Head

Prof. Dr. Albrecht Riethmüller

Research Associates

Dr. Peter Moormann / Dr. Frédéric Döhl / Dr. Julia Schröder

Student Assistants

Franziska Kollinger  / Christoph Weyer

Objective

The goal of Project Section B4 is to explore the consequences of aesthetic diversification on musical experience today. The study will examine the tension between aesthetic experience and the crystallization of musical judgment by focusing on three paradigmatic areas of inquiry: Subproject (UP) 1 delves into the trend of referential composing and investigates its procedures and impacts. Subproject 2 surveys the changes in the status and function of concert audiences today, while Subproject 3 ponders the phenomenon of the conductor Gustavo Dudamel within the context of art, media, society, and politics.

Subproject 1: Composing with Referential Material: Procedures and Repercussions

(Dr. Frédéric Döhl, EA; Prof. Dr. Albrecht Riethmüller, GA)

Within the field of contemporary music, Subproject 1 focuses on the significant trend of composing with borrowed material. This so-called referential composing is based on the utilization of pre-existing music or material by third parties for one’s own creative purposes. The starting point of this research is the observation that the well-established practice of employing a reference (quote, analogy, adaptation, allusion, fusion, parody, etc.) has grown exponentially in the production of music today. It has mutated from a quantitative to a qualitative change with regards to both the artistic procedure and, more importantly, to the crucial legal consequences stemming from this type of amalgamated creative process. Composers in this niche share the attitude that all previously existing music is potentially transportable into one’s own musical language, and they take an unfettered access to the works of others for granted. The borrowed musical material, however, is meant to become so independent that its ability to be perceived as a reference recedes as much as possible within the overall aesthetic experience of the music. The aim then is to redefine one area of the compositional procedure by relativization of its perhaps most significant trait.

The study is divided into two parts. One area focuses on the delineation of this compositional trend with regard to its procedures, conceptualizations, and avenues of circulation. The other analyzes the reaction of jurisprudence, specifically of lawyers and judges who have experience in the area of intellectual property, since their determinations carry the most weight and provide far-reaching consequences for those involved in this field of activity.

Subproject 2: The Positioning of the Concert Listener

(Dr. Julia H. Schröder)

For half a century, since musical happenings and promenade concerts came into existence, much experimentation has been devoted to freeing up the boundaries of the traditional concert ritual and to determining anew the interaction between the listener, performers, and music. The goal of this subproject is to examine the current state of these attempts by way of the richly diverse concert life in Berlin, with the intent to assess the degree to which the listeners’ position in concerts—where they are specifically located in a hall as well as the status they are accorded as listeners—has truly changed.

To these innovative concert formats belong concerts with a freely moving public; concerts in which the composition is repeated, whereby the listeners change their seats; and concerts that dispense with the concert hall in favor of a public space—all format changes that implicitly and explicitly alter our conceptions about the process of listening to music. How a concert is staged, which refers to both its framing and its former traits, becomes more important. Such staged concerts introduce a wide range of experiential concepts, from the inclusion of visual aspects, e.g., special lighting or wandering musicians, to performances in utter darkness that heighten the auditory experience. Various dissolutions of artistic boundaries will also be examined: the distinction between separate genres, as in the transference of musical gesture toward a non-functional aesthetic or dance-like movement (Xavier LeRoy’s choreography of a composition by Helmut Lachenmann, 2005); placing concerts in public spaces (performances in Berlin’s central train station, 2010); and among musical styles (programming early and modern music together, or when a program of Baroque music undergoes an after-concert remix by a DJ).

The research will primarily focus on spatial aspects of the concert situation which by design are co-dependent on inherently musical factors. One hypothesis in circulation asserts that the transformations in concert format result in novelties in programming and that they have an impact on the types and forms of newly commissioned compositions. Emerging theories will then be compared to typologies of listening which have been developed in music sociology and music psychology. 

Subproject 3: The Dudamel Project

(Dr. Peter Moormann)

Gustavo Dudamel, born in Venezuela, is one of the world’s most sought-after conductors. As musical director of the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra, the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and, most recently, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, he has become a symbolic figure for a new generation of classical music fans. Due to his passion and social involvement, he has drawn a younger audience into the world of classical music, whereby the media interest in the 30-year-old star Dudamel has played a pivotal role. Marketing strategies of pop music have been utilized by the classical music sector to capitalize on the conductor’s media presence.

The starting point for the media interest in Dudamel began with his musical background. He is a product of the “Sistema de Orquestas Juveniles de Venezuela” (El Sistema), a national music education program for socially disadvantaged youth, with the goal of broadening their perspective and prospects in life. Dudamel became the conductor of this youth orchestra alreadyat the age of 18. While serving in this capacity it became a personal agenda, so to speak, for him to combine classical music with other genres such as folk music and jazz. Mirroring his social involvement that began with El Sistema, he continues his involvement with young musicians to this day, for instance, with the Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles (YOLA) and in pilot projects in Sweden and Scotland. A German equivalent entitled “For Every Child an Instrument” has also been formed. Conversely, these endeavours beg the question as to whether the social, political, and historical motivations informing such patronage amount to a form of political instrumentation. The interaction between this type of musical potential, the media, and various social strategies form the methodological framework of this subproject.