It’s interesting what you say about responding to Carter emotionally. I actually find that I respond to his music in this way much more than I do to that of dodecaphonic peers such as Babbitt. Is it, I wonder, because the structures Carter builds from his tetrachords feel, to me, more “instinctive”, and, yes, more lyrical on occasion, than structures built rigidly on units of a 12-note chromatic series? I’m not indicating that I think lyricism and dodecaphony are antithetical, incidentally, just that the one appears to be much harder to achieve with the other than with certain alternative compositional techniques.
Unlock with Patreon
It’s interesting what you say about responding to Carter emotionally. I actually find that I respond to his music in this way much more than I do to that of dodecaphonic peers such as Babbitt. Is it, I wonder, because the structures Carter builds from his tetrachords feel, to me, more “instinctive”, and, yes, more lyrical on occasion, than structures built rigidly on units of a 12-note chromatic series? I’m not indicating that I think lyricism and dodecaphony are antithetical, incidentally, just that the one appears to be much harder to achieve with the other than with certain alternative compositional techniques.