Link to this week's Dvar Torah
During his lifetime, Aaron Copland was known as “The Dean of American Music.” This title has withstood the test of time and he stands firmly as one of the most influential composers and teachers in American musical history, and probably THE most in the 2nd half of the last century (Arnold Schoenberg was indisputably the most influential in the 1st half. His Treatise on Harmony is the basis for all our college music theory texts. Schoenberg Hall at UCLA is named after him.)
French Horns (the most complex brass instrument). They are used in Fanfare just above the Bb Trumpets (see score below).
That being said, Copland was a versatile master of all genres of American music, from jazz to ragtime to Modern Classical to the 12-tone language of the Avant-Garde. After Schoenberg and Copland, the great theoretician and American composer Vincent Persichetti organized this eclectic panoply of harmonic palettes into an organic whole, showing how the Pitch Class expressions of secundal, tertian and quartal harmonies can be understood and analyzed as different voicings of related chord structures. (The key is in the Overtonal implications of their intervallic mixture.) We will explore what Copland called his open and accessible harmonic vocabulary, based on freely mixing tonal and harmonic relationships between jazz and classical and modern music. He used this language expressively to create some of our most sincerely patriotic music ever, and to champion the freedoms of the average person, in a refined cultural medium that is enjoyable and approachable for the common man or woman.
We will dwell here on his most patriotic compositions, noting that he was of Jewish-Lithuanian background and an American Progressive to his core. In a future diary we will examine his full biography and truly impressive body of work, from Jazz to Experimental to mixed open intervals to the more abstruse Serialism. Copland mastered all these styles and taught them to the next generation of great American Composers like Leonard Bernstein, William Schuman, the whole Tanglewood gang, Lukas Foss, Druckman, and he profoundly influenced the succeeding generation such as Reich, Glass, Williams (of Star Wars fame, but he also writes Modern Classical with Copland as his model), Adams, Persichetti, Gould and Michael Tilson Thomas.
The 3 valves of the Trumpet can combo lots of notes besides their open 6/4 chord, including microtones. Skilled players can play two notes at once, 'split' playing
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To celebrate our very own Democratic 4th of July, here is Copland's magnificent Fanfare for the Common Man conducted by the composer. It's perhaps the loveliest unofficial national anthem written by an American, and specifically inspired by the democratic ideals of FDR's four Great Freedoms: Freedom of Speech and Expression, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want, and Freedom from Fear.
The title was taken from a famous speech by Henry A. Wallace proclaiming the Century of the Common Man. Wallace was a Progressive agronomist who had studied under George Washington Carver, and had been FDR’s Secretary of Agriculture and Commerce, and then his Vice President before Truman. The piece was commissioned for the war effort and was composed and first performed in 1942:
A quite transparent exposition with quartal melodies and harmonies, 9th chords, and tertian polychords. The brass begins with an Inversion of the lower Partials of the Overtone Series, resulting in a fourth then a fifth. It's interesting to have the 4th on the bottom because although it's an inversion of the 5th, it implies a higher Harmonic (see below). Notice the tuned percussion in the bass bracket; the timpani are key in producing the right effect to resonate with the brass. So that the percussion is not merely rhythmic noise but joins in the Overtones of the above harmonies. Note how the metallic sounds of the tam-tam (gong) enhance the natural Harmonics of timpani and the bass drum and brass. This subtle tone-color blending is key to the art of orchestration, and Copland is magisterial in this, as are his student and friend Bernstein and his student MTT (Michael Tilson Thomas). The orchestral family resemblances, in both harmony and high competence are not accidental (music pun).
Timpani are tuned drums of different sizes
In effect the timpani provide the Fundamental and the Second Harmonic throughout, but inverted (to a P4 instead of P5). This creates an interesting Major 9th/Major 11th effect, with the inverted Second Partial beating (vibrating) against the Fundamental and the lovely brass harmonies floating transparently above. These are quartal/quintal chord formations, but with Tertian roots (they in fact function as quartal counterparts of tertian Classical root movement chords, and progress clockwise around the circle of 5ths, like a series of Secondary Dominants). It’s tertian harmony blending and exchanging freely with quartal, demonstrating the functional interchangeability of intervallic chord types in Persichetti’s Treatise. These quartal chords thicken in the finale into bitonality/ polytonality, but in a very recognizable contemporary language of 9ths and 11ths (what are 9ths after all but two superimposed triads connected at the 5th - the Classic Jazz polychord).
They say a great author is often heralded by a lucid and brilliant short story. This is a succinct work of translucent luminosity and genius, and eloquent personal affection for its subject.
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Benny "the King of Swing" Goodman
Commissioned by notable Jazz clarinetist Benny Goodman, here is Copland's very likable Clarinet Concerto in his variegated American Classical + Jazz harmonic style. Starts quite conventionally and quietly, but check out the virtuoso 2nd and 3rd movements. The 2nd movement is full of Latin Jazz quotes, as Copland was in Rio at the time he wrote it. Some spooky modernity in the 3rd, using secundal harmonies. Also some virtuosic writing for Goodman, lots of nice runs. The 4th has just madcap syncopation, but the language is back to quartal/tertian and ranges between conventional Jazz and modern. Some lovely polytonal cadences on high clusters (secundal chords). These same progressions are then recapitulated as quartal harmonies in the transition to the more modernist finale of the movement, a vigorous ostinato in the bass, with lots of cool counterpoint by the clarinet. Ends with virtuosic glissandi in the Cadenza, which Goodman found difficult to do. The arch of the composition begins unobtrusively, almost shyly but what a finale!
An interesting side note to this Concerto is parts of the finale were too high for Goodman's normal tessitura (playing range). Right before the Cadenza, the original score has pencil notes "too hard for Benny Goodman!" and Copland gave the high notes to the piano part. Newer recordings have been made with the parts restored. Nonetheless Copland considered the best recording to be the premiere, broadcast nationally by Goodman and the NBC Symphony Orchestra in November 1950, with the composer conducting. Goodman himself says they 'got along swell' except for that part before the Cadenza. He paid Copland $2,000 for it which was a lot in those days.
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Abraham Lincoln, our 16th President 1861-1865
Here is Copland's A Portrait of Lincoln, with Henry Fonda narrating, conducted by the composer. The narration starts at about 8:10, but the entire Symphonic Overture is one of sheer inspiration and beauty, in Copland’s characteristic American Modern style. Listen to its opening chords of haunting, melancholy sublimity. Later on it quotes various folk tunes (Camptown Races etc), rather like in Appalachian Spring, but moves inexorably towards the gravitas of Lincoln’s words:
It’s worth noting here that Copland’s Leftist leanings got him proscribed during the McCarthy Era. President Eisenhower was forced to cancel a performance of Lincoln at the White House in this atmosphere. All the more reason to celebrate this beautiful piece now: “That this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth.”
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Here is his monumental 3rd Symphony, closely related to Fanfare and based on some of its melodies. The First Movement starts with a simple theme in woodwinds and strings, which migrates into the brass and pre-echoes the Fanfare. There is a somewhat dissonant Scherzo, but it resolves into a lovely woodwind section. Contrapuntal complexities of 24+divisii parts alternate with inspired lyricism and just beautiful harmonies. The boisterous 2nd Movement is classically exuberant Copeland. The Third Movement is deeply contemplative, almost ambiguous and then transitions into the Finale, where we hear a very quiet recapitulation of the Fanfare. The 4th Movement is a complete reworking of the Fanfare main theme in a phenomenal polyphonic development. No mere cover of his earlier work, but an entirely new, richly textured composition. The entire symphony is worth listening to several times:
And here is the famous 4th movement, which made the 3rd Symphony “an American Monument” at the time, and it still is. The Fanfare begins it, but then listen to what he did with it. Only a master composer could have conjured this lively, soaring polyphonic texture. It subtly quotes ‘Yankee Doodle’ towards the end, and then reverts to the lovely counterpoint of the Fanfare, but augmented and expanded into a full symphonic texture and development section, and an awesome recapitulation. It is just magnificent!
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Had he written nothing else but these 4 fine pieces, Copland would be justly famous. This deeply felt and sincerely patriotic music reminds us of who we ought to be.
In that future diary we will explore his remarkable career and all his major works. Like Beethoven for 19th Century Europe, Copland in modern America taught or inspired entire succeeding generations of composers. With accessibility, integrity, and a profound humanity, they are a guiding star for all the rest.
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<big><big>Have a safe, happy, hopeful 4th of July!</big></big> h/t arhpdx
