Musik & Ästhetik, 2009, Jg. 13, Ausgabe 52

The »State of Material« in Contemporary Music

In accordance with Niklas Luhmann´s theory of art the concept of musical material expands into the connection of media-forforms where the material appears as a guiding difference within the medial fabric. From the postmodern perspective a »state of material« in Adorno´s sense only – if at all – applies to an individual work. It is shown however that the category of sound can nonetheless be used to determine an overarching historical situation – in the system of New Music at least – namely that of its institutional consolidation. (This situation is described as needing reform however as institutions conserve the sonic identity of New Music.) Sound in its important role as medium is joined by the »substance« postulated by Harry Lehmann; this comes about through a lingual and sonically objectifiable exploration of music. The technological innovation of the digital revolution finally concretises both the question of the medium and that of the substance and opens up new aesthetic and publicatory possibilities.

Burney´s Statement: »There are really more soloists and good composers in this orchestra than perhaps in any other European orchestra«

Burney´s statement points to a close triangulation between elementary forms of musical action in the Mannheim tradition: orchestral performance solo performance and composition. In historical demarcation from the musical understanding of the early 18th century this constellation described by Burney presupposes an identical musical act of production in all three forms of action: a transition from nothing to something. In aesthetics around 1760 this act is described using the category of the sublime. Sublime events are experienced not in their quality only in their factuality. This view is a key to understanding the aesthetics of the Mannheim School.

Illuminating Passages: On the Station Theatre of Manos Tsangaris

Manos Tsangaris is an explorer of artistic boundaries who constantly moves through different forms of passage in his work. By combining traditions from concert music sound installation and the visual arts his »situative« music theatre is able to overcome boundaries between different segments of today´s music scene. Time and again his projects revolve around the discovery of spaces both long-familiar and unusual ones as well as manifold shifts of perspective including shifts between different formats. The old idea of the Wandelkonzert in which the audience is mobile is brought to life again albeit with deliberately open and confusing aspects and with recognisable connections to the basic conceptual ideas of post-dramatic theatre.

Shamefaced Seconds in Pop and Rock

As brief non-musical inserts at the starts and/or ends of tracks micro-prologues/epilogues consisting of noises speech and other elements are a constant feature in pop and rock recordings to this day. These phenomena are here clarified using examples and divided into four types according to function: realistic narrative surreal and obscure. After identifying the confrontation with silence as the nerve centre of music the author goes on to show that these micro-prologues and epilogues conceal this centre in a form of »soul shame« (O. F. Bollnow) thus embodying a special form of musical self-reflection only possible in pop and rock music.

Hommage à Ulrich Holbein

The writer Ulrich Holbein is one of the most important and unusual figures in contemporary German literature. He does not fit into any segment of the market and is incompatible with the wider literary scene. No other German writer can match his potency of language and flexibility of ideas. His knowledge is unmatched and he sets new standards for the most adventurous images metaphors neologisms and semantic constructions.

Anatomy of the Educated Classes or Music-Sociological Half-Knowledge?

In response to the question »What is German?« Adorno once referred to the inner combination of »the great which does not content itself with any conventionally posited boundaries and the monstrous « as well as an ossification of »intellectual culture« into an »end in itself« with a tendency to »leave behind the humanity of the real world and be self-sufficient«. This is how one could outline the central thesis in Irmgard Jungmann´s book Sozialgeschichte der klassischen Musik [A Social History of Classical Music]. It seeks to reveal the idolatrous aspects of the German love of music from the beginnings of bourgeois society to the present day. To achieve this the author extensively traces the process in which the idealisation of German music finally took the step to cultural chauvinism. In contrast to Adorno however Jungmann crudely equates the »great« with the »monstrous« and the work´s autonomy with its fetishisation. The model of successful »intellectual culture« as a critical point of reference is thus simply eliminated. The deeper reason for this lies in the methodical constrictions of current music sociology which inevitably bounces off art as a fait social sui generis.

The Voice Born of Suffering.
The Dreams of Benjamin Britten

Referring to Benjamin Britten´s stage works Billy Budd and Peter Grimes as well as the musical poetics of John Cage this article discusses the consequences of presupposing a composer´s homosexuality as the origin of a musical poetics.