The first in-depth historical overview of how spectral music arose in France: the most influential European compositional movement of the past fifty years.

The first in-depth historical overview of spectral music, which is widely regarded, alongside minimalism, as one of the two most influential compositional movements of the last fifty years. Charting spectral music's development in France from 1972 to 1982, this ground-breaking study establishes how spectral music's innovations combined existing techniques from post-war music with the use of information technology. The first section focuses on Gérard Grisey, showing how he creatively developed techniques from Messiaen, Xenakis, Ligeti, Stockhausen and Boulez towards a distinctive style of music based on groups of sounds mutating in time. The second section shows how a wider generation of young composers centred on the Parisian collective L'Itinéraire developed a common vision of music embracing seismic developments in in psychoacoustics and computer sound synthesis. Framed against institutional and political developments in France, spectral music is shown as at once an inventive artistic response to the information age and a continuation of the French colouristic tradition.

The first biography of the composer Gérard Grisey shows how the artist's sensuality and rigor came together to form the musical genre known as spectralism. The French composer Gérard Grisey (1946-98) changed the course of music history with his small but potent output. Labeled "spectral" music, his compositions looked to the physics of sound and the capacities of human perception for material and inspiration. Born in Belfort, Grisey was the son of a French Resistance veteran turned car mechanic and a homemaker. His first instrument was as humble as his background: the accordion. But Grisey rose from his provincial background to the heights of his profession. This first biography of Grisey traces his journey from rigid Catholicism to broader mysticism; his studies in Olivier Messiaen's legendary composition class; the development of the first "spectral" works in the 1970s; Grisey's stint teaching at the University of California at Berkeley, during which he suffered severe depression; the development of his late, post-spectral style; and his untimely death at the age of 52, shortly after completing his masterpiece on death, the Four Songs for Crossing the Threshold. Drawing on original archival research, interviews with more than fifty of Grisey's colleagues, friends, and lovers, and the study of previously overlooked sketches, this biography shows the delirium and form at the heart of Grisey's life and art--the structured sensuality that allowed him to revolutionize the music of the twentieth century.

This dissertation provides aesthetic and historical perspectives of the French spectral music and offers an analysis of Gérard Grisey's late work Vortex Temporum I and II, which was written in 1994-96 and is dedicated to Gérard Zinsstag, Salvatore Sciarrino, and Helmut Lachenmann. Chapter One is an introduction to the spectral movement, including the characteristics of spectral music and the biographies of three generations of select spectralists. The remainder of this chapter demonstrates certain essential techniques that influence the musical style of Grisey. A brief introduction to the life of Grisey and some trademarks of Grisey's oeuvres are presented in Chapter Two. Time concepts, an important facet of Grisey's work in general, indicated in Grisey's essay "Tempus ex Machina" is also outlined here. In Chapter Three, I present an analysis of the first and second movements of Vortex Temporum, a composition for chamber ensemble, consisting of six players: piano, flute (picc/alto/C/bass), Bb clarinet (bass clarinet), violin, viola, and violoncello. In my analysis, I look at aspects of the work such as its basis in various waveforms and how contrasts are formed through use of register, and Grisey's innovative approach to the temporal parameter. I also investigate the convergence of Grisey's spectral attitude and traditional Western classical music in the analysis.

Marilyn Nonken finds precedent in the works of pianist-composers Liszt, Scriabin and Debussy for spectral attitudes towards the musical experience.

The famous quip I don't know much about art, but I know what I like sums up many people's ideas about how to judge a work of art; but there are inherent limitations if we rely on immediate impressions in judging what should be enduring products of our culture. While some might criticize this as a return to elitism, Joshua Fineberg argues that without some way of determining intrinsic value, there can be no movement forward for creators or their audience. He draws on contemporary thought about Design space and Universal Grammar to show how intrinsic values can be rediscovered. He then looks at the importance of multimedia in allowing multiple points of entry for the discovering of new works, finally showing how the composer can Design music for human beings--creating a kind of art that can preserve the research agenda of conceptual work without renouncing the understanding of human listeners and performers embodied by craft. Classical Music: Why Bother? will intrigue all listeners of contemporary music, students of musical thought, and composers-but it will also interest students of contemporary aesthetics. It answers the age-old question How can we bring a new audience to contemporary art? - and challenges both the creators and their audience to broaden their ideas about what is valuable and lasting in today's culture.