Talk:Luigi Nono

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Mr Kohl has been adament, about linking the description of Nono's musical innovations in 'Il Canto Sospeso' (the division of words into syllables to form floating, diversified sonorities) with Stockhausen's misreading of Nono's setting of the text as meaningless! The two appraisals are in fact quite different, since the former description (including 'an imaginative extension of Schoenberg's 'Klangfarben-melodie') in no way undermines the moral or political relevance of the words, nor the semantic expression of Nono's music!

I've tried to tell Mr Kohl numerous times, but he has failed to realise this. His liking of such a description with Stockhausen's misreading, in view of Nono's rebuttal, is only a childish attempt to make the original author look stupid! - Since it was Mr Kohl, who failed to realise the latent truth in much of the original claims of this article.

I would advise Mr Kohl to refrain from making any further such edits that unncessarily confuse ideas and substance of thought, as they border on vandalism! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 217.38.64.106 at 12:01, 2 July 2007

It is always a pleasure to have a civilized discussion with another editor who respects Wikiquette and the talk page guidelines, particularly those regarding unacceptable behaviour. [I take 217's removal of the name-calling to be a tacit apology.] Self-evidently, Mr. or Ms. 217 is not one of those people, and seems bent on provoking me into a flame war. I decline to oblige, but will go so far as to respond to a few points. (1) I did indeed state I was making a correction to the lapse of time between those two lectures, in accordance with Wiki guidelines for edit summaries. Since it was my own previous mistake that I was correcting, boasting can scarcely come into it. (2) It is true that I utterly fail to see the distinction between Stockhausen's description of breaking the words up into separate syllables (and even smaller units, for he goes so far as to suggest just the vowels) and "the division of words into syllables to form floating, diversified sonorities." Perhaps Mr./Ms. 217 or some other kind soul can enlighten me further. (And, incidentally, up to now this has not been described in the article as Nono's "innovation", a statement which certainly would require some justification, since any number of earlier composers could be cited in this connection—as Guillaume de Machaut has been, for example, in Giuliano Angiolini, "Le son du sens: Machaut, Stockhausen", Analyse Musicale 9 (1987): 43–51, and in Mark Delaere, "Das Analyseseminar Olivier Messiaens und Entwicklung der seriellen Musik um 1950", Musikwissenschaft zwischen Kunst, Ästhetik und Experiment: Festschrift Helga de la Motte-Haber zum 60. Geburtstag, Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 1998, pp. 89–104.) (3) Mr./Ms. 217's repeated assertions that this word-fracturing is a simple fact (and therefore not requiring attribution) is contradicted by Nono himself, in the cited 1960 Darmstadt lecture, not to mention the footnote Stockhausen inserted into his discussion after Nono informed him that this conception violated his intentions. Consequently, it would be important to know who else might have disagreed with Nono on this point, and how early such an erroneous view was promulgated, if indeed Stockhausen was not the first. (4) I agree completely that the Klangfarbenmelodie connection has no bearing on "the moral or political relevance," etc. I was merely pointing out that, unlike the word-fracturing issue (pace 217.38.64.106), Stockhausen nowhere makes such a connection. (Guerrero's link with Survivor from Warsaw is the nearest thing I can find, though her discussion is more to do with Sprechgesang than Klangfarbenmelodie.) (4) If 217 insists on believing he/she can read into my edits an intention of making an anonymous original author "look stupid", I suppose there is little I can do to dissuade him/her, but for the record I assert that my intention is solely to disentangle "confused ideas and substance of thought" as I find them but—even more to the point—to have contentious matter (and this matter was contentious enough to materially contribute to the split between Nono and Stockhausen) correctly attributed to its sources.--Jerome Kohl 20:23, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry to inform you but there really is no conncetion between the description of the processes in 'Il canto sospeso' as 'words fragmented into syllables, exchanged between voices to form floating, diversified sonorities' and Stockhausen's comment's, other than he correctly cites the division of words into smaller properties. That is not an "erroneous view" as you state but simply a discription of the musical processes. *That* is not what affronted Nono, but rather Stockhausen's intimation that such processes undermined the semantic content of the words, and hence the moral and political expression of the music. And that much, is certainly not stated, nor implied in 'words fragmented into syllables, exchanged between voices to form floating, diversified sonorities'; so to make any insistent connection between these two statements is entirely misleading. As pointed out, such a connection does serve only to 'confuse ideas and substance of thought'. (Hence, my necessary interjection of 'However', which you have repeatedly attempted to edit out). What you have attempted to relate are two entirely different ideas, since in no way was the original author asking 'why have texts? why these texts?' or concluding that the semantic content is expelled out of 'shame'. I hope you understand this now.

With regard to Nono's 'musical innovations' - yes musical innovations, since the composer on several occasions in letters refers to "the new technique (method of composition)" for the choir; a "new compositional technique is developed in this work (for example, in the use of the chorus, where the word aquires a new flexibility through the simultaneous melodic and harmonic projection of the syllables, as in No. 9)". Even if there have been historical precedents, which Nono calls upon to justify his approach, Il Canto Sospeso achieves a new sound-world of expression, a new 'sound-synthesis', so as to validate the citation of 'musical innovations'.

I have no problem at all with your statement about what it was that infuriated Nono; this much is evident from the composer’s quoted words. But Nono also rejects the claim of intentional fragmentation, stating he “had neither a phonetic treatment of the text nor more or less differentiated degrees of comprehensibility of the words in mind”. Of course, it does not necessarily follow that Nono believed that such fragmentation does not exist in the end product but, if he did accept this, it raises the tantalizing question of whether he regarded this as a failure of his compositional craft, or an unforeseen but perfectly acceptable result.

What is still left dangling, however, is this supposedly self-evident fact that the music consists of “motivic, point-like vocal writing in which words are fractured into syllables exchanged between voices to form floating, diversified sonorities”. First off, “motivic” and “point-like” are mutually contradictory (see the Wikipedia article Punctualism). Secondly, I personally do not find Nono’s textures in Il canto particularly punctual, nor do most commentators, who usually remark on Nono’s lyrical bent and the consequent sinewy, coherent, winding vocal lines (this appears also to be the point of the reference to the Pauli interview). Certainly there is some fracturing of words into syllables but, as Stockhausen points out right at the start of his discussion of Il canto, these particular texts resist this kind of treatment, especially in comparison with the texts used in the other two works under discussion in Stockhausen’s lecture, Boulez’s Le Marteau sans maître and Stockhausen’s own Gesang der Jünglinge. It is because this claim is far from obvious that a reference is needed, citing just who made this contentious claim, which is at least partly in conflict with Nono’s own statements.

Concerning a need to cite just who might have likened it to Schoenberg’s Klangfarbenmelodie, this is not an obvious similarity as far as I am concerned, and I would appreciate a pointer to the source for what I regard as an extremely doubtful comparison. If this is *not* found in some referrable source, then it looks very POV to me, and should be removed on that basis.

As for your problem with the word "however", let me clarify that this simply seems an unneccessary word. I have now recast that sentence in a different way. Do you still find this objectionable and, if so, why?--Jerome Kohl 19:47, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Answer: Firstly there is no need to be so pedantic. Nono's vocal writing is and may be described as both 'motivic' and 'point-like' even if this is seemingly contradictory. There is no evidence from the score that Il canto sospeso consists primarily of one type of choral writing, in fact far from it. I feel it important to apply both descriptions in conjunction with one another, so as to aclimatise the reader with the most obvious and overt features of Nono's much discussed techinique, in which traditional motifs are, on the whole, abandoned as the composer considered them relics of a bygone, bourgeoisie era. (See Nono's programme note for the premiere in Cologne, quoted in Flamm).

As I have explained above, the interjection of 'However', I believe is necessary, as Stockhausen goes on to develop a completely different argument with regard to the word-setting. With reference to the Klangfarbenmelodie analogy, it is again, made explicit in Flamm IX, after quotation of Nono's comments with regard to his 'lyrical intentions' taken from his conversation with Pauli, Frankfurt/M, 1971. Frankly, I trust the authority of Flamm's article, which after all, stands as the Preface to the official Eulenburg Edition, above your reservations.

That seems perfectly reasonable to me, and naturally I am well aware of Nono's attitude toward thematicism (an attitude shared with most of the Darmstadt composers of that time). Why didn't you just cite Flamm in the first place, or at least after I asked for a reference? BTW, the interview with Nono made by Pauli was not done in 1971, as the article presently states, though Pauli's anthology of interviews was published in that year. I do not have this book, so I am relying on RILM, who tell me that all of the interviews in that book were conducted between 1968 and 1970. Since you seem set on keeping the word "however", I shall let this stand (though Stockhausen's argument, based as it is on the observed text fragmentation, is not completely different). Still, I would like to know who it was who first (before Stockhausen) publicly pointed out the fragmentation of the text into syllables (without, presumably, making the claim about hiding the texts' meanings), since Nono plainly complains that this, too, was not his intention.--Jerome Kohl 21:08, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

Fragmentation should be undertood in the sense of allocation of syllables to different voices; hence words are fractured, diversified between the voices. That much is obvious - Nono states this himself in his programme note.

I'm sorry, I have to disagree with you - Stockhausen does go on to develop a completely different and misleading thesis (as I have explained numerous times). To be honest, I'm not sure that the Stockhausen quote, nor Nono's rebutal merits inclusion in an article of this scope, which is surely meant to be a general introduction to Nono's life and work. Add to that, it only serves to embarrass Stockhausen (Is that what you want?). Perhaps they would be better suited to a seperate article on Il canto sospeso and its 'reception'. Indeed, I am tempted to remove the reference to Stockhausen here and what follows at least until the line 'Il canto sospeso has been described as an everlasting warning'.... It is clear enough from the later paragraph documenting Nono's 1959 lecture and the aforementioned rupture, what caused Nono and Stockhausen to go their seperate ways.

With regard to the Klangfarbenmelodie citation, reading Flamm, I thought the initial reference was taken from Pauli (since Flamm's statement is given in the context of the Pauli quotation explaining Nono's "lyrical intentions" encompassing all dimensions). As, I do not have a copy to hand, I was unable to give a page number. When you complained that such analogy was 'an extremely doubtful comparison', I therefore simply cited Flamm. For myself, it is an obvious pointer to Nono's compositional technique. (I would suggest you read Christopher Fox's article on the influence of Schoenberg on Nono - Contemporary Music Review, Davismoon, 1999a).

If you want to be constructive, perhaps you might look out for a different photo! I would recommend the portrait-photo of Nono used for the cover of Stenzl's 'monograph' biography, published recently in Germany (unsure of exact date)- it might be available on Amazon. However, any photo of the composer is surely preferable to Nono's tombstone.

I'm not sure why you persist in thinking that we are in disagreement about Stockhausen's extrapolation from the concept of syllabic fragmentation, and Nono's offence. I have already said that this is obvious from the Nono quotation (translated from the original German) which I added to the article. It does seem to me germane to the biographical discussion to include all of the reasons (and not just a selection) for the abruption of relations between the two men. Nono's indignant behaviour certainly does not seem to me to reflect ill on Stockhausen, considering that the latter apologized publicly for any offence caused by his misinterpretation of Nono's intentions. Still . . .

The problem with "obvious" facts (in the context of Wikipedia) is that the obviousness clearly varies according to who is speaking. This is the reason for the "no original research" and citation-of-sources policies. As far as Flamm and Pauli are concerned, you have the advantage over me, since I have access to neither. Pauli is not in my local library, and my copy of the score of Il canto is the old one, not the new 1995 edition.

As to the photo, others have complained of this as well (see the section "Better photo", below). I am extremely happy that you have found a suitable photo to replace the gravestone image now with the article. I was not aware that that photo was copyright-free. But why are you asking me to "be constructive" and add it to the article, when you are so much better-informed about it? Exactly the same problem has come up in connection with the article on Stockhausen, BTW.--Jerome Kohl 06:50, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I am not experienced with the Wikipedia technology (that is why at first, I had trouble inserting the sources, citations)- to upload a photo. Besides, which I'm not sure that the photo in question is copyright free. If I find a suitable photo, I will do my best to transfer it, but I suggest others do the same.

I have very little experience with this myself, but perhaps you will find the Uploading images help page useful. Copyright of photographs is a more serious issue on Wikipedia than many people at first believe.--Jerome Kohl 20:08, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Better photo

The picture of his gravestone should be replaced with a portrait. ;) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 87.122.37.219 (talk) 00:06, 22 December 2006 (UTC).

[edit] cquote, blockquote

Note from the template description that Cquote "is a template meant for pull-quotes, which stand apart from the text of a page. It generally should not be used in articles unless there is a good justification for doing so. Pull-quotes work best when used with short quotes, and at the start or end of a section, to help emphasize the content of the section. For shorter pull-quotes of 50 words or less in a similar style, consider using Rquote." Not too sure about Blockquote myself. Schissel | Sound the Note! 16:33, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

"Not too sure" in what sense: Whether it is a good idea ever to use them, or under what circumstances they should be used? If the latter, the rule of thumb is to use them if the resulting blockquote is at least three lines long. If the former, opinions do vary, especially where a series of mixed long and short quotes occur, but it is generally recognized that the block-quote format more clearly sets off longer quoted material than running-in the quotation. In any case, thank you for the reference on Cquotes.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 16:59, 20 November 2007 (UTC)