Klarinet Archive - Posting 000927.txt from 2000/07

From: Andrea Bergamin <a.bergamin@-----.it>
Subj: Re: [kl] Serialism
Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 19:05:36 -0400

Serialism is a way to control "some" aspect of the composition.

Generally speaking, you can organize pitches, rhythms, dynamics, timbres...
in a sort of matrix.
Dodecaphony or "twelve note composition" involves only pitches.
You have to take 12 notes enclosed in an octave with none of them omitted or
used twice, in an orders called series or row.

For example... Webern's String Quartet op.28...

the row is : sib la do si re# mi do# re solb fa lab sol (the beginning (sib
la do si) is the name BACH)...

There are 12 notes, no repetition and no omission.

This is the ORIGINAL row (or "basic set" as it's called in the USA). You can
read it reversed (from right to the left) and you have the RETROGADE.
Then you can invert it (ascending intervals in the original become
equivalent descending intervals and vice versa) for the INVERSION and revert
it to obtain the RETROGADE INVERTED.

You can have 4 row of 12 notes multiplied for 12 transposition and you have
144 rows.
The total number of possible twelve-note series is 479,001,600 but each
composer designs the series he uses to each individual composition.

as exercise... take the row I've written above and built the RI beginning
with sib then the R and the I beginning with sol and you will discover one
of the secrets of this particular series. (there are 2 secrets left...)

---

I agree with Sean. Serialism is a failure because the esthetical background
is changed.

With the series music became a mathematical or statistical problem: you have
to define a matrix and the score will be just a writing exercise.
It is some sort of neo-medieval concept of art and artist role.
The composer refuses his own conceptual and creative power and this is the
emancipation of music. Music doesn't need the composer and, more deeply,
music doesn't need the man.

This need MANY messages... I hope you has understand my english.

CIAO

> Da: Bilwright@-----.net (William Wright)
> Risposta: klarinet@-----.org
> Data: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 15:01:54 -0700 (PDT)
> A: klarinet@-----.org
> Oggetto: Re: [kl] Serialism
>
> <><> Sean Osborn wrote:
> Serialism is when you apply the row of 12 to other aspects of the music,
> including any or all of the following: register, dynamic, orchestration,
> duration, accents, etc.
>
>
>
> What is "row of 12"?
>
> Thanks,
> Bill
>
>
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