1 Notes on Luciano Berio’s Thema (Omaggio a Joyce) (1958) Joyce) (1958) and Visage (1961) (1961) by Bruce Christian Bennett Luciano Berio imagined a situation in which it would be possible to move imperceptibly from text to music, a situation in which text and music form a partnership in which they are equals. Berio busied himself from 1957 to 1958 researching onomatopœia in poetry with Umberto Eco, 1 in particular, the poetry of James Joyce. Resulting from this was the composition, Thema (Omaggio a Joyce). Joyce) . In it, Berio sought, "an escape from the generally recognized problem for aesthetic theory of the primacy of musical structure st ructure over poetic structure."2 Berio's experiment, as it was to manifest itself in Thema, Thema, required a text that was both onomatopœic and that could be read not as fixed and logically continuous but as an impressionistic collection of possibilities. Thus, while Stockhausen relied upon a text that could be assumed to be general knowledge, Berio relied on a text whose meaning is essentially ambiguous to begin with. While Berio did not subject his compositional material to serial processes, he did discover the need to clearly categorize and then relate the compositional material along lines of similar or dissimilar "vocal colours"3 in a kind series. The series then, "[ranged] from A to U, including the diphthongs," such that the series corresponded to "the successive positions of the resonating points of the vocal apparatus."4 The formal structure of both Thema, Thema, and later Visage , follows a narrative form. The narrative structure is based on some kind of phonetic or linguistic transformation and evolution. In Thema, Thema, the onomatopœic nature of the chosen text material itself is highly 1 Schrader.
(1982), 179. 2 Berio. "Poetry and Music - An Experiment", Prospice 10 10 (1979), 10. 3 ibid., 16. 4 ibid., 16.
2 suggestive of musical possibilities. Berio notes that all the musical possibilities are, "already implicit in the Joycean original: ...based ...on ...[the] powers of accentuation and timbre peculiar to the English language."1 In this way, Berio's composition is text based whereas Stockhausen's composition is based on abstract musical principles. The text of Thema is the 'overture'2 to the Sirens chapter (chapter 11) of Joyce's Ulysses . This particular chapter from Ulysses is an homage to music and, more specifically, to the purely musical idea of Fuga per canonem (although he is clearly unable to employ real canon, for it is impossible in the literary form of a novel to have simultaneous, contrapuntal lines). In the 'exposition,' Joyce's text establishes a series of basic themes, which are separated from their linguistic context by leitmotifs, of sorts. These leitmotifs are stripped of any semantic connection or discursive meaning. Berio notes that any musical consideration of these literary leitmotifs would be restricted to onomatopœia, which he calls, "the most primitive style of spontaneous musical expression." 3 He then characterizes these leitmotifs by a type of musical figuration or means of articulation: 4 "Imperthnthn thnthnthn"
-
trillo
"Chips, picking chips"
-
staccato
"Warbling. Ah, lure!"
-
appogiatura
"Deaf bald Pat brought pad knife took up"
-
martellato
"A sail! A veil awave upon the waves"
-
glissando
Joyce thus transforms language into music by reference to such musical gestures. Furthermore, by means of thematic references (i.e., leitmotifs) Joyce is able to allude to musical structures. What is perhaps most interesting to Berio regarding Joyce's text is, however, 1 ibid.,
15. 2 Joyce. (1946), 252-253. 3 Berio. "Poetry and Music - An Experiment", Prospice 10 (1979), 12. 4 ibid.
3 the musical quality of the sound of the words themselves: onomatopœia. "There is [in Joyce's text] a kind of musical process that goes from the relatively simple exposition of words to noise, that is to the moment where everything is saturated by sibilant sounds in a kind of cadenza on the white noise quality of the 's' sound."1 By means of various tape manipulations, such as variations of duration and frequency and changes of frequency levels, Berio is able to reveal, "new relationships within the material itself (the resemblance of the constituents)." 2 Furthermore, he is able to imitate, "the natural transformations of vocal sounds," 3 by electronic means. "Artificial conjunctions in consonants (in particular rapid successions of unvoiced and voiced stop consonants: b-p, t-d, t-b, ch-g) permit a decisive evolution towards greater richness of articulation." 4 Thus, in Thema, "s" - which is the primary vocal colour of the whole piece - may change into "f" and "f" to "v" or to "sz" to "zh", etc..., and, in its similarity to white noise, may dissolve into electronic sounds. Every textual element is then adapted to 3 main types of articulation and processes of transformation as suggested by the original nature of the elements themselves: 5 1) Discontinuous element -> Cyclic -> Continuous (ex. "Goodgod, he never heard in all") 2) Continuous element -> Cyclic -> Discontinuous (ex. "s") 3) Cyclic element -> Continuous -> Discontinuous (ex. "thnthnthn")
1 Schrader.
(1982), 179-180.
2 ibid. 3 ibid. 4 Berio. 5 ibid.
"Poetry and Music - An Experiment", Prospice 10 (1979), 17.
4 Thema can be divided into five sections based on the process of negotiating the 'series' of vocal colors. Thema may also be heard roughly in a tripartite form based on whether the text is perceived as language or as sound object. When Berio wants the text to be perceived strictly as a sound object the quality of the sound is essentially electronic.1 When the piece moves into the realm of electronic sound it also moves from the linguistic to the musical. Thema (Omaggio a Joyce): I. 0:00–0:59 Vocal: sibilants vs. plosives v, s, f, th, fl -> (sp) -> bl {as in "blooming"} process of disassembling phrases into words and words into syllables II.
1:00–2:33 Vocal/Electronic duet: "a", sibilants, "u", plosives ah -> (sm)a(ck) -> u -> (J)i(ngle) -> o ; 'hissss' text further abstracted into syllables and phonemes; word objectified as sound in duet with the electronics
III.
2:33–2:59 Electronic: sibilants and pitched white noise - "s" predominance of "s" text almost entirely dissolves into white noise: total dissolution of semantic - pure sound
IV.
3:00–4:48 Electronic: "chips" + "o" 3:43—"Mor-rrr-bida" 4:03—electronic 'hit' evolves into 'electronic chatter' process of re-assembling words 'chatter' brings electronic into the realm of linguistic
1 Even
though no actual electronically produced sounds are used in Thema, the degree to which Berio employs tape manipulations creates an "electronic" quality of sound.
5 V.
4:49–6:12 Vocal: pitched vowels, portamento, sibilants 5:07—clearly audible text: apprehensible language predominance of "s" dissolves into "hissss..." as texture thins
The narrative of Thema then, is a process of disassembling the text into its constituent phonetic elements, exposing previously unheard "musical" relations between these constituent elements, and then reassembling them into comprehensible language all in smoothly graded transitions. Berio allows the listener to "get inside" the onomatopœic quality of the text itself and as such exposes the music inherent in the poetic language. The intention of Berio's Thema was to "develop the reading of Joyce's prose in a restricted field dictated by the text itself..." 1; thus the sound material itself, in its very acoustic (i.e., onomatopœic) nature, dictates the criteria for the composition. Visage further abstracts the process explored in Thema, for there is only one real word in the whole piece, "parole," while the remainder is made up of paralinguistic gesture, phonetic sounds, and mock language. Paul Griffiths interprets both Thema and Visage as psychological documents. Griffiths is tempted to interpret Thema as signaling the, "breakdown of the text as a metaphor for mental disintegration."2 And then upon hearing Visage Griffiths has the feeling of "observing a woman in an emotional turmoil of anguish, fear, hysteria, and sexual arousal."3 As such, Griffiths seems to interpret Visage similarly to the RAI, for whom the work was originally intended, who banned the work from radio play for being "obscene."4 However, while any heartfelt interpretation of music has a certain validity, I believe both Griffiths and the RAI missed the point of the work entirely. Berio offers a clue to interpreting Visage 1 Berio.
"Poetry and Music - An Experiment", Prospice 10 (1979), 18. 2 Griffiths. (1979), 38. 3 ibid. 4 Osmond-Smith. (1991), 64.
6 in the liner notes of the Turnabout recording: "Visage can be heard ...as a metaphor for vocal behavior: its means of discourse mainly at the onomatopœic level." More than that, I hear Visage as a metaphor for the evolution of spoken language. To attain the sound material for Visage Berio had Cathy Berberian 1 improvise a series of monologues, where each one is based on a collection of phonetic materials and a repertoire of vocal gestures as defined by a given linguistic model; 2 however no real words from any language, except for the Italian - "parole,” are used. Thus, as in the apprehension of a foreign tongue, one perceives language where no real language exists. Regardless, these "false" languages are not entirely meaningless, for Berberian's voice is able to convey a sense of meaningful content (particularly emotional) by means of intonation and vocal inflection. Berio uses the word "parole" in Visage to articulate formal regions. Likewise, the electronically generated sounds in Visage form a parallel dimension to the vocal sounds. I distinguish in Visage five formal regions devoted to one aspect of the evolution of spoken language. The piece begins with a primordial mist of white noise and out of the mist the first intimations of vocal articulation form. Visage: I. 0:00–3:38 the birth of speech As the vocal sounds evolve from inarticulate gurgles to articulate speech-like sound (phonemes to syllables, syllables to semblances of words) so does the electronic 'mist' of white noise transform into narrower bands of articulated noise. This section ends in laughter (the pleasure of discovery?).
1 The
voice that is Cathy Berberian is truly amazing. I believe she deserves nearly as much credit for Thema and, in particular, Visage as Berio himself. 2 Osmond-Smith. (1991), 63.
7 II.
3:40–6:00 language
"Parole" is heard whispered at 3:38; thus intimating the process we are hearing: the transition from the apprehension of vocalizations as mere sounds to linguistic symbols. The electronic sounds move in articulated pitched bands of noise imitating the voice's apparent articulation of spoken language. III.
6:00–10:08
emotive vocal gestures
"Parole" is heard at 6:00 and again at 6:10 amongst laughter and laughter turning into weeping. The electronic sounds, on the other hand, revert shifting planes of filtered noise until about 7:00 where they once again fall into imitations of the vocal gestures. At ca. 7:36 there is a wonderful blending of the vocal and the electronic as reverb is applied to inhaled vocalizations and moves into the realm of electronic noise. This section comes to a climactic outcry in both the electronics and the voice at ca. 9:00. IV.
10:08–13:50
emotive language
"Parole" is clearly articulated at 10:08 followed by a slight pause (marking the middle of the work). Both the electronic and vocal sounds rapidly articulate what can be heard as language. The nature of the vocal inflection and intonation imparts a sense of urgency, possibly even the extreme emotions of fear, anguish, or hysteria. The emotional content of this section comes to a head at ca. 13:38 with the outcry of "parole" within a dense and active electro-vocal texture. V.
13:50–21:04
song/poetry
Starting at about 13:50 the voice sings in unison with the electronic sounds. Then at 16:13 recites "poetry" (heard as such by means of vocal inflection) in counterpoint to and eventually alternating with song. As such, this treatment of the voice is tantamount to giving
8 both music and poetry equal status as the highest symbolic orders of the voice: the artistic voice. At the same time the poetic recitation is first heard, the seeds of the "chorus of humanity" are planted in the electronics, which evolves slowly, gradually, and continuously to the end of the piece. At ca. 18:07 the solo voice dissolves into the electronic chorus - the individual is subsumed into the totality of humanity, where linguistic differences dissolve into common understanding. Thus, in my interpretation, Visage ends with the solo voice dissolving into the greater chorus of humanity. In Berio’s Thema and Visage , the structure of the work and its material are one in the same thing. His materials are entirely linguistic in nature. In Thema, Berio "transposed to a different, and perhaps higher, level, that which already exits in the text." He "extracted music," from the text, "and developed it in a way congenial to the text itself." 1 In Visage Berio achieves the intimation of language without any real language present. He created music and narrative structure from models of language while simply relying on the vocal inflection of the onomatopœic material to convey a sense of content. Berio both disassembles and intimates linguistic semantics by realizing the onomatopœic implications of the text.
1 Schrader.
(1982), 180.
