Some Notes
The Emperor's New Clothes
Elliott Carter's Piano Concerto, Concerto for Orchestra, and Three Occasions
(Arte Nova 27773, $5.98)
Works: Tedious; Performances: Committed; Recording: Excellent
(Similar commentary appears at Amazon.com)
FASHION STATEMENT
From the vantage point of 20-30 years later, Elliott Carter has
emerged as a central figure in a New York school of
"preconstuction," including among others Milton Babbitt, Charles
Wuorinen, Donald Martino, and Roger Sessions (although the latter
was perhaps more lyrical and intuitive than the others singled out here).
Their defining characteristic is the use of precompositional sets,
which fix main musical elements (such as pitches and rhythmic features) prior
to actually writing any music. (This should not
suggest, however, that their works sound the same, any more than
do the works of Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern, the "Second Viennese
School").
The artifice of their style (and philosophy) has fallen out
of vogue with the new generation of composers, but during the 1960s
and 70s they dominated New England and Middle Atlantic universities
and conservatories (Yale, Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, etc.), and
therefore also music criticism. Regardless of where the composers
lived, New York City was their spiritual epicenter. But they failed
to capture the imagination of even that most urbane and intellectual
of audiences, beyond the academic community (and "intellectual"
wannabes) they spawned. (Milton Babbitt went so far as to call
composers of their ilk "vanity" composers, although he intended
this to be ironic.)
Here we have a classic example of "The Emperor's New Clothes."
Only in this tale most of the public doesn't buy into it.
IF YOU CAN MAKE IT THERE ...
Precompositional sets (including those derived from post-Schoenbergian
techniques) were used in varying degrees, to the extent that
mathematics often dominated the "musical" conception. The music itself
is generally characterized by jagged and/or fragmented melodic or motivic
material, tonality that is either absent or hidden, and vertical
sonorities dominated by augmented fourths and minor seconds
(including inversions and various transpositions), but frequently
with a secondary use of major seconds and perfect fourths.
Characteristically complicated rhythmic and metrical elements
consciously avoided patterns derived from speech and traditional
dances. Instrumental textures and sonorities (including the use of
extreme registers and unorthodox sounds) were used not merely for
"color," but took on structural significance; and contrasting "blocks"
of sounds and rhythms were sometimes pitted against each other in a
kind of monumental counterpoint.
Of course, these characteristics can be found in earlier music (Schoenberg, Webern, Varese, Messiaen, Ives...). More innovative were the group's formal procedures, which tended away from the linear, cause-reaction type of discourse toward a more kaleidoscopic jumble (i.e., intersection/interlay/interplay) of the various constructive elements. The desired effect is often more cumulative than conversational: exegesis, apparently, is antithetical.
CARTER CARTER BO BARTER ...
Certainly, all of Carter's music does not fit into the "preconstructional" category. But the pieces on this album ably represent the music of this "school," and, in retrospect, also represent the musical mainstream of the time, as was determined by the academic establishment. Carter's use of precompositional sets to determine a work's content is nonetheless distinctive, and perhaps derives more from the example of Messiaen than from Schoenberg (and, by extension, than from Boulez or Babbitt).
Carter is not a proponent of Schoenberg's "twelve-tone system," even though he does sometimes use fixed sets consisting of all twelve tones of the chromatic scale. He does not, for example, limit himself to a single tone-row (or "chord," as he refers to his organizing tone sets), and each set is not used in the manner of a strictly-repeated ostinato.
Carter himself has discussed the precompositional contivances of his music. The First String Quartet is developed primarily from an all-interval tetrachord (E-F-G#-A#), and in the Second Quartet each of the four instruments is assigned sets of characteristic intervals and rhythms. His Double Concerto uses two all-interval tetrachords (one which characterizes the harpsichord, the other the piano), and from these are derived several 12-tone rows (with eight notes derived from the original tetrachord and its transposed retrograde inversion, to which is added the four-note "residue" of the chromatic scale).
For the Piano Concerto, Carter used two 12-tone sets, one for the piano/concertino group, and the other for the orchestra; each of the two sets is subdivided into six "triads" (some of which share pitches), forming twelve groups in which are further defined registers, and speeds or "characters" for each triad. The Concerto for Orchestra uses similar pre-compositional sets, but subdivided into five- and seven-note chords instead of triads. Carter said he used similar types of substructures in all his works.
FAMILIARITY BREEDS CONTEMPT
When Mr. Carter composed these works there was nothing "new" about his harmonic language: Arnold Schoenberg had written harmonically similar music during the early years of the 20th century, and by the 1920s had manufactured his dodecaphonic system to organize the pitch content of pieces that labored to avoid tonality. Today, the sound of "atonal" music is familiar to anyone who has seen cinematic thrillers and horror movies.
The problem for most listeners, then, is not that Carter?s music sounds "different" from what one is accustomed to hearing, but that the harmony is so unrelentingly the SAME from beginning to end, and from one piece to the next. The pieces on this album lack any real melodic distinction and harmonic variety, as is demonstrated in the sound clips provided by Amazon.com.
THE DEVIL, YOU SAY
Now, it well may be that there are NOT tritones dominating every measure of these pieces, but the impression one is left with is that there are. This is the result of a fundamental misunderstanding regarding atonal music and "the emancipation of the dissonance" and the way most people actually hear harmonic structures. The theory is that when one removes "tonal" references, the ear is free to hear the myriad combinations of tones and intervals as distinct and equal entities. But the tonal music of Bach, Beethoven, and Bartok, together with omnipresent popular music, is a more pervasive part of contemporary music-making than "atonal" music ever was or likely will be. Given this, it is virtually impossible to "free" oneself from the fundamental experience of tonality (in the broadest sense), which results not only from culture, but from the physical properties of acoustics and the physiological workings of the human ear.
In any harmonic environment, a tritone (i.e., an augmented fourth or diminished fifth) automatically dominates if it is present. Especially in a highly chromatic harmonic environment, the ear will frequently "supply" a tritone (oftentimes out of overtones) to try to make sense of a highly dissonant vertical sonority, even when no tritone is actually sounding. And the ear retains the sense of "melodic" tritones between successive chords.
SCHERZO-PHRENIA
When a tonal "center" is obliterated the relational harmonic identities of chords (tonic, dominant, subdominant) are likewise destroyed. In fact, this was a desired goal of composers of atonal music. The intention was to give each sonority equal importance, with an independent identity. But instead, for most listeners, the atonal environment creates a vast series of anonymous, rather than distinctive, sounds. Simply deciding that, okay, from now on intellectually-devised mathematical relationships will take precedence over the laws of physics was presumptuous. This shows the sort of detatchment from reality upon which pharmaceutical companies have come to rely.
The irony here is that Schoenberg himself recognized this shortcoming and adopted a more pluralistic approach in his later works, re-incorporating tonal elements into his harmonic and melodic vocabulary. [Too bad that the New England academic musical establishment failed to appreciate this, too--a generation of American composers wasted two or three decades writing same-sounding "intellectual" music for which there is no audience; or worse: were discouraged from writing potentially great music because they refused to use the establishment?s serialized cookie-cutter. Even a composer as well-established and as well-loved and respected (today, anyway) as Samuel Barber suffered under the musical McCarthyism of the 60s and 70s, because the establishment press denegrated his music as too backward-looking. Ironically, Barber's music was always described as "mainstream"--and now, with the contemporary shift away from atonality, it finally is.]
Atonality does have its place in music-making -- but not without limits. One cannot deny the primal position tonal music occupies in contemporary Western life (again, "tonal" in the broadest sense). In this real-world context, atonal music necessarily assumes a coloristic or "atmospheric" role for most listeners (similar to music constructed exclusively from the whole-tone scale, or with unrelenting "quartal" harmonies). Because it lacks the harmonic direction of tonal music, atonal music often creates an air of instability or suspense. But when this colorful "suspense" is never resolved, longer (and exclusively) atonal pieces tend to become either tiresome (from the lack of discernable harmonic variety), or psychologically overwhelming. And the tedium is especially great when there is no distinctive thematic material, because one is left with only oversaturated, and ultimately indistinct, colors. Even a "light-hearted" and amusing piece like Schoenberg's Serenade, op. 24, comes across to many (most?) as a disturbing parody, like Mozart gone mad.
BABY TALK
Carter?s language in the works on this album is rather like a musical Esperanto: artificial and contrived. He intentionally avoids memorable thematic material, and his complicated rhythms are likewise forgettable. In the piano concerto, the soloist, through no fault of her own, often sounds (literally) like a tone-deaf child left to improvise at the keyboard. Still, Carter?s orchestrations are brilliant, and there is an occasional lively flourish amid his wash of moans and monotony. ('Three Occasions' shows a tiny bit of lyricism lacking in the concertos, but you may not notice by the time you get to them because of the fatigue generated by the first two works. So, unless you're a Carter aficianado, you may want to start with the 'Occasions' and save the concertos for other days. Because of the harmonic sameness, you probably won't want to listen to all three works in one sitting.)
CROSS WORDS (or, IN THE MORNING SOW THY SEED...)
In music, as in any art, technical mastery serves only one purpose: to better enable the artist to convey ideas to the audience. Carter, however, said he did not take the audience into consideration, but composed only for himself. (Audiences and performers have responded appropriately and accordingly by pretty much ignoring him as well...) When faced with such self-avowed musical onanism as this, the technical aspects become of only remote academic interest. No doubt, these works ARE rigorously well-organized. But, given the lack of engaging melodic, rhythmic, and harmonic substance, it is hardly worth the listener?s while to bother trying to figure them out.
Because, even if one recognizes the intellectual rigor required to formulate a Sunday Times crossword puzzle, few will ever mistake the puzzle for poetry.
THE GOOD NEWS (or, CHECK, PLEASE)
But, at least in American music, Carter is historically important, so if you are curious about the orchestral music of his generation and "school," this disc should fit the bill nicely. These performances are polished and energetic, with the excitement of a live concert about them, and the recorded sound is warm and atmospheric without any loss of detail. Plus, at this bargain-basement price you only have a little to loose...
But otherwise, save your money. [A better choice might be a recording of Carter's Variations for Orchestra, an essentially lyric work of tragic beauty, freely atonal, and more inspired than contrived in its argument.]
Emperor?s new clothes? Why, Mr. Carter, we see your ...
Well, you get the picture.
(copyright 1999, Cowford Ed)
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