Encounter with The Other: The Serialists and The Spectralists

https://doi.org/10.22146/jksks.57953

Dionysius Arya Nataraja(1*)

(1) Bennington College
(*) Corresponding Author

Abstract


Musik kontemporer di Paris pada tahun 1970an didominasi oleh musik serial, dan spektralisme hadir memberi alternatif. Di tulisan ini, saya berargumen bahwa fenomena naiknya musik spektral ini bukan hanya sekedar masalah domestik musik kontemporer Eropa, tetapi fenomena ini berkaitan erat dengan masalah hubungan dengan yang “Liyan”, termasuk dengan budaya musik non-Barat. Dalam analisis saya, saya menemukan tendensi pada komposer musik serial untuk menjadi eksklusif melalui apa yang saya sebut mekanisme Othering, yang muncul pada tulisan-tulisan Schoenberg dan Boulez. Sebaliknya, komposer spektral menunjukkan sikap yang lebih inklusif terhadap musik di luar musik kontemporer Eropa. Musik spektral menawarkan terobosan dalam cara pandang terhadap musik, baik dalam ranah teknis mau pun kultural. Sebagai contoh, menggunakan spektrum inharmonik untuk basis komposisi daripada spektrum harmonik—spektrum harmonik sering digunakan sebagai landasan teori untuk membingkai musik non-Barat sebagai “alami” dan “belum tersentuh”. Contoh lain adalah memblurkan perbedaan antara warnanada dan harmoni, di mana konsep ini memperluas konsep harmoni, hingga tidak terbatas pada definisi harmoni klasik Eropa. Musik spektral membuka jalan baru untuk menghadapi pertanyaan-pertanyaan tentang inklusivitas.

 The Parisian contemporary music scene was dominated by serial music in the 1970s, and spectral music came to provide a musical alternative. In this essay, I argue that the rise of spectral music is not merely a domestic phenomenon within the European contemporary music scene, but that it is deeply tied with the issues of Othering, including the relationship with non-Western musical cultures. My analysis points out the tendency of exclusivity of the serialists via what I call mechanisms of Othering, as appears in the writings of Schoenberg and Boulez. On the contrary, the view and approach of the spectral composers tend to be more inclusive towards various musical system. Spectral music proposes viewpoints that are groundbreaking on the technical and cultural level. For example, putting the focus on the inharmonic spectra as a compositional basis, which negates the obsession towards the harmonic spectra, as it is often used as a theoretical justification to frame non-Western music as being “natural” and “untouched”. Another example, blurring the distinction between timbre 

 


Keywords


orientalism, postcolonialism, composition, serialism, spectralism

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References

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.22146/jksks.57953

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