Product Description

In this significant study of the music of Pierre Boulez, Dr. Koblyakov provides a complete analysis of Le Marteau sand Maître and deals with the development of serial music in the twentieth century and the problems of serial organization in general. He reaches stimulating conclusions about serial thinking and harmony in themusic of Pierre Boulez, thus enabling an understanding of the intricacies of this major composer's compositional techniques.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1169180 in Books
• Published on: 1993-11-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 229 pages

Review
"A goldmine of information...this is probably the single most important examination of a Boulez composition." -- Jason Gibbs of Notes - December 1992

A goldmine of information...this is probably the single most important examination of a Boulez composition.
–Jason Gibbs of Notes, December 1992

An important part of the work is dedicated to a minute analysis of my Marteau sans Maître. I was very much impressed by his knowledge and acute sense of analysis.
–Pierre Boulez

It is still the greatest single step forward in Boulez studies so far published...and serves to renew one's admiration for the fact that such eloquently febrile music should stem from such coolly calculated mazes and matrices. The mystery may be reduced, but the magic is enhanced.
–Arnold Whittall of Music and Letters, April 92

It is still the greatest single step forward in Boulez studies so far published...and serves to renew ones admiration for the fact that such eloquently febrile music should stem from such coolly calculated mazes and matrices. The mystery may be reduced, but the magic is enhanced.
–Arnold Whittall of Music and Letters, April 92

Legions of serial analysts...will study and quote from it for some time to come. Koblyakov's penetration of Boulez's compositional processes is extraordinarily deep and thorough.
–F. Goosen of Choice, July/August 91

Legions of serial analysts...will study and quote from it for some time to come. Koblyakovs penetration of Boulezs compositional processes is extraordinarily deep and thorough.
–F. Goosen of Choice, July/August 91

Customer Reviews

a dissection of an avant-garde masterwork
Le Marteau sans Maitre, or The Hammerless Master was after the Surreal poet Rene Char, he was part of the Resistance to the Nazis during World War 2. Boulez was the first to realize the creative implications of the dodecaphonic language begun by Arnold Schoenberg later Anton Webern. Serialism was a vigorous extension of the utilization of the profound number of 12, all of the tones in the tempered system. This 12 was extended to rhythm,duration, articulation and dynamics, so not only pitch was a point of organization.What this created was a situation where sound could now be projected in an infinite variety of shapes and designs. Serialism was a brief epoch like any epoch with a beginning middle and end, and it came to a marvelous end around the late Fifties. Its demise can be explained by the exhaustion of the language, of its music materials. Each work was an excursion into eradicating itself. Boulez, of his gneration was always the most musical, always with tangible gestures and emotive threads traceable to Debussy,or Webern or Messiaen, wheras composers like Stockhausen, or Nono, Berio,tried to erase this connection. Boulez brought an informed musical sensibility, an aesthetic of the sensuous, the exotic, and mysterious to his music,informed by World Music as well, as the instrumental constitution that Marteau suggests. Serialism had its problems however, structurally, it couldn't extend itself into larger forms,orchestration was also problematical, and there was a point where the complexity the density of the phrase existed purely for itself, for no one could hear it. Marteau however is a classic precisily because it harbored modest expressive goals, albeit within an incredibly complex structural plan.Koblyakov discusses Boulez's use of harmony, a concept others of his generation might well dismiss. And the fascination here is the analysis of points,and simultanaeities of density, how they function within locally from note to note and from movement to movement, how harmonies are constructed, their gradations and shape.Marteau unfolds as the three poems Boulez selected in three discreet sections composed of shorter movements, with what is now a classic avant-garde instrumental combination of voice, viola, alto flute, guitar and a large array of handheld percussion&(vibraphone).As a tribute to this works profundity, there were countless works by Boulez contemporaries with this identical set after. Boulez's aesthetic always sought the means toward multiplication, how a germ of an idea can sustain, refigure and reproduce itself. This is done here with reiteration of the materials of the serialized 12, with harmonies accreting and diminishing as the work progresses.How pitch reproductions can exist on alocal level within each movement and on a global level, within the entire work. Koblyakov impeccably traces these complex transformations of pitch with wonderful graphic tables equally exhaustive as the work. A full score of the work projected into screens defining the works relationships is also provided here.