Adorno_On the Problem of Musical Analysis

On the Problem of Musical Analysis Author(s): T. W. Adorno and Max Paddison P addison Source: Music Analysis, Vol. 1, No. 2 (Jul., 1982), pp. 169-187 Published by: Blackwell Publishing Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/854127 Accessed: 09/12/2009 09:03 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp.. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=black . Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

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T. W. ADORNO

ON THE PROBLEM OF MUSICAL ANALYSIS Introducednd Introducednd translated translated Max Paddison

On February24, February24, 1969, a fezv monthsbefore monthsbeforehis his death, death, T. W. Adornogave Adornogave a public lecture, Zum Problemeder musikalischen nalyse', nalyse', at the Hochschule fur Musik und Darstellende Kunst, Frankfurt-am-Main. Frankfurt-am-Main. There seems to have been no zvritten ext ext ( at least, none seems to have been preserved)and preserved)and it is most likely that Adorno deliveredhis deliveredhis talk, as zvashis recordingmade at the time by the Hochschule TonbandNr. TonbandNr. 102, Bibliothek der Hochschule ur Musik und DarstellendeKunst, DarstellendeKunst, Ffm. . I zvas allozved y the Hochschule Hochschule o make a cassettecopy cassettecopy of the recording, vAich I subsequentlyranscribed subsequentlyranscribed nd translated.This translated.This is the first time, therefore, therefore, that the materia of this talk has appearedn appearedn print. Unavoidably, n viezvof the form of its originalpresentation originalpresentation s a lecture, a small amount amountof of editinghas editinghas beennecessary. beennecessary.By By all accountsAdorno accountsAdorno had an impressive apacity to organize complex deas spontaneously spontaneouslynto nto coherentarguments,on arguments,on the spot, so to speak. Nevertheless,there are inevitablya inevitablya fezvpurplepassages purplepassageszvAere, zvAere,tt has to be admitted, he meaning is decidelyobscure n any but the most general sense. Hozvever,zvhat Hozvever,zvhat is offeredin the follozvingtranslation s, to all intents and purposes, 'the zvhole',blemishes blemishes nd all, and the only bits of Adorno'stalk Adorno'stalk that I have cut out are the occasional'Ladies and Gentlemen',and Gentlemen',and the odd aside zvAich endedto endedto interrupt he flozvf the argument vAen ead as zvritten text: I have referred o the asides n the notes. Stylistically, as a 'talk', 'Zum Problemeder musikalischenAnalyse' cannot and should not be comparedzvith comparedzvith Adorno's concentrated concentratedand and elegant zvritten exts (althoughthe elliptical mode of expression, o much a feature of Adorno'sprose, is also in evidencehere). evidencehere). The justificationor the publicationof publicationof this lecture does not, of course, lie in any stylistic gI The Adorno Foundation.Permissionto reprint or to quote any part of this article should be directed to SuhrkampVerlag, SuhrkampVerlag, Frankfurt.The Frankfurt.The editor and publishersof publishersof Music Analysisgratefully Analysisgratefullyacknowledge acknowledgepermission o publish this articlefrom the Adorno Foundationand dationand SuhrkampVerlag. (C) MUSIG ANALYSIS 1:

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feature such is not to be expected rom zvhatwas, in all likelihood,a semi-improvisedalk. Justification, f any be needed,lies instead in the subject-matter: owhere lse that am azvareof in his numerous vritings on music there to be found such an extensiveaccountof Adorno'sviezvs on musicalanalysis. This alone makes it of historicaland documentary interest.The ideas Adornoputsforwardin this talk are not nezv themselvesand are at timeson rathergenerallevel, so that its mostinteresting aspectlies in the connectionsAdornomakesbetween ideas. He is providing, in effect, a critiqueof analysis 'philosophyof analysis' through zvAich nalysismay reflectupon itself, questionand recognisets various aims and limitations,and attempt to go beyond'mere tautology',as he puts it. His dialecticalapproachdoes not claim to be a system n its ozvn right, and offersno solutions.It operates nstead as critiqueof existing ideas and theoreticalsystems, to reveal their inner contradictionsand hiddenassumptions. Thereare, of course,manyproblems resentedby the attemptto translate Adorno.It is not only that his sentencesare long and involved,and that English-zvith its lack of genderin relativepronouns-does not take naturallyto such complexity. t is also that Adorno'suse of the German language itself rather diosyncratic.Bearingboth thesepoints in mind, I decided not to simplify his style and sentencestructuretoo drastically merely in order to produce a translationzvAichreads like smooth and effortlessEnglish. have tried instead to retain something the 'against the grain' feel of the orzginal.The 'grain' and structureof his sentences are as much part of zvhat Adorno is saying as are their apparent meanings as the 'meaning'of zvork cannot be taken apart from consideration the zvork'stechnical structure.It zvould perhapsnot be toofanciful to suggest hat the structureof the musiche is discussinghas parallels in the structure of Adorno's ozvn convoluted prose. Quite apartfrom such general translationproblems,hozvever,here are numberof individual terms, usually of technical or philosophical nature, zvAichpresent particular difficultiesbecausethey have no convenient or adequateEnglish equivalents.The readeris thereforereferred to the notes for considerationof problematicalterms like Elementaranalyse,Auflosungand Wahrheitsgehalt. Finally, a fezvpointson my use of italics and bracketsn the text. Italics are used to indicate (i) certainbasicconceptsor categories vhichAdorno employs particularly their irst appearance);(ii) foreignzvords mainly German); (iii) stress (zvAeret has seemed me that Adorno s emphasisingcertainpointsin his mannerof deliveryon the tape); and (iv) titles of zvorks,etc. Square bracketsare used to indicate (i) reference the originalGerman vord phrasetranslated;and (ii) occasional xtra zvords inserted nto the English translation fill out the impliedsense of the orzgznal. 170

MUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

ON THE PROBLEMOF MUSICAL ANALYSIS

I should like to thank Emma Scheele, Peter Siebenhuhner nd Willy Bultermannor readingthroug:hnd checkingmy transcription gainst the tape, as zvell as for their invaluablesuggestionsor improving he translation. I am also grateful to ProfessorLudwigFinscherof FrankfurtUniversity for his advice on certain particularlymystifyingsections and to Frau Reul and the libraryof the Hochschuleur Musik und Darstellende Kunst,Frankfurt,or puttingthematerialat my disposal. The word 'analysis'easily associates tself in music with the idea of all that is dead, sterileand farthestremovedfrom the living workof art. One can well say thatthe generalunderlyingfeeling towardsmusicalanalysis s not exactly friendly. The musician's traditionalantagonismtowards all so-called 'dead knowledge' is something that has been handed down of old, and continues to have its effect accordingly.One will encounterthis antipathyagain and again, above all in the rationalisation epresentedby that absurd though utterly inextinguishablequestion: 'Yes, everything you say is all very well and good, but did the composer imselfknow all this was the composerconscious f all these things?' I should like to say straightaway that thi question is completelyirrelevant: it is very often preciselythe deepestinterrelationshipshat analyses are able to uncover within the compositionalprocess which have been unconsciouslyproduced; and one has to differentiateherc- differentiate strictly between the object itself (that is, between svhat s actuallygoing on within the object itself) and the way in which it may have arisenin the consciousness or unconsciousnessof the artist. Otherwise one ends up arguingon the level of the retiredoperettadirector n Hamburgwho once, in the course of an analytical alk I was giving, cameup with the question as to 'whetherMozart had been conscious of all these things'. This concern with the unconscious seems to go only too naturallywith the professionof operettadirectoror operettacomposer. The invalidityof this grudge againstanalysisis obvious, think, to the musicalexperienceof each personwho attemptsto come to terms with his or her experience. I'll begin with the experience of the performer, or interpreter. If he does not get to know the work intimately, the interpreter and I think every practisingmusician would agree with me here- will not be able to interpret the work properly. 'To get to know somethingintimately' if I may expressit so vaguely means in reality'to analyse': that is, to investigatethe inner relationshipsof the work and to investigate what is essentially contained within the composition. One could well say that) in this sense, analysismay be regardedas the home ground of tradition [der Ort der Tradition]. If, with an eye for these things, one examinesBrahms then one finds (and I regret that I have to refrainfrom showing this in detail here) just how much his compositions (especially the earlier works, which I consider to be exeraordinarilymportantand significant)are actuallythe productof the analysisof worksof MUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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the past especiallythose of Beethoven.One sees how this music in itself would be unthinkablewithout the analyticalprocess which preceded it. Thus the infinite motivic economy which characterises he technique of the earlierBrahms(wherebypracticallyno note occurswhich is not in fact thematic) is really quite inconceivablewithout the dissolving process of analysis a process which is, at first sight, apparently rreconcilablewith such economy. I should like to bring your attention to further basic requirementof analysishere: that is, the readingof music. As everybodyknows, this is matter which is much more complicatedthan simply knowing the five lines and four spaces, the accidentals and the note-values the whole system of signs, everything,that is to say, which is representedgraphically to be read as the score (I won't go into more recentdevelopments,where in many cases notation is more precise, although in other cases is also more vague in this respect). The signs and the music which they signify arenever directlyone and the samething. And in orderto readnotationat all, so that music results from it, an interpretative act is always necessary that is to say, an analyticalact, which asks what it is that the notation really signifies. Already in such elementaryprocesses as these, analysisis alwaysessentiallypresent. The facade i.e., the score as 'picture' [dasNotenbild] has to be unravelled,dissolved,[auggelost]andthis as reliablyas possible) in order to arrive at that which is indicatedby the score.And once such an analyticalprocesshas been set in motion (as is the case, for example, with even the most elementaryreading of notation), then such an analyticalprocessmay not be stopped at will, as the resultof sonle resolve or other which insists that, whateverhappens, one is not allowed,for Heaven's sake!, to touch the unconscious.That correct reading of the score is the prerequisitefor correct interpretation s obvious, but ss by no means as self-evidentas one might think. In the first place it is a feature of earliermusical practicethat decisive musical elements like tempo and dynamics,and very often also phrasing,are not to be gathered from the score at all, and have to be extrapolated.They are to be discoveredfrom that which is not written that is to say, from an analytical act. But such an analyticalprocess is still needed even sn the case of composerswhere the score is alreadyhighly formulated.In this connection I'm thinkingparticularlyof Beethoven and perhaps t is a good idea to consider this for a moment, as there are questions here which, in my opinion, arefar too seldomreflectedupon. Beethoven is relatively sparing in his use of markingsin his scores. Apart from the bare musical text itself there is not much in the way of markings;what there is, however, is and carefully thought out, and to some extent one needs to be familiar with certain BeethovenianSpielregeln 'rules of play', 'rules of the game') in order to understand ust how painstakingand precise the markingsare. One needs to know, for example, that the marking p within an overallforte field 72


ON THE PROBLEM OF MUSICALANALYSIS

indicatesthat, after an accent, the pianodynamicshould then continue to be played, whereassomething like sf within such a context indicatesthat the overall dynamic (f should continue. There is, moreover,the whole question of the interpretationof dynamic markingsin general: whether they are absolute e.g., whether crescendialways lead up to forte or whether they are only relative within particular dynamically-defined fields. This in itself is already an extraordinarilydifE1cult roblem in innumerablecases in traditionalmusic, and can only be resolved can only be answered with recourseto the structureof the music. That is to say, therefore, that this is also an essentially analyticalproblem. Furthermore, the most important 'rule' for the if I may so term it'elementaryanalyticalreading'of Beethovenis that, in his case, each marking is basicallyvalid up to the next marking,and that only when a new marking is quite clearly indicated may the performerdepart from the dynamic previously indicated. But even such a rule as this which, I would suggest, may in generalbe applied to Beethoven needs constant re-examination gainstthe structureof individualworks. Analysisis thus concernedwith structure,with structuralproblems,and finally,with structural istening. By structure do not meanhere the mere groupingof musical parts accordingto traditional ormalschemata,however; understand t ratheras having to do with what is going on, musically, underneathhese formal schemata.But this is also something that ane dare not oversimplify,and it is alreadypossible to see here how big the problemsof musical analysis are. For, contraryto widespreadbelief, even that which is going on underneath s not simply a second and quite different thing, but is in fact mediated by the formal schemata, and is partly, at any given moment,postulatedby the formal schemata,while on the other hand it consists of deviationswhich in their turn can only be at all understood through their relationship to the schemata. Naturally enough, this refers most directly to that traditionalmusic in which such all-encompassinggeneralschematicrelationshipsexist at all. The task we have before us, therefore, is the realisationof this already complex relationship of deviationto schema,rather than just the one or the other alone; and as a first step in this directionit can well be said that what we understandas analysis is the essence of the investigationof this relationship. Although forgotten today, partlydue to certainfollies of which he was guilty and partly due to his vulgar nationalism,Heinrich Schenkermust surely, in spite of all, be given the greatestcredit for having been the first to demonstrate hat analysis s the prerequisite or adequateperformance.2 And within the Schoenbergcircle, ever since the period of the Vereinur musikalische rivatauffuhrungen,his had alreadybeen placed quite consciously at the very centre of performancepractice. This was probably first realised most fully by the Kolisch Quartet, the reason for whose famous practiceand technique of plasJing rom memory in some respects MUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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stems from the simple fact that, if one has reallystudiedworksthoroughly and taken the trouble to analyse them, then one can play them from memory as a matter of course. That is to say, if each performer in quartetplaysaccording o the scoreas wholeanddoesnot merelyfollowhis own part,then this, in effect, already mpliessuch an intimateunderstanding of the work's structurethat playing from memory is essentially the naturaloutcome. Schenkeriananalysis,distinguished as it often is by its extraordinaryprecision, subtlety and insistence, really amounts to an attempt to bring music down to certainfundamental tructuresof the most basickind, amongwhich the centralposition is occupiedby whathe called theSFundamentalLine [Urlinie] difficult concept which oscillates remarkablybetween step-progression[Stufenfolge]nd basic thematicmaterial [thematische rmaterial]. relation to this FundamentalLine all else appearsto Schenkeras being, so to speak, quite simply fortuitous kind of 'additive' [Zusatz],as it were and it is this, I think, that already marks out the limitations of the Schenkerianform of analysis. For, in reducingmusic to its most generalisedstructures,what seems to him and to this theory to be merely casual and fortuitous is, sense, precisely that which is really the essence, the being [das Wesen] f the music. If, to take ratherunsubtle example, you examinethe difference between the styles of Mozart and of Haydn, then you will not expect to discover this differencein general stylistic models and characteristicsof the formal layout (althoughvery significantdifferencesdo exist between the Haydnesqueand the Mozartiansonataform). You will have to resort instead to examining small but decisive features little physiognomic characteristics in the way the themes themselves are constructed, features which, for Schenker, are of mere secondaryimportancebut which make all the difference and constitute, in fact, the difference between Haydn and Mozart. Now what this means, therefore,is that what constitutes the essence, or 'Being' of the compositionis for Schenkermore or less its very abstractness, n fact, and the individualmoments3through which the composition materialises and becomes concrete [sich konkretisiert],re reduced by him to the merely accidental and nonessential.Thus such a conceptof analysis ntrinsicallymisses the mark,for if it is really to reveal the specific structureof the work, as I have maintained, it has to come to terms with precisely those individualmoments which, in terms of Schenker'sreductive process, merely supervene and which for him, therefore,are only of peripheral nterest. He himself tried to defend himself againstthis criticism (of which he was naturallyaware) and he particularly ried to justify the generalnature of the Fundamental Linc- or the identity of FundamentalLines- by reference o certainbasic relationships[Urverhaltnisse] n the music- a point of view which disregards the thoroughlyhistoricalstructureof all musical categories.But it also cannot be denied that, as far as Beethoven is concerned,Schenker's methods hit upon a valid moment; as Rudolf Stephanhas remarked, he 74


ON THE PROBLEM OF MUSICAL ANALYSIS

Schenkerianmethod is actually only really fruitful in connection with Beethoven. The inadequacy of Schenker's approach can be seen very clearlyin his attitudeto Debussy. As a Francophobe,Schenkerrepreatqdly attacked Debussy in a very shabby manner, and accused him (and others, including Richard Strauss)of the destructionof the Fundamental Line, without being able to see that, in Debussy's case, there are criteria for inner consistency and musical cohesion which are entirely different from the requirementsof what he calledthe FundamentalLine, essentially derived as it is from the harmonisedchorale. But it is possible to learn somethingfrom all this which I considerto be centralto the whole idea of musicalanalysis:namely that analysismust be immanent hat, in the first instance, the form has to be followed a priori, so that a composition unfolds itself in its own terms. Or, to put it anotherway, one has to allow the compositionsomethingin advance:that is, one must let it asserttself, in orderto be able to enter into its structureanalytically. t never seems to have occurred o Schenker hat his accusingDebussy of the destructionof the FundamentalLine could in any way have been connected with the crisis in motivic-thematic composition (which Schenker had made total andabsolute). Now, to get back to Beethoven, for whom, as I said, the Schenkerian approach s, in a certain sense, legitimate. One can perhaps account for this to a certainextent as follows: due to its artistically-plannedndifference towardseach of the individualaspects of the materials t uses, Beethoven's music amounts to something like a kind of 'justification' f tonality itself and of the forms associatedwith tonal[Rechtgertigung]4 ity. Beethoven, as it were, tried to reconstruct onality through his autonomous and individualisedmusic. In a mannernot unlike Kant where, if you will allow me a philosophicaldigression, the objectively-givenworld of experience is thrown into question and has then to be recreatedonce more by the Subject and its forms in Beethoven the forms (particularly the large, dynamicforms like the Sonata)could be said to re-emergefrom out of the specific process of the composition. It is actually tonalitytself which, in Beethoven'scase, is both theme as well as outcome, and in this sense the Schenkerianconcept of the FundamentalLine to some extent correctlyapplies here. However, Beethoven's genius consists precisely in the fact that this process does not remain on general evel, but, on the contrary and in a manner which correspondsexactly to the great tradition of German philosophy (the philosophy of Hegel above allf it plunges itself from the most generalised and unspecific into the most extremeconcretion n order thus to lead back to the binding forces of the Universal once more. The decisive factor in Beethoven's compositionsis just this 'way to concretion', and it is precisely here, because of this peculiar change of emphasis, that Schenkerhas not gone the whole way. But it is exactly in this directionthat the way the idea of analysis really does lie: that is to say, composition understood as a 'coherence', as a MUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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dynamic set of interrelationships Zusammenhang]. nd it is within this set of interrelationships if anywhereat all that the meaningof the composltlonreslees. I should now like to draw few conclusions from all this. Firstly, althoughanalysisis certainlyof decisive help in questionsof performance and interpretation, t is not actually from interpretation hat it is derived, but from the work itself. You couldput it this way: analysis s itself a form in its own right, like translation, criticism and commentary,as one of those media through which the very work unfolds. Works need analysis for their 'truth content' [Wahrheitsgehalt]5o be revealed. To return to Beethovenagain: initiallyhe achievedhis effect throughwhat I think has been called 'titanism',or through his expressivity;and only by means of intensive structuralanalysisdid it then later become clear why his music can, with good reason,be called 'beautiful'and 'true', and also eventually whereits limits were to be sought. Aesthetictheorieson music and, above all, aestheticprogrammesthatis to say, claims made for and judgementspronouncedon music) are quite inconceiveablewithout analysis.Analysisis to be understoodas an organ not only of the historicalmomentumof the works in themselves,but also of the momentumwhich pushes beyond the individualwork. That is to say, all criticismwhich is of any value is foundedin analysis;to the extent that this is not the case, criticism remains stuck with disconnected impressions,and thus, if for no other reasonthan this, deservesto be regarded with the utmostsuspicion. If one takes Wagner's claim regarding music's 'coming of age' seriously that is, the inescapablerelationof music to repexion then with this the significanceof analysisas something mmanent o the worksthemselves must also increasecorrespondingly,and has indeed done so. Given the presenceof living experience,music unfolds itself throughanalysis;it becomes fuller for this experience, richer rather than poorer. Any interpreter who has initially made music only from what, precritically [vorkritisch], called 'musicality',and who has then subsequentlyperformed from an all-encompassinganalyticalconsciousness, will, I think, have no difficulty in acknowledginghere what an enrichment is to be discoveredin the realisationof hidden relationshipswhich, so long as the workis not analysed,cannot come to the fore. An art awareof itself is an analysedart [die iArer elbstbewussteKunst st die analysierte].There is a kind of convergence between the analytical process and the compositionalprocess-I have tried to show this in my book on Berg,6 using him as a model whereby the music, in a certain it is that can be looked upon as being its own analysis. works operate within a pre-existing medium and with pre-existing forms and this is certainlythe overall tendency in the developmentof modernmusic, particularly ince Tristan the more it is that, for the sake of their own 'livingness'[um iAres igenenLebenswillen],they are in need *

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*



of specifically tailored analysis. A piece by Handel broadly speaking may to some extent be grasped without analysis; Beethoven's Diabelli alreadymuch less likely to be understood without it, whereasthe Bagatelles f Webern cannot be grasped at all in this way. If Webern'sBagatelles re performedunanalysed, hough with faithful attentionto all markings n the score but without uncovering the subcutaneous elationships a merelyrespectable enderingof the score as it stands, that is then the result, as is not difficultto imagine, is utter nonsense [einvollkommeneralimathias]. n the other hand, the moment these pieces are analysed, and performed after having been analysed, they make sense and the light dawns.7. . . If, without analysis, such music cannotbe presented n even the simplest sense as being meaningful, then this is as much as to say that analysis is no mere stopgap, but is an essential element of art itself. As such it will only begin to be able to correspond to the status of art when it takes the demands of its own autonomyupon itself. Otherwise, n the words of Heinz-KiausMetzger,it remains mere tautology' that is to say, a simpletranslation nto words of that which everyonecan hearin the music anyway.Analysishas to do with the surplusdasMehr] n art; it is concernedwith that abundancewhich unfolds itself only by meansof analysis.It aims at that which as has been said of poetry (if I may be permitted a poetic analogyfis the truly 'poetic' in poetry, and the truly poetic in poetry is that which defies translation.Now it is precisely this moment which analysismust grasp if it is not to remainsubordinate.Analysisis more than merely ' the facts' [was blossderFall ist], but is so only and solely by virtue of goingbeyondhe simple facts [die einfachenTatbestande] absorbing itself into them. Every analysis that is of any value, thereforand anyone who analyses seriouslywill soon realisethis for himself is a squaringof the circle. It is the achievement of imagination through faith; and Walter Benjamin's definitionof imaginationas 'the capacity or interpolation nto the smallest details'applieshere.8 Now, the ultimate 'surplus' over and beyond the factual level is the truthcontent, nd naturally t is only critique that can discover the truth content. No analysis is of any value if it does not terminatein the truth content of the work, and this, for its part, is mediatedthroughthe work's technicalstructure[durch ietechnischeomplexionerWerke].f analysis hits up againsttechnical nconsistency, hen such inconsistency s an index of the work's untruth I have attemptedelsewhereto demonstrate his in concrete terms in certain specific aspects of the music of Wagner9and of Richard Strauss. 0 At the moment, I wish only to put forward these thoughts in their theoreticalgenerality,however although with the immediate furtherqualification hat the work of art insists that one put this question of truth or untruth immanentlynd not arbitrarilybring some yardstickor other of the cultural-philosophical r cultural-critical arieties to the workfromoutside. MUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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I now want to come to the point I have reallybeen leadingup to so far: analysis, as the 'unfolding'of the work, existsdinrelationship o the work

[Typus].

haps most clearly to be seen in the first of the more primitive forms of analysis to have become generally effective- the so-called 'guide literature' [Leitfadenliteratur] o the music of Wagner and the New German School, as associated with the name of Hans von Wolzogen. Here the intention was simply to ease orientation n the kind of music which avoids traditional orms but which is held together by the drasticmeans of Leitmotivewhich, though admittedly varied, are always essentially recognisable. This aim is achieved by the simple procedure of picking out the Leitmotive,abelling them and identifying them in their different forms. (It may be noted in passing that this kind of analysis contradicts ts own aim, and serves, in fact, to furtherthat external,superficial ype of listening which so characterises he old-style Wagner listener, proud if he is able to recognisethe 'Curse Motif' in the Ringevery time somebodygets murdered,given the necessaryreferences if he doesn't recognise t on the darkenedstage anyway while in doing so he misses what is really happening in the music.) This reified form of analysis, as representedby the 'guide' to themes and motifs, serves a reifiedand false consciousnessof the object. Because of its inadequacy,however, it has at least served to promote another, and much more justifiable,type of analysis in particular that associatedabove all with the Viennese classicsand for which Riemann could be said to have supplied the best-known examples. I am going to label this type 'elementalanalysis' [Elementaranalyse].1lith progressive energy it turns to the smallest single elements from which a piece is built up roughlyin the same way in which knowledge,according o Descartes, has continuallyto divide up its object into the smallestpossible elements. Now, just as the principle of economyan be said to dominate n the music of Viennese Classicism (that is, the Viennese tradition since Haydn, but particularlyBeethovenand Brahms,and in a particular ense also Schoenberg and his school) that is to say, that a maximum of different appearances Erscheinungen] as to be derived from a minimum of basic shapes [Grundgestalten] can the 'elemental'type of analysis be seen, in fact, to have its support in that kind of music which can be categorised under the concept 'motivic-thematic'composition. Implied here there is also, of course, a hidden criticism of this type of composition, obligatory as it was for more than 150 years. 'Elementalanalysis' confirmsa suspicion which irritateseveryone who persists in occupying himself with [motivic-thematic]music: namelyand I'm going to say something blasphemoushere its similarityto the jig-saw puzzle, constructed as it is out of elements over against which dynamic development (which on the face of it predominatesto such an extent in this music) reveals itself in many ways to be merely a contrived appearance. It could be said that the character of this 'aesthetic ap78



pearance' whicheven applies, in spite of all, to an art as far removedfrom illusion as music, and through which music has integrated tself into the developmentof Europeanculture as a whole) has occurredas the consequence of an unceasing 'Becoming' or development from out of itself n reality, however, such music could more [aus sichHerauswerdendes]. accurately be said to have been 'put together' [zusammengesetzt] the quite literal sense of having been 'composed',contraryto the impression more usually associatedwith it. And incidentally,this may also be said to a certain extent to apply to Bach, producingat times in his case due to the absence of the aspect of 'Becoming' [AspektdesWerdens]that impression of mechanicalnesswhich can be dispelled only by an ideological effort [of interpretation]which actuallyglorifiesthe apparentmechanicalness as a special kind of logicality. Indeed, all 'Becoming'in music is in fact illusory, insofaras the music, as text, is really fixed and thus is not actually'becoming'anythingas it is alreadyall there. Nevertheless,music is actually only a 'coherence' [Zusammenhang]hen regarded as a 'Becoming', and in this there lies a paradoxfor musical analysis: analysis is, but, on the one hand, limited by what is actuallyfixed and on the other hand, it has to translate his backagaininto that movementas coagulated n the musical text. But the 'elemental' ype of analysisis also inadequateas far as Viennese Classicismis concerned.Schoenberg'ssentence: 'music is the history of its themes', serves to remindus of this. May 'Becoming'continuealways o haveits problematic xistence All this appliesparticularly o Beethoven. In his case the germinalcells [dieKeime]are very often as initially stated ingeniouslyindifferent, n order that they may smoothly [bruchlos] nd seamlessly lead up to the whole; in fact, they simply represent the fundamental relationships of tonality itself. And it is particularly he case with Beethoven that, just for this very reason, it is much more important what the themes becomewhat happens to them and how they develop than what the basic elements themselves actually are. The real weakness of analysis up to now lies in the fact that it neglects this 'moment of Becoming' for the reduction [of music] to its elements. In this connection would like to referonce more to what I said earlieraboutanalysisbeing an essential prerequisiteof criticism. I have just spokenof the 'indifference' of the materialin Beethoven. With Wagner, the basic motifs [Urmotive] which are supposed to representthe primevalworld [das Urweltliche] Wotanand the Valhalladomainin the Ringare kept within a certain how shall I put it.> undifferentiated,or 'unspecific Universality'. But in Wagner'scase they are not, by long way, as legitimateas they are with Beethoven because Wagner's individual motifs have the significanceand weight of symbols, and contain basically the whole idea of the germinal cell of the Romantic Lied. For this reason they have pretensions to 'Beingness'[Sein] 'in and for themselves'much more than is ever the case with Beethoven. And this weakness, inherent in the themes and contraMUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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dicting their own claim to just 'beingthere' [dazu sein],points, moreover, to theirrealweaknessas regardssubstance, view of whathappens them and what they become somethingthat one would not think of in connection with Beethoven,becausewith him the priorityof 'Becoming'ver that which simply is is alreadyestablishedright from the start. Yes, really trueand adequateanalysiswould have to point out such differences,and it is possible to see from this how an analysis of this type merges into crltlclsm,

lnto crltlque.

Any adequateanalysisof Beethovenhas to graspthe music as an event, as 'a somethingwhich is happening'[alseinGeschehendes], ndnot only as the elementsflankedby this event. In the recapitulation f the firstmovementof the Ninth Symphony, or example, is not the returnof the theme and the components, the basic constitutive elements [Urbestandteile] which it is formed that matters; what is important that this recapitulation appearsas the resultof the foregoing development.It is a similar situation in the Appassionataoncerning the overwhelmingeffect of the recapitulationover the dominant pedal point in the first movement. Analysiswould have to show why hese kinds of effects are achieved,and not simply that here, at this point, this or that theme recurs.To demonstratethis is in realityextraordinarily ifficult; but by the very posing of this question you may already be able to recognisethat the tedium and aridityof analysisin generalis consequenceof the fact that analysishas not yet reallybegun to grapplewith its own problems something,in fact, whichshould be its properconcern. Now, from all that I've been saying so far it may have become plain to you just how much any particularkind of analysisand its legitimacyare actuallythemselves dependentUpOIlhe particularmusic which is being analysed. It goes without saying that radical serial and aleatory music cannot be grasped by traditionalanalyticalapproaches,and particularly not by means of the 'elemental'type of analysis, because concepts like 'dynamic coherence' [dynamischeinnzusammenhang] nd so on are far removedfrom its basic assumptions.It is preciselyhere, when faced with aleatory and serial music, that analysis is frequently confused with the mere recordingof facts [blosseTatbestandsaufnahme]. his then results in the kind of absurdityonce reservedfor me at Darmstadt,where a composer (who, to his credit, has since given up the vocation)showed me a compositionwhich seemed to me to be the purestnonsense.When I asked him what this or that meant, what meaning, what kind of musical sense this or that particularphraseor developmenthad, he simply referredme to correspondencesbetween dynamic markingsand pitches and so onthings which have nothing whateverto do with the musicalphenomenon as such. This kind of descriptionof the compositionalprocess,of what the composerhas done in the composition,is totallyunproductive,just as are all those kinds of aestheticexaminationwhich areunable to extractfrom a workany more than whathas been put into it, so to speak what it says in 80



the Baedekerguide. All such approache are doomed from the outset as worthlessand irrelevant. With so-called 'athematic', ree atonalitythe relationshipsare quite different, and I mention this precisely because I feel myself to be on much firmerground here, analytically peaking,than when faced with serial and post-serialmusic. Herc and I'm thinking above all especiallyof Webern in this connection one encounters once more particular ransformation of the categoriesof traditional hematic-motivi compositionalmethods. I have elsewhereattemptedto develop this in some of the most daring of Webern's works, like the Bagatelles and the violin pieces. Here the transmutation f the traditional i.e. thematic-motivic) ategoriesof musical coherence into something quite opposed to them can be traced and demonstrated.The thematic technique of 'developingvariation' a technique which necessitatesthe unceasingderivationof the 'new', indeed the radicallynew, from the 'old' is 'radicalised' o become the negationof that which used to be called the 'thematicdevelopment'or 'working-out' [thematischeArbeit]. And it is this coherencc this transmutation that analysis has to meet in such music. Its task, therefore,is not to describe the work and with this I have really arrived at the central issue concerning analysis generally its task, essentially, is to reveal as clearly as possible the problem f each particularwork. 'To analyse'means much the same as to become aware of a work as a force-feld [Kraftgeld]organised arounda problem.Having said this, however, we must now be quite clear about one thing: whether we like it or not analysis is inevitably to some extent, of its very nature, the reduction of the unknown, the 'new' with which we are confronted within the composition and which we want to grasp-to the alreadyknown, inasmuchas it is the 'old'. However, in that everymoderncompositioncontainsan essential,inbuilt moment that combats this mechanismof the familiarand the known, in so far can it be said that the analysisof modern works is also always a betrayalof the workalthoughat the same time it is also actuallydemandedby the work itself From this there also arises the question as to how analysisputs right this wrong it inflicts on the work; and the way to an answer lies, I believe, preciselyin the fact that analysis serves to pin-point that which I call the 'problem' of a particularcomposition the paradox, so to speak, or the 'impossible'that every piece of music wants to make possible. (Ratheras in Schoenberg's Phantasy for violin and piano: how in the end the radically-dynamic rocess of composition tself results in a composition co-ordinatedfields, and how the categoriesof the compositiontransform themselves into the balance, the equilibrium of those fields, and then finally, through this equilibrium,an effect is brought about which fulfils the dynamic.13)Once the problem I was almost going to say the 'blind spot' of the work has been recognised,then the individualmoments will thereby be clarified in a quite different manner than by the so-called 'reductive'methodsof traditionalpractice. MUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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Now all this has to be differentiated,of coursc and I must emphasise this from the so-called 'holistic' method of examination Wanzheitliche Betrachtung14] popularwith the educationalists.With musical compositions it is obviouslythe Whole hat matters;but the Whole is not something which simply reduces the individual single moments to insignificance. The Wholc if I may be permitted to express it in Hegelian terms is itself the relation between the Whole and its individual moments, within which these latter obtain throughout their independent value. Analysis exists only as the uncoveringof the relationshipbetween these moments, and not merely by virtue of the obtuse and aconceptual priorityof the Whole ove1 its parts. It is particularly n new music, moreover, that analysis is concernedjust as much with dissociatedmoments ith the works' 'death-wish' [ Todestriebl that [Dissoziationsmomente], is to say, with the fact that there are works which contain within themselves the tendency to strive from unity back into their constituent elements as it is concerned with the opposite process; and these are questionswhich have been totally neglected in the name of the so-called 'holistic' method, within which there are usually disturbinglypositivist implications.Just as analysisshould no longer dare be of the 'elemental' type, it is also equally wrong that it should disregardthe individualmoments and reduce them all to the same level of indifferenceby taking rigid and overridingconceptof the totalityas its point of departure.If one reallytakesthe Whole as one's point of departure hen also simultaneously implied here is the obligation to grasp the logic of the individual moments that is, the concretionof the isolated musical 'instants'. And of correspondingly,if one takes the constituent elements as the departureone's task is to understandhow these elements in themselves, and frequentlyin contradiction each other, and then throughthis contradiction,also simultaneouslygenerate he Whole. In this sense that is, relativeto Whole nd to part analysis s always double process[ein Gedoppeltes].rwin Ratz to whom we are indebte for some excellentanalysesof certainvery complexmovementsby Mahler (the Finale of the Sixth Symphonyand the first movementof the Ninth, for example)15 once formulated his very nicely in one of his analysesas follows: there are really two analysesalways necessary; that which advances from the part to the Whole i.e., just like the way in which the innocent istenerhasno choice but to listenin the firstinstance,willy-nilly; and then that which, from the already-wonawarenessof the Whole, determines the individualmoments.And this is not merelya genetic difference, determinedby the time-factor; the differenceis also determinedby the object the compositionalstructure tself in which both these valid momentsnecessarily ntermesh. Moreover and this is of further importance n distinguishingit from any 'totality cult' [Ganzheitskultus]he relationshipof whole to part is never to be understood as the relationship of an 'all-embracing' 182


ON THE PROBLEMOF MUSICALANALYSIS

[Umfassenden] o an 'all-embraced' Umfassten],but is, instead,dynamic, which is to say a process.This means to say, on the one hand, that in music, as an artwhich unfoldsthroughtimc all have, generally speaking, something evolving about them, something 'becoming' [Werdendes], nd thus reachout beyondthemselves.The sense and aim of an analysiswhich takes the individualmomentas its point of departure s not only as tends mostly to be the case- the indicationand fixing of the individualmoments (or more extreme, their mere recognition);it is also the indicationof that within them which propelsthem onward.Take, for example, the well-known counter-subject o the first theme of Mahler's Fourth Symphony:16 Cl.

Fag.

a2

Already,rightfromthe very beginning,one has to listen to this in terms of the direction wantsto go in and for which it yearns, in terms of the fact that it is strivingultimatelybeyond itself towardsthe high B,17in orderto fulfil itself; and if one doesn't hear this in its individualelements, if one doesn't hear the theme's own directional endencywithin each single element, then the descriptionof the individualmomentscan already, or this veryreason,be said to have missedthe point. If one analysesthe main theme of the first movementof the Eroica,for example, then one sees that the point which occurs almost immediately and leaves the music hangingsuspendedon the C# that damming-upof forces which invests the initial Grundgestaltwith tension after firstfew bars is decisiveand of muchmoreimportance hanthe indifferentbroken majortriad with its closing minor seconds, the so-called materialof this theme (andof most of the themesof the so-calledVienneseClassics). On the otherhand, attentionhas also to be paid to the way in which the individualmotifs are pre-formedby the Whole, as is mostly the case with Beethoven. Beethoven'smusic is not in fact formed, or built up, out of themes and motifs at all, as the 'elemental' ype of analysiswould lead us to believe; it is ratherthat these themes and motifs are insteadalready almost said 'prepared',anachronistically, one talks of 'preparedpiano': they adaptthemselvesto become part of the pervading dea of the whole. Beethoven's work was, in fact as may be easily recognised from the sketchbooks essentiallyto tinker with the themes and motifs until they finally became capable of meeting their function within the Whole. In realitythis functionalwayshas priority Beethoven,althoughit seemsas though everythingdevelops out of the 'motive-power' Triebkraft] the individualelements.And in this his music is no mereanalogyfor, but is in fact directlyidentical o, the structureof Hegelianlogic. While one should not overvaluethe genesis of music ti.e., the way in which it comes into being] and should not, above all, confuse it with the innerdynamicsof the MUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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composition,with Beethoven,at least, this genesis neverthelesssuffices to demonstrate ust how much the conception of Whole dynamicallyconceived 'in itself' [die Konzeption eines in sich dynamischvorgestellten Ganzen]definesits elements,and how, throughthis, the taskfacinganalysis right from the start will naturally be totally different from that which the 'elemental' ype of analysismakes t out to be. All in all, therefore if you will allow me very rough generalisationtwo types of music can be distinguished: 1) the kind which goes, in principle, from 'above' to 'below', from totality to detail; and 2) the kind which is organisedfrom 'below' to 'above'. Thus, accordingto which of these dominatesthe structureof the music, the same will correspondingly direct the analysis itself. If I may speak from my own experience for second: I hit upon the necessity for extensivemodifications o the concept of analysisthroughthe study of the music of my teacher,Alban Berg. The Berg analyseswhich I wrote some 30 years ago, directlyafter his death, were traditionalanalysesof the kind which brings the 'whole'down to the smallestpossible number of what one calls 'germinalcells' [Keimzellen], and then shows how the music develops out of them.18And there is no questionbut that Berg himself,from his own understanding of the term], would also still have approvedof this traditionalkind of analysis. However, as I came to revise and preparethe book last year [1968], and so to occupymyself with Berg's music with renewedintensity, I saw something that I had, of course, dimly sensed for a long time: namely, that Berg's music is not at all a 'Something' [ein Etwas] which forms itself, so to speak,out of a 'Nothingness' [ein Nichts] of the smallestpossible, undifferentiatedcomponentelements. It only seems like this at first glance. In reality it accomplisheswithin itself a process of permanentdissolution19 [permanente Auflosung],ratherthan achievinga 'synthesis' a term which any self-respectingperson should hardlybe able to get past his lips these days. So then, not only does Berg's music start out from the smallest componentelements and then immediately urthersubjectthese to a kind of 'splitting of the atom', but the whole characterof his music is that of permanentre-absorption ack into itself [permanenteSelbstzurucknahme]. Its 'Becoming', if I may term it thus at all events, where it crystallisesout its idea in its purest form is its ownnegation iAreeigeneNegation]. This means that such a structuringof the inner fibre of a music also calls for an analyticalpractice completely different from the long-established 'motivic-thematic' pproach and should like expresslyto say that it was in the Berg book that I becameparticularlyawareof this necessity. However, I don't in the slightestflattermyself as in any way havingsucceeded in fulfilling this demand, and what I say here as criticism of analysis in generalalso applies without reservationas a criticismof all the countless analyses hat myselfhave everproduced. Analysis,therefore,meansmuch the same as the recognitionof the way in which the specific,sustainingstructural dea of piece of music realises 184


ON THE PROBLEM OF MUSICALANALYSIS

itself; and such a concept of analysiswould need essentiallyto be derived from each workanew. Nevertheless, I have no wish to stop shorthere with this demand for the absolute singularity or absolute analysis.There aiso lies in analysisa moment of the Universal, the General [des Allgemeinen] and this goes with the fact that music is certainly also, in essence, language-and it is, furthermore,precisely in the most specificworks that this moment of 'Universality' s to be sought. I might attempt to summariseor codify this universality n terms of what I once defined as the 'materialtheory of form in music' [materialeFormenlehre der Musik]: that is, the concrete definition of categories like statement [Setzung], continuation [Fortsetzung],contrast [Kontrast], dissolution [AufiRosung], uccession [Reikung],development[Entwicklung],ecurrence [Wiederkehr], odifiedrecurrence modifizierterWiederkehr],nd however such categoriesmay otherwise be labelled. And so far not even the beginningsof an approachhave been maderegarding llch 'material heory of form' (as opposedto the architectonic-schematicype of theory). These [i.e. dialectical] categories are more important than knowledge of the traditional orms a such, even though they have naturallydeveloped out of the traditionalforms and can always be found in them. Were this conceptionof analysissuch as I have in mind, and which is in accordance with structural istening were this conceptionto be consistentlyrealised, then somethingelse, a further evel, something ike such a 'material heory of musical form', would necessarilyemerge out of it. It would not, to be sure, be fixed and invariable-it would not be a theory of form for once and always, but would define itself within itself historically,accordingto the state of the compositionalmaterial,and equallyaccordingto the state of the compositional orces of production. The crisis in composition oday and with this I should like to closc is also a crisis in analysis.I have attempted o make you awareof why this is the case. It would perhapsnot be too much of an exaggeration o say that all contemporarymusical analyses be they of traditionalor of the most recent music have remained behind the level of contemporarymusical consciousnessin composition.If analysiscan be raised to this level without thereby lapsing into vacuous obsession with musicalfact-collecting, then it will, in its turn, very probablybe capableof reactingback on to, and criticallyaffecting,composition tself. NOTES 1. It may seem that Adorno is contradictinghimself here. What he means is that, although the motivic economy of the early Brahmsis dependent upon the analysis which precededit, there does at first sight appear to be something irreconcilableabout these two processes. That is to say, on the one hand there is the process of compositionand integrationwhich attempts to conceal the technical steps which went into its own construction,while, on the other hand, there is the step-by-step process of analysiswhich, through MUSIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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2. 3.

4. 5.

dissection, dissolution and 'dis-integration',attemptsto reveal and lay bare the technicalstructureof the integratedworkonce more. It has to be remembered hat Adorno is speaking n 1969, but Schenkerstill remainsrelativelyneglected Germany. 'Moment'in the sense refersto the Germandas Moment,defined in Martin Jay, The DialecticalImagination London: Heinemann, 1973), p. 54, as 'a phaseor aspectof a cumulativedialecticalprocess. It shouldnot be confused with derMoment,whichmeans momentin time in the Englishsense'. Although 'justification' perhaps an unexpected word in this context, it is nevertheless the correct translationof Rechtgertigung ere. It seems clear enoughwhatAdornomeans. 'Truth content' [Wahrheitsgehalt] a difficult concept as Adorno uses it. The following two quotations from Adorno's Asthetische Theorie (Frankfurt/Main:Suhrkamp,1970) may help to providea few clues: truth content of the work of art is the objectivesolution of the riddle containedin each work.... It is only to be obtained throughphilosophicalspeculation.This, and nothing else, justifies aesthetics [and, by implication,analysis](p. 193). Art aspiresto Truth, though is not Truth directly;to this extent is Truth its content.Art is Knowledgethrough ts relationship Truth (p. 419).

The notion of 'truthcontent' ties up with the conceptionof the art work as being primarilya formof cognition, knowledge albeit,in the caseof music, in purely musical-structural erms). This particularlyHegelian position of Adorno's calls to mind Schoenberg, in Ch. of Fundamentals Musical Compositioncf. AlexanderGoehr, 'Schoenberg'sGedankeManuscript',fournal of theArnoldSchoenbergnstitute,Vo1.2, No. 1, p. 16): 'The realpurpose of musicalconstruction not beauty,but intelligibility'.It is temptingalso to connect the 'truthcontent' of the work with the 'problem'around which the work, as 'force field', forms itself (see p. 181 of the present translation). Lafite, 1968). kleinstenUbergangs 6. Adorno, Berg: der Meister Partsof this book originallyappearedas contributions Willi Reich'sAlban Berg: mit Bergs eigenenSchriftenund Beitragenvon TheodorWiesengrundAdornoundErnstKrenek Vienna:HerbertReichner,1937). 7. In an aside (which have omittedin the text) Adorno suggestswe follow up the points he is makinghere by referring the chapteron Webern'sBagatelles('Interpretationsanalyseneuer Musik [Webern,Schonberg, Berg]')in Der getreue Korrepetitor GesammelteSchriften,Vo1. 15; Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp,1976). 8. In an aside Adorno mentions at this point that Walter Benjamin'sson is present the audience. 9. T. W. Adorno, Versuch berWagner written 1937/38, publishedBerlin and Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1952). English translationby Rodney Livingstone, as In Search of Wagner(London: NLB, 1981). See also 'Zum "Versuch uber Wagner"' in appendix to GesammelteSchriften, Vo1. 13 (Frankfurt/Main:Suhrkamp,1971); 'WagnersAktualitat',and 'Nachschrift zu einer Wagner-Diskussion' Gesammelte chriften,Vo1. 16, Musikalische Schriften II (Frankfurt/Main:Suhrkamp,1978). 186


ON THE PROBLEMOF MUSICALANALYSIS

10. T. W. Adorno, 'RichardStrauss',in Musikalische chriftenIII, Gesammelte Schriften,Vol. 16 (Frankfurt/Main:Suhrkamp, 1978). An English translation,by Samueland ShierryWeber, appeared Perspectives New Music, Fall-Winter1965,pp F32 and 113-129. 11. There are problems in finding an adequate translationfor Adorno's term Elementaranalyse.Formal-motivicanalysis' perhaps comes as close as anything. However, I have opted for 'elementalanalysis'in the text, unsatisfactoryas it is, as I felt it necessaryto retainthe notion of 'element', 'elementary'and'elemental', n the senseof 'reduction o constituentelements'. 12. See note 7. 13. Adornois probablyreferring o the fact that Schoenbergcomposedthe violin partof Op. 47 beforethe pianopart. 14. Adornois certainlyreferring Gestaltpsychologyherc but in particular, would seem, to that school of Gestaltknown as 'Ganzheitspsychologie'i.e. the Second Leipzig School of Gestalt Psychology associated with F. Krueger).This was a dilutedformof Gestaltwhich deifiedthe Whole over its parts. 15. Erwin Ratz, 'Zum Formproble bei GustavMahler:eine Analysedes ersten Satzes der IX. Symphonie',in Musikforschung ol. 8, 1955, p. 169; ' eine Analysedes Finales der VI. Symphonie', Musikforschung,ol. 9, 1956, p. 156. Also: GustavMahler(Berlin: 1957). 16. Adornosimply sings his exampleat this point. It is the five-notemotif, which appearson clarinetsand bassoonsat b. 20 of the firstmovementof Mahler's Fourth Symphony. 17. The 'high B' referred o by Adorno is most certainlythat on the cellos in b. 94, the high point of this 'counter-subject' i.e., the five-notemotif referred to in note 16 above) as it is ultimatelyextended in the cellos in bs 90-101. Adorno seems to have expected a lot from his audience,that they should be able to make this connectionon the spot, from the rathersparseindications he gives. 18. See note 6. easy to find a satisfactory ranslation Auflosung, s it can mean, 19. among other things, disintegration,solution, and also liquidation. I have decided on dissolution s this is the term used by AlexanderGoehr in his discussion of Schoenberg's Gedankemanuscript (Journal of the Arnold Schoenberg nstitute,Vo. 2, No. 1, pp. F25). It is illuminatingto consider Schoenberg'suse of the term Auflosung as well as of the term liquidieren) the following extractfrom the Gedankemanuscript p. 24): Dissolution [Auflosung] s the exact counterpartof establishment [Aufstellung], irm formation,shaping. If in these the main objective is, through variationof the basic shapes [Gestalten],to bring out their characteristics s sharplyas possible, to interconnect he single Gestalten s closelyas possible,to keepthe tensionamong the tones high, the most importantthing in dissolutionis to drop all characteristics fast as possible, to let the tensions run off and to liquidate [liquidieren]he obligations of the former Gestaltenin such way that there will be, so to speak,a 'cleanslate', so that th possibilityfor the appearance f othermaterials given. USIC ANALYSIS 1: 2, 1982

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