The central theme of this volume concerns the variety of ways in which a number of composers engage with the concept of musical timescale. After all, temporal processes lie at the heart of contemporary compositional practice. Traditionally, tonality was a powerful force in articulating musical time, while post-tonal repertoire raises new creative challenges of how to construct, articulate and convey a sense of narrative within a modernist idiom. This collection of articles seeks to examine these issues and to offer a variety of insights into the different ways that new music may address matters such as containment and expansiveness, fragmentation and continuity, stasis and dynamism. A range of different viewpoints emerging from individual composer case studies complement more general theoretical discussions.
In a sense, this topic is too large to be accommodated within the confines of a single volume. Consequently, no real attempt has been made to ensure some kind of coverage. Instead we have assembled some six versatile perspectives on this over-arching theme, and these move progressively from the general to the particular. An introductory article on the nature and description of time in music (Michael Rofe) is followed by an overview of how this relates to new music in Finland, through a consideration of selected orchestral works by Magnus Lindberg (Tim Howell). Thereafter, a series of case studies focus on particular aspects of timescale as relevant to these individual composers. The issues being addressed include: ‘speed and slowness' in Gerald Barry (Daniel March); ‘continuity’ in John Adams (Richard Powell); ‘fragmentation’ in György Kurtág (Martin Scheuregger) and ‘balance’ in Toru Takemitsu (Mark Hutchinson). Overall, this calculated eclecticism provides both breadth and depth, exploring the articulation of musical time through a combination of compositional process, analytical discovery and listener perceptions.
Another common denominator concerns matters of time and place. All the contributors are associated with the Department of Music at the University of York, having taught and/or studied here. Now approaching its 50th Anniversary year (in 2015), the Department at York has a well-established reputation for engaging with contemporary music—especially in relation to composition and performance. This publication perhaps reveals a rather different slant: that of musical scholarship, and more particularly musical analysis, though several of the authors are also active in terms of composing and performing new music. Hopefully something of this interdisciplinary, holistic element that typifies the York ethos—valuing an engagement with the musical experience above all else—will emerge from this collection of articles.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to all the contributors to this volume not just for their creative and insightful articles but also for their supportive approach (towards each other and to me) during the whole enterprise. It has made the process of assembling and editing this volume a real pleasure. Thanks are also due to the Department of Music, University of York for granting me a term of research leave in order to complete this project. My warmest thanks are to Cathy Denford who has specially created—yet again—a striking and imaginative cover illustration. Perhaps it is best to judge a book by its cover, after all.
Cover image: ‘Narratives’, is by Cathy Denford (www.cathydenford.info)