Temporal Brush Strokes: Aspects of Temporality and Musical Narrative in Grisey’S Partiels and Talea

Temporal Brush Strokes: Aspects of Temporality and Musical Narrative in Grisey’s Partiels and Talea

THESIS

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University

James M. Tickel

Graduate Program in Music

The Ohio State University

2017

Thesis Committee:

Dr. David Clampitt, Advisor,

Dr. Thomas Wells,

Dr. Anna Gawboy

Copyrighted by

James Tickel

2017

Abstract

Music can be observed as the construction of sound and silence throughout time. We have a vast vocabulary and many analytical tools to talk about the construction of music outside of time, but still struggle to find ways to discuss music in terms of temporal relationships. Composers often use terms such as

‘pacing’ and ‘flow’ to describe temporal relationships in music. This thesis will attempt to address temporality and musical narrative in a more rigorous fashion, building on concepts from the literature of music perception and the author’s own observations.

The methodologies presented in this paper will be illustrated through analysis of two works, Partiels and Talea, of Gérard Grisey, a founder of the musical style known as ‘spectral music’, one of the more pervasive styles of the later-twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Due to its nature, spectral music often avoids common tendencies of musical construction regarding melodic and motivic development and transformation. Rather, harmony and timbre are the tools composers look to for musical direction, and this paper intends to explore how composers shape these timbral and harmonic resources through time to create a sense of musical narrative.

While the methodologies presented in this thesis are focused primarily on spectral music, the author feels that they can be applied, in a general sense, to musics of many other styles and genres. ii

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank both of my advisors, Dr. David Clampitt, and Dr.

Thomas Wells for the invaluable guidance and mentoring throughout the learning process of this thesis, as well as the rest of my academic time here. I would also like to thank the other member of my panel, Dr. Anna Gawboy, who has been an incredible mentor during my time at OSU and has helped me grow immeasurably as an educator.

My friends and loved ones have been and continue to be a huge help and support group that somehow manage to keep me sane. Words fail to describe the gratitude I have for everyone involved.

-James Tickel

iii

Vita

1993 ...... Born Westerville, OH

2011 ...... International Baccalaureate, Westerville

South High School

2015 ...... B.M. in Music Composition, Capital

University

2015-2016 ...... Graduate Fellow, The Ohio State

University

2016 to present ...... Graduate Teaching Associate, The Ohio

State University

Fields of Study

Major Fields: Music

Table of Contents

ABSTRACT ...... II

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...... III

VITA ...... IV

LIST OF FIGURES ...... VI

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE REVIEW ...... 1

Part 1 - Introduction ...... 1

Part 2 – Music, Time, and the Listener ...... 6

Part 3 – Narrative ...... 12

CHAPTER 2: APPLICATION AND ANALYSIS ...... 18

Part 1 – Partiels ...... 18

Part 2 – Talea ...... 41

CHAPTER 3: CONCLUSIONS ...... 56

WORKS CITED ...... 62

List of Figures

Figure 1. Temporal relationships and their relative levels of predictability ...... 2

Figure 2. Opening page of Partiels showing the 'bite' and 'resonance' ...... 23

Figure 3. Diagram of temporal events during the opening of Partiels ...... 24

Figure 4. Diagram of developing 'resonance' gesture between rehearsal 2

and 12 of Partiels ...... 26

Figure 5. Rehearsal 12 of Partiels showing transition to new musical material ...... 30

Figure 6. Relative contour of time-intervals in Partiels between rehearsal

12 and 20 ...... 31

Figure 7. Relative contours between time-interval gestures ...... 32

Figure 8. Reduction of rehearsal 14–22 in Partiels showing pitch and

harmony swelling gestures ...... 34

Figure 9. Interval class content of swelling gestures in rehearsal 14–22 in Partiels ...... 36

Figure 10. Approximate durations of swelling gestures in rehearsal 14–22 of

Partiels measured in seconds, spaced relative to duration ...... 38

Figure 11. Opening page to Grisey's Talea ...... 44

Figure 12. Relative durations of opening gestures in Grisey's Talea ...... 45

Figure 13. False entrance of 'a' gesture, broken 'b' gesture and structural return

of 'a' gesture at rehearsal 3 in Talea ...... 49

Chapter 1: Introduction and Literature Review

Part 1 - Introduction

There is a vast array of terminology and analytical methods to discuss aspects of music outside of time, whether it be harmony, formal structure, or aspects of pitch content, etc. However, there is a much smaller gamut of analytical tools to discuss temporal aspects of music and psychological impact.

Composers often rely on intuitive means for communicating information regarding temporal organization, and the ‘flow’ of music. The goal of this thesis is to present some analytical tools and terminology to explore these aspects of temporal organization in music, and what affects that organization has in terms of musical narrative, and listener perception.

To explore this organization, we must first identify how music and time are related, which is much more complicated than it might first appear. On the surface level, there are aspects of rhythm and duration, the immediate relationship of sounds in time to each other. For a large majority of western art music, there is also a sense of meter or pulse that the surface level rhythms and durations are held reference to (i.e., on the beat or off the beat, longer or shorter than the beat). However, much of the western music produced in the 20th

1 century has a weakened sense of pulse, if not abandoning a perceptible sense of consistent pulse all together. In this case, we cannot really speak in terms of rhythm anymore, but rather the relative durations perceived by what is immediately surrounding it. Without pulse, one is only aware of what is short and what is long by what they can compare it to.

It is obvious to point out that the terms short / long are insufficient to describe all the intricacies and vast complexities available with combinations of different durations of sound throughout time. Gérard Grisey presents in his 1987 article, “Tempus ex Machina: A composer’s reflections on musical time,” a scale of different temporal relationships and their relative levels of predictability, and thus their relative levels of order and disorder (fig.1).

Figure 1. Temporal relationships and their relative levels of predictability1 a) Periodic maximum predictability Order a) Continuous-dynamic average predictability 1)continuous acceleration 2)continuous deceleration c) Discontinuous-dynamic slight predictability 1)acceleration or deceleration by stages or elision 2)statistical acceleration or deceleration d) Statistical zero predictability Disorder complete re-division unpredictability of durations maximum discontinuity e) Smooth rhythmic silence (Howell 2014) (Mueller 1946) (Grisey, Did you Say Spectral? 2000)

1 Gérard Grisey. “Tempus ex Machina: A composer's reflections on musical time,” Contemporary Music Review, 2:1 (1987): 239–275

Observing small scale durations on this spectrum lets us begin to see the relative nature of temporal structures. However, we thereby only observe the relations of time on a local level, and we know that music is not composed with only consideration for the local level of organization. Rather, composers take great care to have some sort of large-scale structuring in their works, with recurring and transforming material. But what does all that mean if the listener cannot perceive this structuring? Can listeners only perceive the local level relationships of time or is there some level of understanding of this higher order of organization?

Clearly, we do not only perceive local-level relationships, otherwise musical themes would be lost from our memory as soon as they are gone, and all new musical material would be heard as being brand new. Yet, we know from experience that musical themes are not fleeting moments of experience; rather, they are constructions that stay with the listener.2 Composers play with this phenomenon, creating moments where a theme finally returns triumphantly at the end of a long movement, playing with the listener’s memory of the musical material distantly separated in time.

Husserl describes the primary acting forces in perception as, “(1) In any present phase, the perception of a duration (for example a sustained tone) includes within itself the unified continuity of the tone’s own past phases

(retention) as well as an orientation toward its own future continuation

2 Rofe, Michael. “Dualisms of Time,” Contemporary Music Review 33.4 (2014): 341-354 3

(protension); and (2) This description of the perception of continuity and duration in the present of the tone parallels the inherent temporality and time- consciousness that accompanies all our cognitive acts.”3_ By this, Husserl means that the perception of a single event in time is defined by the event’s existence previously in the music. Not only within the local level of a piece of music itself, we experience music relative to the culmination of experiences from every other piece of music we’ve heard. A good example of this is in respect to tonal music, listeners can often predict the approach of a cadence from only the musical material given leading up to the cadence. Tonal music often follows similar harmonic paradigms, allowing listeners to predict future events without ever having listened to that piece of music before.

Another phenomenon in tonal music that foreshadows upcoming musical events is the concept of dominant chord resolutions. In tonal music, dominant function harmonies have such a strong push to resolution that one can hear, and sing, the chord of resolution hearing only the preceding dominant harmony. The dominant chord itself so strongly projects a future event yet to happen that if it resolves elsewhere than the expected resolution, there is a moment of surprise.

The ‘mind’s ear’ has been fooled, a musical event in the present created an expectation for a consequent musical event in the future, and this expectation was broken, thus creating a jolt of surprise. This specific moment of surprise is

3 Moshaver, Maryam A. "Telos and Temporality: Phenomenology and the Experience of Time in Lewin's Study of Perception." Journal of the American Musicological Society 65.1 (2012): 179–214 4 referred to as the deceptive cadence, or deceptive resolution. Composers throughout time all play with the balance between expectation in ways beyond far beyond just deceptive cadences. This balance between fulfilling expectation, and breaking expectation is the foundation of musical narrative.4

We could take a hypothetical example of a piece of music that repeatedly makes use of deceptive cadences. At every cadence, there is deceptive motion. At first, there would be a sense of surprise as the expectation is for the dominant chord to resolve to the proper tonic chord. However, as this pattern of deceptive cadences continues, the listener’s ear becomes attuned to the pattern set in place of deceptive resolution, and the listener will begin to expect a deceptive resolution at the instance of a cadence. Thus, ‘deceptive’ motion becomes expectation, rather than surprise.

The composer could at a later cadence in the piece, ‘properly’ resolve the dominant chord to the typically expected tonic chord. The listener expects deceptive motion due to the narrative set in place by the composer, and the breaking of that expectation by resolving the dominant chord ‘properly’ comes as a surprise. So, in the local neighborhood of this hypothetical piece, ‘deceptive’ resolution is the norm, while ‘proper’ resolution becomes deceptive.

Cadences are not the only tool for creating and manipulating expectation.

Phrase structure, sequences, metric organization, syncopation, melodic contours,

4 Howell, Tim. “Magnus Lindberg: Narratives of Time and Space.” Contemporary Music Review 33.4 (2014): 355–372 5 and harmonic progressions are all other tools used by composers to create expectations or to break expectations. It is worth noting that while all of these aspects are prominent in tonal music, the goal of this study is to examine musical construction in music that is inherently non-tonal. Rather than discussing the intricacies of the construction of tonal music and manipulations within the somewhat rigid system of tonality, the point of introducing these concepts inherent to tonal music was to show the relationship of music and expectation with concepts familiar to most audiences.

Part 2 – Music, Time, and the Listener

From looking at these musical constructs we can begin to see how we experience music in a very non-linear relationship to time. The two temporal relationships mentioned thus far are what Grisey calls the ‘Skeleton’ and ‘Flesh’ of time.5 In this article Grisey writes about his own take on temporality in musical organization, and in terms of listener perception. He breaks apart the elusive concept of time into 3 parts, the ‘skeleton,’ ‘flesh,’ and ‘skin.’ He describes the ‘skeleton’ as the quantitative temporal aspect of musical construction, what can be measured in basic temporal measurements (i.e., seconds/minutes). The

5 Gérard Grisey. “Tempus ex Machina: A composer's reflections on musical time,” Contemporary Music Review 2.1 (1987): 239–275 6 skeleton, while it does have implications regarding predictability, is not sufficient to describe the temporal organization of music. A series of events cannot be understood in simple mathematical divisions, they must be compared to motions in respect to before and after individual events.6

The ‘flesh’ is a more qualitative approach to understanding musical experience, examining what aspects of the music create expectation, and how those expectations are satisfied, or broken. The ‘skin’ of time is the subjective, psychoacoustic aspect of music where the listener and music interact. This is the description of how the listener personally, and subjectively perceives what they hear, and where the composer “notices more than he acts.”7 There is not much room for empirical discussion in the space of this ‘skin’ of time,8 however we can utilize both Grisey’s skeleton and flesh of time to examine the construction and narrative of different pieces of music.

Stockhausen also wrote about understanding musical construction through temporal organization, referring to experiential time.9 Stockhausen uses the concept of experiential time to compare musical events to each other in respect to the effect they have on the listener’s perception of time. The amount of alteration between musical events is in direct correlation to the experiential time of a

6 Mueller, G. E. Experiential and Existential Time. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 6.3 (1946): 424–435. 7 Gérard Grisey, "Did you say Spectral?" trans. Joshua Fineberg. Contemporary Music Review 19 (2000): 1–3. 8 Hennessy, Jeffrey J. "Beneath the Skin of Time: Alternative Temporalities in Grisey's ‘Prologue for Solo Viola’." Perspectives of New Music 47.2 (2009): 36–58. 9 Stockhausen, K. (1958). Structure and Experiential Time. Die Reihe 2 (1958): 64–75. 7 passage, as well as the density of alteration. The greater the amount of alteration or density or alterations, the greater the amount of information the listener must process, thus time appears to pass more quickly. Stockhausen presents a somewhat counterintuitive example where using Grisey’s ‘skeleton’ understanding of time, we would have a very fast division of time (i.e., repeated

16th notes at a fast tempo). However, if there is little to no alteration of the pattern, either in rhythm or pitch, there is very little information for the listener to process as they begin to understand and expect what is to come. Thus, even in fast quantitative divisions of time, there can be a very slow flow of experiential time. Conversely, in very slow tempi or divisions of time, there can be a very fast flow of experiential time if there is no repetition, or no way for the listener to expect what is to come.10

The concept of experiential time has been empirically tested in respect to tonal music and closely related / distantly related keys.11 The study was to see how untrained listeners experienced the flow of time in passages of music that either didn’t modulate, modulated to a closely related key, or to a distant key.

The study found modulation had a significant effect in time estimation where subjects in general overestimated the duration in all examples, but dramatically overestimated the duration of passages that did not modulate. Passages that had

10 Stockhausen, K. (1958). Structure and Experiential Time. Die Reihe 2 (1958): 64–75. 11 Firmino, Érico. A., Bueno, J. L., & Bigand, E. “Travelling Through Pitch Space Speeds up Musical Time.” Music Perception: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 26.3 (2009): 205– 209. doi:10.1525/mp.2009.26.3.205 8 the most distant modulations elicited the shortest time estimations.12 These results coincide with what we would expect from our understanding of experiential time. The passages without modulation had the smallest degree of information, thus the slowest flow of experiential time, while the passages with distant modulations had the greatest degree of information, and thus the fastest flow of experiential time.

We can generalize this concept to something that is not specific to tonal music. Rather than thinking of the previous example with modulation as an experiment specifically testing perception of different modulation techniques, we can look at the expectations created in this procedure. By creating a strong sense of a tonal center, we intuitively expect the continuation of the musical passage to stay within that key, thus presenting the least information. By modulating we add information, and the farther we modulate the more information we add, thus giving the most dramatic response. We intuitively understand that we expect things to stay the same, but is there any way to empirically test this?

To test ‘expectation’ shouldn’t it be necessary to first define ‘expectation’?

This is more difficult than one might imagine as it is not a ‘thing’ that we can describe, rather a state of consciousness, which itself is not fully understood.

Rather, we can think of expectation as a theoretical construct with a meaning and

12 Ibid.

9 definition that is open to debate.13 Because of this, it is difficult, if not impossible, to directly test expectation. Instead, we have an intuitive sense of the effects of expectation, and we can design experiments to test how expectation operates.

Huron notes several experiments that test visual and auditory responses to various stimuli. For example, in a test of visual stimuli, subjects (none of whom spoke Mandarin) are presented various Chinese characters that appear on a screen for 5ms. This is barely enough time for the eyes to process the visual stimuli, and far too short for the brain to examine any details of the characters.

After being present a string of seemingly random characters the subjects are asked which characters they felt more positive feelings towards. The study showed a strong tendency for subjects to have the most positive feelings towards the characters that appeared most frequently.14 There is a similar test for auditory stimuli using tones of various frequencies, subjects tended towards the tones that occurred most often.

What these experiments demonstrate is that we psychologically latch onto repetition, we create an expectation for whatever it is we latch onto to reoccur, and things that deviate from those expectations creates some level of cognitive dissonance. Even without a structural context subjects were able to form expectations (even if not consciously) from the stimuli presented. This is referred

13 Huron, D. (2008). Sweet anticipation: music and the psychology of expectation. Cambridge, MA: MIT. 14 Ibid. 10 to as the exposure effect.15

Both experiments test an expectation of ‘what,’ but we also form strong expectations of ‘when.’ In most western music, there is a metrical system which provides a strong hierarchy of rhythmic organization, a consistent flow of strong and weak beats in which agogic stresses most typically fall. In a more general sense outside of meter, we tend to latch onto a pulse, or steady repetition of durations, and strongly expect future events to occur in continuation of that stream of durations. Huron notes an experiment where subjects are presented a musical passage of consistent pulse, but seemingly randomly changing intervals.

The final note of the passage was to be played at five different temporal positions; one position exactly where it is expected, and two positions both before and after expected. The subjects are to answer if the final note is higher or lower than the first note. The results show that when the final note was given at any point in time other than where it was expected, the subjects were at best guessing in their responses, while they answered much more accurately when the note was given at the appropriate time.16

Similar to the previous experiments of audio and visual stimuli, this experiment does not directly show expectation, but shows a cognitive result of expectation, in this case broken expectations. The steady pulse created a strong expectation of ‘when’ the next event will occur. Breaking that expectation causes

15 Ibid. 16 Ibid. 11 a flex in experiential time, and forces the listener to reflect on the event, providing less cognitive time to accurately describe the event.

Part 3 – Narrative

All the methods we’ve discussed thus far are individually insufficient to describe a temporal event and the psychological effects that carry with those events. Rather, we can use these tools in tandem to formalize a conceptual shape for temporal and phenomenological events. We can create a map of these temporal events throughout the course of a work to attempt to make empirical statements regarding musical narrative.

The concept of musical narrative has been mentioned several times throughout this paper, but what exactly is musical narrative? Using the Merriam-

Webster dictionary definition of narrative we are left with: the representation in art of an event or story.17 This is useful for describing programmatic music, music that has some extra-musical element. However, this definition of narrative leaves something to be desired to describe absolute music, music for the sake of music.

The music doesn’t necessarily tell a story or describe events, rather, the music itself is the story.

17 Webster, Noah. "Narrative." Def. 3. New Collegiate Dictionary. A Merriam-Webster. Springfield, MA: G. & C. Merriam, 1963. 12

How do arrangements of sound waves create this affect? We mentioned earlier that the formation of expectation and either fulfilling or breaking those expectations are the foundation of musical narrative. We have also presented the idea that repetition in music forms expectations and positive attachments towards the object of repetition. One might have the consequent thought that the

‘best’ music would be completely repetitive without any change or deviation.

However, we know that isn’t the case, all music goes through change, and music that repeats too much we tend to find boring. Since we know music goes through change we can infer that music presents cognitive challenges, and these challenges that are presented are what evoke emotional responses in the audience and create a sense of story, or narrative. So, in other words, it is not the character of the musical material that defines the narrative; rather, it is the motions the musical material goes through and the ways the music develops and changes that define the narrative of the music.18 David Lewin adds to our understanding of phenomenological events with our understanding of expectation. Husserl explained that our perception of events is heavily influenced by the previous iterations of that event. Yet also, our expectations (or protension) influences our perception of current events, whether those expectations are

18 Adlington, Rovert. “Musical Temporality: Perspectives from Adorno and de Man,” Repercussions 6.1 (1997): 5-60 13 reinforced, confirmed, or denied with the presentation of the event.19 20

Leonard Meyer suggests that expectations are formed through some sort of context either set by the music or brought to the music by the listener.21 This is a relatively easy to accept prospect when considering tonal music, as there are several contexts we can consider. Tonality itself is a context which we form ‘what’ expectations from. For example, the leading tone within any scale as a very strong tendency to resolve to tonic, and having only the context of tonality, and the key area of the piece of music, we form an expectation for the leading tone to resolve to tonic. There are also contexts of typical formal designs, such as the sonata- allegro form, from which more educated audiences may be able to form expectations. In terms of western art music, there are also metrical contexts, and contexts of instrumentation that all play a part in the formation of expectations.

One might expect a different style of writing from a Beethoven string quartet than from a Beethoven symphony solely from the contexts of the instrumentations.

However, our interest in this paper is not in the formation of expectation in tonal western art music. The primary musical interest of this paper is the spectral music of Gérard Grisey, which can be defined in a few ways. One way to define spectral music is by the techniques that are involved with spectral composition.

19 Lewin, David. “Music Theory, Phenomenology, and Perception,” Music Perception, and Interdisciplinary Journal 3.4 (1986): 327–392 20 Moshaver, Maryam A. "Telos and Temporality: Phenomenology and the Experience of Time in Lewin's Study of Perception." Journal of the American Musicological Society 65.1 (2012): 179–214. 21 Meyer, Leonard B. Emotion and Meaning in Music. Chicago: U of Chicago, 1956. 14

Without indulging too much examination into the specifics of spectral composition, this involves analyzing the spectra of a particular sound and using the resultant data as resources for harmonic, melodic, or other compositional construction. However, even within Grisey’s lifetime, he began to detest the term spectral music due to the strict pre-compositional processes attached to it.22 He felt the connotations led to the general idea that there was no musical intent to his work and his music was merely a collection of mathematical constructions.

Thus, Grisey preferred to use the term ‘spectrally inspired’ when referring to his compositional style later in his life. Similarly, we can define spectral music not by a strict set of compositional techniques, but rather an attitude in which there is a compositional focus on timbre.23

Because of this the harmonic and motivic elements of spectral music often disregard tonal contexts. Most of the contexts we mentioned in respect to western art music are not present in spectral music; aspects of traditional formal structure, metric hierarchy and archetypical musical traits of certain instrumentations are absent in spectral music. However, this is not to say that spectral music specifically avoids these aspects of musical construction.

Composers such as Schoenberg, Stravinsky, and Wagner actively sought to avoid

22 Hennessy, Jeffrey J. “Beneath the Skin of Time: Alternative Temporalities in Grisey's ‘Prologue for Solo Viola’.” Perspectives of New Music 47.2 (2009): 36–58. 23 Fineberg, J. (2000). “Guide to the basic concepts and techniques of spectral music.” Contemporary Music Review, 19.2, 81–113. 15 these constructs.24 Without going too much into the details of how these composers avoided these musical designs, we may make a few general observations about them. Wagner obsessed over hiding cadences, extending the resolutions, and resolving in non-traditional ways. Schoenberg sought to create music with no sense of tonal center, to the point where the interval content was designed to be less tonally suggestive than a random set of pitches.25 Similarly,

Stravinsky designed rhythmic passages less metrically suggestive than entirely random rhythmic constructions.26

In the case of both Schoenberg and Stravinsky, they create musical contexts that are contra-tonal and contra-metrical, respectively. This is to say that their musical construction is directly intended to deny these expectations. This is not the case in spectral music, as there is no direct intent to deny expectations of tonality or meter, rather there is simply a disregard for the contexts of tonality and meter altogether.

So, if there are no contexts that we can use to experience spectral music, how does one form expectations from the music? If one cannot form expectations those expectations cannot be fulfilled or denied so how can the music have narrative? How do we experience music of this style?

Using our understanding of the exposure effect (subconscious latching onto

24 Huron, D. (2008). Sweet anticipation: music and the psychology of expectation. Cambridge, MA: MIT. 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid. 16 repeated stimuli) we can blend the different ideas of perception presented thus far. Rather than considering musical context as a separate entity from the music, perhaps the music can create its own musical context. We will see that Grisey often opens his pieces with a small musical gesture that repeats, often with small transformations at the beginning. This creates a context of sorts for the individual piece itself. The intervallic content, rhythmic construction, instrumentation, and other musical elements of these gestures all become the context for the individual piece. It is worth noting that Meyer notes about the context that the individual listener brings to the piece based upon their personal aesthetics, and the gamut of pieces they have listened to previously. This is directly related to what Grisey refers to as the ‘skin’ of time. This paper will not delve much into this topic as it is difficult to make empirical claims: every individual listener has their own unique

‘skin’ level contexts.

We will be considering two different pieces by Grisey using these elements of temporal construction, experiential time, information density, exposure effect and musical context all in tandem. We will be examining these pieces in terms of formation of expectation, fulfillment or denial of those expectations, at both local levels and large form structural levels. Based on the organization of these temporal events we can make claims about the shape of the musical narrative for these pieces.

Chapter 2: Application and Analysis

Part 1 – Partiels

When first teaching someone unfamiliar with the style of spectral music, often the first piece one would mention is Partiels, written by Gérard Grisey in

1975, and regarded as a defining piece of Grisey’s musical style.27 Partiels is the third of a monumental cycle of six pieces of various instrumentations, Les

Espaces Acoustiques.

Partiels is written for a chamber group of 18 musicians; 2 flutes, 1 oboe, 2 clarinets, 1 bass clarinet, 2 horns, 1 trombone, accordion, 2 percussionists, 2 violins, 2 violas, cello, contrabass. The ensemble has many elements of that of a chamber orchestra, with a reduced brass section. There is also the addition of the accordion, which will provide a very interesting timbral admixture to an otherwise typical instrumentation.

The entire piece is derived from the sonogram analysis of the attack of a trombone playing a low E2. All the pitches from the analysis are rounded to the

27 Fineberg, J. (2000). “Guide to the basic concepts and techniques of spectral music.” Contemporary Music Review, 19.2, 81–113. doi:10.1080/07494460000640271

18 nearest quarter-tone (giving us a 24 pitch-class chromatic universe), to balance maintaining the intonation and harmonic quality of the analysis, and making life somewhat easier for the performers, as playing the exact frequencies would be practically impossible.28 The derived pitches are orchestrated throughout the ensemble, and at least in the opening of the piece, dynamically and gesturally orchestrated to model the temporal evolution of the transient of the trombone.29

The point of the piece, however, is not to mimic the sound of the trombone, or to use the orchestra to synthesize the sound of the trombone (the trombone in the ensemble alone would be sufficient for this task). The analysis of the trombone sound and the derivation of pitches is merely a compositional tool to find interesting and colorful harmonies and pitch collections that one might not discover otherwise. Knowing the context of the piece, a listener might be able to associate the sound of the opening of the piece with that of a trombone.

However, as the piece develops this association becomes more distant, to the point where it is only conceptual, and there is no audible correlation between the music and the recognizable sound of the trombone. I would be interested to see if anyone could of their own discretion state the correlation between the music and the timbre of the trombone.

28 Rose, François. (1996). Introduction to the Pitch Organization of French Spectral Music. Perspectives of New Music, 34(2), 6-39. 29 Fineberg, J. (2000). Guide to the basic concepts and techniques of spectral music. Contemporary Music Review, 19(2), 81–113. 19

This concept of outsourcing the generation of pitch content is not an entirely new compositional idea, Messiaen (Grisey was, in fact, a student of

Messiaen) is well known for using transcriptions of various birdsongs in his works.30 Thanks to the developments in technology and tools of sound analysis, it was only a matter of time before using technology as a tool for sound analysis and re-synthesis became a popular compositional tool for pitch content derivation, and other sources of compositional interest.

The piece begins with a sort of call and response figure, opening with a rhythmic figure in the contrabass and trombone, and a staggered harmony built throughout the rest of the ensemble. We can conceptually break apart this gesture into two parts, the initial rhythmic figure representing the “bite” of the trombone, and the answering harmony as the “resonance” of the trombone, shown in figure 2. This gesture of call and response repeats approximately for the first four minutes of the piece.

In terms of relative durations, in the opening both the “bite” and

“resonance” gestures last approximately 8 seconds. The very first “bite” and resonance gestures also repeat verbatim 3 times. The very beginning has a lot of information, which is somewhat trivial as the opening to every piece can be considered to have a lot of information. However, the very high dynamic and accented quality of the opening could be seen as more dramatic, or containing

30 Paul Griffiths. "Messiaen, Olivier." Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press.

20 more information than that of a gentler, more quiet opening statement. The first repetition presents no new information, and gives something for the listener to latch on to, and forms an expectation for what is to come. The third repetition still presents to new information and based on the previous repetition and consistent relevant durations between gestures, confirms both expectations of

‘when’ and ‘what.’ At this point the experiential time is very low, providing the listener time to internalize the gesture as a large portion of the piece relies on this gesture.

The exact repetition is short lived, however, as after the third repetition there is the first change of pattern. Instead of 3 equal duration accents in the contrabass, there are 4 unequal durations, landing on a strong downbeat. This also marks a change in relative durations between the ‘bite’ and ‘resonance’ gestures. Also, instead of 2 equal durations of 8 seconds, the ‘bite’ gesture is transformed by a 1:2 ratio, lasting 4 seconds, and inversely the ‘resonance’ gesture is transformed 2:1, lasting 16 seconds. This has two-fold temporal impacts. Firstly, the shortened ‘bite’ gesture at the point of breaking the rhythmic regularity increases the amount of unexpectedness, adding to the information to be perceived. Second, the increased duration of the ‘resonance’ gesture provides some cognitive time to make up for the increased in speed of experiential time at this point. This also sets up the following relative durations, as from this point forward the two gestures more follow this new duration ratio, ‘bite’ lasting 4–5 seconds and ‘resonance’ lasting 12–16. Another slight change in the composite

21 gesture is instead of having a rhythmic ‘break’ or ‘pause’ between the ‘bite’ and

‘resonance’ gestures, the ‘resonance’ gesture begins immediately on the downbeat signaled by the shorter ‘bite’ gesture. This pattern of the ‘bite’ and ‘resonance’ gesture elision also continues.

This moment is a relatively small change in experiential time, however, as there is little denial in expectation of ‘what’ and more a change in expectation of

‘when’. The call and response nature of the gesture remains, rather there is merely an adjustment of ratios with a short hiccup in repetition, altering the repetition pattern for future iterations.

The next two iterations of the ‘bite’ and ‘resonance’ gestures very closely follow the pattern set up at this hiccup moment, following the same 4–16 second duration ratio. The ‘resonance’ gesture maintains the same thick texture at this point, with only small changes in harmony between iterations. The ‘bite’ gesture follows small variations in rhythm over a consistent 11/16 meter. It is worth noting that the meter in this piece is not perceivable, but is used as an organization method for the ease of performers and rehearsal purposes. So, similar to the beginning, the second repetition of the ‘hiccupped’ gesture forms an expectation, and the third repetition confirms those expectations.

Figure 2. Grisey’s Partiels, opening page showing ‘bite’ and ‘resonance’ gestures

Thus, Grisey poses an interesting temporal event already at this point in the piece. He creates a moment of surprise that also becomes an expectation- building event. This is displayed in figure 3, along with a diagram of the relative flow of experiential time up to this point in the piece.

Figure 3. Diagram of temporal events during the opening of Partiels

‘hiccupped’ ‘ “

relative flow of experiential time faster

slower

Grisey continues from this point slowly building the texture and intensity of the ‘resonance’ gesture. The ‘bite’ gesture continues with small alterations to the rhythmic pattern, slowly adding more articulations to the gesture, beginning

24 with four and by the end of this section (rehearsal number 12) with eight articulations. Grisey creates a large-scale crescendo from rehearsal 2 to rehearsal

12 through the building of texture, harmony, and dynamic, and timbre.

Grisey begins this crescendo purely through texture and dynamic, building larger harmonies and increasing from a p-mp dynamic to a mf-f dynamic from rehearsal 2 to rehearsal 4. At rehearsal 4 Grisey begins to build intensity through timbre, introducing a new gesture in the viola part. Grisey asks the viola to perform a wide vibrato gesture at a sul ponticello bowing position. This creates a very sharp, noisy quality sound, adding to the building of intensity Grisey is orchestrating. He also asks for flutter tonguing in the winds by rehearsal 8, continuing the building of ‘noisy’ articulations.

Grisey trades this gesture between other string voices, and begins asking for other voices to perform sul ponticello, slowly building a noisier texture. By rehearsal 9, Grisey begins asking for the strings to perform with ‘extreme bow- pressure.’ This technique creates an even noisier quality of sound than bowing sul ponticello, almost completely devoid of pitch. In this way, we can see Grisey is slowly building an evolving texture, developing from a relatively quiet harmonic texture to a relatively loud, noisy texture. Figure 4 will show the development of texture throughout the time between rehearsal 1 and rehearsal 12.

Figure 4. Diagram of developing 'resonance' gesture between rehearsal 2 and 12 of Partiels

16s 16 16s 12s 12s 12s 14s 12s 12s 12s 12s

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

Grisey also texturally develops the ‘bite’ gesture through rehearsal 1 and 12 as well. Not only does the number of articulations throughout the gesture increase linearly with time, Grisey begins to present new material on top of the rhythmic gestures throughout this section. In the pickup to rehearsal 6, Grisey asks for the strings to bow directly on the bridge during the ‘bite’ gesture. This playing technique provides a very quiet, almost whistle-like quality of sound. In the pickup to rehearsal 9 Grisey develops this timbral event, asking for a natural harmonic glissando in the strings. This is a similar timbre to bowing on the bridge, producing a very whistle-like sound, however on the strings there is more substantial pitch content to the sound, and generally a more clear sound than that of bowing on the bridge. There is an interesting contrast, then, in the development of the ‘resonance’ and ‘bite’ gestures. The ‘resonance’ gesture slowly develops from pitch to noise, the ‘bite’ gesture slowly develops from noise to pitch during this section.

Looking back at figure 4 we can look at how this development happens through time. At a local level the rhythmic pattern of the gesture appears to be speeding up slightly, beginning at rehearsal 1 with 16 seconds per gesture, ending at 12 seconds per gesture by rehearsal 12. At a more structural level we can look at the relative duration between events containing new information, these events are marked in figure 4 with squares around the rehearsal numbers.

Between rehearsal 1 and 4 there is a composite 48 seconds, between rehearsal 4 and 7, 36 seconds, between rehearsal 7 and 9, 26 seconds. We will leave the musical space between rehearsal 9 and 12 until later. Using this information, we can attempt to map out the experiential time of this passage. We can see that between these rehearsal points, there is a decrease in the amount of time between introductions of new information; 48>36>26. So, Grisey presents a temporal system that both presents new information, and accelerates the rate at which new information is given. Rather than to break expectation suddenly as he does in the event at rehearsal 1 (the ‘hiccupped’ gesture), we have a gradual building of temporal uncertainty.

To determine relatively how much uncertainty this passage presents we can use the table from figure 1 presented by Grisey regarding different methods of temporal organization. We know that this passage is accelerating in presentation of new information, so to determine where exactly we are on

Grisey’s scale we must determine whether we are accelerating at a constant rate, or a variable rate, as they have different perceptual impact.

To do this, we can examine the relative change in duration between these temporal events. So, we can first look between rehearsal 1 and 4 (48 seconds), and between rehearsal 4 and 7 (36 seconds). The difference in these durations is

12 seconds, which is 25% of the duration of the initial event (between rehearsal 1 and 4). Next, we look at the duration between rehearsal 4 and 7 (36 seconds) and between rehearsal 7 and 9 (26 seconds). Here the difference in duration is 10 seconds, which is 27.8% of the duration between rehearsal 4 and 7. Thus, we have a 25% acceleration, followed by a 27.8% acceleration. Statistically speaking, we could say the rate of acceleration is also accelerating. However, this is a very small increase, and this very small difference in the rate of acceleration would most likely be missed by the unsuspecting listener. Since we are doing this examination to understand how the musical organization affects listener perception, it is perhaps inappropriate to consider the passage as a variable acceleration if the listener would not be able to identify the passage as a variable rate of acceleration. Thus, I argue that this passage falls within the ‘continuous- dynamic’ portion of Grisey’s scale of temporal organization, and for the sake of impartiality, we can consider this portion at the higher end of the spectrum of continuous-dynamic organization, leaning towards discontinuous-dynamic organization.

We have left out the musical space between rehearsal 9 and 12 thus far because a very important temporal event happens at rehearsal 12. At rehearsal 12 there is a complete change of musical material. Grisey breaks the pattern of ‘bite’-

‘resonance’ that has been the entire structural basis for musical development up to this point. However, Grisey does this transition in a very clever way. We have mentioned that the musical content from rehearsal 1–12 has been building texture and intensity, all while accelerating the rate at which the intensity is building, with a local level rhythmic, or ‘time-interval’ acceleration. We define a time-interval as the relative durations between articulations, or the relative speed of a repeated rhythmic pattern. This combination creates a strong musical cue that some climactic moment is coming. The point of building musical intensity is to achieve some musical goal point, the music points to some destination.

Grisey at this destination point completely changes the structural elements of the music, yet he does so in a somewhat deceiving way. The first true presentation of ‘pattern breaking’ material comes immediately before rehearsal

12, in the final iteration of the ‘bite’ gesture that creates an expectation of the

‘resonance’ gesture to follow immediately on rehearsal 12. During this final ‘bite’ gesture, Grisey presents an aggressive, rhythmically intense, intervallically angular string passage that at first appears to be the goal destination of the previous building of intensity.

This new material comes simultaneously with the final ‘bite’ gesture, so the listener expects some continuation, or some sort of answer to follow with the forthcoming ‘resonance’ gesture. However, Grisey breaks his pattern here, presenting completely new structural ideas. The more ‘simple’ thing to do would be to present this new musical section after the completion of a ‘bite’- ‘resonance’

29 gesture pair. Grisey rather plays with audience expectation and makes this sudden shift in the middle of the gesture pair, making the transition that much more sudden, and that much more surprising and powerful. In tandem, he also proposes a somewhat ‘fake’ musical goal point, making it appear the music was building to the aggressive angular motives in the strings, only to immediately depart from this gesture.

Figure 5. Rehearsal 12 of Partiels showing transition to new musical material

At this point in the music, we have what Stockhausen would label a moment for perceptual sectionalizing.31 The complete change in structural material and musical character accounts for this segmentation. Thus, we might in some ways consider this moment the beginning of a new piece of music; we can bring the previous section to the question of perception and temporality later.

This section begins with swelling and falling repeated time-intervals swapping between instruments. These time-intervals change in duration each time they are swapped to another instrumental voice, creating a sort of melodic line, in an abstract sense. We can’t directly correlate the changing time-interval durations to pitch; however, we can correlate these changing intervals relative to each other in terms of contour. If we map faster time-intervals to higher pitch, and conversely slower time-intervals to lower pitch, we can create a map of the relative durations, shown in figure 6.

Figure 6. Relative contour of time-intervals in Partiels between rehearsal 12 and 20

Time-interval contour map 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 19

31 Stockhausen, K. (1958). Structure and Experiential Time. Die Reihe, 2, 64–75. 31

Figure 7. Relative contours between time-interval gestures

Relative contour-shapes between time-interval gestures

Points 1-5 Points 6-10 Points 10-14 Points 15-19

4 intervals

- 3

1 Relative pitch Relative of time

0 Consecutive time-intervals

Looking at figure 6 we see all the relative contours for all the time-interval relationships. This map isn’t very useful in terms of perception or temporality, as most listeners would probably not audibly be able to identify that the second swell and the sixth swell have the same time-interval gesture. However, this map does allow us to look for a pattern in between time-interval gestures, which can be helpful for determining how this musical passage is perceived.

We can see from figure 6 that while there may not be exactly repeated patterns, there are arch-like figures that appear between points 1–5, 6–10, 10–14, and 15–19. Figure 7 takes a closer look at the contour of these subset groupings, 32 mapping the contour of each individual arch, and comparing these contours to each other.

From this diagram, we can see that these contours are incredibly similar.

All these ‘gestural arches’, other than the arch between points 10–15, follow a linear path from low-time interval to high-time interval, back down to low-time interval. The arch between points 10–15 however has a small contour dip between intervals 2 and 3, but still follows the overall arch gesture contour of low-high- low.

This provides us with a sense that the listener might be able to form some expectation of what time-interval is going to come next. While it is not an exact expectation, there is some expectation of faster or slower, or ‘higher’ or ‘lower’ contour relationship of time-interval.

Looking even closer at these arch-gestures, we can see that the contours between points 1–5 and 6–10 are the most similar. This is perhaps Grisey proposing the gesture, then reaffirming the gesture to form expectation. The most heavily altered arch-gesture comes immediately after, between points 10-14, and occurs with an elision of the previous arch-gesture. This is a soft denial of expectation, not presenting necessarily ‘new’ information, but transforms the figure enough to be surprising. The following arch-gesture between points 15 and

19 then more closely follow the contour expectation set by the first two arches, reaffirming the expectation of the gesture.

Grisey gradually confuses these rhythmic gestures more, texturally hiding the time-intervals patterns with swelling pitches and harmonies. These swells sometimes occur at the same time as the dynamic swells of the time-interval patterns, however also sometimes occurs in-between gestures. We can thus conceive of these pitch and harmony swells as a separate gesture, composed into a sort of counterpoint with the time-interval gestures.

These pitch swells begin at rehearsal 14 in the trombone and horn parts, at the same point the second contour-arch of time-intervals begins. However, we can look back to the beginning of this section (rehearsal 12) and there are similar gestures present. While not necessarily pitched, there are timbral swells on both bass clarinet split-tone effects, and the strings playing with bow-pressure at an alto sul ponticello bowing position. There is very little recognizable pitch with these timbral effects, but we can conceive of them as part of the same large scale gesture as the pitched swelling gestures.

Figure 8. Reduction of rehearsal 14–22 in Partiels showing pitch and harmony swelling gestures

*This denotes an unpitched timbral effect 34

Figure 8 shows the pitches used for these gestures, leaving out aspects of rhythm and duration, to be addressed later. The reduction leaves out the material between rehearsal 12–14 as there is little use of adding timbral effects to the pitch reduction.

It is difficult to state any repetitive pattern that guides the direction of these pitches/harmonies from one simultaneity to the next, as we can in the case of the time-interval arch patterns. There are apparent small-scale patterns that are present for a short while, but then immediately dissipate and a different pattern emerges. However, even with a quick glance we can get a sense of the large-scale direction of this passage.

We begin the passage at a very low pitch, C2 and Db2, and gradually ascend throughout the passage to higher pitch, eventually reaching a peak of E7.

If we consider the preceding timbral effects as part of these gestures, then we can say that the registral trajectory of the entire passage is a linear ascent from extremely low, even inaudible frequencies, to extremely high-pitched frequencies.

Looking more closely at the interval content on the simultaneities we can find other aspects of trajectory and direction in this passage. At a surface level, we can see there is an increased thickness in texture as the passage progresses.

We begin with only dyads at the start of the passage, while not a completely linear development, we end the end passage with chords comprised of 3 and 4 notes.

There is also an ‘opening up’ of texture, we begin in a very closed position, the dyads are primarily a second apart. Throughout the passage, the interval content

35 gradually spreads apart, from closed position dyads to compound intervals spanning nearly two octaves.

In terms of orchestration, Grisey poses something contrary to what the elements of texture we have examined thus far might suggest. The broadening of texture and widening of intervallic content might suggest a building of intensity, however Grisey orchestrates something quite different. The passage begins with both timbral effects, low brass swelling very loudly and other full, somewhat aggressive timbres. By the end of the passage Grisey transitions to only flutes and string harmonics played very quietly, producing a very soft, thin timbre.

Another change in character of this passage is the ‘quality’, or relative level of dissonance in the simultaneities, shown in figure 9.

Figure 9. Interval class content of swelling gestures in rehearsal 14–22 in Partiels

* denotes a semitone cluster (012)

** denotes a whole-tone cluster (024)

**’ (026) – similar sonic quality to (024), very ‘whole-tone esque’

Looking at figure 9 we can see the opening half of the passage has a large emphasis on semitone and tri-tone interval relationships, both of which are naturally quite dissonant. The second half of the passage has a much larger prevalence of more consonant harmonies, even some major triads emerging

(enharmonically). Aside from the major triads, there is also a much higher prevalence of whole-tone relationships, which are comparatively much more consonant than semitone relationships. The passage also ends on wide perfect fifths in the strings, having a very pure, stable quality. This transition is non- linear, much like the broadening of texture; it is a more gradual shift from dissonance and instability to consonance and absolute stability. To summarize all the trajectories of this passage we have discussed, we have: a transition from low pitch to higher pitch, thin to broad texture, full to thin timbre, loud to soft dynamic, dissonance to consonance, and instability to stability.

These examinations demonstrate how this passage develops through time, however, we can also look at this passage in terms of expectation and experiential time. It was previously mentioned that it is difficult to determine a small-scale pattern that predicts any sort of continuation in this passage. So, while this passage may not create strong expectations of ‘what,’ it might rather create expectations of ‘when.’ Figure 10 will show the construction of relative durations of our pitch swell gesture reduction.

Figure 10. Approximate durations of swelling gestures in rehearsal 14–22 of Partiels measured in seconds, spaced relative to duration

At a first glance to figure 10 we can see a clear rhythmic acceleration, with durations at the beginning of the passage lasting approximately 8–10 seconds, while at the end of the passage lasting a short 2–3 seconds. Looking somewhat more closely, we can see at the local level there is a fair bit of consistency.

Observing only the first two systems of figure 10 there is a strong tendency towards durations between 8–10 seconds, with only a handful of discrepancies.

Similarly, in the third system there is a tendency toward durations of approximately 4 seconds, and in the final system a tendency of 2 seconds.

We can view these tendencies as a sort of rhythmic consistency that form local level rhythmic expectations. From the high level of consistency to these expectancies, listeners are able to form strong expectations of ‘when’ the next sonic event is going to happen. Like the previous section of the piece, there is also a gradually accelerating rhythm of events here. The rate of acceleration is fixed, as the four second durations are 50% the duration of the previous events, and the

2 second durations 50% their preceding events. Thus, we exist on the continuous- dynamic portion of Grisey’s spectrum of temporal construction for this passage.

To truly get a sense of the temporal perception of this passage we need to take account of all the aspects we have mentioned thus far.

We demonstrated the strong expectation forming pattern of contour in the time-interval gesture participant to this passage. However, there pitch- swelling gesture participates in a sort of counterpoint with our time-interval gesture, somewhat hiding and confusing the audible expectations one might expect from a purely theoretical viewpoint. The nature of the development of the pitch-swelling gesture also participates in confusing our expectation, as there is a transition between extremes of frequency, dynamic, texture, timbre, and relative dissonance and stability. This combination of different musical trajectories presents a relatively high density of information, thus there is a relatively faster flow of experiential time. The ‘average predictability’ of the ‘when’ aspect of the

39 pitch-swelling gestures, and the high predictability of contour in the time-interval gestures create a strong sense of continuity. It gives the listener something to grip onto during the somewhat musically turbulent passage we have just traversed.

While the other less consistent musical aspects perhaps hide the elements of temporal construction from an initial aural identification, the temporal expectations Grisey managed to construct create a strong sense of continuity while also undergoing a high density of musical change and transformation.

The unstable musical environment of this passage also contributes to the sort of ‘resolved’ quality of the following musical material at rehearsal 22. At rehearsal 22 we have the string harmonics droning on a very pure perfect fifth while the woodwinds perform some glissandi that ‘rub’ against this pure sonority.

There are also some aleatory elements present at this point, in that Grisey asks the glissandi to be played ad libitum, in a somewhat periodic fashion.

Looking at this passage alone one might not expect such a resolute quality.

However, in context following the preceding turbulent material we can begin to see how this passage might be experienced in a sort of resolute nature. We previously mentioned the harmonic trajectory of the previous turbulence travels from dissonance and instability towards more consonant harmonies, making the pure perfect fifth interval sound even more stable and resolute. The halt of harmonic rhythm also creates a sense of stopping movement, especially considering the preceding acceleration of harmonic rhythm, making this moment at rehearsal 22 sound as the ‘goal destination’ of the preceding musical

40 development. Thus, we can see the musical experience of rehearsal 22 is very different when considered in context, or out of context.

This is only scratching the surface of the temporal construction within

Partiels, however, we can already start to get a picture of the musical elements at play that shape the musical experience and narrative of the piece. We could spend more resources into Partiels, however, it is probably more beneficial to examine another piece by Grisey and explore that musical space. Doing so we can begin to show that examining musical construction with these methods does not apply to only one individual piece of music, rather, we can apply these methods to many different pieces of music across many different styles.

Part 2 – Talea

Talea, scored for clarinet, flute, violin, cello, and piano, was written somewhat later in Grisey’s life, 1986. This piece represents Grisey’s changing ideas about construction and organization in his music. In this piece, Grisey was less concerned with the strict compositional methods that are often associated with spectral music and more concerned with the musical rhetoric of the piece.32

32 Anderson, Julian. “Grisey, Gérard.” Grove Music Online. Edited by Deane Root. Accessed March 28, 2017. http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com 41

Grisey was also becoming more and more interested in aspects of time and temporal organization. The title of this piece alone hints as this increasing interest, Talea, coming from the medieval term used to refer to a process of rhythmic repetition.33 In medieval times the word ‘talea’ was often used in tandem with the word ‘color,’ where talea refers to organization of rhythm, color refers to the organization of pitch.34

We could also consider the word talea from its Latin roots, meaning

“cutting.” This has some immediate musical relevance to the piece as Talea opens with very ‘sharp’ musical lines, separated by seemingly empty space. In some ways, this resembles cutting up slices of time, having some very active slices, followed by very inactive slices.35 Grisey is perhaps playing with the counterpart subject of ‘talea’ and ‘color’, set in the most extreme musical contrast, both in terms of dynamic, and in terms of gesture.

Looking more closely into the score, we can see that the opening line is a very quick ascending (by quarter-tone) gesture written so the performers are rhythmically ‘out of sync’ with each other. There are triplets, nonuplets, decuplets, and septuplets composed simultaneously that don’t conclude at the same time, making a very unclear rhythmic texture. This is immediately followed by a very disproportionately long silence, the ascending gesture lasting just shy of

33 Sanders, Ernest H. “Talea.” Grove Music Online. Edited by Deane Root. Accessed March 28, 2017. http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com 34 Ibid. 35 Gérard Grisey, Talea (Milan, Italy: Ricordi, 2009), preface, n.pag.

42 two quarter notes (approximately 1.5 seconds), while the following silence lasts a full eighteen quarter notes (approximately 13.5 seconds). This massive contrast in texture and dynamic, as well as duration, presents a very high density of information. The listener also finds themselves expecting some sort of audible

‘answer’ or response to the initial gesture, and each additional moment this event does not happen only further increases the rate at which the listener experiences time, more and more awaiting some musical response.

Once the response does arrive, however, it is still in stark contrast with the initial ascending gesture. We are presented with a very quiet, almost static response. Pitch is also nearly indiscernible here, as the cello is playing with extreme bow-pressure, resulting in a very noisy timbre, almost devoid of pitch.

This sound crescendoes into the following gesture, which is very similar to our opening gesture. We return to the fff dynamic and with the full instrumentation playing. The gesture is still rhythmically muddled, however, there is one big difference, in this iteration, the figuration descends rather than ascends. These two lines are perceptually linked due to the similar aspects of dynamic, timbre, and rhythm, even though the contour is flipped we are still able to recognize these two lines as the same gesture.

Again, like the opening gesture, the violent outburst is followed by an essentially static response. This time, however, the silence and very quiet elements are flipped in order, presenting the quiet, quasi-unpitched material before the silence. We also have something very different than the cello bow-

43 pressure gesture. Instead, we have the flute, clarinet, and cello holding long tones all quarter-tones apart. This close clustering of pitch makes the pitch of the individual instruments incredibly hard, if not impossible to discern. Rather, we perceive the difference between the frequencies, or the audible ‘beating’ due to the destructive interference of the very close frequencies.

Figure 11. Grisey's Talea, opening page

Comparing just the two gestures of the cello bow-pressure and quarter- tone pitch clusters, while there are some similarities in terms of pitch ambiguities, the two events are very different in terms of timbre. Yet, these two ideas are inexorably linked perceptually. This is due to the musical context that surrounds them. Both ideas are used in response, and in stark contrast to the violent ‘scalar’ gesture. Therefore, we perceive both ideas as the same gesture.

Grisey has thus set up a pattern of expectation. The pattern contains two gestures, one short and violent, the other very quiet, long, and relatively unmoving. We can also look more closely at the relative durations of these gestures, shown in figure 12.

Figure 12. Relative durations of opening gestures in Grisey's Talea a b a’ b’

1.5s |------25s------| 1.5s |------21s------|

It is worth mentioning that these durations are only approximations, while calculating exact durations from the score is possible, and mathematically simple, it is not exactly necessary. Firstly, the durations will vary from performance to performance, and even during individual performances due to the nature of human performance. It is impossible for humans to play exactly metronomically, so it would be analytically foolish to expect it to be so. Secondly, humans are also

45 quite unskilled at measuring time, especially in musical contexts, so if it is impossible for performers to portray these exact durations, and impossible for the audience to perceive the exact durations, approximations are sufficient, if not preferable analytically.

Perhaps more relevant than the exact durations are the proportions of the durations of adjacent events. Gestures a and b are approximately a 1:16 ratio while a’ and b’ are approximately 1:14. At this large of a scale, the minute difference of 1:16 to 1:14 is essentially indistinguishable, and the combined gestures of ab and a’b’ are perceived as essentially the same temporal construct.

One could also argue that the somewhat shorter consequent duration is to make up for the slowing down of experiential time, as the gesture has already been heard once before and does not present any new information, yet still leads to the same conclusion that gestures ab and a’b’ are the same temporal construct.

The opening of the piece continues with these gestures; violent outbursts, quiet ‘colors,’ and silence. The composite gestures are never repeated exactly; however, there is always some small variation, an ever-changing texture that evolves throughout time. Grisey creates a network of expectations in this way, expectations for the individual gestures, and expectations for how the gestures interact with each other. At rehearsal 2 there is the expected return of the ‘a’ gesture, this time returned to its original ascending contour. Four measures later the gesture returns once more, and this time descending in contour. This does not create a system where each time the gesture appears there is a breaking

46 expectation since the contour flips each time. Rather, we perceive the large-scale pattern of flipping contours, and form expectations based on this pattern. That is to say, we expect a consequent ascending contour following a gesture with a descending contour. Alterations from this large-scale pattern are what create moments of broken expectation, or surprise.

However, there are some elements of surprise that happen at this moment,

4 measures after rehearsal 2. In all the previous iterations of the ‘a’ gesture, the different voices all began at the same time, on a strong downbeat. This time, however, there are staggered entrances all at a ppp dynamic. This event also happens much sooner than expected: the model set by the previous gestures have an intermediary ‘b’ gesture lasting approximately twenty seconds. This time, however, this apparent ‘a’ gesture arrives after only approximately twelve seconds of the ‘a’ gesture at rehearsal 2. There is also some apparent missing material.

Previously, the entire ‘b’ gesture was comprised of two sub-gestures, a quiet timbral gesture, and complete silence. At this point, however, the ‘b’ gesture at rehearsal 2 appears to only be comprised of the quiet timbral material, missing the moments of silence.

Immediately following the ‘a’ gesture four measures after rehearsal 2 we find the missing silence, and at rehearsal 3 we see a return of the ‘a’ gesture, all voices initiated together, at the expected fff dynamic, yet with a descending contour? Following the pattern set by previous models we would expect this contour to be ascending, so there is something awry here. We previously

47 mentioned that the ‘b’ gesture of rehearsal 2 was missing the silence portion of the gesture, which was found immediately following the staggered ‘a’ gesture midway through rehearsal 2. Let us, just for a moment, ignore the existence of this staggered ‘a’ gesture. We would then have a complete ‘b’ gesture, of the appropriate length as well, approximately 20 seconds.

So, considering the broken, or ‘cut’ nature of the ‘b’ gesture, and the full return of the ‘a’ gesture at rehearsal 3, we could consider the staggered ‘a’ gesture in rehearsal 2 as a ‘false entrance’. What constitutes the entrance of ‘a’ at rehearsal 3 as the ‘real’ entrance rather than the entrance midway through rehearsal 2? Firstly, the entrance at rehearsal 3 follows all the conventions that

Grisey has set in previous gestural models in this piece; dynamic, orchestration, and temporal alignment. The gesture midway through rehearsal 2, however, breaks many of these conventions. It has a different temporal alignment in that of staggered entrances, and a starkly different dynamic, ppp instead of fff. The only elements that maintain consistency with the rest of the piece are the orchestration, and the contour of the gesture, which is enough to maintain it perceivably as an ‘a’ gesture, however, does not sound ‘structural.’ Thus, once the true ‘a’ gesture appears at rehearsal 3, we understand the previous staggered ‘a’ gesture as a false entrance.

Figure 13. False entrance of 'a' gesture, broken 'b' gesture and structural return of 'a' gesture at rehearsal 3 in Talea

Here Grisey is tricking the audience’s ear, by breaking the pattern he has set using material the listener is expecting, in an unexpected way. This is not a new concept; it was widely present throughout tonal music. Brahms, for example, is famous for using techniques to blur the formal structure of his pieces, using various techniques to fool the listener’s expectations at moments where there would be a ‘formal seam’.

Grisey thus creates a temporal system in the opening of Talea very similar to the opening of Partiels. Other than the surface level observation that both openings have gesture-pairs, in Partiels the ‘bite’ and ‘resonance’ gestures and in

Talea our violent and static gestures, the way Grisey creates a system of expectation and breaks those expectations in the opening of both pieces is very similar. In Partiels, the gesture-pair is repeated exactly three times, the second repetition forms an expectation, and the third repetition confirms those expectations. The fourth iteration does not necessarily present new information, yet breaks the pattern expectation by shortening the ‘bite’ gesture and elides the

‘bite’ and ‘resonance’ gestures together. So, this is not a broken expectation of

‘what,’ but more of a broken expectation of ‘when.’

Similarly, in Talea Grisey essentially repeats the opening violent and static gestures three times, while not exact repetitions as in Partiels, they are presented very similarly. The second repetition forms the expectation of the gesture-pair, and the third repetition confirms the pattern. Only now does Grisey break this

50 formed pattern, not with a ‘what’ expectation, but a ‘when’ expectation, using a false entrance. While two pieces is not nearly a large enough survey to make claims about musical style, seeing two pieces written at very different points in

Grisey’s career, this might be a clue into an element of Grisey’s personal style of temporal construction in his music.

Continuing in Talea, at rehearsal 3 we have the true return of the ‘a’ gesture, yet there is something new about this gesture. It is considerably longer than expected, instead of lasting two quarter notes, or 1.5 seconds, it encompasses a duration of 4 quarter notes, or approximately three seconds.

While the difference between 1.5 and 3 seconds at first seems miniscule, when considering that this is twice the duration on the previous gestures the difference becomes more substantial. Grisey continues the development of the piece using the longer variation of the gesture, similarly how in Partiels, the ‘hiccupped’ gesture that was first a surprise, became the model for expectation to follow.

Immediately following the extended ‘a’ gesture we see at rehearsal 3, we expect some iteration of the ‘b’ gesture. This does, in fact, follow, in somewhat of a different configuration. We have previously mentioned that the ‘b’ gesture was comprised of two sub-gestures, silence, and quiet timbral effects. Both sub- gestures had approximately equal duration within the composite ‘b’ gesture.

However, at rehearsal 3 we have a ‘b’ gesture of appropriate length for the model

Grisey has presented (approximately 20 seconds), the relative durations of the sub-gestures within the composite ‘b’ gesture is not as expected. Instead of equal

51 parts, there is only 2 quarter notes of silence, or 1.5 seconds, while the quiet timbral sounds envelop approximately 18 seconds, very distant from the 1:1 ratio that was present in previous iterations.

This new ratio for the sub-gestures within the ‘b’ gesture continues in a similar fashion at rehearsal 4, and by rehearsal 5 the silence portion of the ‘b’ gesture is completely gone. In this way, Grisey has gradually transformed the ‘b’ gesture to create an overall texture that is more continuous, playing a part in the overall transformation of texture to one of periodicity, to one of aperiodicity. This transformation will be explored further.

At rehearsal 4 we have an expected iteration of the ‘a’ gesture, ascending in contour as expected to follow the descending ‘a’ gesture from rehearsal 3.

However, during the following ‘b’ gesture there is what appears to be another false entrance of the ‘a’ gesture, 4 measures after rehearsal 4. This false entrance is somewhat different than the previous false entrance during rehearsal 2. This time we have the appropriate fff dynamic and unified attack, thus blurring the distinction between false entrances and structural entrances. The contour is different than what is expected though, being an arch structure rather than a clear ascent or descent, making it somewhat clearer that this is not a structural entrance. This is also immediately followed by a quiet, staggered ‘a’ gesture in the rest of the ensemble in the appropriate descending contour, thus making it clear that this is not a structural iteration of the ‘a’ gesture. We can see that Grisey is

52 playing with his own pattern of temporal construction, using the same method to break expectation, but in a slightly transformed, more developed fashion.

Grisey continues this development, interrupting each intermediary ‘b’ section with more false entrances, making it less and less clear where the structural iterations of the ‘a’ gesture are, and where the false ‘a’ gestures are, to the point where the two ideas are completely indistinguishable. This has the side effect of also blurring the ‘b’ gesture, until eventually both gestures are completely merged together. This process continues until eventually the piece becomes a contrapuntal texture of the two gestures happening simultaneously, and it becomes incredibly difficult, if not impossible to identify where one gesture begins or ends.

Before we get to this ‘devolved’ textural complexity, Grisey begins to present new musical information. At rehearsal 6 Grisey presents a gesture in place of where we expect either a structural or false entrance of the ‘a’ gesture.

Rather, we are given a gesture that is dynamically similar to what we expect, fff, and similar in contour, overall ascending, as we expect. However, the gesture is full of alternating intervals, rather than the quasi-scalar material we expect in the

‘a’ gesture. This ‘replacement’ gesture is used in place of where we would expect an ‘a’ gesture. As the piece develops, the ‘replacement’ gesture becomes more frequent, until rehearsal 9 where the ‘a,’ ‘b,’ and ‘replacement’ gestures all participate in an elaborate counterpoint together.

We can begin to see the large-scale textural transition from periodicity to aperiodicity. That is to say, a texture of musical gestures recurring at expected intervals, to a texture of continuity, where the beginning and end of gestures are hidden by all the others. We can consider this transition of texture like a gradient between two colors. Consider a gradient between the colors yellow and blue, the middle of the gradient will be a combination of both colors, in the case of this specific gradient, hues of green. This section of transition is somewhere in the middle of this conceptual gradient. We can also consider the ‘replacement’ gesture previously mentioned as the yellow element of this gradient. The more present this gesture becomes, bringing us farther along the gradient.

By rehearsal 16 we have completed the transition of texture, and have reached the opposite end of the gestural gradient. At rehearsal 16 the entire ensemble participates in the arpeggiating gesture, which comes from the overtone series of C.36 All voices enter on a strong beat together, rather than contrapuntally, and the piano reaches the lowest note of the whole piece, marking the point as one of structural importance perceptually, and making it immediately clear that we have arrived at some destination.

There are elements of this passage that are also quite similar gesturally to the opening ‘a’ gesture. While there are some variations in dynamic, the primary dynamic of this passage is fff. The composite rhythmic construction is also quite

36 Gérard Grisey, Talea (Milan, Italy: Ricordi, 2009), preface, n.pag.

54 similar to the ‘a’ gesture, with quintuplets, sextuplets, sixteenth, and triplet figures all happening simultaneously. From this similarity, and the method

Grisey has introduced this new gesture and developed the piece, we might perceive this new gesture and the ‘a’ gesture as related or intertwined in some way. Grisey’s use of replacing the ‘a’ gesture with this arpeggiating figuration creates a definitive link between the two ideas. The strong textural and formal marking of the arrival of rehearsal 16 thus gives us a sense that the material between rehearsal 4 and 16 was a gradual transformation of the ‘a’ gesture into the arpeggiating figuration. Due to this gradual transformation of gesture, the arrival of rehearsal 16 does not feel so much as an arrival of a new section, but rather a goal destination that the piece has been aiming towards for a while.

From this method of analysis, we can see that Grisey not only composes a counterpoint with the musical gestures he has composed, but also a counterpoint with formal structure and expectation. We saw in the opening how Grisey devised a gestural pattern, one in which the listener forms strong expectations of ‘what’ and ‘when.’ He begins to then break these patterns and expectations he has set, and repeats the method in which he breaks those patterns, thus blurring the distinction between what is surprise and what is expected. This technique of gestural elaboration develops until it is once again clear where the structural elements are, and that structural element is what was first used to deny expectation, and to surprise. This is how Grisey has devised the narrative of these works.

Chapter 3: Conclusions

From the analyses and methods presented in this paper we can begin to see that perhaps the more important elements in spectral music and the music of

Gérard Grisey are not so much the character of musical gestures, but rather the space these gestures travel through. “Music is the space between the notes.”37

This famous quote by Debussy is used in reference to the silence between tones, but we can imagine other ways in this the quote might be relevant. In both pieces we have examined by Grisey, Partiels, and Talea, the techniques used to create expectation and surprise was not very much involved with the actual musical gestures themselves. Rather, Grisey created these networks of expectation and surprise by how these different gestures were connected in time, and the paths he takes to get from one musical place to another. Perhaps it is these networks and pathways that Grisey takes us through that is what defines the music rather than the nature, or the character, of the musical gestures being used.

37 Koomey, Jonathan G. Turning Numbers into Knowledge: Mastering the Art of Problem Solving. Analytics Press, 2008.

We previously mentioned that music is like the painting of sound and silence through time. The methods presented in this paper attempt to catch a glimpse on how exactly these pieces are painted in time, and how we experience the music in time. This concept inspired the title for the paper, Temporal Brush

Strokes. These analyses are not meant to try to say that one piece is composed better than another; the question of quality of composition is a completely separate issue. Rather, these analyses are meant to show the compositional choices composers make when creating their paintings of sounds, or in an abstract sense, the brush strokes used to spread musical paint over the canvas of time.

So, is there any use analyzing music in the ways presented in this paper beyond the act of analysis itself? I believe there are several.

Aspects of performance and musicianship are inherently linked to issues of musical narrative, and perception. There is only so much detail composers can put on the score to tell performers how to perform the music, often there are details of expression that cannot be notated and are left to the performer to decipher on their own accord. There are also times where the score is vague on specific instruction, and there is plenty of space left for the performer to devise their own interpretation of how the music should be performed. These decisions can have great consequences, both positive and negative, on how the music will flow through time, or be perceived.

These decisions are somewhat simple for trained musicians in the context of traditional tonal western art music. It can be immediately clear on a surface level what interpretive decisions should be made to emphasize the temporal or formal constructions made by the composer. However, in the context of spectral music, the task of making interpretive decisions is made much more difficult. It can be difficult on a surface-level reading to understand the development of musical ideas, and when structural events take place. One might be able to grasp where the ‘joints’ are between musical ideas, but the finesse and detail required for a truly expressive performance require much more involvement with the structural and temporal details devised by the composer. Performers who are able to read and analyze music with the methods presented in this paper will be better able to pinpoint these structural details and be able to visualize how the music should flow through time, thus making them more informed when deciding what interpretive choices should be made at certain points in the music.

It is also important to note that the methods of analysis in this paper are not specific to spectral music. Rather, it is a different way of conceptualizing music in time, and we can apply these methods of conceptualization to music of many different styles.

Concepts of musical narrative are also very relevant to composition pedagogy. Aspects of how music flows through time and the rate of change in music have been primarily a product of intuition. This makes it very difficult to translate the concepts of temporal construction to words, thus making the

58 involvement of discussion of temporality in private lessons, and especially the classroom, very difficult. How does one effectively communicate ideas that are based solely on intuition? Take for instance a scenario where a composition teacher tells a student, “this passage moves too quickly,” or, “this passage isn’t leading anywhere.” While this is good feedback, it provides little in the way of actual instruction or guidance. What part of the music is moving too quickly? Are the gestures too short? Do the gestures develop too quickly? Is the tempo too fast? How do I create a clearer sense of direction? These are all questions left to be answered by the intuitive feedback. Examining the student’s music using the techniques presented in this paper can give a much clearer picture of how the music is developing through time, or the lack thereof. The act of quantifying concepts that were once abstract allows us much greater ability to discuss these ideas.

Beyond the classroom or private lesson setting these methods of analysis can still be of great use educationally. The act of composing is often borrowing ideas from other composers and previous pieces and using those ideas in one’s own musical voice. Very rarely does one set out to do something completely new, where a model for any level of reference is absent. Students’ ability to read a score in the ways presented by this paper gives them more opportunity to learn from the wealth of musical achievement available for them to explore. It is very difficult to decipher these musical elements if one does not even know where to look. Being able to borrow ideas of formal construction, temporal organization,

59 and musical development is an invaluable tool to a growing composer of all stages of development.

This paper does not present a complete aggregate of all the different ways and methods in which music can be constructed through time. To attempt to do so would be foolish, as composers are constantly inventing new ways to musically move through time. Rather, this paper presents the methods in which we can examine how specific passages are organized constructed through time. To then understand the narrative of the music one must consider how these techniques of organization and construction are perceived, and how they exist relative to each other.

While spectral music abandoned many of the traditional aspects of music and brought with it radically new ideas about the nature of music, the fundamental nature of musical narrative is still alive and well in spectral music.

By abandoning traditional elements of music, Grisey and other composers inspired by the developments of spectral composition entered a realm of new sonic possibilities, one where relating musical ideas over distances in time becomes ever more important. (Rose 1996)

We can begin to see how complex the relationship between music and time can be, yet also how important the relationship is for how we experience music.

This paper was not meant to explore the ways in which music of one specific style is constructed through time, but rather to explore some methods in which we can explore the relationship of music and time regardless of the style and

60 compositional methods of the piece in question. Spectral music provides a good medium for this exploration as there is a lack of musical cues we typically associate with musical expectation. Without these typical musical cues, we are forced to explore the construction of music in a more general way, and in doing so we create methods that explore temporal relationships without regard to stylistic specific qualities.

In our exploration of two separate pieces by Grisey, Talea and Partiels, we found similar methods of temporal construction in the introductions. We found that Grisey used the power of expectation in creative ways, using moments of initial surprise as the basis of expectation for upcoming musical development.

Grisey actively uses aspects of expectation and temporality as a tool to propel musical direction, to make transitions between musical ideas, to create a sense of continuity, or a lack thereof. Through these explorations, we have begun to see that perhaps the more prevailing aspect of Grisey’s music is the manner in which he gets from one musical place to another, rather than the quality of specific musical gestures. Or in other words, we have examined the temporal brush strokes Grisey has used in these pieces to paint his music through time.

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