Dissertation Index
Author: Campbell, Edward Title: Boulez and Expression: A Deleuzoguattarian Approach Institution: University of Edinburgh Begun: October 1994 Completed: June 2000 Abstract: This study considers Boulez’s music in terms of both structure and expression. In order to do so, it reorients and retheorises the problematic concept of “expression”, freeing it from unhelpful previous usage. The post-structuralist theory of expression of the philosophers Deleuze and Guattari is explored in order to provide a means whereby musical structure and expression can be reconciled within one account. For Deleuze and Guattari, expression is a rhizomatic, connective affair in which a musical composition may be viewed as an “assemblage”, as the product of flows from a number of media, which provide levels of expression and content for one another through their inter-connectivity. While Boulez rejects a particular Romantic notion of expression, he clearly accepts the existence of a level of expression within music albeit as something which he has not fully theorised for himself. Having articulated a theory of expression, the greater part of the thesis is taken up with the consideration of three main concepts which may be said to be “expressive” within Boulez’s music, in terms of the theory. These are difference as variation, musical spatiality and musical temporality. Difference is considered at the levels of athematicism (the virtual theme), open form (virtual form), accumulative development and heterophony (the virtual line). Spatiality is considered in terms of Boulez’s “diagonal” pitch dimension, smooth and striated pitch-space, the use of register, the articulation of a composition around significant polar pitches, timbral space and the use of the external auditorium space. Time and temporality are considered in the contrast of smooth and striated time. Keywords: Boulez, Deleuze and Guattari, Expression, Difference, Virtual Theme, Virtual Form, Accumulative Development, Heterophony, Spatiality, Temporality TOC: Introduction 1 1. Boulez as Composer: A Critical Survey 5 Descriptive Analyses 10 Reconstructive Analyses 11 Ecriture and Perception 16 More Specific Studies 20 Musical Modernism: Creative Connections 23 Orientations 27 2. Boulez and Expression 33 Topic Theory and Mythic Semes 35 Musical Modernism and Expression 39 Boulez and Expression 43 Musical Content and Expression 52 Content and Expression: A Deleuzoguattarian Perspective 57 A New Image of Thought 63 Boulez: A Rhizomatic Approach 71 3. Boulez and Musical Difference Introduction 77 Deleuzian Difference 79 Twentieth Century Music, Difference and Repetition 88 Athematicism: The Virtual Theme 98 The Open Work: Virtual Form 122 Difference as “Accumulative Development” 136 Heterophony: The Virtual Line 141 Boulezian Heterophony and the Deleuzian Fold 147 Difference and Repetition: Loose Ends 149 Summary and Conclusion 152 4. Boulez and Musical Spatiality Introduction 158 What is Musical Pitch-Space? 160 Interior Pitch-Space and the Diagonal 166 Smooth and Striated Space 179 Registral Space 188 Polar Notes 216 Exterior Spatiality 226 Timbre Space 239 Summary and Conclusion 252 5. Boulez, Time and Temporality Introduction 255 Music, Time and Temporality 257 Modernism, Time and Temporality - Bergson and Proust 262 Time and Temporality within Twentieth Century Music 268 Boulez, Tempo and Duration 276 Two Temporalities: Smooth and Striated Time - In Theory 280 Smooth and Striated Time - In Practice 286 Static Temporality within Post-War Music 306 A Deleuzoguattarian View 309 Summary and Conclusion 316 Conclusion 321 Bibliography 328 Contact: Dr Edward Campbell 15 Hailes Crescent Edinburgh EH13 OND Tel: 0131 441 6883 gill.ed@virgin.net |