Henry Cowell之作曲理論研究以Quartet Romantic (1915-17)為例

Henry Cowell's Quartet Romantic and His Compositional Theory

10.29873/GMJ.200606.0002

楊聿聖(Yu-Sheng Yang)

新音樂素材 ； 浪漫四重奏 ； 聲部交換 ； 不諧和對位 ； New Musical Resources ； Quartet Romantic ； Stimmtausch ； Dissonant counterpoint ； Charles Seeger

關渡音樂學刊

4期（2006 / 06 / 01）

27 - 73

繁體中文

本文探討美國作曲家Henry Cowell年輕時的作曲理論與實踐，也就是他剛進入加州大學柏克萊分校那段期間，跟隨作曲家兼音樂學家Charles Seeger學習時的創作與理論著作。 鑒於中文資料匱乏，本文從Cowell年輕時的求學背景開始探討，接著摘要介紹理論著作《新音樂素材》，然後對《浪漫四重奏》進行詳細的分析，從中可以發現這部作品具有初期的序列主義傾向，而也可以發現Charles Seeger以作曲家身分對年輕Cowell的諸多影響，並探討Seeger以及Cowell在無調音樂寫作手法上和當時歐洲作曲家如Schoenberg間之相關性。

Henry Cowell's Quartet Romantic was composed between 1915 and 1917. In this quartet, he developed a well-known system which uses a pre-composed 4-part harmonic theme, thentranslates pitches from it into note-length subdivisions. However, Cowell only provided onethirdof this harmonic theme and he also roughly ignored the deviation of the frequency ratios between just intonation and overtone series, making it difficult to reconstruct the entire harmonic theme. This article will reconstruct the rest of the harmonic theme. Despite the confusion, this method of composition which uses a pre-composed material as referential elements, provides not only a rhythmic framework in the first movement but also the melodic contour of the subjects in the second movement, foreshadowing some methods of serial composition. As Cowell has suggested in the preface of the score, he composed the pitch materials in the two movements of this quartet by using dissonant counterpoint. This article will point out that how dissonant counterpoint works differently in the two movements. In addition, dissonant counterpoint was first theorized by Charles Seeger in 1930, but it was also discussed in Cowell's New Musical Resources without mention of his teacher, Seeger's name. What is the difference between these two? Through the author's analysis of Quartet Romantic, the first intention of this article is to examine Cowell's theory with its later development in the context of 20th century European atonal music and serialism, while the second deals with the aesthetics of listening to and performing such a puzzling music.

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