Symphony Flashcards
Brahms overview
B. 1833; symphonies 1876-85
Rescued abstract tradition; symphonic seriousness; cerebral approach
Brodbeck: Brahms 1 distinctively realises Beet 5/9 archetype from dramatic min-mode to joyous maj-mode finale, while Brahms 4 plays with archetype, ending with grave passacaglia
Symphony 1: Movement-tonality plan of C-E-Ab-C microcosmically echoed in tertiary harmony (typical Brahmsian unity/economy)
Dahlhaus quotes
‘around 1900 there was little or no difference between the symphony and the symphonic poem’ (Mahler/Strauss similar styles)
Symphony’s history ‘circumpolar’ not teleological: Beethoven’s ‘shadow’ lingered throughout
(Oeschle and Brodbeck’s alternative historiography: 1839 Schubert 9 rediscovery initiated new era of symphony)
Historiography of symphony’s ‘slow decline, death and resurrection’ in 19thC (disputed by Brodbeck 2013)
Brahms adopted Beethovenian dialectic of monumentality and sophisticated thematic manipulation
Hepokoski on Brahms
Hepokoski: Brahms overwhelmingly allusive; preoccupied with Austro-Hungarian musical tradition e.g. J.S. Bach Cantata allusion (end of 1) or Passacaglia (end of 4)
Symph 1 conceals declaration of love for Clara Schumann
Absolute vs programmatic: Liszt’s views
Absolute symphony was ‘enervated’
Split Beethoven into 2 periods: form governing him, and him shaping form
Liszt’s 12 symphonic poems and 2 programme
symphonies later used as models
‘new wine demands new bottles’
‘Berlioz and his Harold Symphony’ (1855): 100-page-long galvinising manifesto
Split composers between programmatic ‘Tondicher’ (tone-poets) and non-programmatic composers who were unoriginal, ‘formalist’ unoriginal, ‘formalist’ (A.B. Marx influence) and blind to audience need of anchor for perception (public genre)
Hepokoski: Liszt’s ideas influenced ALL 19thC composers
Absolute vs programmatic: Hanslick
Viennese critic/aesthetician who argued for ‘independent meaning of music’
Music comprised self-referential ‘sounding forms in motion’ - only genuine subject was exploration of themes, self-reflective coherence/commentary and references to autonomous musical tradition
Hepokoski categories
1 = absolute music (non-existent) 2a = dialogues with musical tradition (Brahms/Dvorak/Mahler omnipresent referentiality) 2b = nationalistic (Tchaikovsky/Dvorak/Sibelius) 2c = tacit/implicit/suspected programme (Brahms 1, Tchaikovsky, Mahler) 3 = programme symphony/symphonic programme/overture (Liszt/Tchiakovsky/ 'Manfred'/Strauss)
1830s crisis
Fink’s 1838 encyclopedia article: sets extremely/unattainably elevated standards; emphasises organicism/coherence, grandeur, public+private nature, and Germanness
Schumann 1839 Neue Zeitschrift review: laments epigonic symphonies, criticising in terms of Fink’s criteria
1850-70 crisis
Stats:
Vienna 1848-68: only 10 new symphonies performed
Berlin 1848: 3 new, 53 Beethoven
New symphonies ‘episodic and of inferior quality’ - most composers averse to genre; orchestras and publishers reluctant, critics harsh
Berlioz’s ‘Harold en Italie’ (1834)
Unique, unprecedented hybrid of symphony and concerto
Viola ‘solo’ but positioned ‘near the public and isolated from the orchestra’ - virtuosity/orchestral antiphony rare
Programme: Harold as ‘melancholy dreamer’, ‘present in the action but does not participate in it’ - mirrored in superimposition of idee fixe onto contrasting passages that remain oblivious (unlike Symphonie)
Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique (1830)
3/5 movements resemble sonatas but with unusual proportions: 1st mov intro twice as long as exposition+development
Liszt transcribed it after attending premiere - influence
Secondary literature on Berlioz
Holoman 1997: Berlioz ‘was less concerned with the purity of the symphonic genre as he inherited it than with the symphony as a form for experiment and progress toward his own ideals as a composer of dramatic music’ - freer than German symphony and Parisian opera
Holoman: ‘phantasmagoria’ sequence of images like in a dream, with evolving sonorities rather than technical pillars of construction
Bonds 1992: Berlioz shows ‘deeply ambivalent attitudes towards Beethoven’s symphonies’ (they are traditionally regarded as his main inspiration) - Harold as ‘sinfonia anti-eroica’ compared to Beet 9
Distanced himself from program/absolute dichotomy
Influence palpable in Liszt, Tchaikovsky, Mahler
Berlioz Romeo et Juliette (1839)
Thematic cyclism at several structural levels:
Foreshadowing of choral recitative
Reminiscing of fete and love motif
Ian Kemp shows most imaginative moments developed from line-by-line reactions to Shakespeare’s play:
Speech in balcony scene imitated by violas/cellos and woodwinds
Tomb scene follows narrative line-by-line
Shed any sense of Viennese periodic phrase-structure
Liszt’s symphonic poems: novel aspects
Were regarded as avant-garde - Wagner called them ‘so new, so incomparable to anything else’
Style amalgamates cosmopolitan influences: Italianate melodies, Germanic thematic development, Hungarian gypsy music and French grand opera
Form guided by poetic idea, leading to formal innovation/deformation
Cyclic forms and thematic transformation rather than Beethovenian development
Hamlet: parallels between symphonic play and poem underpinned by large-scale arch form, thematic transformation and varied repeats
Harmony: augmented triad in opening of Faust symphony
Liszt’s symphonic poems: derivative elements
Hamilton 1997: formal ingenuity most evident when seen as deformation of sonata form:
Tasso’s opening evokes frustrations of Tasso’s life via formal frustration - slow intro builds via dom. ped., but expectations of main allegro theme in C-min thwarted by return of slow intro (forming ABA), thwarted again by eventual appearance of main theme as long lyrical melody in slow tempo
Hamilton 1997: Beethoven influence (piano transcriptions/sonata performances) reflected in allusions
First group of poems utilises sonata form; Taruskin (2010) argues sections of Les Preludes correspond ‘to the movements of a regular symphony if not in the most conventional order’ and overall narrative matches archetypal ‘per aspera ad astra’
Mahler’s symphonies
Now regarded as modernist, not late Romantic, by scholarship
Symphonies 1-4 initially had programmes
Mahler 1 intertextually alludes to Lieder
Johnson (2009): ‘self-conscious extremes of Mahler’s stylistic ventriloquy are startling. His music underlines its own theatricality, its tendency to stage itself by frequent changes of scene, character, and viewpoint’
