UDC: 78.01 781.6 COBISS.SR-ID 258596620
Received: Nov 3, 2017/
Reviewed: Jan 15, 2018/
Accepted: Feb 2, 2018
Control and Chance in music and art
A survey of philosophies
Shuang Cai
Department of Piano Performance, Sichuan Conservatory of Music, China
Department of Piano Performance, Sichuan Conservatory of Music, China
Acknowledgments
The idea for comparing these particular articles stemmed from Dr. Jeongwon Joe, the co-author of the final article examined. I would also like to thank Dr. Matthew Quick for his helpful suggestions and assistance in editing.
Citation:
Cai, Shuang. 2018. "Control and Chance in Music and Art: A Survey of Philosophies." Accelerando Belgrade Journal of Music and Dance 3:1 |
Abstract
This article is a survey and review of several writings on the philosophies and compositional techniques involving control and chance in the creation of modern art and music. The purpose of discussing and comparing these writings is to trace different understandings, reactions, and interpretations of these philosophies in order to offer a more informed perspective on these oft misunderstood techniques. The first article analyzed is Robert Charles Clark’s “Total Control and Chance in Musics: A Philosophical Analysis,” which discusses fundamental issues regarding both total control and chance music. The second article, Stephanie Ross’ “Chance, Constraint, and Creativity: The Awfulness of Modern Music,” presents some of the adverse reactions to these methods of composition. The third and fourth articles, Roland Barthes’ “The Death of the Author” and “From Work to Text,” offer a broader philosophical viewpoint on the different roles of the author and their product when creating art. The final article, Jeongwon Joe and S. Hoon Song’s “Roland Barthes’ ‘Text’ and Aleatoric Music: Is the ‘Birth of the Reader’ the Birth of the Listener?” concludes this survey by tying Barthes’ concepts back to music.
Keywords: chance music, modern art, aleatoric music, methods of composition, serialism, determinism |
Robert Charles Clark
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Belgrade Center for Music and Dance is the publisher of Accelerando: BJMD
Belgrade Center for Music and Dance is the publisher of Accelerando: BJMD