The Art of Recomposition: Creativity, Aesthetics, and Music Theory The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation O'Hara, William Evan. 2017. The Art of Recomposition: Creativity, Aesthetics, and Music Theory. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:41140209 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA The Art of Recomposition: Creativity, Aesthetics, and Music Theory A dissertation presented by William Evan O’Hara to the Department of Music in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the subject of Music Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts May 2017 © 2017, William Evan O’Hara All Rights Reserved iii Dissertation Advisor: Prof. Suzannah Clark William Evan O’Hara The Art of Recomposition: Creativity, Aesthetics, and Music Theory Abstract Theoretical recomposition—the act of re-writing an existing piece of music in the service of a technical, aesthetic, or critical argument—is encountered frequently in critical and analytical writings on music. These recompositions, however, have rarely been commented upon. Not only are they mostly absent from secondary literature, but those who employ them rarely reflect on the creative and analytical processes involved, leaving their diagrams to speak for themselves. Through a study of theoretical treatises, pedagogical manuals, and academic and popular criticism, I demonstrate how recomposition often serves both conservative and progressive musical impulses simultaneously, and I analyze and critique its use in theoretical and pedagogical writings, exposing recomposition’s liminal aesthetic status: hovering between vibrant, audible music and inert diagram. The first half of the study argues that recomposition has been as essential tool in music theory’s development since the eighteenth century, and it continues to be common in contemporary textbooks. By using theoretical recompositions to recast the history of music theory as a continual process of (re)negotiation among a variety of cultural forces—rather than an endless succession of monuments—I hope to open new lines of communication between theory and analysis, and musicology more generally. The second half of the study iv examines the ways in which theoretical recomposition reflects upon the act of listening itself. Various contemporary theories of listening—which approach music from such diverse perspectives as phenomenology, cognitive science, and reader-response theory—each attempt to generalize the same recompositional impulse that bubbles under the surface of my earlier historical and philosophical case studies: a desire, as Peter Szendy puts it, “to make my listening, listened to.” This realization demonstrates recomposition’s relevance not only for formal analysis, but also for the study of informal, “everyday” listening. It thus engages with, reinforces, and historicizes recent efforts by musicologists and sound scholars to explore the ways in which listening (musical or otherwise) involves not only passive processes of reception, but also active, and even creative, work on the part of the listener. v Table of Contents List of Figures vii List of Tables xii Acknowledgements xiii Dedication xvi Introduction: A! or G"? 1 Chapter One 26 Towards a Theory of Recomposition I. The Invisibility of Recomposition 26 II. Leonard Meyer’s Laws, Rules, and Strategies: Prelude to a 50 Theory of Recomposition III. Reasons to Recompose 55 Corrective Recomposition 56 Model Recomposition 61 Theory-Building Recomposition 63 Analytical Recomposition 69 Recomposition, Listening, and Expectation 73 IV. Interactions Among Categories 83 Chapter Two 88 Episodes in the History of Recomposition I. Rameau’s Figured Bass and the Metalanguage of Dissonance 91 II. Language, Metaphor, and Form in Jerome-Joseph de Momigny’s 108 Analysis of Mozart’s String Quartet in D Minor (K. 421) III. Anton Reicha Presents: The Marriage of Figaro 124 IV. Recomposition in William Rothstein’s Phrase Rhythm in Tonal Music 138 Chapter Three 157 Possible Mozarts: Recomposition and Counterfactual Logic I. Counterfactual Conditionals and Possible World Semantics 160 II. Representing Possible Worlds 167 III. Modal Realism 178 IV. Carl Czerny on Mozart’s Sonata in D Major, K. 381 185 V. Fétis, Weber, and Mozart’s “Dissonance” Quartet, K. 465 195 VI. On Musical Realism 205 vi Chapter Four 216 Recomposing the Listener in Contemporary Formenlehre I. Structural Listening, Plastic Listening 224 II. Sonata Theory: Listening to Dialogic Form 243 III. Form-Functional Theory: Listening to Ideal Types 249 IV. Recomposition in Sonata Theory 254 V. Recomposition and Formal Functions 266 VI. Listening to and Recomposing Haydn’s Symphony No. 46, 2nd mvt. 282 Chapter Five 301 Music Theory on the Radio: Excavating Hans Keller’s Functional Analyses I. Functional Analysis and Unity: Deciphering Keller’s Theory 309 II. Keller’s FA1: Mozart’s String Quartet in D Minor, K. 421 315 III. Motivic Trees, Chains, and Networks 324 IV. Listening to Abstraction 337 Conclusion 343 Works Cited 347 vii List of Figures Figure 0.1: W.A. Mozart, String Quartet in C Major, K. 465, I, mm. 1–4 1 Figure 0.2: Weber’s Initial Recomposition of Mozart, K. 465, I, mm. 1–3 4 Figure 0.3a: Michael Rogers’ Analysis of Chopin, Prelude in E Minor, Op. 28, No. 4 20 Figure 0.3b: Recomposition of Chopin, E Minor Prelude, mm. 19– “21” 20 Figure 0.4: Three recompositions of Chopin, E Minor Prelude 23 Figure 1.1: William Rothstein’s Foreground Reduction of Strauss, “Blue Danube” Waltz 27 Figure 1.2: Rothstein’s Durational Reduction of Strauss, “Blue Danube” Waltz 28 Figure 1.3: Rothstein’s Lightly Annotated Score of Mozart, Piano Sonata in 30 A Major, K. 331 Figure 1.4: Rothstein’s Recomposition of Mozart, K. 331, mm. 5-8 30 Figure 1.5: Recomposition of K. 331, I, showing a full measure of post-cadential fill 32 Figure 1.6: Recomposition of K. 331, I, showing phrase overlap and new material 33 Figure 1.7a: Haydn, Piano Sonata in A! Major, Hob. XVI-46, I, mm. 22.3-38 35 Figure 1.7b: Rothstein’s recomposition of Haydn, Piano Sonata in A! Major, mm. 27-38 36 Figure 1.8a: William E. Caplin’s Analysis of Mozart, Symphony No. 40, I, mm. 1-14 38 Figure 1.8b: Caplin’s Recomposition of Mozart, Symphony No. 40 38 Figure 1.8c: Attempted completion of Caplin’s recomposition of Mozart, 39 Symphony No. 40 Figure 1.9: Hans Keller’s Account of Mozart, Piano Concerto in C, K. 503 40 Figure 1.10: The Who, “Bargain,” original and recomposition 43 Figure 1.11: Rothstein’s recomposition of Chopin, Nocturne in B Major, Op. 62, No. 1 48 Figure 1.12: Haydn, String Quartet in B! Major, Op. 71, No. 1, I, mm. 1-2 52 Figure 1.13: Beethoven, String Quartet in E! Major, Op. 127, ii, m. 51 58 Figure 1.14: Excerpt from Beethoven’s letter to Prince Galitzin 59 Figure 1.15: Corelli, Sonata Op. 5, mm. 59–62, with fundamental bass analysis 66 Figure 1.16: Descending thirds in “Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt” settings by Wolf and 72 Schubert Figure 1.17a: Chopin, Mazurka Op. 67, No. 2, mm. 1–17 75 Figure 1.17b: Corresponding output from David Temperley’s key-finding algorithm 75 Figure 1.17c: Temperley’s recomposition of Chopin’s Mazurka, Op. 67, No. 2 76 Figure 1.18a: Beethoven, Symphony No. 5, 2nd mvt., mm. 1–8 79 Figure 1.18b: PDQ Bach’s recomposition of the theme, from Quodlibet for 79 Small Orchestra (1993) viii Figure 1.19: Imagined tonal context for C-F" succession, from Lewin’s GMIT 80 Figure 1.20: Recompositions of Schubert’s “Morgengruss,” showing perceptual projections 81 Figure 2.1: An example of fundamental bass notation 92 Figure 2.2a: Corelli, Violin Sonatas Op. 5, No. 1, m. 5 and mm. 9–10; annotations 96 by Rameau Figure 2.2b: Realization of Corelli’s figured bass 97 Figure 2.2c: Realization of Rameau’s figured bass 97 Figure 2.3a: Corelli, Violin Sonatas, Op. 5, No. 1, mm 1–2; annotations by Rameau 98 Figure 2.3b: Possible figured bass realization, based on Corelli’s figures 98 Figure 2.3c: Possible figured bass realization, based on Rameau’s fundamental 98 bass and figures Figure 2.4: A more syntactic fundamental bass line for Figure 2.3a 99 Figure 2.5: Corelli, Sonata Op. 5, first Allegro, mm. 59–62, with fundamental 102 bass analysis Figure 2.6. The first page of Momigny’s analysis of W. A. Mozart, String Quartet in D 109 Minor, K. 421, I Figure 2.7: Notable Moments in Momigny’s Text Setting 116 Figure 2.8: Momigny’s Analysis, mm. 17–24. 121 Figure 2.9: Momigny’s Analysis, mm. 85–95. 123 Figure 2.10: Anton Reicha’s Grand coupe binaire. Printed originally in Traité de haute 125 composition, Vol. II, 300. Figure 2.11: Anton Reicha, Table of Musical Ideas from Mozart, Overture to 133 Le nozze di Figaro Figure 2.12: Mozart, Le Nozze di Figaro, Overture (piano reduction) 134 Figure 2.13a: Beethoven, Piano Sonata in A Major, Op. 2, No. 2, I, mm. 21-37 142 Figure 2.13b: Rothstein’s Recomposition of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata in 143 A Major, I, mm. 29-34 Figure 2.14a: Beethoven, Piano Sonata in G Minor, Op. 49, No. 1, I, mm. 1-16 145 Figure 2.14b: Rothstein’s recomposition of Beethoven, Op. 49, No. 1, mm.