Reflections on Saariaho’s writing
Having just finished Kaija Saariaho’s 1987 paper Timbre and harmony: interpolations of timbral structures, in Contemporary Music Review, 2:1, pp 93–133, I thought it best to commit some of my reactions to it.
There are some particular moments of insight, which I’ll work through in order. Firstly she cites Kandinsky: “Form is the external manifestation of inner meaning” (Vassily Kandinsky: The Spiritual in Art, 1969). Aside from the fact that musicians, musicologists and above all composers tend to take reference from out-of-date thinking in other art-forms, I think this is particularly apt, even now, as a guidance for how to approach form in music.
Too often is structure confused with form. Look at it this way; the way a piece is structured in terms of harmony, orchestration and material is completely separate from the way these elements are formed. To coin an analogy, form is the father of structure; at least in the classical sense. We have a set of boxes (possibly within larger boxes)—the form—which we fill with material—our structures. These boxes might even be predisposed towards a particular type of material. These constraints often paradoxically provided a composer with inspiration, as a kind of competition to perfect their art, in the manner of an acheiveable target.
What Kandinsky is suggesting is that there is, in fact, no box at all. Which is, in itself, obvious—there cannot be form without content. That the content shapes the form is the interesting part, because this suggests that in music the structures themselves do not hold the meaning, but instead the method in which they are arranged carries the semantic weight. Saariaho suggests that she has never referred to pre-established formal structures, and in fact it would be crazy to expect that a composer necessarily adopted forms developed directly from analysis.
Kaariaho goes on to say “Amongst familiar organizational models concerning pitch the tonal system is, in my own experience, the most effective means of suing harmony to construct and control dynamic musical forms.” and “I think, however, that using tonal functions in such a way is definitely a thing of the past. This is why the tonal systems would seem to be only a potential model for the creation of tensions through the use of pitches” and finally “…I am absolutely convinced that [tonal harmony] is an out-dated approach to the problems posed by the organization of pitch structures”. She goes to say that tonal harmony is the only way of effectively creating dynamic structures, but that perhaps it’s not necessary to do that anymore. Why do I raise this? Because I think this is an issue which has still not been satisfactorily solved.
Tonal structures are a proven, effective way of creating tension and meaningful structure in music. Serialism has left many unconvinced, in the same manner as Marxism: fundamentally sound but disastrous in practice. Musically speaking it let us down on several points: the matter of ‘octave equivalency’—notes do not sound the same in each octave; interval equivalency—a major third is not a minor sixth; set-equivalent chords are not identical sonically. Spectralism solved some of these problems by reintroducing the natural hierarchy of tones without reverting to tonal structures. Many of the issues raised with spectralism have been circumvented/solved by the advent of computer processing and analysis technologies (a contentious issue, I know), through the endless possibilities for manipulation of sound.
Saariaho sways towards investigating a hierarchy of timbre to replace tonal structures, but in my field I am swayed towards a complex appreciation of the interplay of tones. This is driven by my interest in the contradiction between the harmonic series and the system of equal temperament: two systems in use at the same time, contending for the same position. The physical irrefutability of the harmonic series leads us to appreciate the tonic–dominant–sub-dominant relationships. The dominant resolves strongly to the tonic, being part of the harmonic series of the tonic, and the modulation to the sub-dominant provides a leverage (alternate dimension?), because the tonic is a part of the harmonic series of the sub-dominant (and not vice-versa). The build-up of tension in the dominant is due to the third of the dominant chord wanting to directly resolve (up) to the tonic again, whilst this is not the case with the sub-dominant. Whilst these are very simplistic observations, it highlights one of the basic issues regarding the organisation of a hierarchy of tones and chords into a harmony, and how little we can actually categorise without resorting to a subjective use of our ear.
Saariaho also goes on to say “It is by modifying the speed of harmony’s development that harmonic tensions are created, by making harmony into a strictly controlled parameter. To achieve this, I worked on the degree of differentiation of successive chords an don the linear duration of each chord”. This is the eternal compositional tool of stasis vs. movement. Another is the level of interest generated by material. One can have very mediocre material juxtaposed by inventive (catchy, if you will) material, in order to heighten its catchiness. This is the method unconsciously suggested by thematic development, that one suggests imperfect combinations of what one has heard before, ultimately recapitulating on the initial material, satisfying the listeners’ desires. An even level of release of good material would result in a saturated work. The listeners’ ears need to be teased, like in a horror movie when the tension is sufficiently developed.
I was investigating another parallel area of interest, that of Bill Viola’s work in visual art. To describe his work here in such a short manner does not do its depth of thought justice, but he (currently) works with extremely slow video, in the manner of a very subtly animated painting. The casual viewer would assume a light-box photograph or extremely high-quality video still, but in fact it is an extremely slow video. The concept of going beyond the medium of video to question its very premise of presenting motion is one to be greatly praised. I am considering how this could be possible in music, to present a moment of stasis in a particular musical texture.
The normal way we elongate events is to literally play them more slowly, and the electronic equivalent is time stretching using a phase vocoder, preserving the pitch. Under normal circumstances the usefulness of this (without disturbing the formant arrangement of the original) is limited to twice and half the length. The factors that have to be taken into account are the numbers of bands it is split into (powers of 2) window overlap (again powers of 2) and window shape. The most low level process I have found is the Csound and Matlab implementations, which might provide a little more room to maneuver. Also band-splitting the sound file into (at least) high and low might preserve individual formants better with extreme processing.
Saariaho examined this principle in Vers le Blanc (1982), in which a single extremely slow glissando from one chord to another lasts 15′, subverting the perception of harmonic change. Leif Inge examined the same principle with 9 Beet Stretch, Beethoven’s 9th Symphony stretched to 24 hours long. There’s also John Cage’s ORGAN2/ASLSP, currently being performed in St. Burchardi in Halberstadt, in the eighth year of its 639 year performance. So the idea of performing music for a very long period isn’t new, but Cage’s doesn’t examine slow, continuous change, rather specific moments in time that have sudden changes. Also it’s not feasible to truly experience the work, because the time spent in performance for one human wouldn’t be enough to experience the enormity of the work. We can only imagine the momentous moment of change.
In Saariaho’s work, the computer is treated as an assistant to composition, not as a replacement for any part of the composition process. This is an important difference, because the conception of the work occurs far from the equipment, and is simply treated as a tool to realise the composition. Compare this with using the computer as the composition pad to realise your ideas. The ideas are beyond acoustic or electronic timbres, they are merely the ideas which Saariaho conjures in her mind, and the limitations of the tools are the only boundaries. Compare this to working within the boundaries, within the walls of a piece of software or pad of paper.
Ending with another quote, which I believe is sometime at odds with our current compositional thinking, and more in common with our belief in scientific knowledge (not to confuse this with current meta-scientific thought which purports that we are merely travelling in circles of knowledge): “…just as the universe of Newton is contained within the universe of Einstein, contemporary music, can similarly contain, in addition to other elements, all the developed knowledge of our civilization, as well as the knowledge that we have been able to acquire about other civilizations”.