[SMT-PAIG] Expressive shaping of sound

Mon May 3 10:28:26 PDT 2021

Thanks Tekla and John for both of your helpful pointers!

John, I may paraphrase your story about teaching Shostakovich and cite it as personal communication, if you don’t mind, and yes, please do send me the relevant chapters.

With best wishes,

John

*PS: Please get enough sleep. Missing sleep knocks down your immune system. Even mild sleep deprivation makes it more likely to get a cold virus. (Google it…)
I’ll be adding this tag to my emails until it seems like this message is getting out enough.

___________________________________
John Paul Ito
Associate Professor of Music Theory
Director of Graduate Studies
www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/johnito/<http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/johnito/>
[signature_2005761210]<http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/johnito/research/FIT/FIT.html>

School of Music
Carnegie Mellon University
5000 Forbes Ave.
Pittsburgh, PA 15213

HOA 139
412.268.1246
412.268.1431 (FAX)

From: PAIG <paig-bounces at lists.societymusictheory.org> on behalf of John Lawrence <johnyilawrence at gmail.com>
Date: Friday, April 30, 2021 at 3:05 PM
To: "paig at lists.societymusictheory.org" <paig at lists.societymusictheory.org>
Subject: Re: [SMT-PAIG] Expressive shaping of sound

John,

Regarding covers and the like: Victoria Malawey has some great discussion of how vocal timbre affects meaning in different covers in Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” in Chapter 2 of A Blaze of Light in Every Word. If mashups interest you too, I recommend Kyle Adams's article "What Did Danger Mouse Do?," which is about The Grey Album.

Regarding Shostakovich: I've actually twice taught a class session on the question of sincerity vs. sarcasm in the finale of Shostakovich's Fifth. (I try to teach comparative recording analysis in most of my classes for non-majors, especially, since they find that more accessible than most of the more standard topics, such as form.) I provided a little bit of background on the issue, and then gave them Bernstein's and Rostropovich's recordings, asking them to identify and discuss the moments where the performances seem to reflect divergent attitudes towards the emotional content of the music. However, I didn't tell them that Bernstein takes the music at face value and Rostropovich is being ironic. And most of my students have thought it was the other way around! They interpreted Rostropovich's labored coda as representing struggle towards triumph, and they found Bernstein's fast tempo to be too glib to represent genuine triumph (like someone faking / going through the motions).

Regarding the general phenomenon of performances altering the perceived content of classical music: Dorottya Fabian’s article "Analyzing Difference in Recordings of Bach’s Violin Solos with a Lead from Gilles Deleuze" explores a wide array of parameters worth considering (although, I must admit, my perception of Grumiaux’s and Milstein’s styles is the reverse of hers). And at the risk of self-aggrandizement, I'll mention that this general issue was one of the main topics of my dissertation (specifically with regards to how lines seems to interact with each other). I'm happy to send you the relevant chapters.

John Lawrence

On Apr 30, 2021, at 12:48 PM, paig-request at lists.societymusictheory.org<mailto:paig-request at lists.societymusictheory.org> wrote:

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  1. Expressive shaping of sound (John Paul Ito)

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Date: Fri, 30 Apr 2021 16:47:58 +0000
From: John Paul Ito <itojp at cmu.edu>
To: "paig at lists.societymusictheory.org"
<paig at lists.societymusictheory.org>
Subject: [SMT-PAIG] Expressive shaping of sound
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Hi everyone,

With apologies to those of you who will have seen my full message on SMT Discuss, I wanted to bring one small, targeted request to this group.

I?m looking for literature on the topic of the way in which specific performance inflections can steer the meaning and expression of music in one direction or another.  For example, how might a performance of Shostakovich?s Fifth Symphony take a position on its being either triumphant or sarcastic?  Or, how can a cover or a remix of a pop song change meaning and expression in relation to the original?  I?d be happy to hear about insightful discussions of any kind, including in magazine articles, record reviews, etc.

Thanks for any leads, and hope you?re all well,

John

*PS: Please get enough sleep. Missing sleep knocks down your immune system. Even mild sleep deprivation makes it more likely to get a cold virus. (Google it?)
I?ll be adding this tag to my emails until it seems like this message is getting out enough.

___________________________________
John Paul Ito
Associate Professor of Music Theory
Director of Graduate Studies
www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/johnito/<http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/johnito/>
[signature_794049318]<http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/johnito/research/FIT/FIT.html>

School of Music
Carnegie Mellon University
5000 Forbes Ave.
Pittsburgh, PA 15213

HOA 139
412.268.1246
412.268.1431 (FAX)
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