THE SHAPING OF TIME IN ’S ÉMILIE: A PERFORMER’S PERSPECTIVE

Maria Mercedes Diaz Garcia

A Dissertation

Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

DOCTOR OF MUSICAL ARTS

May 2020

Committee:

Emily Freeman Brown, Advisor

Brent E. Archer Graduate Faculty Representative

Elaine J. Colprit

Nora Engebretsen-Broman © 2020

Maria Mercedes Diaz Garcia

All Rights Reserved iii ABSTRACT

Emily Freeman Brown, Advisor

This document examines the ways in which Kaija Saariaho uses texture and to shape time in her 2008 opera, Émilie. Building on ideas about musical time as described by

Jonathan Kramer in his book The Time of Music: New Meanings, New Temporalities, New

Listening Strategies (1988), such as moment time, linear time, and multiply-directed time, I identify and explain how Saariaho creates linearity and non-linearity in Émilie and address issues about timbral tension/release that are used both structurally and ornamentally. I present a conceptual framework reflecting on my performance choices that can be applied in a general approach to non-tonal music performance. This paper intends to be an aid for performers, in particular conductors, when approaching contemporary compositions where use the polarity between tension and release to create the perception of goal-oriented flow in the music. iv

To Adeli Sarasola and Denise Zephier, with gratitude. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to thank the many individuals who supported me during my years at BGSU.

First, thanks to Dr. Emily Freeman Brown for offering me so many invaluable opportunities to grow musically and for her detailed corrections of this dissertation. I would also like to extend my sincere gratitude to Dr. Nora Engebretsen for her deep insights and guidance throughout my research and for having introduced me to concepts that have shaped my musical thinking. Also, thanks to Dr. Elaine Colprit for introducing me to music cognition, which has been critical to my development as a performer. I am grateful for my committee members, Dr. Brown, Dr.

Colprit, Dr. Engebretsen and Dr. Brent Archer for their help in the research and writing process and for their generosity with their time. I could not have completed this document without their knowledge and support.

I would like to thank everyone who made possible the performance of the opera Émilie which lead to this document: to the musicians for their generosity and openness, to Dr. Michael

Laurello for his role as sound designer and for helping with technical logistics. Thank you to the

Katzner Award for supporting this project. Especially thanks go to Dr. Hillary LaBonte, soprano, who sang wonderfully the role of Émilie.

I would like to thank the BGSU community for their continuous support in the artistic projects I did over my years of studies. To Dr. Marilyn Shrude, for always supporting with her presence every concert I was ever part of and for having had the vision of creating a very unique doctoral program where I had the opportunity to meet many interesting colleagues and musicians. vi

I cannot forget my “American” family who has been crucial to my academic success. I could not have done this without the unconditional love and support of my friends: Allen Otte,

Denise Zephier, Deb Helton and so many others.

Finally, thank you to my family: my parents Mercedes and Manuel, my brothers Manolo y Rafael and my partner in life Johannes, for giving me their love every single day. vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

INTRODUCTION ...... 1

CHAPTER 1. DEFINITION OF LINEARITY AND THE ORGANIZATION OF TIME IN

POST-TONAL MUSIC ...... 5

Linearity ...... 10

Non-Linearity and Problems of Categorization...... 13

The Role of Performers in the Shaping of Time ...... 14

CHAPTER 2. SAARIAHO’S MUSIC ...... 19

Timbre and Texture as Generators of Form ...... 22

Saariaho as an Opera ...... 28

CHAPTER 3. ÉMILIE. BRIEF SYNOPSIS AND FORMAL OVERVIEW ...... 33

Instrumentation ...... 42

Heterogeneity of Time ...... 44

CHAPTER 4. TEXTURE, TIMBRE AND TIME IN ÉMILIE ...... 47

Timbre and Texture as Generators of Form in Émilie ...... 48

Growth/Life/Decay and Sonic Expansion/Contraction ...... 54

How the Times Interrelate ...... 56

CHAPTER 5. CONCLUSIONS. TEMPORAL ANALYSES AND IMPLICATIONS FOR

PERFORMERS AND CONDUCTORS ...... 59

Performative Decisions ...... 61

Conclusions ...... 64

BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 67 viii

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page

4.1 Example Growth/Life/Decay ...... 55 ix

LIST OF TABLES

Tables Page

3.1 Meta-Sections in Émilie and Approximate Duration ...... 42

3.2 Predominant Temporal Focus by Scene ...... 45 1

INTRODUCTION

As a conductor, I have a strong interest in phrasing and how phrasing shapes the overall form, and in the performance and study of contemporary music. My early training as a conductor emphasized the study of phenomenology as developed by .1 That approach had a very strong focus on the study of formal structures and phrasing and on how to bring them out during performance. Direction or phrase towards a goal or climax is accomplished by extroversion or building of tensions and introversion or release of tension.2 During my doctoral studies at Bowling Green State University I learned about Jonathan Kramer’s studies of time, as well as about Albert Bregman’s “Auditory Scene Analysis”.3 These studies opened additional possibilities for score study in preparation for performance. Kramer’s ideas about different ways of organizing time4 have been particularly influential on my thinking: the linearity familiar from—but not exclusive to—tonal music, the different ways to express this linearity, including multiply-directed linearity, and the experience of non-linearity and its different expressions, such as in Moment time or Vertical time. I experienced the enormous possibilities of these theoretical approaches for performance and for listening to music.

1. Konrad von Abel, “Phenomenology of Music,” Musikproduktion Hoeflich, accessed November 27, 2019, https://www.musikmph.de/phenomenology-of-music/

2. Lucia Marin, “Basic Fundamentals of Phenomenology of Music By Sergiu Celibidache as Criteria for the Orchestral Conductor,” Theses and Dissertations (dissertation, University of Kentucky, 2015) https://uknowledge.uky.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1043&context=music_etds)

3. The term Auditory Scene Analysis (ASA) was coined by psychologist Albert Bregman and proposes that the human auditory system organizes sound into meaningful elements. Albert Bregman, “Progress in Understanding Auditory Scene Analysis.” Music Perception: An Interdisciplinary Journal 33, no.1 (2015), 12-19. Another interesting read is David Huron, “Tone and Voice: A Derivation of the Rules of Voice-Leading from Perceptual Principles,” Music Perception: An Interdisciplinary Journal 19, no. 1 (2001), 1-64.

4. Jonathan Kramer, The Time of Music: New Meanings, New Temporalities, New Listening Strategies (New York: Schirmer Books, 1988). 2

I realized there was very little written about time in post-tonal music, especially from the perspective of a performer. In post-tonal music, which lacks traditional harmonic progressions that establish a sense of goal-oriented directionality, composers have used other musical means to create linearity. Kaija Saariaho, for instance, has expressed an interest in creating direction in her music by using texture and timbre. I chose to write about a work by Saariaho because she is a composer I admire and, even more so, because she has expressed interest in creating form through texture and time and I chose her opera Émilie (2008) in particular because it was a work that I had the possibility to perform. Thus, the practical experiences I had in rehearsals and performances serve as a source of information for this dissertation.

When studying pieces that use texture and timbre structurally, as is the case in much of

Saariaho’s music, a conductor has to identify how the composer shapes the flow of time. When preparing Émilie for performance, I thought about how the musical elements do or do not create directionality in music. For instance, the score opens with suspended, floating harmonies and no clear perception of pulse. As the scene develops, however, aspects of tension and release become more prevalent through the use of contrasting sections, suggesting forward motion. I have identified the time-related challenges that are present in this piece for me as a conductor in hopes of developing a framework that will also be helpful in approaching similar pieces from the repertory. My intention with this paper is to create a guide that will facilitate the work of other performers and conductors, providing them with an informed perspective on issues of time in post-tonal works that use timbre and texture as the main structural elements.

This document is not an exhaustive analysis of Émilie, but rather a guide in how to think of the parameter of time in post-tonal music. This composition serves as an example of changing perspectives of time occurring within one work, and different ways in which this can be 3 accomplished by the composer and influenced by the conductor. My study is specifically focused on the use of time (not to be confused with ). The analyses of timbre and texture in this piece are undertaken from the singular perspective of time and how these elements influence time.

In the opening chapters of this document I survey existing work on time in post-tonal music generally and in Saariaho’s music in particular to provide background and context for my document, as well as introducing the reader to Émilie. Chapter 4 presents my findings on

Saariaho’s approach to time, and Chapter 5 explores the implications of these findings for performance. A brief overview of the chapters is as follows:

In Chapter 1, Definition of linearity and the organization of time in post-tonal music, I draw on relevant literature in the field to establish a theoretical framework for discussing concepts of linearity and non-linearity in post-tonal repertoire. Chapter 2, Saariaho’s Music, focuses on Saariaho’s music with a brief literature survey related to time and to the roles timbre and texture play in her music. In Chapter 3, Émilie, I provide a synopsis and formal overview of the opera, introducing the characters and the notions of heterogeneity of time inherent to the libretto as well as the concept of meta-instrument 5 and its use in this opera. Chapter 4, Texture, timbre and time in Émilie, is a continuation of the analysis initiated in Chapter 3, but focuses specifically on timbre and texture, and explores how those elements help shape the experience of time. I discuss several key concepts about how timbre and texture shape time such as the duality purity of sound versus noise or the multiplicity of voices, and present examples of how those are expressed in the composition. And finally, in Chapter 5, Conclusions. Implications for

5. Although the term Meta-instrument has been used in electroacoustic music to refer to an instrument invented in 1989, I am using the term meaning a grouping of instruments that form a unified timbral unit. More information about the electroacoustic instrument can be found in Anne Beetem Acker, “Meta-Instrument,” Grove Music Online, 2016. https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo- 9781561592630-e-4002294481 4 performers and conductors, I expose how an analysis of aspects of time can inform performance.

I give examples of specific decisions I made and examine the reasoning behind them. I also reconsider some of the decisions I made and explore critically how and why I would now make different interpretative decisions. 5

CHAPTER 1. DEFINITION OF LINEARITY AND THE ORGANIZATION OF TIME IN

POST-TONAL MUSIC

Music is purely an art of time, and the musician—with or without the composer—builds and regulates the experience of the speed of time passing. Time becomes matter in music; therefore composing is exploring time as matter in all its forms: regular, irregular. Composing is capturing time and giving it a form.6

Kaija Saariaho has explored notions of time and the shaping of time in her compositions throughout her career. In her opera Émilie, the concept of time is of great importance, not only in the libretto, which focuses on the memories of Gabrielle Émilie le Tonnelier de Breteuil,

Marquise du Châtelet, during the last days of her life, but also in the way the music expresses intersections between the past, the present and the future.

A performer must be aware of the intended musical narrative in addition to that suggested by the text. The performer is responsible for presenting a sequence of events (objective time), for engaging with the work’s narrative time (temporal disjunctions inherent in the libretto and their musical projections), and for the shaping of subjective “experiential” time. Sometimes a performer must reconcile these different experiences of time and understand how they interact with each other and how they contribute to shaping the overall structure of the piece. In this chapter, I review notions of time that are important to my discussion of Saariho’s opera Émilie, but also apply to other contemporary works.

Musicians often talk about time in terms of clock time or objective time,7 referring to time measured relative to metronome markings or other fixed indicators. Although, for pragmatic

6. Pirkko Moisala, Kaija Saariaho (Chicago: University of Illinois, 2009), 54.

7. Terms as found in Jason D.K. Noble, “What Can the Temporal Structure of Auditory Perception Tell us about ‘Timelessness’?” Music Theory Online 24, no. 3 (2018). http://mtosmt.org/issues/mto.18.24.3/mto.18.24.3.noble.html 6 reasons, we think of a musical performance as a series of events executed within an objective time flow, our perception of time, both generally and in music, is subjective. Music theorist

Alexandra Vojcic points to the role memory plays, for example, in our assessments of time:

“The process of relating and comparing temporal events is fundamentally subjective, as it relies on listener’s memory more than certain objective differentiation of musical objects.”8 She also mentions how expectations are formed by our experience listening to tonal music, and acknowledges the influence of chronometric time, specifically our relationship to the clock, in framing our expectations of time. “The near-constant reference to the regularly articulated sound of the clock, which symbolizes the passage of time, has perhaps conditioned us to a far more

Newtonian perspective than we would care to admit.”9

During the twentieth century, composers explored and experimented with different concepts of time in musical compositions. Technology, such as recording devices, and knowledge of music from other cultures, also had a strong influence in changing the music landscape. Some composers consciously attempted to avoid musical gestures connected to common-practice pitch or metric hierarchies, which would remind the listeners of tonal relationships. Schoenberg tried to break the idea of tonality by attempting to avoid relationships between the dominant and the tonic, creating sonorities that seemed to lack a sense of directionality. Other composers found inspiration in the sounds of non-Western traditions.

Debussy, in the fin de siècle, drew inspiration from the Gamelan in terms of sonorities and conception of time. Gamelan do not “drive” us to a goal in the music, which we call climax, but instead they create a perception of suspended time through repetition. The

8. Alexandra Vojcic, “A Sonorous Image of Time-Stretching in Birtwistle's ‘Harrison's Clocks’,” Perspectives of New Music 48, no. 1 (2010), 9.

9. Vojcic, “A Sonorous Image of Time-Stretching,” 9. 7 hierarchy between sounds that is characteristic of tonal music is not there. Gamelan music uses repetition that does not “grow” or develop. Debussy explored these non-goal oriented sonorities and experimented with repetitions and suspended harmonies that do not resolve. An example of gamelan influence in Debussy’s music is found in the last movement of his Nocturnes, “Sirènes”

(1899).10

Another composer who experimented with non-goal oriented compositions was

Stravinsky. He explored possibilities with combinations of uneven meters and with block-like musical structures. The combination of uneven meter creates unpredictability, which disrupts our efforts to identify linear regularity. Compositions in thematic blocks help negate linearity, since self-contained sections exist and change from moment to moment rather than participating in a developmental process.

In the mid-twentieth century, when technological experimentation associated with the beginnings of was starting to develop new sonic worlds, Stockhausen, perhaps influenced by the possibilities of recording and technology in music, explored sounds that remained static, which do not seem to lead anywhere but to stay in the moment. He defined this musical experience as Moment Form, a term that implies the experience of present time—of the moment, in opposition to directionality toward a future goal.11 Stockhausen developed these ideas about time in some of his compositions such as Momente or Kontakte.

10. Tamagawa presents a case of the influence of Javanese Gamelan music in Debussy’s compositions, in Kiyoshi Tamagawa, Echoes from the East: The Javanese Gamelan and Its Influence on the Music of (London: Lexington Books, 2019).

11. Moment Form has been defined as a “Term introduced by Stockhausen, implying that the listener’s concentration should be on the “moment” or section with some defined character which may last for a moment or over a minute (it is an enlargement of the concept of group). This kind of form is exemplified by Kontakt, Carre and most particularly by the work called “Moments”, which –in keeping with the principle that relationships between moments are not so important –allows changes in the ordering of sections.” Paul Griffiths, The Thames and Hudson Encyclopaedia of 20th-Century Music (London: Thames and Hudson, 1986). 8

Although this non-linear exploration of sounds became very important in the twentieth century, not all composers felt that they were able to express their musical ideas through non- linear compositions. Composers such as Carter, Ligeti and Lutoslawski, among others, continued exploring different concepts of time, including linearity. Elliott Carter expressed his interest in time-related subjects in this way:

Around 1945...I suddenly realized that, at least in my own education, people had always been consciously concerned only with this or that peculiar local rhythmic combination or sound-texture or novel harmony and had forgotten that the really interesting thing about music is the time of it—the way it all goes along.12

Carter felt that his contemporaries were exploring sonorities without much consideration for temporal aspects. He experimented with different experiences of time and developed complex metric modulation. He also created layers of different pulse-streams, which played together lead to simultaneous experiences of different times.13

But to understand the way music developed in relationship to the experience of time one has to be aware that new technology not only shaped the processes, the sounds, and understanding of time for composers but also affected our experiences as listeners. Recordings allow us to listen repeatedly to the same excerpts or to skip sections altogether, however we prefer. We can start and stop a recording at any moment in a piece. Non-linear pieces can, under repeat listening, be heard as linear. Listeners will become so accustomed to the recorded version that they will have expectations of what is going to come.14 Even mobile-forms,15 although

12. Jonathan W. Bernard, "Elliott Carter and the Modern Meaning of Time," The Musical Quarterly 79, no. 4 (1995), 644-82.

13. Brenda Ravenscroft, “Setting the Pace: The Role of Speeds in Elliott Carter’s ‘A Mirror on Which to Dwell’.” Music Analysis 22 (2003), 253–82.

14. Kramer, The Time of Music, 59-60. 9 composed to be different in every performance, can become fixed. Technology,16 as Kramer puts it, “has liberated listeners from the completeness of musical form.”17 However this is just one way in which technology has influenced the way we listen and create music.

Composers have been exploring different ways to organize time in music. Education in western countries has begun with the study of tonal music and the study of phrasing which predisposes us to look for and try to create linearity. Phrasing a piece of music implies being aware of relationships between the sounds, which are understood as hierarchies in tonal music.

The hierarchy found in music creates relationships of tension and release that build up to a goal or climax. This was studied by Sergiu Celibidache, the Romanian conductor who worked with, among other orchestras, the Munich Philharmonic and Berlin Philharmonic. He thought that linearity, even when implicit in the composition, could not be expressed unless performers were aware of these hierarchical relationships.18

Because performers largely start learning music with tonality,19 the thought of goal- directed linearity is often present in an approach to performing. But is it possible to encode linearity in post-tonal works? And if so, what is the role of the performer in projecting this

15. Mobile Form: “Term used by association with Calder mobiles in works of which composed sections may be arranged in time as chance or chance or choice disposes. This has been most usually a European sort of aleatory composition, practiced notably by Boulez (Third Piano Sonata, Domaines, Eclat), Stockhausen (Kavierstuecke XI, Momente), Berio (Epifanie) and others, though Brown too has created musical mobiles. Most works of this kind date from the late 1950s and 1960s; the greater interest in long-range harmonic process since then has brought about a decline, measured in Boulez’s successive revisions of his Pli selon pli.” Definition taken from: Paul Griffiths, The Thames and Hudson Encyclopaedia of 20th-Century Music (London: Thames and Hudson, 1986).

16. Here Kramer refers specifically to the possibilities of recordings.

17. Kramer, The Time of Music, 21.

18. Abel, “Phenomenology of Music.”

19. I am referring here to musical education in Western Countries. 10 linearity? Is it enough to perform the score-specified events? And when presented with non- linear events, what is then the role of the interpreter?

Linearity

We experience life as mostly linear, one event after the other, but this succession of events happens while we remember events of our past that shaped our present or project our aspirations into the future. Although technology has shaped our lives, giving us possibilities before unimagined, we still listen linearly. We can listen to the same excerpt over and over, and on our own, select parts of a full composition that was intended to be heard complete. We listen to mostly “perfect” recordings made in studios, chunking together pieces of the composition, but ultimately, we experience one event after the other, in linear progression. About this, Jonathan

Kramer writes: “Even the most non-linear music exists in time, however, and is therefore initially heard as a temporally ordered succession. Thus, linearity can never be banished totally from the musical experience.”20

Kramer, in his book The Time of Music, distinguishes between linear and non-linear music—music in which there is a perceived goal or that which does not express any predictability. Linear music is goal oriented. One event precedes the next and Kramer thinks that we can project forward, anticipating possible continuations or musical goals. Non-linear music, on the other hand, does not move towards anything. We cannot anticipate what is coming next.

Kramer differentiates between music which ‘becomes’ and music which simply ‘is’. Goal oriented music implies a movement towards something, while non-directed music is experienced in the present.

20. Kramer, The Time of Music, 62. 11

The concept of linearity has been a paradigm of tonal music for several centuries and shaped how performers thought of time in music. Linearity is based on hierarchical structures that create the experience of tension and release.21 Tonal music by definition is hierarchical. It is created around a tonal center to which all the other sounds gravitate. In tonal Western music we need to establish a center of stability (tonality) to then be able to move far from it. The further we go from the center the more tension it creates, as long as the center is still in our consciousness.

Tonal music has been defined in terms of connections, which are expressed on horizontal and vertical parameters. Every sound is believed to lead us to the next one and to create a series of hierarchical connections that take us to a point or section of greater tension or climax. By contrasting tension with its release we create a sense of motion and directionality, which results in the perception of linearity or goal oriented music. We reach this climax through tension created by the duality between stability and instability. This is often achieved in a gradual way.

Composers create a musical structure, form, which is often based on this idea of directionality.

The biggest moment of tension in the piece is reached through steps of tension and release and the general release is also accomplished gradually.

The concept of linearity in tonal music was studied in depth by Heinrich Schenker. He created a system that shows ways in which deeper structures of music interrelate to each other to create a “unity” in the piece. Although widely accepted for providing a framework to study tonality, Schenker’s theory has been criticized for leading to a “fundamentally mistaken concept of time in music”22 because it presents a synchronic experience of time, in which “present is collapsed into a single moment”. Synchrony is presented here as opposed to diachronicity. “The diachronic approach implies the unfolding of (musical) content along with the interpretation and

21. Kramer, 21.

22. Eugene Narmour quoted in Alexandra Vojcic, “A Sonorous Image of Time-Stretching.”9. 12 the understanding of such interpretation, whereas the synchronic encompasses the understanding of the plane of existence (such as a temporal vector), rather than its studies, represents a context specific and a culturally dependent approach to ongoing revision of temporal relations from the cognitive standpoint.”23

Also concerned with the concept of unity and linearity is the study of phenomenology of music, which explores the idea of directionality and hierarchical unity in tonal music. Sergei

Celibidache presented a framework to interpret linearity in tonal music for performers through understanding the relationships between the elements in music.

Linear music does not require that sounds move unequivocally in one direction. There can be different ways in which this linearity can be expressed. Sometimes the tension of a phrase is not resolved immediately but the resolution is shown somewhere else. Kramer names this multiply-directed time. “If the implication in every section is continually frustrated by the subsequent section but is often realized elsewhere then the musical time is Multiply-directed.”24

To understand how conventions are broken and linearity is created or evaded, we must understand musical conventions. Musical gestures of beginning, cadence or ending have been thoroughly studied relating to tonality, but composers have also used those musical gestures outside of the tonal language. A musical gesture for ending a piece that happens in the middle of a piece breaks our expectations that relate to this musical gesture of closure. What happens after this closing gesture will have a different meaning related to our experience of the time. The past happens here ‘in the future’. Musical time, therefore, is shaped by conventions that create expectations in the listener.

23. Vojcic, “A Sonorous Image of Time-Stretching”, 35.

24. Kramer, The Time of Music, 58. 13

“Gestural time [...] depends on our recognizing the shapes and hence understanding the implied meanings of gestures.”25 Those gestures have been mainly attached to the idea of tonality and its conventions, such as cadences, beginnings, etc. but Kramer believes that we recognize those gestures in non-tonal music as well. Kramer proposes the example of Roger

Session’s No. 2 (1951: “(it possess a more comfortable linearity that is still not dependent on tonality. It depends instead on unmistakable gestures (such as opening, cadences, climaxes and transitions that are shaped by the composer and presumably, performers, to be recognized and thus to function in the composition.”26 In this example Kramer describes how

Sessions is able to create linearity referencing common tonal gestures, without using tonal pitch relationships such as the fifth and tonic.

Non-Linearity and Problems of Categorization

Music frees us from the tyranny of absolute time. In its ability to create unique temporalities, music makes the past-present-future exist on a plane other than that of the earlier-simultaneous-later.27

In music where sections do not seem to lead to one another, but are “self-contained”, they create

“moments”, which in the context of the work are not pieced together to create a unity. Kramer calls this Moment Time, which he considers a subsection of non-linearity. He defines another subsection, more extreme than the concept of non-linearity, as Vertical time. Vertical time relates to the concept that other theorists have defined as timelessness. Composer and music theorist,

Jason Noble, explores the difference between what he calls human time and timelessness.

“Music whose temporal organization optimizes human information processing and embodiment

25. Kramer, The Time of Music, 151.

26. Kramer, 60.

27. Kramer, 161. 14 expresses “human time,” and music whose temporal organization subverts or exceeds human information processing and embodiment points outside of human time to timelessness.”28

Categorization of time in music is not easy, as it is open to interpretation. There are fundamental problems to this categorization: it is not immediately obvious to which category a piece belongs, and often “compositions do not consistently exhibit one species of time on every hierarchical level. […] The temporality of music is far too complex to be explained in any depth solely by categorization.” 29 The book The Time of Music is full of apparent contradictions.

Kramer often uses the language of Schenkerian analysis to express different levels of significance in music. He talks about contradictions between the foreground, middle ground and background in how music elements are expressed, such as time. Sometimes the contradictions of interpretation can be also due to the particular performance. Performers can—and do— shape our perception of time in any given piece. A performer’s choices of tempi and their decisions about phrasing, how those phrases interrelate, and how sections connect, etc. will offer different experiences to the listener.

The Role of Performers in the Shaping of Time

To what extent are these temporal modes really properties of music and to what extent are they imposed on a composition by listeners or performers?30

Before introducing specific challenges for performers in the shaping of time, I should make a distinction between tempo and time for the purpose of this study. As I mentioned at the beginning of this study, performers are often concerned about metronomic aspects of music for practical reasons, but this “mechanical” aspect of performance is also decisive in the way

28. Noble, “What can the Temporal Structure of Auditory Perception tell us about ‘Timelessness’?”

29. Kramer, The Time of Music, 58.

30. Kramer, 59-60. 15 performers shape elements of time. Time and tempo are deeply connected and influence each other in ways that are often imperceptible. We do not hear tempo; we hear sounds and their relationships, and yet a good choice of tempo will allow listeners to perceive those relationships that happen in the music. The choice of a good tempo should be one that respects the composer’s intention, but also that allows the music to be “heard”, meaning that it will take into consideration aspects such as the of the instruments and the hall. Christopher Hasty points out that we customarily “identify time with the process of change . . . mistak[ing] time for events, forgetting that it is the events that occur quickly and not time itself.”31 Arnie Cox likewise has expressed that:

To speak of the perception of time and of temporal motion is usually to speak loosely. What we perceive are states, changes of state (state-change), and differences between states (state-difference), along with the temporality in our experience of these perceptions (yet-to-occur, occurring, and having-occurred, corresponding to anticipation, presence, and memory).32

Contemporary performers, such as have described this in more mundane ways, comparing choosing the right tempo with choosing the right suitcase,

The tempo is the suitcase. If the suitcase is too small, everything is completely wrinkled. If the tempo is too fast, everything becomes so scrambled you can’t understand it. And if the suitcase is much too large for what you are taking, all the objects inside swim inside and cannot really stay in place as they are supposed to. If the tempo is too slow for the content, the whole energy of the music dies away and there is no continuation.33

31. Christopher Hasty, “On the Problem of Succession and Continuity in Twentieth-Century Music,” Music Theory Spectrum 8, no. 1 (1986), 58–74.

32. Arnie Cox, Music & Embodied Cognition: Listening, Moving, Feeling, & Thinking (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2016), 133.

33. Daniel Barenboim, “The Phenomenon of Sound,” DanielBarenboim.com, accessed November 18, 2019, https://danielbarenboim.com/the-phenomenon-of-sound/ 16

This is not only a contemporary concern. Richard Wagner wrote in 1869 about this dichotomy about tempo and time. He thought that the right tempo was the one that would allow the music to be “sung”. He believed that the “melos” (melody in all its aspects) determined the right tempo. In his book On Conducting he writes about an experience he had when he heard

Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony played at the “right tempo”, which allowed all the connections and hierarchies to be expressed: “And that superb orchestra sang the symphony. The possibility of its being well sung implies that the true tempo had been found: and this is the second point which impressed me at the time.”34 Wagner explained why this happened and why the orchestra was able to express the deep structures of the symphony: “The right comprehension of the

MELOS is the sole guide to the right tempo; these two things are inseparable; the one implies and qualifies the other.” 35

The choice of tempo should not be done arbitrarily, but after deep study on the structures and elements that compose the music. Then we need to decide what elements we should bring out in the music that will help express better the structure of the piece. Each tempo will bring out in performance slightly different aspects of the composition. For instance a slower tempo will allow us to hear the intricacies of more complex music, such as polyphony, harmony, etc., so listeners can be more aware of inner voices. But a tempo that is too slow might make listeners miss the larger structure of the piece, losing the connection between parts. A tempo that moves forward in certain passages might allow more direction in the phrasing, facilitating a better connection between the different parts of the music, or we might need to take tempo slightly slower to create more tension by delaying relationships between sounds. Tempo therefore is a

34. Richard Wagner, On Conducting: A Treatise on Style in the Execution of Classical Music, trans. Edward Dannreuther (New York: Dover Publications, 1997), 18.

35. Wagner, 18. 17 help to the expression of the time in music, to manifest, in the case of tonal music, the linearity subjacent to it, and in other post-tonal works, the expression of time that is expressed under the .

In my interpretation of the opera Émilie, I had to make decisions on tempo trying to be as close as possible to the intentions of the composer. There were other aspects to consider, however, such as acoustic properties of the performance hall and reverberation, as well as others in relationship to the “flow” of the music. For instance, in moments where I intended to create more directionality in the music, because I interpreted that to be the composer’s intention, I used slight variations of tempo to propel the music to reach a climax. In other moments that I interpreted as non-linear, I suspended time to emphasize the “timelessness” of a certain section, or on the contrary, I moved the tempo forward to not lose the flow of the piece. Those decisions of tempo, which I explain more specifically in Chapter 5, were informed by the large-scale temporal dimensions of the piece.

I have mentioned how performers often think about ways in which sounds are connected among themselves. A sound is connected with the sounds that it immediately precedes and follows. But sounds are also connected with previous sounds or sounds yet to come, as in motives or themes that are repeated throughout the piece or in gestures that are conventional.

Performers look for material that is repeated or that is novel, to make sense of the world of sonorities that each work of music brings us to, and strive to show the shaping of phrasing, the structure, and the inner intricacies of a piece. Performers also look for connections between the multiple parts in an attempt to deliver a performance that is deeply connected to the profound aspects of the music and not only what is the superficial. 18

It is also the performer’s job to bring out structural aspects of music, and to understand as well as possible what the intentions of the composer were and the context in which the composer wrote the piece. In the case of Émilie, how does a conductor reconcile the different time expressions of the text and the music? And can we interpret a piece as linear even if there are non-linear sections in it?

The study of time has been a particular fascination of mine since I started studying conducting. I wanted to find the relationships between the sounds, not what the sounds, or physical elements were, but more than anything else what lies in between. The superficial aspects of music are what can be seen at first sight on the paper such as the pitches, , even the , but there is more that cannot be seen and the performer needs to discover as s/he works on the piece. Time is one of those elements that stays hidden from the eye and ultimately resists to be defined. 19

CHAPTER 2. SAARIAHO’S MUSIC

Music is purely an art of time, and the musician—with or without a composer, builds and regulates the experience of the speed of time passing. Time becomes matter in music; therefore composing is exploring time as a matter in all its forms: regular, irregular. Composing is capturing time and giving it a form.36

While Kaija Saariho’s music has often been described as “timbral”, timbre and time are profoundly interrelated. Although expressed by timbre, the experiences of attack, sustain, decay and release are fundamentally temporal. “The stasis or dynamism of each part—its temporal form—is inherently linked to the consonance or dissonance of its harmony-timbre—its content.”37 This chapter explores existing works that study how Saariaho shapes time through timbre. I also talk about Saariaho as an opera composer and how she uses elements from traditional opera, such as musical gestures,38 that connect us temporally with linear elements of tonal music.

Saariaho’s work, strongly influenced by electronic music composition and Spectralism, stems from this influence in the use of timbre as a form-generating and time-shaping parameter.

Saariaho identifies French Spectralism as one of her influences. Spectralism’s techniques are based on computer analysis of the sound-spectrum and the projection of its inner dynamics into an acoustic space and time. It has influenced the treatment of sound in her music not only in the use of harmonies and , but also in the conception of time.39 Just as Spectralism shows the

36. Kaija Saariaho quoted in Pirkko Moisala, Kaija Saariaho (Chicago:University of Illinois, 2009), 54.

37. Michael Rofe, “Capturing Time and Giving it Form: Nymphéa,” in Kaija Saariaho: Visions, Narratives, Dialogues, Tim Howell, Jon Hargreaves, and Michael Rofe (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011), 93.

38. See the reference to Kramer’s analysis on Roger Sessions’ String Quartet No. 2 in Chapter 1 about how Sessions creates linearity with the use of musical gestures.

39. Kaija Saariaho, Biography (accessed October 1, 2019) https://saariaho.org/biography/ 20 interconnectedness of timbre and harmony, Saariaho’s music also illustrates the relationship between timbre and time, as I will show in Chapter 4.

Gérard Grisey, one of the pioneers of Spectralism along with Tristan Murrail, acknowledges the importance of time in spectral music40 by stating, “Strengthened by an ecology of sounds, no longer integrates time as an external element imposed upon a sonic material considered as being ‘outside-time’, but instead treats it as a constituent element of sound itself ”41 Time is therefore an aspect of sound’s process and unfolding, rather than time as measured through or perceived in relation to an externally imposed grid, whether clock time or a hierarchical metered time-grid.

Kaija Saariaho’s concept of music developed throughout her years of study and beyond.

She began her studies of composition in , at the , and went on to study in the summers at the ,42 where she heard for the first time the music of the

French Spectralists Murail and Grisey. This musical encounter had a very big influence on her music and led her to explore further those compositional techniques and concepts developed by the Spectralists. In 1982, she started her work at the Institut de Recherche et Coordination

Acoustique/Musique (IRCAM) in Paris, where she continues to work today. Since the 1980s, she

40. “Spectral music” has been defined as “A term referring to music composed mainly in Europe since the 1970s which uses the acoustic properties of sound itself (or sound spectra) as the basis of its compositional material.” , "Spectral music," Grove Music Online, 2001. https://www-oxfordmusiconline- com.ezproxy.bgsu.edu/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e- 0000050982.

41. , “Did you say Spectral?”, trans. Joshua Fineberg, Contemporary Music Review 19 no. 3 (2000), 2.

42. The Darmstadt school is how the Summer Courses for New Music (Internationale Ferienkurse für ), founded after the Second World War in 1946 are known. “The courses had two main goals: first, to propagate American political and cultural values as part of the general Allied effort to reeducate the German population in preparation for the establishment of democratic institutions; and second, to provide a meeting place where musicians from the former fascist or fascist-occupied areas of Europe — chiefly Germany/Austria, France, and Italy — might further their musical reeducation through exposure to (and instruction in) styles and techniques that had been prohibited or otherwise silenced during the fascist years.” Richard Taruskin, "Chapter 1 Starting from Scratch," Music in the Late Twentieth Century, Oxford University Press (New York, USA, n.d.) accessed December 14, 2019. https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume5/actrade-9780195384857-div1-001008.xml. 21 has written for solo instruments with electronics, for chamber ensembles, and orchestra. And, although in 1984 Saariaho had thought that opera was an “outdated art form,”43 she has become widely known as an opera composer. After the success of her first opera premiered in 2000,

L’amour de loin, Saariaho composed (2006), the oratorio

(2006) and Émilie (2010)44 at the Lyon Opera. Even though her music has a contemporary aesthetic, she has recognized the influence of Wagner’s music in her operas,45 especially the opera Tristan und Isolde. She has been able to successfully combine the experiences of time in contemporary music—both linear and non-linear, with the plot line often associated with opera.

Contemporary aesthetics have explored concepts of time that go beyond linearity.46 At the end of the 1980s and especially in the 1990s composers were more open to a plurality of musical esthetics, including juxtaposition of musical styles and nonlinear narratives.47

The publication of Visions, Narratives, Dialogues by Tim Howell, Jon Hargreaves, and

Michael Rofe, and Kaija Saariaho by Pirkko Moisala manifest a growing interest in Kaija

Saariaho’s music in recent years. These books are dedicated entirely to her life and work, presenting musical analyses of her most emblematic works until 2010. Included in Howell, et al’s book, are the important essays on time in Saariaho’s music by musicologists Michael Rofe and Daniel March. I will draw upon many of their concepts in my analysis of Émilie. This is not intended to be an exhaustive summary of the literature, but to serve as an overview of how

43. Tiina-Maija Lehtonen, “Kaija Saariaho: Värien säveltäjä” [“Kaija Saariaho: The Composer of Colours”], Synkooppi, 2 (1984), 49.

44. All dates refer to the year of premiere.

45. Saariaho, Kaija, “Musiikissa, musiikista, musiikkiin” [“In Music, on Music, into Music”], in Pekka Hako and Risto Nieminen (ed.), Ammatti: saveltaja [Composing as a Profession] (Helsinki: 2006), 131.

46. See Chapter 1 for definitions of time.

47. Liisamaija Hautsalo, “Whispers from the Past: Musical Topics in Saariaho’s Operas,” in Kaija Saariaho: Visions, Narratives, Dialogues, ed. Tim Howell et al. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011), 110. 22 current musicologists and theorists describe Saariaho’s use of timbre and texture to mark time and define form, and how timbre and texture relate to the notions of time in the preceding chapter.

Timbre and Texture as Generators of Form

Discussion of pitch organization in isolation is therefore problematic, given all the performance variation that in reality shape the sound; the listener is more likely to perceive a broader gestural shape; sonic expansion. This expansion occurs simultaneously across harmonic and timbral aspects of the music: not only do we move from unison to chord, but also from silence to mf, from timbral purity to timbral diversity, from simplicity to complexity. This type of parametric conflation reveals the strong influence of Saariaho’s spectral research. In physical terms, harmony and timbre are closely related phenomena.48

Analyses that describe the concept of timbre as a determinant factor in shaping Saariaho’s music in connection with Spectralism include Daniel March’s analysis of Cendres (1998).49 Cendres is a piece for , cello and piano written in 1998. In his analysis of this piece March describes the ways in which the shape of the music is created and the way in which electronics have influenced Saariaho’s compositions for acoustic instruments: “[Cendres] displays evidence of their composer’s experience with electronics, and both particularly represent ways of imitating electronic processing through acoustic instruments. This is clearest with the use of resonance— resonances that evolve or that modify the sonority thrown into it— and the use of gradual transformation, parameter by parameter.”50 Cendres starts with an E-flat 2 in piano and cello.

The cello alternates between sul tasto and sul ponticello, which creates very different timbres; from purity to a “dirtier” sound. This initial E-flat 2 is then played out throughout the

48. Rofe, “Capturing Time and Giving it Form: Nymphéa,” 83.

49. Daniel March, “From the Air to the Earth: Reading the Ashes,” in Kaija Saariaho: Visions, Narratives, Dialogues, ed. Tim Howell, et al. (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011), 15-40.

50. March, 15-40 23 instruments with harmonies from the series. This phenomenon of expansion of sonority is then resolved in a new sonic center in measure 14, where it arrives to C#, shifting E-flat as the sound center to C#. The following process implies a removal of pitches from the top and bottom of the harmony from the beginning,51 which can be understood as a composed realization of an electronic process of filtering.52

Another example of an imitation of a filtering process executed by acoustic instruments is the one found between measures 35 and 37. In this case the music divides into two streams. The upper stream widens the filter to get to an interval of a seventh. That widening of the intervals creates a sense of expansion.

Another piece where we can hear the phenomenon of sonic expansion is Nymphéa. This piece from 1987 was written for string quartet and electronics and constitutes part III of

Saariaho’s Jardin Secreto trilogy. At the beginning of Nymphéa there is an expansion of pitch space implying the passing of time, but not necessarily motion towards a goal.53 It could be described as an opening as musical space. This experience of movement without a direction relates to concepts of non-directed time, such as vertical time. Music seems to move, but there is no arrival anywhere. In the examples presented above Saariaho uses timbre to shape time. Even when there is no direction implied, there is movement.

The study of pitch in isolation from other elements of the music is therefore insufficient.

It does not give us enough information about the context or about the shaping of time. Rofe has stated that,

51. March, “From the Air to the Earth,”25.

52. Filtering has been defined as: “An electrical circuit that emphasizes or eliminates some frequencies from a signal. Filters are used in electronic music to alter the harmonic content of a signal, which changes its timbre.” Definition found in: Fandom, “Electronic Music. Filter” (accessed December 12, 2019). https://electronicmusic.fandom.com/wiki/Filter

53. Rofe, “Capturing Time and Giving it Form: Nymphéa,” 83. 24

Discussion of pitch organization in isolation is therefore problematic, given all the performance variations that in reality shape the sound; the listener is more likely to perceive a broader gestural shape: sonic expansion. This expansion occurs simultaneously across harmonic and timbral aspects of the music.54

Saariaho uses extended techniques such as glissandi with light finger pressure or increase of bow pressure that alter the timbre of the sound, creating additional harmonies, or distorting the sound. Not only do we move from unison to chord, but also from silence to mf, from timbral purity to timbral diversity, from simplicity to complexity. Rofe explains that harmony and timbre are related to one another.55 Because of the alteration of timbre through extended techniques, the listener hears those changes as changes in harmony.

Another way in which Saariaho has explored timbre, texture, and the concepts of sound purity and impurity, is through a duality which she has named, tension/stasis.56 This concept of shaping music in time with two contrasting elements is also used in Im Traume, a piece for cello and piano. It is constructed out of two distinct textural entities: a harmonic ground, which creates stability, and a disruptive element of sudden changes of color and texture.

I began to use the sound/noise axis to develop both the musical phrases and larger forms, and thus to create inner tensions in the music. In an abstract and atonal sense the sound/noise axis may be substituted for the [tonal] notion of consonance/dissonance. A rough, noisy texture would thus be parallel to dissonance, whilst a smooth, clear texture would correspond to consonance.57

54. Rofe, 83.

55. Rofe, 85.

56. Vesa Kankaanpää, “Dichotomies, Relationships: Timbre and Harmony in Revolution,” in Kaija Saariaho: Visions, Narratives, Dialogues, Tim Howell et al. (ed.) (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011), 161.

57. Kaija Saariaho, “Timbre and Harmony: Interpolations of Timbral Structures,” Contemporary Music Review 2, no.1 (1987), 94. 25

This contrast between purity of sound and noise or dissonance contributes to creating linear time and shaping the phrase. It can also be used to create form at large scale.

In Nymphéa this axis purity/noise is not only used as a generator of form, but rather as an ornament of the sound. Because the timbre changes, we perceive the passing of time.58 It is change that is determinant. That is why when there is prolongation of sound, we hear it within the same sound world and there is not sense of change, and therefore of directionality. “Time— that is to say, linear, progressive time—inheres in expansion/contraction gestures more prominently than in prolongation gestures due to the extent of ordered directionality [...]

Perceptions of temporality follow on: time can be felt to pass “more quickly” in dynamic music than in static music—just as it would in tonal repertoire—-offering a means of building patterns of musical time within clock time.”59

The experience of tension/release is connected to the idea of linear thinking: music that moves to a goal. But as shown, this duality might be used by composers to explore different sonorities in a non-dynamic way. When noise is used not as a generator of tension that will necessarily be released, but as an exploration of the timbre, it does not imply a movement towards anything, but on a local level, an “ornament” of the sound. This differentiation between purity and noise as an “ornament” or as functional would depend fundamentally on the context in which these contrasts are found. When found on a large-scale, in relation to different sections of the work, it would most likely have a functional role, while on a local level it could be perceived uniquely as an embellishment.

The music could imply motion but without direction, showing a contradiction between linearity and motion. It seems to transport us, but fails to take us anywhere.

58. Rofe, “Capturing Time and Giving it Form: Nymphéa,” 87.

59. Rofe, 87. 26

It is as if the listener is rooted in the mud, observing, and stirred by, a series of diverse conditions that pass him or her by, rather than being actively transported between musical states. This sensation is remarkably common, at least for the listener, in Saariaho’s work.60

Rofe distinguishes three different ways in which sound is used in relation to the experience of time: Expansion, prolongation and contraction. They correspond respectively to the natural phenomena of growth, life and decay.61 And in temporal terms they could be understood as linear, vertical and linear. Three distinct phases can therefore be heard over the initial 24 bars of Nymphéa, defined loosely as growth (expansion), life (prolongation) and decay

(contraction). These concepts relate to the natural world.62 The terms of growth, life and decay are not only connected to images of nature and life, which have constituted for Saariaho a strong inspiration in her work, but also to experiences of time. She has in fact, synesthetic abilities, so she sees music as colors.63 That is why images and analogies are often used in analyses of her music. In the analyses of Nymphéa, it should be noted that timbre, texture and time are intimately connected in many ways: expansion and contraction create a sense of movement, creating contrast between them, while prolongation implies stasis, and lack of temporality.

For Rofe,“Nymphéa demonstrates several means by which Saariaho manipulates the passing and parsing of time: dynamism and stasis as a way of controlling how quickly musical time is felt to elapse; reminiscence and variation as a way of highlighting the passing of clock time; interactions between the temporal domains of memory, perception and expectation; symmetry and asymmetry as a means of perceiving (dis)order; cyclic and linear modes of temporal evolution, and their effect upon the extent of directionality;

60. Rofe, “Capturing Time and Giving it Form: Nymphéa,”98.

61. Rofe, 98.

62. Rofe, 86.

63. Pirkko, Kaija Saariaho, 55. 27

teleological listening as one of several possibilities. Saariaho finds ways of integrating processes that seem, on paper, quite incompatible.64

Growth-life-decay shapes the overall form of Nymphéa. Rofe considers each of these patterns as a cycle and he considers it possible to hear the work as a series of cycles. He states:

“The form of Nymphéa might better be rationalized not as a linear succession of cycles, but as a cycle of cycles. In this model, the central core represents a single state of rest, from which the music expands into, and contrasts out of successive states of activity.” As Saariaho has noted, “a chord which is familiar [in this case not a chord, but a unison] somehow assumes the function of consonance”65 What functions as consonance and center of stability is therefore perceived depending on the context. The listener might not perceive the singular pitches or hear the timbral and textural simplification or complexity of the sound. The stable sound will be then the one that is closer to the sound extreme of the axis sound/noise.66

Rofe mentions symmetry as an important part of Saariaho’s compositional process.

“Saariaho’s aforementioned affection for symmetrical structures—and the distortion of those symmetries—carries significant structural function here through the (a) symmetrical packaging

(capturing) of time.” However, it is important to note the ways in which symmetry is perceived by the listener. Rofe writes “It is therefore fair to assume the possibility of large-scale directional listening: the background symmetry can take shape during the listening experience through evolving expectations.”67 A work with which Saariaho explores symmetry is Mirrors (1997, for

64. Rofe, “Capturing Time and Giving it Form: Nymphéa,” 102.

65. Saariaho, “Timbre and Harmony,” 122.

66. Rofe, “Capturing Time and Giving it Form: Nymphéa,” 97.

67. Rofe, “Capturing Time and Giving it Form: Nymphéa,” 96. 28 flute and cello, originally a CD-ROM game. The instructions indicate: “there should be always a mirror in one or several of the following musical dimensions: , pitch, instrumental gesture or timbre.” 68 While these instructions might allow the performers to create a sense of directionality, it is highly unlikely in a free form composition to create linearity. The compositional concept is close to mobile-form, which is by definition non-linear; however, the performer could project intentionally a sense of linearity. Would that be a valid or failed performance if it does not respect the composer’s intentions?

Another work that explores symmetry is Jardin Secret I for tape. In this work Saariaho tries to create new kinds of pitch hierarchies. However, how can she create this if she divides the scale symmetrically, like she does in this composition? Can we have linearity if there is not hierarchy? Kramer seems to think so. He thinks that “since linearity in tonal music can result in part from structures that do not operate in a tonal manner, we may reasonably expect to find linear processes that operate in textural, motivic, metric, and other domains of atonal music as well.”69 In Jardin Secret I, Saariaho creates interpolations between different scales, gradually moving each pitch in a scale towards a pitch in another scale. She worked however on “the ambiguity in the relationships between pitch, harmony, timbre and noise.” These ambiguities would lead to a non-linear conception of time.

Saariaho as an Opera Composer

Saariaho’s conceptions of time are also present in her operas. In them, she explores, through the use of a personal musical language and gestures common to traditional opera,

68. Kaija Saariaho, Mirrors (score notes) (London: Chester Music, 1997).

69. Kramer, The Time of Music, 170. 29 different temporal realities. Here I will present examples of how she has used these musical gestures in some of her earlier operas.

Despite her initial reservations with the art form, Saariaho has quickly become a very well known composer of opera. She has created a language that speaks to contemporary audiences. And although Saariaho’s music might lack the harmonic language of traditional opera, she is indebted to it.

Yet despite the lack of tonal harmony in Saariaho’s musical language, her operas often make repeated reference to recognizable musical gestures, passages and patterns; the structure, form, direction, rhythm or instrumentation of these passages resonates closely with certain standard musical conventions or topics. At times these reinforce textual content, but at other times they recur without any links with the text. Importantly, these topics often have their precise equivalents in a tonal frame of reference.70

In her operas, sound is not just shaped as part of form. It is also used to create familiar topics and tropes. By using those elements, the composer creates temporal relationships that can be experienced outside of the particular place, or by referencing internal themes, or gestures, they can be intra- and inter-opus/stylistic references. Those familiar references connect us with the temporal aspect of opera. They also help shape form as well, creating emotional states that express musically in terms of tension/release.

Saariaho does not only reference internal elements, such as repeated motives, but also external elements, such as dances. In the opera L’Amour de loin she references external elements that give further context. In particular, the use of the Tarantella dance serves as a reference to folk music, which is associated in this opera with the unnamed friend of the troubadour Jaufre.

This hierarchy is communicated above all through the music: the popular “folksy” tarantella belongs to the subordinates, and stands in contrast to the music of Jaufre

70. Liisamaija Hautsalo, “Whispers from the Past: Musical Topics in Saariaho’s Operas,” 112. 30

himself, which follows the conventions of troubadour music in its well-developed and refined nature.71

Other external references include the use of strong rhythms to imitate the sound of trotting horses which Jaufre, the troubadour, would ride. Saariaho alludes to this sound in the introduction to Act III.

Music also uses conventions and gestures to describe emotional states. One of these conventions is the descending second, pianto topic.72 The pianto (from the Italian piangere: to cry) comes from the renaissance madrigal but has also been used in contemporary music.73 The pianto is used not only to express sorrow, but in L’Amour is used in association with emotions of concern or hesitation. Another musical element associated with the story is the catabasis, a term that comes from old Greek and means descending. This is different from pianto in that it can be any descending gesture and not only a second. It represents the death or upcoming death of

Jaufre.

Another song associated with death is the berceuse, or cradle song. Although of course also associated with childhood, it has been linked to death since ancient mythology. “For instance, sleep and death—Hypnos and Thanatos—are brothers.”74 In L’Amour as well as in this song this is used in association with death as well as sleep. Saariaho’s second opera Adriana

Mater focuses on the love of a mother for her son in the context of a war and its extreme circumstances. Like in the opera Émilie, Adriana Mater has a woman as protagonist and takes on

71. Hautsalo, “Whispers from the Past: Musical Topics in Saariaho’s Operas,” 115.

72. Raymond Monelle, The Sense of Music: Semiotic Essays, (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2000), 17-18 and 66-79.

73. Torvinen, Juha, 2007, 225-36. Quoted in Tim Howell et al., Kaija Saariaho: Visions, Narratives, Dialogues (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011). 74. Pentikäinen, Juha, 1990:183 quoted in Tim Howell, et al. Kaija Saariaho: Visions, Narratives, Dialogues (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011). 31 a feminist stance. As in Émilie, Saariaho uses electronics that are modified75 in live performance.

In this opera Tzargo rapes the protagonist, Adriana, during the war. Of that rape a baby is Yonas.

Seventeen years after his birth, Yonas will confront his father, who has returned from the war blind and crippled. The pianto (crying) topic appears here again, as it did in L’Amour, to symbolize sorrow and pain. Here it is used particularly in the , which is associated with the character of Adriana.

The topic of war is not new to the opera genre, however, in this case, the war does not have its own music.76 Instead, Saariaho uses large sonorities and to describe war.

The topic of rape on the other hand is treated here quite graphically. The music describes the action of violence with descriptive sounds. Adriana shouts, ‘No!’ with no pitch written, while the orchestra creates a loud mass of sound.

The use of gestures in music has a meaning in terms of time. Their use connects us with a common past, connecting the with the large tradition of opera, in addition to allowing inner references within the piece. “The nightmare of modernism”77, as Raymond

Monelle has called it, no longer monopolizes the aesthetics of contemporary music. Saariaho seems to have brought us out from this nightmare, so that composers do not need to see opera as being directly at odds with their musical language, as did the generation of post-war modernists and their heirs. Rather, opera today can be a highly effective platform for contemporary composers, allowing them to create and experiment using a plurality of techniques and

75. To manipulate live electronics in performance Saariaho ask for an additional “performer” who sits with the rest of the orchestra and “triggers” the different effects indicated on the score. Karija Saariaho, Émilie: An Opera in Nine Scenes (London: Chester Music, 2008)

76. Hautsalo, “Whispers from the Past,”122.

77. Monelle, Raymond, The Sense of Music: Semiotic Essays (Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2000), 17-18 and 66-79. 32 aesthetics. Overall, it appears as if these whispers from the past are now contributing to the operatic narratives of the future, and they are doing so with a level of success that is appreciated by a significantly wide range of audiences.”78

78. Hautsalo, “Whispers from the Past,” 128. 33

CHAPTER 3. ÉMILIE. BRIEF SYNOPSIS AND FORMAL OVERVIEW

When I say “form” I mean precisely the idea that Vassily Kandinsky defined as the following: Form is the external manifestation of inner meaning.79

Saariaho’s intention of shaping form through inner meaning is shown in Émilie. Music and narrative are interconnected and inform each other, sometimes complementing and other times contradicting. In this chapter, I present a brief synopsis of the opera and the ways in which

Saariaho uses heterogeneity of time. I also describe the treatment of the instrumentation and how it is organized in what I call meta-instruments.80 This chapter presents the framework for the specific study of time that I will explore in Chapter 4.

Kaija Saariaho’s operas have dealt consistently with the characteristic themes of traditional opera:81 love, God, hate, violence and death. The opera Émilie is no exception to this.

It deals with the love of a mother for her child and with Émilie’s conflicting relationships with her lovers, but— and here it adds something exceptional in the world of traditional opera—this opera also manifests Émilie’s love for science and her passion for work.

Gabrielle Émilie le Tonnelier de Breteuil, Marquise du Châtelet was a French mathematician and physicist well known for her translation of Isaac Newton’s Principles of

Natural Science. A married woman, she had a long-term affair of about ten years with Voltaire, and in her last years she fell in love with Monsieur de Saint-Lambert, by whom she became pregnant. Émilie died in childbirth at the age of forty-three. This opera focuses on the last days of her life, in 1794, while she was pregnant and finishing her translation into French of Newton’s

Principia. The libretto, written by Lebanese author , focuses on the emotional

79. Saariaho, “Interpolations of Timbral Structures,” 93.

80. See definition in the introduction of this document. 34 dimension of these last moments of Émilie’s life. The text portrays a passionate and intense woman both in her private and professional worlds.

The opera, which is over one hour long, unfolds as Émilie is writing a letter to her lover,

Monsieur de Saint-Lambert. The nine scenes—Pressentiments, Tombe, Voltaire, Rayons,

Reencontre, Feu, Enfant, Principia and Contre l’oubli—focus on different aspects of her inner and outer life. There is no physical action on stage during this opera. Instead, Émilie is anxiously thinking about her future, remembering the past, and obsessively working on her translation.

Although she is the only character on stage, the composer uses all of her compositional resources, such as the use of electronics, to metaphorically bring other characters to the stage.

Voltaire and Monsieur de Saint Lambert, as well as Émilie’s father and her child, are all present in the opera, but only as channeled through her thoughts.

Although the opera is in nine scenes, I consider them to group into three meta-sections, as shown in Table 3.1. The first section, Section A, consists of Scenes I to III, introducing the characters and corresponding musical elements. Scenes IV to VII form the middle section, which

I call Section B. It can be understood as developmental, in that themes are transformed, characters are shown in more complexity, and Émilie experiences her most dramatic feelings.

Scenes VIII and IX are a reflection backwards on what has already transpired, and Saariaho brings back the main themes of Scenes I to III as a large-scale recapitulation, which I have called

A’.

More specifically, the first meta-section, Scenes I to III, presents the characters and the story. Scene I (Pressentiments) features Émilie’s premonition of her own death and introduce the character of Monsieur de Saint-Lambert, to whom Émilie starts writing a letter. This scene leads to the image of her grave in the very short Scene II (Tombe), and the section ends with the 35 presentation of another important character in the drama, Voltaire, in the eponymous Scene III.

With these three characters, Saariaho and Maalouf present the frame of a story that will develop in subsequent scenes.

The second meta-section, B, comprises two pairs of scenes. Scenes IV and V represent a duality between work and life in Émilie’s world. Scene IV, Rayons, is about her work on the translation of the physics book (the title refers to the rays of sun and their impact on the perception of color). Scene V, Rencontre, refers to Émilie’s reconnection with an aspect of her personal life that she thought was lost to her, passion for love. Scenes VI, Feu, and VII, Enfant, also connect with work and life respectively. Feu, fire, focuses on both describing the physical aspects of fire, and on remembering the emotional aspects of her passionate life connected with both love and work. She complains about her swollen body because of her pregnancy and expresses her fears for her unborn baby. At one moment during this scene she starts speaking in

English, probably addressing Voltaire, since that was the language they used to communicate between themselves, to tell him about her feelings in these very difficult moments. Émilie feels her death very close, and with that dark thought the next scene follows. Enfant is dedicated to her child. She worries about the future that waits for her child if she dies and hopes that her child will have a good life. Émilie gives her future daughter advice about how to live her life: “Distoi bien que le mode est a toi, ma fille, si seulemente to oses t’en emparer!” (Tell yourself that the world is yours, my daughter, only if you are willing to take it). Scene VIII, Principia, emphasizes Émilie’s intellectual work and focuses on Saint Lambert and Voltaire. This scene seems to float between her work and her memories about these two men in her life. The final scene, Contre L’oubli, focuses on describing part of Émilie’s translation while giving a farewell to life. 36

Aspects of instrumentation, tempo, rhythmic and pitch elements enhance the connection with the synopsis. The use of electronics transforms the sound of the soprano82 to create effects representing different characters in her mind. The orchestra accompanies Émilie, creating an ambience that makes us feel as though we were lost inside her mind. The harpsichord reminds us that she is an eighteen-century woman who played that instrument, but it is also used as a musical tool to propel us to the next thought or emotion through fast rhythms. Émilie is shown here as a human, complex, intellectual, and yet deeply emotional woman; Saariaho’s music continually moves us from one aspect of Émilie’s personality and life to another in these last moments of her life.

Scene I, Pressentiment, forebodings, initiates the opera with a non-tonal arpeggio from the harpsichord and ethereal, soft sonorities in the strings and percussion instruments. The sonority formed by the pitches B-D-Eb-F#-G will be a very important unifying musical element throughout the piece, but especially in the first and last scenes of the opera. Émilie is filled with foreboding, sensing her imminent death. She writes about her fears to Monsieur de Saint-

Lambert, lamenting his short responses to her letters, even though he reassures her that he still loves her “pourtant vous jurez que vous m’aimez encore”. She does not seem to believe him completely, commenting, “Que serait la réalité du monde sans la parure de l’illusion?” (What would be life without illusion?). The music reflects conflict between her premonitions and pain for her distant lover, but it also opens a window into the depth of her soul and her philosophy of life and love: “De vous aimer avec fureur; je n’ai jamais appris a aimer autrement.” (To love you with fury; I never learned to love differently).

82. The soprano performing Émilie sings through a microphone, which sends the signal to a computer, which transforms the sound and sends it back to the speakers. The resulting sound is the combination of the natural and modified sound. 37

Scene I is full of dramatic contrasts of tempo that create a feeling of emotional instability.

Saariaho uses tempo changes as structural part of this scene. The metronome markings show the tempo moving from quarter =48 to nearly twice as fast, quarter note =92, and the changes happen sometimes in a matter of just one measure. The sense of forward motion is created by the harpsichord’s very active rhythms, filled with sixteenth and thirty second notes.

Scene II, Tombe, Grave, is a short movement that takes us to the darkest moments of

Émilie’s last days. She is imagining what her gravestone will say when she dies, while reflecting on the words that Voltaire dedicated to her: “…La divine, la sublime Émilie”. The movement is built on two contrasting timbral sections between the strings and the winds. This scene has a clearer sense of pulse than the Scene I due to a steady rhythm of quarter in the . These contrasting sections are created in alternation, as if they were two independent blocks. The first section presented by strings and percussion has a rhythmic directionality with quarter and eighth repeated notes, while the winds interrupt this flow with a vertical sonority—a rhythmic unison of a half note. Here, Saariaho uses the descending minor second pianto (crying) gesture,83 perhaps the most significant musical gesture of this Scene. The glissando of a minor second, used in the cellos at the beginning of the scene, is part of the descending figure and contributes to the general atmosphere of sorrow.

Scene III is dedicated to Voltaire and it evokes memories of Émilie’s encounters with him. As it advances, Émilie hears Voltaire’s voice in her head mocking her. In this scene the composer uses live electronics modifying the voice of the soprano84 to produce something resembling a male voice in order to represent Voltaire. It seems to reflect on the ambivalent relationship Émilie might have had with Voltaire during those last times of her life, since she met

83. The Pianto gesture and Saariaho’s use in other operas are discussed in Chapter 2. 38 her new lover, by whom she is pregnant, while still together with Voltaire. This scene is characterized by driving rhythms and for the first time in the opera there is a meter of 6/8.

In these first two scenes Saariaho presents the characters and most of the thematic material to be developed: the pulsating rhythms, the triple versus duple rhythmic figures, and the suspended colorful, timbrally rich passages. After this section we seem to return to the beginning, to Scene I, for a moment in the sonorities heard. Here, floating harmonies characterized by an absence of clear pulse, initiate Scene IV and thus the B section. In Rayons,

Émilie’s thoughts seem to move erratically from her personal life and premonitions, back to her work. The music transitions almost without alteration between these two main subjects; the intensity of the emotions are expressed equally when reflecting about her work and her love life.

This Scene reflects the deep conflicts and emotions Émilie feels. Just as Émilie uses English with

Voltaire, she uses Latin when she quotes passages from Newton’s book that she is translating.

That change of languages increases the feeling of emotional instability that is so present during this Scene. In it Émilie introduces scientific concepts about the sun that she was working on while translating Newton’s work. The thematic musical material is mostly borrowed from Scene

I.

In Reencontre, Scene V, there is a jump back to the past. Émilie is thinking about the time before she met Monsieur de Saint Lambert, when she valued tranquility and thought that she would never feel passionate love for a man again. She thinks nostalgically about the times when she was just focused on her work, was at peace with her life and cultivated kindness:

“Pourtant je pensais avoir atteint l'âge paisible, je chérissait l'amitié, je courtisais la science, et je cultivais la sagesse.” (Yet I thought I had reached the peaceful age, cherished friendship, courted science, cultivated wisdom. This changed when she met Saint Lambert and Émilie expresses it 39 in this way: “Ma belle philosophie a fondu comme la givre.” (My beautiful philosophy melted like ice). During Scene V she goes back to the moment when this new love erupts in her life and transforms it. Scene V begins with a clarinet solo borrowed from Scene I. This solo creates feels very improvisational and is shared with other instruments in the woodwind section. The alternation between the wind instruments at the beginning creates direction forward in the music during the first seven measures. In the next section, beginning in measure eight, marked Sempre lento ma piu intenso, we hear something that evokes a heartbeat played by the . This motive, musically represented by the relationship between figures of sixteenth and dotted eights, as well as by their proportional equivalences, can be understood as musically expressing the figure of the unborn baby or the heartbeat of Émilie. It is used and varied throughout the scene beginning at measure 20. The relaxed rhythm in the timpani accelerates and transforms to reach a state of anxious feeling, which reaches a climax very quickly in measure 36. This transformed motive of a heartbeat is a main thematic element of this scene, creating forward motion throughout.

In Scene VI, Feu, Émilie continues feeling those deep conflicts and again goes back and forth between thinking about her work and personal life and, for the first time, she mentions people other than her last two lovers. She refers in the abstract to people who are talking about her roundness, probably making fun of her pregnancy at an advanced age. She expresses for the first time her conflict with her pregnancy, not about the baby she is carrying but about the social pressure and difficulties she is encountering having to confront it all by herself. The feeling of loneliness and desperation are very present all throughout the opera. The scene ends with Émilie saying once more that she feels close to death as she approaches delivery. 40

With this thought the music transitions to Scene VII, Enfant, dedicated to the child she is expecting. Here the music resembles a lullaby with calmer rhythms and less contrasting material, with delicate in the harpsichord passed to and from the percussion later in the movement. Enfant, like the previous scenes, does not superficially depict emotions, but shows a wide array of thoughts, feelings and deep human conflicts. In this scene Maalouf and Saariaho present the image of a mother who questions what life will await her child if she dies or if the child should be a girl. Émilie remembers times with her father, who encouraged her to be curious and to study, and wishes for a father like hers for her baby. Here again we hear the voice transformed by electronics, this time to represent Émilie’s father. She gives empowering advice to her baby girl about living in the world as a woman. She ends the movement with a very strong statement of self-affirmation: “Moi je refuserai jusqu’au bout de maudire ma passion tardive, alors même qu’elle m'entraîne vers le néant.” (I will refuse to curse my late passion to the very end, even as it drags me to nothingness). With this phrase she states her unapologetic attitude for having lived a passionate life, even if it is bringing her death. This passion is reflected musically in the fast gestures in harpsichord and winds.

With each scene we discover more about Émilie’s complex and deep inner life. In meta- section B, Saariaho develops the thematic material first presented in meta-section A. From the standpoint of the libretto there is a deepening in the emotions of Émilie and we start to understand more about her life and passions. We become more involved in the tumultuous last moments of her life. The opera expands on her passion for science, and her thirst for life and love, but also about the difficulties surrounding her last moments.

With Principia, Scene VIII, we start meta-section A’. This scene represents a musical and thematic return to the first meta-section. In Principia, which is also the title of the work by 41

Newton that Émilie is translating from Latin to French, she tells us that she is suffering more than anything else for not been able to finish her work. She describes her hectic schedule, waking up at 9 a.m., sometimes even at 8:00. At 3 p.m. she stops to make herself a coffee, going back to work at 4:00. She stops again at 10 p.m. to have dinner, resuming at midnight and continuing until 5 a.m. the next morning. Musically, Saariaho uses eighth notes in the marimba to create a steady pulse, which contrasts with the moments when she quotes excerpts of the translation, where there is a suspended feeling of pulse and a compound rhythm formed by steady eighths in the and first with half note triplets. She says she is almost finished, but she must review her proofs. The music accompanies creating an emotional intensity with very loud chords and a diminuendo played by the strings. She hopes to hold the book in her arms soon:

“Bientot je porterai mon livre dans mes bras.” The book is also her baby, like the one that she carries.

In the last scene Contre l’oubli, against forgetting, Émilie thinks about transcendence and leaving a legacy of her work. Although she will miss the colors, the dreams and life, in this scene she is saying goodbye to the world and preparing for her fall into oblivion. The piece ends with the harpsichord playing the same chord (B-D-E-flat-F#-G) with which the work began. It is a mirror of the beginning of the opera. In measure 15 we hear a repetition of the motive of Scene

II, Tombe, but this time the words that come with the music are very different, “et si je ne me relevais pas, il paraitra quand meme”. (If I never rise again, the book will still come out). The heartbeat motive comes in measure 54 before Émilie says: “la tete haute, le coeur amoureux.”

(The head high, the heart full of love). And it is heard again in measure 121 when Émilie is saying goodbye to the world, “I already miss the colours, I miss the dreams.” Scenes VIII and IX 42

represent a recapitulation using all the motives such as the pianto gesture, the non-tonal

arpeggiation and the “heartbeat” motive.

Table 3.1 Meta-Sections in Émilie and Approximate Duration

Meta-section A Meta-section B Meta-section A’

19 Min. 22 Min. 18 Min.

Pressentiments Tombe Voltaire Rayons Reencontre Feu Enfant Principia Contre L’Oubli

Scene I II III IV V VI VII VIII XIX

10 Min. 3 Min. 6 Min. 10 Min. 6 Min. 7 Min. 10 Min. 8 Min. 10 Min.

Instrumentation

The instrumentation is used throughout the piece in a consistent way, emphasizing blocks

of instruments grouped by families: strings, brass, woodwinds and, to a lesser degree percussion.

Meta-instruments are created through the combination of instruments from within these families:

strings are used frequently to create sonorities involving extended techniques that include trills

created between natural and harmonic sounds, sul ponticello and sul tasto,85 and the strings often

transition slowly from one to another to create a distinct timbral effect. The brass section uses air

blowing techniques that create a very soft, quasi-pitchless sound, and articulate entrances of slow

arpeggios that are created as a meta-instrument, combining the timbres of each one of the

85. Sul tasto and sul ponticello are string techniques about the placing of the bow. Sul tasto refers to the indication to perform the indicated passage with the bow over the fingerboard of the instrument, while sul ponticello indicates the performer to place the bow as close as possible to the bridge of the instrument. These techniques produce distinct sounds. Sul tasto produces a very soft sound, while sul ponticello produces a “dirtier” sound closer to noise. 43 instruments. The brass meta-instrument creates an effect of human voices. The is used as a more independent voice accompanying the singer, playing the same pitches Émilie’s character does. The woodwinds are used sometimes in this way as well and are heard frequently helping the singer with pitches. Like the brass section, they also create a meta-instrument combining entrances to create harmonies with the different colors of the instruments. The percussion section sometimes imitates the sonorities and rhythms of the harpsichord.

The harpsichord is treated differently from the other instruments in the orchestra. It reminds us that Émilie is an eighteenth-century woman, but also adds a personal element to the story as Émilie played harpsichord during her lifetime. Musically, it adds the motor rhythm that propels the music forward while other instrumental sections are used mainly for timbre. In the first movement, for instance, the written changes of tempo would not be perceptible if it was not because of the harpsichord rhythms. It is consistently a soloist voice and in a way is treated as another character of the story, or as Émilie’s alter ego. One instance of this is in Scene I,

Pressentiments. After Émilie says: “I sense forebodings” the harpsichord comments on her psychological state with a very insistent rhythm. Another instance where the harpsichord is used as in a similar manner is in Scene 4, Rayons. She says: “but then, one day I understood and felt wounded. I sought refuge in my other kingdom, the largest and wealthiest of them all and the most peaceful too, the kingdom of knowledge.” During this phrase the harpsichord comments on the difficulty of these emotions. The very rapid register shifts and rhythms accentuate the drama of this moment. At the end the harpsichord contradicts what Émilie says. After saying “the most peaceful”, the harpsichord goes on with rapid intense figuration to convey agitation. This reflects once more the conflicting emotions present throughout the opera. 44

Heterogeneity of Time

As in by James Joyce, where the whole novel narrates events that happen during a lapse of a few hours, in Émilie, chronometrical time and psychological time are different. Here the narrative combines the text of the letter Émilie is writing with her thoughts about her own life. The opera starts with Émilie writing a letter to St Lambert; the scratching of the quill is projected through electronic means. Soon she introduces us, as silent witnesses, to her own thoughts and feelings. The opera has a very intimate narrative—when Émilie talks to the audience she is talking to herself. The narrative moves between different times in her life. At moments, it moves from the past to the present, back to an imaginary and projected future, all of that while the chronometric time stays within a lapse of a few minutes or hours.

The future, present and past coexist in the libretto. The heterogeneity of time is present throughout the opera.86 The objective time—when it all happens, in some undefined present that might have lasted between a few minutes or a few hours, takes place while Émilie writes a letter to her beloved Monsieur de Saint Lambert. This experience of present time coexists with the psychological time of Émilie, which expresses much variety of emotions. During the opera we experience the flash-back to her life, and we get to know some of her deep sorrows, fears and passions that shaped her life, while she projects to the future the expectation for an unborn child, a girl, and of her own death.

To understand the connection between the scenes in terms of text narrative I have created a chart with the predominant times represented in each scene.

86. Bernard, "Elliott Carter”, 644-82. 45

Table 3.2 Predominant Temporal Focus by Scene

Pressentiments Tombe Voltaire Rayons Reencontre Feu Enfant Principia Contre L’oubli Present Future Past Past Past Present Future Present Future Future Present Present

Table 3.2 reflects a simplification and does not show the connections to musical

elements, but offers an overview of the general narrative of the opera. Often future, past and

present are intertwined through the musical elements. The scenes where the narrative is based on

the present are dedicated to Émilie’s work, such as Scene IV, Rayons, and Scene VIII, Principia.

In Rayons she talks about the principles of physics, and in Principia she describes her work

schedule. Even here the narrative is not linear, as Émilie often jumps from one thought to the

next, which takes us away from the main temporal line of the scene. In Scene II, Tombe, she is

imagining her own death, and how her grave will look. This is a projection to the future. With

the last phrase “Moi le opete, disait il, et toi la geometre”—I am the poet and you the geometer,

Saariaho leads us to the next scene, dedicated to Voltaire and their past relationship. This scene,

written both in French and English is dedicated to their common past.

In Scene IV, Rayons, measures 59 to 79, music accompanies and comments on the text

without giving a clear sense of directionality—it is not static, there is movement in the triplets

that accompany the voice, but the music does not seem to propel us anywhere. The repetition of

the same rhythmic patterns with minimum change of pitch plays with our expectations.

Repetition creates predictability but does not lead anywhere.87 The end of the phrase does

however direct us to the next one, which is also a new stream of thought. The present is

expressed by a “timelessness” feeling in the music, expressed by long notes.

87. Kramer talks in detail about vertical time in Chapter 12 “Time and Timelessness” in Kramer, The Time of Music. 375-397. 46

Scene IX, Contre l’oubli, connects us with the future. It is a projection of Émilie’s dark thoughts about her death. However, musically there is a return to the themes of the first three scenes. The last scene starts with the same pitches that are used in the first measure in Scene I in the harpsichord. Here we find a moment of heterogeneity where the narrative and the musical elements contradict each other. We hear something known while connecting to the future with the narrative. This contradiction between times adds emotional complexity, and ultimately

“humanity” to the opera.

We have seen how the heterogeneity of time is manifested in the plot and how different musical elements contribute to this. But how does Saariaho specifically create linearity or negate it? 47

CHAPTER 4. TEXTURE, TIMBRE AND TIME IN ÉMILIE

In a musical context, the properties of sound that have typically been suitable for analysis are those technical features that not only have a strong visual presence in a musical score (giving the impression of greater subjectivity, but also point toward compositional techniques. Those features that, in the dominant paradigm have in practice been “unsuitable” for analysis are the external aspects, features that go beyond “the phenomenon itself”.88

Time, or more specifically perceived time, has been one of those elements that were considered

“unsuitable” for analysis because the different experiences of time are not easily observed in the score. The perception of time depends upon the experience of the performer and the listener,89 and upon the interpretation of other parameters found in music, such as texture and timbre.

Analyses have focused on the objective aspects of the written score,90 those that were easily quantified and described, such as pitch. Analyses were also focused on describing compositional processes such as the use of motives, or themes, more than on the phenomenological91 aspects of the music related to the experience of listening.

In this chapter I describe ways in which texture and timbre shape time in this opera. In

Chapter 3, I offered details of how heterogeneity of time is expressed. I provided a table simplifying the manifestations of time represented in each scene, but did not yet answer the question of how Saariaho introduces different temporalities in the music narrative of Émilie.

88. Judy Lockhead,“‘How Does It Work?’: Challenges to Analytic Explanation,” Music Theory Spectrum 28, no.2 (2006), 233-54.

89. See footnote 3 in Introduction about Auditory Scene Analysis (ASA).

90. Two American exceptions of theorist who worked on analyses on time are Thomas Clifton and Lockhead. Some writings include: Thomas Clifton, Music as Heard: A Study in Applied Phenomenology (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983). And Lockhead, “’How Does it Work?’.”

91. Phenomenology has been described as “the study of structures of consciousness as experienced from the first- person point of view.” David Woodruff Smith, "Phenomenology,” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2018), Edward N. Zalta (Ed.) (2018), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2018/entries/phenomenology 48

Here I explain how timbre and texture shape time and create linearity. Linearity and non- linearity exist side by side in the opera and together are able to create a large linear form. I present how the details of both linearity and non-linearity contribute to the shaping of a linear experience. For this discussion, I have considered both what is written on the score, but especially how the experiences of rehearsing, performing and listening have informed me about the opera.

Timbre and Texture as Generators of Form in Émilie

We do not think on one plane, but on many planes at once. It is wrong to suppose that we follow only one train of thought at a time; there are several trains of thought, one above another. We are generally more aware, more completely conscious of thoughts which take form on the higher plane; but we are also aware, more or less obscurely, of a stream of thoughts on the lower levels. We attend or own to one series of reflections or images; but we are all the time aware of other series which are unrolling themselves on obscurer planes of consciousness. Sometimes there are interferences, irruptions, unforeseen contacts between these series. A stream of thought from a lower level suddenly usurps the bed of the stream which flowed on the highest plane of consciousness. By an effort of will-power we may be able to divert it; it subsides but does not cease to exist. At every instant of conscious life we are aware of such simultaneity and multiplicity of thought- streams.92

One characteristic of music that the written word does not share is the possibility of true simultaneity of voices. Music can express multiplicity, which allows us to hear different streams of thought as they happen. In Émilie, music does not simply accompany the voice of the

Marquise de Châtelet, it also expresses that which words cannot say, subconscious thoughts, fears that cannot or do not want to be expressed, anxiety, etc., but also the sublime. Often music anticipates emotional content that will be expressed later in the text; other times it emphasizes it, but also contradicts it. In music there are many layers of sounds, some are in the foreground and

92. August Bailly quoted in Jonathan W. Bernard, "Elliott Carter,” 644-82. 49 others stay in the background. Even those sounds in the background can transmit emotional significance, and they certainly contribute to the shaping of time

The pianti93 gestures used in Tombe with the glissandi of the strings emphasizes the feeling of sorrow and pain. In measure 142 of Scene I, a quick diminuendo in the winds emphasizes the word “instant”, to bring out even more the emotional content of the text. At the end of this phrase, a static timeless moment in the music is created by long sustained notes in strings and isolated entrances in the winds. There the harpsichord enters with a fast rhythm joined a measure later by the vibraphone. The feeling of pulsation, created by a marking of time, resumes here with repeated pitches, creating a linear transition. The music anticipates the following phrase: “Ce detestable presentiment” (This detestable presentiment). Emotionally, the previous phrase has communicated sorrow, but now the music communicates a different content and anticipates the emotions of Émilie, as if the music could hear Émilie’s thoughts before she could express them. Anticipation is expressed often in the opera changing the emotional content of the music before the new text comes. The repeated heartbeats94, played by strings from measure 113 to 122, create a feeling of anxiety that previews the emotional state of the protagonist, while propelling us forward.

Different thoughts and feelings that occur simultaneously can be observed in Scene VIII,

Principia, measure 49. Émilie has just said: “bien que j’en souffre.”(Although I suffer) and here we can hear fast heartbeats in string pizzicato (sixteenth and dotted eighths). She continues:

“Mon angoisse, afrayeur, et j’en riais presque, c’est de mourir sans achever ma traduction de

Newton.” (My anxiety, my fright, would be to die without completing the translation of

93. For description of this musical gesture see Chapter 2.

94. See analysis in Chapter 3 for a description of what I understand as “heartbeat” in the music and how it is expressed rhythmically. 50

Newton). The distinct pulses of the pizzicato are contrasted by legato triplets in eighth notes played by winds and later marimba. While the heartbeat has a clear feeling of motion and direction, the triplets give us a feeling of unclear beat, which in this opera is often connected with confusion. Here Saariaho produces a “dissonant” texture, which is an example of how contradiction and/or ambiguity are expressed musically.

Saariaho often uses “interludes” between different thoughts expressed by Émilie. For instance, from measure 105 to 112 in Scene I, Pressentiments, there is a musical moment where the feeling of timelessness and motion appear together. Strings and winds are treated as two meta-instruments contrasting with the eighth notes played by the marimba and timpani alternatively. The strings are used as generators of different timbres through alternation between sul ponticello (bowed close to the bridge) and normal (typical bow placement between the bridge and the fingerboard) on sustained trills. Winds are heard in staggered entrances a half note apart in soft dynamics. The marimba and timpani have a steady rhythm that creates movement. This

“Interlude” ends with the harpsichord propelling the music forward with a very fast rhythm, to the next section. Again, we have an example of different streams of thought and times occurring simultaneously. But, how does this multiplicity contribute to the shaping of time?

The more elements and thoughts expressed in music, the more complex the final sonic result is. Complexity and multiplicity have been used in post-tonal music often as an alternative to dissonance. The more multiplicity—which could be considered to be the opposite of unity— the more tension it creates. But what happens when complexity is not resolved? Is multiplicity by definition linear? We have examples in music literature that would contradict this. An example is found in the micropolyphony in Ligeti’s Atmospheres, where the complex mass of 51 sound, although expressing multiplicity of voices, does not imply goal resolution, creating therefore non-linearity.

We could conclude then that for linearity to be perceived we need duality. It is the contrast between multiplicity and simplicity that creates linearity. When multiplicity is used alone without contrast with a different element, such as in the previous example, it could be perceived as non-linear.

The axis, noise/purity, functions in a similar way to multiplicity/simplicity. Noise takes the place of dissonance in tonal music and purity takes the place of consonance and/or tonal center. With this combination, and its possible gradations, tensions are created in the music, which can, in the context of an opposition with simplicity, result in an experience of linearity.95

An example of how noise creates tension and directionality by contrasting with purity of sound happens at the end of both Scenes II and III. Here the orchestra creates tension by adding more timbres, more instrumentation and a crescendo dynamic. This propels the sound towards the next scene where a contrasting quiet point of arrival follows.

But not every time this contrast noise/purity is created is it intended to generate movement towards a goal. Sometimes it could be argued that it is an ornament of the sound, within the same temporal frame. Linearity can therefore be perceived on a local level, while being part of a larger non-linear section. One example is found at the beginning of Scene 5,

Rencontre. Here we have several instrumental voices that indicate different manifestations times.

The wind section seems to move in “waves” that lead us from one instrument to the next—

95. Kaija Saariho herself describes this axis as an organizational framework underlying her music and thought (see footnote 57 in Chapter 2). Others who have written about this topic in Saariaho’s music are Rebecca Leydon, “Clean as a Whistle: Timbral Trajectories and the Modern Musical Sublime” Music Theory Online 18, no. 2 (2012). https://mtosmt.org/issues/mto.12.18.2/mto.12.18.2.leydon.html And Karen Siegel, “Timbral Transformations in Kaija Saariaho’s From the Grammar of Dreams,” CUNY Academic Works. Dissertation (City of New York University, 2014) https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/383. 52 starting with clarinet, then the oboe leading to the flute, only to begin again. It appears to create direction. There is movement—rhythmically created in each individual instrument, but also by the alternation of instruments. On the local level there is linearity, but on the large section this is contradicted by the lack of arrival anywhere. The “waves” that create tension and release are heard as timbral ornaments within the non-directed larger section. The meta-instrument created by strings stays static—using the timbral resource very common in the opera of alternating between sul ponticello and the regular bow placement while playing trills. Although the strings create a sonority which also generates movement because of the alternation of harmonics— timbral change, it is more of a surface motion, not linearity. The harpsichord, as in the whole opera, plays fast active rhythms, an again implies movement. The percussion adds yet another voice with long tremolo notes in the vibraphone, marimba and timpani. This is a non-linear and yet, timbrally complex, section.

Another important way in which Saariaho shapes time is through the use of meta- instruments. These sets of instruments combine in new sonorities and timbres. The new timbres are created by the combination of the different individual instruments. We perceive masses of sound each with a unique sonority. Together, the strings form a new timbre, which is often modified by using extended techniques. This also occurs in brass and woodwind meta- instruments. They are in constant dialogue among themselves, and occasionally an instrument is used as an independent voice, like the trumpet. These dialogues between meta-instruments, together with the individuality of timbres of some of the instruments, help create the form of the opera. Much of the motion in the music is produced by contrasting different textures that also contribute to the shape of time. The usage of rhythm or the absence of defined pulse shape the 53 structure of the piece, that is constantly moving between these two temporal elements—of forward motion/ directionality and of timelessness or vertical time.

In the beginning of Tombe the instruments are used in units. The meta-instrument created by strings, using a combination of repeated notes with marimba and glissandi in cellos and create mass sonority that is interrupted by the defined pitches and rhythm in winds in measures 4 and 15. Like the contrast that happened in Scene I, Pressentiments, between rhythmically defined sections and non-linear sections, here too, meta-instruments are used to create contrast with more complex sections.

A way in which texture is created is by adding different instruments with quick and alternate rhythms, which share and exchange the melodic line, like in measure 23 to 25 of the same scene. This resource is often used, like at the beginning of Scene V, Rencontre or at the beginning of Scene IX. An example of a moment where strings, winds and percussion are used as a unique meta-instrument is the beginning of Scene IV. At a tempo of quarter=48, the perception is of static sound, even if there is some exchange of entrances in the winds.

In Scene VII, Enfant, a “fused” timbre is created similar to the meta-instruments, but here through the use of polyrhythms. These polyrhythms are perceived as a smooth timbral texture— as color, a “fused” timbre. The other instrumental voices occurring simultaneously—strings and winds with long sustained notes, do not contrast this , but simply accompany it. This scene, a sort of lullaby, actually represents an example of large-scale simplicity. The multiplicity is “grouped” therefore in our consciousness.

The duality conveyed by tension and release, through the contrast between the use of individual instruments and of meta-instruments, occurs on a large scale in Scene IV, Rayons.

Here, after beginning with a non-directed section, Scene IV is interrupted (measure 14) by the 54 harpsichord used as a soloist. Very active rhythms contrast with the previous section. In measure

27 the string meta-instrument is introduced in an arpeggiated manner, one instrument after another: first , then violin 2, viola, cello, and a few measures later, bass.

The use of sections of the orchestra as meta-instruments or “fused” timbres, allows the composer to create clear textures where the feeling of timelessness is emphasized. It minimizes the number of individual voices at any time, while creating rich sonorities. Each section moves together, creating blocks of sound. When used in the strings it creates a sense of timelessness, while meta-instrument concept, when using winds creates a sense of flow through the exchange of individual instruments. This combination between two main temporal worlds builds a balance between tension/relaxation, maintaining the interest and sense of movement throughout. Tension, created by more dense textures or dynamics is contrasted by static sections of meta-instruments.

This use of meta-instruments generates new timbres, but also specific textures in the music.

When we return to the first theme of Scene I in the last scene, after almost an hour of music, we hear it as a clear resolution and conclusion of the piece. The last scene reprises all the musical themes of the opera, giving the listener a greater sense of conclusion.

Growth/Life/Decay and Sonic Expansion/Contraction

Saariaho’s work with electronics finds an expression in her writing for acoustic instruments. As mentioned when discussing other analyses of Saariaho’s music,96 sonic expansion can be a clear indicator of the passing of time, but not necessarily of direction towards a goal. An example of local level directionality is found in Scene III, Voltaire. In measures

63-65 we have an expansion in pitch content manifested by the addition of instruments resolving into a quick diminuendo. It creates an effect of growth and rapid decay. Another example of this

96. See Chapter 2. 55 effect is found at the beginning of the opera. Pitches introduced by the harpsichord are repeated by bassoon and clarinet. The growth can be heard by the upper intervals D to E-flat played by the bassoon followed by the clarinet playing the ascending pitches F# to G, to return to those same pitches, this time in a diminuendo. The tempo marking calmo, at quarter note= 48, emphasizes this growth/decay feeling.

Figure 4.1 Example Growth/Life/Decay

In this example the lower voice is played by bassoon (bass clef) and the top voice by clarinet in

B-flat (treble clef).

Several analyses on Saariaho’s music have explored the connection with nature in the way she generates form. She has mentioned nature as one of her inspirations for creating music.97 The organic processes of growth/life/decay, is similar to the experience of breathing, and therefore phrasing. Saariaho’s connection with nature can be observed from the very beginning of the opera in the way the instrumental voices lead to each other.

At the beginning of Scene IV, Rayons, we have an example of a passage without direction towards a goal. On a local level, a growth-life-decay experience is created by the change of timbre in the strings—from a normal bowed sound to sul ponticello and back, and simultaneously in the winds an expansion and contraction of harmonic material. The way this is

97. See Chapter 2 and its bibliography for more details on this. 56 created does not express uniformity in the sound. Each voice in the strings changes harmonics and bow placement at different moments, creating a feeling of organic breathing. The winds also are used as meta-instruments that expand and contract harmonic content to produce a feeling of growth and decay. These two meta-instruments contrast with the steady pulse in the percussion.

How the Times Interrelate

Kaija Saariaho proposes a dichotomy between timbre and harmony, and explores the ways in which this interaction informs her ideas about musical structure. In Saariaho’s view, harmonic tensions traditionally function horizontally (that is in succession) to shape musical form, while timbre constitutes the vertical (or simultaneous) matter that follows this movement. One of her ambitions from early on in her compositional career has been to reverse this relationship: timbral processes come to generate musical form.98

Until now we have seen ways in which timbre and texture are used to generate different experiences of time. Now we are going to see how the different experiences of time combine together to create musical form.

Opposition between timelessness and linearity characteristic of this opera is often created by very clear rhythmic changes. The beginning of the opera sets the tone with a lack of temporal perception—timelessness. Forebodings are expressed musically by motion forward created by harpsichord that appears immediately at the beginning of the opera and repeats in leitmotifs throughout Scene I. The alternation of timelessness and activity continues expanding until the entrance of Émilie. This alternation results in a sense of linearity on a large scale. Linearity here acts as tension while non-linear moments act as the release of that tension.

Once the references about time have been established—such as at the beginning, where a texture created by the strings informs us of a timelessness experience, we understand the time

98. Kankaanpää, “Dichotomies, Relationships: Timbre and Harmony in Revolution,” 159. 57 reference that is going to exist in the opera.99 Once this reference is created we hear also those periods of timelessness as large sections of relaxation within the piece.

Although we already discussed how the simultaneity of voices can express different emotions or thoughts, these differentiated musical elements can also be interpreted as two temporal motives which are interpolated—as in a block-like composition. This is called, in cinematographic terms, vertical montage.100 And, although the experience of splicing together similar excerpts might not add to the narrative of the opera, it is interesting to understand the ways in which similar worlds of time are assembled together. This kind of intellectual exercise can help us find connections among similar sections and create over-all continuity.

In Presentiments, Scene I, one temporal motive is initially presented by the harpsichord—and occasionally by percussion and the other motive by the rest of the orchestra. If we splice the harpsichord parts in the first Scene together, we could see some continuity within it, as well as if we did the same with the other section. This duality creates two main streams of contrasting ideas. The harpsichord propels the energy—it has a feeling of chronometric music, against the chrono-ametric quality of the section represented by the orchestra. One represents the passage of time, while the other takes us to a place of timelessness. As in Baroque music in which composers created polyphony with one voice at diverse registers, here too we can interpret the different voices as creating a vast poly-time experience with different time events occurring

99. “The perception of time-stretching depends on the existence of:(a) a referent--an established or intuited perception of temporal succession that is subsequently heard as slower or faster than previously experienced; and therefore (b) memory, an experience of the past that we can recall and compare with ongoing events.” In Vojcic, “A Sonorous Image of Time-Stretching,” 6-7.

100. Although he did not invent the process of splicing or montage, Sergei Eisenstein, a Russian filmmaker, developed and wrote extensively about it. It is relevant for music how he relied on memory to create this vertical montage--by juxtaposing different scenes quickly the viewer could have the experience of simultaneity of images. Bernard, “Elliot Carter”, 661. 58 simultaneously. In Scene IV, Rayons, something similar to Scene I occur. The contrast between chronometric and chrono-ametric music is realized by rhythmically contrasting blocks of sounds.

We have found in this opera how linearity and non-linearity can happen simultaneously at different levels of structure. A non-linear section at a local level can be part of a larger linear structure. We have also seen, when reviewing the ways growth, life, decay structures are used in this music, how linear sections can be considered, on a local level, non-linear. In order to interpret any given section of the opera, we must consider the whole context in which it occurs.

Ultimately, different forms of time can be experienced together creating tension that will contribute to the shaping of the over-all structure.

This opera poses specific challenges for conductors: How to shape the overall arc of a piece with so many simultaneous experiences of time and how to interpret the non-linear sections in the context of the whole work are some of the questions I discuss in Chapter Five. 59

CHAPTER 5. CONCLUSIONS. TEMPORAL ANALYSES AND IMPLICATIONS FOR PERFORMERS AND CONDUCTORS Every musical analysis rests on assumptions at least, on the analyst’s intuitive impression of what methods of analysis are appropriate for the given work and for his or her particular reading of it. Some analytical assumptions are so widespread that we tend to forget that they actually are assumptions. For example, we tend to take for granted that any piece worth analyzing is unified, and thus a methodology aimed at the elucidation of unity (as virtually all commonly employed analytical techniques are) is automatically assumed to be useful.101

Looking for parameters in music that try to find or confirm “unity” has long interested not only theorists, but also performers. Part of my preparation to perform this opera included this: to find the unity102 in the duality and the multiplicity expressed in the score. In my analysis I have attempted to demonstrate how these different expressions of time—linear and non-linear, ultimately contributed on a large scale to the experience of linearity. I also try to show how different experiences of time can happen simultaneously at different levels. We can find linearity on a local level that is part of a non-linear section. This linearity would be experienced as an embellishment of the larger structure. Also, as in the axis sound/noise, we can perceive the different times, linear and non-linear, as contrasting elements that combine to shape the overall form of the work.

In this chapter I present some interpretative decisions related to time that I made for my performance. I also present a critical discussion about some of my interpretative choices and how this analysis of time has been informed by my performance. And finally, in the conclusion, I present theoretical principles that could be applied to other similar works of the repertory.

101. Kramer, 221.

102. See footnote number 3. 60

In contemporary music performance, it has often been believed103 that the task of the performer was to simply “execute” what was written on the page. Some composers, such as John

Brian Ferneyhough, or Milton Babbitt, to name a few, wrote scores with much detail in them, intending to provide all information necessary to performers. However, as musicologist Ian Pace demonstrates, even in those highly detailed scores, there are many interpretative decisions to make. Those decisions include how to play something as small as an accent, how fast to do a particular sound decay, how to balance a chord where all the instruments have the same dynamic, or how to execute numerous technical aspects, such as the pedal in a piano part, for instance. To make interpretative decisions, even for the small details, one should be aware of large-scale organization. Through these details we recreate the piece and shape the large-form.

To make an informed decision about these small details, the conductor must understand the temporal structure of the whole score. Does the work present a linear or non-linear narrative?

Are there contrasting temporal expressions? And if so, how do they interact? The way we understand the score will determine the result in performance. If we understand that the different sections of a composition, linear and non-linear, are part of a larger linear structure, we would try to bring out that implicit linearity. We would make decisions about the detail based on our understanding of that linearity. On the contrary, if we consider that the sections are non-linear and we interpret them as independent sections, we would then interpret them as self-contained.

We would then express the non-linearity contained in the score.

103. Ian Pace, “Notation, Time, and the Performer’s Relationship to the Score,” Unfolding Time, Leuven University Press (2009), 157-60. 61

As I mentioned in Chapter One, phrasing is one of the most important aspects of the study of performance during the formative years and beyond. In phrasing we seek to bring out and express unity in the music, through the expression of tension and release. We discover the relationships between the elements that create a large arc of the piece and through the expression of the details we are able to express that larger structure. A phrase that builds tension which resolves is creating directionality in it; however, there are many ways to express that as a performer. Depending upon how much articulation or how much vibrato we do, or how we balance a chord, we will bring out a different experience of performance to the listener.

One example of possible interpretative decisions which would bring out different experiences of time is found at the beginning of Scene V. I interpreted the beginning section to be non-linear. However, on a local level there is linearity expressed in the movement of the winds. If we balanced the wind section to sound as one unit, or meta-instrument, we would express more the timelessness. However, if the entrances of the winds are highlighted, even with a slight accent we would bring out the local linearity. In each case the experience of time would be slightly different and would express the contradiction of the different temporalities in subtle ways.

Performative Decisions

When I did my performance of Émilie, it was my first time working on this opera. As I write this dissertation there are things that I would do differently. I would emphasize some sections more; there are tempos that I would keep more stable, and in some moments I would express the contradiction and tension implicit in the multiplicity of times more. I would take more time in some segments, especially at the beginning of the opera, to really stretch the 62 feeling of timelessness. I would allow the different forms of time to unfold more organically while patiently waiting and developing the sections.

As a performer one must decide whether to emphasize the goal-driven movement in the music and make obvious the dichotomy between tension and release or on the contrary stay in the moment in the non-linear moments. In a piece like this one, full of contrasts of time, the conductor must be aware of these and help shape the narrative contained in the score. Should I express a moment as leading to the next one, or is this expressing a moment of non-linear sonority? In what ways are these sections related to each other? Are they part of a bigger unit, a large “curve” that builds on the tension or do we understand those sections as self-contained and independent between themselves? In theory both answers are possible and a performer could choose to interpret a work in both ways. In this section I explained both what my interpretation was at the time of my performance and what this analysis has informed me of.

The beginning of the opera starts with an arpeggio in the harpsichord and a chordal sonority in the strings. This creates a dreamy sonority that lacks perception of meter. The opera starts in a state of timelessness that is interrupted by sudden rhythmical passages from the harpsichord. The motion in Scene I is created through the rhythm in the harpsichord which goes back and forth between rapid, metrically defined motives, and arpeggiations without defined pulse. Scene I is constructed on block-like sections, which represent contrasting temporal experiences. As a performer I wanted to express those temporal contrasts and connect them because I understood they were connected to create a large-scale linearity.

One intellectual exercise that helped me understand the large-scale form of Scene I was to think of the linear sections represented by the harpsichord, as one large section and the non- linear sections as another independent one. That way there were two large segments that were 63 superposed as building blocks. The purpose was to find connection among the sections to help me recreate a musical narrative. This exercise helped understand their relationships. Through that exercise I got to the conclusion that Scene I represented a case of multiply-directed linearity.104

In this expression of linear time, the tension is not resolved immediately but in a later moment in the piece, the resolution is postponed. That interpretation as multiply-directed time informed of the underlined linearity that as a conductor I tried to express.

But how did I express the large-scale in the detail? How did the understanding of an overall linearity inform me of the interpretative decisions on a local level? Tempo was an important element to consider. In this scene the contrasting tempos between linear and non-linear sections are remarkable. The linear sections are almost double the speed of the non-linear sections, which emphasizes even more the difference between time experiences. However, my intuition during rehearsals and performance was that to emphasize the overall linearity I had to

“move” the non-linear sections slightly over the written tempo to maintain the flow between sections. I thought that since the undefined pulse in the non-linearity made it not possible to have a feeling of metronomical time, I could facilitate this way the connection among sections, allowing the linear segments to remain in the listener’s memory.

Although I thought that this way to interpret the non-linearity would bring out more the overall linearity I realized after later hearings of my performance, that I could have taken more time in the non-linear sections. They helped create the overall linearity acting as moments of release of the piece.

Although it sounds counterproductive to emphasize the lack of direction to emphasize the larger linearity and arc in the piece, I do find that it is the duality and the expression of this duality, which expresses better the directionality and shape of the piece.

104. Refer back to Chapter 1 and the definition of multiply-directed time. 64

Another example of contrasting experiences of time is found at the beginning of Scene II,

Tombe. In this scene, the glissandi in cellos are accompanied by marimba and pizzicato in both first violins and basses. These instruments form a meta-instrument, a unique timbre that I tried to emphasize by giving more impetus and a quick decay to each note, to bring out the pianti shaped by the glissandos. This linear section is interrupted in measure 4 by the half notes played by the wind meta-instrument. This change of timbre interrupts the linearity from the previous section and it resumes one measure later. This pattern of linearity interrupted goes on throughout this movement. I interpreted these contrasting sections as two complementary sections that create a linear narrative. This is an example at a local level of how the contrast between linearity and non-linearity can create an overall linear structure. I performed the non-linear section as a release of the linear section.

There were also linear voices within larger non-linear sections, which I interpreted as

“ornamental”. They did not propel us anywhere although there was movement within it; they served to embellish the overall arc of the piece.

Although the intentions of the composer might be sometimes to explore different aspects of time, performance of any music happens linearly. Even timeless, non-directed sections happen successively. These combinations of goal directed and non-directed sections create large phrases that can often be better expressed by enlarging and “taking time” to express the non-directed sections.

Conclusions

Of what use is music-knowledge? Here is one idea. Each child spends endless days in curious ways; we call it “play”. He plays with blocks and boxes, stacking them and packing them; he lines them up and knocks them down. What is that all about? Clearly, 65

he is learning Space! But how, on earth, does one learn Time? Can one Time fit inside another; can two of Them go side by side? In music we find out!105

Music has the capacity to express several streams of thoughts and time narratives simultaneously. We can experience different times concurrently, contradicting and superposing each other. The multiplicity and contradiction of the different expressions of time express the complexity of the human experience.

I showed in this document how Saariaho manipulates time through the use of timbre and texture. During my preparation, rehearsals and performance of Saariaho’s Émilie, I made some decisions based on my understanding of the narrative, the musical elements and their interrelation. Sometimes these two narratives were in dialogue with one another and complemented one another, but on occasions they seemed to contradict each other.

Performers need to understand how these elements interact in the context of time to create a total narrative while expressing its contradictions. Although the different expressions of time created by timbre and texture can ultimately contribute to create linearity, linearity cannot be expressed without the performer’s intention of doing so.106 The score is simply a map; thus one must look at it for indications of where to go, where to stop and take more time, and in which parts one should move forward or on the contrary, expand time. It is the performer’s responsibility to bring the score to life, making interpretative decisions that show the inner structure of the composition.

Although analyses are only assumptions, they are useful assumptions when trying to find connecting elements to perform a post-tonal score. Performances are also based on assumptions

105. Marvin Minsky quoted in Kramer, The Time of Music, 1.

106. That was one of Celibidache’s main points in his teaching of phenomenology. The performer must unfold the relationships to express the linearity implicit in the score. 66 and accordingly are personal ways to interpret a score; they do need to be informed decisions.

The goal of this document is to illuminate the need to have a deep understanding of the score in order to be able to make decisions that will bring out the true intentions of the composer.

Saariaho’s intention to create form using timbre and texture is clearly reflected in his music, and is the performer’s role to bring out the large form created through timbre and texture.

Although this document is focused on a particular piece of the contemporary repertory, this kind of analyses have further implications for the understanding of time narrative in post- tonal works. As a performer, I want to create performances that capture the listener and make them engaged throughout the piece. I also want to understand the composer’s intentions, particularly when they are not obvious or unequivocal. Through the study of time in post-tonal compositions, we have access to understand larger structures and its relationships.

When there are different, conflicting times expressed in a score, performers must understand their inner relationships. Different times can coexist in one work, and even can occur simultaneously. We can find different levels of temporal structure that are helpful to performance. Understanding the different levels at which temporalities are expressed helps us to express the nuances and details of post-tonal scores. I explained in chapter 4 how time narratives that occur simultaneously in Émilie can be understood to be part of an underling linearity or non- linearity. Linearity on a local level can be perceived as an ornament in a larger non-linear section. Non-linearity can also be part of a larger linear structure. But it is the performer’s role to make interpretative decisions that are not only intuitive, but also based on an in-depth study of temporal structures. 67

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