Peter Kalve
01-05-2006, 04:53 PM
Hi
Mark asked in one of his posts if I could explain the style of music in which I tend to write, for those who may not be too familiar with the method.
Twelve Tone Music - sounds weird doesn't it? Actually, we've had pieces using twelve-tone technique since Bach wrote Fugue 24 from Book I of "The Well-Tempered Clavier". Bach used a fugue subject that played all twelve (go on...count 'em) notes within the chromatic scale of an octave, without repeating any note in that chromatic scale before each note of the chromatic scale was played first of all. In other words, he went through every note of the chromatic scale - though note in ascending or descending order (he ordered the seauence of notes to fit his fugal "shape"). This idea was slowly developed through the succeeding centuries. If you listen to a piece music by Bach, Mozart, then Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, then Wagner, Bruckner and Mahler, in that order you will get an idea of how music developed and changed over that time, up to the start of the twentieth century. And it does change! Listen to the opening of "Tristan" by Wagner - and tell me - what exactly is the key of the opening 4 bars! Try the same with the opening of the last movement of Bruckner's 9th Symphony and tell me that the incredible melodic line of the cellos and violins is expected! Already "tonality" (i.e. that piece of music which begins obviously in Cmaj, goes, say, to Fmaj, maybe passes through to Gmaj before returning to Cmaj), is stretched to the point that you cannot go back to the "old" style of writing music, without saying something that has already been said before!
And it is at this point that we come to Schoenberg and the "Seconf Viennese School". These were composers, who, in various ways really began to write pieces in which there was no "key", but instead, where each not had equal value. Rules had to be developed to give this kind of writing structure: order your notes into a tone row - often 12 notes, which make up notes you would find in a chromatic scale, but placed in a sequence so that no obvious key is present; don't use octaves; avoid tonal cadences in the melodic line; ruun your tone row forwards, backwards upside down and upside down-backwards (Honest! We call this Prime, Retrograde, Inversion and Retrograde-Inversion...and it works!!).
I write most of my music using this technique, although I do tend to write with tonal implications in the tone rows. I also use canons, "mirror" pieces, and other similar compositional techniques, to provide a very careful structure to my music. But I do also write tonal stuff too! Check out my various posts on the forum, and you'll get lots of tonal and 12 tone samples of my music.
Hope that helps.
Dr Peter Kalve
Mark asked in one of his posts if I could explain the style of music in which I tend to write, for those who may not be too familiar with the method.
Twelve Tone Music - sounds weird doesn't it? Actually, we've had pieces using twelve-tone technique since Bach wrote Fugue 24 from Book I of "The Well-Tempered Clavier". Bach used a fugue subject that played all twelve (go on...count 'em) notes within the chromatic scale of an octave, without repeating any note in that chromatic scale before each note of the chromatic scale was played first of all. In other words, he went through every note of the chromatic scale - though note in ascending or descending order (he ordered the seauence of notes to fit his fugal "shape"). This idea was slowly developed through the succeeding centuries. If you listen to a piece music by Bach, Mozart, then Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, then Wagner, Bruckner and Mahler, in that order you will get an idea of how music developed and changed over that time, up to the start of the twentieth century. And it does change! Listen to the opening of "Tristan" by Wagner - and tell me - what exactly is the key of the opening 4 bars! Try the same with the opening of the last movement of Bruckner's 9th Symphony and tell me that the incredible melodic line of the cellos and violins is expected! Already "tonality" (i.e. that piece of music which begins obviously in Cmaj, goes, say, to Fmaj, maybe passes through to Gmaj before returning to Cmaj), is stretched to the point that you cannot go back to the "old" style of writing music, without saying something that has already been said before!
And it is at this point that we come to Schoenberg and the "Seconf Viennese School". These were composers, who, in various ways really began to write pieces in which there was no "key", but instead, where each not had equal value. Rules had to be developed to give this kind of writing structure: order your notes into a tone row - often 12 notes, which make up notes you would find in a chromatic scale, but placed in a sequence so that no obvious key is present; don't use octaves; avoid tonal cadences in the melodic line; ruun your tone row forwards, backwards upside down and upside down-backwards (Honest! We call this Prime, Retrograde, Inversion and Retrograde-Inversion...and it works!!).
I write most of my music using this technique, although I do tend to write with tonal implications in the tone rows. I also use canons, "mirror" pieces, and other similar compositional techniques, to provide a very careful structure to my music. But I do also write tonal stuff too! Check out my various posts on the forum, and you'll get lots of tonal and 12 tone samples of my music.
Hope that helps.
Dr Peter Kalve