Re: Chord Function?

llatham@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 wrote:
>I think there are two camps Orlando - one camp avoids tonality (to
greater 
>or lesser degrees, and to the exclusion of) but also seeks to avoid any 
>other elements that might also be considered "traditional". To use a 
>pejorative term, it strives to be "Anti-Music" by traditional
definitions. 

Unfortunately, all musical traditions are built on aesthetic legacies of 
expectation that are gradually augmented over time by visionaries 
pu****ng the proverbial envelope. But, pu****ng the envelope is not 
tantamount to throwing it out.

>The other camp also avoids tonality, but in its place tries to provide
other 
>unifying factors instead. An example is "process" music (which can use 
>serial elements) where establi****ng a key center may not be the "point"
of 
>the work, but the "point" is to cycle through X possible permutations. So

>rather than trying to listen for a key, or a tonic chord, we are instead 
>recognizing a pattern and our "expectations of finality" are granted by -

>not a tonic chord - but an arrival at the logical conclusion of the
process 
>(completion of a cycle for example).

I can definitely dig that in Schoenberg, Berg, even late Webern and 
Messiaen, to name a few.

>I find the latter much more to my liking. While I'm not at all a staunch 
>advocate of traditionalism, I do still like to "recognize" elements
within a 
>piece of art. If it's "too abstract" for me, I simply lose interest
because 
>I can't hear anything cool happening.

Part of why you can't hear anything cool happening is that there's no 
rub against expectations. Part of the psychological game of composition 
involves flirting with people's sense of genre expectation, giving them 
enough to lull them into a falsely secure state and then shocking them 
with dissonance, rhythmic complexity, dazzling counterpoint or timbral 
weirdness. But, if the music is composed of one shocking move after 
another, the ear eventually resigns itself to the grim prospect of no 
falsely secure state at any time. I think that's when people lose 
interest. The WEstern classical music world went through an unfortunate 
phase during which many composers believed that music and pleasure 
should be permanently severed. They truly believed that listeners should 
no longer luxuriate in lush tonal harmonies and beautiful melodies. 
Well, audiences seem to have won that war.

Orlando