Some thoughts on Tuesday's class and Cowell.

Before I blog again....this is Rugby, my new puppy and i just wanted to show him off.

The more I let the information sink in from class to class, the more thoughts I have about the subject. (Which I guess is natural.) After doing the reading in the Gann about his development of theory based on the harmonic series, I went back and listened to some of his music. And maybe as I listened to his music, the less and less dissonant it sounded. It could be that I was becoming desensitized to the clusters, but maybe after having an understanding of what Cowell's aesthetic, I was able to hear what he intended the listener to hear.

In Cowell's earlier music he utilized simple melodies over tone clusters as a means of composition. I have not actually looked at the scores but the example of "The Tiger" doesn't really show a range of the clusters. Should the clusters sound the same every time you play the piece? I don't know. I would have to listen to more performances of his music to have a better understanding. But one thing I took in from listening to some examples is that the "harmony" created by the clusters seemed to compliment the melodies being played in the right hand. It didn't sound as dissonant as one would expect. I found that when I focused one the "melody" I was able to make harmonies in my head. The music became much more interesting to me, the more I listened to it.

Another thing that was interesting about these pieces was the rhythmic aspects of the music. I would like to find the time to read more about his thoughts on rhythmic notation. In some of the pieces there was a very lively hythmic energy and I wanted to see how it was notated.

I would like to know how Cowell thought of himself in his role in American music. The book has him listed as an ultramodernist and he had his own new music society. Was Cowell opposed to the European-stlye American composer like the other composer's during this period of American music? I wonder this because the latter part of Cowell's music seems to be more conservative. The music is still interesting because he uses music and inflences from all over the world, but he became more reliant on standard forms. (Even though his symphonies have about twice the amount of movements as your standard symphony.) Cowell seems to settle down from his rebellious "teen" phase and settled down to a style that was more subdued. When you compare his piano works with some of his orchestral pieces, there is a noticable difference. The orchestral music is more tonal and it doesn't seem like a logical progression of style. Maybe this is just a sign of Cowell's maturity in life, but I am left to wonder if Cowell still considered himself as an "ultramodernist." But then again does being an ultramodernist mean that you can't be conservative? Does the music have to be completely alien from what is already around to be modern? I think Cowell does a fine job of reamining fresh and modern in his later style.