Ned Rorem's Poems of Love and the Rain
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UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI Date:___________________ I, _________________________________________________________, hereby submit this work as part of the requirements for the degree of: in: It is entitled: This work and its defense approved by: Chair: _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ _______________________________ Ned Rorem’s Poems of Love and the Rain and Paul Hindemith’s Hin und zurück: an Analysis of Two Twentieth-century Vocal Works With an Emphasis On the Use of Mirror Form A document submitted to the Graduate School of the University of Cincinnati in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF MUSICAL ARTS in the Performance Studies Division of the College-Conservatory of Music 2007 by Kathleen M. Maurer B. M., Butler University, 1977 M.M., Bowling Green State University, 1979 Committee Chair: Professor Mary Henderson Stucky ABSTRACT Ned Rorem’s Poems of Love and the Rain and Paul Hindemith’s Hin und zurück: an Analysis of Two Twentieth-century Vocal Works With an Emphasis On the Use of Mirror Form by Kathleen M. Maurer This study centers on the use of mirror form in two twentieth-century vocal works—Ned Rorem’s song cycle Poems of Love and the Rain and Paul Hindemith’s chamber opera Hin und zurück. An historical introduction (Chapter I) discusses the use of mirror form in vocal, instrumental, and piano works from the fourteenth century to the present. The study includes biographies of Rorem, Hindemith, and librettist Marcellus Schiffer, and it presents background information about both works with reference to performers, performances, and recordings. Rorem chose mirror form—sometimes called an arch form or a palindrome—in order to present two contrasting settings of the same poems within a single work; Hindemith’s choice reflects his interest in creating a comedy based on silent film techniques of 1920s Germany. Compositional elements specific to Rorem’s song cycle examined in this study (Chapter II) include the poetry and authors, rain imagery, and pacing. The discussion of Hindemith’s opera (Chapter III) includes the influence of Expressionism and various comic elements, including characters, text, stage directions, and instrumentation. Chapters II and III present a comparison of the halves of each composition and analyze the overall structure, use of unifying motives, and tonal organization in both works. iii Chapter IV draws conclusions by comparing and contrasting Rorem’s and Hindemith’s implementation of mirror form and their compositional techniques. Appendices A–D contain photos of and letters from Ned Rorem, lists of Rorem’s song cycles and Hindemith’s stage works, and a list of performances of Hin und zurück. Author Kathleen Maurer provides a complete literal translation of Hindemith’s opera, including stage directions (Appendix E), to assist the reader in understanding the nuances of the German language, including the comedy inherent in the libretto. The importance of the mirror form from the performer’s standpoint is examined, and its effect upon the performance. Maurer concludes that both Rorem and Hindemith were successful in achieving their compositional goals. iv Copyright © 2007 by Kathleen M. Maurer All rights reserved v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to acknowledge and thank my doctoral advisor and document committee chair, Professor Mary Henderson-Stucky, for her guidance and assistance in the preparation of this document, and for her invaluable support during my doctoral studies. I would also like to thank committee members Dr. Miguel Roig-Francoli and Professor Kenneth Shaw for their input and assistance. I would like to acknowledge Boosey & Hawkes, Inc. for granting permission to reprint musical excerpts from Ned Rorem’s Poems of Love and the Rain, and Schott Music GmbH & Co. KG and European American Music Distributors LLC for granting permission to use the German text and musical excerpts from Paul Hindemith’s Hin und zurück and for providing a perusal score. Special thanks go to Dr. Eleanor Trawick for the many hours she spent discussing the theoretical analysis of these two works with me, and for her editorial expertise. I would also like to thank Dr. Anna Priebe for her editorial assistance. I am especially grateful to my husband, David, and daughter, Lisa, for their support and encouragement during my years of research and writing, and to my parents, Arthur and Joan Leamer, for their constant support. I would like to thank my pianist, Ji-Young Jeoung, for her insightful study of the score of Poems of Love and the Rain with me in preparation for our performance. My thanks go above all to Ned Rorem, for taking the time to answer all my letters, for his kind and complimentary words about my writing and my performance of his song cycle, and for his wonderful composition. vi CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES............................................................................................................ix CHAPTER I: MIRROR FORM...........................................................................................1 CHAPTER II: NED ROREM AND POEMS OF LOVE AND THE RAIN........................13 Biography...............................................................................................................13 Poems of Love and the Rain...................................................................................15 Poetry and Authors....................................................................................18 Unifying Motives.......................................................................................20 Rain Imagery..............................................................................................24 Pacing.........................................................................................................32 Mirror Form...............................................................................................33 Conclusions................................................................................................69 The Effect of Mirror Form on the Performance.........................................72 CHAPTER III: PAUL HINDEMITH AND HIN UND ZURÜCK....................................76 Biography...............................................................................................................76 Hin und zurück.......................................................................................................79 Hindemith and Expressionism...................................................................84 Marcellus Schiffer—Biography.................................................................85 Comic Elements.........................................................................................88 Mirror Form...............................................................................................97 Conclusions..............................................................................................120 Effect of Mirror Form on the Performance..............................................123 vii CHAPTER IV: CONCLUSION......................................................................................125 BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................................................135 APPENDIX A: PHOTOGRAPHS AND LETTERS.......................................................141 APPENDIX B: SONG CYCLES BY NED ROREM......................................................147 APPENDIX C: STAGE WORKS BY PAUL HINDEMITH..........................................149 APPENDIX D: PERFORMANCES OF HIN UND ZURÜCK........................................151 APPENDIX E: HIN UND ZURÜCK TEXT AND STAGE DIRECTIONS....................153 viii FIGURES 1. Seven movements of Cantata No. 63.......................................................................2 2. Seven-part form of the da capo Chorus in Cantata No. 63......................................3 3. Table of Contents from the score of Poems of Love and the Rain..........................8 4. Scenes and song titles in The Last Five Years.......................................................11 5. Poems of Love and the Rain—list of songs in their order of composition............18 6. The Rain Motive as it appears at the beginning of the Prologue...........................21 7. The Rain Motive as it appears at the end of the Epilogue.....................................22 8. Recurring Vocal Motive as it first appears in mm. 7-8 of the Prologue................23 9. Length of time between songs in performance......................................................33 10. Chart showing a comparison of the settings of each poem, the use of the Rain Motive (RM) and Vocal Motive (VM), and the name of the author for each song pair............................................................................35 11. Comparison summary of Song No. 2 and Song No. 16—Stop All The Clocks.....38 12. Comparison summary of Song No. 3 and Song No. 15—The Air Is The Only.....40 13. Comparison summary of Song No. 4 and Song No. 14—Love’s Stricken “Why”........................................................................................................42 14. Initial vocal motive................................................................................................44 15. Accompaniment motive showing dominant harmonic function............................44 16. Accompaniment motive in imitation of the initial vocal motive, shown at two pitch