Musik & Ästhetik, 2002, Jg. 6, Ausgabe 24

Metrotectonics and the golden mean. Debussy's 24 Préludes for piano

The formal analysis of Debussy's music is known to be a challenge to music theorists. The composer himself often expressed his profound skepticism towards traditionally (as he called it: »scholarly«) formal models. He realized his musical ideas in a formal architecture that cannot be entirely submitted to traditional analytic tools. Of all his compositions the 24 Préludes for piano present themselves as being one of the most intricate and fascinating objects of formal analysis. One of the most important features of the Préludes is a specific understanding of meter which appears to be not a succession of rhythmical pulses but rather a phenomenon of its »absolute« extension in time a continuum analogues (to some degree)to Bergson's notion of »durée.« In other words a »measure of extent« can be chosen as the basis of the analytic approach. The Russian theorist Georgy Konjus elaborated in 1930-40 on the so called metrotectonic method of analysis which is here applied to Debussy's music. This approach reveals proportions and symmetries in the Préludes as well as the role of the golden mean in all possible manifestations: as straight inverted mirrored as well as increasing and decreasing progression. Debussy uses almost »mathematical« norms of musical tectonics and creates an architecture that we experience as the organic entity of his works.

Aesthetic and practice. On the »objectivibility« of aesthetic value principles

The fundamental problem of every pragmatic aesthetics is how it reconciles the irresolvable nature of culturally and morally bound aesthetic thinking with a scientific claim to objectivity. The aesthetic-pragmatic moral principles necessary for doing so must stand the test of aesthetic experience for which they should be constitutive. Here Beethoven's Waldstein Sonata Thomas Mann's Doktor Faustus and Picasso's Guernica are used as examples to show that »creativity« »comprehensibility« and »constancy« do justice to this basic claim. As a culturally bound and specifically aesthetic a priority this constellation of criteria takes not only the relationship of interests and structures of art and aesthetics into account; above all it makes possible a judgement of the aesthetic-cultural value of artistic objects and practices that is just as controlled as it is critical.

Contours of haziness. Microintervalics in the work of Bernd Asmus

This analysis focuses on the meaning of microintervalics especially in the ensemble piece Gewölk from 1996 whose fundamental idea is the conflict between differing tuning systems. In Gewölk the equal steps of the tempered piano are contrasted to a complex harmony that is however derived from the simplest pre-conditions: it is based on a narrowly limited supply of (only three) pure intervals. Nevertheless chains of pure intonations make possible the finest microtonal differentiations in extended chord passages. Starting from a rigid and initially exposed grammar of the »Gestaltbogen« (formal contour) during the piece a process of gradual dissolution and evaporation takes place which ends in microtonal uncertainty and noise.

Moritz Hauptmann's dialectical cadence model and the harmony of the nineteenth century

In comparison to Hugo Riemann's far-reaching claim the theory set forth by Moritz Hauptmann appears to be little more than a preliminary stage which was soon forgotten. But if one puts forth the effort to examine the dialectical harmonic definition depicted by Hegel and systematically worked out by Hauptmann moments become visible whose differentiation overlaps with or even levels out Riemann's attempts at generalizing. A comparitive analysis of the beginning of Beethoven's Piano Sonata Op. 53 shows how its tonal constitution can be more adequately depicted from a harmonic transformation process using Hauptmann's dialectical cadence model than through Riemann's intergrating functional theory.
Hauptmann's theory not only proves to be an ideal method for the complexly diversified harmony of the 19th century but also implies - ex nihilo - moments of romantic musical aesthetics. If one accenturated the romantically relevant terms which Hauptmann uses such as »Entzweiung« (division) »Entfernung« (distance) or »Gefährdung« (threat) - as is used for the subdominant and for Robert Schumann's »poetic« disposition in his C Major Fantasy Op. 17 - then one can see how broad is the inner range of Hauptmann's classically founded theory yet how it might potentially extend beyond itself.

Theses on music technology space

This text puts forth the model of an understanding of music that no longer thinks of it from the paradigm of time. The correcting terms ar »technology« and »space«. Music and muscial perception are influenced to a large extent by modern technology. This influence changes the relationship between time and space in music. Time is the traditional medium of the reflexive (self-)emergence of a subject and space is the realm of the uncontrollable outer world. Seen from the history of civilization the orientation in space is primary whereas the relation to time is secondary meaning an extension of it (space). The history of mankind takes place in subjective phases of making time. In the capacity of technology modernity is an excellent showplace for a breakthrough in open or unbounded space. This allows the ineffective boundaries of inside and outside to become radically unstable. In the music since Beethoven this shows itself as »Verräumlichung« (a creation of space). At the same time the dimensional structure of musical time steps into the foreground compared with its successive unfolding. Future present and past are spatial embodiments of time. Musical forms through which a work attains a temporal relationship to itself lose their meaning. The working term itself changes exiting into space. Whether this is a regressive or progressive progress is impossible to determine.

Analog noises. The aura of digital classical music

Analog turntables are considered outdated. The new digital equipment is suppposedly able to produce a noise-free and strikingly »real« reproduction of sound. This technical achievement could however mean a loss in respect to aesthetics: The analog noises of the analog LPs are a means of effectively producing »classical« music. The point to the distant source of the music and give it a certain aura. This essay shows how digital recordings attempt to adopt the advantages of the older medium and to reconstruct the analog noises.

New and the newest music in Italy

Surprisingly in Italy there is currently a well organized field of »new music« in spite of the almost total disinterest on the part of the political institutions toward the sector of contemporary music. This is also a result of a strong avant-garde movement after the Second World War (Berio Nono Evangelisti Maderna) and of involvement with the international new music scene. The development of new music since the 1970s is shown here in three chapters: 1. electro-acoustic music with its numerous studios and laboratories; 2. the younger generation with the examples of its composers: Luca Francesconi Ivan Fedele Giorgio Battistelli Marco Stroppa Claudio Ambrosini and Alessandro Melchiorre; and 3. the numerous facets of the youngest generation. In addition the more important performers conductors and ensembles are introduced.