Segmenting the Labyrinth:
Sketch Studies and the Scala
Enigmatica in the Finale of Luigi Nono’s Quando stanno morendo Diario
Polacco N. 2 (1982)[1]
Friedemann
Sallis
I can’t utter too many warnings
against overrating these
analyses, since after all they
only lead to what I have
always been dead against: seeing how it is done;
whereas I have always helped people to see: what it is!
Arnold
Schoenberg[2]
Patricia Hall once observed that musical sketches are most helpful for
“highly defined theoretical systems.” She then went on to state that sketch
material pertaining to music created within transitional (i.e. poorly defined)
systems is likely to be ambiguous, telling us little more than what we may
already have discovered in the finished score.[3]
With respect, I submit that the very idea of stable, “highly defined
theoretical systems” somehow standing outside of the historical flux of musical
thought is at once a figment of my colleague’s imagination and one of enduring
myths of modern music theory. Be that as it may, Gianmario Borio has since
turned Hall’s observation on its head. Referring to the study of new music
composed during the latter half of the twentieth century, he wrote that
philological research (i.e. sketch studies) should not be used to confirm
analytical hypotheses formulated in advance, but rather it becomes the conditio
sine qua non for the formulation of these hypotheses.[4]
In other words, when studying music for which appropriate analytical hypotheses
have not yet been developed or remain underdeveloped, the careful examination
of the composer’s surviving sketch material often provides the requisite
criteria with which a plausible analytical hypothesis can be established.
To exemplify this point, the last 36 bars of the third and final
movement (labelled Part III[5])
of Luigi Nono’s Quando stanno morendo, Diario Polacco N. 2 for
two sopranos, mezzo soprano, contralto, bass flute, violoncello and live
electronics will be examined in some detail. The goal is to show how a study of
the composer’s working documents can provide a framework, within which basic
units of Nono’s compositional technique can be identified. By combining data
obtained from a close reading of the published score and surviving sketch
material with the information gained from what we know of the work’s context,
the student of this music can more efficiently circumscribe what Allen Forte
once called the “analytical object.”[6]
To accomplish this task we will scrutinize working documents Nono used to
produce Quando stanno morendo, as well as the related work ¿Donde
estas, hermano? Per ‘los Desaparecidos en Argentina’ for two
sopranos, mezzo soprano and contralto (1982), and we will also examine aspects
of the context within which these two works were written.
The Archivio Luigi Nono conserves a substantial collection of diverse
documents pertaining to the composition of Quando stanno morendo. At
present that collection contains 827 leaves of manuscript material. Of these,
420 leaves have been classified as sketches and drafts in the narrow sense of
the term (i.e. documents containing work directly related to the compositional
process). The rest of the collection is made up of a fair copy (47 leaves) and
360 leaves of various documents pertaining to pre-compositional stages and
documents related to the first performance of the work. The size of the collection is typical of
compositions written in the early 1980s and is representative of Nono’s
compositional practice.[7]
The four-voice a cappella Finale of Quando stanno morendo
constitutes not only the chorale-like concluding section of Part III, but also
functions as a coda for the entire work. This is not the first time Nono has
turned to the unadorned human voice to complete a composition. His Epitaffio
No. 3 Memento, Romance de la Guardia civil española (1952-53) for
choir and orchestra ends in a similar manner. This early work sets a poem by
Federico García Lorca in which the author presents a stunning confrontation
between order and chaos, law and magic, power and
lyricism, and authority and liberty.[8]
The work ends with unaccompanied choir singing the last four lines of García
Lorca’s allusive text (bars 411- 442).[9]
The last 31 bars are the only section in which the vocal ensemble is presented
a cappella and in which it actually sings (in the preceding sections the
ensemble functions as a speaking choir), setting it off from the rest of the
composition. The text is clearly meant to be understood as a concluding
statement.[10]
Similar concluding sections for unaccompanied voices or voice can also be found
in works such as Intolleranza (1960-61) and La fabbrica illuminata
(1964).
Jeannie Guerrero has examined this aspect of Nono’s work and noted that
the concluding function of these finales is not only a matter of content but
also of form. She contrasts the multidimensional counterpoint and complex
textures of Sarà dolce tacere (1960) with the retrograde canon at the
end in which these dense structural procedures are clarified.
The multidimensional counterpoint thus reaches utter silence at the
conclusion of Sarà dolce tacere. The ending serves as a structural cadence for
the entire song and aptly reflects the work’s title, “It will be sweet
silence.” Further the gradually aligning generator paths throughout the middle
of the song indicate a large-scale progression toward the final cadence. The
increasing contrapuntal alignment across four dimensions binds the entire work
into an organic whole.[11]
Compared to the ‘noisy’, agitated textures of the beginning and middle
of Sarà dolce tacere, the retrograde canon at the end of the composition
“performs the act of falling silent.”[12]
In Cori di Didone (1958), Guerrero notes that the duration-dynamics
palindrome of the Finale brings the complex, chaotic textures of the work to
rest. At the same time, this place of structural repose resonates strongly with
the text’s emphasis on the “silence of dead seas.”[13]
In the following, we shall see that the homophonic textures of the a cappella
Finale of Quando stanno morendo bring into focus certain structural
aspects of the music of preceding sections, while at the same time presenting a
concluding commentary on the work as a whole. For reasons that will become
apparent in the course of the text, this article will focus on Parts II and III
of Quando stanno morendo. In any case, an exhaustive analysis of the
entire work would not be possible within the space provided here. [14]
Work and Context
Completed on 3 September 1982, Quando stanno morendo is the third
of a series of four works conceived and written at the Experimental Studio of
the Heinrich Strobel Foundation of the Südwestfunk at Freiburg im Breisgau
between 1981 and 1983.[15]
It is one of the first in which Nono successfully integrated the real-time
manipulation of sound using information technology developed specifically for
this purpose at the Foundation. The innovative concepts, procedures and
technologies developed at the Foundation would strongly mark Nono’s
compositions written during his last decade from both a technical and an
aesthetic point of view and constitutes one of the primary factors providing
coherence to what has come to be known as the composer’s late work (1980-90).
This being said, the music produced during this period is not merely about
applying new technology to old compositional problems. Quando stanno morendo,
first performed in Venice on 3 October 1982, has a rich history that is
recounted in the composer’s dedication.
In October 1981 the organizers of the Warsaw Music Festival invited me
to compose
Diario polacco No.2 which should have taken place this year.
Then came the 13th of December.I have had no news of the
friends who invited me.
The organizers were dismissed, the Festival did not take place.
My desire to write this Diary became even stronger.
I dedicate it to my Polish friends and companions, who - in exile, in
hiding, in prison, at
work - resist and hope even if they despair, believe even if they are
incredulous.[16]
The suppression of Solidarno by General Jaruzelski with the tacit support of the Soviet Union in
December 1981 had a devastating impact on Nono. This can be clearly felt in the
work’s libretto: a collage of fragments taken from poems by Czes_aw Mi_osz, Endre Ady, Aleksandr Blok, Velemir Khlebnikov and Boris Pasternak,
selected and edited by Massimo Cacciari, who became one of Nono’s principal
advisers during the last decade of his career. Part II (the second movement) is
entirely based on a text by the Russian futurist poet, Velemir Khlebnikov
(1885-1922).[17]
In their ‘Notes’ concerning the elocution of this text, the editors of the
published score state: “The text requires enunciation that is free, not
measured, serious and decisively articulated: an apostrophe sculpted to produce
dramatic introspection rather than declamation.”[18]
The text is thus not only to be heard for its musical value but also for its
semantic content. Its central section, translated in Italian, reads:
Mosca chi sei? Moscow
– who are you?
Io so che voi siete I
know that you are
lupi ortodossi. orthodox
wolves.
Ma come mai, come mai non udite But
how, how on earth don’t you hear
Il fruscìo dell’ago della sorte? the
rustling of the needle of fate?[19]
Figure 1: Transcription and English
translation of lines 7 to 11 of the text of Part II
Khlebnikov’s words resonate well with the context in which they were
written, i.e. the disintegrating regime of Tsar Nicolas II. That Nono and
Cacciari should have chosen to use the work of this particular poet to make a
statement on the repression of Solidarno__ speaks volumes on their attitude toward the Soviet regime under Leonid
Brejnev.
Compositional History of the Finale
The compositional history of the Finale (Part III, bars 59-94) is complex
and in some respects remains unclear to this day. In the following Plate we see
an early typescript of the text fragments which established the ternary
framework of Part III.
The word “ALBA” scrawled graffiti-like near the top of the page means
“dawn” and can also refer to the age-old vocal genre otherwise known as ‘aube’
or ‘aubade’. Carola Nielinger-Vakil has pointed out that the term
appears on numerous sketches from the late 1950s onwards and almost invariably
refers to the poetry of Cesare Pavese, in which the unspoilt beginning of the
day - dawn - stands for hope.[20]
The
lines of Pasternak’s text that begin Part III refer to a period when we will
return to light (“noi verremo alla luce”). Commenting on Quando stanno
morendo shortly after the work had been composed, Nono wrote:
And if each thing were to be seen in this way - as unheard, individual,
indivisible - then each thing
would escape the fate of death to which it would be consigned by the
winter of the “orthodox wolves”.
If we are able to sustain this expectation, then we might be able to
shine the “light of day” and thus
defeat the death that today hangs over us. [21]
The musical tone of Part III is also far less agitated and more lyrical
than that of Part II, conforming to the general idea of a ‘chant d’aube’.
Marco Mazzolini has identified cuts which were made in both the text and
the music of Part III (see Figure 2 below).[22]
Mazzolini’s observations are based on two scores of the work, which he labelled
“Stesura originaria” [Original draft] and “Stesura con taglio”[Draft with cuts]
(see Example 2 below). Initially Nono had intended to divide the first text fragment(marked ‘a’ in Plate 1) into three
subsections. In the end he cut the last part of Pasternak’s text following the
word ‘chiamerà’ and in so doing eliminated the last 18 bars of what would have
been the third subsection of a fifty-four-bar ternary form. He also cut the
first three lines of the third text fragment, leaving only the last line of
Khlebnikov’s text and in so doing eliminated half of the music that had been
composed for this final section of the work.[23]
Plate 1: Luigi Nono, Typescript of the
Original Text of the Third Movement.
Reproduced with the kind permission of the Archivio Luigi Nono. © Eredi
Luigi Nono.
“Stesura originaria” [Original Draft] “Stesura con taglio”
[Draft with cuts]
(Original structure of Part III) (Definitive
structure of Part III)
a) 1. bars 1-21 a) bars
1-36 (subsection 3 was cut. In the published
2. bars 22-36 score,
double bar separates bars 21 and 22,
3. bars 37-54 identifying
the dividing line between subsections1 and 2.)
b) bars 1-22 b) bars
37-58
c) bars 1-70 c) bars
59-94 (bars 1-34 of the earlier version were cut)
Figure 2: Comparison of the original and
definitive structures of Part III presented by Marco Mazzolini in 1993
.
These cuts were made late in the compositional process. The Archivio
Luigi Nono conserves an autograph fair copy (catalogue no. 47.12.02, no doubt
the document Mazzolini labelled the “stesura originaria” in his 1993
conference). This fair copy is dated 3 September 1982. The publication of this
date at the double bar in the published score (which presents the “stesura con
taglio”, or definitive version of Part III) is misleading because the cuts must
have been made after 3 September 1982. Erika Schaller observes that during the
last phase of his career, Nono would often
make cuts during rehearsals leading
up to the first performance.[24]
As can be seen in Plate 1 above, the Finale of Part III was originally
supposed to have set four lines of another text fragment by Khlebnikov.
Quando stanno morendo, le erbe
intristiscono When they are dying,
[blades of] grass wither
Quando stanno morendo, i cavalli respirano When they are dying, horses breathe
Quando stanno morendo, i soli si spengono When they are dying, suns fade away
Quando stanno morendo, gli uomini cantano When they are dying, men sing
Figure 3: Transcription and English
translation of the last four lines of text presented in Plate 1
The music composed to set this text, exists in three distinct versions,
which for the purposes of this paper will be labelled 1, 2 and 3. The numbers
refer to the chronological order in which Nono composed the three versions.
Example 1: Quando stanno
morendo, Part III, Original Draft of the Finale, bars 1-70, Pitch Content
of Versions 2 and 1 of the Finale
1 Version 1 is the last thirty-six bars as they appear in the published
score, which set only the last line of Khlebnikov’s text (see Example 1).
2 Following the completion
of version 1, a new version of the same music was composed by permuting the
order of the compositional units. Version 2 was to have set the first three
lines of Khlebnikov’s text, and, together the two versions would have
constituted a Finale seventy bars in length, twice as long as it actually is.
As noted above, Nono cut version 2. In the following example the dyads,
trichords and tetrachords of versions 2 and 1 are presented as they appear in
the “stesura originaria” (duration values have been eliminated). The intervals
and chords of version 1 are numbered and a cursory comparison of the two
versions reveals that except for chords 23 and 24, which are missing in version
2, the pitch content of version 2 is identical to that of version 1.[25]
3 On 28 September 1982, three and a half weeks after having completed Quando
stanno morendo, Nono used version 1 to create a new work entitled ¿Donde
estas, hermano? Per ‘los Desaparecidos en Argentina’ for two sopranos, mezzo
soprano and contralto. He did this by replacing Khlebnikov’s text with the
Spanish words “¿Donde estas hermano?” With regard to the music, though minor
changes do occur in dynamics, phrasing and note doublings, the pitch and
duration structures of versions 1 and 3 are identical.¿Donde estas hermano?
was first performed on 24 November 1982
in Cologne as
part of a
solidarity concert organized by the German section of the ‘Association
Internationale de Défense des Artistes victimes de la répression dans le monde’
(AIDA). The concert’s goal, clearly
reflected in Nono’s subtitle, was to reinforce public awareness of those who
had disappeared during the years of state sponsored terror and specifically of
the approximately one hundred Argentinean artists who remained unaccounted for
at that time.[26]
The event’s motto was ¿Donde estas, hermano?, which Nono appropriated
for both the title and the text of this new vocal work. ¿Donde estas
hermano? has since been published and recorded. This last version is
mentioned here in passing for two reasons: first, it clearly demonstrates that
though the texts of Nono’s works are always important and should never be
ignored, they do not necessarily constitute the determining factor for the
organization of the music; second, this
version shows that the Finale of Quando stanno morendo can be understood
as a musical entity in its own right and can thus be analyzed as a
self-standing piece, without taking into account the live electronics that are
minimally present in version 1 (see footnote 10 above).
How do we know that version 2 was derived from version 1 and not the
other way around? The study of sketch material pertaining to Quando stanno
morendo provides an answer. Plate 2 below presents a sketch used by Nono as
he began to compose the Finale. It shows how vocal parts of the previously
composed Part II and the first two sections of Part III were used to create the
pitch structures of version 1.
The Roman numerals in the left margin refer to Parts II and III and the
lower case letters refer to the sections of each movement. The pitch content of
this page is almost completely derived from the vocal parts in the five
sections of Parts II and III that precede the Finale. For example, the pitches
notated on the uppermost staves of the page present the melodic material sung
by the second soprano and mezzo-soprano in sections ‘a’ (bars 10-37)[27]
‘b’ (bars 56-81) and ‘c’ (bars 82-105) of Part II. Except for one note the
correspondence between the sketch and the vocal lines in Part II is exact both
in terms of pitch and register.[28]
The pitches notated on the following staves present the melodic material of
Part III sung by the first soprano in section ‘a’ (bars 1-27) and by the
contralto in section ‘b’ (bars 37-53).[29]
Plate 2: Quando stanno morendo,
Part III, bars 59-94, Sketch.
Reproduced with the kind permission of the Archivio Luigi Nono. © Eredi
Luigi Nono.
Plate 3: Quando stanno morendo,
Part III, bars 59-94, sketch.
Reproduced
with the kind permission of the Archivio Luigi Nono. © Eredi Luigi Nono
This sketch presents the compositional units with which Nono composed
the four-voice chorale of the Finale. The
units are made up of single pitches, dyads, trichords and tetrachords. The
column of numbers written in the upper right corner (1=6; 2=9; 3=16; 4=5)
indicates the sum of one-, two-, three-, and four-note units Nono intended to
use at one point in the compositional process.[30] The octava
bassa signs in
the left margin show
Nono modifying register. The pitch content of the entire upper staff is
sung an octave lower in the Finale than where the same material was sung in the
second movement. Nono also eliminated units (the encircled tritone e''' b''flat
on the first staff, the same interval on the third staff, as well as the
following tritone) and changed their order (the b'' became the fourth unit on
the second staff). At some point he appears to have envisioned the Finale being
made up of 35 units (see the encircled figure on the right side of the page).
In the published score, the Finale contains 31 units: the sum of the squared
and circled figures to the right of the compositional units.
Some time after he had completed the page presented in Plate 2, Nono set
his compositional pitch units in a metric structure and added duration to the
pitch structure of the Finale. This can be seen on the bifolium presented in
Plate 3. In both sketches presented in Plates 2 and 3, Nono used different
coloured ink (blue, red and black) to distinguish between first ideas and
corrections. Despite the sketch-like quality of the writing in Plate 3, the
pitch and durational aspects of the Finale are now firmly in place. Though the
text, phrasing, dynamics and the live electronic manipulation are still
missing, the document presented above can be seen as a first rough draft of
what would become the music of the Finale of Quando stanno morendo and
of ¿Donde estas hermano?
From the information gleaned from these two pages, we are able to draw
the following conclusion. The sketches in Plates 2 and 3 present the
compositional units in the order that corresponds with version 1 of the Finale.
This confirms that version 2 is derived from version 1 and not the other way
around, because the structures of version 1 are directly related to previously
composed vocal material of Parts II and III.
Segmenting Pitch Structure in the Finale
What are we
to make of this seemingly chaotic collection of mainly 3-5 and 3-8 trichords in
the Finale of Quando stanno morendo? How are these compositional units
related to one another and how did Nono recompose this material for version 2?
In a broader context, how should we understand these harmonic structures which
are so characteristic of Nono’s late work as a whole? The phrase structure of
vocal music (following text/music relationships) often constitutes a good point
of departure for an examination of the above questions. However, as we have
seen, the same compositional units were used to set three completely different
texts, and, in the case of ¿Donde estas hermano? (version 3 of the
Finale), a new text was simply superposed on a pre-existing musical structure
(version 1). As a result, though the text/music relationship is significant, it
can not be the sole reference for a coherent explanation of Nono’s phrase
structures.
One promising line of endeavour in this particular case is to examine
how the so-called scala enigmatica is related to the pitch structure in
the Finale of Quando stanno morendo. Commentators and analysts have
noticed the presence of this scale in Nono’s late work, beginning with the
string quartet Fragmente - Stille, An Diotima (1980).[31]
According to Laurent Feneyrou, it is so pervasive in the compositions of the
1980s that it parallels Nono’s use of the all interval row in works of the late
1950s.[32]
The scala enigmatica was invented
by Adolfo Crescentini, a Bolognese music professor who, in a letter published
in the Gazetta Musicale di Milano on 3 August 1888, challenged readers
to harmonize a seven-note scale made up of an eight-note pitch collection
organized in a succession of major, minor and augmented seconds, the eighth
pitch being the lowered fourth degree in the descending version (see Example
2). The following year, Giuseppe Verdi used the scale as a cantus firmus in his
"Ave Maria" (subtitled Scala enigmatica armonizzata a 4 voci
miste), which became the first of the Quattro Pezzi Sacri (1898).[33]
Example 2: The Scala
Enigmatica as used by Giuseppe Verdi in “Ave Maria,” bars 1-16
In Nono’s compositions, the scala enigmatica never appears as such.
This fact has led some, notably Heinz-Klaus Metzger, Luigi Pestalozza and Jürg
Stenzl, to suggest that Nono used it as a kind of generalized background matrix
with only vague relationships to the structure of a particular work.
Paraphrasing Nono, Metzger stated that the scale should be seen as a
“generative constellation” [generativer Konstellation] from which the composer
derived his diastematic material, and went on to suggest that the beginning of
the string quartet Fragmente - Stille can be related to the scala
enigmatica transposed to A. He did not explain how he came to this
conclusion and indeed dismissed such explanations as pedantic.[34]
More recent studies of Nono’s late work have attempted to provide a more
precise definition of the term “generative constellation.” Taking Metzger’s
remarks as his point of departure, Hermann Spree noted that in Fragmente-Stille,
An Diotima the scala enigmatica has neither a determinant
function (like that of a series) nor can it be dismissed as mere neutral background
material.[35]
He observed that the pitches A, E-flat, D and A-flat are clearly present at the
very beginning of the string quartet and that this pair of interlocking
tritones presents the four transposition levels of the scala enigmatica
that play a framing role throughout the work. He also stated that the pitch
structure of the string quartet should not be understood as a succession of
transpositions, moving from one level to another, but rather as intervals and
chords derived from specific transposition levels which appear to be freely
mixed, leaving the impression that the music seems to hover between two or more
forms of the scale.[36]
Contradicting Spree’s findings somewhat, the first fifteen units of
version 1 of the Finale of Quando stanno morendo can be grouped into a
succession of segments derived from specific transposition levels of the scala
enigmatica. The first three compositional units contain seven of the eight
pitches of the scale transposed to B flat. As is often the case in Nono’s late
work, tritones, perfect fourths and fifths, major sevenths and minor seconds
dominate the diastematic structures of the compositional units 1 through 3 and
continue to do so throughout the Finale.[37]
The first trichord presents two characteristic intervals of the scale
transposed to B flat: with the minor second between the first and second scale
degrees and the tritone between the first and fourth scale degrees.
The minor second is spelled enharmonically as B natural rather than as C
flat.[38]
Numerous analysts have noted the idiosyncratic manner with which Nono notated
music derived from the scale. Spree spoke of Nono’s “insensitivity” to
questions concerning enharmonic spelling.[39]
Though this aspect of Nono’s writing does not provide an unequivocal key to the
composer’s pitch structures, notation can be an indication of how closely
various transposition levels of the scale are related to specific sections of
his music. For example, in an undated sketch produced for Prometeo, some
time between 1981 and 1985 (the period during which he composed Quando
stanno morendo), Nono copied out all twelve transpositions of the scala
enigmatica, starting on C at the top of the page and descending by
half-step to B at the bottom of the page (as though he were deploying a serial
table).[40]
Nono’s notation of the scale in this table is not rigorously systematic (it
contains numerous inconsistencies), but neither is it incoherent. The guiding
principle seems to be the facilitation of reading and writing. Throughout the
sketch he avoids all infrequent accidentals: B sharp, F flat, all double sharps
and flats, etc. Though on occasion, the spelling of a degree in the ascending
form of the scale will differ from that of the descending form, this does not
occur frequently. In Example 3 below, the first six compositional units
(setting the word “Quando”) are placed above the transposition levels from
which they can be derived. The scales are spelled exactly as Nono wrote them in
his sketch for Prometeo.
Example 3: Quando stanno
morendo, Part III, Finale, Compositional Units 1-6 Placed Over
Transpositions of the Scala Enigmatica, Transcribed from a Sketch for
Prometeo
The spelling of all pitches conforms to that used in the sketch for
Prometeo. For example in compositional unit 1, the B natural conforms to
the manner in which Nono notated the second degree of the scale in both
ascending and descending forms. In cases where a discrepancy arises between the
spellings of the same degree on ascending and descending forms of the scale (G
sharp ascending and A flat descending in the B flat transposition for example),
Nono tends to choose spellings used in the ascending form. Of the first 22
enigmatica, only one pitch (A flat of unit 9, see Example 4 below) does not
conform to Nono’s idiosyncratic notation of the scale found in his sketch for Prometeo.
Example 4: Quando stanno morendo, Part III, Finale,
Compositional Units 7-15 Placed Over
Transposition of the Scala
Enigmatica, Transcribed from a Sketch for Prometeo.
The next
compositional unit (4) breaks with the previous group of three because it
contains F and C sharp, neither of which are found in the B flat transposition
of the scale. These two pitches are contained in the scale transposed to F. In
fact they are the only two notes of the scale on F which do not occur in the
scale on B flat. Furthermore, D and G sharp, the only two notes of the B-flat
transposition that do not occur in the F transposition, form the tritone of the preceding compositional unit (3). Thus units 3 and 4
display the strongest possible contrast that can be obtained between these two
overlapping pitch collections. Units 4 through 6 are made up of five of the
eight pitch classes of the scale transposed to F.[41]
These five scale degrees are also characteristic of the scale on F: the lowest
note, the fourth in both ascending and descending forms, the augmented fifth
and the major seventh. Note should also be taken of the fact that unit 4 also
contains the tritone made up of the first degree and the ascending fourth
degree of the scale, analogous to the tritone found in unit 1. The
transposition levels from which these compositional units can be derived,
divide the setting of the word in two equal halves.
The transposition identity of compositional units 7 through 9, which set
the second word of the text (“stanno”), is not quite as certain as the first
two groups (see Example 4 below). The six pitches of these units all belong to
the scale transposed to E flat and all are in normal spelling.[42]
Only one pitch (G) distinguishes the pitch collection of the E-flat
transposition from those of the B -flat or F transpositions and it is absent.
Consequently all of the pitches used in compositional units 7-9 could be
derived from the B-flat and F transpositions. This reading of the pitch content
of units 7 through 9 is however unsatisfactory because unit 7 contains a C
sharp and a D. The former is present in the B-flat transposition and the latter
in the F transposition, making the trichord impossible to classify. Moreover,
the six pitches of units 7 through 9, like those of units 4 through 6,
correspond to characteristic scale degrees of the E-flat transposition: the
lowest note, the fourth degree in both ascending and descending forms, the
augmented fifth, the augmented sixth and the major seventh.
The units 10 through 12, which set the word “morendo”, can be derived
either from the B-flat or the F transpositions of the scale. Their spelling conforms
to both transpositions. However, when combined with compositional unit 13,
which contains pitches that can only be derived from the scale on F, the set
(units 10 -13) constitutes a convincing whole. Here again, the pitch material
of these units is made of six characteristic pitches of the scale on F: the
lowest note, the major third, the fourth degree in both ascending and
descending forms, the augmented fifth, and the major seventh.
The last three units of this first section of the Finale are in a mirror
relationship with units at the beginning, which corresponds to the fact that
the vocal line of the third section of Part II is the retrograde of the vocal
line of the first section (see the sketch presented in Plate 2: the pitch
material of the third staff marked “c” is in a retrograde relationship with the
pitch material of the first staff marked ‘a’).[43] However,
this relationship is not exact: units 1 - 3 - 4 correspond to units 15 -14 -
13. Unit 2, which should have been placed between units 15 and 14, is missing.
As noted above, when Nono constituted the compositional units of the Finale, he
deliberately eliminated the interval e''-flat – a'', which would have been
placed between units 14 and 15 (see Plate 2, third staff from the top of the
page). If we examine the register displacement of pitches making up these
units, it is clear that Nono was constructing a tight symmetric relationship
between the compositional units at opposite ends of this first section of the
Finale. In all three pairs of trichords, at least one note retains its initial
register. The tritone of units 1 and 15 is inverted (the augmented fourth
equals the diminished fifth); the tritone of units 3 and 14 is transposed two
octaves higher, and the tritone of units 4 and 13 is inverted in the opposite
direction to that of units 1 and 15. Clearly, these complementary melodic
patterns (the first curving down, the second curving up) were consciously
composed, reinforcing the notion that the units of the B-flat sections at
opposite ends of the first fifteen compositional units belong together and do
have a shared identity (see Example 5).
Example 5: Quando stanno morendo, Part III, Finale, Compositional Units 1-4 (bars 59 - 62) and 13 –
15 (bars 73 - 75)
Units 16 through 21 can be derived from the scala enigmatica on B
flat (see Example 6). Though the group contains twice as many compositional
units, its pitch material is exactly the same as that deployed in units 1
through 3. In both cases, seven of the eight pitch classes of the B-flat
transposition are deployed and in both cases the missing pitch is F sharp.
Example 6: Quando stanno morendo, Part III, Finale, Compositional Units 16-21 Placed Over the B-flat
Transposition of the Scala
Enigmatica, Transcribed from a Sketch for Prometeo.
Unit 22 contains an F and thus breaks with the preceding group derived
from the B-flat transposition (see Example 7 below). This suggests the
beginning of a new group of units derived from the F transposition, notably
because it contains the characteristic tritone formed by the lowest tone and
the ascending fourth degree of that scale. Unit 22 could be grouped with units
23 and 24, because the pitches of the latter two units can also be derived from
the F transposition of the scale. This interpretation is however problematic.
As shall be shown below, units 23 and 24 appear to belong to the last section
of the Finale. However, this segmentation leaves unit 22 in an orphaned
situation, a lone dyad derived from the F transposition, isolated between two
larger groups; the only such occurrence in the Finale. This interpretation is
nevertheless plausible when unit 22 is placed together with the two units that
would have surrounded it, had the composer not eliminated them late in the
compositional process. The reader will remember that Nono cut the last 18 bars
of section ‘a’ of Part III. In these bars the soprano solo was to have sung the
text fragment “faremo luce al giorno” [we will shed light on the day]. The
pitches Nono used to set the soprano’s text can be seen in the following plate,
(see Plate 4) which presents a close-up shot of a portion of the sketch: E
flat, A, C sharp; B, F; E, B, B flat. All of these pitches can be derived from
the scale on F. They constitute seven of the eight pitch classes of the scale
and the E flat corresponds with Nono’s idiosyncratic manner of writing the
sixth degree of the scale: E flat instead of D sharp.
Example 7: Quando stanno
morendo, Part III, Finale, Compositional Unit 22 Plus Two Compositional
Units Eliminated by Nono, Placed Over the F Transposition of the
Scala Enigmatica, Transcribed From a
Sketch for Prometeo. All eliminated pitches are shown in parenthesis.
Plate 4: Quando stanno morendo, Part
III, Finale, Detail From the Sketch Presented in Plate 2.
Reproduced with the kind permission of the Archivio Luigi Nono. © Eredi
Luigi Nono
The point is not to
criticize or even question Nono’s decision to cut this section of the Finale (any
discussion of that lies outside the framework of this paper). However it is
interesting to note that the compositional units that were eliminated reproduce
the patterns of selection and organization that clearly dominate the pitch
structures of the first twenty-two compositional units of the Finale.
Units 23
through 25 set the last word of the text (“cantano”) and are different from the previous compositional units in two
ways. First, as tetrachords they thicken and enrich the harmonic texture by
allowing all four voices to sing simultaneously for the first time. Second from
unit 25 onwards, the pitch content differs significantly from that which
dominated the first fifteen compositional units.[44] This can
be seen by comparing the pitch content of units 1 through 22 to that of units 23 through 31. As noted above, all pitch classes in units
1-22 are derived from the transposition levels of the scala enigmatica
on B flat and F. Together these two transpositions form a collection of 10 pitches:
the absent notes are C and G. Nono also systematically avoided using F sharp
(present both in the B-flat and F transpositions of the scale) throughout the
first section of the Finale (units 1-22).
All three pitch classes are deployed in the compositional units of the
last section of the Finale (units 23-31). Of the nine compositional units, five
contain one of the three pitch classes absent in the first 22 compositional
units. If we include the two compositional units Nono eliminated (see Plate 2),
the proportion remains approximately the same: six of eleven units contain
those three pitch classes.
The last nine compositional units are difficult to classify in terms of
transposition levels. On the one hand, these units contain all twelve pitch classes
of the chromatic scale. The units can of course be derived from various
transposition levels: notably on F (units 23, 24, 30); C (26, 30), C sharp (26,
27), F sharp (27, 31), and G sharp (25, 28, 29). However, no coherent grouping
similar to that found among units 1-22 can be achieved. An examination of the
spelling of this pitch class material reveals that it tends to correspond with
Nono’s idiosyncratic habit of writing the C transposition of the scale. (In his
sketch for Prometeo he uses C sharp instead of D flat and B flat instead
of A sharp.) Also C is prominently deployed as the highest pitch and as one of
the last two pitches. However, only two units (26 and 30) can actually be
derived from this transposition level and so though the idea that Nono was
working with a chromatically enriched C transposition of the scale seems
tempting, such an interpretation is inconclusive (see Example 8).
Example 8: Quando stanno
morendo, Part III, Finale, Compositional Units 23-31 Placed over the
Chromatic
Scale Based on the C Transposition of the Scala Enigmatica as
Spelled in a Sketch for Prometeo.
In order to reinforce the proposed segmentation of the Finale’s pitch
structures, we shall now turn to version 2. As noted above Nono reordered the
compositional units of version 1, creating a new version intended to set the
opening lines of Khlebnikov’s text. In version 2, two compositional units (23
and 24) are missing. Otherwise the pitch content and register deployment of the
compositional units in version 2 is identical with that of version 1. These two
versions also present a number of striking similarities in the manner in which
the compositional units are combined (see Example 1 above).
1 The division established in version 1 between compositional units 1-22
(derived primarily from B-flat and F transposition levels) on the one hand and
units 23-31 (which show no grouping according to transposition levels) is
clearly maintained in version 2. Nono used compositional units 25-31 to
complete the Finale. Indeed, the contrast between compositional units 1-22 and
25-31 is heightened in version 2. The compositional units 23 and 24, which begin the last section of version 1, can
also be derived from the F transposition of the scala enigmatica. In
version 1 they could thus be related to compositional unit 22, creating a
transitional or pivotal group between the two sections of this version. No such
transition exists in version 2. With its prominent C, compositional unit 27
makes a clear break with the preceding units.
2 More often than not,
words and musical phrasing coincide with groups of compositional units derived
from a specific transposition level. In version 1 only the first word of the
text (“Quando”) does not. To set this word, Nono used six compositional units,
divided equally into two groups of three: the first clearly derived from the
B-flat transposition and the second from F. This occurs twice in version two
(see the words “intristiscono” and “i cavalli”). Nevertheless, throughout these
two sections convergence of text, musical phrasing and compositional groups
constitutes the rule rather than the exception.
3 The patterns of grouping
identified in version 1 tend to be replicated in version 2. For example the first
fifteen compositional units of version 1 form a subsection by virtue of the
fact that they are encased in mirror relationship (see Example 1 above). No
such mirror relationship obtains in version 2. However the first fourteen
compositional units can be seen as forming a subsection bounded by groups
derived from the B-flat transposition level. Within this subsection similarity
also prevails. Certain groups from version 1 are maintained intact in version
2. Compositional units 7 through 9, which were said to derive from the E flat
in version 1, remain together in version 2, reinforcing the argument that they
do indeed constitute a group.
Notwithstanding the inconclusive analytical results concerning units
23-31 of version 1, Nono clearly reserved a different configuration of his
pitch material and a different end.[45]
The structure of the Finale reminds us of comments Guerrero made on those of
Sarà dolce tacere and Cori di Didone (see above). Here too, the
clear, calm, homophonic structures of the a cappella chorale provide fitting
closure, both in terms of form and of content.
Furthermore,
by singling out the vocal material of Parts II and III to compose the Finale,
Nono is not simply constructing a logical end to a closed form; he also appears
to be using musical means to make an indirect commentary on the work’s content.
“Cantano” means ‘they (the men who are dying) sing’ and suggests that Nono set
the songs of dying men on another musical plane, creating an uncanny allusion
to the last twenty bars of Arnold Schoenberg’s A Survivor from Warsaw in
which the chorus of condemned men break out in song. Rather than continuing to
circulate along the well-trodden paths of previously composed material, this
last song breaks out into new uncharted territory. It is here that Schoenberg’s
two categories of knowledge about music (how it was made and what it is) meet
and interact in Quando stanno morendo.
Concluding Remarks
Among the sketch material conserved at the Archivio, I have not come
across any documents explicitly confirming that Nono consciously used
transposition levels of the scala enigmatica to organize the pitch
structures of the Finale of Quando stanno morendo. But then one rarely finds
smoking guns in archives and libraries because sketches are by their very
nature incomplete. Pascal Decroupet has astutely observed:
They are
the result of a process and not just evidence of a journey. In and of themselves,
sketches are incapable of revealing all of the stages linking the material and
the work. However through careful observation one can extrapolate, generalize
and even invent fundamentally important criteria, which may have left no trace
in the composer’s working documents. The analyst must therefore fill in the
blanks and engender coherence¼ If the
archaeological reconstruction of the composer’s thinking is by its very nature
an illusion, careful study of sketch material can endow the analyst’s hypothesis
with a certain degree of probability.[46]
The above
citation brings us back to the point made by Borio at the outset of this
article. The information concerning palindromes, the symmetric relationships in
terms of register among compositional units and even the use of specific
transposition levels of the scala enigmatica to structure pitch content is of course all in the score to be
uncovered. But these relationships have to be identified among the multitude of
all possible relationships that can be produced from the data at hand, and more
importantly, the analyst has to be alerted to the significance these structures
can have for his or her object of study. The fact that Nono composed the vocal
material of the second movement in the form of a palindrome and then partially
obscured this structure in the Finale through the elimination of certain units
and the modification of pitch and register in others is important and can be
best apprehended from the study of his sketches. It is in this regard that the
study of the composer’s working documents is useful. As well as providing
quantitative information, which may not be otherwise available (i.e.
information gleaned from a comparison of versions 1 and 2 of the Finale), they
also enable the scholar to construct a qualitative environment within which he
or she can better validate the interpretation of analytical data.
Bibliography
Albèra, Philippe ed. Luigi Nono, Programme for Prometeo Tragedia
dell’ascolto
(Paris: Contrechamps/Festival d’automne, 1987).
Arnold, Denis. [Preface], in Giuseppe Verdi, Quattro Pezzi Sacri
(London: Eulenburg,1973)
Borio, Gianmario. “Sull’interazione fra lo studio degli schizzi e
l’analisi dell’opera,” La nuova
ricerca sull’opera di Luigi Nono, Gianmario Borio, Giovanni Morelli and Veniero Rizzardi eds.
(Venice: Leo S. Olschki, 1999).
Breuning, Franziska. Luigi Nonos Vertonungen von Texten Paveses (M_nster: LIT, 1999).
Cacciari, Massimo ed. Luigi Nono: Verso Prometeo (Milan: Ricordi
1984).
Campbell, Roy. Lorca: An Appreciation of His Poetry (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 1959).
De Benedictis, Angela Ida and Veniero Rizzardi eds. Luigi Nono
Scritti e colloqui, Volumes
1&2 (Lucca: Ricordi, 2001).
Decroupet, Pascal. “Floating hierarchies: organization and composition
in works by Pierre
Boulez and Karlheinz Stockhausen during the 1950s,” A Handbook to
Twentieth-Century
Musical Sketches, Patricia Hall and
Friedemann Sallis eds. (Cambridge:Cambridge
University Press, 2004), 146-160.
Dress, Stefan. Architektur und Fragment: zu späten Kompositionen
Luigi Nonos
(Saarbrücken: Pfau, 1998).
Feneyrou, Laurent ed. Luigi Nono Écrits (Paris: Christian
Bourgois, 1993).
Forte, Allen. The Structure of Atonal Music (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1973).
Guerrero, Jeannie. “Multidimensional Counterpoint and Social Subversion
in Luigi Nono’s
Choral Works,” Theory and Practice 28 (2003): 53-77.
______________. “Tintoretto, Nono and Expanses of Silence” unpublished paper
presented at
the Dublin International Conference on Music Analysis, University
College Dublin, 2005.
Hall, Patricia. A View of Berg’s Lulu Through the Autograph Sources (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1996).
Haller, Hans Peter. Das Experimentalstudio der Heinrich-Strobel-Stiftung
des Südwestfunks
Freiburg 1971-1989. Die Erforschung der elektronischen Klangumformung
und ihre
Geschichte, Vol. 2
(Baden-Baden: Nomos, 1995).
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Diario polacco N. 2,”
unpublished paper presented at a conference entitled “Problemi
critico-testuali nelle edizioni
dell’ultimo Nono” organised by the Biennale di Venezia (June 1993).
Metzger, Heinz-Klaus. “Wendepunkt Quartett?” Musik-Konzepte Luigi Nono
20 (1981): 93-112.
Nielinger-Vakil, Carola. "Quiet Revolutions: H_lderlin, Fragments by Luigi Nono and Wolfgang Rihm."
Music & Letters 81/2 (May 2000): 245-274.
Nono, Luigi. Quando stanno morendo Diario polacco no 2,
André Richard and Marco Mazzolini
eds. (Milan: Ricordi, 1999).
Ogburn, David, “‘When they are dying, men sing ...”“ Nono’s Diario
Polacco n.2,” Ems:Electro-
acoustic Music Studies Network - Montréal, 2005, http:/www.emsnetwork.org/article,php3?id_article+175 .
Pestalozza, Luigi. “Nono, parole e suono”, Luigi Nono Scritti e
colloqui, Vol. 2, Angela Ida De
Benedictis and Veniero Rizzardi eds. (Milan: Ricordi, 2001), 603-630.
Sallis, Friedemann. “Le paradoxe postmoderne et l’œuvre tardive de Luigi
Nono,” Circuit
musiques contemporaines, Analyses 11/1 (2000): 69-86.
Schoenberg, Arnold. Letters, Erwin Stein ed., Eithne Wilkins and
Ernst Kaiser trans. (New
York: St. Martins Press, 1965).
Solare, Juan Maria. “¿Donde estas hermano?: Die ewige Utopie. Die
politische Haltung Nonos
nach dem Streichquartett und seine Auseinandersetzung mit
Lateinamerika,” Klang und
Wahrnehmung. Komponist – Interpret – Hörer, Darmstädter Beiträge 41 (Mainz:Schott, 2001), 215-248.
Spree, Hermann. “Fragmente – Stille, An Diotima” Ein
analytischer Versuch zu Luigi Nonos
Streichquartett (Saarbrücken:
Pfau,1992).
Stenzl, Jurg. “Gli anni Ottanta,” Nono, Enzo Restagno ed. (Turin:
EDT, 1987), 206-226.
Umbral, Francisco. Lorca, poeta maldito (Barcelona: Editorial
Planeta, 1998).
[1] This article is an amalgamation of two conference papers: 1. “Sketch
material and the study of late twentieth-century music: the case of Luigi
Nono’s ¿Donde estas, hermano? (1982)” presented at a meeting of the
American Musicological Society (New England branch) held at Harvard University
on February 5, 2005; 2. “Segmenting the Labyrinth; Sketch Studies and the scala
enigmatica in Luigi Nono Quando stanno morendo. Diario Polacco N. 2
(1982)” presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Music Theory held at
Cambridge (Mass.) on November 13, 2005. I would like to thank the Social
Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and the Faculté des études
supérieures et de la recherche of the Université de Moncton for funding the
costs involved in this project. I am deeply grateful to Erika Schaller and the
Archivio Luigi Nono for providing timely support and assistanceand to Carola Nielinger-Vakil for her honest and helpful comments on this
text. I am indebted to Marco Mazzolini (BMG Italy) and
Jeannie Guerrero (Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester) for sharing
unpublished papers on their research with me. I also heartily thank my numerous
student assistants (Renée Fontaine, Rémy Fortin, Frederic Hétu, Sylvie LeBlanc
and Nicholas Smith) who worked with me in the course of this project. Finally I
warmly thank my colleague, Edward Jurkowski (University of Lethbridge) for his
thoughtful help and advice.
[2]
Arnold Schoenberg, Letters, Erwin Stein ed., Eithne Wilkins and Ernst
Kaiser trans. (New York: St. Martins Press, 1965), 164. (Schoenberg’s
emphasis).
[3]
Hall’s example of music written in a “highly defined theoretical system,” is of
course Alban Berg’s Lulu. As a counter example she presents Hugo Wolf’s
“Der Glücksritter” from the Eichendorff Lieder (1888), which alas finds
itself consigned to the purgatory of music written in an “ambiguous, less well
defined system.” Patricia Hall, A View of Berg’s Lulu Through the
Autograph Sources (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), 7-12.
[4]
Gianmario Borio, “Sull’interazione fra lo studio degli schizzi e l’analisi
dell’opera”, La nuova ricerca sull’opera
di Luigi Nono, Gianmario Borio, Giovanni Morelli and Veniero Rizzardi eds.
(Venice: Leo S. Olschki, 1999), 5-6.
[5]
The composition’s three movements are labelled Part I, Part II and Part III in
the published score. This convention has
been adopted for this article.
[6]
Allen Forte, The Structure of Atonal Music (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1973), 83.
[7]
According to Erika Schaller, chief musicologist at the Archivio Luigi Nono the
quantity of working documents pertaining
to Quando stanno morendo (manuscript material, recordings, heliographic
material [photographs, photocopies, engraver’s score, etc.]) is relatively
large, but nevertheless typical of similar-sized works produced during the
early 1980s. Email received from Erika Schaller on 19 January 2005.
[8]
Francisco Umbral, Lorca, poeta maldito (Barcelona: Editorial Planeta,
1998), 138. Umbral’s summing up of the
poem’s content also resonates remarkably well with the intertwined strands of
thematic content running through both the Epitaffio cycle and Quando
stanno morendo. Indeed they are characteristic of Nono’s entire oeuvre,
making the composer’s decision to set this text at the beginning of his career
particularly significant.
[9] Federico García Lorca, Romance de la Guardia civil española
(1926) (last four lines of the poem)
¡Oh, ciudad de los gitanos! O
city of the gipsies, who
¿Quién te
vió y no te recuerda? That saw you could forget you soon?
Que te busquen en mi frente. Let them seek you in my
forehead.
Juego
de luna y arena. The
playground of the sands and moon.
Roy Campbell, Lorca: An Appreciation of His Poetry (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 1959), 78.
[10]
Nono’s handling of the vocal textures in the final sections of Epitaffio No.
3 and Quando stanno morendo
enables the establishment of another interesting parallel between these two
works at opposite ends of his career. In the former, Nono sets solo voices
against the choir singing the same music bocca chiusa (bars 411-426 and
436-442). In the latter, the score calls for a reverberation of 2 to 3 seconds
and the displacement of the singers’ sounds in circular patterns through loud
speakers placed around the hall. This is achieved by using a digital
spatializer (the so-called Halaphon). From bars 59 to 88 the singers’ sounds
are simultaneously displaced in a clockwise direction (10 seconds per cycle)
and a counterclockwise direction (7 seconds per cycle). Throughout the Finale
the dynamic level of sounds transmitted via the loud speakers must remain
slightly lower than that of the singers, shadowing the sound production of the
singers and creating a soft, vocal background texture, not unlike a choir
singing bocca chiusa. For a detailed description of the digitalized
sound direction of Quando stanno morendo, see André Richard and Marco
Mazzolini, “Notes”, in Luigi Nono, Quando stanno morendo Diario polacco no 2
(Milan: Ricordi, 1999), XXV-XXIX.
[11]Jeanne
Guerrero, “Multidimensional Counterpoint and Social Subversion in Luigi Nono’s
Choral Works,” Theory and Practice
28 (2003): 69.
[12]
Ibid., 68.
[13]
Jeannie Guerrero, “Tintoretto, Nono and Expanses of Silence” unpublished paper
presented at the Dublin International
Conference on Music Analysis, University College Dublin, 2005.
14 For a discussion of
certain aspects of the first movement involing an examination of sketch
material, see David Ogborn, “‘When they are dying, men sing...’: Nono’s Diario
Polacco n.2, “ EMS: Electro-acoustic Music Studies Network - Montréal ,
2005, http://www.ems-network.org/article.php3?id_article=175.
[15] The other three works are Das atmende Klarsein for bass flute,
chamber choir and live electronics (1981); Io, frammento dal Prometeo
for three sopranos, chamber choir, bass flute, contrebass clarinet and live
electronics (1981); Guai al gelidi mostri for two contraltos, flute,
clarinet, viola, violoncello, double bass and live electronics (1983).
According to Hans Peter Haller (the inventor of the Halaphone and one of Nono’s
principal collaborators at the Strobel Foundation) the group of four works
should be seen as steps toward Prometeo. Tragedia dell’ascolto for
soloists, chamber choir, chamber orchestra and live electronics (1983-86), the
major work of Nono’s last decade. Hans Peter Haller, Das Experimentalstudio
der Heinrich-Strobel-Stiftung des Südwestfunks Freiburg 1971-1989. Die
Erforschung der elektronischen Klangumformung und ihre Geschichte, Vol. 2
(Baden-Baden: Nomos, 1995), 127-128. To the above list one should also add Omaggio
a György Kurtág for alto, flute, clarinet, tuba and live electronics
(1983-86).
[16]
Luigi Nono, [Dedication], Quando stanno morendo Diario polacco no 2,
unpaginated.
[17]
Together with Vladimir Mayakovsky (1893-1930), Khelbnikov founded the Futurist
literary movement in Russia. Following his premature death, Khlebnikov’s
reputation declined, though his work did continue to exert a considerable
influence on Mayakovsky, Pasternak and Osip Mandelstam. After World War II,
Soviet critics attacked Khlebnikov’s work for being formalist and decadent. The
poet’s rehabilitation began with the death of Stalin in 1953, but Khlebnikov
remained a marginal figure in the Soviet literary scene. By the early 1980s no
new edition of his complete work had yet appeared.
[18]
André Richard and Marco Mazzolini, “Notes”, in Nono, Quando stanno morendo,
XXI.
[19]
“Texts selected and edited by Massimo Cacciari”, in Nono, Quando stanno
morendo, LIII.
20 Email received from
Carola Nielinger-Vakil on 14 February 2007. See also Fanziska Breuning, Luigi
Nonos Vertonungen von Texten Paveses (M_nster: LIT, 1999), 246-247.
[21] E se
ogni cosa può essere cosi vista - come inaudita, singola, indivisibile – ogni
cosa potrà ancora sottrarsi a quel destino di morte cui vuole consegnarla l’inverno dei «lupi ortodossi».
Se sapremo custodire quest’attesta, potremo ancor far «luce al giorno»
rifiutare la morte che ora ci viene. (Nono’s emphasis) Luigi Nono, Scritti e
colloqui, Vol. 1, Angela Ida De Benedictis and Veniero Rizzardi eds.
(Lucca: Ricordi, 2001), 490.
I am very grateful to David Ogborn for providing me with the above translation.
[22]
Marco Mazzolini, “Problematiche editoriali in Quando stanno morendo. Diario
polacco N. 2,” 6-7. This unpublished paper was presented at a conference
entitled “Problemi critico-testuali nelle edizioni dell’ultimo Nono” organised
by the Biennale di Venezia (June 1993).
[23]
Nono’s reasons for making these cuts are unknown, though his motivation may
have involved formal considerations. By cutting 18 bars from section ‘a’ and 34
bars from section ‘c’ Nono endowed Part III with a balanced ternary form (‘a’
36 bars; ‘b’ 22 bars; ‘c’ 36 bars). Furthermore, the length of these sections
in terms of bar numbers establishes a set of proportionally symmetric
relationships based on the golden mean. The total length of Part III is 94
bars: 94 x .618 = 58.09 (the length of sections ‘a’ + ‘b’). The relationship
can also be established between sections ‘a’ and ‘b’. Thus the relationship
obtaining between the length (measured in bar numbers) of section ‘a’ and the
whole of Part III is the same as that obtaining between the length of sections
‘a’ and ‘b’. Of course these relationships only exist ‘on paper’. The tempo
marks of the three sections of Part III (‘a’: quarter note = 45; ‘b’: quarter
note = 35; ‘c’: quarter note = 45) indicate that the proportional relationships
in terms of bar numbers were not meant to be perceived audibly. This does not
however preclude the possibility that these proportionally symmetric
relationships were part of the formal concept of this work. For more on the
significance of proportionally symmetric relationships and specifically the
golden mean in Nono’s late work, see Friedemann Sallis, “Le paradoxe
postmoderne et l’œuvre tardive de Luigi Nono,” Circuit musiques
contemporaines, Analyses 11/1 (2000): 69-86.
[24]
Email received from Erika Schaller on 23 February 2006. The Archivio conserves
an undated heliograph of the original version, in which cuts were made. For the
moment though, we do not know whether these cuts occurred before or after the
first performance of Quando stanno morendo.
[25]
Throughout versions 1 and 2 all pitches have only one duration value: the whole
note. The duration of silences separating these whole notes varies constantly.
The silences have been eliminated from Example 1 in order to focus on pitch
structure.
[26] For
more information on ¿Donde estas hermano? as well as Nono’s
long-standing interest in the culture and the political situation in Latin
America, see Juan Maria Solare, “¿Donde estas hermano?: Die ewige
Utopie. Die politische Haltung Nonos nach dem Streichquartett und seine
Auseinandersetzung mit Lateinamerika”, Klang und Wahrnehmung. Komponist -
Interpret - Hörer, Darnstädter Beiträge 41 (Mainz: Schott, 2001), 215-248.
[27]
From here on, bar numbers refer to the published score unless otherwise
indicated.
[28] The
only discrepancy is the third note of the first trichord: the e'''. The
corresponding note of the vocal line of section ‘a’ in Part II is an a'', an
exception which in this case proves the rule.
[29]
The first three tetrachords of the staff marked ‘III b’ on the sketch contain
three pitches (E flat of the first tetrachord, e' flat of the second tetrachord
and b' of the third tetrachord) that are not part of the contralto line. These
pitches are however present in the violoncello part in bars 37, 39 and 41 respectively.
[30]
Plate 2 presents a black and white reproduction of the page on which Nono used
three different colours of ink: blue, red and black. The colours appear to
indicate two or perhaps three chronologically distinct stages of composition.
The same is true of Plate 3 below. The difference between black ink on the one
hand and blue and red ink on the other hand can be distinguished in the lighter
shades of grey and textural qualities of the pen and marker strokes on Plates 2
and 3. To be able to use this information to identify the layers of
compositional activity presented, we would need to take a close look at colour
reproductions.
[31]
Heinz-Klaus Metzger (1981) was the first to make a substantial commentary on
the impact of the scala enigmatica on Nono’s compositional technique in
his study of the string quartet Fragmente-Stille, An Diotima (1980).
Heinz-Klaus Metzger, “Wendepunkt Quartett?”, Musik-Konzepte Luigi Nono
20 (1981): 93-112. Since then, the publication of sketch material pertaining to
the composition of Prometeo, Tragedia dell ascolto has demonstrated the
extent to which Nono used the scala enigmatica in the composition of his
last major achievement. See Massimo Cacciari ed. Luigi Nono: Verso Prometeo
(Milan: Ricordi 1984); Philippe Albèra ed., Luigi Nono (Programme for Prometeo
Tragedia dell’ascolto) (Paris: Contrechamps/Festival d’automne, 1987);
Sallis, 75.
[32]
Laurent Feneyrou, “Introduction”, Luigi Nono, Écrits (Paris: Christian
Bourgois, 1993), 18.
[33] Denis
Arnold, [Preface], Giuseppe Verdi, Quattro Pezzi Sacri (London:
Eulenburg, 1973), III. Nielinger-Vakil suggests that Hermann Scherchen may have
introduced Nono to this work in the late 1940s.
See Carola
Nielinger-Vakil, "Quiet Revolutions: H_lderlin, Fragments by Luigi Nono and Wolfgang Rihm,"
/Music & Letters/ 81/2 (May 2000): 250.
[34]
The source of Metzger’s paraphrase was a workshop given by Nono in Bonn,
presumably at the time Fragmente Stille, An Diotima was first performed
in 1980. Metzger, 106-107. This view of the scala enigmatica in Fragmente
Stille, An Diotima is shared by Jürg Stenzl, who states that in the string
quartet the scale constitutes an underlying, inaudible structure, another
secret world of the work [“¼una
struttura profunda, inudibile direttamente, un altro “mondo segreto”
dell’opera.”]. J. Stenzl, “Gli anni Ottanta”. Nono, Enzo Restagno ed.
(Turin: EDT, 1987), 215. For his part Luigi Pestalozza has described the scale
as basic material for the string quartet. L. Pestalozza, “Nono, parole e
suono”, Luigi Nono, Scritti e colloqui, Vol. 2, Angela Ida de Benedictis
and Veniero Rizzardi eds. (Milan: Ricordi, 2001), 610.
[35]
Hermann Spree, “Fragmente Stille, An Diotima” Ein analytischer Versuch zu
Luigi Nonos Streichquartett (Saarbrücken: Pfau, 1992), 28-29.
[36]
Spree, 35. Indeed, Stefan Drees has noted that even in cases such as “Hay
que caminar” sognando for two vioins (1989), where Nono specifically
identified the scala enigmatica transposed to C as the source of the
intervals performed quasi senza vibrato in the introduction to the
published score, certain intervals in the third section (Leggio 3) do
not belong to the C transposition of the scale. Drees suggested that these
pitches were derived from the scale transposed to F. Stefan Drees, Architektur
und Fragment. Zu späten Kompositionen Luigi Nonos (Saarbrücken: Pfau,
1998), 176.
[37]
These intervals are prevalent in the scala enigmatica and sketches
pertaining to the composition of Prometeo show Nono listing the number
of such intervals that can be derived from the a scala enigmatica
transposed to C. Sallis, 75.
[38]
Given that the scala enigmatica is a seven-note diatonic scale, normal
spelling presumes a different note name for each scale degree, implying note
names such as B sharp, F flat, E double flat and C double sharp. For an example
of normal spelling, see Example 2 above.
[39]
Spree, 30.
[40]
This sketch is published in Albèra ed., Luigi Nono, 1987, inside front
cover.
[41] In
the sketch for Prometeo, mentioned above, Nono spells the second and
sixth degrees of the scale on F idiosyncratically in both ascending and
descending forms of the scale (F sharp instead of G flat and E flat instead of
D sharp). Neither of these degrees is present in compositional units 4 through
6.
[42]
The second degree, which Nono spells idiosyncratically in his sketch (E natural
instead of F flat) is not used in units 7 through 9.
[43]
Mazzolini also identified this relationship in his 1993 conference. Mazzolini,
9.
[44]
Interestingly units 23 and 24 constitute two transpositions of the same
tetrachord, pc 4-16. This set happens to be the complement of pc 8-16, the set
corresponding to the scala enigmatica. At present there is no evidence
to suggest that this is nothing other than a curious coincidence.
[45]
With regard to Nono’s string quartet, Spree has noted that broad sections of
this work can be seen as constituting a grand, complex ‘Spiegelkabinett’,
and goes on to point out that exact palindromes are in fact hardly ever found.
Spree, “Fragmente - Stille, An Diotima” Ein analytischer Versuch, 35-36.
I prefer to describe this aspect of Nono’s late work as mosaics made up of
fragments of broken mirrors.
[46]
Pascal Decroupet, “Floating hierarchies: organization and composition in works
by Pierre Boulez and Karlheinz
Stockhausen during the 1950s,” A Handbook to Twentieth-Century Musical
Sketches, Patricia Hall and Friedemann Sallis eds. (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2004), 146-7.