Maintaining Disorder: Some Technical and Aesthetic Issues Involved in the Performance of Ligeti’s E´ tudes for Piano

This article examines some of the particular questions and associated strategies concerning matters of rhythm, perceived metre, notation, accentuation, line, physical approach to the keyboard, pedalling, and more in the performance of Ligeti’s Études for piano. I relate these issues to those encountered in earlier repertoire, including works of Schumann, Liszt, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Bartók and Blacher, and argue that particular approaches and attitudes to both technical and musical matters in the context of these Études can fundamentally affect the concept of the music. A particular focus is upon issues of continuity and discontinuity, and the ‘situation’ of these works within particular pianistic and other traditions by virtue of the approach taken to performance

Gyorgy Kurtag's 'The sayings of Peter Bornemisza' OP.7 Song in a cycle in 1960's Hungary

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:DXN025106 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Bulgarian Rhythm and its Disembodiment in The Sayings of Péter Bornemisza, op. 7

The starting point is the concept of Bartók's 'So-Called-Bulgarian Rhythm' as it appears in György Kurtág's The sayings of Péter Bornemisza. This rhythmic type has been identified in Kurtág's The sayings by two commentators and also by Kurtág himself while sketching for the work. It appears here as a unifying structural element within movements as well as across the cycle as a whole. It is juxtaposed with descriptions of fear, death and pastoral reawakening in the text, in transformations of varying musical significance (once in combination with an allusion to Penderecki's Threnody). The type's interaction with the body in the text of The sayings invites a reading drawing on the bodily engagement with music that Bartók advocated after his contact with peasant music in general, but with particular reference to 'So-Called-Bulgarian Rhythm'

Ligeti, Kurtág, and Hungarian Music during the Cold War

Menggambar elemen-elemen kunci dari pemikiran musik di Hungaria sejak perang dingin, buku ini menyajikan perspektif unik tentang warisan musik bangsa baik di dalam maupun di luar perbatasan Hungaria selama Perang Dingin. Meskipun Ligeti menjadi bagian dari avant-garde Barat setelah meninggalkan Hungaria pada tahun 1956, sumber-sumber arsip menerangi kontaknya yang terus berlanjut dengan para pemusik Hungaria, dan perspektif mereka yang bergeser dalam pekerjaannya. Musik Kurtág lebih jelas terlibat dengan tradisi Hungaria, terjerat dengan pendudukan Soviet, dan merupakan bagian kontribusi dari budaya musik yang beragam di kota ini. Namun, dari pertengahan 1960an dan seterusnya, para kritikus mengidentifikasi musiknya sebagai "kebenaran" artistik dan moral yang berbeda dari kehidupan musikal yang lebih luas di Budapest: ini adalah simbol kehidupan ideal di luar kehidupan sehari-hari di Hungaria. Dengan meletakkan interpretasinya tentang karya-karya dalam situasi politik yang kompleks ini, Beckles Willson tetap bersimpati pada argumen oleh kritikus musik Ligeti, Kurtág dan Budapest bahwa musik mereka mungkin memiliki kehidupan di luar ideologi nasionalis dan ideologi Perang Dingin