Mobile Form/Moment Time
Music with structure that is not fully determined
- Representative composers:
- Earle Brown
- Roman Haubenstock-Ramati
- Karlheinz Stockhausen
__MOBILE FORM AND MOMENT TIME__
Although quite similar and often grouped together in the one work Mobile form (also known as Open Form) and Moment Time are viewed, and are often spoken of, as different aspects within the music. Mobile/Open Form is distinguished more by its particular elements that make up the music as it is seen on a score and played by the performer, whereas, Moment Time is distinguished more by the unique characteristics that make up the music that is heard by the listener. Therefore, it can be conceived that:
Mobile Form can be the same as Moment Time
HOWEVER
Mobile Form can be linear, unlike the Discontinuity of Moment Time,
AND
Moment Time can be a determined composition, unlike the indeterminacy of Mobile Form.
MOBILE/OPEN FORM
Collins Gem Thesaurus
Mobile-
- Itinerant, migrant, movable, peripatetic, portable, travelling, wandering.
- Changeable, ever-changing, expressive.
Heinemann Australian Dictionary
Mobile - adj. Able to move or be moved.
In Mobile Form this definition applies to the musical segments which make up the pieces form.
This Form, similar to Aleatory music is best understood as a subcategory of Indeterminate music.
Joseph Machlis in his book Introduction to Contemporary Music states:
"In aleatory music - the term is derived from the Latin word for dice - the overall course of the work is fixed, with the details left up to the performers' choice or chance. Conversely, open form indicates music in which the details are fixed but the sequence of the larger formal events is determined by choice or chance." (Machlis, pp450)
Two Types of Mobile Form
- CHOICE - A decision made by the performer determines the order of the given musical segments within a piece.
- CHANCE - A chance operation, such as rolling a dice, determines the order of the given musical segments within a piece.
Choice
The first of these two types, Choice, is again sub-categorised into two sections
- Those that rely upon a spur-of-the-moment decision by the performer - Example 1
- Those that rely upon a more considered choice prior to a performance - Example 2
Example 1
"Earle Brown is perhaps best known for his 'open form' works, typified by Available Forms I (1961) and Available Forms II (1962)... Brown was intrigued by the fact that the materials of the mobile never changed, but 'you never see it in the same configuration.' With his open form works, he set out to create 'a piece that never repeats itself, but is the same material all the time.'"
"Available Forms I consists of six unbound pages which specify four or five events, and requires two conductors. Each conductor can begin on any page with any event, thereby constructing the work from the available materials. With works like Available Forms I, he created a form in which the content was predetermined, but the relationships between the different parts constantly change. Similar principles are found in his Available Forms II and Event: Synergy II." (Database of Recorded American Music, 2006).
Audio Example of Available Forms I:
04 Available Forms I.wma
Corresponding score example to Available Forms I:
Example 2
"Boulez’s Piano Sonata No.3, suggests a more considered choice. The sonata is in five parts, which may be played in any of several permutations, and each part contains sections, which may be variously ordered and/or omitted." (Oxford University Press, 2006)
Audio Example of Piano Sonata No.3
Five Movements
- Troisieme Sonate: Glose
- Troisieme Sonate: Texte
- Troisieme Sonate: Parenthese
- Troisieme Sonate: Commentaire
- Troisieme Sonate: Constellation - Miroire
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00000147K/202-1250472-9130250?v=glance&n=229816
Chance
The second of these types, Chance, has characteristics that were employed by Mozart in his composition Musikalisches Wurfilspiel (also known as Mozart's Dice Game) long before this music was categorized into Mobile Form.
"His Musikalisches Würfelspiel was a dice game where the results of throws choose amongst possible prewritten bars of music. Depending upon the numbers thrown, different, but similar, pieces can result." (Brown, A and Sorensen, A.2006)
MozartDiceGame.mid
Obviously a complete understanding of this work would only be possible with reference to the score or further recordings, but this audio sample may give reference to future listenings of this piece.
There is a mixed opinion as to whether or not works with moving forms, such as this, are really categorised under Mobile Form. Many consider the forms only determined by choice to be true Open Forms, and any form of chance is strictly aleatory music.
"Perhaps because of his background in jazz and his work with John Cage, Brown was very careful to avoid facile comparisons between what he was trying to accomplish with his open form works and aleatoric music, saying, in essence, that his music offered choice, not chance: 'There's a huge difference between improvisation (spontaneous decisions) and chance.' He did, however, admit that he was 'trying to provoke classically trained musicians to improvise by taking away rhythmic information from them.'" (Database of Recorded American Music, 2006).
Leigh Landy in Experimental Music Notebooks makes the observation that,
"The problem with open form is that without any visual information, and assuming a listener does not get the chance to hear a work several times within a reasonably short period of time, it is often impossible to recognize that a form is open. The version becomes 'the work' in fixed form for a listener." (Landy, pp94)
Stockhausen once described,
“The ideal mobile form, requires that the work’s mobility be apparent on only one hearing.” (Kramer(1981), pp547)
This is where the desire for unified elements of both the mobile form and moment time come into place.
MOMENT TIME
Heinemann Australian Dictionary
Moment - noun. A particular point in time
As the definition of moment suggests, the focus in moment time is on a particular point in time creating a vertical sound or a continual 'now'.
Who first thought of it?
- The term Moment Time was first given by Stockhausen, which was a progression from his earlier Group Form.
- His first composition under the title of Moment Time was Kontakte, however, over the next year his compositional ideas with Moment Time expanded, and were slightly modified.
- These compositional ideas reflected the practices of composers, such as Debussy, Stravinsky, Webern, Varese, and above all, Messian.
Musical Characteristics of Moment Time
- No 'beginning' - just starts
- No 'ending' - just finishes
- No directional pull to a climax
- Continually focused on the now
- Generally, but not specifically, written in mobile/open form
- Made up of moments
- Avoidance of functional implications between moments eg. cadences, voice leading
- Discontinuity
Jonathan D. Kramer in his article, Moment Form in Twentieth Century Music, states:
"Moment forms verticalise time, render every moment a Now, avoid functional implications between moments, and avoid climaxes they are not beginning-middle-end forms. Although the piece must start for simple practical reasons, it may not begin; it must stop, but it may not end." (Kramer, pp180)
Every Moment
Each moment has its own characteristics, which need to be in place to effectively create a work in Moment Time. They are as follows -
- Each moment should be a complete entity within itself.
"Every present moment counts, as well as no moment at all; a given moment is not merely regarded as the consequence of the previous one and the prelude to the coming one, but as something individual, independent and centred in itself, capable of existing on its own. An instant does not need to be just a particle of measured duration." (Kramer, pp179)
- Each moment must be incredibly contrasted to the other, yet still identifiable as belonging to the same piece.
"The contrast between moments must all but annihilate by comparison any incidental contrast within moments, yet the moments must still seem to belong to the same piece." (Kramer, pp548)
- Each moment should have some form of linearity and tonality, in order to clearly hear the discontinuity when it occurs.
"The power of discontinuity is most potent in tonal music, which is the music par excellence of motion and continuity. Harmonically defined goals and linear priorities for voice-leading provide norms of continuity against which discontinuities gain their power." (Kramer, pp177)
A Musical Example
Klavierstucke XI, composed by Stockhausen, is a great listening example of Moment Time. Composed by the founder of this musical genre, Klavierstucke XI employs many of the characteristics discussed.
Audio Example of Klavierstucke XI
http://qutmusic.pbwiki.com/f/sandis%20super%20stockhausen%20sample.wav
REFERENCE LIST
Brown, A and Sorensen, A.(2006) "Mozart Dice Game." Retrieved 21 August 2006, from http://jmusic.ci.qut.edu.au/jmtutorial/MozartDiceGame.html.
Database of Recorded American Music. (2006). "The Art of Earle Brown." Retrieved 21 August 2006, from http://dram.nyu.edu/mt/dram-featured/archives/2006/08/the_art_of_earl.html.
Earle Brown Music Foundation (2006). "Earle Brown - composer." Retrieved 21 August 2006, from http://www.earle-brown.org/.
Kramer, J. D. (1978). "Moment form in Twentieth Century Music." The Musical Quarterly 64(2): 177 - 194. UK: Oxford University Press.
Kramer, J. D. (1981). "New Temporalities in Music." Critical Inquiry 7(3): 539 - 556.
Holland, M. (1995). "Heinemann Australian Dictionary." Port Melbourne: Rigby Heinemann.
Landy, L. (1994). Experimental music notebooks. Chur, Switzerland.
Machlis, J. (1980). Introduction to contemporary music. London :, Dent.
Oxford University Press. (2006) "Grove Online, Aleatory mobile form." Retrieved 21 August 2006, from http://www.grovemusic.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/shared/views/article.html?section=music.00509.4
Welsh, J. P. (1967). "Open Form and Earle Brown's Modules I and II." Seattle, WA: Perspectives of Music, University of Washington.
(word Count- 700 by Sandi, 750 of quotes)
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