Transcript DAT 335: Music Perception and Cognition

Contemporary Composition Seminar
Fall 2012
Instructor: Prof. SIGMAN
Thursday 14:00-16:00
Lecture VII
0. Administrata
• Assignment II: review
• Assignment III (Cardew, Kagel, Scelsi, and
Sciarrino): to be posted 내일; due Friday (금),
10/26 VIA EMAIL
• Midterm Exam: 11 월 01 일
• Review: 10 월 25 일
• ?’s?
Italian Aristocratic Mystics: Scelsi +
Sciarrino
0. Carlo Gesualdo (1566-1613)
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Prince of Venosa
Experiments with tuning and harmony
Mannerism (마내리즘)
Composer of madrigrals
Influential upon both Scelsi and Sciarrino
Example: Gesualdo, “Io parto”
I. Giacinto Scelsi: The Third
Dimension
A. Biography
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(1905-1988)
Aristocratic (귀족의) background
Studied with Schönberg in Vienna
1930’s: Neoclassical period; promoted work of Shostakovich,
Hindemith, Stravinsky in Italy
Traveled extensively (alone) in Egypt,India, Nepal…
Met John Cage, Feldman, and other American
experimentalists in Rome
Reclusive (은둔하는)
Wore fur coats and hats in summer
B. Venice: East Meets West
• In the 1950s, Scelsi developed an interest in
Eastern mysticism (신비주의)
• He attributed this interest to living in Venice
(베니스), an important crossroads of the
Roman and Byzantine empires
• His music reflects a Western interest in form
and material development/rigour with an
Eastern (and particularly Byzantine) sense of
temporality and aesthetic
Byzantine chant example
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Microtonal inflection
Focus upon single pitch centres/drones
Slow evolution
Narrow register
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fr4mAIibx
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• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJ7LGWb
xumI&feature=related
C. The “Third Dimension” of Sound
• Scelsi used the term “sphericity of sound” to
describe his approach to music since ca. 1950
• Sound as 3D object, viewed from different
angles
• Third dimension = continuum between pitch,
timbre, rhythm, and harmony
Example: String Quartet no. 4
(1964)
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Microstructure of single tones
Unique string scordatura for each instrument
Notation: 1 staff/string
Local process: harmony (quarter-tone clouds) -> vibrato->
bisbigliando (timbral trills) -> trill/tremolo -> steady tone
Global process: slowly unfolding arc, rising in register
Middle/upper register emphasis; no “bass”
“Virtual fundamental”
Very slow and very fast music at the same time
D. Music and Ritual: Okanagon
(1968)
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Several versions
For tam-tam, harp, and contrabass
Contrabass = scordatura
Harp = microtonal tuning
Harp and tam-tam played with resonator
(tuning key)
• No exact repetition
• Ensemble as single instrument
E. Improvisation and Transcription:
Aitsi and String Quartet No. 5
1. Aitsi (1974)
• For amplified piano
• Distortion = transients = ++ microtonal pitch content
• Formal proportions/climaxes: structured according to
Fibonacci series and golden mean
• Durational notation (in seconds)
• Attack-resonance exploration
• Distilled to its essence: short and concentrated work
2. String Quartet no. 5 (1984)
• Transcription of Aitsi
• Microtonal re-mapping
II. Salvatore Sciarrino
A. Bio
• (b. 1947, Palermo)
• Lived in Rome, Milan, and Umbria
• Assistant to Luigi Nono on La lontananza
nostalgica utopica futura
B. Microvariation of a SoundStructure
Example: L’orologio di Bergson
(1999)
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For solo flute
Part of his Opera per flauto (works for flute)
Highly structured
Shifting sense of time
Role of silence/negative space
Exposed flute mechanism: harmonics, whistle tones, keynoise
• Microvariation of basic, unstable elements over time
• Intense listening: threshold of audibility
C. Ensemble Works I: Introduzione
all’oscuro (1981)
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Literally “Introduction to the Dark (Side)”
For ensemble of 12 instruments
Threshold of silence
Unstable sonorities: no exact repetition
Iambic/heart-beat element
D. Sciarrino and Gesualdo: Luci
mie traditrici (1996-98)
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Opera in 2 acts
3 characters
Plot: Gesualdo murders his wife and her lover
17th century libretto (Il tradimento per l’onore)
Transcriptions/re-interpretations of Gesualdo
madrigals
• Baroque ornamentation in vocal parts
E.The Mechanical World:
L’Arceologia del Telefono (2005)
• For 13 instruments
• “archeology of the telephone”
• Traces history of telephone in sound: from
Alexander Graham Bell to dial phones, to
touch-tone phones to the mobile phone