“Structure: one of the key words of our time”--through ‘unintelligible’ word setting, via passing sound--makes Boulez’s marteau an engaging metaphor, but not necessarily an audible one. This Journal will focus on the relationship between Char’s poetry, Boulez’s ‘word-setting,’ and marteau’s audible and non-audible instrument relationships.
Boulez’s statement regarding structure is an interesting one in that (if I am understanding his words correctly) he is speaking on applying complex relationships of metaphor to macro and micro levels of decision making in music composition. The poetry of Réne Char becomes part of the weave of Boulez’s marteau. One can think of Char’s poems as closely grouped, vertical, and parallel strings running from top to bottom of a space; and Boulez’s marteau as horizontal woven strings running in and out, on top of and beneath Char’s words. In the music of marteau these vertical strings are not audible however--and for me at least, Boulez’s Structure seems present but not completely ‘intelligible’. (It should be said however, that I am being extremely critical of Boulez’s work. It is quite possibly the case that I myself can not comprehend music in such a manner.)
In Modern Music and After Boulez mentions another Structure--one of the relationship between leaves on a tree and the light of the sun passing through them. If one were to apply wind/motion to this structure, a very interesting musical metaphor could result. However like the above mention weave of Char and marteau, I am not sure if this metaphor--as interesting as it may be to visualize/’audilize’--could become Musical Structure. “There are interesting ideas, and there are interesting musical ideas. Not all interesting ideas are interesting musical ideas.” (William Kleinsasser)
Boulez describes the relationship/Structure between instruments in marteau as: “the flute with viola as an instrument able to sustain sounds, the viola (pizzicato) with the guitar for its plucked strings, the guitar with the vibraphone as a resonator, and the vibraphone with the xylorimba as an instrument to be struck.” In addition to Char’s words, Boulez is overlaying six other sets of parallel string to his weave. The relationships of each instrument is at a specific angle, and the music of marteau represents a combination of metaphors and relationships and Structures. While I would claim that many of these complex weaves are not audible, the flavor of marteau is one that completely encompasses them--representing the compositional techniques that make up the “finished product” of marteau as a composition.
While Structure may not always be audible, it has an affect on audible parameters within a composition. Rather, even if one is not completely successful in expressing these metaphors/Structures as sound, I believe that engaging them will at least result in an expression of musical interest.
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