Parallelism between Linguistics and Music – Noam Chomsky and Heinrich Schenker

Author(s):  
Botond SZOCS

The paper aims to compare musical language with verbal language, creating a new perspective on music and natural language. The three categories of linguistics, phonology, syntax and semantics are analyzed. Bernstein highlights the analogies between the linguistic categories and music, researching the same three components of linguistics in music. The possibility of applying the transformational grammar procedures to the musical text is studied. In the second part of the paper, the authors investigate the method of analysis based on harmony and counterpoint, differentiating several structural levels conceived by the theoretical musician H. Schenker. Schenkerian analyzes are a relatively recent appearance in the field of musical analysis, which proposes as an innovation in the field of musical analysis the structural vision of musical discourse.

Author(s):  
Elisabete M. de Sousa ◽  

The present essay presents the content of the landmarks that punctuate the long dialogue between verbal language and musical language during the 19th Century, by means of examples taken from the critical and theoretical writings of Hector Berlioz, Robert Schumann and Richard Wagner. In the search for the dramatic essence of music, such dialogue took different forms: the possibility of verbal language being translated by musical language, the pre-existence of a musical-poetic idea in any musical composition, eventually contributing to the appearance of program music, and finally, the principles presiding over Wagner’s Gesamtkunstwerk. Special emphasis is given to Richard Wagner’s Parisian article De l'Ouverture (1841), as well as to the impact on Soren Kierkegaard.


2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 151-160
Author(s):  
Rosina Caterina Filimon

Abstract The topic approached in this paper aims to identify the structural similarities between the verbal and the musical language and to highlight the process of decoding the musical message through the structural analogy between them. The process of musical perception and musical decoding involves physiological, psychological and aesthetic phenomena. Besides receiving the sound waves, it implies complex cognitive processes being activated, whose aim is to decode the musical material at cerebral level. Starting from the research methods in cognitive psychology, music researchers redefine the process of musical perception in a series of papers in musical cognitive psychology. In the case of the analogy between language and music, deciphering the musical structure and its perception are due, according to researchers, to several common structural configurations. A significant model for the description of the musical structure is Noam Chomsky’s generative-transformational model. This claimed that, at a deep level, all languages have the same syntactic structure, on account of innate anatomical and physiological structures which became specialized as a consequence of the universal nature of certain mechanisms of the human intellect. Chomsky’s studies supported by sophisticated experimental devices, computerised analyses and algorithmic models have identified the syntax of the musical message, as well as the rules and principles that underlie the processing of sound-related information by the listener; this syntax, principles and rules show surprising similarities with the verbal language. The musicologist Heinrich Schenker, 20 years ahead of Chomsky, considers that there is a parallel between the analysis of natural language and that of the musical structure, and has developed his own theory on the structure of music. Schenker’s structural analysis is based on the idea that tonal music is organized hierarchically, in a layering of structural levels. Thus, spoken language and music are governed by common rules: phonology, syntax and semantics. Fred Lerdahl and Ray Jackendoff develop a musical grammar where a set of generating rules are defined to explain the hierarchical structure of tonal music. The authors of the generative theory propose the hypothesis of a musical grammar based on two types of rules, which take into account the conscious and unconscious principles that govern the organization of the musical perception. The structural analogy between verbal and musical language consists of several common elements. Among those is the hierarchical organization of both fields, a governance by the same rules – phonology, syntax, semantics – and as a consequence of the universal nature of certain mechanisms of the human intellect, decoding the transmitted message is accomplished thanks to some universal innate structures, biologically inherited. Also, according to Chomsky's linguistics model a musical grammar is configured, one governed by wellformed rules and preference rules. Thus, a musical piece is not perceived as a stream of disordered sounds, but it is deconstructed, developed and assimilated at cerebral level by means of cognitive pre-existing schemes.


Author(s):  
Olha Vasylenko

The relevance of the article is to consider a new perspective of genre transformation in the Ukrainian oratorio of the 21st century, studied in the aspect of the relationship between poetic text and music. The work of Yevhen Stankovуch seems to be the pinnacle of the evolution of passions, during which textual interpolations changed and creatively renewed the genre canon. Despite the significant cultural and social resonance of the oratorio Taras Passion, its creative discoveries have not found coverage in scientific discourse yet. Main objectives of the study are to investigate the methods of conceptualizing the poetic word of Taras Shevchenko in the musical language of Y. Stankovуch’s oratorio and to reveal the genre innovations of the work. Such perspectives of analysis outline the boundaries of the novelty of this article. The research methodology is based on the methods of historical, cultural, phenomenological analysis. Their involvement is justified by the complex nature of the scientific problems of the article. Historical method reveals the general content and artistic specificity of the selected segment of Ukrainian musical history; culturological method focuses research on the different types of genres literary, artistic and musical culture; phenomenological method provides the study of certain conceptual contours and promotes the semantic differentiation involved in the analysis of multilevel cultural and artistic phenomena. Results and conclusions. The features of the uniqueness of modern oratorio opuses with the title “Passion” are determined. The ways of conceptualizing the poetic word in the choral music by Yevhen Stankovych are revealed: they are determined by the process that is able to combine various elements of Ukrainian ethnic culture as well as spiritual and religious traditions. The figurative and ideological concepts of word and music are subordinated to the main principles of the Ukrainian mentality (cordocentrism (philosophy of the heart), sacrifice and chivalry). The multidimensionality of the semantic field of Taras Shevchenko’s poetry is noted, as a result of which the real characters of the national liberation history are endowed with an aura of holiness like biblical persons. The gallery of various images of Y. Stankovych’s oratorio synthesizes the peculiarities of the national worldview and the evangelical virtues. In the pantheon of images of holy martyrs, sung in music, the composer places the image of T. Shevchenko. It is indicated that the story of the last days of the earthly life of the St. Virgin, the Prophet, Jan Hus is of particular importance. The principles of selecting fragments of T. Shevchenko’s poems for the libretto of the oratorio directly correspond to the genre canons of passions. The author defines the peculiarities of the composer’s interpretation of the personality of T. Shevchenko the poet as a prophet, patriot, bearer of the sacred Word, an ardent preacher of the ideas of spirituality, a bright exponent of the ethical position and spiritual tradition of the ethnos. At the same time, he acts as the narrator of the oratorio. The prerequisites for the transformation of the genre structure of the work of Y. Stankovych in the context of inheritance of the methods of text interpolation, up to their radical rethinking, are considered. The correspondence of the compositional and structural norms of sacred utterance in the poetry of T. Shevchenko and in the music of Y. Stankovych has been proved. It is indicated that the text genres of prayer, biblical epigraphs, retellings of passionate subjects, Church Slavonic archaic vocabulary of verses are revealed by the composer in the corresponding musical genres (znamenny chant, chorale, hymn, bellringing) and in the parameters of the expressive style. It is indicated that the drama of T. Shevchenko’s poetic style directly corresponds to the immanent qualities of a composer-symphonist and is realized by the orchestral parameter.


Music ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Christensen

Tonality is a ubiquitous term in musical discourse as indispensable as it is obfuscating. Typically, the term tonality (and more generally, “tonal music”) references the pitch-centric “common-practice” language of the transposable major and minor key system within which most classical music has been composed in the West from at least the mid-17th century through the early 20th century. Many theorists have highlighted certain empirical features of melody or harmony as being particularly characteristic or even essential to the tonal system (e.g., the content and structure of the diatonic scale, hierarchies of scale degrees and chord functions, or the cadence in defining or stabilizing tonal centers). At the same time, many theorists have emphasized the psychological power of tonal music for evoking strong affective responses from listeners by arousing strong expectations of tonal behavior that may be realized, delayed, or even thwarted. Clearly, then, any study of tonality needs to take into account the varying and often conflicting ways the concept is understood and used by given writers. But the concept of tonality has also been useful to musicologists for constructing evolutionary models of musical development while also describing—and contrasting—other musical styles and historical languages of music that do not always follow the norms of Western “common-practice” music. Particularly important in this regard is the chromatic language of many late-19th- and early-20th-century composers that is thought to have extended, deviated from, or even negated normative tonal syntax. Here Wagner’s use of chromaticism and extended modulation is usually cited as the progenitor of this process, one that is seen by many of these same observers to have led in the 20th century to the gradual dissolution of classical tonality in favor of a non-hierarchic kind of pitch organization, termed by neologisms such as “suspended tonality,” “post-tonality,” and perhaps most conventionally, “atonality.” Of course, tonality did not pass away; it continued to thrive as a common musical language through the 20th century, particularly in popular music idioms, even as it evolved into numerous dialects and hybrid forms within our globalized and digitalized musical marketplace. Yet the persistence of this myth of tonal evolution and devolution in Western histories of music suggests how high the stakes are in defining the content and perimeters of tonality. Tonality seems to be simultaneously an object and an ideal that continues to exert unparalleled influence—and not a little anxiety—to this day.


2020 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
pp. 143-172
Author(s):  
Judit Csüllög ◽  
Krisztina Várady

"The main purpose of the article is introducing the Hungarian contemporary composer, László Kátai. He is a retired associate professor who worked for almost 30 years at the Music Department of Eszterházy Károly College (Eger, Hungary). His compositions are strongly connected to Hungarian folk music and his musical language is based on Béla Bartók’s style amongst some other influences. The analysis of four piano compositions is the essence of the study. Keywords: László Kátai, Bartók’s style, piano pieces, musical analysis, Hungarian folk music"


Author(s):  
Yurii Zakharov

This article examines the life and artistic journey of the Polish composer Witold Lutosławski over the period from 1913 to 1945. Special attention is given to the fate of his father Józef who along with his brother were executed by a firing squad in September 1918, as well as to the fate of the omposer himself and his brother Henryk during the World War II. In the second part of the article, the subject of research becomes the peculiarities of musical language of W. Lutoslawski, as well as his views upon the sound structure and dramaturgical construct of the compositions. The presence of two substantive aspects in Lutoslawski’s music is proven: 1) gradual transformation of harmonious vertical due to progressive changes or addition of sounds (in combination with intonation transformations); 2) dramaturgy of sections and dramaturgy of layers. The author offers a new perspective on the works of Witold Lutosławski as the continuation G. Mahler in the area of the general concept of symphonic style, as well as in the area of intonation plot. At attempt is made to explain the peculiarity of perception of Lutosławski’s music by Russian audience in the context of comparison of the Russian and Polish mentality.


Author(s):  
James William Sobaskie

The poetic allusiveness of Chopin’s Préludes, Op. 28 (1839), intrigues and inspires - yet remains remarkably elusive. However, the concept of ’precursive prolongation’, founded on the Schenkerian notions of prolongation, diminution and structural levels, offers insight. Precursive prolongations, which include anticipations, appoggiaturas, secondary dominants and initial ascents, as well as elaborated versions of these plus those structures Heinrich Schenker called ’auxiliary cadences’, all are distinguished by the trait of prospective dependency. Expectations elicited by these tonal structures correspond to many of the allusive qualities we perceive in Chopin’s Préludes.This article begins with a survey of familiar precursive prolongations. It then proceeds to a definition that also distinguishes the concept of precursive prolongation from Schenker’s notion of auxiliary cadence. Next, analyses of several of Chopin’s Préludes (including those in C major, A major, B major, A-flat major, F minor and E minor) serve to demonstrate its ability to illuminate the structure and poetry of these pieces. The article concludes, among other findings, that many of Chopin’s Préludes exhibit a structural plan, described here as the ’attempt, attempt?achievement’ paradigm, that simulates a struggle to achieve a goal or to solve a problem by exploiting the suggestive power of precursive prolongation. Finally, the preludes in F minor and E minor are revealed to be most unusual tonal compositions in that each delays the first structural statement of its tonic harmony until its final bar, and each lacks a true fundamental line.Musical excerpts (accompanied by aural examples) and analytical sketches provide illustration.


1976 ◽  
pp. 51-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
BARBARA PARTEE

2006 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 620-646
Author(s):  
RACHEL GOLDEN CARLSON

ABSTRACT Textual-musical integration in representative 12th-century Aquitanian versus suggests that poetic and musical language were shaped not independently but rather in conjunction, inspired by the same rhetorical principles. The versus Resonemus hoc natali (Paris, Bibliothèèque nationale fonds latin 1139, fol. 50v) and De monte lapis scinditur (London, British Library, Additional Manuscript 36881, fol. 19v), both underexplored in the musicological literature, centrally treat the Biblically inspired topos of Daniel's mountain as a metaphor for Mary's virginity. Witnessing opposite ends of the versus manuscript chronology, these compositions together offer two discrete snapshots of active and shifting approaches to textual-musical expression in veneration of the Virgin. Stylistic contrasts between the versus parallel a two-pronged path described by English rhetorician Geoffrey de Vinsauf in his influential treatise Poetria nova (ca. 1210). In particular, Geoffrey's notions of the natural and artistic paths furnish interpretive tools for understanding both poetic and musical discourse. While the earlier Resonemus hoc natali takes a linear path that emphasizes narrative structure, the later De monte lapis travels a more circuitous route of permutation and reconstitution, evoking artifice rather than nature. As poetic texts demanded, or conformed to, new rhetorical strategies, music did likewise, and according to similar rhetorical ideals.


2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 156-168
Author(s):  
Tatiana Oltean

AbstractThe present research focuses on the toccata in a contemporary stylistic context, as a revival of the Baroque toccata in the creation of a Romanian composer from Cluj-Napoca, Șerban Marcu. He is a representative of the mature school of composition, studying under the tutorship of the celebrated Romanian composer Cornel Țăranu. His style unveils a series of constant traits, such as the programmatic feature and the preference towards musical forms and genres pertaining to the Western musical tradition, among them the madrigal, the song, the bagatella, the variations, the suite, the étude, the tone poem, the ballet or even the opera. He wrote five toccatas over the span of a decade. The toccata – understood both as a musical genre and a composing technique – is to be found in his output either as a movement in a mini-suite (Free Preview, 2008), or as an autonomous work, written for solo instruments as the piano (Toccatina, 2017), the organ (Balkan Toccata, 2018), as well as for various chamber ensembles, each featuring, among other instruments, the piano (tocCaTa brevissima, 2014, Toccata impaziente, 2018). The analysis unfolds by taking as focal point a series of keywords that have circumscribed the term toccata within the musicological literature. These core concepts are further placed in relationship with various techniques – neo-baroque as well as modern ones – which are to be identified in Șerban Marcu’s output of toccatas. The analytical procedures focus on highlighting the tradition/innovation binomial and are layered by taking into discussion the parameters of the musical discourse, namely the form, the musical language, the idiomatic instrumental writing, the compositional techniques, as well as aesthetic aspects such as the playfulness, the comic, the irony, the bizarre, the caricature and the paraphrase.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document