Thank you for those who replied to my post. I enjoyed reading your opinions
as I am really a great fan of this man Bartok *g*

James Tobin replied:

>But his slow movements are often hushed and as hauntingly beautiful as any
>ever written.  And in such works as his Dance Suite and Roumanian Dances
>he seems almost the heir of Brahms and Dvorak with their Hungarian and
>Slavonic Dances, so the break with the past can be exaggerated, even though
>in general he represents the high modern period.  His work has a great
>range.

True the Roumanian Dances are as sweet should have been Dvorak. Call it
traditionalism - old road -if you like. But I think that also many pieces
which sound much more dissonant or gritti, still can count for traditional
as Bartok in most of his production put the emphasis on MELODY. Allen Forte
in his analysis "The Musical Quarterly" claims that he found a serial
conception in the third movement of the fourth quartet (1928), if not in
Schoenbergs manner, which might be the extreme of Bartoks influence in the
20ies from Schoenberg and Berg (It is not proved that he knew Webern). But
back to melody, bartok wrote some very interesting stuff on (his)
contemporary music, though his writings are seldom quoted. Here on
Messiaen's "Mode de valeurs d'intensities". Bartok writes:

"Die entschiedene Wendung zum Atonalen hin begann [...] als man versuchte,
die zwoelf Toene nicht nach gewissen Skalen-Systemen zu ordnen und diesem
Ordnen gemaess den einzelnen Toenen groesseres oder kleiners Gewicht zu
beizulegen, sondern die einzelnen Toene in jeder beliebigen, nicht auf
Skalensysteme zurueckfuehrbaren sowohl horisontalen als auch vertikalen
zusammenstellung zu gebrauchen".

and further:

"Die engsten Lagen von drei und mehr benachbarten Toenen wirken je nach der
Tiefe bzw. Hoehe als mehr oder minder dicht klingendes stilisiertes Geraeusch"

and then he wrote:

"Bei homophoner Musik arbeitet man sozusagen mit gleichzeitig oder in mehr
oder minder raschen Nacheinander erklingender Tonmassen, mit dichteren oder
duenneren Tonflechen, welche Qualitaeten durch die Zahl der angewandten
Toene, durch die Absolute lage und die relative (d.h. weitere oder engere
Lage) usw. bedingt sind"

This the quotes from "The Problem of Modern Music" which Bartok wrote in
his twenties - and one can think here that it shows likeness to the same
musical situation as Ligeti, a propos Luigi Nono's "Cori di Didone" (1958),
has described like this in "Wandlungen der Musikalischen Forn, die Reihe
VII (1960):

"...strukturbildend sind nicht mehr Intervalle, da diese ihre Funktion
aufgegeben haben, sondern Dichterverhaeltnisse, Verteilung der lagen und
Verschiebungen im Auf-und Abbau der vertikalen Komplexe".

Bartok true passed a period lending towards thicker dissonance after this
essay - like in "The Miraculous Mandarin", but he started to collect
Folkmusic before this (after having discovered pentatonic gypsy influence
in Debussy's harmonies), I here refer to Bartoks own description in his
autobiographical scetch, where he explains his use of it for expanding the
scales. It might be added that along with the etudes, the mandarin stands
completely isolated in his production.

To conclude this I would rather place Bartok along with Schoenberg ('s
non-atonal works) as a "Neotonalist", then beside Strawinski.

Or let Bartok speak again: "Yet there is much music to be composed in
C-Major" (1930).

Jan Jarvlepp:

>If you would like to get well acquainted with the theoretical side
>of Bartok, the book "Bela Bartok: An Analysis of his Music" by Erno
>Lendvai (Kent & Averill, London) is an excellent place to start.

is this book avaliable in non-ugrian language? I didn't know it to be.

Bryan Shaw:

>When it comes to Bartok I cannot say enough good things nor even really
>pick a favorite piece. The Sonota for Two Pianos and Percussion is a
>real masterpiece though underappreciated.

Why do you think so? For the specially constructed soundeffect? Bartok was
else a poor orchestrator I think, and he didn't develop much. I am hard but
frank.

>The middle movements of the Second
>and Third Piano Concertos is some of the most serenely beautiful music I've
>ever heard and in exact contrast to much of his work including the other
>pieces I mentioned.

But so difficult to play. alas!

>Even his smallest piano works are full of all kinds of
>title details that show the masterful composer that he was. He is often to
>harsh for many people's ears but he is more than energy and noise if he is
>studied much at all.

I would chime in that "Mikrokosmos" is indeed full of details. I think it
is cosmos in more than one way, as Wagner, with his monumental Ring was not
the only composer who had the guts to visualize the life of whole universe
audially, just with more megalomania. Mikrokosmos's 150 studies are
actually thought to be practice for kids, though I think most composers
would have respected them more than that *pun intended* GGGG*

Thomas Boyce sums up:

>I'm sure it's easier to list the works of Bartok that we DON'T like!

Good to hear! I also must say Bartok ROCKS! Hey, the man is ja fun! Listen
to when he "laughs at" and tries to make fun of Debussy for instance!

On Bartok's work with viaductial bowforms: again the sonata for two pianos
and percussion is also fun, with this LARGE 12 minute first movement and
the two SMALL movements that follow upon them. Still the listener doesn't
get an impression of unbalance between them. The Bartok expert Halsey
Stevens suggests as only explanation: "The tematic wealth of the first
movement and its continual regeneration, so that it conveys less the
impression of a highly organized closed form than of an uninterupted
outpouring", which except for that it is a questionable judgement - says
just nothing at all. These proportions are however not the result of chance
(as they are "disproportional" enough to look like that. Erno Lendvai has
shown that behind this is a geometric calculus; the whole sonata consists
of 6432 1/4-notes. The split proportion 3975:2457 falls exactly on the new
bar between first and second movement, and which proportion is this?

However in regard to the unconventional writer for the orchestra Bartok
was, I was really *shocked* by hearing the "Music for Strings, Percussion
and Celeste". I hadn't expected that from a composer who here wanted to
show so much high ambition should show up such a masterpiece. But since I
discovered what a great man he was, I wouldn't be surprised by anything. He
rocks! The man rocks fat!!!

Didrik Schiele