Description
Book SynopsisTrade Review"A welcome contribution to the literature of modern music. . . . Highly recommended." --
Choice"An astonishing book, a virtual encyclopedia of James Tenney that threatens to leave no remaining scope for further scholarly work on his music. It answered many questions I've long had about Tenney's music, and has already acted as a spur to my own work. The amount of information one could currently find on Tenney's work would comprise only a small fraction of what is included here."--Kyle Gann, author of
The Arithmetic of Listening: Tuning Theory and History for the Impractical Musician"Wannamaker's essential, extraordinary work on the music of James Tenney is a brilliantly detailed and exhaustively researched addition to our comprehensive understanding of Tenney's music and compositional ideas, and to our conception of music of the second half of the twentieth century."--Larry Polansky, Emeritus Strauss Professor of Music, Dartmouth College
Table of ContentsPreface xi
Conventions and Abbreviations xv
1. Introduction 1
1.1. A Summary Chronology 3
1.2. Aesthetic and Methodological Bases: Music in Sound 10
2. Early Works and Influences (1934–59) 18
2.1. Stan Brakhage and Interim (1952) 19
2.2. Manhattan and Meeting Carolee Schneemann 21
2.3. Lionel Nowak, Carl Ruggles, and Charles Ives’s Concord Sonata 23
2.4. Seeds (1956/1961) 25
3. Tape Music and “Meta/-Hodos” (1959–61) 31
3.1. Lejaren Hiller and Harry Partch 31
3.2. The University of Illinois Electronic Music Studio 32
3.3. Collage #1 (“Blue Suede”) (1961) 34
3.4. “Meta/-Hodos” (1961) 41
4. Computer Music and Ergodicity (1961–64) 48
4.1. Edgard Var se, D’Arcy Thompson, and “Growth to Form” 51
4.2. John Cage, Variety, and Ergodicity 54
4.3. Max Mathews and MUSIC 59
4.4. The Acoustic Correlates of Timbre 62
4.5. Algorithmic Composition 63
4.6. Analog #1 (Noise Study) (1961) 68
4.7. Phases (1963) 76
5. Performance and the Social (1964–68) 83
5.1. Downtown in the 1960s 83
5.2. Tone Roads and an American Experimental Tradition 86
5.3. Fluxus and Friends 89
5.4. Carolee Schneemann, Antonin Artaud, Wilhelm Reich 93
5.5. Choreogram (1964) 97
5.6. Fabric for Che (1967) 101
6. Process and Continuity (1969–71) 110
6.1. Gradual Processes 112
6.2. For Ann (rising) (1969) 118
6.3. Postal Pieces (1965–71) 124
7. Interlude: Harmonic Theory 135
7.1. The Meaning of Harmony 137
7.2. The Harmonic Series 140
7.3. Interval Tolerance and “The Language of Ratios” 144
7.4. A History of Consonance and Dissonance 147
7.5. Roughness and Beating (CDC-5) 148
7.6. Toneness and Harmonicity (CDC-2) 149
7.7. Harmonic Space (CDC-1) 155
7.8. Harmonic Measures and Their Applications 165
8. Canons and the Harmonic Series (1972–79) 169
8.1. The Harmonic-Series Music 170
8.2. Clang (1972) 172
8.3. Spectral CANON for CONLON Nancarrow (1974) 176
8.4. Harmonium #1 (1976) 183
8.5. Three Indigenous Songs (1979) 189
9. Harmonic Spaces (1980–85) 193
9.1. The Harmonic-Space Music 193
9.2. Harmonium #3 (1980) 195
9.3. Bridge (1984) 199
9.4. Koan for String Quartet (1984) 216
10. Transition and Tradition (1986–94) 224
10.1. Critical Band (1988) 225
10.2. Flocking (1993) 231
11. Spectra and Diaphony (1994–2006) 237
11.1. Dissonant Counterpoint and Statistical Feedback 237
11.2. In a Large, . . . (1994–95) 241
11.3. Diaphonic Study (1997) 246
11.4. Arbor Vitae (2006) 250
12. A Tradition of Experimentation 259
Appendix A. Acoustics, Sensation, and Logarithmic Models 261
Appendix B. Spectrographic Analysis 265
Notes 271
References 301
Index 315
