Rite of Spring analysis- HELP!

I'm currently trying to digest the analysis by Pieter van den Toorn. He thinks that the 'Augurs' chord is based on octatonicism which he has identified as from collection III with the infiltration of Fb triad from collection I. That is still understandable, but what I can't quite get is the bottom of page 68 where he favours the C major chord triad in his analysis almost as a replacement to Fb because he sees Eb and C as structural tones that govern the progress of the music from the "Augurs of Spring" to the end of "the Ritual of Abduction". (Daniel K.L. Chua) How does van den Toorn see that the C major chord is a permanent theoretical position in defining the 'Augurs' chord?? help! heehee...

Bibliography for Rite of Spring

Hi all!! =) Here are the resources I've gathered on the Rite of Spring:



Russian Folk Melodies in the Rite of Spring from the journal of the American musicology society



Rioting with Stravinsky: A particular analysis of the Rite of Spring by Daniel K. L. Chua from Music Analysis



The music of Stravinsky by Stephen Walsh ( a book)



Another 2 books by Pieter C Van Den Toorn: The music of Igor Stravinsky and Stravinsky and the Rite of Spring

I've found another 2 journals: Stravinsky and the octatonic from the music theory spectrum and Stravinsky's 'tonal axis'.

I haven't read much though just a little here and there. I only found out that the starting bassoon part was taken from an anthology of Lithuanian folk songs complied by a Polish priest named Anton Juszkiewicz. (Russian Folk Melodies in the Rite of Spring) Still haven't quite decided on an area I would like to focus on.

Rite of Spring

Some information I've discovered so far from my readings...

Igor Stravinsky was born in Russia and had a very depressing childhood I would think considering all his loved ones around him died from some sort of illness. He studied law actually but eventually became a musician (duh!) under Rimsky-Korsakov who exposed him to a new world of music and also help him get acquainted with writers, artists and musicians.

Rite of Spring: composed between 1912 and 1913 for Serge Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. His inspiration came from a painter by the name of Nicholas Roerich who shared his idea of a pagan ritual in which a chosen girl will dance herself to death in front of a circle of wise elders in order to appease the god of spring. The music was intensely rhythmic and the setting of the ballet was based on pagan Russian, a depart from the usual demure conventions of classical ballet.

The stage was then set for the Rite of Spring to be performed on May 29 1913 at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris and was conducted by Pierre Monteux.

There are 2 parts for this piece:

First Part: A Kiss of the Earth

-Introduction
-The Augurs of Spring [: Dances of the Young Girls]
-Ritual of Abduction
-Spring Rounds
-Ritual of the Two Rival Tribes
-Procession of the Oldest and Wisest One [the Sage]
-The Kiss of the Earth (The Oldest and Wisest One)
-The Dancing Out of the Earth

Second Part: The Exalted Sacrifice

-Introduction
-Mystic Circle of the Young Girls
-The Naming and Honoring of the Chosen One
-Evocation of the Ancestors
-Ritual Action of the Ancestors
-Sacrificial Dance (The Chosen One)

The melodies in this piece were inspired by folksongs. Apparently, there's some elements of primitivism in his work. Oh man... I see octatonic collection, interval cycles (what's that?!), ostinati etc etc.... *stars*

Since it's a major work, I am most probably going to choose the section on the Sacrificial dance. The finale is always the most interesting.. haha. =P

Bela Bartok's Romanian Dances

2nd listening journal- I thought I'd listen to a song that's different from experimental music, so I chose Bartok's Romanian Folk dances. Here's the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHZt6ITdSto

There's five movements to this piece: 1. Jocul cu bata, 2. Braul, 3. Pe loc, 4. Buciumeana, 5. Poarga romaneasca

Initial response: I really liked it! haha. I preferred the piano and violin one more than the piano solo one. Because of the way the violin sound really brings out the melody, it really made you feel like getting up to do those traditional dance. Because this is a dance, there were repetitions throughout the piece. Also the music had to last more than 1 minute for it to be called dance music. There weren't any moments were you could identify a cadence or some sort of chord. Probably because Bartok is one of those composers who broke away from the diatonic system and adopted a new way of composition. There were some moments where it sounded arabic (maybe more the 2nd section). Perhaps it's because of the use of the augmented 2nd melodic interval? Each section of the piece had an it's own theme but still had some form of unity with the rest in terms of the sound world. My favourite section was the 5th section, the fastest section out of all. The piece also reminded me of tribes dancing around a campfire during those festive occasions. All in all I really loved Romanian Folk dance song. =)

Some information about this piece:

As mentioned above, Bartok broke away from the diatonic system and in search of a new system of composition, he found inspiration from Hungarian Folk music. His dedication to folk music was sparked when overhearing a nanny from Transylvania sing.

This piece is based on folksongs and dances that Bela Bartok has heard from on fiddles, bagpipes and shepherd's flute from gypsies and peasants during his ethnomusicology trip to Hungary in 1910-1914 (there's some history about Hungary and Romania back then). He tries to use some variation in his accompaniment with interesting harmonies and avoids repetition of a phrase.

The first section- Jocul cu bata:

which means 'dance with a staff' in English is from the Maros-Torda region. According to Bartók he claimed that it was played to him by two Rumanian Gypsy violinists from Màramaros.

The second section- Bràul: means sash dance

is a dance that requires the use of a waistband or sash. It's origins are from Torontàl.

The third section- Pe loc: means in one spot

imitates the sound of the rustic flute that Bartok observed in his time spent in Torontàl.

The fourth section- Buciumeana: means horn dance

is a dance from the Buscum People from Torda-Aranyos.

The fifth section- Poarga romaneasca: means fast dance

is a combination of two fast dances and is a couple dance (Manuntelul). This dance is taken from Behar and Torda-Aranyos.

Peasant music and Bela Bartok: ( if you've done your follow up readings, this will sound familiar)

There are three ways of using peasant music:

1) Taking the peasant melody unchanged, vary it slightly or writing an accompaniment together with an opening and closing phrases. There are two kinds of characteristic about such a work. Either the peasant melody becomes the king and everything else about the music is secondary to the melody or it plays a secondary role in the music.

2) the composer creates ideas based on peasant melodies.

3) the composer immerse himself in the culture, penetrate into it's music, feel it and bring out the qualities by having the proper settings. Bartok states that in every case, the musical qualities of the setting should come from the musical qualities of the melody so that everything comes together in unity.

(taken from The influence of Peasant Music on Modern Music by Bela Bartok)

Some interesting facts I found from readings: Bartok went to the 'countryside' with Kodaly to find out information on Maygar Folk music and realised that it had been previously misregarded as gypsy music. While Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsodies have been based on gypsy music. In fact, Maygar folk music and gypsy music had very little in common. These Maygar folk songs were based on pentatonic scales like Oriental music from Siberia and Central Asia.

Enjoy listening!! =)

Rite of Spring?

I'm thinking of doing the Rite of Spring, a 20th Century piece by Stravinsky, for my term assignment. A major work according to Dr Chong. My friend was telling me how this piece didn't really sound like music when he first heard it, but after much studying and listening to 20th Century music, he heard the Rite of Spring again and thought it was a fantastic piece. So I was hoping to get some insights as to why he thought it was great, cos I only remember hearing the pounding part (which was supposed to be the 'popular' part). Feel free to share your knowledge, opinions etc... =) I read somewhere that this piece was written based on some ritual of human sacrifices. Not sure what the full picture is but I'll tell you more after I read my readings.

Did some readings about this piece and watched part of it's ballet. I wouldn't have thought that it would be made into a ballet. Perhaps it's because I have a pretty narrow view of ballet that they are usually sweet and dainty. The story behind this piece is rather interesting. It's about a pagan ritual, where a Russian girl dances to her death in front of a circle of wise elders in Spring to appease the Spring God.

I wonder whether there might be an east-west influence since it's written based on the Russian spring.

Some noteworthy points about this piece is that it does not follow the convention of that time where music is usually in duple or triple time. It did not have regular phrasing either and there isn't much repetition in themes unlike songs written in this period. All these factors have made the music unpredictable.

Just read that some of the Russian Folk music that Stravinsky knew was inevitably of Asian origin. Not sure if any folk music was used in his rite of spring.

Cornelius Cardew's Octet' 61 for Jasper Johns

It's back to school and the assignments are pouring in... Here's my first listening journal on Cornelius Cardew's Octet '61 for Jasper Johns.



I first heard it during Magnetic Band's SOUNDing concert. It was the last piece they played and before that they had already performed 4 other pieces. One of them included a 20 minutes triangle piece and a piano piece (not the typical melodious one you would expect). I didn't really enjoy the concert since it's the first time I've actually been to a 20th Century concert, half the time I was cringing in my chair not knowing what's going to happen next or what the whole piece is about. It's an acquired taste they say... But anyway, I thought even if I didn't understand a single thing at least I knew the piano was clean since during the piano piece the performer used soft sticks (think the bbq brush kind of stick, haha) and was brushing the strings of the piano. She even tapped the bottom of the piano and the floor surrounding the piano. At least I know during the next piano recital at YMS that the piano is clean and that the floor can take my weight. =P And Benji was commenting after the performance that the $15 we paid for entrance fee went into the refreshment which was biscuit, cheese and wine (much to my delight, heh).



Back to the Octet' 61 for Jasper Johns..

My initial response: Like I mentioned above, it wasn't melodious. There was no sense of any tonality or a tonal centre. It felt more like the making of sounds rather than making 'music' to what we know music to be. It also felt random, like people just making random noises and putting them altogether. Well, it's an experimental music which didn't sound like something you'll need a lot of time to rehearse but the performers reassured me that they practised just as hard as those classical pieces. The instruments chosen weren't exactly the conventional orchestral instruments. In fact, they had the piano, the sheng, the toy piano, a range of percussion instruments, a flute and 2 vocalist. When they ended their performance, I had no idea they ended! making it difficult to clap at the end of the piece. They say when an audience is audiating they would know when to clap at the end of the piece. Now would it ever be possible to know when a experimental music like that ends? There's practically no cadence in the entire piece. Heh, I wonder if the light personnel actually knew when to turn on the lights after each performance. I think I've just succeed in making the piece sound really horrible but there's more to this piece.

Some background information about the composer:
Cornelius Cardew was a composer, pianist and a cellist. He was also a member of an free improvisational group called AMM. He has played many great works by Cage, Tudor, Young etc.. during his lifetime. He was also a founding member of the Revoluntionary Communist Party of Britain ( a man with political and musical interest!). This piece, Octet '61 for Jasper Johns, interestingly was written in 1961. And I would tend to think that perhaps there were 61 graphic pictures because of the year?

What I discovered about the piece:
I spoke to one of the performers after the performance and got her to explain the music. She told me that this piece was written by Cornelius Cardew for his close friend. And what inspired him to write this piece was a painting by Jasper Johns. Now this piece is made up of 61 different graphic designs (not your usual music score) and when put together, they resemble the painting he had his inspiration from. These graphic designs had ambiguous notes embedded within it and the performers were required to use their creativity to come up with possible score based on these pictures. One of the graphic had a treble clef, bass clef, no.5, no.3, an A note and a F note. The performers then came up with 5 A notes in the bass to triple F notes in the treble clef. But there are many kinds of combination one can have with those 6 signs. Since this can be played with any kind of instrument in any combination and 60 out of the 61 pictures should be played in sequence and the last 1 played ''anywhere and as often as desired'', I would think that there wouldn't be two alike performance. The beauty about such compositions is that one did not need to be a composer to be able to decipher what he was writting and anyone was free to interpret what he/she liked of course with certain boundaries. Strange... It's like breaking the boundaries of the usual conventional classical music but yet at the same time having boundaries of a different kind, like interpreting a certain work within a certain perimeter.

After this performance, there were two things I took away: 1)I was confused as to what defines music (still am!) and 2) subtle changes in timbre makes us more aware of the different sounds and after playing/listening to such pieces, we become more aware of the sound when we play our usual classical pieces like Beethoven, Mozart etc... =)


Here's my two cents worth of this piece! Feel free to comment =)

Switzerland, Italy and Dubai june'09

Touched down last night at about 9pm, the moment we came back we went out to eat chinese food.. I've had an overdose of pasta, pizzas, sandwiches and gelato ice cream. Really miss Singapore's food.. If I had a choice I'll choose to still be on holiday but having asian food available to me also. My tour group ppl were really easy to get along with, it was fun talking to them. It was hard saying goodbye to them.. But I'm sure I'll bump into them soon, afterall I met my jc classmate in Milan in a cathedral! heh =)

Anyway here's a preview of what we did in Switzerland, Italy and Dubai =)

Day1: Zurich (switzerland)
We reached Zurich at about 1pm in the afternoon and headed to The Magnificent Rhinefalls supposedly the widest waterfall in Western Europe. Looks really pretty... this is what I have for now, I'm waiting for my dad to pass me the rest of the photos. We took more than 5000 photos. record-breaking!

We then headed down to the heart of blackforest which is situated in Germany to see Lake Titisee. Its actually quite a normal lake, nothing really special, to me that is.. heh.

the surroundings of Lake Titisee...

A shop selling cuckoo clocks.. the shops here close really early like 6pm and they start work at 11am in the morning. Pretty good working hours eh? And did I mention their min. wages is 3.5k for a cleaner! Btw, their currency here is Swiss Franc, they don't use Euros. I think its cos they dun consider themselves Europeans even though they're part of Europe.
Following which we headed back to Lucerne, one of Switzerland most beautiful cities, for the night.

Day 2: Lucerne

the bridge connects the old Lucerne and the modern Lucerne and we had to walk around here in the rain. Well its also partially cos our tour guide wanted to make sure our driver had enough rest. In Europe, a bus driver can only drive within 12 hours since he starts work and rest for 12 hours before he starts work again. Moreover, he can only drive for not more than 6 days at one go. We then went to Bern, the capital of Switzerland. We visited the bear pit, which is the icon of Bern, only to find out that the bear had pass away a few months ago.

The entrance to Bern, its a really narrow road that leads into the city. We decided to take a walk in instead of taking the coach. These are the surroundings as we enter Bern...

Food in Switzerland is mainly fast food, sandwiches and pizza.. Basically Western food.. there were a great variety of shops there.. like H&M etc.. shops that we don't have here, but shopping there is more expensive than shopping back here.. so we didn't get much stuff except their chocs.. those were really cheappp... like less than a buck for a block of chocolate.. but they kinda melted and changed in shape on its way to Dubai which temperature ranged from 37-46 degrees Celsius!

We then drove to Interlaken for the night, it was still bright at 8pm.. the sun is up at about 5am each day and sets at about 8-9pm.. so the day seems really long, unlike in winter where its the opposite.. these are the surroundings of Interlaken, a very small town.. their houses in Switzerland are really nice, like those cottage looking houses that we see on TV..

Day 3: Interlaken

to continue my story... heh.. I managed to transfer some photos.. I'm still waiting for 3000 photos to be loaded into my laptop right now.. Anyway, the reason why this place is named Interlaken is cos its between two lakes, as you could have guessed from the name. =)

We headed down to the Top of Europe called Junfraujoch by train. My tour guide who isn't eng ed said, we need to go down to the train station to capture the train and the whole bus burst out laughing, and he didn't know why.. mean I know =P

the scenery to the top was breath-taking..

The light reflected by the snow was blinding.. we couldn't open our eyes without the sunglasses..

We then headed back down, a different route and went back to Interlaken for our gala dinner. We also went to the chocolate factory there named Schu, they had really good choc and it was free flow!! ;) you can probably guess where I was standing! haha.. Right infront where the chocs were.. heehee..

the strawberry made entirely out of chocolate..

Day 4: Glacier 3000

another alps.. the temperature there isn't as cold as at the top of Europe..

I couldn't get the other pictures from Italy, some problems with my lappy and the internet. so here's what I have....

The buildings in Italy are mainly brown, beige, and white..

The baptistry, cathedral and the leaning tower of Pisa.

This is a part of Italy, can't really rmb where.. heh.

This is Venice.. it was pretty crowded the day we were there.. there's a museum on the right and a cathedral at the back.. its easy to get lost here cos there's many alleys and many canals.. they're really smelly btw.

The cathedral in Tuscany or Sienna. This is just a snap shot of Italy, the photos are on facebook =)