in any particular way (race, creed, gender)?

From the flip side, is it ethical for a composer to set a text which reflects an attitude with which they do not agree? Or can we permit a composer to distance themselves from the texts which they set (or titles used)?

Perhaps the easiest response was given by John Schaefer, the Wagner commenter:

This is why I prefer to read the book or hear the music before I go and learn about the person who made it. I think I’d find it hard to be objective looking at a painting with young Adolf Hitler’s signature in the corner. Of course, if I liked it, and then saw that signature in the corner, I might feel like losing my lunch, but then no one ever said that art was supposed to be easy.

While rather convenient, I am sure that such an approach would not satisfy many audience members. Perhaps, however, it is the audience member who must in the end take responsibility for the cognitive dissonance as they place a meaning on the music beyond that which can be known from the music itself (i.e., not knowing its author). Of course, this would assume that we understand what meaning can be conveyed through music. I am pretty sure, however, that an innocent listening to Wagner’s Wedding Marchwould never reveal its sometimes-despised author; why else would I still be asked to play it at so many weddings?