How meaningful is ‘topography’ as a metaphor for investigating the history of composition in postwar music? The disparate nature of musical languages from 1950 to the present day challenges any perception of continuity and obscures potentially significant connections: serial (and post-serial), minimalist (and holy minimalist), new complexity, new tonality, algorithmic… an apparently endless list of distinct language-types stretches out before the musician. The term ‘topography’ implies a static, perhaps even a rigid, representation of how natural and man-made features are depicted on a map. Initially, this does not seem to lead to any understanding of such a constantly changing, time-based subject such as the history of composition. But would the use of the plural form prove to be more helpful? The editors of this excellent volume clearly thought it would – and rightly so. Their decision to use ‘Topographien’ immediately creates a more dynamic and fluid set of possibilities entirely suited to a study of contemporary music. The image of a single map can now be replaced by a multi-layered one with different topographies placed on top of each other. The principal areas remain unaltered. Their relative positions and individual characteristics are not compromised. But on closer examination each stratum, with its unique topographic configuration, exposes clearly differentiated connections between these major features. Revealing the relationships between musical languages is one of the great strengths of Topographien der Kompositionsgeschichte seit 1950.
Many of the individual contributions in this book originate from research at the Musikwissenschaftliches Institut at the University of Cologne. The academic strengths of the institution are apparent in the number of postgraduate dissertations that have been adapted for this volume. It is noteworthy that Topographien is the sixteenth volume of the series ‘Signale aus Köln: Beiträge zur Musik der Zeit’ and thus forms part of an invaluable series dedicated to issues relating to contemporary music. Most of the volumes in the series result from events which took place at the institute and practically each one, therefore, benefits from discussions between composers and musicologists sharing their insights and methodologies. The analytical/historical strengths of German musicology are obvious in Topographien: wide knowledge of relevant literature and scrupulous attention to the evaluation and organisation of source material.
Most authors chose to examine a specific aspect of a composer’s output by means of a particular composition or theoretical framework. There is, naturally, an inherent difficulty confronting all editors of such volumes: how to unify a number of essays, each of which doubtless makes a valuable contribution to contemporary musicology, but which as a whole stubbornly resists any attempt to forge links between each chapter. However, the editors have achieved a real sense of coherence whilst simultaneously celebrating the individuality of each author. To revisit, albeit briefly, the topographic metaphor, the reader might identify one main feature (electroacoustic music, for example) and view it by means of thoughtful, well-argued chapters which reveal connections between composers such as Berio (Giomi/Schwoon), Smalley (Berger), Brümmer (von Blumröder) and Tutschku (Paland). Alternatively, from a different vantage point such as Berio’s contribution to contemporary musical thought, another route can be followed to reveal the composer’s role at IRCAM (Pousseur), his use of intertextuality (Pantel) or the application of live electronics in his works (Giomi/Schwoon).
As the subtitle makes clear, several well-known members of the European postwar avant-garde are represented such as Pousseur, Xenakis, Berio and Kagel (despite his birthplace I still associate Kagel with European developments). The sole non-European is Cage whose use of ‘time brackets’ is intelligently analysed and discussed by Hünermann. The reader might assume, therefore, that there will be a succession of chapters dedicated to the ‘usual suspects’. This is certainly not the case. In addition to the aforementioned – and long overdue – studies of Smalley, Brümmer and Tutschku, Schuler posits the importance of the ‘fragment’ as a compositional principle in Franco Evangelisti’s music which is then related to notions of brevity found in certain works of German Romantic literature. Romanticism also figures in an equally insightful chapter by Feß on the music of Wolfgang Rihm, where the author detects aspects of Romantic thought such as ‘Romantic distance’. Furthermore, the central theme of electroacoustic music is revisited by von Blumröder and Grintsch. Neither examines specific composers. Instead, each presents a more wide-ranging discussion of their chosen subject. Von Blumröder evaluates many sources relating to electroacoustic music’s early history and tackles the thorny problem of how to unravel the fundamental differences between musique concrète and elektronische Musik. Grintsch provides a thorough survey of reproduction techniques with particular reference to loudspeaker systems such as the acousmonium, Gmebaphone and BEAST.
One feature of the volume deserves special mention. The book is ‘framed’ by the opening and closing chapters based on work by two sadly missed figures in contemporary music: Henri Pousseur and Heinz-Klaus Metzger. In a transcribed lecture Pousseur reminisced about his relationship with Luciano Berio. It is touching to read the genuine affection that Pousseur had for Berio and his deep regret when he described how he missed the opportunity to visit Berio during his final days in hospital. I have to confess I had similar emotions when I heard of Pousseur’s sudden death. Pousseur kindly participated in various projects I initiated and even now I think of questions that only he could answer. They are, of course, questions that now can never be asked. A chapter such as this is an important historical document which, even if there are no startling revelations, demonstrates the humane values of a greatly missed composer and theorist. The editors must be congratulated on its inclusion. Lastly, Metzger’s short discussion concludes the book. He considers Adorno’s question of ‘truth’ in music and demonstrates how an intelligent reading of this philosopher (surely one of the most important of the twentieth century) can alert us to matters of social and political importance. We ignore them at our peril.
In conclusion, this book contains many discussions that will be of importance to both analysts and musicologists. Moreover, the indexes facilitate searching for specific subjects. This should be an obvious function of an index but frequently I have encountered publishers who insist on a single index of personal names and compositions only. The omission of such detailed indexes (I accept this is a personal gripe of mine) is a sad indictment of much academic publishing today. In the case of ‘Topographien’ the publisher has wisely included an index of concepts and other subjects to facilitate more effective cross-referencing. My one criticism is that the reproduction of some large-format scores made reading the notes a considerable challenge, but that may be the case with the particular copy I was reading.
I would urge anyone interested in contemporary music to read this volume – and others in the series. You will not be disappointed.
