Twelve-tone technique

Twelve-tone technique (also dodecaphony) is a system of musical composition devised by Arnold Schoenberg. Music using the technique is called twelve-tone music. Josef Matthias Hauer also developed a similar system using unordered hexachords, or tropes, at the exact same time and country but with no connection to Schoenberg.

History of the technique's use

Founded by Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg around the late 1910s, the method was used during the next 20 years almost exclusively by the Second Viennese School (Alban Berg, Anton Webern, Hanns Eisler and Arnold Schoenberg himself). Rudolph Reti, an early proponent says: "To replace one structural force (tonality) by another (increased thematic oneness) is indeed the fundamental idea behind the twelve-tone technique," arguing it arose out of Schoenberg's frustrations with free atonality (Reti, 1958). The technique became widely used by the fifties, taken up by composers such as Luciano Berio, Pierre Boulez, Luigi Dallapiccola and, after Schoenberg's death, Igor Stravinsky. Some of these composers extended the technique to control aspects other than the pitches of notes (such as duration, method of attack and so on), thus producing serial music. Some even subjected all elements of music to the serial process.

Related Topics:
Arnold Schoenberg - Second Viennese School - Alban Berg - Anton Webern - Hanns Eisler - Rudolph Reti - Luciano Berio - Pierre Boulez - Luigi Dallapiccola - Igor Stravinsky - Serial music

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In practice, the "rules" of twelve-tone technique have been bent and broken many times, not least by Schoenberg himself. For instance, in some pieces two or more tone rows may be heard progressing at once, or there may be parts of a composition which are written freely, without recourse to the twelve-tone technique at all. Offshoots or variations may produce music in which:

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• the full chromatic is used and constantly circulates, but permutational devices are ignored
• permutational devices are used but not on the full chromatic

Charles Wuorinen claimed in a 1962 interview that while, "most of the Europeans say that they have 'gone beyond' and 'exhausted' the twelve-tone system," in America, "the twelve-tone system has been carefully studied and generalized into an edifice more impressive than any hitherto known." (Chase 1992, p.587)

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Derivation

Derivation is transforming segments of the full chromatic, less than 12 pitch classes, to yield a complete set, most commonly using trichords, tetrachords, and hexachords. A derived set can be generated by choosing appropriate transformations of any trichord except 0,3,6, the diminished triad. A derived set can also be generated from any tetrachord that excludes the interval class 4, a major third, between any two elements. The opposite is partitioning, the use of methods to create segments from sets, most often through registral difference.

Related Topics:
Derived set - Trichord - Diminished - Tetrachord - Major third

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Combinatoriality

Combinatoriality is a side-effect of derived rows where combining different segments or sets such that the pitch class content of the result fulfills certain criteria, usually the combination of hexachords which complete the full chromatic.

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Invariance

Invariant formations are also the side effect of derived rows where a segment of a set remains similar or the same under transformation. These may be used as "pivots" between set forms, sometimes used by Anton Webern, see George Perle.

Related Topics:
Invariant - Anton Webern - George Perle

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Other

Also, some composers have used cyclic permutation, or rotation, where the row is taken in order but using a different starting note.

Related Topics:
Cyclic permutation - Rotation

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Although usually atonal, twelve tone music need not be - several pieces by Berg, for instance, have tonal elements.

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One of the best known twelve-note compositions is Variations for Orchestra by Arnold Schoenberg. "Quiet", in Leonard Bernstein's Candide, satirizes the method by using it for a song about boredom.

Related Topics:
Arnold Schoenberg - Leonard Bernstein - Candide

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