Indeterminate Composition by Note Omission, Shortening and Contraction by

Transcription

1 Indeterminate Coosition by Note Omission, Shortening and Contraction by Kit Buckley, Bachelor o Music (Honours) This thesis is presented in partial ulilment o the requirements or the degree o Master o Music. The University o Western Australia School o Music November

2 Abstract Although various orms o chance and indeterminacy have been utilised to varying degrees over the last 60 or so years by many dierent coosers, not all possible avenues have been explored. This research proposes to examine three new methods o indeterminate coosition, and coare them to established indeterminate techniques. This study will investigate three means o realising perormance indeterminacy, through the removal o part o a written, determinate score by the perormer. These procedures are note omission, where a note is replaced with a rest o equivalent value, note shortening, where part o a note's duration is removed and replaced with a rest o an equivalent value, and note contraction, where the note is skipped over, with the perormer proceeding immediately to the next note. In each case, the application o these procedures should serve to highlight particular elements and sub-structures within the ull score. In the introduction, the deinition o indeterminacy, and other closely related terms, such as chance and irovisation will be established. As these terms have been used inconsistently rom author to author, a clariication o their deinition, as used in this thesis, is necessary beore speciic coositions and approaches can be discussed. Ater the literature review in the irst chapter, the second chapter will examine some o the established indeterminate methods. Although this survey will not be exhaustive, it will discuss key indeterminate works, and works that contain indeterminate elements rom the mid to late 20 th Century, including coositions by Pierre Boulez, John Cage, Morton Feldman, Brian Ferneyhough, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Iannis Xenakis, to establish the context or the author's new methods o coosition. The inal chapter o the thesis will discuss the author's three new methods o indeterminacy. This will be undertaken with speciic reerence to three o the author s original coositions, which will tie the coosition portolio together with the research. Passages rom each piece will be analysed, with the ilications o the indeterminate techniques coared to the works discussed in Chapter Two. Particular mention will be made o how this version o partial indeterminacy aects the basic elements o music such as melody, rhythm, orm and harmony; and also how this may alter the nature o perormance and rehearsal. The cooser-perormer-audience relationship will also be discussed, along with possible ilications o recordings, and potential interpretational bias. 2

3 Table o Contents Abstract: 2 Table o Contents: Acknowledgements: 4 Introduction: 5 Chapter 1: Chapter 2: Literature Review 10 Examination o Established Indeterminate Methods 14 Chapter : 2 Note Omission 2 Note Shortening 24 Note Contraction 24 Piece or Large Chamber Ensemble 29 Lots o Pieces or String Quartet 2 Piece 2 or Solo Cello 4 Ideological Ilications 7 Conclusion: 42 Bibliography: 46 Appendices: Appendix 1: 52 Appendix 2: 5 Appendix : 54

4 Acknowledgements I would like to thank my supervisors Chris Tonkin and David Symons or their constant support and suggestions. By orcing me to rethinking many o my musical convictions, they have helped make my thesis and coositions much more unilateral and open than they would otherwise have been. I would also like to thank my amily, particularly my mother, who read through and edited many o the thesis drats. Without their support and assistance, this thesis would probably never have been inished. 4

5 Introduction This thesis examines three new orms o indeterminacy that have been devised by the author. The three are used in his original coositions and corise perormance indeterminacy that allows the perormer to omit part o the written score by either shortening note lengths, (note shortening), eliminating notes entirely and replacing them with silence, (note omission) or skipping notes and proceeding immediately to the next note, (note contraction). Beore these processes are explained in more detail, the concept o indeterminacy needs to be examined. Whilst the term 'indeterminacy' is relatively new in musical parlance, coositions that can be described retrospectively as indeterminate have been written or many centuries. Indeterminacy in music has however, been explored as a signiicant coositional ield in its own right almost exclusively since World War II, concurrently with similar investigations in the other arts. Since then, only a small number o coosers have consciously set out to introduce indeterminate elements in their coositions. As such, the potential o indeterminacy as a coositional method is still being examined. However, the explorations that have occurred thus ar, alongside those in other closely related experimental music ields, have led to radical changes and re-evaluations o many aspects o music. From the outset, it is useul to establish a working deinition o the terms chance and indeterminacy. In musical literature, the terms 'chance' and 'indeterminacy' are oten used interchangeably. However, considering both in their original context, the Penguin English Dictionary deines them as: Chance: '1a) the incalculable assumed element in existence that renders events unpredictable. b) an event without discernible human intention or observable cause...' 1 Indeterminate: 'not deinitely or precisely determined or ixed; vague.' 2 With their adoption into music, these two key terms were given a more speciic meaning in the context o experimental music. It ollows that the word 'chance' would naturally reer to something that has already been determined via an unpredictable or uncontrolled process, whilst indeterminate suggests that the event that 1 2 Robert Allen (ed.), The Penguin English Dictionary Third Edition, (London: Penguin Books, 2007), 209. Ibid., 65. 5

6 will determine something that has yet to occur. Conusion arises when Paul Griiths' article in Grove Music Online, groups chance and indeterminacy under the general label o 'aleatory' music, which the article deines as 'a term applied to music whose coosition and/or perormance is, to a greater or lesser extent, undetermined by the cooser.' This is a meaningless categorisation, as it does not clariy whether the cooser, perormer or both are responsible or the undetermined elements. The term aleatory in act only reers to chance, but not indeterminacy. Boulez states: ''Aleatory' is a word that is requently used, rightly or (more oten) wrongly when speaking o 'chance'. It means a directed, or controlled, chance, one that you have yoursel chosen.' 4 which is an unhelpul conlation o the traditional meanings o the terms 'chance' and 'indeterminacy'. The author has thereore avoided using the word aleatory in the thesis, as the deinition does not clariy the range and scope o either chance or indeterminacy. Although some scholars have suggested alternative deinitions or the terms indeterminacy and chance, there are problems created when these deinitions contradict the general meanings o the words. One problematic alternative suggested by Roger Reynolds, states 'I see irovisation, indeterminacy and chance as progressive degrees o a tendency to leave detail unspeciied',5 and later, 'I... a cooser wants an indeterminate situation, there can be no preerred solutions and, ultimately, in the case o chance, virtually no "rules"'.6 However, this proposal only suggests a degree o reedom that each term might provide, without considering how it is to be created or realised within coositions. More iortantly, it puts irovisation, indeterminacy, and chance on a linear scale o 'indeterminacy' by introducing a hierarchy o terms which are at odds with the standard deinitions o the words. However, measuring the extent o the term 'indeterminacy' is a useul concept, so that a distinction can be made between coositions based on how 'indeterminate' they are. The dierence between the terms indeterminacy and chance can be understood by considering John Cage's Music o Changes (1951), a solo piano work that was Paul Griiths. 'Aleatory.' In Grove Music Online. Oxord Music Online, (accessed September 20, 2010). Pierre Boulez (ed. Christian Bourgois), Orientations (trans. Martin Cooper) (London: Faber and Faber Limited, 1986), 461. Roger Reynolds, 'Indeterminacy: Some Considerations', Perspectives o New Music Vol. 4, No. 1 (Autumn Winter, 1965), 16. Ibid., 16. 6

7 coosed through the use o chance procedures. Cage governed how chance would be generated and combined to orm the coosition, by tossing coins and consulting the I Ching to determine each o the coosition's elements. In the score itsel he writes, 'it will be ound in many places that the notation is irrational; in such instances the perormer is to eloy his own discretion,'7 so that certain parts o the score are in a rough sense 'indeterminate'. Cage points out that 'though no two perormances... will be identical... [they] will resemble one another closely.'8 However, while Music o Changes is somewhat more indeterminate than say, a Beethoven Piano Sonata, the level o variance between perormances will be slight, and as such, it is more correct, in the author's opinion, to consider Cage's piece as an exale o chance rather than indeterminacy. In this way, Music o Changes also serves to highlight the dierence between indeterminacy and chance i a piece is an exale o one, then it does not necessarily ily it is an exale o the other. A related exale is Earle Brown's Indices. Although the piece was coosed 'by means o tables o random numbers (used in a way [that] introduces bias),'9 the score uses conventional notation throughout, with no unusual perormance instructions, so the resulting sounds are determinate. The terms 'indeterminacy' and 'chance' are however not mutually exclusive. John Cage's 4' (1952) or exale, contains both indeterminate and chance elements. 4' is clearly indeterminate, as the sounds heard within the piece have not been determined by Cage, but it is also an exale o chance as the sounds are also not determined by the perormers, and the duration was determined by chance operations. The deinition o indeterminacy does not distinguish between dierent 'degrees' o the term. As 'determinate' and 'indeterminate' are used in standard music nomenclature, it is useul to deine the opposite o determinacy, named here as 'total indeterminacy'. With total indeterminacy, a coosition is independent o its perormance, and any perormance is independent o the coosition. This means a perormance cannot be easily, i at all, 'back-related' to the original score, and because o this, an unidentiied recording o the piece cannot be evaluated as an accurate representation o the original John Cage, Music o Changes (New York: Henmar Press, 1961), Preace to Score. John Cage, Silence: Lectures and Writings (London: Calder and Boyers, Ltd., 1961), 6. Ibid., 7. 7

8 coosition. Total indeterminacy is perhaps best seen as an extreme, as there are very ew scores that give perormers this degree o reedom. Its polar opposite, total determinacy, is very much an ideal in a non-electronic context, as no amount o detail on a musical score can account or every possible variable in human perormance. As such, although the terms determinacy and indeterminacy are only relative, they nevertheless serve to separate some works rom the latter hal o the 20 th century rom earlier indeterminate coositions, as coosers began to intentionally relinquish or delegate the control o key elements o pieces to perormers. In music o the common practice period, where coosers have indicated their intentions to the perormer with conventional notation, their ideas can be readily corehended by the perormers. The role o the musicians is to interpret the notes on the score by ollowing the cooser's intentions, to perorm the piece as well as possible. The audience hears and receives the cooser's vision through the perormer's interpretation. With the exception o world premieres and/or very obscure works, there is likely to be a score and/or a recording available, which can be studied in advance by the audience to acquire an 'outline' o the coosition. Consequently, the audience can attend a concert knowing exactly what will be heard, but without knowing how it will be interpreted by the perormers. Thus in western art music, 'determinate' coositions revolve around a ixed score, with the interest in the perormance centred on the quality o the original coosition and the coarison and evaluation o dierent interpretations o the piece. Indeterminate coositions, however, are not limited to a single outcome, so the quality o the realisation depends not just on the perormer's interpretation, but also on how they select their material in indeterminate sections. Within conventionally notated music, particularly prior to the 20 th century, verbal instructions or suggestions to the perormer are seldom seen outside o a piece's title. The cooser's intentions were instead conveyed through musical notation, most o the time through a collection o pre-existing symbols and common descriptive terms. In many cases, these musical symbols only give a general guideline as to how the coosition is to be interpreted by perormers. Notational symbols may be used to preerence certain interpretations o a work over others because o stylistic considerations. Dierent symbols also take on dierent meaning according to the perormance traditions that have accrued or each individual cooser and coosition, 8

9 as well as rom the general stylistic traits o the period. I a perormer is conronted with musical nomenclature that they have encountered many times beore, they may see these symbols as being suggestive o how the work should be interpreted. For this reason, many indeterminate coositions utilise unusual methods o notation and/or presentation, to ehasise the non-traditional approach that the perormers need to take. All non-electronic but otherwise determinate coositions are independent o their perormances to a certain extent. This can be attributed to instrumental actors, (or exale, the brand o instrument used), the subjectivity o musical notation (or exale, the length o a staccato), and the perormance space (or exale, a large concert hall versus a small room). However, the overall dierences are minor, as the ramework o the coosition is, in most pieces, consistent between perormances. As such, the sounds heard can be recognised as dierent renditions o the same musical score. Any observed dierences are almost all very minor and are related primarily to perormance practice. The irst chapter o this thesis corises a literature review. The second uses John Cage's writings and those o other coosers and musicologists as a basis or exploring some o the established coositional methods that eloy indeterminate elements. The coositions examined include work by John Cage and the other members o the New York school Morton Feldman, Earle Brown and Christian Wol as well as the Europeans Karlheinz Stockhausen and Pierre Boulez, along with Iannis Xenakis's Evryali. This orms the conceptual basis or the third and inal chapter, in which the author's techniques o note omission, shortening and contraction are deined and discussed with relation to his original coositions. The dissertation concludes with a discussion o the wider issues raised by note omission, shortening and contraction. 9

10 Chapter 1 Literature Review This literature review ocuses primarily on the writings and interviews o coosers whose views on indeterminacy can be related directly to the coositions discussed in this thesis. Seminal works by these coosers are analysed in Chapter 2 and the literature reviewed relates to these coositions. The oremost cooser/author in the ield o indeterminacy, John Cage, published several books that chronicle his writings and thoughts over a given time, including Silence,10 A Year rom Monday,11 M,12 Ety Words,1 X14 and Anarchy.15 Cage's extensive interviews have been collected in several books including Conversing with Cage.16 One deinitive lecture, given in 1958 and published in Silence, discusses 'coositions that are indeterminate o their perormance.'17 This reers to pieces where the cooser allows one or more iortant elements o a coosition to be determined by the perormer. Cage's lecture orms the structural basis o Chapter 2, due both to its wide-ranging ocus on a variety o coositions, and its place as one o the earliest discussions o indeterminacy. Cage's interviews, and books written collaboratively, or with the close assistance o Cage, also provide a substantial amount o inormation on his coositions and thought processes. These include The Roaring Silence, 18 and The Music o John Cage. 19 Morton Feldman's Intersection (195), when examined rom the perspective o indeterminacy, is an exale o a piece that provides choices within discrete intervals o time in the coosition's overall ramework. Feldman wrote extensively on his own John Cage, Silence: Lectures and Writings (London: Calder and Boyers, Ltd., 1961). John Cage, A Year rom Monday: New Lectures and Writings (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1967). John Cage, M: Writings '67-'72 (London: Marion Boyars, 1998). John Cage, Ety Words; Writings 7 78 (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1979). John Cage, X; Writings (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 198). John Cage, Anarchy: New York City January 1998 (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 2001). Richard Kostelanetz, Conversing With Cage (New York: Limelight Editions, 1988). Cage, Silence, David Revill, The Roaring Silence John Cage: A Lie (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 1992). James Pritchett, The Music o John Cage (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 199). 10

11 music and the indeterminate elements involved in his coositions. Some o his writings have been collected in the book, Give My Regards to Eighth Street.20 O these, the most iortant text or this thesis is Liner Notes (1962),21 where Feldman outlines the rationale behind his stylistic changes in coosition. He discusses the ideas that led him to write graphically notated music and the reasons why he subsequently rejected this approach and went on to explore other methods o indeterminacy. This dissertation also discusses Earle Brown's piece 4 Systems (1954), which is independent o its perormance as a result o its use o graphical notation, hence making it indeterminate. Brown has spoken and written about his music in several iortant articles and lectures, including 'The Notation and Perormance o New Music',22 a lecture presented at Darmstadt in 1964, and 'Transormations and Developments o a Radical Aesthetic'.2 Brown is an interesting case study, since some o his coositions utilise indeterminate elements, while others remain ully determinate, although only his indeterminate works all within the scope o this thesis. Christian Wol's Duo or pianists II (1958) is indeterminate in perormance: while each pianist has a separate part, they cannot proceed through the piece independently, as their selections also need to take the other pianist's actions into account and react to their interpretation. The most iortant o his writings or this thesis is the article 'On Form'24, in which Wol discusses the indeterminate procedures involved in Duo or pianists II, and how they are extension o those seen in Stockhausen's Klavierstuck XI. In addition to this, he has given several interviews on the subject, including one with David Patterson25 and another with Stephen Chase and Clemens Glesser.26 In the aorementioned article, Wol discusses the inspiration or Duo or pianists II, as well as its realisation in perormance Morton Feldman (ed. B. H. Friedman), Give My Regards to Eighth Street: Collected Writings o Morton Feldman (Cambridge: Exact Change, 2000). Ibid., -7. Earle Brown, 'The Notation and Perormance o New Music', The Music Quarterly Vol. 72 No. 2, (1986), Earle Brown, 'Transormations and Developments o a Radical Aesthetic', Current Musicology 67/68, (Fall 1999), Christian Wol, 'On Form', Die Reihe Vol. 7 Form Space, (1964), David Patterson, 'Cage and Beyond: An Annotated Interview with Christian Wol', Perspectives o New Music 2:2, (1994), Stephen Chase and Clemens Glesser, 'Ordinary Matters: Christian Wol on his Recent Music', Teo - A Quarterly Review o Modern Music 58:229 (July 2004),

12 In their writings about indeterminacy, Pierre Boulez and Karlheinz Stockhausen have examined the role it played in some o their coositions rom the 1950s. One piece by each cooser is discussed in this thesis. Boulez's rd Piano Sonata (1957-) is analysed as a coosition that has an indeterminate orm that allows the perormer to choose their own path through the coosition, within certain restrictions. In his article, 'Sonate, que me veux-tu',27 Boulez principally examines this work, outlining his own thoughts on indeterminacy. He urther explores these issues in a series o articles, the most signiicant being 'Alea'.28 Stockhausen's Klavierstuck XI (1956) is also studied as an exale o an indeterminate coosition where the order o segments may be varied in perormance. In Stockhausen's case, his 'Texte zu Eigenen Werken zur Kunst Anderer Aktuelles',29 as well as his seminal article, '... how time passes...'0 and some o his collected interviews 1 examine his instrumental music, including Klavierstuck XI. Although Iannis Xenakis does not generally utilise indeterminate techniques in his coositions, a ew o his pieces are (almost) iossible to play as written, orcing the perormer to coromise the written score. His solo piano piece Evryali (197) has a ew passages that all into this category, where the perormer is unable to play the score in a coletely determinate manner. Many articles have been written on this coosition, some by perormers who have collaborated with Xenakis on the work and can recount his views, most notably those by Peter Hill2 and Marc Couroux. Michael Nyman's book, Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond, 4 is an iortant source or early developments in indeterminacy. He describes how an alternative to the European avant-garde emerged in America rom Cage's ideas, and analyses a variety o Pierre Boulez (ed. Jean-Jaques Nattiez, ), 'Sonate, que me veux-tu' in Orientations: Collected Writings (trans. Martin Cooper), (London: Faber and Faber, 1986), Pierre Boulez, 'Alea' in Stocktakings rom an Apprenticeship (trans. Stephen Walsh), (Oxord: Oxord University Press, 1991), Karlheinz Stockhausen, Texte zu Eigenen Werken zur Kunst Anderer Aktuelles, (Köln: Verlag M. DuMont Schauberg,1964). Karlheinz Stockhausen, '... wie die Zeit vergeht ', (Die Reihe, 1957): Trans. by Cornelius Cardew as '... how time passes...', English ed. o (Die Reihe, 1959): Karlheinz Stockhausen Oicial Website Stockhausen.org 2009, Kürten, viewed 1 October 2009, < Peter Hill, Xenakis and the Perormer, Teo New Series, No. 112 (March 1975), Marc Couroux, Evryali and the Exploding o the Interace: From Virtuosity to Anti-Virtuosity and Beyond, Conteorary Music Review 21:2- (2002), Michael Nyman, Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond, (London: Studio Vista, 1974, repr. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999). 12

13 pieces, including many o the key American indeterminate coositions o the 1950s. Nyman's work is one o the earliest secondary sources that proiles and explores the creative direction o various indeterminate coosers, including Cage and other members o the New York School. The German musicologist and sociologist Theodor Adorno developed arguments in some o his later writings, including the essays 'Music and New Music' and 'Vers une musique inormelle', both published in Quasi una antasia. 5 These articles discuss issues surrounding the post World War II avant-garde, including coosers that utilise indeterminate procedures in their music. While Adorno's writings do not discuss particular coositions in detail, they are relevant because they highlight the context surrounding indeterminacy. Paul Griiths has written extensively on new music, and in works such as A Concise History o Modern Music 6 and Modern Music and Ater 7 has covered the early developments o indeterminacy in detail, including an examination o all the coosers mentioned in Chapter 2. He also wrote the Aleatory 8 entry or Grove Music Online, which in spite o the mistaken deinition o terms, still provides the most corehensive encyclopaedic source or this topic. Notwithstanding the avoidance o the term 'aleatory' in this thesis, the article still contains much valuable inormation on indeterminacy. Coosers and scholars have discussed and deined indeterminacy in various ways, and it would be outside the scope o this paper to examine all that has been written about the subject. The most iortant writings on indeterminate music come rom the American cooser, John Cage, and o these, the lecture Indeterminacy 9 given in Darmstadt orms the basis o the next chapter. This lecture was one o the irst ormal, systematic attets to investigate indeterminacy in detail. The indeterminate coositions discussed in Cage's lecture will be supplemented with the comments o other scholars, Theodor W. Adorno (trans. Rodney Livingstone), Quasi Una Fantasia - Essays on Modern Music (London: Verso, 1992). Paul Griiths, A Concise History o Modern Music: From Debussy to Boulez (London: Thames and Hudson, 1978). Paul Griiths, Modern Music and Ater: Directions Since 1945 (New York: Oxord University Press, 1995). Paul Griiths, 'Aleatory', Grove Music Online (ed. L. Macy), < (Accessed 15 February 2008). Cage, Silence,

14 coosers and their coositions, and will contextualise some o the established orms o indeterminacy. 14

15 Chapter 2: Cage's lecture Indeterminacy presented on the 8th o September, 1958 at Darmstadt was the second o three lectures he gave at the Darmstadt International Summer Courses or New Music. Although the lecture was the most conventional o the three with regard to ormal structure, it describes and questions the ideology behind signiicant European and American indeterminate coositions o the 1950s.40 It corises six sub-lectures, the irst ive o which discuss one or two pieces. Each is preaced with the statement this is a lecture on coosition which is indeterminate with respect to its perormance. 41 As the central topic o this thesis is indeterminacy, only the indeterminate works mentioned in Cage's lecture, and parts o the last sub-lecture are examined. Although the pieces examined in this chapter are not ully representative o all indeterminate developments, they highlight the dierences between the more 'indeterminate' approach taken primarily by the New York School o American indeterminate coosers and in response, the more 'controlled' approach taken by many major European indeterminate coosers. In the second hal o the irst sub-lecture, Cage discusses Karlheinz Stockhausen's Klavierstuck XI, one o the most iortant indeterminate coositions rom Europe in the 1950s. This work shares stylistic similarities with conteorary American indeterminate coositions, such as Feldman's Intermission 6, which also use a variable layout on the page, although Stockhausen's work is considerably more colex and places additional restrictions upon the pianist. Klavierstuck XI consists o 19 short musical ragments, distributed irregularly on an oversize sheet o paper. The perormer is instructed to start at any ragment, and then proceed to whichever the eye catches next. The interpretative markings or the next ragment are determined rom the previous one, and the piece ends ater any ragment is heard or a third time. Thus, the sequence o these parts... is indeterminate, bringing about the possibility o a unique orm, which is to say a unique morphology o the continuity, a unique expressive content, or each perormance. 42 However, as Eco mentions, Stockhausen's Klavierstuck XI... will never be [in perormance] gratuitously dierent. [The piece is] Martin Iddon, 'Gained in Translation: Words about Cage in Late 1950s Germany', Conteorary Music Review 26:1 (2007), Cage, Silence, 5. Ibid. 15

16 to be seen as the actualisation o a series o consequences whose premises are irmly rooted in the original data provided by the author. 4 Certain key aspects o the work including the notes and rhythms (in relative terms, as the tei may change) are ixed, ensuring that Stockhausen's inluence over the inal sound o the piece is still present. However, as two dierent perormances could potentially use coletely dierent ragments, Klavierstuck XI is still a coosition that is clearly independent o its perormance. The instructions or Klavierstuck XI allow or perormances o varying lengths, but there seems to be an unspoken intention that most, i not all o the ragments will be played twice beore one is repeated or a third time. This approach allows or a longer perormance o the piece, so the audience can hear more outcomes o the decisionmaking process. Another issue, discussed in greater detail in Chapter, is the choice o which ragments to play. Although Stockhausen indicates that the order o the ragments should be governed by what the eye sees next, in practice, pianists are likely to prepare a version o the work that allows or a large number o ragments to be heard twice beore any is repeated or the third time. Moreover, by the time a pianist has learned this diicult piece, they are likely to have memorised where the various ragments are on the score and would not move their eyes spontaneously without knowing what they would see next. This would seem to run contrary to Stockhausen's desire or spontaneity in perormance. This issue not only applies to Stockhausen's piece, but it also highlights, in general terms, how a perormer might approach any indeterminate coosition. There is always the possibility o memorising an interpretation, and determining beorehand exactly which elements are to be heard in perormance. As it is iossible to tell rom a perormance i the perormer has pre-prepared their interpretation, Stockhausen's instructions or spontaneity seem to be at cross-purposes with the coosition's structure. Morton Feldman's Intersection (195), is a representative exale o his graph music rom the 1950s and '60s, and illustrates the reer approach to indeterminacy taken by the New York School. Intersection consists o a division o the piano keyboard into low, medium and high registers, and a division o time into discrete intervals, indicated 4 Umberto Eco, The Open Work (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989),

17 respectively by the horizontal and vertical columns on the score. In each box a number o notes, indicated as a numeral, are to be played at the speciied register, the combination o these elements creating the graph-like appearance o the score. Feldman does not speciy exactly where the low, medium and high registers all, nor does he provide any suggestions or the melodic, harmonic or rhythmic elements, beyond speciying how many notes are to be heard in a given register at a given interval o time. Cage, in the second sub-lecture, observes that the perormer's role in Intersection as that o a photographer who on obtaining a camera uses it to take a picture. The coosition permits an ininite number o these, 44 highlighting how the basic subject matter remains ixed, but the range o possible interpretations within that ramework is almost unlimited. Whilst Feldman does not give any interpretative guidelines in the score o Intersection, he nevertheless seems to preer some realisations over others. Nyman observes that, ater several years o writing graph music Feldman began to discover its most iortant law. He ound it was not only allowing the sound to be ree, but was also liberating the perormer. He had never thought o the graph as an art o irovisation but more as a totally abstract sonic adventure. Feldman regarded this realisation as iortant, stating, I now understood that i the perormers sounded bad it was less because o their lapses o taste than because I was still involved with passages and continuity that allowed their presence to be elt. 45 Cage also argued that, Feldman's conventionally notated music is himsel playing his graph music. 46 Thus, the unspoken (or unwritten) ilication is that any interpretation o his graphical scores has to be harmonically, rhythmically, and dynamically in line with his conventionally notated works o the same period, as per traditional ideas o perormance practice. Whilst Intersection is clearly indeterminate, this element is teered by the above perormance considerations that provide unwritten guidelines or how the piece should be realised. Indeed, Feldman later indicated his dissatisaction with graph music, stating that i the means were to be irecise the result must be terribly clear 47, reerring to the diiculties arising rom the amount o reedom given to the perormer, while preerring certain outcomes over others in indeterminacy, both o which are problematic areas o graph music. The issue o potential interpretative bias will be urther explored in Chapter o the thesis Cage, Silence, 6. Nyman, Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond, 70. Ibid., 5. Feldman, Give My Regards to Eighth Street: Collected Writings o Morton Feldman, 6. 17

18 Next, Cage discusses 4 Systems (1954), one o Earle Brown's earlier indeterminate experimental coositions. 4 Systems corises a single page o notation, consisting entirely o black rectangles o various sizes. On the score Earle Brown notes that the piece may be played in any sequence, either side up, at any teo. The continuous lines rom ar let to ar right deine the outer limits o the keyboard. Thickness may indicate dynamics or clusters. 48 Despite the use o the phrase 'outer limits o the keyboard' and the dedication o the score to the pianist David Tudor, the piece has no speciied instrumentation. Cage describes the perormer's role in 4 Systems as that o making something out o a store o raw materials... The perormer's unction, in the case o 4 Systems, is dual: to give both structure and orm; to provide, that is, the division o the whole into parts and the morphology o the continuity. 49 Although the elements in 4 Systems are determined in relation to each other, the relative ranges o the notes, the teoral aspects such as rhythm and the overall perormance length are indeterminate. Beyond the suggestion o 4 Systems being a piano work, it is unclear whether there are any other unspoken intentions or preerred interpretations. However, as Brown was also writing music o a more determinate nature at the time, these works may provide interpretative guidelines or his indeterminate coositions. Although 4 Systems is clearly an exale o indeterminacy, the piece is 'indeterminate' to such a degree that perormances are unable to be ollowed on the score. Consequently, it is easier to understand each perormance as an original work in its own right. The inal indeterminate coosition discussed in Cage's lecture is Christian Wol's Duo or pianists II (1958). Wol states, Karlheinz Stockhausen's Klavierstuck XI introduced the notion o a variable, unpredictable continuity o structural sections, variably characterised according to the sequence in which they happen to appear, and an indeterminacy o the total length o a piece at any particular perormance. Beginning with that idea my Duo or pianists II makes a counterpoint o two sequences o structural units each indeterminate beore any perormance. 50 The score consists o a number o small blocks o music which are each highly indeterminate, with elements o pitch, rhythm and dynamics to be determined and interpreted by the perormers. In Earle Brown, 4 Systems (New York: Associated Music Publishers, 1961), Footnote on Score. Cage, Silence, 8. Wol, 'On Form',

19 addition, the two pianists need to react dynamically to each other, ollowing detailed cueing instructions rom the cooser or how to proceed between sections. The players take cues rom each other that are speciied in general terms but are not necessarily limited to a single outcome. The indeterminate nature o this work stems rom the interactions between the two perormers in addition to their independent actions. Cage writes, in the case o Duo or pianists II, structure, the division o the whole into parts, is indeterminate. 51 This piece has no overall 'determinate' score, but the parts each perormer plays are not coletely independent o each other. Cage describes the piece as evidently not a time-object, but rather a process the beginning and ending o which are irrelevant to its nature. 52 The piece is a series o connected events that are both independent and indeterminate. Cage goes on to state that: the unction o each perormer in... Duo or pianists II is coarable to that o a traveller who must constantly be catching trains the departures o which have not been announced but which are in the process o being announced. He must be continually ready to go, alert to the situation, and responsible. 5 Wol states that both luidity and exactness o perormance are possible. And no structural whole or totality is calculated either speciically or generally in terms o probabilities or statistics. The score makes no inished object, at best hopelessly ragile or brittle. There are only parts which can be at once transparent and distinct. 54 Here, he reers to how only a limited number o possibilities rom the overall score can be realised in any one perormance, with even the overall structure being indeterminate. The length o the work is also indeterminate, as there is no cue or ending the piece; the perormers agree on a total duration. 55 As music is experienced over time, a variation o length between dierent perormances adds an additional level o indeterminacy to Duo or pianists II. The Cage, Feldman, Brown and Wol coositions discussed in this chapter are collectively classiied in the remainder o the thesis as representative exales o the 'radical' approach to indeterminacy, where multiple elements o the score are let or the players to determine in perormance. The overall theme o Cage's lecture is an examination o how musical possibilities can John Cage, Ibid., 8. John Cage, Ibid., 8-9. John Cage, Ibid., 9. Christian Wol, On Form, Die Reihe Vol. 7 (1964), 0. Wol, 'On Form', 0. 19

20 be expanded with regard to coositions that are indeterminate o their perormances. Although it briely explores a range o possibilities, some other methods will be briely described below to help contextualise the discussion o the author's methods in the inal chapter o the thesis. One other iortant European indeterminate coosition, conteorary to Stockhausen's Klavierstuck XI, is Pierre Boulez's Third Piano Sonata (1955- ). Although the whole coosition was perormed by Boulez in 1967, only Trope, the second movement and Constellation-Miroir, the retrograde section o the third movement, Constellation, have been published colete as o 2012, although ragments and acsimiles exist o some other movements56. Boulez became aware o indeterminacy through his contact with Cage in the 1940s and 50s, although his approach to it was more restrictive than the coosers o the New York school. Boulez was also inspired by the open orm ound in Stephane Mallarme's Un Coup de Dés Jamais N'Abolira Le Hasard, where the structure, layout and typeace allow or the poem to be ordered in various ways, whilst still maintain the original context 57. In justiying the Third Piano Sonata's approach, Boulez asks: Why coose works that have to be re-created every time they are perormed? Because deinitive, once-and-or-all developments seem no longer appropriate to musical thought as it is today, or to the actual state that we have reached in the evolution o musical technique, which is increasingly concerned with the investigation o a relative world, a permanent discovering rather like the state o permanent revolution.''58 By 'relative world', Boulez is reerring to all the varying possibilities encoassed by each indeterminate coosition, so that perormances o the work are continual discoveries. The 'restrictions' placed on the Third Piano Sonata vary throughout, but certain elements o the piece are conventionally notated (and hence ixed), most iortantly the notes and rhythms. In the sections Parenthese and Commentaire, rom Trope, there are optional passages that can be played or omitted independently o each other. There are only a small number o optional sections, and as these are interspersed with determinate sections that must be played, the total number o outcomes available to the pianist is relatively limited and these outcomes are structurally uniied by the determinate sections. Although perormances will dier rom Dominique Jameux, Pierre Boulez, (trans. Susan Bradshaw), (London: Faber and Faber, 1991), 299. Dominique Jameux, Ibid., 9. Pierre Boulez, 'Sonate, que me veux-tu',

21 each other, making the overall piece indeterminate, these dierences are not radical. The determinate elements and conventionally notated score ensure that the overall sound o each section is maintained in Boulez's style. Boulez describes the nature o the rd ormant, Constellation and its pair, Constellation-Miroir as thus: 'There is a certain resemblance between this Constellation and the plan o an unknown town... The actual route taken is let to the initiative o the perormer, who has to pick his way through a close network o paths.'59 However, in the Third Piano Sonata the overall degree o indeterminacy is relatively limited when coared to, say, Feldman's Intersection. Although the Third Piano Sonata's orm may vary in perormance, all the sounds heard have been envisaged during the coositional process by Boulez, making the work also more 'determinate' than Stockhausen's Klavierstuck XI. There are ar ewer pathways that can be taken through the score, resulting in a coosition that is or the most part determinate, with possibilities or small 'indeterminate' divergences. The Boulez and Stockhausen exales suggest that variation in structure alone is unlikely to lead to a highly indeterminate coosition. These two European coositions are used as representative exales o what is termed, in the remainder o the thesis as the 'conservative' approach to indeterminacy, where the cooser still maintains a signiicant degree o control (or determinacy) over the inal sound o a perormance. One category o indeterminate coositions not mentioned in Cage's lecture (possibly because there were no extant exales at the time), is that o pieces which are indeterminate because they are conventionally unplayable. As only a portion o these scores can be reproduced by their perormers, the pieces become (perhaps unintentionally) indeterminate in perormance. Exales can be seen in some coositions rom the 1960s onwards, which developed in parallel with new advances in technical virtuosity. Several sections o Iannis Xenakis's solo piano work Evryali (197), exceed the limitations o any human perormer, as acknowledged by commentators including the pianist Marc Couroux. Couroux writes that 'the gauntlet is so clearly thrown down that the diiculties cannot be anything other than premeditated.'60 Consequently, although Xenakis is not usually considered to be an indeterminate cooser, several o his pieces have to be 'siliied' by their perormers Ibid., 151. Couroux, Evryali and the Exploding o the Interace: From Virtuosity to Anti-Virtuosity and Beyond,

22 It should be noted that whilst Xenakis used stochastic and other mathematical ormulae to assist in the generation o many o his coositions, these coositional methods all into the category o chance rather than indeterminacy, as the inal scores all use determinate notation. Aside rom the purely technical aspects o Evyrali, such as the very ast moving semiquaver chordal passages throughout; between the ith bar o Page 9 and the ourth bar o Page 10 there are stretches o over two octaves, which are well beyond the reach o almost any human hand. Although these stretches could perhaps be arpeggiated, this would seem to be a betrayal o Xenakis's intention, and even this would be nigh iossible to perorm at the ull teo indicated. In this respect, Evyrali is dierent to many o Xenakis's other coositions, including his earlier piano work, Herma (1962). Although Herma also places extreme demands on a pianist's technique, including very rapid wide leaps, the coosition still remains within human capabilities. Couroux's article also discusses whether Evyrali should be subject to a ixed reduction o notes, or whether the player should attet to ind their own path through the piece at each perormance. Couroux describes a conversation with Xenakis where he was asked Couroux whether he 'rethought Evryali every time [he] played it.'61 Although this idea is not stated explicitly in the score, the question suggests Xenakis would preer ceaseless reinterpretations. I the piece is realised with the same selection o notes each time, then the reduction essentially becomes a new piece, as some parts o the original will always remain hidden rom the audience, as is the case with Peter Hill's approach to Evryali.62 O course, these variations would be slight, as in most places, the score is able to be played as written by a virtuoso pianist. Many o Brian Ferneyhough's coositions also contain sections that are virtually unplayable, requiring the perormers to decide which details are easible or them to execute. Ferneyhough states, 'What interests me is encouraging the perormers, in any given coosition, to come to terms with their own natural limits, and thereby transcend them.'6 Although Ferneyhough, like Xenakis is not considered to be an indeterminate cooser, by orcing perormers to make coromises in order to play his coositions, he adds an indeterminate element to them Ibid., 66. Peter Hill, Xenakis and the Perormer, Teo New Series, No. 112 (March 1975), James Boros and Richard Toop (eds.), 'Interview with Joel Bons', quoted in Brian Ferneyhough Collected Writings, (Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1995), 2. 22

23 It should be added that these issues o diiculty do arise in earlier repertoire, particularly in some piano music o the 19th century. In the works o Liszt, or exale, the use o 10ths and 11ths that appear in some o his early piano works lie out o the reach o many pianists, and as such the score needs to be coromised or siliied either by arpeggiating chords or transposing parts down an octave. Due to developments in the piano over the last two centuries, certain passages that could be executed cleanly on earlier instruments cannot now be eectively realised on a modern piano. An exale o this noted by Alan Walker is the opening bar o the 8th o the 12 Grandes Etudes (187), where the piece in the inal version, Wilde Jagd rom the Études d'exécution transcendante (1851), was siliied as 'such measures are virtually unplayable on a modern piano; at any rate, the texture will not speak.'64 In this case, because o the perormance diiculties, the potentially indeterminate 187 version o the work has been superseded by the 1851 revision, and so in practice this piece cannot be considered as an indeterminate coosition. Only a small number o coositions that utilise dierent methods o indeterminacy have been discussed. Although these methods are not ully representative, they do cover the key trends within indeterminate music as they represent some o the pioneering 'radical' and 'conservative' indeterminate coositions. While many o the above techniques share some similarities with the author's approach, the indeterminate methods that have been used in his original coositions since 2008, are to his knowledge largely unique. These techniques are the subject o the third chapter. 64 Alan Walker, Franz Liszt: Volume Two, The Weimar Years, (London: Faber and Faber, 1989),

24 Chapter : This chapter details the techniques used in the author's original coositions dating rom the beginning o During 2007, the author began to question the idea o a ixed perormance with a predetermined outcome, and started to explore ways in which musicians could have a greater role in a coosition's realisation. The irst piece written giving the perormer more reedom was the Piece or Solo Violin (2007), where the violinist is asked to play 'extremely expressive[ly]' and 'with much reedom'. Although this instruction had the potential to change the piece's character a little, the potential outcomes would however still remain relatively ixed. The author elt uncoortable with traditional ideas o musical interpretation, where coosers speciy almost all o a coosition's details, leaving only minor interpretative decisions to the perormer. He also began to ponder the intent o musical perormance, which led to the ollowing questions: I one cannot surpass or even equal existing, deinitive recordings o a coosition, is there any reason to perorm at all? Why attend perormances at all, i one is already amiliar with the piece, and knows exactly what notes and rhythms will be heard? Is there a need to try and reproduce a ixed ideal (or near ideal)? Or is it better to give the perormer, in conjunction with the cooser, some reedom to create their own ideal? Starting rom these questions, the methods o note omission, note shortening and note contraction evolved over the next three years. These methods are a orm o what Adorno describes as the transormation o 'psychological ego weakness into aesthetic strength.' 65 The author's unwillingness to have control over all elements o a coosition (psychological ego weakness) and subsequent use o note omission, shortening and contraction serves to increase the expressive potential and variety available in perormance (aesthetic strength). In their silest orm, all three procedures are perormed on an otherwise conventionally notated, 'determinate' score. This is the case or all o the author's original coositions discussed in this thesis. Note Omission In 'indeterminate coosition by note omission', the perormer may omit any number o notes rom the original score, and replace them with a rest (i.e. silence) o the equivalent 65 Adorno, Quasi Una Fantasia - Essays on Modern Music,