Home FOR AUTHORS Slovenská hudba 2013 Slovenská hudba, Vol. 39, No 1, p.57-82

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Slovenská hudba, Vol. 39, No 1, p.57-82

Title: Prípad Hindemith
Author: Janka Kubandová

Abstract: The Hindemith Case
Since its origin and especially due to Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750), who polished it to perfection, the fugue is considered the most complex and most consequential of all contrapuntal forms. It has always been perceived as a profound and serious form, and the archetype of compositional perfection among the composers as well as performers. No wonder many composers appreciated the fugue form as a norm with which they frequently confronted their own compositional methods.
At the lessons of music theory fugue and counterpoint generally are usually presented as extremely strict, even clumsy and archaic compositional devices. But it need not be necessarily truth. Indeed, many composers wrote fugues only as technical exercises improving their own skills, but writing a good fugue was and still remains a sign of great mastery. Since the baroque times the fugue concept has been closely related to the possibilities of the functional harmonic system and mainly in the 20th century music it gained absolutely new expressive prospects, influenced by new principles of the organization of music material. The concentration on individual interval relations instead of the principle of stacking thirds in chords, the balance of the consonance and dissonance, application of dissonant chords in a similar way to consonant ones on heavy beats, chromatics, modality, metro-rhythmical irregularities (stress on unstressed beats, dotted rhythm, alternation of the metre in a fugue, odd measures etc.), influences from jazz or other music genres offer a wide number of new expressive means to a composer not to be found in older fugue types.
The examples illustrating the analyses of the selected fugues from the cycle Ludus tonalis demonstrate how Hindemith handles the material and how it is reflected in the expression of his fugues. Without knowing that many of the fugue themes come from the cycle Ludus tonalis, we could identify them as fugue themes only with difficulties. The grave, majestic expression of many of the fugues refers directly to the baroque tradition, even to older types of strictly linear vocal polyphony. The others serve as a typical reflection of their time by their vigorous disturbance, an impulsive, dance, humorous character, or by grotesque, almost ironic expression. The irony is an expressive means by which the comic is applied; the meaning is shifted, e.g. a positive expression acquires a pejorative meaning. But it can also represent a critical opinion of its author of his/her own work. For Hindemith irony was one of the means of his own expression since his juvenile work (typical example being his composition Ragtime for large orchestra (1921) based on the theme of Bach’s Fugue C minor from the The Well-tempered Clavier I., or a parody of Mahler and Reger in his early one-act plays), but it may be found also in his later works. In the fugues from the Ludus tonalis the irony is one of the important expressions of the “modern” fugue.
Let us consider the necessity of knowledge of Hindemith’s theory for the analysis of the Ludus tonalis cycle. Indubitably it is useful to know the composer’s opinions of the development of new music and the approach towards his work and the organization of the music material, hence towards the analysis of (his own) music. While his music refuses to exclude the tonal centre principle and the effect of centripetal and centrifugal forces related to it, it may imply the impression that the knowledge and mastering of Hindemith’s theory is not immediately necessary for understanding of his music. However, traditional terminology sourcing in the tonal-functional music is not alway sufficient for its verbal comprehension, especially with respect to the principles of the Row 1 and Row 2 and categorization of the chords based on a simple interval relation instead of the stacking of thirds. It is indeed useful to familiarize oneself with Hindemith’s theory for the analysis of his music, or to know some analytical approaches towards the 20th century music, e.g. Schenker’s method, the principles of which have much in common with The Craft of Musical Composition (e.g. the principle of so-called Stufengag – the sequence of the main tones among others). Hindemith’s theory is not perfect, what many theoreticians highlight, but on the other hand it is an important evidence of the composer’s attempt on a systematic reflection of his own music language on the background of then music development.

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Year: 2013, Volume: 32, Issue: 1 Page From: 57, Page To: 82



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