Elliott Carter, 1908-2012

[karlhenning]

This defies credulity.

Let me handle this, Nancy . . . Far out, Catherwood, just roll a couple of bombers and leave them on the side-table.

[Al Moritz]

but he also conducted Mozart works

Excellently, in fact (I have heard his recording of the flute concerto in G major from 1985). You may dislike Stockhausen's music, but you cannot pretend that he was not a highly capable and trained musician. This is also evident from his early, more "traditional" choral works which he wrote in 1950 before he had found his own voice (erm, according to some, turned crazy ).

[Joe Barron]

Now, this is the kind of discussion I like.

[Al Moritz]

And in his earlier days he used to play lots of classical, baroque, romantic, jazz etc as a pianist.

Yes, there is this story in Kurtz' s Stockhausen biography where he and his musicians were rehearsing Mikrophonie I (trust me, the most "noisy" Stockhausen piece ever, with banging on and scratching of the surface of a tam-tam; I love it, one of my absolute favorites). There were some technical problems with the electronics involved, and in order to entertain and kill some time while things were fixed, the composer sat on the piano and played some old jazz classics. He never "negated" the past, contrary to the myth.

[karlhenning]

There were some technical problems with the electronics involved, and in order to entertain and kill some time while things were fixed, the composer sat on the piano and played some old jazz classics.

But did he play "Your Feet's Too Big"?

[Joe Barron]

But did he play "Your Feet's Too Big"?

Mr.Carter saw Fats Waller perfrom in the 1930s and has often talked about the structures of jazz as a basis for his own music.

[Mark G. Simon]

Not necessarily, Mark. Carter has often stated that Mozart is his favorite composer, and that the three Da Ponte operas would be his desert island disks. He also once startled a critic by saying he wanted his music to "be like Mozart's." According to David Schiff, what Carter finds compelling in Mozart is his emotional ambiguity --- "happy when sad, major when minor." It was this same quality, that troubled listeners as astute as Beethoven and Wagner. Their troubled response also proved how much better they heard the music, as opposed to those who find it "merely beautiful," at least according to Schiff.

I find it odd when critics and listeners use Mozart a s club with which to beat Carter's aesthetic.

Just as I find it odd that people would use Carter as a club to beat Mozart's aesthetic. I'm sure Carter could not have gotten very far with Nadia Boulanger without a firm understanding of Mozart. The quote about "happy when sad, major when minor" ties in with his statement about music in which "first you do a little of this and then a little of that" and how he wanted to "mix the 'this' and the 'that'". Another way Carter has learned from Mozart (I'm sure Boulanger instilled this in him, but could have easily used Mozart as an example) is textural clarity in the midst of maximum instrumental activity. You know how Mozart was admonished for writing "too many notes". He did so out of concern for the individual players. He made sure everyone had an interesting part. There are all kinds of contrapuntal details in his symphonies and string quartets where other composers would have put simple accompaniment figures. Mozart didn't want to bore his musicians with filler, so he gave them interesting Nebenstimme figures which his contemporaries thought made the music "too highly spiced". But he always left holes in the texture for these little figures to come through, even though they only last 3 or four beats, so that there is never excessive sonic clutter.

Now you can look through any Carter score and see exactly the same thing. The Concerto for Orchestra has an awful lot of stuff going on, but except for big climactic sections, there's never more than a couple of things going on at once. There are little bits of activity that may only last a couple of beats, but for those beats everyone else either has rests or sustained notes. It looks very striking on the page, and the affect when you hear it is of maximum clarity, even with the incredible amount of activity.

[Joe Barron]

Mark, as always, your post opens up a multitude of doors, any one of which would be rewarding to enter. I'm not sure just when Carter came around to Mozart, and I don't know if it was Boulanger who unlocked his appreciation. He has said that when he was younger he was interested only in modern music, and he was quite mature when he learned to love the classics. Of course, the spirit of the neoclassical Stravinsky loomed over Boulanger's lessons, and she had her students sing though all of Bach's cantatas, which certainly helped to seal Carter's interest in counterpoint.

I don't think the Concerto for Orchestra would have been possible without the example of Ives's Fourth Symphony, particularly the second movement: listen to the climaxes of both side by side sometime. (Remember, too, the symphony was premiered by Stokowski in 1966, just about the time Carter began work on the Concerto.) But Carter has criticized Ives for piling up so many notes that the sound of individual instruments, such as a flute playing in its middle range, gets lost and fails to contribute to the overall effect. Carter wanted to develop the kind of layering Ives pioneered, but he insisted on clarity, too, and the techniques you describe so well are a direct result of that insistence. What has always impressed me about the Concerto for Orchestra is that no matter how much is going on, every note can be heard.

Whether this push toward clarifying Ives is left over from Mr. Carter's training with Boulanger, an outgrowth of his admiration for Mozart, or an imperative of his own temperament, however, I really can't say.

[Joe Barron]

Nice article about Mr. Carter today in the L.A. Times.  Much of it will be familiar to regulars on this board, but there is some new information. I didn't realize grandad gambled away his money.

[Joe Barron]

Rumors of Mr. Carter death have been greatly exaggerated

From Newsday's online arts listings:

DEC. 4. Cellist Timothy Eddy and Pianist Gilbert Kalish. Elliott Carter's "Sonata for Cello and Piano" (1948), in honor of the late composer's 100th birthday. Staller Center for the Arts, Stony Brook. stallercenter.com, 631-632-2787. -- Research by Judy Raia

Miss Raia needs to do some more research.

[karlhenning]

That was Episode 1 of The Death of Mary Queen of Scots . . . .

[Mark G. Simon]

The late composer's 100th birthday

Maybe Judy Raia has plans for him some time before Dec. 4.

[Joe Barron]

That was Episode 1 of The Death of Mary Queen of Scots . . . .

Episiode 2 will be heard on BBC 1 almost immediately ...

[karlhenning]

I think she's dead.

— No, I'm not.

(crash)

[Joe Barron]

I think she's dead.

— No, I'm not.

(crash)

Lay off!

[Joe Barron]

Oh, BTW, Karl, Mr. Carter's new piece for percussion sextet, Tintinnabulation, is scheduled for premiere Dec. 2 at the New England Conservatory of Music. I expect you to provide a report.   

[karlhenning]

Oh, BTW, Karl, Mr. Carter's new piece for percussion sextet, Tintinnabulation, is scheduled for premiere Dec. 2 at the New England Conservatory of Music. I expect you to provide a report.   

Thanks for the alert! I'll be there.  (It's a Tuesday; excellent.)

[bhodges]

Just found out about this concert:

Thursday, February 5, 2009, 7:30 p.m.
Zankel Hall
Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Piano

Bach: Canons Nos. 1 and 2 from The Art of Fugue 
Carter: Two Diversions 
Bach: "Rectus Inversus" No. 12 from The Art of Fugue 
Carter: Night Fantasies 
Bach: Canons Nos. 4 and 3 from The Art of Fugue 
Carter: Retrouvailles 
Carter: Matribute 
Carter: 90+ 
Bach: "Rectus Inversus" No. 13 from The Art of Fugue 
Carter: Intermittences 
Carter: Caténaires

--Bruce

[Joe Barron]

A Thursday. Possible, but not likely.

[karlhenning]

Could be an Edward Gorey storybook: The Unlikely Thursday