Quiz: Mystery scores

sul G · February 14, 2009, 11:51:19 AM

Quote from: Guido on February 14, 2009, 11:40:13 AM
Yes, I know it's modal - I know that this is one of the aspects of English writing of this time which appeals to me the most (though I have ni real idea technically how it works). And false relations! I still don't really understand why modality doesn't 'collapse' into the the key of the key signature (the key from which the modes' scale is derived) - like here E minor - how does one avoid the pull of the A minor chord to E?

Well, it's due to the composer, really, rather than anything inherent in the mode. Here, the scale may be E minor, but the seventh isn't sharpened, so it's really aeolian, and the E is never reached via a semitone from D#. This means that the E minor feeling isn't fully established, and that G major is always only a inch away, and other modes too if the composer wishes - A dorian, for instance. It's down to Moeran how far and how much and where he wants to stray, and the result is that the music appears to move around whilst staying still. I'm not sure if that's what you were asking, however - maybe all that is obvious to you and you're talking about something else!

Guido · February 14, 2009, 11:59:38 AM

Quote from: sul G on February 14, 2009, 11:51:19 AM
Well, it's due to the composer, really, rather than anything inherent in the mode. Here, the scale may be E minor, but the seventh isn't sharpened, so it's really aeolian, and the E is never reached via a semitone from D#. This means that the E minor feeling isn't fully established, and that G major is always only a inch away, and other modes too if the composer wishes - A dorian, for instance. It's down to Moeran how far and how much and where he wants to stray, and the result is that the music appears to move around whilst staying still. I'm not sure if that's what you were asking, however - maybe all that is obvious to you and you're talking about something else!

Yes that's what I mean. But what for intance difines A dorian from say E Aeolian or B Phrygian - i.e. what makes us hear the chord 'in' one of those modes rather than one of the others, when the chords themselves are exactly the same? How does one establish that one is definitely in A dorian, rather than B Phrygian.

sul G · February 14, 2009, 12:10:59 PM

Context - what else is going on? - and selectivity - what notes do you use and which do you not? and how do you use them? You can establish A dorian as the modal centre in a similar way to that with which you would establish A minor*. The use of E as a dominant, for instance, reinforced by rhythms and gestures that make it a dominant. Ditto for B phrygian. The establishment is not as definitive as in major/minor music, but it's strong enough, and in any case, the ambiguity, the ability to float between keys rather than leaping decisively, is part of what makes the music what it is.

I refer you to the early modal compositions of Luke Ottevanger in this area. I believe he had a thread here once with links to these works.

*There are importance local differences, of course. Above all, you don't have a G# in your 'dominant', so you can't establish A as fully as you could otherwise. Hence the attractive modal colouring, but also hence the 'timeless' feeling inherent in so much modal music - without the sharpened 7th pushing from chord A to chord B - from THEN to NOW - the music floats instead; relatively speaking, everything feels like NOW.

Guido · February 14, 2009, 12:58:52 PM

Thanks for this, all fascinating - I've been wondering about it for a while. Ok, so alot of it is up the composer - interesting. I think I would find musical analysis even more mind bending taking this kind of thing into consideration!

karlhenning · February 14, 2009, 01:03:23 PM

One of "my" students in an undergrad theory class, a violinist with a fine ear, once insisted that a tune used by Holst in Jupiter, which as a melodic dictation I had cast in C mixolydian, was (had to be) in F major, even though in all the eight bars the pitch F occurs only twice, and both times on weak beats.

J.Z. Herrenberg · February 14, 2009, 01:31:28 PM

Though I can't contribute much by way of solving anything - combination of being out of my depth and not having much time -, I must say I like sul G's latest contributions a lot. I think I understand the uses of modality for the first time... Luke is gone. Long live sul G!

sul G · February 15, 2009, 02:31:58 AM

So, I had a look at a couple of the compositions of Luke Ottevanger - before and after, so to speak - and I saw how the use of modal techniques like those described above were in some respects a real simplification for him, at least at first, whilst at the same time making the coherence of his music less reliant on more mysterious processes.

First example, non modal, fully chromatic, is from one of his Improvisations - 20 tiny piano pieces each written in about 20 minutes and under carefully controlled circumstances in 2003. The music's logic, the mechanisms which hold it together, are clear but unusual and obscure - hence the marking Mistico (probably). For instance, there is the opening idea, in quintuplets grouped into 4s, and its recapitulation in straight 4s grouped into 5s. Something similar goes on in the middle section. The final cadence, in which the voice exchange between top of left hand and top of right hand works in conjunction with the expanding bar lengths and written-out rit. - but why? - also functions in this way. The piece works (Luke hopes) but by dint of creating its own musical processes. Most of these improvisations work in a similar way, FWIW.

Second example is the very first modal piece he wrote, the first of his 10 Individuation and Enlightenment pieces, 2005. The mode is G, Ab, C, D, Eb, F - the Ab suggests a kind of Phrygian G, hence a kind of G minor, even though no B flat is present. If emphasis is placed on the F, however, and on the minor third F-Ab, the music takes on an F minor hue, as in the middle of the piece.

This modal piece is incredibly simple, in fact - really a retrogression, in technical terms, from the music he'd been writing before. It is, after all, the first piece he'd written in this way, and really an experiment. But I think that in this technique he recognised something of real fluidity and yet with an inner unity, which gave to each piece its own specific harmonic colouring[s ]; what's more, I think he recognised something that worked for him, specifically. Later on he began to use more than one mode, and the exploit the relationship between modes, in order to create more complex structures. But the basic principle remains the same, it seems.

sul G · February 15, 2009, 02:42:43 AM

Some more scores for you. Easy, these ones, I think. Get one, you'll get them all. Two batches, one of five scores, one of three.

First batch:

426, 427, 428

sul G · February 15, 2009, 02:43:31 AM

...429, 430

sul G · February 15, 2009, 02:44:23 AM

Second batch

431, 432, 433

Guido · February 21, 2009, 03:35:28 PM

The unsolved ones of mine - more clues:

As I said the first composer seems to especially favour the oboe, particularly in adagios - this penchant spreads through all his works, from his first orchestral work, through his concertos, symphonies and other orchestral works... Here he finally gives the oboe an actual concertante part of its own... and the piece is a failure, one of his weakest, though still touching in its limited way - echoes of his greatness are to be found here, but when he composed this he was a broken man.

The second unsolved piece, I said that the solo part usually has other markings... those marking are words.

Chafing Dish · February 21, 2009, 07:39:36 PM

432 - is it Abel Decaux' Claires de Lune?

sul G · February 22, 2009, 12:25:20 PM

No it's not, but that would be a great score for the future- it's full of funky stuff. This is by a French composer, though - I suppose that is obvious - and one of a similar eccentricity.

I suppose I ought to give clues on these last two batches of mine, as they aren't going - but I really don't want to have to spell it out.

Joe_Campbell · February 22, 2009, 01:01:28 PM

Quote from: sul G on February 22, 2009, 12:25:20 PM
No it's not, but that would be a great score for the future- it's full of funky stuff. This is by a French composer, though - I suppose that is obvious - and one of a similar eccentricity.

I suppose I ought to give clues on these last two batches of mine, as they aren't going - but I really don't want to have to spell it out.

Incidentally, this score (432) seems to require some rather "large" hands, no?

sul G · February 22, 2009, 01:04:19 PM

Looks that way, yes! There's no trickery here, this is simply a piano piece (it may exist in another form, I'm not sure, but to worry about that too much might be to follow a red herring). You might take something from the fact that this piano writing is strange, I suppose, but I've already told you that this composer is a bit of an eccentric.

Nice av, Joe. Have I missed something or is that a new one? I like it....

Joe_Campbell · February 22, 2009, 01:25:55 PM

Quote from: sul G on February 22, 2009, 01:04:19 PM
Looks that way, yes! There's no trickery here, this is simply a piano piece (it may exist in another form, I'm not sure, but to worry about that too much might be to follow a red herring). You might take something from the fact that this piano writing is strange, I suppose, but I've already told you that this composer is a bit of an eccentric.

Nice av, Joe. Have I missed something or is that a new one? I like it....

Unfortunately, as eccentricity seems to be a prerequisite among accomplished composers (

), your clue has done little in my mind as far as narrowing down prospective choices (I also don't pretend to be an afficianado on the subject). Because of Chafing Dish's suggestion, I did again take a look at 'Clair de Lune,' and I noticed that the score you posted certainly has some things in common with No. 3 (le cimetiere), but not enough for me to think that they would have been from a similar inspirational vein.

By the way, the avatar is new. It's a local painter's work (Ken Horn). This is from a series he did called "Fool's Paradise." Each one of his painting is accompanied with a poem. The poem for this painting is as follows:

Crossing the Burn

The Quest

Polished smooth by rough hands
is it now darkly waiting
below a foreign chapel
guarded by ignorance
and a large deathless beast ?

Fashioned by the Eastern man
is the quest still worth the risks ?
If the answer lies within us
is the journey just the song
to the tune that's always been there
...and yet we must go on.

I'm *this* close to ordering this painting. *this* close, I say!

sul G · February 22, 2009, 01:32:17 PM

Quote from: Joe_Campbell on February 22, 2009, 01:25:55 PM
Unfortunately, as eccentricity seems to be a prerequisite among accomplished composers ( ), your clue has done little in my mind as far as narrowing down prospective choices

Well, it wasn't really meant as a clue. Anyway, I've already given a very big clue a post or two ago. In a bit of a disguise, though...

sul G · February 22, 2009, 02:31:11 PM

Guido, using your tastes as a guideline, I'm going to guess that your oboe one is Barber's Canzonetta, op. 48, which was a late piece, as you hint, completed by someone else. I can't pretend I've heard it, though.

sul G · February 22, 2009, 02:33:03 PM

Quote from: sul G on February 22, 2009, 02:31:11 PM
I can't pretend I've heard it, though.

OK, I have now, or enough to know I got this one right.

sul G · February 22, 2009, 02:47:16 PM

Quiz: Mystery scores

sul G

Guido

sul G

Guido

karlhenning

J.Z. Herrenberg

sul G

sul G

sul G

sul G

Guido

Chafing Dish

sul G

Joe_Campbell

sul G

Joe_Campbell

sul G

sul G

sul G

sul G