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Berio and the Art of Commentary Author(S): David Osmond-Smith Source: the Musical Times, Vol Berio and the Art of Commentary Author(s): David Osmond-Smith Source: The Musical Times, Vol. 116, No. 1592, (Oct., 1975), pp. 871-872 Published by: Musical Times Publications Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/959202 Accessed: 21/05/2008 10:04 By purchasing content from the publisher through the Service you agree to abide by the Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. These Terms and Conditions of Use provide, in part, that this Service is intended to enable your noncommercial use of the content. For other uses, please contact the publisher of the journal. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=mtpl. Each copy of any part of the content transmitted through this Service must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. For more information regarding this Service, please contact [email protected]. http://www.jstor.org As for Alice herself, when she marriedin February taking tea with Adele.12 Brahms seems to have 1896, Brahms was invited to be best man, an been pleased with the results. 'Have I actually sent invitation he declined only because he could not you the double portrait of Strauss and me?', he face the prospect of having to wear top hat and asked Simrock(30 October 1894), 'or does the com- white gloves. Alice's husband was the painter poser of Jabuka no longer interestyou?' But here, Franzvon Bayros,who in 1894,for the goldenjubilee too, matters of dress caused him concern. 'They of Strauss's debut, had depicted in oils an evening will all be abusive about my defective clothing gathering at the Strauss home in which Brahms again!', he confided to Heuberger,and went on: appears along with members of the family, various 'Despite his age Strauss has remaineda dandy.And artists, the sculptor Viktor Tilgner, Max Kalbeck, what a one! I am never carelessly dressed. And if the composer Carl Goldmark and the pianist I wear hunting linen in summer-well, that I must Alfred Grunfeld. allow myself.' It was Adele Strausswho, at Ischl in the summer of 1894, arrangeda surprisefor Brahmsby inviting Johann Strauss was born on 25 October 1825. a photographeralong to the Villa Erd6dy. There Brahms was photographed standing with Strauss 12The photograph with Strauss and the two with Adele may be found in R. Prochazka: Johann Strauss (Berlin, 1900), 92, 97 on the verandahand, in at least two differentposes, and E. W. Engel: op cit, 283, 300. Berio and the art of commentary David Osmond-Smith On October 24 Luciano Berio will be 50; on October whose basis is not another of Berio's own works, 17 he conducts the London Sinfonietta in a concert of but the Scherzo from Mahler'sSecond Symphony. his own music that includes, as well as 'Points on the Appropriately enough, much of the superposed Curve to Find' (1974) for piano and 22 instruments, material also consists of fragmentary quotations 'Folk Songs' (1964), 'Sincronie' (1964) fobr string from Beethoven to Boulez, which between and concertati' the ranging quartet, 'Tempi (1959), first them build a portrait of the associative performance of a new work for Heinz Holliger, up partial 'Chemins IV' for oboe and 13 strings. The concert will networks running through Berio's musical world. be recorded by BBC TV and used as the basis for an Portraitureby collage itself becomes the basis for edition of'Omnibus' devoted to Berio. furthercommentary in Recital I (1972), wherevocal Inasmuch as anniversaries imply retrospect the fragments selected from the repertory of Cathy choice of new work for Berio's anniversaryconcert Berberianform the point of departure.But that last could hardly be more appropriate,for CheminsIV instance, consisting as it does of a manipulable representsthe latest outgrowthfrom his most long- series of brief excerpts, illustrates by default the standing project: the series of Sequenzasfor solo most idiosyncratic feature of the techniques em- instruments-begun in 1958 with a work for flute, ployed in Sinfonia and the Chemins:the use, as a and currentlybeing extended by a nearlycomplete compositional starting-point, of a complete and Sequenza for violin-and the series of Chemins self-sufficientmusical work. The need to pre-estab- that has been elaborated on the basis of certain of lish an immutableframe of referencethat can act as the Sequenzas. a goad to the composer's imaginationis widely in It was Sequenza II (1963) for harp that first evidence in both pre- and post-tonal music. (Within attracted Berio's attention as providing suitable tonal music, the hierarchyof rules governingpitch materialfor the superimpositionof an instrumental structure is itself of sufficient complexity to take commentary,the result being Chemins1 (1964) for over the same function.) But in all such cases, the harp and orchestra. But the genetic potential of composer deliberately adopts as his frame of SequenzaVI for viola, written for Walter Trampler reference a structure that is of itself incomplete: in 1967, was to prove far greater.It was used as the whether it be a pitch series to be moulded into foundation for Chemins II (1968) for viola and comprehensibilityby manipulating rhythm, pitch nine instruments,which in turn engenderedChemins direction and intensity; or a 15th-centurycantus III (1969) for the same combinationand orchestra.1 firmusthat originatedas a single line from a previous Meanwhile, Chemins II underwent further trans- work, or as a monophonicchant, or song, and must mutation into Chemins lib (1969) for orchestra, now be incorporatedinto a new polyphonictexture; and finally (perhaps) into Chemins lIc (1972) for or indeed a 16th-centuryparody mass that takes bass clarinet and orchestra. Now it is the turn of and develops complete fragments from another Sequenza VII for oboe, written for Heinz Holliger polyphonic source, without great regard for either in 1969, to follow the same path. the overall form of that source or the original But perhaps the best-known (and most easily order of the fragments. appreciated) of all Berio's musical commentaries Berio, by contrast, takes a complete musical is the third movement of the Sinfonia (1968), work and scans it for points of potential growth. 871 The resultant sonic aggregates, that either sprout a 'Documentary' for voices originally produced from the original material or else are established to last year for Hilversum Radio. This is based on a set it in relief, are often of such density as to demand typically fragmentary, multilingual poem by a global attention amid which the original structure Eduardo Sanguinetti that hovers around ideas of will become partly submerged, taking with it the beginning, middle and end, as exemplified by fleet- balances and tensions that gave that structure its ing references to the opening lines of Eliot's 'East coherence. The challenge of the incomplete is thus Coker' Quartet, the Gospel according to St John, resurrected, for each addition will demand further and Dante's Inferno, and given corporeal form additions if a new overall coherence is to be estab- when identified with mouth, phallus and anus. lished, and yet the exigencies of the by now partly Berio accordingly combs his way through the poem obliterated original must nonetheless be respected. time after time, seeking out the multiplicity of As Berio said of the relations between Sequenza VI semantic inflections permitted by the 'open' and and Chemins II and III, 'each new layer creates a ambiguous nature of such a text, and using these new, though related surface, and each older layer shifts in semantic implication as the material from assumes a new function as soon as it is covered'. which to build his large-scale structure. Happily, However, granted the comparatively pellucid in view of the evanescent nature of radio broad- combination of oboe and chamber strings, it remains casting, he is now working on a concert version for to be seen whether Sequenza VII will disappear Swingle II.2 beneath the surface of Chemins IV to the extent iThe three pieces are recorded together on RCA SB 6846. that Sequenza VI did beneath the more variegated 2to have its premiere in Liege on Nov 14 and a performance at instrumentation of Chemins II. the Elizabeth Hall on 13 Feb 1976 One of the more results of this approach striking Styrian Autumn,Graz, Oct 6-26: new works by Cerha, Kalmar, is to place in question the finality and internal in- Neuwirth, Rands, Haubenstock-Ramati, Moran, Detoni, so attributed to the individual Kaufmann, Ferrero, J. M. Horvath, Osbourne; ORF SO evitability readily (Dufallo), Graz Pro Arte Orchestra (Hoffmann); Vienna 20th work by a public reared on a set of established Century Ensemble, Schola Cantorum Stuttgart, Eje Thelin classics, each assured of its immutable niche in the Gr6up, Basle Ensemble; Evangelisti, Holliger, Gottwald, Kontarskys, Bozay; multi-media programmes, symposia, cultural pantheon. It chooses rather to emphasize theatre and film festivals, exhibitions. Details from the General- the to which a 'finished' piece may be so sekretariat des steirischen herbstes, Mandellstrasse 38, A-8010 degree Graz, Austria. only by virtue of a partly arbitrary set of decisions on the for whose reversal the Little Missenden Festival, Oct 4-12: Concerts of British music; composer's part, Clerkes of Oxenford, Trinity Boys' Choir, Lindsay String Chemins series allows ample opportunity. Quartet; Pears, Ellis; children's concert, young musicians' Another for com- concert; master class; exhibitions. Details from the Box Office, piece exploring opportunities Ashcroft, Little Missenden, Amersham, Bucks; or telephone mentary of an altogether different kind is A-Ronne, Great Missenden 3768. 1~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ tL5!1. _ - , 111 !1l !1:'' ma _U I~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 872 |_| .
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