Between history and nature: Theories of material in European serialism

The technique of serialism was accorded unrivaled aesthetic prestige by composers and music theorists in Europe in the 1950s and 1960s, and central to the writings on serialism were theories of musical material. In the postwar effort to dismantle traditional compositional techniques and build a new music from the most basic elements, the concept of material was seized upon and invested with the intellectual concerns of the period. Theories of material, therefore, are informed by implicit belief systems that reach across disciplines: they frame the arena in which aesthetics, philosophy of history, and, in some cases, sociological theory are brought to bear upon compositional technique. This disciplinary richness is often laced with appeals to history and nature, which are used to justify the prescriptive and proscriptive import of theory. This dissertation examines theories of musical material from the postwar period, analyzes their explicit and implicit content, and shows how they are informed by conceptions of history and nature. Fundamental links between material, history, and nature emerge in the etymology of the word "material," which is reconstructed in the first chapter. Although it figured in music theory long before the postwar period, the concept of material became essential to the discourse on serialism partly due to the writings of Theodor W. Adorno, who was widely read in Europe at the time. The second and third chapters of this dissertation present a detailed study of Adorno's theory of musical material and an account of the complex history of his reception among postwar composers. The fourth chapter examines the discourse about material in numerous theoretical texts on serialism by influential composers and theorists writing in the 1950s and beyond. Theories of material are the key to a critical understanding of postwar serialism, for they provide the space in which its principal concerns coalesce. There are no extensive studies of the concept of material in serial theory. This dissertation aims to remedy that lack and to demonstrate the significance theories of material had for European serialism.