Twelve-tone technique and my beginner's prejudice

[Cato]

Why organize music around anything? Is all art organized around something? Okay, art may become noise if it's not organized around something, but this something can be on higher level, something much more sophisticated than scales, chord structures and note rows. How about note matrixes = a set of note rows? That would be 12 x 12 note technique.

You need to check out Tibor Serly's Modus Lascivus idea!

Serly developed what he referred to as an enharmonicist musical language. In his book Modus Lacscivus (1975) he explored a set of 82 basic tertian chords. Serly titled several of his later works as being "in modus lascivus," including sonatas for violin, viola, and piano.... His Concertino 3 X 3 uses this compositional system, but is most memorable for its formal structure: it consists of nine movements, the first three for piano solo, the second set of three movements for orchestra without piano, and the final set combining the previous sets, played simultaneously

See:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibor_Serly

[Ken B]

You need to check out Tibor Serly's Modus Lascivus idea!

Serly developed what he referred to as an enharmonicist musical language. In his book Modus Lacscivus (1975) he explored a set of 82 basic tertian chords. Serly titled several of his later works as being "in modus lascivus," including sonatas for violin, viola, and piano.... His Concertino 3 X 3 uses this compositional system, but is most memorable for its formal structure: it consists of nine movements, the first three for piano solo, the second set of three movements for orchestra without piano, and the final set combining the previous sets, played simultaneously

Ah yes, the music-minus-one school of composition.

[Linus]

For what it's worth, when I was younger I strongly preferred atonal and dodecaphonic/serialist music (which to me sounded pretty indistinguishable from "free" atonality in practice, if not in theory) to more conventional classical music.  I sought the exhilaration of having little sense of how the music would move forward, yet also seeking to make a kind of intuitive "whole" of the seeming unpredictability (or, perhaps, to find the "invisible connections" between the notes). I also appreciated the gloomy, edgy, Kafkaesque atmosphere that such music (often) evoked. I was approaching it from an avant-rock direction, having listened to a lot of music like King Crimson's early '70s improvisations. It took me a bit longer to learn to really appreciate more conventional, tonal classical traditions, and I still struggle somewhat with 18th century musical conventions in particular (so perhaps Linus and I are trying to achieve the same goal, though from somewhat opposite directions).

Some more or less atonal music is what I liked the most when I was younger and I also had initial trouble with enjoying 18th century Classical, but I really love that now. So I can't say tonality nor atonality is a huge problem for me nowadays. My slight aversion to some modern music probably has more to do with overall structure, I think.

Greetings Linus, NorthNYMark, and other newer members!

Greetings, and thanks for the tips!

I share this similar concern with you, even though I do enjoy some 12-tone works. I think of it as sorting m&ms according to color in some really elaborate and mathematically brilliant way. They probably would look random to those who didn't know the pattern.

Would you recommend to actually "think" my way to understanding those patterns, or should I just listen until my brain adjusts?

I suggest you google what George Rochberg, at one time one of America's most acclaimed serialists, said after the death of his son. Then seek out some of his later music, such as Black Sounds or the Violin Concerto.

Ah, interesting how he says that "he was unable to adequately express his profound grief and loss through serialism". Perhaps grief is simply not serialism's forte.

No, I don't look at as emotionally limiting. I look at it as emotionality via a different soundscape that's in a slightly different musical world altogether. It's almost like you've entered into another dimension when you listen to Schoenberg or Berg and that, in my opinion, is a good thing.

I think my apprehension comes from a worry that it will be impossible to relate human emotions to this other dimension. When I listen to, say, Beethoven, both my feet are still on the ground, but his music stretches my soul towards the heavens. I fear that metaphorically letting go of the ground (if that is what the twelve-tone technique does) would make the experiences from that alternative dimension... "existentially irrelevant", for lack of a better term.

These works are perfect examples of the twelve-tone technique having a strong narrative, expression, and sense of purpose.

Ah, I suppose that could dispel the worries I just wrote about above.

I do not know enough about harmony and compositional technique.
But the 12-Tone-Method was not just conjured up out of thin air. Neither was atonality. Wagner, Debussy and others had "weakened" tonal/tonical harmony in such a fashion that atonality was for man musicians a "logical" next step.
(the dogmatism comes in when some claim that it was the *only* logical step.)
But then some apparently had the problem of "too much freedom" and wanted a method to unify pieces in a stronger fashion. Someone once tried to explain to me how the 12 tone idea and "forbidding" repetition was a rather natural outcome of the kind of chords and chord progressions the atonal composers had used anyway, but this was too technical for me, so I do not really remember the details.

I wonder if a similar progression had taken place before, one where one strain of development has to be "patched up" afterwards by another one.

You may not know that the 12-Tone-Method was developed independently (as far as I know actually a little earlier than Schoenberg) by Josef Mathias Hauer. His music is very different from the highly emotional, expressionist Schoenberg (and followers), so he used the method apparently in a different way. There are other works supposedly based on 12 tone series that sound rather "tonal" (it all depends on the series I guess), e.g. Martin's petite symphonie concertante and some pieces of Rolf Liebermann from the 1950s.

I had no idea, I'll check those fellows out. Thanks!

[EigenUser]

Would you recommend to actually "think" my way to understanding those patterns, or should I just listen until my brain adjusts?

Well, it's hard to say. When I first started listening to Boulez's Derive I I was concerning myself with trying to "find" the patterns and structure. I no longer do.

When I first heard Webern's Six Pieces I was under the incorrect impression that it was a twelve-tone work. However, this didn't concern me at the time. What drew me to the piece was a very sad four-note violin solo in the sixth piece. I found it incredibly touching. I've written this before on here, but it was a familiar romantic sound in an alien world -- something that didn't seem to be wanted anymore. In fact, there are others of the Six Pieces that do similar things. The funeral march, of course, is a familiar sound in the fourth piece. Also, the the third piece has an eerie music-box melody -- another familiar sound to most people. But, they are all presented in a totally foreign landscape which seems indifferent.

The Symphony is also very good and worth checking out (he calls it a symphony, but it is really only about 10 minutes long!). The first movement contains a few little things that make me feel similar.

Maybe it sounds lame to say that something so short had such an impression on me, but when dealing with Webern everything gets scaled down length .

[Cato]

The reference to Josef Hauer might not lead to much of interest: he had a parallel idea, but the musical results are not even close to anything by Schoenberg or other major and even minor composers who tried the "12-tone method."

I have seen some of Hauer's scores: perhaps the ones recorded are better and than the scores I have seen.

One reviewer has a rave for this:

http://www.amazon.com/Josef-Matthias-Hauer-Symphonic-Works/dp/B000NOIWP8/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_2?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1411775120&sr=1-2-fkmr1&keywords=josek+hauer

[Jo498]

I have the Hauer disc linked to, but maybe listened once or twice. As I said the music is very different from Schoenberg and other expressionists. I do not really have an opinion on Hauer, the point was just to show that the "method" can yield very different results. The perceived similarity among pieces by Schoenberg and his circle may have to do more with their expressionism than with the 12-tone-method.

[Karl Henning]

I have the Hauer disc linked to, but maybe listened once or twice. As I said the music is very different from Schoenberg and other expressionists. I do not really have an opinion on Hauer, the point was just to show that the "method" can yield very different results.

Or, from another angle, there was a general motivation among composers of that day to enlarge the musical palette (it was not just Schoenberg being "quirky" or contrarian), and there is by no means only one way to achieve coherence with the supposedly "chaotic" sound world of Chromaticism Unchained!

[Cato]

Or, from another angle, there was a general motivation among composers of that day to enlarge the musical palette (it was not just Schoenberg being "quirky" or contrarian), and there is by no means only one way to achieve coherence with the supposedly "chaotic" sound world of Chromaticism Unchained![/i]

Two examples beginning with "Karl":  Karl Amadeus Hartmann !!!  Karl Henning!!!

[71 dB]

1. The chord could be created any way the composer likes: arpeggiated or motivic or just as a chord of whole notes. 

2. The theme could share a note: the composer would need to follow the musical logic in his/her imagination!  The theme would not necessarily be perceived as 3-notes: check e.g. Tchaikovsky's opening "theme" in the last movement of the Sixth Symphony.  Depending on the composer, the entire sequence with the harmony and the two 3-note sections could be perceived as a melody.

3.  If you use these limits, and have success, I suspect they will not be weird at all! 

1. What is the difference of an arpeggiated chord and a fast short melody of the same notes? Especially played with instruments having a fast attack and decay times, arpeggiated chords sound like melodies rather than chords.

2. I don't think I understand fully what you say. Are you saying it's the way the music is orchestrated that dictates how different notes are "grouped" in the listener's ears into chords and melodies? If there is a simple pieces of music for piano and flute and there is a long chord C-E-G on the piano while flute plays melody A-G-A-D-... on top of the chord, the melody and the chord are clearly separated "musical objects" because piano and flute sound very different. If the melody was played on another piano instead, god knows what chords the listener would hear. 

3. Yeah, of course 

[Cato]

1. What is the difference of an arpeggiated chord and a fast short melody of the same notes? Especially played with instruments having a fast attack and decay times, arpeggiated chords sound like melodies rather than chords.

2. I don't think I understand fully what you say. Are you saying it's the way the music is orchestrated that dictates how different notes are "grouped" in the listener's ears into chords and melodies? If there is a simple pieces of music for piano and flute and there is a long chord C-E-G on the piano while flute plays melody A-G-A-D-... on top of the chord, the melody and the chord are clearly separated "musical objects" because piano and flute sound very different. If the melody was played on another piano instead, God knows what chords the listener would hear. 

1. Well, perhaps you do not understand what an arpeggiated chord is?  Most people would not pick it up as a "melody" at all, but as a chord whose individual notes happened to be quickly separated for a split second.

2. No, a piano would be able to separate the two parts, if we assume the music is even halfway competently composed!    Did you check the Tchaikovsky score?

If you are really interested, get some classic works in the genre and listen to them, study them, with the scores!  Your questions will be answered thereby!

Check this: while not a "12-tone" method work, it shows Schoenberg working his way along such a path instinctively.  Note how the chords do not make the "melody" impossible to follow. 

https://www.youtube.com/v/xrjg3jzP2uI

And the Fourth String Quartet shows Schoenberg using his "composition with 12-notes" ideas.

https://www.youtube.com/v/aYiHRpmT6D4

[Florestan]

Although I have been watching this thread with interest I have refrained from posting in it --- until now.

1. Well, perhaps you do not understand what an arpeggiated chord is?

My dear friend, is it absolutely necessary for us, simple music lovers as we are, to understand what an arpeggiated chord is in order to appreciate its beauty?

I have just listened to Haydn's op. 76 / 2. I can deliver you a whole lecture about what it inspired me to feel and think of; but I guess it would amount to nothing, zero and nil, because I really don't understand what a fifth is... 

Music does not have to be understood. It has to be listened to. - Hermann Scherchen

2. No, a piano would be able to separate the two parts, if we assume the music is even halfway competently composed!    Did you check the Tchaikovsky score?

I just loooooove Tchaikosvky. His music gives me goosebumps every single time I hear it --- but since I haven't checked one single score of his, I cannot tell whether his music is halfway, thirdway or anyway competently composed at all.

If you are really interested, get some classic works in the genre and listen to them, study them, with the scores!  Your questions will be answered thereby!

Study them with the scores???

Music should humbly seek to please; within these limits great beauty may perhaps be found. Extreme complication is contrary to art. Beauty must appeal to the senses, must provide us with immediate enjoyment, must impress us or insinuate itself into us without any effort on our part. --- Claude Debussy

(this coming from the father of modern music speaks volumes in itself)

[Cato]

Although I have been watching this thread with interest I have refrained from posting in it --- until now.

My dear friend, is it absolutely necessary for us, simple music lovers as we are, to understand what an arpeggiated chord is in order to appreciate its beauty?

I have just listened to Haydn's op. 76 / 2. I can deliver you a whole lecture about what it inspired me to feel and think of; but I guess it would amount to nothing, zero and nil, because I really don't understand what a fifth is... 

Music does not have to be understood. It has to be listened to. - Hermann Scherchen

I just loooooove Tchaikosvky. His music gives me goosebumps every single time I hear it --- but since I haven't checked one single score of his, I cannot tell whether his music is halfway, thirdway or anyway competently composed at all.

Study them with the scores???

Music should humbly seek to please; within these limits great beauty may perhaps be found. Extreme complication is contrary to art. Beauty must appeal to the senses, must provide us with immediate enjoyment, must impress us or insinuate itself into us without any effort on our part. --- Claude Debussy

(this coming from the father of modern music speaks volumes in itself)

Hi Florestan!

I understand your concern!   

And of course, no, one does not need to understand music theory or what an arpeggiated chord is to love a work.  Our Finnish member, however, seems interested in understanding the theory, of knowing "how is that placed on paper," and so studying the score is a good way to do that!

[71 dB]

1. Well, perhaps you do not understand what an arpeggiated chord is?  Most people would not pick it up as a "melody" at all, but as a chord whose individual notes happened to be quickly separated for a split second.

I know the basic idea of arpeggiated chords, but I'm afraid I don't know the exact definition. So, if the notes are separated say 1/8th of a whole note in time, it's not an arpeggiated chord? Even if the notes decay off very slowly and are heard simultaneously for seconds?

2. No, a piano would be able to separate the two parts, if we assume the music is even halfway competently composed!    Did you check the Tchaikovsky score?

Sorry, I don't have the score of Tchaikovsky's 6th symphony. I don't even have a recording of the piece! 
My ability to read scores is of course very poor. If I get myself scores someday, they will be Elgar's scores.  0:)

If you are really interested, get some classic works in the genre and listen to them, study them, with the scores!  Your questions will be answered thereby!

I'm interested of 20 times more things than I have time to study in my lifetime and I get interested of new things almost every day. I end up scratching the surfice of nearly everything.  Maybe someday I will try to read Elgar's score of Enigma Variations.


Anyway, I have learned something new about 12 note technique and tone rows. Baby steps... ...thanks!

[Cato]

I know the basic idea of arpeggiated chords,...

My ability to read scores is of course very poor. If I get myself scores someday, they will be Elgar's scores.  0:)

I'm interested of 20 times more things than I have time to study in my lifetime and I get interested of new things almost every day. I end up scratching the surface of nearly everything.  Maybe someday I will try to read Elgar's score of Enigma Variations.

Anyway, I have learned something new about 12 note technique and tone rows. Baby steps... ...thanks!

Try this:

https://www.youtube.com/v/_TD8gjZ46gw

If you really cannot read music or scores, then you will need some training on simpler scores, like trios or string quartets, before graduating to an orchestral score by Elgar! 

Many scores are available at the Petrucci Music Library on-line.

And here is a piano score and performance of the first and last movements of Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony!  Skip to 18:53 or so for the Adagio, and you will see that the "theme" is very harmonic, in 4 and 5 voices: try playing just one of the voices on a keyboard, and you will see how polyphony creates harmony, e.g. play just one of the bass voices, and see how different it is from the whole!

https://www.youtube.com/v/o5IiJZOhRk4

[71 dB]

Try this:

https://www.youtube.com/v/_TD8gjZ46gw

Thanks! Some of these videos can be educational.

If you really cannot read music or scores, then you will need some training on simpler scores, like trios or string quartets, before graduating to an orchestral score by Elgar! 

Many scores are available at the Petrucci Music Library on-line.

Well, I was able to download the score of Handel's 'Largo' for piano a year or so ago. I 'programmed' about half of it on Garage Band. The idea is I try to add new sounds to the piece. Give me a minute and I'll tell you what the next note is. 

And here is a piano score and performance of the first and last movements of Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony!  Skip to 18:53 or so for the Adagio, and you will see that the "theme" is very harmonic, in 4 and 5 voices: try playing just one of the voices on a keyboard, and you will see how polyphony creates harmony, e.g. play just one of the bass voices, and see how different it is from the whole!

https://www.youtube.com/v/o5IiJZOhRk4

Thanks. I'll check that out...

[Karl Henning]

Ah, I suppose that could dispel the worries I just wrote about above.

Welcome to a twelve-tone Ländler

[aukhawk]

In response to the OP, I'd suggest:
1. Rules are made to be broken.
2. All music (by definition really) has rules.  Even randomly-generated music operates according to rules. 
The rules governing the music of (for example) CPE Bach were potentially** far more restrictive than those that (for example) Schonberg adopted.
** except when he broke them.