David Arditti wrote:

>Haydn-Mendelssohn-Wagner-Hindemith: 99 percent of the time: same chords,
>same prinicples of melodic construction, same rhythms, same principles
>of voice-leading, very similar principles of counterpoint, very similar
>principles of dealing with instruments and voices.  I say again, far more
>similarities than differences.  And this is not the same as just saying
>they were tonal.  One can identify the fundamental breaches of the regime,
>typified by these composers, that lead to modernism, as: 1) The
>abandonment of classical voice-leading, first of all by the late 19th C
>French composers 2) The abandonment of triadic harmony, first tried by
>Liszt 3) The deliberate extensive use of instruments in classically
>"un-natural" ways, both in the way they are played individually, and
>co-ordinated into ensemble textures, pioneered by Stravinsky most
>prominently.

This is a series of ex-cathedra assertions which simply begs for debunking.
Hindemith abandoned most principles of classical voice leading for much of
his career, returning to them rather late.  His sonatas, for example, are
filled with the kinds of leaps that would not have passed muster in any
counterpoint class in the 1800's.

Moreover his assertion "same principles of melodic construction" is simply
flat out wrong.  Even Beethoven's system of melodic construction caused
more than a few problems with theorists through out the 19th century, has
abandonment of symetrical melodic structures caused some to label him a
"poor melodist", his abandoment of contrapunctal ornament as the means to
create rhythmic variety, as characterises both Haydn and Mozart, gives his
melodies a rhythmic feel.  His use of ur-cells through out a piece was,
again, a dramatic break with the past which caused more than a bit of head
scratching.  This was why it took an entirely new means of rehearsing
orchestras to perform his symphonies regularly.  It took several very high
quality musical thinkers, including Mendelssohn, Berlioz, Liszt, Czerny,
Wagner and Habeneck several decades to finally codify these methods.

Wagner's idea of melodic construction was sufficently different as to
require that he more or less found his own school of playing, with its
use of motivic variations within a single melodic line, use of melodies
which did not indicate a tonal center, and leading motives.  Shaw wrote
extensively on the separation between Wagner's melodic methods and those
that preceded him.

As for instrumentation, the great revolution in practice was not in the
20th century, but in the mid 19th century in the era of Berlioz and Saxe.
The introduction of valves made instruments easier to play n a variety of
keys, and made them in pure intonation in all keys.  It also, as Wagner and
Brahms noted, removed the difference between open and closed notes.  There
is a note about this topic attached at the front of several of Wagner's
scores, demanding the precise execution to maintain the difference.  The
changes in bowing between the time of Spohr and Joachim are marked, both
in the range and selection of strokes and in the length of phrases.

I could spend a few hundred K detailing the shift from modal construction
of melodies to tonal construction in Bach, or the change from polyphony to
homophony in neo-classicism, or the change from sectional to articulated
tonal structure between early and late Mozart - but all of this gets aside
from the main point.

This point is that in reconciling conflicting practices a kind of
accomodation is arrived at, one which often makes earlier tensions mute.
We do not have the same feel for variety of consonant chords as in Mozart's
time.  If one looks at the voicing of his cadences, one finds a strict
hierarchy of consonance which is, to us, almost invisible.  If one looks
at the percentages of various chords, one will quickly find that chord
sequences that are rare or non-existant in Mozart are common in Wagner,
most specifically inverted interupted cadences.

To cut the other way - Hindemith in significant portions of his work
abandons traditional voice leading, where Schoenberg never does, nor
does Webern.  From the standards that Mr.  Arditti points toward, the
Second Vienna School, other than its expanded chord vocabulary, is
indistinguishable from Wagner, since its techniques of melodic construction
are derrived rather closely from Wagner's pratice.

I could go on, but what is the point? Merely having made the statement
indicates that its author is immune to facts and logic - so numerous are
the counter examples in architecture, painting and literature.

Which saddens me, one of the reasons for the lack of credibility in the
arts for a revival of the idea that the world of artists must be more
intimately connected with the broader audience, is that so many of its most
visible spokes men are ignorant of the tensions and turbulent history of
traditional art.  It seems that many of them are busy fleeing from what
they see as an all too turbulent present, that they are willing to create
a mythic stulified past as a refuge.

In point of fact long before the avant-garde there was a tremendous
tension in the arts.  In the 20th century making differences manifest had
cachet, so that those differences that existed were often exagerated.  Mr.
Ariditti by arguing for a static artistic past before the 20th century has,
ironically, proven that he agrees with the avant-garde on most fundemental
issues, and is, whether he likes it or not, a modernist - indeed as
Modernist in his fundemental assumptions as Boulez or de Kooning because
he has accepted their version of history.

stirling s newberry
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