Musik & Ästhetik, 2017, Jg. 21, Ausgabe 82

Composed, Interpreted and Perceived Time: The Integration of Temporal Structures into a Performative Analysis – a Discussion with Reference to J. S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations – Recent developments in interpretation research and performance studies have raised doubts as to whether musical performances genuinely, as often claimed, underline ›structural‹ properties of musical works. Rather, spontaneous, unorthodox ways of treating tempo and dynamics – ›accents pathétiques‹ (Mathis Lussy) – are used to establish relationships that a conventional score analysis can barely pick up or dictate. Against this background, the present essay attempts to grasp Variation 21 from Bach’s Goldberg Variations and its position within the overall temporal framework by means of a ›performative analysis‹ integrating structure-, interpretation- and reception-analytical aspects, and on the basis of a categorial model of temporal perception in music (›spatialized time‹, ›transformative time‹, ›presentist time‹). Here Robert Hill’s idea of performance as ›formal analysis in real time‹ acts as the starting-point for detailed analytical observations on micro- and macro-form amid the tensions of interpretation history. What transpires, especially in the comparison of different tempo dispositions for the entire cycle, is a tension between architectural coherence and a discontinuity in which spatialized time is broken through in the direction of presentist time, or allows itself to be carried along in the mobility of transformative time.

Councillor Krespel, or, The Engineer of the Super-Violin: Scientific Discourse and Art Discourse As Grotesque Synthesis in Hoffmann’s Story »Councillor Krespel« – The obsessive artistic drive of Hoffmann’s figure Councillor Krespel has the goal of building the perfect violin. To reach this supernatural goal, Krespel uses not only the methods of the violin-making craft, but also the dissecting method of medical anatomy and the constructive method of the engineering craft. His aporia lies in striving to reach the soul of the instrument and the je ne sais quoi of the highest artistic effect by scientific-technical means. At the end, Krespel liberates himself from his obsession; the engineer of the super-violin crafts toys for children and thus removes himself from both the scientific and the art-metaphysical discourses, which enter a grotesque synthesis in Hoffmann’s tale.

Mozart’s Film Debut as an Endgame: La Mort de Mozart (1909) – The earliest Mozart film, until now usually ascribed to Louis Feuillade, which Étienne Arnaud made in 1909 for Gaumond, deals with what later became a typical subject: Mozart’s final, incomplete Requiem. The decisive aspect here is that the music for this film, arranged and recorded by Paul Fosse (duration: 12-13 minutes) can be completely reconstructed. Paul Fosse’s choice of music gives the story of Mozart’s requiem and death, filmed in a conventionally linear fashion, a dramaturgical structure through the music. Pointing beyond the film itself, this indicates that the time of the silent film featured widely varied approaches to musical accompaniment (»adaptations«). They can be researched and constructed using the recordings of music for over 1600 silent films for which Paul Fosse »adapted« the music at the Gaumont Palace.

The Idiosyncratic ›Neo-Neoclassicism‹ of Late Ligeti in the Second Movement of His Violin Concerto – As individual and ›forward-thinking‹ as György Ligeti’s compositional stance was, there are tendencies in some of his late works that, in aesthetic terms, exhibit uncanny parallels with the (neo-)classicist late style of Debussy – in particular, a strange tension between an idiosyncrasy forging ahead in visionary fashion and a simultaneous reliance on established stylistic elements from the past. The title of the second movement of his Violin Concerto – ›Aria, Hoquetus, Choral‹ – points to the deliberate application of compositional and formal principles from earlier periods. At first glance, however, it is by no means clear how far into the musical ›underground‹ the effects of these principles actually extend: the plain, ›pseudo-modal‹ sound world of the theme is combined with the intellectual rigour of medieval cantus firmus technique. Tonal reminiscences collide with the seemingly chaotic polyphony of independent sonic levels, and ›raw‹ archaisms like drones and unadjusted natural intervals play a decisive part. The element of subversion and distortion is present at all times, whether at the rhythmic level, in the chromatic ›falsification‹ of the theme, or also the use of ›impure‹ foreign bodies like ocarinas and lotus flutes. The result is a ›patchwork‹ that is by no means postmodern, but rather forms a coherent world of musical expression.

Rejection as a Point of Departure: Notes on Dealing with Critical New Music in the Context of Its Mediation – The specific aesthetic of critical modern music – the program of which includes the »rejection of the familiar« (Helmut Lachenmann), among other things – frequently also produces an attitude of rejection on the part of the audience. This attitude of rejection indeed substantially impedes the instructional handling of the corresponding modern music, but can also become the basis for long-range and lasting aesthetic learning processes if it is possible to transparently convey the dialectical relationships between aesthetic aspiration, social reality, and the individual experience of modern music.

Problem Histories of Musicology: A »Re-reading« of Carl Dahlhaus’s Foundations of Music History – The relationship between historical theory and historiography in Carl Dahlhaus’s work is addressed in a recently-published »re-reading« of his Foundations of Music History. Within the framework of the collection, Dahlhaus’s book is tied both to historical discourses of evaluation and current discursive contexts in the field of history. This shows steps towards a third way between the currently widespread camp-based thinking of Dahlhaus’s devotees and his despisers. His practice of thought, which brought him great esteem in music theory and hostility from the cultural sciences, could be made fruitful by an attentive musicology as a potential source of tension between historical norms and diversity of presentation.