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- Newsgroups: rec.music.compose
- Path: sparky!uunet!spool.mu.edu!umn.edu!umeecs!zip.eecs.umich.edu!fields
- From: fields@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Matthew Fields)
- Subject: Re: How does one compose?
- Message-ID: <1992Dec23.210102.1541@zip.eecs.umich.edu>
- Sender: news@zip.eecs.umich.edu (Mr. News)
- Organization: University of Michigan EECS Dept., Ann Arbor
- References: <o591VB1w165w@dorsai.com> <1992Dec21.135542.2877@eagle.lerc.nasa.gov> <85767@ut-emx.uucp>
- Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 21:01:02 GMT
- Lines: 28
-
- In article <85767@ut-emx.uucp> james@astro.as.utexas.edu (James McCartney) writes:
- >I would say they are a compositional geek. The Schoenberg 12-tone system
- >was useful as a hammer. It did open new territory. But I think that once
- >the wall is broken, the hammer should be thrown away.
-
- Uh, if there's one thing Schoenberg did NOT really do with the 12-tone
- system, that's open new territory. The territory was opened by Berlioz's
- generation, and Schoenberg pulled himself both-legs into it back around 1908
- or so, i.e. 13 years and 16 opus numbers before he started working in 12-tone
- serialism. He and his two prominent students worked out on a piece by piece
- basis a variety of serialisms that were useful for the particular pieces
- in which they were applied, until around 1923 when he got going on the suite
- op.25, and realized he had a handle on an idea he could treat more abstractly
- and exploit for a number of other compositions.
-
- Recently I heard a strictly serial composition by Donald Martino, called---
- again, my memory is flakey on this--- White Isle. Absolutely delicious,
- though rhythmically very simple. I'd love to get my hands on a recording.
-
- Lessee, when Rameau figured out the idea of the fundamental bass as an
- organizing principle in music, that was a hammer that opened whole new
- horizons of harmony. With those horizons open, natch we should have abandoned
- tonality then and there as having served out its useful life...
- but I just happen to sometimes like tonality. So send in the thought police
- to ticket me every time I use one of these outmoded tools.
-
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-