TWENTIETH- - Synapse Music

164 Imports and Allusions
Quotation in Bernd Alois Zimmermann 's music is an important stylistic element
rather than the exceptional event, a good example being Photoptosis ( 1968), an orchestral
work with quotations from various sources. In Petroushkates (1980), Joan Tower has composed
a sort of paraphrase variation on Stravinsky's original. Direct quotations in
Pelrotlshkales are most apparent at the beginning, but chords, rh ythms, and melodic fi gures
drawn from Stravinsky can be heard throughout the work, most of which maintai ns the exhilarating
spirit of the opening of PelrushlaJ.
Bach's Partita in E Major for solo violin serves as the basis for the third movement of
Lukas Foss's Baroque Variations (1967). Far removed from the traditional theme and variations,
this dramatic and effective work often views the Bach work through a wi ldly distorted
lens. Chapter 14 includes additional discussion of this movement.
Perhaps the most famou s example of quotation is the third movement of Berio's Sinfonia
(1968), a work for eight voices and orchestra. The entire movement is based on the
third movement of Mahler's Symphony No.2 (1 894), sometimes obviously but often more
subtly, with additional quotations from Bach, Berg, Brahm" Debussy, Ravel, Schoenberg,
Strauss, Stravinsky, and others, these quotations being alJuded to on occasion by the chorus.
7 Most of the text, however, is drawn from Samuel Beckett's novel The Unnameable.
The connections between Mahler, Joyce, Beckett, and Berio have been convincingly
shown, including the suggestion th at Joyce's stream· of-consciousness style of writing has
its parallel in Mahler's music, and presumably in Berio's as well. 8 The result is a musical
col1age but also a complex and fascinating work, much more than a haphazard pastiche.
Alfred Schnittke is a Russian composer who has been using quotations and stylistic
allusions in his music since the late 1960s, one example among many being his Moz-arl, a
blend of Mozartean gestures and twentieth-century dissonances, muJtiphonics, and other
effects. His use of earlier materials is sometimes humorous and sometimes serious.
Sometimes I'm tweaking the li stener. And sometimes I'm thinking about earlier
music as a beautiful way of writing that has disappeared and will never come back;
and in that sense, it has a tragic feeling for me. 9
INFLUENCES FROM FOLK MUSIC, JAZZ,AND ROCK
Composers of the nineteenth century were certainly not unaware of folk music, as witnessed
by the influence of Polish folk music on Chopin and the arrangements of German
folk songs by Brahms. The rise of nationalism in the late nineteenth century spawned an
increased interest on the part of composers of all countries in the music that was indigenous
to their own cultures, and this interest continued into the twentieth centwy, especially
in the fi rst several decades.
Probably the composer whose name first come, to mind in connection with folk
music in the twentieth century is Bela Bart6k. Shortly after the beginning of the century, he
and his compatriot ZoMn Kodaly began a serious study of folk music, at first only Hungarian,
but soon including that of neighboring countries as well. Bart6k's interest in this
area is seen explicitly in the titles of many of his works; for example, the following titles
appear in Volumes 4-6 of the Mikrokosmos: