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I do think this would be more worthwhile than the crude nationalist/exceptionalist models which still have a lot of currency. But this may not be acceptable to some who have so much invested in such political views.
Please do read the full article! (42/42)
Please do read the full article! (42/42)
January 2, 2026 at 3:56 PM
I do think this would be more worthwhile than the crude nationalist/exceptionalist models which still have a lot of currency. But this may not be acceptable to some who have so much invested in such political views.
Please do read the full article! (42/42)
Please do read the full article! (42/42)
… Xenakis, Ligeti and Penderecki, and many others. The tradition of Young, Reich, Riley, Glass is just one of these. And some of these different ‘branches’ often meet and create new hybrid traditions. I hope to write this history at some point. (41)
January 2, 2026 at 3:54 PM
… Xenakis, Ligeti and Penderecki, and many others. The tradition of Young, Reich, Riley, Glass is just one of these. And some of these different ‘branches’ often meet and create new hybrid traditions. I hope to write this history at some point. (41)
From these, a whole range of directions can be identified meaningfully, including the work of Duchamp and Dada, Varèse, Antheil, Messiaen, Orff and Schaeffer, Cage, Feldman and Wolff, Scelsi, Radulescu and musique spectrale, N.A. Huber, Stiebler, Thomas Marco, … (40)
January 2, 2026 at 3:52 PM
From these, a whole range of directions can be identified meaningfully, including the work of Duchamp and Dada, Varèse, Antheil, Messiaen, Orff and Schaeffer, Cage, Feldman and Wolff, Scelsi, Radulescu and musique spectrale, N.A. Huber, Stiebler, Thomas Marco, … (40)
Furthermore, I proposed abandoning the term ‘minimal music’ in favour of a new centrality of ‘temporal suspension’ (related to Adorno’s concept of ‘Verräumlichung des Zeitverlaufs’), whose most pronounced manifestations stem from Satie, Stravinsky and integral serialism. (39)
January 2, 2026 at 3:47 PM
Furthermore, I proposed abandoning the term ‘minimal music’ in favour of a new centrality of ‘temporal suspension’ (related to Adorno’s concept of ‘Verräumlichung des Zeitverlaufs’), whose most pronounced manifestations stem from Satie, Stravinsky and integral serialism. (39)
On this basis, I argue that the European/American, modernist/minimalist model, clearest in Schwarz, should be abandoned alongside other simplistic dualisms, and assumptions of easy linear traditions of influence, allowing instead for tree-like historical models. (38)
January 2, 2026 at 3:44 PM
On this basis, I argue that the European/American, modernist/minimalist model, clearest in Schwarz, should be abandoned alongside other simplistic dualisms, and assumptions of easy linear traditions of influence, allowing instead for tree-like historical models. (38)
Furthermore, Andriessen’s idiom becomes increasingly more uncompromising and acerbic at the same time as the Americans were softening their approach. All things told, it is clearly insufficient to view Andriessen as just an appendage to American minimal music. (37)
January 2, 2026 at 3:41 PM
Furthermore, Andriessen’s idiom becomes increasingly more uncompromising and acerbic at the same time as the Americans were softening their approach. All things told, it is clearly insufficient to view Andriessen as just an appendage to American minimal music. (37)
The influence of US minimal music is clearest in Andriessen’s De Staat (1976) and Hoketus (1977) (though really the use of unisons by Frederic Rzewski). But works like Il Duce (1973) can be heard in direct opposition to Reich’s It’s Gonna Rain and Come Out. (36)
January 2, 2026 at 3:39 PM
The influence of US minimal music is clearest in Andriessen’s De Staat (1976) and Hoketus (1977) (though really the use of unisons by Frederic Rzewski). But works like Il Duce (1973) can be heard in direct opposition to Reich’s It’s Gonna Rain and Come Out. (36)
There is little doubt of Andriessen’s frequently expressed hostility to a range of *German* traditions (above all Wagner, Mahler, Schoenberg) but that should not be equated to a hostility to the modernist project, of which he was and is a part. (35)
January 2, 2026 at 3:35 PM
There is little doubt of Andriessen’s frequently expressed hostility to a range of *German* traditions (above all Wagner, Mahler, Schoenberg) but that should not be equated to a hostility to the modernist project, of which he was and is a part. (35)
Andriessen loved much jazz and was also very interested from an early stage in the ‘experimental’ work of Cage et al. But he and his work cannot be easily separated from the wider European post-war modernist tradition, and especially his own teacher Luciano Berio. (34)
January 2, 2026 at 3:33 PM
Andriessen loved much jazz and was also very interested from an early stage in the ‘experimental’ work of Cage et al. But he and his work cannot be easily separated from the wider European post-war modernist tradition, and especially his own teacher Luciano Berio. (34)
Andriessen’s own view of the US and US culture mirrors what wider scholars identify in the post-war Netherlands: initial admiration, warmth and fascination following the liberation of Europe, Marshall Plan and Dutch NATO membership, but more critical during the Vietnam War. (33)
January 2, 2026 at 3:30 PM
Andriessen’s own view of the US and US culture mirrors what wider scholars identify in the post-war Netherlands: initial admiration, warmth and fascination following the liberation of Europe, Marshall Plan and Dutch NATO membership, but more critical during the Vietnam War. (33)
Part 2 of my piece looks at how Andriessen’s work has been critically and historically conceived since it first came to prominence. The most important points are the following: the influence of US minimal (and other) music is undeniable, but that of Stravinsky no less so. (32)
January 2, 2026 at 3:27 PM
Part 2 of my piece looks at how Andriessen’s work has been critically and historically conceived since it first came to prominence. The most important points are the following: the influence of US minimal (and other) music is undeniable, but that of Stravinsky no less so. (32)
Fink, Taruskin and Ross attempt to pathologise European minimalism as somehow a distortion of the real thing, in an ugly manner, almost like a warning against cultural miscegenation. (31)
January 2, 2026 at 3:24 PM
Fink, Taruskin and Ross attempt to pathologise European minimalism as somehow a distortion of the real thing, in an ugly manner, almost like a warning against cultural miscegenation. (31)
Other traditions, including the ‘holy minimalism’ of Görecki, Pärt, Kancheli, Tavener were added to the periphery, though important UK contributions such as Colin Matthew’s’ Fourth Sonata (1974-5) for orchestra were mostly ignored. (30)
January 2, 2026 at 3:23 PM
Other traditions, including the ‘holy minimalism’ of Görecki, Pärt, Kancheli, Tavener were added to the periphery, though important UK contributions such as Colin Matthew’s’ Fourth Sonata (1974-5) for orchestra were mostly ignored. (30)
Goeyvaerts’ credentials as a composer central to the integral serialist project were undeniable, and his Sonata for Two Pianos (1951) has long been recognised as pivotal. But he also moved into a later pared-down, modal idiom. His work lent new weight to the model of Mertens.(29)
January 2, 2026 at 3:20 PM
Goeyvaerts’ credentials as a composer central to the integral serialist project were undeniable, and his Sonata for Two Pianos (1951) has long been recognised as pivotal. But he also moved into a later pared-down, modal idiom. His work lent new weight to the model of Mertens.(29)
But the figure who provided the biggest challenge to the Schwarzian model was Belgian Karel Goeyvaerts, whose Compositie no. 4 met dode tonen (1952) and Compositie no. 5 met zuivere tonen (1953) could be viewed as the first post-1945 minimal works. (28)
January 2, 2026 at 3:17 PM
But the figure who provided the biggest challenge to the Schwarzian model was Belgian Karel Goeyvaerts, whose Compositie no. 4 met dode tonen (1952) and Compositie no. 5 met zuivere tonen (1953) could be viewed as the first post-1945 minimal works. (28)
Lovisa and Götte, without fundamentally breaking with either the Schwarz model or that of centre/periphery, still developed wider canons, featuring the likes of Zoltán Jeney, Erhard Grosskopf, Peter Hamel, Hans Otte and Horatiu Radulescu. (27)
January 2, 2026 at 3:15 PM
Lovisa and Götte, without fundamentally breaking with either the Schwarz model or that of centre/periphery, still developed wider canons, featuring the likes of Zoltán Jeney, Erhard Grosskopf, Peter Hamel, Hans Otte and Horatiu Radulescu. (27)
Nonetheless, sustained exploration, beginning as early as 1980 with the European Minimal Music Project in Utrecht, demonstrated how the European minimal music traditions were too extensive and complex to be contained so simply. (26)
January 2, 2026 at 3:11 PM
Nonetheless, sustained exploration, beginning as early as 1980 with the European Minimal Music Project in Utrecht, demonstrated how the European minimal music traditions were too extensive and complex to be contained so simply. (26)
But how to categorise European composers whose work clearly related to that of the now dominant Americans? Many, even including Mertens, employed a model of ‘centre’ and ‘periphery’, with Europeans definitely in the latter category. (25)
January 2, 2026 at 3:09 PM
But how to categorise European composers whose work clearly related to that of the now dominant Americans? Many, even including Mertens, employed a model of ‘centre’ and ‘periphery’, with Europeans definitely in the latter category. (25)
Wider histories by Richard Taruskin and Alex Ross played up the US/European opposition, with assumptions of superiority that come close to simple xenophobia, even stronger in Kyle Gann’s 1997 history of American Music. (24)
January 2, 2026 at 3:05 PM
Wider histories by Richard Taruskin and Alex Ross played up the US/European opposition, with assumptions of superiority that come close to simple xenophobia, even stronger in Kyle Gann’s 1997 history of American Music. (24)
Fink, echoing his teacher Susan McClary, made bold claims for socially subversive potential in the work of Reich and Glass, but otherwise took a strident anti-modernist tone and dismissed a
suggestions that music could do other than reiterate the logic of consumer capitalism.(23)
suggestions that music could do other than reiterate the logic of consumer capitalism.(23)
January 2, 2026 at 3:01 PM
Fink, echoing his teacher Susan McClary, made bold claims for socially subversive potential in the work of Reich and Glass, but otherwise took a strident anti-modernist tone and dismissed a
suggestions that music could do other than reiterate the logic of consumer capitalism.(23)
suggestions that music could do other than reiterate the logic of consumer capitalism.(23)