I beg to differ. I (as a musician) do not enjoy Schonberg and he brought on all of this atonality that many of the musicians do not treasure. He was a genius, yes, but I and others (it would depend upon taste) do not always enjoy it.
schoenberg is the Beethoven of the modern day--he started something new from something old--he has pioneered music through his genius.
And, just like Beethoven, at the time (and a few years after) he wasn't considered as much of a musical genius as he was--yes then he was popular, and Schoeberg had his following, but it is retrospect--a few hundred years down the line that we will realize how much groundwork of his ideas of music and philosophy of sound he has laid down for us.
It's quite unbelievable that nearly one hundred years after Schoenberg created his twelve tone method, gave us numerous masterpieces and many other composers thought highly enough of this new direction as to devote much energy and creativity to bringing it further, we still have ignorant people who insult and mock their memory with their stupidity.
@jimbothenoob I understand what you mean, and I believe in the existence of excercises in pretension. I certainly think people who feel that 12-tone is more advanced than harmonies are being at least a bit pretensious. Shonberg himself wouldn't have said that. Its just another way to write music. It often represents terror and insanity very useful emotional depictions. I'm sure you recognize the sounds from 1960's movies. I promise, I legitimately enjoy this music.
@thirdcreed I think that may be a reason many people violently reject it - because just like the conventional tonal system lends itself to the sounds of joy, calm, fulfilment, etc, the twelve-tone system tends to "sound like" insanity, evil, despair, etc. It's almost like the devil's counterpart to "normal" tonality. Not that I think it's useless, just to clarify.
@PraecoNoctis True, that probably is a reason people violently reject it. The question I think we should ask is not "Is it music?", but "Is it valuable?". Tragedy and sadness are often depicted by a traditional tonal scheme, this is seldom questioned as being valuable, even though we generally try to avoid being sad. Perhaps because we enjoy truth, as much as we enjoy beauty. Hence: "Truth is beauty, beauty is truth". When you find a piece accurately describing your experiences it is
@thirdcreed fulfilling. Certainly those that had going through the existentialism and ambiguity of the post-war period would have found congruence with this music and their insane world, which they were now connected and educated enough to appreciate the insanity of while still being in someway connected. It represents the absolute horror you feel from looking at the world we live in closely. That being said...for me, this stuff is only enjoyable in small doses. Either as incidental music...
It's incredibly complex music, with a stupefying amount of math and thought behind it. And yet, I can't get past the notion that this is all just an exercise in pretension. 12-tone music is always presented as being more advanced than conventional music, and listeners are presented as being more enlightened, but why is that? Is it because he broke the rules and created really complex new ones? I could paint a crappy picture of a house with a diamond paintbrush, but that wouldn't make it art.
btw-- I dont disagree with your original post, I just don't like cage's philosophy, and he irks me cause I think gets alot of attention for being a rather poor musical philosopher. So I can't help but argue with him, even when know ones asking for it. I'd still be very interested to hear your thoughts on the matter. I used to hate shonberg, now I love his music, maybe cage will be the same, although I doubt it currently.
elements to mean something. Another beings 'meaning' has always been hard to ascertain, but it start by combining elements: vocal sounds into language, tones into music, paint strokes into images. None of these things are meaningful in and of themselves, they can be combined to be meaningful. Cage claimed to have 'emancipated' sound. I think this is like 'emancipating' engine parts. They are meaninless and useless as just elements. Do you follow what I mean?
Harmony is a system for combing tones into a meaningful whole. Twelve-Tone is another system. Systems are inherently abstract. That's not to say it isn't real, It's just not an object. It is a relationship between objects. You can think of that relationship as being there already and being discovered or being created, but systems aren't categorized--they ARE categories. If you would call these systems ways to combing elements into a meaninful whole, then cage's thought is we just need
I think they definetly are abstract. When the number two was first 'created' or 'discovered' it wasn't found in a hole somewhere, a human being looked at many different objects and groups of objects, and recongized a pattern of 'twoness' in the groups which we would now say have two similiar elements. This is the meaning of 'abstraction': that is, to recognize a common charachteristic among physical phenomenon,and to attach a label to the charachteristic and use it to label another set.
@thirdcreed..well I'm not entirely sure how to respond. I wouldn't say numbers or tones are an abstraction, they are merely labels that we have put to something that is already present. Scales etc existed before we categorized them. Tonal and atonal existed ...harmony and disharmony..etc I think it's a matter of perception. I perceive man to discover and not create...so we 'discovered' how to write harmonious musics and so on. If you perceive music to be what is written on staves or played thru
@thirdcreed..well I'm not entirely sure how to respond. I wouldn't say numbers or tones are an abstraction, they are merely labels that we have put to something that is already present. Scales etc existed before we categorized them. Tonal and atonal existed ...harmony and disharmony..etc I think it's a matter of perception. I perceive man to discover and not create...so we 'discovered' how to write harmonious musics and so on. If you perceive music to be what is written on staves or played thru
many people and composers (john age etc) say all sound is music...the basis of music in nature could be named as wind, anything physical colliding and so on. we have just manipulated those natural things and produced instruments that need those elements to make sounds. Tones exist in nature....rhythm exists in nature and so on. so music is within our subconcious and has manifested itself in many idioms, all of which are subjective. lets just listen....
@redcassette I love shoenberg, but I've always found my self fundamentally disagreeing with cage's philosophy of music. Tones, I think are an abstraction just as numbers are an abstraction, but I think numbers in and of themselves are wholly uninteresting. It is only when someone can do something meaningful with them that I find them interesting. I think that's why I do not like cage's brand of aleatoric music Perhaps I'm misunderstanding, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on it.
@redcassette I love Schoenberg, but I've always found my self fundamentally disagreeing with cage's philosophy of music. Tones, I think are an abstraction just as numbers are an abstraction, but I think numbers in and of themselves are wholly uninteresting. It is only when someone can do something meaningful with them that I find them interesting. I think that's why I do not like cage's brand of aleatoric music Perhaps I'm misunderstanding, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on it.
@redcassette Tones and harmonies do exist in nature, and music is supposed to be a beautiful imitation of those tones, not a solidly accurate reproduction. This is why nobody would even conceive of John Cage's music until after the baby boomer generation; that's the generation that stopped taking history's lessons seriously.
@redcassette Yes, but you have to consider the compositional abilities and objective merits involved in writing the Goldberg Variations, and in banging sticks against rocks while listening to the wind blow.
@redcassette What's all this Romantic nonsense? ;-) (I believe that music is very much of a man made product and that any order or sense we see in the universe is just a product of our mind, not of an underlining language or mind behind the universe... order and similarities are just an emerging property from chaos, but our mind adds meaning to it).
I am afraid to listen to too much dissonant music. Over time I am certain I will slowly adjust to more and more dissonance, and eventually will be conditioned to enjoy pure dissonance - something that no one can enjoy but those who have been conditioned just like me. It is at that point that I will be, in a sense, musically insane.
Can someone please explain serialism and the twelve tone system to me? I have background in music and know that his music was about playing all twelve tones without emphasis of a single note. I don't understand tone rows though nor do I completely understand primary series or secondary series, or the part where the narrator of the video starts talking about the "geometric" nature of the rows.
Simply put, a tone row is a specific ordering of the twelve notes of the chromatic scale. As a result of this ordering, certain intervals between the notes will be emphasized. It is from the row that musical materials (melodies, harmonies, etc.) are extracted.
Any given tone row can be transformed in certain ways. The initial ordering of the notes is called the "prime" form. When this ordering is run in reverse, it is called "retrograde"; when the row is turned upside-down (that is, the directions of the intervals are flipped; what was an ascending major third now becomes a descending major third, etc.), it is called "inversion"; when the inversion is run in reverse, it is called "retrograde inversion".
Additionally, any of these four forms--prime, retrograde, inversion, retrograde inversion--can be transposed to start on any note of the chromatic scale, resulting in a total of 48 possible row forms to choose from (12 prime, 12 retrograde, 12 inversion, and 12 retrograde inversion).
All of these transformations only change the specific ordering of the notes; they don't change the intervalic content, and they don't change the pitch content (which is always going to total twelve notes). In this way, the row furnishes the basic material for a composition, and ensures unity at all levels of structure. It can result in music that sound surprisingly "tonal", and music that sounds decidedly not tonal. Much beautiful music has been written using this technique.
@darthdidious Okay well, you seem totally enamored with your own intellect. I haven't studied atonalism; I have been interested in it on my own time, I devote my studies elsewhere. You are right; I don't know a lot about it, but i understand the principle. I do not care about the specifics. So what else is left of this discussion? If it was only to prove that you know more about it than I do, than I guess we are done.
@darthdidious And one last thing: anything can be beautiful. I find that if I look carefully, everything around me has an immediate existential significance that is amazing to me. However, this depends on the viewer, and what the viewer wants to see. What the viewer sees is not necessarily something that is universal.
@thecritiquevirtuoso There is one thing more to add to dathdidious's description: In the most prime example of serial composition, no note is re-used until all twelve have been used, so that no note gets played more than any other. Although Schoenberg strayed from this.
That rule isn't an essential part of the theory. For various reasons, a composer may want to emphasize certain notes more than others by repeating them, giving them harmonic re-enforcement, etc. As you note, Schoenberg didn't follow this rule at all.
@darthdidious I would say that he followed it to a point. But he did not let that rule dissuade him from making decisions which he thought would strengthen the piece.
@pooperscoopr69 Well said, however, the aesthetic ideal cannot be blamed for the swiftly diminishing wave of talented and emotionally mature art. Instead, I must point out, that the very moment an aesthetic ideal is structured, broken down, and examined, it becomes worthless, as if it were less than the sum of its parts.
@pooperscoopr69 Eloquently said. Are you suggesting that a purely subjective interpretation of art is worthless? Or are you referring to the artist who expects their work to stand on it's own capacity to be interpreted, rather than creating the piece with a thoughtful meaning?
So, let me say that I really like schoenberg and music that challenges the traditional paradigms of music in general. And there is something really attractive about schoenberg's pieces. However, while pieces do stand out, they are all very similar. I feel like a piece should have some distinguishing qualities that directly relate to its intent. Distinguishing characteristics are not necessarily tonal though, they simply convey the purpose. two more things: Nikita Koshkin, Leo Brouwer.
All serial music sounds similar in the same sense that all tonal music sounds similar. Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern all wrote serial music, and none sounds anything like the other.
@darthdidious Touche! Yeah, you are right of course. Webern in particular stands out as a good example of that. But I am not ready to admit that I am totally wrong. Atonal music is all very similar because each piece is using similarly arbitrary tones. In tonal music, a lot of it is repetitive, but tonal pieces use a less broad spectrum of notes, so they sound more like the particular spectrum that they use, rather than a jumble of the entire spectrum.
There are plenty of pieces of tonal music that use all 12 notes of the chromatic scale. The difference is that in tonal music the notes are organized hierarchically, with the tonic being the most important, and all other notes relating back to it in some fashion. In 12-tone music the notes are organized in a row, resulting in certain intervalic relationships which gives a row a unique "flavour" (or "colour"). It is not a jumble.
@darthdidious Well, while there may be pieces which use all twelve tones, when they do, the tones are used in passing and the key signature is mostly upheld. The key signature determines what chords will be used and the kinds of moods which will be fostered within the music. I know how atonal music works; i've used Schoenberg's system before; I get it. But with each additional note, the focus of the piece becomes (tonally) less precise. The fewer notes, the more distinct the flavor.
The presence of a key signature in an of itself has nothing to do with whether or not a piece is tonal, nor the kinds of "moods" are to be encountered in the music. What makes tonal music tonal is that the music is organized hierarchically--everything relates back to the tonic triad. It is the centricity of the tonic triad that gives tonal music its coherence.
In 12-tone music, pitch centricity rarely plays a strong role. It is the row that gives it coherence, and specifically the intervalic structure of the row. Some tone-rows only emphasize a small number of intervals, and as a result their "flavour" is no less distinct than that of the diatonic scale. The disorienting effect of listening to the music probably has more to do with a lack of familiarity with the style than anything else.
@darthdidious As for the 'moods' thing, I was talking about the different between minor key and major key. As for the key thing as a whole, you are right. I must be a bit foggy headed or something. You have said it much more succinctly. But what you said is exactly the reason why atonal music sounds similar; it lacks structure. If refers to a row, which is less specific than a triad. pieces that use all twelve tones sound sinister or busy if they use them equally.
Atonal music does have structure, it's just a different kind of structure from tonal music. It's not pitch-centric. The intervalic structure of the row gives the music its unique character (at least in part, because pitch is but one parameter of many with which a composer works), and organizes the music at the small and large scale (agian, in part).
Not all twelve tone music sounds sinister. That's an ignorant thing to say.
@darthdidious I have made your argument before. I like atonal music, what more do I have to say? It DOES sound disjointed in general, It is not just my opinion. It sounds that way because the tone is not considered and the tone is what human beings are accustomed to hearing in a particular way. I wont argue that anymore. And again: tonal music has a key, so does atonal music; atonal music's key consists of 12 notes. Atonal music has rows, but they organize the music in a different way.
A key is not a collection of pitches. Every key has at it's disposal the all 12 notes of the chromatic scale. What makes a piece of music tonal is that the pitches are organized hierarchically: one note is designated the tonic and all the other notes related back to it in a very specific and well-defined manner. If a key was defined simply as a collection of pitches, then it would be impossible to use chromatic notes without destroying the the sense of a tonal center.
@darthdidious In my opinion (feel free to disagree, and I know you will), the row is a convoluted way to organize a piece of music. It is a tad bit too cerebral to be absolutely effective. In fact, the row is the reason that so many people don't take seriality seriously.
The unique quality of serial music in opposition to the coherence of tonal music is it's disjointed sound. It is not an ignorant thing to say. There are a couple exceptions, but the music as a whole has that cadence.
12-tone music is just as coherent as tonal music, just in a different way. If you listen to the music and try to hear a pitch-center, then of course you'll be confused. You have to listen for other things. That doesn't make it cerebral, it's just different. It's actually surprisingly easy to hear the relationships generated in 12-tone music.
@darthdidious Hrm. Well, it has always been difficult for me to hear it unless I listen to the piece many times. Like Schoenberg's six little pieces... I love that! (kinda out of a non-sequitor I know).
@darthdidious I'm kinda out of steam with this argument honestly. But if you want, compare 'Flight of the Bumblebees' to 'El Colibri' or 'Las Abejas'. It is not an ideal comparison for the discussion at hand, but chromaticism breeds a sense of urgency. Pure atonalism is boring and generic, just as randomly generated tones begin to sound like static. It lacks soul. Rows do structure a piece, but to what degree? Atonalism should be a flavor employed on occasion in my opinion. Good night.
You clearly have decided ahead of time that atonal music is boring and "soulless," in spite of not knowing very much about it, or even having listened to much of the music. Anyone who has listened to Pierrot Lunaire or Berg's Violin Concerto, would never say it was "boring" or "soulless." Anyone who knows how diverse atonal music actually is (Stravinsky, Bartok, Schoenberg, Carter), would never say it was "generic."
@darthdidious dude. Come now. I love Pierrot Lunaire. I have listened to Stravinsky's Rite of Spring many times, All of my favorite artists experiment with atonality. It can have soul however, I am attempting to be critical of it despite that fact that I like it. It is worth noting that the majority of people do not like it; of course their tastes are not attuned to it. As you said, it is foreign to the ears. I still stand buy what I have said, much atonal music is somewhat generic
That most people don't like serialism is not a thing worth nothing. Most people don't like Mozart. That's not a thing worth noting either.
The belief that all atonal music sounds generic is a widely-held misconception perpetuated by people like you who don't know much about the music but still feel qualified to pass judgment on it.
second, if music can only appreciated by people who study it, than why should it matter to the rest of the populace?
third, many people like Mozart. I am not referring to pop culture.
fourth, it is not just a belief.
fifth, stop talking to me like I don't know anything about music.
Schoenberg and the rest managed to introduce atonalism into the musical lexicon. For that they should be revered, but do not resist judging them. The music has flaws.
The Mozart example was to show that you're arguing ad populum. That most people do or do not like a given type of music is not relevant to the question of whether or not the music has coherence, is beautiful, enjoyable to listen to; neither is the question of why the music should matter to people who don't study it. Music doesn't have to popular to be good.
It is a belief, and it's a false one too, based on misunderstanding and ignorance.
You've demonstrated to me that in spite of not knowing what you're talking about, you still think your criticisms are valid. I'm not going to stop pointing out your lack of understanding unless you stop pretending you know what you're talking about.
@darthdidious It is the same way with death metal. If you don't listen to death metal, you would never be able to tell the difference between Cannibal Corpse, Dying Fetus and Whitechapple, despite the fact that they are all very different to someone who listens to them. But still, they are generic in their own way.
@darthdidious This is why a Japanese scale or a pentatonic scale sounds significantly different from a regular major scale. I will admit though, that an 8 tone scale sounds fairly unique as well. My point is that 'rows' are not the same as 'keys'; every atonal piece uses the same key, so it sounds roughly the same (tonally). A tonal piece can use rows just as easily as an atonal one can, but it also has a key.
The pentatonic scale doesn't sound very different from a diatonic scale.
A key does not constrain what notes will be used (because all 12 notes can be used in a tonal piece), instead it determines how the notes are organized with respect to each other, with one note (the tonic) at the top of the hierarchy. Atonal music doesn't use a key (i.e. a tonic); all twelve notes are treated equally. Instead of a tonic, it is the row which controls the music.
@darthdidious It sounds very different from a Japanese scale though. Diminished scales sound different from minor scales. A scale can be constructed from a chord. (ex.CEGBDFAC) Certainly you know this. Chords sound distinctly different from each other. if you add more notes to a chord, each one makes the chord more ambiguous, less unique. Every 12 tone chord would sound like an octave of every other one (with slight variations).
There are lots of similarities between the pentatonic scale and the diatonic scale: they are complements, they can both be generated from 5th cycles, and they have very similar intervalic content. A pentatonic scale is just a diatonic scale missing two notes.
I don't see how pointing out that scales can be generated harmonically is relevant to this discussion.
@darthdidious Ah I see, well I feel silly arguing with you about this then. You see, I am not a theorist, I am a music minor. Even so, As for my comment about the 12 tone chord; I meant that if you were to construct a chord that contained every note, it would sound just like any other, despite the order of the notes in the chord. My point was that, as more notes are included, the sound becomes more homogeneous. Adding notes does make a chord more unique, but only while it has a tonal center
@darthdidious My point is that Rows are a cerebral way to arrange music. It takes a lot of concentration to be able to hear the row in a piece of atonal music. It makes the music highly inaccessible.
Atonal music has no key. That's a fact, not an opinion.
The real reason most people don't take atonal music seriously is because they don't know anything about it, and couldn't be bothered to learn. I have no problem with someone not liking the music; I have a big problem when in spite of not knowing anything about it they feel qualified to make sweeping generalisations about it (that it's soulless, generic, cerebral, etc.).
I don't listen to Death Metal, and maybe I wouldn't be able to tell the different between Cannibal Corpse and Dying Fetus, but I then I don't go on about how generic all Death Metal sounds. I don't make sweeping generalisations about things I don't know anything about. You do.
@darthdidious well. Yes. But only inasmuch as every piece of atonal music uses the same notes. It may not technically have a key, but what is a key really? A key is a collection of notes. In that sense, atonal music does have a key.
And again: I do know something about atonal music. I don't know why I have to keep saying this: I LIKE IT. I DO NOT DISLIKE IT. I only want to point out that it has flaws.
The flaws you point out aren't flaws. They're your own lack of understanding.
I don't care if you like the music or not.
A key is not merely a collection of notes. Music that is "in a key" is organized around a tonal center. Atonal music is not organized around tonal centers.
@darthdidious I think that what sets the atonalists apart from one another is the way in which they use space in their music. Schoenberg did a little bit of everything, but Webern really focused on staccato notes rather than long drawn out ones. That simple difference sets the two apart for me. I would be interested to hear from someone as I have not done any in depth research, in what ways do the various atonalists differ from each other in terms of way they place notes?
There are certainly musical parameters besides pitch with which a composer works, and Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern had very different ideas about texture, meter, etc. But even with respect to pitch, the composers of the 2nd Viennese School differed tremendously.
I've just begun working with serialism. I haven't actually composed one full piece yet, and i'm already loving it. I would say that key signatures are important, but i love the way the notes seem to be partially in control of themselves, and it feels far more free, but yet more forced upon you. I suppose its nice to cut lose with serialism once in a while. Schoenberg was nothing less than a genius.
And then when he does that thing where he takes the tone row and plays it backwards... what is the point of that? You can't even recognize any similarity between that and the original tone row when you do that, so it isn't musically related.
It is related, and it's related in a way that is clearly audible. Running the row in reverse changes the ordering, but it preserves the intervalic structure.
Not method or science controls it but the same substance we listen to -the same contents (shape,line,color,timbre,time and spaciality etc.) we listen to in Mozart . that is the opposite of what most think . Listen to these odd melodies that was how world sounded & felt after a world war and economic depression . Atonality lacks the unifying element of tonal center it is freer ,but many composers have their own systems .why not repeat a tone etc.
Arnold Schoenberg is one of the most amazing composers of twelve-tone music. I am a composer and I have seen what it takes to write twelve-tone music and there is more to it than you think, or even what they speak of in the video. If you have questions about it, feel free to ask me. I am happy to answer anything that I can.
@amyleeluvr Cool to see a post such as this. I'm a composer too, but I have yet to write anything in this form. I'm pretty sure I'm going to attempt it within the next few weeks. I'd be very interested in knowing any of the 'niceties' of the form that are not covered in this video. Do you have a treatise on 12-tone music that is emailable?
I'm not a trained musician but that is the music that works for soundtracks, to create atmospheres that I've tried to understand musically but with no formal training I've been lost
iorost: inverted means that if the 1st interval is a ascending perfect 5th, in the inverted sequence it will be a descending 5th... you'll have to do the same thing for every single interval in the row... the only one that keeps the same is the 1st note...
Not sure I follow the "hexachord vs. notation as shown" disagreement, but it's worth exploring. Schoenberg is often surprisingly wonderful to listen to for those who were taught to fear/avoid atonality. The most important thing I got from this video is that S. would like us to abandon strict technical study for enough time to simply absorb the music itself. And try to hear the music played live, if you can. peace
Ignore the notation at 2:40 and onward. It is incorrect (but the audio is correct).
The reason the inversion starts on G and not B-flat is not explained in the video. The inversion is transposed such that the first 6 tones, called its first hexachord (G C# B D C G#), does not overlap with any tones of the first hexachord of the original set (Bb E F# D# F A)...
...This is a special property called hexachordal combinatoriality which is useful compositionally. Not all sets have this property, but Schoenberg usually constructed his sets this way.
All musical materials, including harmonies, are generated from the row. It is a mistake to that that just because a row is conceived as a linear ordering that it therefore only applies to melodies.
i have read many tutorials about this and i still don't understand how to create a twelve-tone based piece. The only thing I understand about them is about getting the row created, and that it can be reversed vertically, horizontally, etc. Once you get the row, what is left to do? what represents the row? is it the melody (i have watched those sheets in the video, and i can see many notes repeated, and no row at all,i cant find it)?? is it the new tonality?? what do I do after creating the row?
repeated notes and short patterns don't count against the row, and the row can be distributed throughout the parts. You can have any of the notes sounding at the same time without upsetting the order, and you can have any combonation of the forms of the row sounding at the same time, Twelve tone music is at it's heart contrapuntal, so there are no rules about vertical sonorities, the focus is on individuality of the lines.
And, as with any style, the rules aren't rules, they're just guidelines. Webern wrote very rigid serial music, and shoenberg and Berg were more lenient about following their own rules.
You compose, just as you would a tonal piece of music once you had decided on what key you were going to use. Obviously, a row is a little more complicated than a key. Think of the row as furnishing the basic materials for composition; melodies and harmonies, etc. Basing all of the musical materials off of the row is a way to ensure unity in a composition. There is no "one way" to compose serial music; that is a myth.
True, but I think schoenberg's, or even Webern's techniques are used in a lot of Black metal bands such as Mayhem, Dark Throne, and Morbid Angel. I actually think that Slayer's solo are actually more of Webern's rather than schoenbergs. Of course very few metal bands are using the these techniques, but at least they know the Idea of it.
the series precented at 2:33-3:08 has several errors - the reverse (nr 2) is miswritten so that there are two D:s; the inversion (nr 3) begins with a perfect fifth, though it should be a diminished fifth, the interval between note 10 and 11 should be a major sixth, but is instead a diminished seventh, and the interval between note 11 and 12 should be a minor second, but is a major second; and the reversed inverted (nr 4) is then based on the wrongly written inversion.
I like to compose with the tone row and 12-tone method sometimes. I found it confusing at first but after a little bit of study I got the same feeling of accomplishment as when I first figured out how to concieve my ideas in counterpoint and fugue. The two practices (12-tone and tonal counterpoint) are extremes of each other, but at their core represent the ingenuity of musical invention.
Hey If it wasn't for schoenberg, we would never discover genres like Progressive, Thrash Metal (Ex. Slayer, Megadeth). Plus when your baked you would find it amusing.
do you listen to megadeth? i'll take it you dont based on the fact that you have a problem with the idea that megadeth can be influenced by composers such as shoenberg. Megadeth, Slayer, ect.. use alot of 12-tone in their music and sometimes use dissonant chords. I meant what i said as a compliment towards shoenberg. When I said Progressive i meant more along the lines of Protest the Hero or Coheed and Cambria.
i haven't heard megadeth for many years, no. i just wondered what you meant that's all. I am generally suspicious of popular music, though, because the deciding factor for preferance with most people i would expect is taste which is not a good enough reason to like anything as far as i am concerned
What is a better reason than taste? I understand that Wagner was groundbreaking in the harmonies he used, but that doesn't mean I like his music...
Another example is that the Beatles wrote very simple music, that I don't believe was very groundbreaking at all, yet they are very popular. That's liking music that is not technically interesting, but is in good taste.
i exaggerated, but i mean that taste does not tell one much untill it is cultivated. Taste initially only tells you what you're comfortable with and where your prejudices are. I mean one mustn't judge somthing's overall value by way of one's prejudices and ignorance towards all the things that aren't the object of one's taste. This is what taste is without love of knowledge: prejudice and ignorance, and i have contempt for this kind of taste
therefore i don't excuse poor or even uncultivated taste in music any more than i do nationalism or racism, even though these are a higher priority of course.
The beatles sometimes wrote simple songs, and sometimes wrote more complex ones with chord changes that switched keys. but if you are a classical player then i can see how you would think all their stuff is simple. if youre a classical player youd probably even think billy joel is simple.
which wouldn't mean that billy joel is worse. some snobbish people like to brag about how complicated the music they listen to is, and by saying that they just show how little they understand of what Music is, and what it represents. i love schoenberg, the beatles, ornette coleman, milton nascimento, led zeppelin, john coltrane, bartok, liszt, schumann, wayne shorter, yussef lateef, pink floyd, deep purple.. everything. music is all. or like hermeto pascoal would say "tudo é som", all is sound.
Though, much the same as people get snobby over the complexity of music the general public snubs music like this because its to complicated. Very few people are able to enjoy classical, Atonal, Jazz, Bluegrass and Rock.
I think the problem is is that people use music to identify what social group they are in, rather than listen to music for its musicality. Those of us who just love music find ourselves without a group lol :-).
well i dont think the "general public" snubs it BECAUSE it's complicated, it just doesn't sound good to them. it's a matter of taste, you know. i love all types of music, but i dont love everyone who plays/sings music, if you know what i mean. e.g. i'm not into mariah carey and her genre in general.. i don't hate it, its not inferior to what i listen to.. but i just like other things better.
i know quite a few people at my music school who enjoy all genres.. so don't worry, we are not alone!
Schoenberg devoted his life to twelve tone music. He knew Webern.
30inventionman 4 weeks ago
love it
TheJotwilight1 2 months ago
I beg to differ. I (as a musician) do not enjoy Schonberg and he brought on all of this atonality that many of the musicians do not treasure. He was a genius, yes, but I and others (it would depend upon taste) do not always enjoy it.
jcsv12345 3 months ago
schoenberg is the Beethoven of the modern day--he started something new from something old--he has pioneered music through his genius.
And, just like Beethoven, at the time (and a few years after) he wasn't considered as much of a musical genius as he was--yes then he was popular, and Schoeberg had his following, but it is retrospect--a few hundred years down the line that we will realize how much groundwork of his ideas of music and philosophy of sound he has laid down for us.
GeorgeMaj15 5 months ago
It's quite unbelievable that nearly one hundred years after Schoenberg created his twelve tone method, gave us numerous masterpieces and many other composers thought highly enough of this new direction as to devote much energy and creativity to bringing it further, we still have ignorant people who insult and mock their memory with their stupidity.
CzarDodon 6 months ago
Stream,',It..'Now",'
ＷＷＷ.ＭＯＶＩＥＳＯＮＬＩＮＥＮＯＷ.ＴＫ
Copy.'`&"."Paste"`"
capabletranslatQy 6 months ago
@jimbothenoob I understand what you mean, and I believe in the existence of excercises in pretension. I certainly think people who feel that 12-tone is more advanced than harmonies are being at least a bit pretensious. Shonberg himself wouldn't have said that. Its just another way to write music. It often represents terror and insanity very useful emotional depictions. I'm sure you recognize the sounds from 1960's movies. I promise, I legitimately enjoy this music.
thirdcreed 7 months ago 2
@thirdcreed I think that may be a reason many people violently reject it - because just like the conventional tonal system lends itself to the sounds of joy, calm, fulfilment, etc, the twelve-tone system tends to "sound like" insanity, evil, despair, etc. It's almost like the devil's counterpart to "normal" tonality. Not that I think it's useless, just to clarify.
PraecoNoctis 3 months ago
@PraecoNoctis True, that probably is a reason people violently reject it. The question I think we should ask is not "Is it music?", but "Is it valuable?". Tragedy and sadness are often depicted by a traditional tonal scheme, this is seldom questioned as being valuable, even though we generally try to avoid being sad. Perhaps because we enjoy truth, as much as we enjoy beauty. Hence: "Truth is beauty, beauty is truth". When you find a piece accurately describing your experiences it is
thirdcreed 3 months ago
@thirdcreed fulfilling. Certainly those that had going through the existentialism and ambiguity of the post-war period would have found congruence with this music and their insane world, which they were now connected and educated enough to appreciate the insanity of while still being in someway connected. It represents the absolute horror you feel from looking at the world we live in closely. That being said...for me, this stuff is only enjoyable in small doses. Either as incidental music...
thirdcreed 3 months ago
or as a small 10 minute section that I am intently listening to.
thirdcreed 3 months ago
It's incredibly complex music, with a stupefying amount of math and thought behind it. And yet, I can't get past the notion that this is all just an exercise in pretension. 12-tone music is always presented as being more advanced than conventional music, and listeners are presented as being more enlightened, but why is that? Is it because he broke the rules and created really complex new ones? I could paint a crappy picture of a house with a diamond paintbrush, but that wouldn't make it art.
Jimbothenoob 7 months ago 3
btw-- I dont disagree with your original post, I just don't like cage's philosophy, and he irks me cause I think gets alot of attention for being a rather poor musical philosopher. So I can't help but argue with him, even when know ones asking for it. I'd still be very interested to hear your thoughts on the matter. I used to hate shonberg, now I love his music, maybe cage will be the same, although I doubt it currently.
thirdcreed 8 months ago
elements to mean something. Another beings 'meaning' has always been hard to ascertain, but it start by combining elements: vocal sounds into language, tones into music, paint strokes into images. None of these things are meaningful in and of themselves, they can be combined to be meaningful. Cage claimed to have 'emancipated' sound. I think this is like 'emancipating' engine parts. They are meaninless and useless as just elements. Do you follow what I mean?
thirdcreed 8 months ago
Harmony is a system for combing tones into a meaningful whole. Twelve-Tone is another system. Systems are inherently abstract. That's not to say it isn't real, It's just not an object. It is a relationship between objects. You can think of that relationship as being there already and being discovered or being created, but systems aren't categorized--they ARE categories. If you would call these systems ways to combing elements into a meaninful whole, then cage's thought is we just need
thirdcreed 8 months ago
I think they definetly are abstract. When the number two was first 'created' or 'discovered' it wasn't found in a hole somewhere, a human being looked at many different objects and groups of objects, and recongized a pattern of 'twoness' in the groups which we would now say have two similiar elements. This is the meaning of 'abstraction': that is, to recognize a common charachteristic among physical phenomenon,and to attach a label to the charachteristic and use it to label another set.
thirdcreed 8 months ago
@thirdcreed..well I'm not entirely sure how to respond. I wouldn't say numbers or tones are an abstraction, they are merely labels that we have put to something that is already present. Scales etc existed before we categorized them. Tonal and atonal existed ...harmony and disharmony..etc I think it's a matter of perception. I perceive man to discover and not create...so we 'discovered' how to write harmonious musics and so on. If you perceive music to be what is written on staves or played thru
redcassette 8 months ago
@thirdcreed..well I'm not entirely sure how to respond. I wouldn't say numbers or tones are an abstraction, they are merely labels that we have put to something that is already present. Scales etc existed before we categorized them. Tonal and atonal existed ...harmony and disharmony..etc I think it's a matter of perception. I perceive man to discover and not create...so we 'discovered' how to write harmonious musics and so on. If you perceive music to be what is written on staves or played thru
redcassette 8 months ago
I try to learn as much as I can about music on my own, and I happened to come across serialism. Thank you, Internet.
acceptedones 10 months ago 4
amazing ¡¡¡ so good video ,, wish people know it and valored it
cescuetoZ 1 year ago
many people and composers (john age etc) say all sound is music...the basis of music in nature could be named as wind, anything physical colliding and so on. we have just manipulated those natural things and produced instruments that need those elements to make sounds. Tones exist in nature....rhythm exists in nature and so on. so music is within our subconcious and has manifested itself in many idioms, all of which are subjective. lets just listen....
redcassette 1 year ago 9
@redcassette I love shoenberg, but I've always found my self fundamentally disagreeing with cage's philosophy of music. Tones, I think are an abstraction just as numbers are an abstraction, but I think numbers in and of themselves are wholly uninteresting. It is only when someone can do something meaningful with them that I find them interesting. I think that's why I do not like cage's brand of aleatoric music Perhaps I'm misunderstanding, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on it.
thirdcreed 8 months ago
@redcassette I love Schoenberg, but I've always found my self fundamentally disagreeing with cage's philosophy of music. Tones, I think are an abstraction just as numbers are an abstraction, but I think numbers in and of themselves are wholly uninteresting. It is only when someone can do something meaningful with them that I find them interesting. I think that's why I do not like cage's brand of aleatoric music Perhaps I'm misunderstanding, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on it.
thirdcreed 8 months ago
@redcassette Tones and harmonies do exist in nature, and music is supposed to be a beautiful imitation of those tones, not a solidly accurate reproduction. This is why nobody would even conceive of John Cage's music until after the baby boomer generation; that's the generation that stopped taking history's lessons seriously.
Marlowann 6 months ago
@redcassette My teacher always said any sound is music if its meant to be music.
philateliceun 6 months ago
@philateliceun what if it is not perceived as music?
MarcPopeTV 2 months ago
@redcassette Very well put.
kevinnowhow 3 months ago
@redcassette Yes, but you have to consider the compositional abilities and objective merits involved in writing the Goldberg Variations, and in banging sticks against rocks while listening to the wind blow.
CaramelMarshmallow 2 months ago
@redcassette What's all this Romantic nonsense? ;-) (I believe that music is very much of a man made product and that any order or sense we see in the universe is just a product of our mind, not of an underlining language or mind behind the universe... order and similarities are just an emerging property from chaos, but our mind adds meaning to it).
ClueBand 1 month ago
@redcassette Puerile sophistry from an artistically and philosophically emaciated being.
FreeVonHelton 1 week ago
Just Learned about this in my humanities class! :D
geekyfrans 1 year ago
There's a mistake at 2:45 in the second staff there should be d# instead of d at the end. It's played correctly, though, only the score is mistaken.
vivvpprof 1 year ago 28
@vivvpprof good on ya, mate.
Saxation1 1 year ago
I am afraid to listen to too much dissonant music. Over time I am certain I will slowly adjust to more and more dissonance, and eventually will be conditioned to enjoy pure dissonance - something that no one can enjoy but those who have been conditioned just like me. It is at that point that I will be, in a sense, musically insane.
winstontheband 1 year ago
@winstontheband
You're an idiot.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious Yeah? How come?
winstontheband 1 year ago
@winstontheband
Only an idiot could say something that stupid.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious Well that's not very nice. Were we talking face to face right now I say I would whip you across the face with a dueling glove!
winstontheband 1 year ago
@winstontheband
lol
darthdidious 1 year ago
@winstontheband Glove slap! baby glove slap!
janken919 1 year ago
Comment removed
0831669087 1 year ago
Can someone please explain serialism and the twelve tone system to me? I have background in music and know that his music was about playing all twelve tones without emphasis of a single note. I don't understand tone rows though nor do I completely understand primary series or secondary series, or the part where the narrator of the video starts talking about the "geometric" nature of the rows.
thecritiquevirtuoso 1 year ago
Comment removed
darthdidious 1 year ago
@thecritiquevirtuoso
Simply put, a tone row is a specific ordering of the twelve notes of the chromatic scale. As a result of this ordering, certain intervals between the notes will be emphasized. It is from the row that musical materials (melodies, harmonies, etc.) are extracted.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious
Any given tone row can be transformed in certain ways. The initial ordering of the notes is called the "prime" form. When this ordering is run in reverse, it is called "retrograde"; when the row is turned upside-down (that is, the directions of the intervals are flipped; what was an ascending major third now becomes a descending major third, etc.), it is called "inversion"; when the inversion is run in reverse, it is called "retrograde inversion".
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious
Additionally, any of these four forms--prime, retrograde, inversion, retrograde inversion--can be transposed to start on any note of the chromatic scale, resulting in a total of 48 possible row forms to choose from (12 prime, 12 retrograde, 12 inversion, and 12 retrograde inversion).
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious
All of these transformations only change the specific ordering of the notes; they don't change the intervalic content, and they don't change the pitch content (which is always going to total twelve notes). In this way, the row furnishes the basic material for a composition, and ensures unity at all levels of structure. It can result in music that sound surprisingly "tonal", and music that sounds decidedly not tonal. Much beautiful music has been written using this technique.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious
Thank you! Now I have at least some rudimentary understanding of this fascinating music.
thecritiquevirtuoso 1 year ago
@darthdidious Okay well, you seem totally enamored with your own intellect. I haven't studied atonalism; I have been interested in it on my own time, I devote my studies elsewhere. You are right; I don't know a lot about it, but i understand the principle. I do not care about the specifics. So what else is left of this discussion? If it was only to prove that you know more about it than I do, than I guess we are done.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
You started saying dumb things, I called you out on it. Simple as that.
You're right though. I am pretty awesome.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious And one last thing: anything can be beautiful. I find that if I look carefully, everything around me has an immediate existential significance that is amazing to me. However, this depends on the viewer, and what the viewer wants to see. What the viewer sees is not necessarily something that is universal.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@thecritiquevirtuoso There is one thing more to add to dathdidious's description: In the most prime example of serial composition, no note is re-used until all twelve have been used, so that no note gets played more than any other. Although Schoenberg strayed from this.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
That rule isn't an essential part of the theory. For various reasons, a composer may want to emphasize certain notes more than others by repeating them, giving them harmonic re-enforcement, etc. As you note, Schoenberg didn't follow this rule at all.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious I would say that he followed it to a point. But he did not let that rule dissuade him from making decisions which he thought would strengthen the piece.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
The subjective as an aesthetic proposition in the realm of art remains the exclusive domain of the unimaginative, the catatonic and the imbecile.
pooperscoopr69 1 year ago
Comment removed
witness124 1 year ago
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@pooperscoopr69 Well said, however, the aesthetic ideal cannot be blamed for the swiftly diminishing wave of talented and emotionally mature art. Instead, I must point out, that the very moment an aesthetic ideal is structured, broken down, and examined, it becomes worthless, as if it were less than the sum of its parts.
witness124 1 year ago
@pooperscoopr69 Eloquently said. Are you suggesting that a purely subjective interpretation of art is worthless? Or are you referring to the artist who expects their work to stand on it's own capacity to be interpreted, rather than creating the piece with a thoughtful meaning?
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@pooperscoopr69
No it doesn't.
darthdidious 1 year ago
This has been flagged as spam show
Place for you to meet other naughty women mworld5.info
dfhjvb1 1 year ago
So, let me say that I really like schoenberg and music that challenges the traditional paradigms of music in general. And there is something really attractive about schoenberg's pieces. However, while pieces do stand out, they are all very similar. I feel like a piece should have some distinguishing qualities that directly relate to its intent. Distinguishing characteristics are not necessarily tonal though, they simply convey the purpose. two more things: Nikita Koshkin, Leo Brouwer.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
All serial music sounds similar in the same sense that all tonal music sounds similar. Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern all wrote serial music, and none sounds anything like the other.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious Touche! Yeah, you are right of course. Webern in particular stands out as a good example of that. But I am not ready to admit that I am totally wrong. Atonal music is all very similar because each piece is using similarly arbitrary tones. In tonal music, a lot of it is repetitive, but tonal pieces use a less broad spectrum of notes, so they sound more like the particular spectrum that they use, rather than a jumble of the entire spectrum.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
There are plenty of pieces of tonal music that use all 12 notes of the chromatic scale. The difference is that in tonal music the notes are organized hierarchically, with the tonic being the most important, and all other notes relating back to it in some fashion. In 12-tone music the notes are organized in a row, resulting in certain intervalic relationships which gives a row a unique "flavour" (or "colour"). It is not a jumble.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious Well, while there may be pieces which use all twelve tones, when they do, the tones are used in passing and the key signature is mostly upheld. The key signature determines what chords will be used and the kinds of moods which will be fostered within the music. I know how atonal music works; i've used Schoenberg's system before; I get it. But with each additional note, the focus of the piece becomes (tonally) less precise. The fewer notes, the more distinct the flavor.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
The presence of a key signature in an of itself has nothing to do with whether or not a piece is tonal, nor the kinds of "moods" are to be encountered in the music. What makes tonal music tonal is that the music is organized hierarchically--everything relates back to the tonic triad. It is the centricity of the tonic triad that gives tonal music its coherence.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious
In 12-tone music, pitch centricity rarely plays a strong role. It is the row that gives it coherence, and specifically the intervalic structure of the row. Some tone-rows only emphasize a small number of intervals, and as a result their "flavour" is no less distinct than that of the diatonic scale. The disorienting effect of listening to the music probably has more to do with a lack of familiarity with the style than anything else.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious As for the 'moods' thing, I was talking about the different between minor key and major key. As for the key thing as a whole, you are right. I must be a bit foggy headed or something. You have said it much more succinctly. But what you said is exactly the reason why atonal music sounds similar; it lacks structure. If refers to a row, which is less specific than a triad. pieces that use all twelve tones sound sinister or busy if they use them equally.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
Atonal music does have structure, it's just a different kind of structure from tonal music. It's not pitch-centric. The intervalic structure of the row gives the music its unique character (at least in part, because pitch is but one parameter of many with which a composer works), and organizes the music at the small and large scale (agian, in part).
Not all twelve tone music sounds sinister. That's an ignorant thing to say.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious I have made your argument before. I like atonal music, what more do I have to say? It DOES sound disjointed in general, It is not just my opinion. It sounds that way because the tone is not considered and the tone is what human beings are accustomed to hearing in a particular way. I wont argue that anymore. And again: tonal music has a key, so does atonal music; atonal music's key consists of 12 notes. Atonal music has rows, but they organize the music in a different way.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
What do you mean by "tone"?
Atonal music has no key. You don't seem to understand what a key actually is.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious A key is a collection of pitches. ie. C harm. min. (C D Eb F G Ab B C). I suppose I typed tone instead of pitch. That is my fault.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
A key is not a collection of pitches. Every key has at it's disposal the all 12 notes of the chromatic scale. What makes a piece of music tonal is that the pitches are organized hierarchically: one note is designated the tonic and all the other notes related back to it in a very specific and well-defined manner. If a key was defined simply as a collection of pitches, then it would be impossible to use chromatic notes without destroying the the sense of a tonal center.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious In my opinion (feel free to disagree, and I know you will), the row is a convoluted way to organize a piece of music. It is a tad bit too cerebral to be absolutely effective. In fact, the row is the reason that so many people don't take seriality seriously.
The unique quality of serial music in opposition to the coherence of tonal music is it's disjointed sound. It is not an ignorant thing to say. There are a couple exceptions, but the music as a whole has that cadence.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
12-tone music is just as coherent as tonal music, just in a different way. If you listen to the music and try to hear a pitch-center, then of course you'll be confused. You have to listen for other things. That doesn't make it cerebral, it's just different. It's actually surprisingly easy to hear the relationships generated in 12-tone music.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious Hrm. Well, it has always been difficult for me to hear it unless I listen to the piece many times. Like Schoenberg's six little pieces... I love that! (kinda out of a non-sequitor I know).
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@darthdidious I'm kinda out of steam with this argument honestly. But if you want, compare 'Flight of the Bumblebees' to 'El Colibri' or 'Las Abejas'. It is not an ideal comparison for the discussion at hand, but chromaticism breeds a sense of urgency. Pure atonalism is boring and generic, just as randomly generated tones begin to sound like static. It lacks soul. Rows do structure a piece, but to what degree? Atonalism should be a flavor employed on occasion in my opinion. Good night.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
Indeed, chromatic tones intruding into a mainly diatonic structure do have a distinct sound, by virtue of their being "foreign".
Rows structure a piece to an extremely high degree. 12-tone music is anything but randomly generated notes.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious I did not say that it WAS randomly generated music, but there are similarities. It was only an analogy.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
You clearly have decided ahead of time that atonal music is boring and "soulless," in spite of not knowing very much about it, or even having listened to much of the music. Anyone who has listened to Pierrot Lunaire or Berg's Violin Concerto, would never say it was "boring" or "soulless." Anyone who knows how diverse atonal music actually is (Stravinsky, Bartok, Schoenberg, Carter), would never say it was "generic."
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious dude. Come now. I love Pierrot Lunaire. I have listened to Stravinsky's Rite of Spring many times, All of my favorite artists experiment with atonality. It can have soul however, I am attempting to be critical of it despite that fact that I like it. It is worth noting that the majority of people do not like it; of course their tastes are not attuned to it. As you said, it is foreign to the ears. I still stand buy what I have said, much atonal music is somewhat generic
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
The Rite of Spring is not 12-tone.
That most people don't like serialism is not a thing worth nothing. Most people don't like Mozart. That's not a thing worth noting either.
The belief that all atonal music sounds generic is a widely-held misconception perpetuated by people like you who don't know much about the music but still feel qualified to pass judgment on it.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious Okay, first, I know that.
second, if music can only appreciated by people who study it, than why should it matter to the rest of the populace?
third, many people like Mozart. I am not referring to pop culture.
fourth, it is not just a belief.
fifth, stop talking to me like I don't know anything about music.
Schoenberg and the rest managed to introduce atonalism into the musical lexicon. For that they should be revered, but do not resist judging them. The music has flaws.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
The Mozart example was to show that you're arguing ad populum. That most people do or do not like a given type of music is not relevant to the question of whether or not the music has coherence, is beautiful, enjoyable to listen to; neither is the question of why the music should matter to people who don't study it. Music doesn't have to popular to be good.
It is a belief, and it's a false one too, based on misunderstanding and ignorance.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
You've demonstrated to me that in spite of not knowing what you're talking about, you still think your criticisms are valid. I'm not going to stop pointing out your lack of understanding unless you stop pretending you know what you're talking about.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious It is the same way with death metal. If you don't listen to death metal, you would never be able to tell the difference between Cannibal Corpse, Dying Fetus and Whitechapple, despite the fact that they are all very different to someone who listens to them. But still, they are generic in their own way.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@darthdidious This is why a Japanese scale or a pentatonic scale sounds significantly different from a regular major scale. I will admit though, that an 8 tone scale sounds fairly unique as well. My point is that 'rows' are not the same as 'keys'; every atonal piece uses the same key, so it sounds roughly the same (tonally). A tonal piece can use rows just as easily as an atonal one can, but it also has a key.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
The pentatonic scale doesn't sound very different from a diatonic scale.
A key does not constrain what notes will be used (because all 12 notes can be used in a tonal piece), instead it determines how the notes are organized with respect to each other, with one note (the tonic) at the top of the hierarchy. Atonal music doesn't use a key (i.e. a tonic); all twelve notes are treated equally. Instead of a tonic, it is the row which controls the music.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious It sounds very different from a Japanese scale though. Diminished scales sound different from minor scales. A scale can be constructed from a chord. (ex.CEGBDFAC) Certainly you know this. Chords sound distinctly different from each other. if you add more notes to a chord, each one makes the chord more ambiguous, less unique. Every 12 tone chord would sound like an octave of every other one (with slight variations).
What relation do you bear to the music world?
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
There are lots of similarities between the pentatonic scale and the diatonic scale: they are complements, they can both be generated from 5th cycles, and they have very similar intervalic content. A pentatonic scale is just a diatonic scale missing two notes.
I don't see how pointing out that scales can be generated harmonically is relevant to this discussion.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious
Adding notes to a chord makes it more unique, not less so.
"Every 12 tone chord would sound like an octave of every other one (with slight variations)."
I have no idea what this means.
I am a music theorist. I teach at a university.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious Ah I see, well I feel silly arguing with you about this then. You see, I am not a theorist, I am a music minor. Even so, As for my comment about the 12 tone chord; I meant that if you were to construct a chord that contained every note, it would sound just like any other, despite the order of the notes in the chord. My point was that, as more notes are included, the sound becomes more homogeneous. Adding notes does make a chord more unique, but only while it has a tonal center
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@darthdidious My point is that Rows are a cerebral way to arrange music. It takes a lot of concentration to be able to hear the row in a piece of atonal music. It makes the music highly inaccessible.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
Atonal music has no key. That's a fact, not an opinion.
The real reason most people don't take atonal music seriously is because they don't know anything about it, and couldn't be bothered to learn. I have no problem with someone not liking the music; I have a big problem when in spite of not knowing anything about it they feel qualified to make sweeping generalisations about it (that it's soulless, generic, cerebral, etc.).
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious
I don't listen to Death Metal, and maybe I wouldn't be able to tell the different between Cannibal Corpse and Dying Fetus, but I then I don't go on about how generic all Death Metal sounds. I don't make sweeping generalisations about things I don't know anything about. You do.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious Yes, but I do listen to atonal music. It is not as though I know nothing about it.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
You listen to atonal music; good for you. But obviously you don't know much about it, and in spite of this feel you can dismiss it all.
I don't care if you like the music or not. I care that you think you know what you're talking about.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious well. Yes. But only inasmuch as every piece of atonal music uses the same notes. It may not technically have a key, but what is a key really? A key is a collection of notes. In that sense, atonal music does have a key.
And again: I do know something about atonal music. I don't know why I have to keep saying this: I LIKE IT. I DO NOT DISLIKE IT. I only want to point out that it has flaws.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
The flaws you point out aren't flaws. They're your own lack of understanding.
I don't care if you like the music or not.
A key is not merely a collection of notes. Music that is "in a key" is organized around a tonal center. Atonal music is not organized around tonal centers.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
Tonal music doesn't use tone rows.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious but it easily could.
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
If by "tone row" you mean a melody that has all twelve notes, then of course, but that's not what a tone row actually is.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious I think that what sets the atonalists apart from one another is the way in which they use space in their music. Schoenberg did a little bit of everything, but Webern really focused on staccato notes rather than long drawn out ones. That simple difference sets the two apart for me. I would be interested to hear from someone as I have not done any in depth research, in what ways do the various atonalists differ from each other in terms of way they place notes?
adognamedsally 1 year ago
@adognamedsally
There are certainly musical parameters besides pitch with which a composer works, and Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern had very different ideas about texture, meter, etc. But even with respect to pitch, the composers of the 2nd Viennese School differed tremendously.
darthdidious 1 year ago
I've just begun working with serialism. I haven't actually composed one full piece yet, and i'm already loving it. I would say that key signatures are important, but i love the way the notes seem to be partially in control of themselves, and it feels far more free, but yet more forced upon you. I suppose its nice to cut lose with serialism once in a while. Schoenberg was nothing less than a genius.
witness124 1 year ago
Comment removed
witness124 1 year ago
@witness124 What is serialism? Music is new to me. thank you.
JinxOz 1 year ago
This introduction will make Schoenberg more accessible to my high school students. Thank you.
MisterHowe 1 year ago
Thank you for sharing this is truly ingenious and absolutely beautifully way to capture the soul essence of Arnold Schoenberg
ObeeLektro 1 year ago
he's a rock megastar!
omatu1 1 year ago
My mind has been blown.
Diomenesx 1 year ago
Tone Rows and Serialism in 20th century
Schoenberg, Webern and Berg
icydong 1 year ago
And then when he does that thing where he takes the tone row and plays it backwards... what is the point of that? You can't even recognize any similarity between that and the original tone row when you do that, so it isn't musically related.
MrDanielWakefield 1 year ago
@MrDanielWakefield
It is related, and it's related in a way that is clearly audible. Running the row in reverse changes the ordering, but it preserves the intervalic structure.
darthdidious 1 year ago
Not method or science controls it but the same substance we listen to -the same contents (shape,line,color,timbre,time and spaciality etc.) we listen to in Mozart . that is the opposite of what most think . Listen to these odd melodies that was how world sounded & felt after a world war and economic depression . Atonality lacks the unifying element of tonal center it is freer ,but many composers have their own systems .why not repeat a tone etc.
lovesGenet 1 year ago
@iorost Say the prime melody's first two notes were A to B, being one whole step up. If Inverted, you would simple go one Whole Step DOWN, A to B.
You just change up to down or down to up in the same steps.
MrLonlie 1 year ago
AND LET THERE BE LIGHT!
johnnynoirman 1 year ago
Arnold Schoenberg is one of the most amazing composers of twelve-tone music. I am a composer and I have seen what it takes to write twelve-tone music and there is more to it than you think, or even what they speak of in the video. If you have questions about it, feel free to ask me. I am happy to answer anything that I can.
amyleeluvr 1 year ago
@amyleeluvr Cool to see a post such as this. I'm a composer too, but I have yet to write anything in this form. I'm pretty sure I'm going to attempt it within the next few weeks. I'd be very interested in knowing any of the 'niceties' of the form that are not covered in this video. Do you have a treatise on 12-tone music that is emailable?
bsdml 1 year ago
I'm not a trained musician but that is the music that works for soundtracks, to create atmospheres that I've tried to understand musically but with no formal training I've been lost
JohnLennon100 1 year ago
Wow ...that's fractals in music !!!!
JohnLennon100 1 year ago
Yet another trivial introduction to twelve-tone music - just what I needed
dannycdoubleb 1 year ago
iorost: inverted means that if the 1st interval is a ascending perfect 5th, in the inverted sequence it will be a descending 5th... you'll have to do the same thing for every single interval in the row... the only one that keeps the same is the 1st note...
Pinela89 1 year ago
GENIO
MrBallarin23 1 year ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
If classical music be the garbage can of music, let serialism be the garbage can of classical music. I have already had excess of it.
ilkinond 1 year ago
Not sure I follow the "hexachord vs. notation as shown" disagreement, but it's worth exploring. Schoenberg is often surprisingly wonderful to listen to for those who were taught to fear/avoid atonality. The most important thing I got from this video is that S. would like us to abandon strict technical study for enough time to simply absorb the music itself. And try to hear the music played live, if you can. peace
wagerfilmART 1 year ago
Simply amazing.
TylerGallion 1 year ago 2
Ignore the notation at 2:40 and onward. It is incorrect (but the audio is correct).
The reason the inversion starts on G and not B-flat is not explained in the video. The inversion is transposed such that the first 6 tones, called its first hexachord (G C# B D C G#), does not overlap with any tones of the first hexachord of the original set (Bb E F# D# F A)...
atpal 2 years ago 2
...This is a special property called hexachordal combinatoriality which is useful compositionally. Not all sets have this property, but Schoenberg usually constructed his sets this way.
atpal 2 years ago
Why were the so-called musicologists of the Nazi era so MENACED by Schoenberg's atonal musical compositions?
schlejde 2 years ago
@schlejde bcs Schoenberg told the truth about them trough his music.
Anoush23 2 years ago
@schlejde
Probably because Schoenberg was a jew.
darthdidious 1 year ago
ascvideo, is this your own narration? Ever thought of doing a full-length documentary on this guy?
bsdml 2 years ago
fascinating sounds...schoenberg is beyond words...infintely abstract
markmando333 2 years ago
First time i've listened something like this. It's mory frightening than metal.
evanescent25 2 years ago
Comment removed
SuperTaiji 2 years ago
for anyone concerned about learning 12-tone composition, I recommend you learn about combinatorials, very powerful way of composing.
Flatliner0452 2 years ago
@Flatliner0452
Derived rows and invariance are cool too.
darthdidious 1 year ago
also, i see (sheets) and hear chords in the music... where do the chords notes come? do they have any rule??
btw... i may have not understood this video since english is not my language
mayorde18 2 years ago
@mayorde18
All musical materials, including harmonies, are generated from the row. It is a mistake to that that just because a row is conceived as a linear ordering that it therefore only applies to melodies.
darthdidious 1 year ago
i have read many tutorials about this and i still don't understand how to create a twelve-tone based piece. The only thing I understand about them is about getting the row created, and that it can be reversed vertically, horizontally, etc. Once you get the row, what is left to do? what represents the row? is it the melody (i have watched those sheets in the video, and i can see many notes repeated, and no row at all,i cant find it)?? is it the new tonality?? what do I do after creating the row?
mayorde18 2 years ago
repeated notes and short patterns don't count against the row, and the row can be distributed throughout the parts. You can have any of the notes sounding at the same time without upsetting the order, and you can have any combonation of the forms of the row sounding at the same time, Twelve tone music is at it's heart contrapuntal, so there are no rules about vertical sonorities, the focus is on individuality of the lines.
bassninjatroy 2 years ago
@bassninjatroy
Twelve tone music is at it's heart contrapuntal, so there are no rules about vertical sonorities, the focus is on individuality of the lines.
This is not necessarily so. The row can be used to generate harmonies as much as it can be used for melodies.
darthdidious 1 year ago
@darthdidious
Yes, you are correct. I wrote this when I had only just begun learning about serialism. Thanks for the correction.
bassninjatroy 1 year ago
And, as with any style, the rules aren't rules, they're just guidelines. Webern wrote very rigid serial music, and shoenberg and Berg were more lenient about following their own rules.
bassninjatroy 2 years ago
@mayorde18
You compose, just as you would a tonal piece of music once you had decided on what key you were going to use. Obviously, a row is a little more complicated than a key. Think of the row as furnishing the basic materials for composition; melodies and harmonies, etc. Basing all of the musical materials off of the row is a way to ensure unity in a composition. There is no "one way" to compose serial music; that is a myth.
darthdidious 1 year ago
Schoenberg; a revolutionary mind!
BarbaraPloyer333 2 years ago
no idea what it means, sorry.
he214ab 2 years ago
¿es demasiado pequeño el mundo para el "buen gusto"(subjetivamente hablando) y la exploración?
son solo posibilidades
ave5551 2 years ago
Awesome! .... by the way, i did not mean to press the 1 star button, missed the paused button -_- sorry!
theawesomeviolinist 2 years ago
Mistakes happen.
ReignOfPraine 2 years ago
wich is the piece that it appears at the begining of this video?
mago3072 2 years ago
The ostinato (palyed by Cellos) from "Die Jakobsleiter"
peachymusic 2 years ago
True, but I think schoenberg's, or even Webern's techniques are used in a lot of Black metal bands such as Mayhem, Dark Throne, and Morbid Angel. I actually think that Slayer's solo are actually more of Webern's rather than schoenbergs. Of course very few metal bands are using the these techniques, but at least they know the Idea of it.
RiffRaff100 2 years ago
the series precented at 2:33-3:08 has several errors - the reverse (nr 2) is miswritten so that there are two D:s; the inversion (nr 3) begins with a perfect fifth, though it should be a diminished fifth, the interval between note 10 and 11 should be a major sixth, but is instead a diminished seventh, and the interval between note 11 and 12 should be a minor second, but is a major second; and the reversed inverted (nr 4) is then based on the wrongly written inversion.
Ralphsson80 2 years ago
the vibraphon plays the right series though ;-)
Ralphsson80 2 years ago 4
I like to compose with the tone row and 12-tone method sometimes. I found it confusing at first but after a little bit of study I got the same feeling of accomplishment as when I first figured out how to concieve my ideas in counterpoint and fugue. The two practices (12-tone and tonal counterpoint) are extremes of each other, but at their core represent the ingenuity of musical invention.
5RetardedSquirrels 2 years ago 2
It's amazing how many people comment about things they don't know anything about...But hey, that's life - keep it up, it's amusing..
atc977 2 years ago 27
Hey If it wasn't for schoenberg, we would never discover genres like Progressive, Thrash Metal (Ex. Slayer, Megadeth). Plus when your baked you would find it amusing.
RiffRaff100 2 years ago
please tell me what megadeth has in common with shoenberg
munkybrain 2 years ago 5
do you listen to megadeth? i'll take it you dont based on the fact that you have a problem with the idea that megadeth can be influenced by composers such as shoenberg. Megadeth, Slayer, ect.. use alot of 12-tone in their music and sometimes use dissonant chords. I meant what i said as a compliment towards shoenberg. When I said Progressive i meant more along the lines of Protest the Hero or Coheed and Cambria.
RiffRaff100 2 years ago
i haven't heard megadeth for many years, no. i just wondered what you meant that's all. I am generally suspicious of popular music, though, because the deciding factor for preferance with most people i would expect is taste which is not a good enough reason to like anything as far as i am concerned
munkybrain 2 years ago
What is a better reason than taste? I understand that Wagner was groundbreaking in the harmonies he used, but that doesn't mean I like his music...
Another example is that the Beatles wrote very simple music, that I don't believe was very groundbreaking at all, yet they are very popular. That's liking music that is not technically interesting, but is in good taste.
chazums1898 2 years ago 2
i exaggerated, but i mean that taste does not tell one much untill it is cultivated. Taste initially only tells you what you're comfortable with and where your prejudices are. I mean one mustn't judge somthing's overall value by way of one's prejudices and ignorance towards all the things that aren't the object of one's taste. This is what taste is without love of knowledge: prejudice and ignorance, and i have contempt for this kind of taste
munkybrain 2 years ago 2
therefore i don't excuse poor or even uncultivated taste in music any more than i do nationalism or racism, even though these are a higher priority of course.
munkybrain 2 years ago 2
The beatles sometimes wrote simple songs, and sometimes wrote more complex ones with chord changes that switched keys. but if you are a classical player then i can see how you would think all their stuff is simple. if youre a classical player youd probably even think billy joel is simple.
Soundgarden1009 2 years ago
which wouldn't mean that billy joel is worse. some snobbish people like to brag about how complicated the music they listen to is, and by saying that they just show how little they understand of what Music is, and what it represents. i love schoenberg, the beatles, ornette coleman, milton nascimento, led zeppelin, john coltrane, bartok, liszt, schumann, wayne shorter, yussef lateef, pink floyd, deep purple.. everything. music is all. or like hermeto pascoal would say "tudo é som", all is sound.
rsinatra 2 years ago 3
Well yeah....Billy Joel's THE SHIIIT
Soundgarden1009 2 years ago
@rsinartra, I agree completely.
Though, much the same as people get snobby over the complexity of music the general public snubs music like this because its to complicated. Very few people are able to enjoy classical, Atonal, Jazz, Bluegrass and Rock.
I think the problem is is that people use music to identify what social group they are in, rather than listen to music for its musicality. Those of us who just love music find ourselves without a group lol :-).
EuphoricDan 2 years ago
well i dont think the "general public" snubs it BECAUSE it's complicated, it just doesn't sound good to them. it's a matter of taste, you know. i love all types of music, but i dont love everyone who plays/sings music, if you know what i mean. e.g. i'm not into mariah carey and her genre in general.. i don't hate it, its not inferior to what i listen to.. but i just like other things better.
i know quite a few people at my music school who enjoy all genres.. so don't worry, we are not alone!
rsinatra 1 year ago