Ed Zubrow:
>I've been studying Deryk Cook's The Language of Music
Great book!
>in the context of this discussion though, I'd like to ask Steve: isn't
>this also what is going on in jazz when the performer/composer extends the
>argument and the conversation through his/her solos?
In the better soloists, sure. I didn't mean to imply that jazz was
illogical. But I do think the type of argument in solos differs, since
so much of jazz is based on either blues or 32-bar standards - song forms.
Consequently, the resulting structure we usually get is a kind of aria
variee, rather than something like the motific plasticity and
interpenetration of sonata allegro.
>incoherent, but some is as logical as the best composed classical music.
>Jazz composers start with a kernal of a melodic or harmonic statement and
>then play with it and toss it back and forth. Perhaps this is different
>from the "extended argument" that defines classical music, but I see as
>many similarities as distinctions. Especially if one allows the kind of
>development that we see in a set of variations, it seems to qualify.
Even here, however, there are all kinds of variations. You have the
18th-century type - essentially, Mozart's on "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little
Star" (I've forgotten the real French title). But you also have the Brahms
and Elgar type, in which a double game is played: not only the invention
of new variations, but the fitting of these variations into a larger
structure. Also, the variations aren't all the same formally. The final
variation in Brahms's Variations on a Theme by Haydn, for example, is a
passacaglia - itself a variation form. I don't see this kind of thinking
in improvisatory jazz, although I certainly see it in works by George
Russell.
>Further in this vein, I'd be interested in Steve's thoughts (or
>those of others) about how "miniatures" fit into Steve's definition
>of classical. As I understand it, Beethoven's mastery of the "extended
>argument" intimidated a generation of composers (including Chopin, Schubert
>and Schumann) into seeking to cram expressive content into the smallest
>possible form. Surely this is some fine music, by any standard
>"classical," despite no extended argument.
I love miniatures. But miniatures are essentially closed forms, like blues
and song. Classical contains not only closed forms, but open ones. Also,
I disagree that Chopin etc. were miniaturists (although they wrote some
fine miniatures). I'd apply that term to composers whose best work
consistently were miniatures.
Steve Schwartz
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