Is Serialism Dead?

[Ogg Vorbis]

We lost Herr Stockhausen this year and it's only a matter of time when Chuck Wuorinen and Elliot Carter, et al kick. Are there young, fresh-skinned serialists out there to carry on?

I kind of think that it's always going to be around in some form or another, because there will always be self-described musical illuminati who need a method of organizing musical ideas (to substitute for a lack of innate ability).

Actually I don't believe that last statement too much. Just about 12% of it.

[vurt]

many of the serialists of the past have been cited as influences for many of todays electronic artists. while perhaps we may not have heard much in the way of pure serialism from these, who knows where the influences will pass too?
maybe there are no major composers being showcased in this field, at the moment, but id imagine there are many fans of this music in the underground, all you have to do is wait for things to cycle. cream always rises to the top eventually, so im told.
perhaps look for someone in this area and help them get noticed, if you tell 20 people, and they tell 20 people and so on...

[jancivil]

No, it just smells funny.

[lotus2035]

I dunno, I quite like Cornflakes...

[jancivil]

perhaps look for someone in this area and help them get noticed, if you tell 20 people, and they tell 20 people and so on...

here is some impure serialism. I was in the area.

[vurt]

perhaps look for someone in this area and help them get noticed, if you tell 20 people, and they tell 20 people and so on...

here is some impure serialism. I was in the area.

so long as you know by pure all i meant was the more modern stuff (kieren hebden and such) that ive heard has definite influences but also brings other forms into play.
i wasnt getting into the old

pure is superior nonsence

.

[jancivil]

what I linked to is an overdubbed couple of improvs. I had to write in that thing, 'serialism', in skool, it got drilled in pretty good, so it's sorta like doing a blues to me.

It's impure because the first three notes are MI FA LA, which you wouldn't do and get a good grade, and ends with a sort of f**ked up 'tonal' cadence.


BTW, all music is *tonal*, 'atonal' music is no different.

[FaX]

FISH

[Ogg Vorbis]

perhaps look for someone in this area and help them get noticed, if you tell 20 people, and they tell 20 people and so on...

here is some impure serialism. I was in the area.[/quote]

Hey, nice ending. It was kinda like Zappa mixed with Kontakt II

[herodotus]

'Serialism' was never really alive.

It grew from a misunderstanding of an otherwise forgotten theorist/musician named René Leibowitz. He was an early champion of the music of 'Schoenberg and his school' as he called it. Schoenberg's 'method of composing with twelve tones' (this is what Arnold called it himself) was a personal approach to a personal compositional impasse. The fact that Webern and Berg adopted it to their own ends wasn't due to Schoenberg's urging, but rather to the fact that his friends found themselves in a similar impasse.

But after Leibowitz started giving his lectures at the Darmstädter Ferienkurse, a different, distorted view of Schoenberg's method was made popular. One man's technique was fetishized into a putative 'new language of music'. Most of what followed was remote from Schoenberg's intentions and aesthetic.

And then, between Babbit's work in the US, and the work of Barraque, Boulez and the rest in Europe, a strange new kind of music came into being. Although people associated Arnold with this music, as if he were somehow to blame for it, the fact is that most of it had nothing to do with him. Of this whole group, only George Perle really seemed to understand Schoenberg's intentions.

It should be noted that Schoenberg himself taught composition for many years, and never once taught a class about his method. His classes and theoretical works were concerned exclusively with tonal music of the common practice period.

[llatham]

We lost Herr Stockhausen this year and it's only a matter of time when Chuck Wuorinen and Elliot Carter, et al kick. Are there young, fresh-skinned serialists out there to carry on?

Yes. Each year, college students begin to study composition and/or theory and are introduced to serialism. There are always going to be some who are inclined to it.

I kind of think that it's always going to be around in some form or another, because there will always be self-described musical illuminati who need a method of organizing musical ideas (to substitute for a lack of innate ability).

Actually, serialism has been around long before Schoenberg "invented" it. In the 1300s, a form of music called an Isorhythmic Motet was popular. This form used a fixed series of rhythmic values from one pre-existing piece, and a fixed series of pitches from ANOTHER pre-existing piece, and combined them to form a pre-composed "row" that would be the basis for the piece, over which freely composed parts were created.

Canons are also serialism: one "row" is the generator for all of the musical material in the piece (or can be; depends on how strict the composer wishes to be)- especially in things like a Cancrizans Canon .

So the idea of serialism is nothing new. But, like the genre of the Isorhythmic Motet, I feel the genre of "Atonal Serialist Dodecaphonic" music is over. Just like Jazz, Rock and Roll, 80's Hair Band Rock, etc. - there are still practitioners of all of these, though the genres on general have moved into the past.

What we should learn from this is that Serialism is a COMPOSITIONAL TECHNIQUE that is well-suited to producing certain musical effects. If a composer wishes to create such a musical effect, knowing how to incorporate serialist procedures in order to achieve that goal would be an important tool to have in one's compositional toolbox, no?

In other words, serialism, dodecaphony, atonality, chance procedures, process principles, etc. etc. are all means to an end, not ends in and of themselves (though unfortunately, many "composers" treat them as such, which I think points toward your "lack of innate ability" comment).

Actually I don't believe that last statement too much. Just about 12% of it.

Good, because there are probably a few misguided souls who believe those compositional techniques are an end unto themselves (and unfortunately some are relatively well-known and are influencing others) but IMHO the "real" composers are those that realize that they are just techniques, and not the piece itself.

Best,
Steve

[lotus2035]

In the 1300s, a form of music called an Isorhythmic Motet was popular. This form used a fixed series of rhythmic values from one pre-existing piece, and a fixed series of pitches from ANOTHER pre-existing piece, and combined them to form a pre-composed "row" that would be the basis for the piece, over which freely composed parts were created.

You mean they used loops in the 1300s?

[Musicologo]

And what about Ars Subtilior? Can't we see this movement as a prenounce to what Schoenberg did later? They have reached a vast degree of complexity in the XVth century with that.

I really can't understand why Ars Subtilior disappeared and I feel that a very new inovative branch of music history vanished into thin air, while the baroque was emerging into another direction.

[Ogg Vorbis]

This is a great forum because the discussion is good and I'm actually learning things.

I agree that serialism is a compositional approach which is, has been and always will be on the table. Looking at the "serial movement" it seems as though composers were looking to create or be a part of a definite coherent "school" of composition which justified their music.

What I personally learned from all the experimentation and "movements" of the 20th century is that music is freely and immediately available and that academic schools of coherent compositional thought who want to carry the golden scepter passed to them from Wagner are not essential components to worthy art.

The best lesson of the 20th Century, in my opinion comes from John Cage. And that is art, music, greatness, etc. is the domain of the audience and not the composer or his/her ordained technique or compositional process.

In an interview many years back, Charles Wuorinen was asked, "isn't serialism for the chap who can't write pretty music?" He candidly but dismissively shot back, "Any composer can use any means to write 'pretty' music, if that's his aim."

Well Chuck, you just freed me of any allegiance to any school or movement or technique. As a composer I can use serial, tonal, isorhythmic patterns, loops, or chance operations to write pretty, ugly, smart or dumb music as I see fit. Thank you.

[MaxSynths]

According to Stockhausen the purpose of serialism is (was) to kill and replace romanticism. If serialism is not already dead I think it must consider suicide.

Sorry but I never understood the point of all that noises. And the statement that a bunch of noises is about to kill and replace romanticism is so ridicolus...

What I'm missing here? I really understand and appreciate minimalism, for example, but my brain refuse to accept any theorical idea suggested by serialism.