George Steiner on Music (part 2)

Let's continue with chapter 6 from Errata. (See previous post.) Steiner is struggling to find out whether the concept of "truth" applies to music. His conclusion is that music is beyond true and false, beyond good and evil. 

I have some doubts regarding this constantly mentioned "beyond-ness" of music but, if the concept of truth and falsity is seen in terms of a unilaterally mathematical dimension, Steiner is certainly right: music is, indeed, beyond truth and falsity. Suppose, however, that we expand the notion of truth to a universal magnitude, to realities beyond reason. Then we might be in a position to say that music is "true"; or, to put it more safely, that there is truth in music; or, even better, that music participates in the truth. Perhaps this does not apply to all music; but it certainly does to these works that are proved to be timeless, the masterpieces. 

Steiner realises that the nature of music itself points to the realm of a mystère suprême. Yet there is a visible side to this mystery, and this relates to music's power. (We've often spoken about that in this diary). "It is music which can invade and rule the human psyche with a penetrative strength comparable, it may be, only to that of narcotics or of the trance reported by shamans, saints, and ecstatics. Music can madden and it can help heal a broken mind. It can be 'the food of love', it can also trigger the feasts of hatred. A tune, a momentary cadence can come to possess our consciousness". A bit further down he adds that, music "exercises over us a singular domination".

***

The next question is one that has haunted me since my adolescent years: Where does a melody come from? There can be no answer - I am aware of that! But Steiner says something quite interesting: "Where does the new melody, the novel key-relation, originate? What, if you will, was there before? Silence, perhaps, but a silence which, in a linguistically inexpressible way, was not mute. Which was charged with 'unresolved tensions and disequilibrium', as Roger Sessions put it, aching for release and resolution". 

And what about the impact of music? There lies another huge issue: music and emotions. "What makes a third minor sad?", he asks... Again, as in many parts of the book, Steiner is more preoccupied with asking the right questions rather than anxiously trying to provide his answers. In crucial issues such as these, are there, in fact, any answers? It seems to me that we humans, in issues as evidently transcendental as these, can only communicate our wonder and ecstasy - nothing more than that. For now. I have this feeling that there are answers to everything, but they are not for now...

Music, in Steiner's beautiful and eloquent prose "demonstrates to me the reality of a presence, of a factual 'thereness', which defies either analytical or empirical circumscription. This reality is at once commonplace, everyday, palpable and ulterior". 

I'll end this small summary of Steiner's thoughts on music with this sentence: 

"The more captive our delight, the more insistent our need of and 'answering to' a piece of music, the more inaccessible are the reasons why. It is a platitude to observe that music shares with love and with death the mystery of the self-evident".

George Steiner, Errata - an examined life, Yale University Press, pp. 70-86.

George Steiner on Music (part 1)

Steiner's Errata is one of the most profound books I've ever read. I had read it back in 2007, but I decided it was worth a second reading. 

It is his thoughts on music (chapter 6) that I would like to discuss; or, to be more precise, to copy them in my diary. For I find in them depth and precision that one seldom finds in musicological analyses. 

Steiner speaks about the relation between music and language. Or, rather, the relation between the language of music and the language of language. The latter points towards the "thereness" of the former, yet "language, in regards to music, 'messes about'". Music is beyond language, a musical score is described as a "meta-language" which can convey, for the person trained, something peripheral about music: yet the essence of music remains unapproachable, and "almost everything said about musical compositions by critics, by poets or writers of fiction, by the ordinary listener and music-lover is verbiage". "In the face of music, the wonders of language are also its frustrations". 

Word imitates music: "it knows rhythm, cadence, sonorities, echo-effects, changes of 'key', thematic variations". And yet, there is, Steiner believes, a primary rivalry between word and music. "In every serious Lied, cantata, chorale or operatic  music-speech, the tension, the agonistic tug-of-war are palpable. The music aims, consciously or not, to draw back  into its own totality, to drain of translatable lexical-grammatical sense, the text. It seek to vocalize completely  the phonetics, the signifying syllables of language. Words are to be melted into pure vocalises."

Is there a way to reconcile these two forces? The answer is yes, and the "means" to achieve this is, for Steiner, human voice when it sings. "Song is simultaneously the most carnal and spiritual of realities". 

As I transfer Steiner's thoughts into my diary, I cannot help but wonder what's the purpose of jotting down my own musical impressions. Do/Can I say anything about music per se? I think the answer can only be in the negative - perhaps with some chinks of light. My only consolation is that my musical impressions try to say something, not about music but about me: the effort is not to describe a musical work that I love, but to try and see myself reflected in it. In some other place, Steiner says that the definition of a "classic" is that it "reads you" (rather than you reading it). This can very well be applied to music...

But we shall continue.

Prokofiev and... Byzantine Music

I was listening (for the umpteenth time...)  to Prokofiev's 2nd Piano Concerto the other day, and towards the coda of the 4th Movement, just before the recapitulation of the theme, I realised, for the first time, that for 10 seconds or so, the music coming to my ears was somehow... byzantine! 

The piano was playing a soft and metreless melody which immediately struck me as being completely byzantine in terms of style; and (even more strikingly) the left hand was -as we say in the language of byzantine music- "keeping the ison" (keeping the drone constant, that is). I cannot remember of a similar instance in Prokofiev's piano music. 

What a vivid example of the creative use of such an ancient tradition! This is the challenge, I thought: not simply copying mechanically but incorporating creatively the musical elements of other traditions into one's own musical voice.

It's worth listening to it - move to 3:29.... (By the way, this is a superb live performance by Nikolai Lugansky [one of my favorite pianists], given some years ago at the RAH).

Thoughts on Brahms Cello Sonata in E Minor

I must admit that I am not particularly fond of chamber music. Yet, there are quite a few works that I really love. One of them is Brahms’s Cello Sonata in E Minor.

I am actually practicing the piece at the moment, as I am going to play it with a wonderful cellist this coming November. 

There is something special about this sonata: from the very first note (the deep E played by the cello) one enters immediately into its world – a somber world, full of deep nostalgia and longing. It's a world that fits perfectly with the very nature of the cello's particular sound quality. 

 

What I also find truly great about this work is the careful balance between the two instruments: this is not a “cello sonata”. It is a sonata for piano and cello. Both instruments retain their individuality, without ever becoming mere accompaniment devices. As has rightly been said, the piano “should be a partner - often a leading, often a watchful and considerate partner - but it should under no circumstances assume a purely accompanying role”. Studying carefully the score, I quickly came to the conclusion that, actually, the piano part has all the qualities of a solo work. One can feel sheer happiness by just playing the piano part!

Each movement has its own beauty, as well as its own individuality (in fact, I don't see much "unity" in the work, ie elements of one movement coming back in another movement). 

The 1^st movement (Allegro non troppo) has a distinctive “autumnal” colour that speaks immensly to my heart. 

What can I say about the Allegretto quasi Menuetto? The middle section has a chopinesque quality and its melody remained in my head from the very first time I heard it. Love, restrained pathos, sweetness - all in one musical phrase...

As for the third movement (a fugue), this is a more cerebral work, quite tricky from a technical point of view. I think it should be the most difficult of the three in terms of “togetherness”. I read somewhere that the theme is actually based on Contrapunctus number 13 – from the Art of Fugue- and I am wondering if this is the case.

All in all, this is a great, a monumental piece of music – one of the best works that Brahms composed. It will be a great challenge to play it – and I really can’t wait!!