Theodor W. Adorno - The New Music

Identifiers: LCCN 2020031373 (print) | LCCN 2020031374 (ebook) | ISBN 9781509538089 (hardback) | ISBN 9781509538096 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Schoenberg, Arnold, 1874-1951. | Music--History and criticism.

Classification: LCC B3199.A33 K7313 2021 (print) | LCC B3199.A33 (ebook) | DDC 780.9/04--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020031373LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020031374

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The Young Schoenberg (1955)

LECTURE 1

Schoenberg’s innovations already present in the early works – No laudatio temporis acti , but the question of the musical sense of every event – The concept of the young Schoenberg – The musical material – Three periods of the young Schoenberg – op. 1, ‘Abschied’ – Proximity to Debussy – Op. 2 songs and art nouveau – Richard Dehmel’s poem ‘Erwartung’ and Schoenberg’s op. 2, no. 1 – op. 2, no. 2, ‘Schenk mir deinen goldenen Kamm – Relationship with tonality – Basic characters – Analysis of op. 2, no. 2; harmony in early Schoenberg – Contrast with Wagner and Strauss – op. 2, no. 3, ‘Erhebung’; note-row technique – op. 2, no. 4, ‘Waldsonne’

LECTURE 2

Metric irregularity in Schoenberg: beginning of an analysis of Verklärte Nacht , op. 4 – Metric design and thematic progression – Duet idea; Adorno’s concept of ‘axial rotation’ (I) – Sequencing – Problematics of adagio movements – Relationship between development and exposition – Strauss’s Tod und Verklärung – Verklärte Nacht : new themes in the second part – Wagner’s leitmotifs – op. 3, no. 3, ‘Warnung’; precision – Verklärte Nacht as a transfer of the idea of the symphonic poem to chamber music, form and organization – comparison with the Chamber Symphony – Question from the audience about the arrangement for string orchestra – Gurrelieder part 1, first song and song of Tove

LECTURE 3

‘The Aging of the New Music’: misunderstandings and questions of musical sense – Gurrelieder , ‘So tanzen die Engel vor Gottes Thron nicht’ – Scale degree awareness and individual weight – Experiences from Webern’s op. 5 string quartet movements – Principle of balance in Waldemar’s song; innovations – Valéry’s concept of refus – The aspect of consistency in Schoenberg – The idea of the large interval: ‘Du wunderliche Tove’ – ‘Lied der Waldtaube’ – New harmony and counterpoint – End of Gurrelieder : chorus – Thematic combination as the origin of Schoenberg’s polyphony – Connection to Mahler – Clarity of musical events, the principle of construction – Thematic combination and note-row technique – Problem of tonality in the op. 6 songs

Schoenberg’s Counterpoint (1956)

LECTURE 1

Artistic idea and technique – The idea of integral composition, the intertwining of contrapuntal thinking and thematic work in Schoenberg – Melody in songs; primacy of counterpoint over polyphony, special status of choruses – The reawakening of the contrapuntal spirit – Counterpoint and harmony – Relation between the voices – Unity through simultaneity of voices; bindingness – Multiple counterpoint and musical space – Relationship of Schoenberg’s counterpoint to harmony – Rhythm – Instrumental texture – Relationship with form

LECTURE 2

Different types of counterpoint – Free counterpoint – Complementary counterpoint – Accompanying counterpoint – Contrapuntal invention of themes – Motivic fragmentation – Thematic combination – The counterpoint of opposing harmonic complexes – Schoenberg’s First String Quartet, op. 7; organization of large-scale form by contrapuntal means

LECTURE 3

Contrapuntal corner points; the ‘energetic’ idea of counterpoint; op. 7 (continued) – Interpretation and shaping – Relationship of two contrapuntal passages to each other – ‘Axial rotation’ (II) – The unification of relatively independent voices; determinate negation – Form as the result of counterpoint; op. 7 (conclusion) – Shortening and balance – op. 9 Chamber Symphony

LECTURE 4

Pierrot lunaire , transition to the twelve-note technique – The ‘roots’ of counterpoint: the need for polyphony and integration – Dodecaphonic counterpoint as a mediation of these aspects, unity within diversity – Model: ‘Der Mondfleck’ from Pierrot lunaire ; the transition to the twelve-note technique as an ‘organic necessity’

Criteria of New Music (1957)

LECTURE 1

Method – Fixed values or relativism – The dialectical approach – Immanent critique – The concept of judgements of taste in Kant – The objectivity of aesthetic judgements and the immanent ‘correctness’ of the matter – Against pluralism of aesthetic judgement – The attitude of musical historicism – How can one actually formulate the question of the musical criterion? – Aesthetic questions are technical questions, questions of procedure – Once again: ‘The Aging of the New Music’, the dialectic of the progress of artistic rationality – The relationship between science and art; aesthetic necessity and ‘effect without cause’

LECTURE 2

Critique of definition, the concept of musical sense – The concept of the development – Misunderstandings of the concept of musical sense, the so-called poetic idea – Problematics of categories of sense, Dilthey – Sense and senselessness historically mediated – Discussion with Eduard Steuermann about the Leonore Overtures , the stringency of the work of art – Discussion: can there be several solutions to a problem? – Discussion about Hindemith – Discussion about Schoenberg’s supposed calculation errors in Accompanying Music for a Film Scene – Conversation about it with Gertrud Schoenberg – Spiritual content and subjective reception – The concept of musical material – Discussion with Erich Doflein about the polemic against Hindemith

LECTURE 3

The question of musical quality, the formal level – Primitivity and complexity; inadequacy of technical categories – Craft and control over material – The danger of entire layers of composition withering away through a fixation on craft – Pierre Boulez, new characters and technical correlates – Originality – Misconceptions about originality – The intensification of the problem: the aim of uniqueness today – Convention and expression; reception of the twelve-note technique – Discussion about the problem of stylistic inconsistency

LECTURE 4

Musical character; danger of rationalization and quantification – Preservation of characters in Boulez and Stockhausen – Two approaches to composition: symphonic type and character-piece type – Schoenberg: the concept of gestalt – Totality – Pointing beyond the gestalt; progression over time – Determination and function – Insistence on the full functional crafting of every detail – The criterion of formal level: abundance of forms – Clarity – The concept of development, musical time – Irreversibility of time – Simultaneity of memory and expectation; balance and homeostasis in Schoenberg