Jaargang 8, nommer 2 – Augustus 2011 - LitNet

Summary
LitNet Akademies Jaargang 8(2) – Augustus 2011
Tematiese fisionomie skep toegang tot drie
uiteenlopende 20ste-eeuse komposisies
Bertha Spies
Departement Musiek
Universiteit van Pretoria
Thematic physiognomy creates access to three divergent 20th‐century
compositions
In the absence of traditional structural coherence, functional tonal harmony and traditional
operatic heroes, how does one make sense of three divergent 20th‐century compositions in
which, respectively, these qualities do not feature? The object of this article is to show that the
immediacy of thematic physiognomy can provide a conceptual framework to help understand
this music, which is often regarded as complex and inaccessible. Melodies normally speak
directly to the listener because they seem to represent the face of the music. Depending on a
person’s frame of mind, a particular face may communicate various messages. Although a
melodic construct as a static image may signify a specific mood (Affekt), its potential to
generate meaning increases dramatically when the lines and contours change in the course of
a work. In this article melodic structures are investigated in their original rhythmical state.
The article has two main parts, the first dealing with thinking and the second with doing.
Firstly, my point of departure is a historical perspective on melody as a field of knowledge,
showing the traditional neglect of melody in the study of music theory. In 1989 Carl Dahlhaus
regarded the study of melody as the poorest discipline of traditional music theory (1989:66).
Nevertheless, Igor Stravinsky, one of the most prominent composers of the 20th century, states
that “melody must keep its place at the summit of the hierarchy of elements that make up
music. Melody is the most essential of these elements, not because it is immediately
perceptible, but because it is the dominant voice of the symphony – not only in the specific
sense, but also figuratively speaking” (1947:40).
Because melody speaks directly to the listener without first having been subject to
systematisation it is an obvious vehicle for rhetorical ideas – the immediacy of the melodic
contours of thematic physiognomy can, therefore, promote communication to the listener.
Although rhetorical principles can be traced back to antiquity, Joachim Burmeister was the
first to explore the connections between rhetoric and music in a systematic way (Palisca
1993:viii). In his Musical Poetics of 1606 he defines melody as “an affection consisting of an
intervallic sequence of pitches, devised or made to produce musical movement that will evoke
affections in a person who is not altogether unmusical” (Rivera 1993:57). In spite of the
decline of rhetoric in the 18th century, “its importance as the first systematic framework for
work‐specific musical analysis was considerable; and it has recently enjoyed something of a
revival” (Morgan 2005:290–1).
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