21–30 of 31 posts
The article mentions her sister Lili, who most people have never heard of. Here are two beautiful short compositions she wrote at age 18 and 22. She died at 24. What a loss! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57ifMZotkh4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jguzDNqTX7s
> How many notes are there?” Boulanger would ask. 12? 88? As many as could be imagined? The answer Boulanger sought was seven, the diatonic scale, to which everything else was an inflection or embellishment. That's a strange view I have never encountered before. In nature there's an infinite number of frequencies, and in the Western system of equal temperament, surely there are the 12 notes of the chromatic scale? To…
In the early 20th c. a more expansive, what we call "atonal," form of music arose that used the chromatic scale without any particular referent to a diatonic system. Some music analysts and teachers even started to replace note names with note indices to avoid diatonic confusion. Atonal composition became popular among avant-garde and film composers in the mid-20th century, and is still with us. The diatonic system, though, has proved quite tough to kill off.
And of course, there are endless fascinating anecdotes from her pupils and colleagues. There's a video of Elliott Carter talking about how she used to sing and play through a Bach cantata every week with her students[1]. Charles Rosen, who served as a panelist together with her at a piano competition observed:
>Mlle. Boulanger did not, indeed, discuss the contestants, but she had ways of making her opinions known. When she was bored by a performance, she would compose canons. On a large piece of paper she had brought with her, she would rule several five-line staffs, and begin to invent some elaborate counterpoint. The implied comment was far more devastating than any words could have been.
There are a number of fantastic articles and videos throughout the site. Looking forward to digging through them.
> How many notes are there?” Boulanger would ask. 12? 88? As many as could be imagined? The answer Boulanger sought was seven, the diatonic scale, to which everything else was an inflection or embellishment. That's a strange view I have never encountered before. In nature there's an infinite number of frequencies, and in the Western system of equal temperament, surely there are the 12 notes of the chromatic scale? To…
Maybe, but the key arrangements on a piano sort of make the exact same point, don't they?
> One suspects that it was Nadia who took on one of the charity’s more unusual services, that of reviewing and correcting soldiers’ counterpoint and harmony exercises
Only in France.
> ones remembered Boulanger offering holistic advice: “Quincy,” she told him, “your music can never be more or less than you are as a human being.”
Wow. I thought a jazz guy said this as "if you want to be a better musician, try being a better person" but I couldn't find it anywhere. Anyone?
> How many notes are there?” Boulanger would ask. 12? 88? As many as could be imagined? The answer Boulanger sought was seven, the diatonic scale, to which everything else was an inflection or embellishment. That's a strange view I have never encountered before. In nature there's an infinite number of frequencies, and in the Western system of equal temperament, surely there are the 12 notes of the chromatic scale? To…
> That's a strange view Maybe, but the key arrangements on a piano sort of make the exact same point, don't they?
> How many notes are there?” Boulanger would ask. 12? 88? As many as could be imagined? The answer Boulanger sought was seven, the diatonic scale, to which everything else was an inflection or embellishment. That's a strange view I have never encountered before. In nature there's an infinite number of frequencies, and in the Western system of equal temperament, surely there are the 12 notes of the chromatic scale? To…
That is actually the way I think of notes in tonal music: You've got a root, a second, a third, … , a sixth and a seventh. But there are different kinds of each degree of the scale (apart from the root): the second could be minor or major or augmented (`sharp 9' is jazz lingo); the third could be major or minor etc. But you don't have to choose just one type of third or fifth etc. in a given piece of music (or part t…