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America’s Musical Landscape�8th edition

Part 6:

Tradition and Innovation in Concert Music

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Chapter 20: Experimental Music: Revolution

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Part 6: Tradition and Innovation in Concert Music Chapter 20: Experimental Music: Revolution

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Tradition and Innovation in Concert Music, 1

Music for the concert hall

    • Unprecedented diversity of concert music styles in the twentieth century
    • Some American composers took an evolutionary approach to the composition of music
      • Bridging the European tradition and a distinctly American voice
    • Others had a revolutionary approach
      • Focused on expanding the known boundaries of music

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Tradition and Innovation in Concert Music, 2

Interaction between the arts

    • The close interaction between visual and literary artists extended to music and dance
    • Multimedia performances
      • Interdisciplinary
      • Inviting the audience to participate: ‘Happenings’
    • Relationships between the visual arts and music
      • Focus on texture and timbre

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Tradition and Innovation in Concert Music, 3

The value of chance

    • During the 1950s and 1960s, the idea of leaving aspects of their creative process to chance appealed to some visual artists and musicians

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American concert music

    • There is no unifying Western musical language
    • A multiplicity of musical tongues

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Experimental Music: Revolution

Charles Ives (1874-1954)

    • Owned a successful insurance business
    • Strong literary interests
    • Wrote instrumental music
      • Program music that reflected his New England home
    • Wrote about 150 songs
      • Often quoted melodies from other musical sources

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Listening Example 68

General Putnam’s Camp

(from Three Places in New England)

By Charles Ives (1874-1954)

Listening guide page 361

    • Timbre: Symphony orchestra
    • Texture: Linear polyphony in which each melodic line should be heard independently. The resulting combination of tones is not intended to be heard as harmony.

This exuberant piece from

1914 included snatches of

patriotic tunes which the

composer altered, distorted

and layered to create an

intriguing sound.

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Listening Example 69

At the River

By Charles Ives (1874-1954)

Tune and Text by Robert Lowry�(1826-1899)

Listening guide page 363

    • Texture: Basically homophonic
    • Form: Verse-chorus
    • Meter: Quadruple

Ives borrowed the music

and lyrics for this 1916

song from a hymn titled

“Beautiful River.” He had

used part of this melody

earlier in his Sonata for

Violin and Piano no. 4.

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Other Characteristics of Ives’ Music

Use of unusual tuning systems create the effect of sounding out of tune

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Bitonality: 2 keys at once

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Polytonality: many keys at once

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Polyrhythm: combination of 2 or more rhythmic patters

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Quarter tones and microtones

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Ives’ Place in History

Poor health prevented Ives from continuing his musical explorations after the 1920s

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Twenty years later, his music came to public attention

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His Third Symphony, written in 1904 and first performed in 1947, won a Pulitzer Prize

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Many of his innovations still sound fresh and unusual

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Henry Cowell�(1897-1965), 1

His early compositions use tone clusters

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Experimental piano works

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Took inspiration from Asian�traditions

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Henry Cowell�(1897-1965), 2

Rhythms divided by 5, 7, and other unconventional numbers

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Collaborated with Leon Theremin to develop the rhythmicon

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Founded the quarterly journal New Music

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Listening Example 70

The Banshee

By Henry Cowell

Listening guide page 367

    • Timbre: Piano, played mostly on the�strings, the timbre altered by Cowell’s�experimental techniques
    • Meter: Free
    • Form: Through composed

Two musicians are needed

to perform this piece – one

seated at the piano while

depressing the damper

pedal, and the other

standing in the crook of the

piano, manipulating the

strings.

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Concrete Music

Experimental movement in Paris in the 1940s included unusual compositional process

    • Selecting sounds to be taped
    • Recording the sounds
    • Manipulating the sounds
    • Mixing the sounds
    • Montage: cutting and pasting the tape

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John Cage�(1912-1992)

Addressed conceptual musical problems and questions like an inventor

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Interested in Asian philosophies, religions, and musical styles

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Inspired by Gamelan Music

    • Used an Indonesian orchestra of metallophones (sets of keys suspended over a frame and struck with mallets), gongs and drums

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Listening Example 71

Hudjan Mas (Golden Rain) (excerpt)

Anonymous

Listening guide page 372

    • Texture: Linear polyphony
    • Timbre: A 25-piece orchestra of xylophone-like bronze-keyed instruments, tuned gongs, cymbals, drums, and flutes
    • Meter: Free
    • Form: A series of simultaneous variations over repeated ostinatos

This composition for

Balinese Gamelan Gong

Kebjar often serves as a

prelude or instrumental

interlude in a longer dance

composition.

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John Cage: Prepared Piano

Prepared piano

    • Modified or ‘prepared’ pianos by applying wood, metal, or rubber to the strings
    • This created percussive timbres and indeterminate pitches

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Cage composed several independent compositions for prepared piano

    • Sonatas and Interludes: sixteen sonatas and four interludes, often considered his masterwork

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Listening Example 72

Sonata V

(from Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano)

By John Cage (1912-1992)

Listening guide page 374

    • Timbre: The piano is prepared so as to produce wooden and metallic sounds similar to those of a gamelan
    • Meter: Duple
    • Form: Binary (two-part): aabb

This piece is organized

according to rhythmically

complex patterns.

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