Composing the Modern Subject: Four String Quartets by Dmitri Shostakovich 0754658848, 9780754658849

Citation preview

COMPOSING THE MODEN SUBJECT: FOUR STING QURTETS BY DMITRI SHOSTKOVICH

Composing the Modem Subject: Four String Quartets by Dmitri Shostakovich

SARAH EICHADT Universiy of Oklahoma, USA

ASH GATE

© Sarah Reichardt 2008 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or trnsmitted in any om or by any means, electronic, mechanical, pho tocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior pemission of the publisher. Srah Reichardt has asserted her moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act,. 1 988, to be identiied as the author of this work. Published by Ashgate Publishing Limited Gower House Crot Road Aldershot Hampshire GUl 1 3HR England

Ashgate Publishing Company Suite 420 IO l Cherry Street Burlington, VT 0540 1 -4405 USA

www. �shgate.com British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Reichardt, Sarah Jne, 1 9 7 1 Composing the modem subj ect : our string quartets b y Dmitri Shostakovich I. Shostakovich, Dmitrii Dmitrievich, 1 906 -1 975. Quartets , string, nos. 6-9 . 2. String quartet - 20th century I. Title 785. 7 ' 1 94'092 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Reichardt, Sarah Jne, 1 97 1 Composing the modem subject : our string quartets b y Dmitri Shostakovich I Sarah Reichardt. p. cm. Includes bibliographical reerences p. ) and index. ISBN 978-0-7546-5884-9 (alk. paper) I. Shostakovich, Dmitrii Dmitrievich, 1 906-1 975. Quartets, string, no. 6-9. 2. String quartet-20th century. I. Title. ML4 1 0.S53R45 2008 785 ' . 7 1 94092-dc22 200704984 1

ISBN: 978-0-7546-5884-9 Bach musicological ont developed by© Yo Tomita.

J© ;·�F��e�s�:a:h����;i11565 FSC

Mixed Sources

Produt group from well-managed forests and other controlled sources

Prnted and bound n Great Britain by MPG Books Ltd, Bodmin, Conwall.

Contents

List ofFigures List ofMusic Examples Acnowledgements Abbreviations

Introduction: Musical Meaning and Analytical Tools Shostakovich and the Modem Subj ect

vii x xi xiii

1 5

The End that is no End: Cadences and Closure in the Sixth String Qutet, Op. 1 0 1 ( 1 956)

17

3

The Space Between: Codas, Death and the Seventh String Quartet, Op. 1 08 ( 1 960)

43

4

Musical Hauntings : The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostakovich's Eighth String Quartet, Op. 1 1 0 ( 1 960)

69

5

The Indivisible Remainder: Novelization in the Ninth String Quartet, Op. 1 1 7 ( 1 964)

99

2

Epilogue: Music and the Real

1 17

Bibliography Indx

121 127

List of Figres

1.1

The Lacanian triangle

10

2. 1 2.2 2.3

Quartet No. 6, irst movement: overview Quartet No. 6, second movement: overview Quartet No. 6, third movement: table of scoring

24 31 32

3.1 3 .2

Quartet No. 7 , irst movement: overview Quartet No. 7, large-scale sonata om

44 58

4. 1 4.2

Quartet No. 8, irst movement: overview Quartet No. 8, second movement: overview

75 79

5.1

Quartet No. 9; ith movement: overview

1 07

List of Music Examples

2. 1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7

Quartet No. 6, irst movement, primary-theme zone (P) of the irst movement Quartet No. 6, irst movement, inal measures Quartet No. 6, irst movement, transition rom development to recapitulation Quartet No. 6, second movement, inal measures Quartet No. 6, third movement, passacaglia theme Quartet No. 6 , third movement, inal measures Quartet No. 6, ourth movement, inal measures

18 20 28 33 35 37 40

Quartet No. 7 , irst movement, coda Quartet No. 7, irst movement, transition rom exposition to recapitulation Quartet No. 7, irst movement, primary theme (Theme A) Quartet No. 7, third movement, coda Quartet No. 7, second movement, inal measures Quart et No. 7, third movement, introduction Quartet No. 7, irst movement, transition rom P to S Quartet No. 7, third movement, ugue subject Quatet No. 7, third movement, stretto section of ugue Quartet No. 7 , thr d movement, retun of Theme A at climax of the ugue Quartet No. 7, third movement, opening of the postlude

43

72 76 77 80 81 84 86

4.9 4. 1 0 4. 1 1 4. 1 2

Quartet No. 8, irst movement, opening measures Quartet No. 8, irst movement, quotation rom Symphony No. 1 Quartet No. 8, irst movement, inal measures Quartet No. 8, second movement, canon on DSCH Qutet No. 8, third movement, triplet theme Quartet No. 8, third movement, cello theme in the trio Quartet No. 8, ourth movement, opening section (A) Comparison of rhythms: Gotterdimmerung vs. Quartet No. 8, ourth movement Gotterdimmerung: Fate motive Quartet No. 8 , ourth movement, Katerina's aria Quartet :o- 8, ith movement, ugue subj ect nd countersubject Quartet No. 8, ith movement, second and third episodes

5.1 5.2

Quartet No. 9 , ourth movement, A section Quartet No. 9, ourth movement, B section

3.1 3.2 3.3 3 .4 3.5 3 .6 3.7 3.8 3 .9 3.10 3. 1 1 4. 1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 4.8

45 45 50 53 55 57 57 62 64 65

86 87 88 91 91 1 05 1 05

x

Composing the Moden Subject

5.3 5 .4 5.5 5.6 5.7 58 5.9 5.10 .

Quartet No. Quartet No. Quartet No. Quartet No. Quartet No. Quartet No. Quartet No. Quartet No.

9, ith movement, irst theme of S (S1) 9, ith movement, S2 cello melody 9, ith movement, ugue subject 9, ourth movement, C3 section 9, ith movement, cy clic ren of iv 9, ith m ovement, opening· measures 9, ith movement, R. 98. 1 3-14 9, ith movement, inal measures

1 08 1 09 1 09 1 10 111 1 13 1 13 1 14

Acknowledgements

One ofthe underlying themes in this book is the inability oflinguistic discourse to ully articulate the wh ole of our lived experience. The. insuiciency of language becomes evident when attempting to convey gratitude to others or support and assistance. The words "acknowledgement" and "thank you" seem awully inadequate, yet these terms are what I have to work with and thus to the ollowing people I attempt to ofer . my inexpressible gratitude. Trough the years I have been blessed with exceptional mentors, and without their guidance I would never be where I am today. Many people have provided invaluable support, encouragement and assistance; at times quite knowingly and other times unwittingly, during the lengthy progress of this work. I don't know if I always eaned it, but I have tried hard to made good use of it. First and oremost I must thank Jim Buhler, who was, and orever will be, my advisor. He has continued as my mentor long ater his oicial capacity had ended. I am truly lucky to have stumbled onto such a supportive and encouraging guide. Patrick Mccreless read multiple versions of the manuscript and I m deeply grateul or the many years I have received his assistance and support. In addition to commenting on multiple chapters, Sanna Pederson has provided invaluable encouragement and camaraderie over the course of the last ew years; without her I would have been suk. In addition to commenting on various drats of chapters, Judy Kuhn has provided me with invaluable ellowship in the world of Shostakovich studies. I am grateul or her encouragement, timely emails and riendship. Armand Ambrosini read parts of this work and has enthusiastically cheered me on during the course of my jouney. Michael Klein has always been willing to read drats, provide encouragement and answer innumerable questions with little waning. More importantly his quick, constant sense of humor quickly banishes any skewed sense of signiicance music theory may take on in my lie. Steve Bruns, Andrew Dell' Antonio, Susan Jackson, Ken Stephenson, and Michael Lee have all at various times given me exceptional advice along with seemingly unending encouragement and unwavering support. Rob Deemer set most of the musical examples or this work, and or that I am etenally in his debt. Jennier Miller Walker and Gene Willet both provided indispensable support to me during the writing of my dissetation and beyond; without them I never would have produced a work worth revising. My family has seen me trough many years of struggle; while they don't always understand what I do, they remain my biggest supporters. My siblings Rachel Reichardt Saylor and Robert Reichardt have participated in numerous long phone calls over the ye� , and I look orward to the thousands more that are to come. Heidi May and Rosie Phillips at Ashgate have my gratitude or faithully guiding this work to press and or their calm, constant help. Despite the best eforts of those mentioned above, this work will have .a ws-I alone can claim responsibility or any and all errors.

xii

Composing the Moden Subject

The initial drating of the dissertation that would lead to this book was made possible by an A.D. Hutchison Student Endowment Fellowship rom the University of Texas. AJunior Faculty Research Grant rom the University of Oklahoma acilitated the revision process. In a ddition, I would like to thank the School· of Music and the College of Fine Arts at the Un iversity of Oklahoma or generously cover ing my copyright ees. Many thanks to Rachel Saylor or the cover drawing of Shostakovich. , Erlier versions of portions of this book have appeared in the ollowing jounals and collections, to which I am most grateul: Chapter 2 : "The End that is no End: Cadences and Closure in Shostakovich's Sixth String Quartet," in Maciej Jabl on ski and Michael Klein (eds), Interdsciplinay Studies in Musicoloy (Poznan: Poznan Society or Advancement of rts and Sciences, 2005). Chapter 4: "Lie ater the Eighth: The Survival of the Subje ct in the Ninth String Quartet," in Stefan Weiss and Melanie Unseld (eds), Ligaturen, vol. 2 (Hildeshei/ New York: Olms, 2008). ·

Permissions The ollowing Shostakovich examples are reproduced by permission of Boosey Hawkes Music Publishers Ltd:

&

String Quartet No. 6, Op. 1 0 1 © Copyright 1. 957 by Boosey Publishers Ltd.

&

Hawkes Music

String Quartet No. 7, Op. 1 08 © Copyright 1 960 by Boosey Publishers Ltd.

&

Hawkes Music

String Quatet No. 8, Op. 1 1 0 © Copyright 1 96 1 by Boosey Publishers Ltd.

&

Hawkes Music

String Quartet No. 7, Op. 1 1 7 ©Copyright 1 966 by Boosey Publishers Ltd.

&

Hawkes Music

. Abbreviations

Octave designation of musical pitches in this book uses the system adopted by the Acoustical Society of America (ASA) where octaves are numbered rom lowest to high¥ st. In this system middle C is designated by C4. All pitches occurring between C4 and the B a seventh higher (whatever the quality of the seventh) will be ollowed by a 4 (B4). An octave above mi ddle C is C5, an octave below is C3 and so on. Reerences to the scores of String Quartets Nos. 6-9 re made using rehearsal numbers, with the number ollowing the rehearsal number representing the number of measures rom the irst measure of the rehearsal number. For example, R. 3 . 1-2 represents the irst and second measures of rehearsal number 3 , with 3 . 1 being the measure marked by the rehearsal number. When discussing entire sections, such as in igures giving overviews of orms, if only the rehearsal number is given, the section lasts through the entire rehearsal number.

Introduction

Musical Meaning and Analytical Tools

Its [analysis'] task, thereore, is not to describe the work . . . its task, essentially, is to reveal as clearly as possible the poblem of each particular work. "To analyze" means much the same as to become aware of a work as a forceield organized around a problem. Theodor W. Adono 1

The aim of the ollowing study is to orm viable interpretive read ings or our string quartets by Dmitri Shostakovich by balancing hermeneutic critiques with close analytical study. My means or doing so will be to combine standard analytical techniques with a reading of the quartets through the lens of Westen hermeneutic theory. The goal is to urther increase our understanding of this music and its power to hold meaning or a wide variety of audiences, and to demonstrate the viability of the type of analytic/hermeneutic discourse used. While I make use of a wide range of concepts and ideas rom literary criticism, Jacques Lacan's concept of the real, thoroughly discussed in Chapter One, provides the oundation or the critical-theory approach. Various scholars have worked to combine analysis with interpretation, and what ollows is indebted to the precedents set. Nonetheless, the research of a ew in particular ha s signiicantly inluenced this study, as these scholars have ocused on deining how analytical tools can be used to create space or hermeneutical insights. Robet Hatten's seminal works on meaning in the works of Beethoven have laid important groundwork or understanding how musical structure nd m eaning are interrelated.2 In particular, Hatten's concept of musical markedness, thoroughly explored in Musical Meaning in Beethoven, presents a model or recognizing diferences in music and correlating these diferences to meaning. 3 Markedness involves the "asymmerical valuation of an opposition" (29 1 ) . Oten coinciding with the asymetrical valuation is n uneven disribution level, mening the marked term occurs wih less requency than the um arked term (36). By becoming marked, a term "speciies . . . inormation which is not made speciic by the more general, 1 Theodor W. Adono, "On the Problem of Musical nalysis," trns. Max Paddison, in Music Analysis 1 :2 ( 1 982): 1 69-87, here p. 1 8 1 . Adono's italics. 2 Robet Hat:n, Musical Meaning in Beethoven: Markedness, Correlation and Interpretation (Bloomington, 1 994) and Interpeting Musical Gestues, Topics and Topes: Mozart, Beethoven and chubert (Bloomington, 2004). 3 For a ull discussion of markedness in music see Musical Meaning in Beethoven, pp. 29-66. Hatten also provides a basic deinition of markedness on pp. 29 1 -2. See also Haten's Interpreting Musical Gestues, Topics and Topes, pp. 8-1 6.

2

Composing the Moden Subject

unmarked term" (34). A basic example of musical maring is the use ofthe minor mode in the Classical style, where the minor mode is most oten used as an expression of the ragic while the major mode has a more general, nontragic conotation (3 ,-7). Thus, the oppositional terms major nd minor e intepreted as corelating to he meaning of nontragic nd tragic. Th e major/minor opposition is a type of stylistic marking, � s i t arises out o f the use o f the modes within the speciic style. n addition to stylistic marking, Hatten deines marken ess that occurs trough compositional proc� sses. Strategic maring is accomplished hrough thematic placement in a musical work, i.e. when a theme, motive, etc. is somehow oregrounded (see 1 1 2-32). Strategic markng allows the assignation of markedness to elements hat· are not mrked sty listically ( 1 1 7). n Hatten's work strategic marking is closely tied to the type of musical mateial (aperiodic/periodic, stable/unstable, etc.) and its unctional placement within the work. While I do not apply Hatten's concepts with the same amount of subtlety (by distinguishing beween stylistic and strategic mrkedness); the concept ofmarkedness as developed by Hatten is invaluable to a study of this tp e. Hatten relies on the concept ofhistorical competency as a guide or interpretations. Michael Klein, who makes impressive use of Hatten's work, has pointed out the diiculties that arise when tying intepretation to historical competency, as "lacking the historical competency that Haten proposes to reconsruct, his readers are in no historical position to judge this interpretive j ouney."4 Klein argues, "recovering the competency ofthe past can be an attempt to hypostatize interpretation" (28-9). Klein's goal in intepreting Chopin's Fourth Ballade thus is not to attempt to resurrect how the work was understood in Chopin's time, but rather to understand the Ballade's meaning to us in the present day. Likewise, I do not intend to use Hatten's tools to reconstruct some sort of historical competency or understanding Shostakovich, but to help understand how and what the music may mean in an age when the political and social contexts in which they were composed have changed signiicantly. Shostakovich's music is illed with stylistic diversions and oregrounded musical ideas that essentially create moments of musical markedness. This marking of ideas within the music, which tends to create ruptures within the musical d iscourse, can orce the music in a new direction, or a reappraisal of what has previously occurred. As Hatten notes, "Oten it is the idiosyncratic that sparks hermeneutic insight into the expressive signiicance of a musical event."5 James H epokoski and Warren Darcy's generic approach to sonata theory provides a potent model or deining and interpreting structural "deormations," and is increasingly used in approaching Shostakovich's ormal complexities.6 Hepokoski and Darcy's dialogic interpretation of orm, in which the individual compo sition is 4 Michael lein, "Chopin's Fourth Ballade as Musical Narrative," Music Theoy Spectrum, X/l (Spring 2004): 23-55, here p. 28. 5 Hatten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven, p. 1 3 3. 6 James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy, Elements of Sonata Theoy (New York, 2006). Rec ent dissertations by Judith Kn and David Castro apply Hepokoski and Darcy's theories to Shostakovich's ormal structures. See Judith Kn, "Shostakovich in Dialogue: Form and Imagery in the First Six Quartets," Ph.D. Dissertation (University of Manchester, 2005) nd David Castro, "Sonata Form in the Music of Dmitri Shostakovich," Ph.D. Dissertation (University of Oregon, 2005).

Musical Meaning and Analytical Tools

3

considered in comparison to what is normative with respect to he historical style, presents a roadmap or locating and discussing issures within Shostakovich's ormal stuctures. Thus, uses or misu ses of ormal and harmonic paradigms, along with deviations within a composer's own style, become moments or intepretation. By understanding the various orms of the quartet movements trough how they reerence, alter or deny expectations created by Shostakovich's previous work nd traditional Formenlehre, we can gain insights into how the composer is able to alter, expand, contort or create new meanings within the work. One may argue that applying analytical tools designed or understanding tonally unctional music may be considered a malappropriation when used o explore the music of Shostkovich, as his musical lnguage is rather diverse in its use of tonal, modal, octatonic, and, later in his lie, serial structures. Yet, it is evident that Shostakovich's music clearly springs rom the eighteenth- nd nineteenth-cenury compositional tecn iques; and while it may not always meet speciic deinitions of unctional tonality it reerences, uses, and manipulates core ideas of tonal rhetoric involving both orm (ranging rom phrase o movement srucures) and harmony (pitch centers, modulations, cadences, etc.). The manipulation of these core aspect of tonal music present points of entry into understanding hermeneutic processes in Shostakovich's music. While not oten discussed directly in the pages that ollow, Theodor . Adomo 's presence looms large within this entire proj ect. To a certain extent Adono unctions as a spiritual adviser or the type of discourse about music promoted in the ollowing chapters, as Adomo's linking of ruptures within musical orm with the arwork's ability to critique society is at the heat of this work. While I do not use ny of Adomo's speciic analytical tools, such as variant orm or breahrough, his belief, in James BUhler 's words, that there is a "undamental broken quality of all arwork that is true"7 is at the heart of my attempt to read correlations between the issures endemic to modem subj ectivity and the uptures ound in Shostakovich's quatets. The ield of Shostakovich research is illed with interpretive mineields, and I approach this study with great caution. In Deining Russia Musically, Richard Taruskin eloquently argues that any claim to know the deinite meaning of Shostkov ich's music (or music in general) is an attempt take possession of both the music and its mening, of controlling it or one's own purpose. The result can be seriously damaging to the signiicance of the artwork; in Taruskin's words : "the price of certainty is always reduction-reduction not only in meaning but in interest and value."8 The intepretations that ollow are admittedly subj ective and are not intended to be considered deinitive. I do not desire to contain, or to use Taruskin's terms, reduce value, but just the opposite-this investigation is intended to expand and open new oppounities or greater depth and breadth of understanding of this magniicent music. If one of the side e fects of my efort is the production of more ambiguities and contradictions, as Tau skin rgues, I will happily embrace them.

7 James Buhler, '"B reaktrough' as Critique of Form: The Finale in Mahler's First Symphony," 19th-Cenuy Music, /2 (Fall 1 996): 1 2543, here p. 1 29. 8 Richard Tauskin, Deining Russia Msically: Historical and Herneneutical Essys (Princeton, 1 997), p. 476.

Chapter 1

Shostakovich and the Modem Subject

Analysis is more than merely "the acts", but is so only and solely by virtue of going beyond the simple acts . . . It is the achievement of imagination rough aith. Theodor W. Adono 1 The tonal structures we call "music" bear a close logical similrity to the orms of human eeling . . . not j oy a nd sorow perhaps, but the poignancy of either and both-the greatness and brevity nd etenal passing of everything vitally elt. Susane Lnge r

Work on the project that eventually ned into this book began with a seemingly small task-analyzing Dmitri Shostakovich's Se venth String Quartet. The Seventh is Shostakovich's shortest quartet, consisting of three, rather le-eting, movements, and usually lasting about twelve minutes. Analyzing this quartet is a j oy, as it is a work of compositional precision, aptly des cribed by Ian MacDonald as having a "diamond­ hard design."3 Seemingly every section, measure, and note can be accounted or in analytical terms. Yet, the more one explains the Seventh String Quartet via orm and pitch use, the more the quartet displays the deiciencies of our analytical processes. The sheer rhetorical power ofthis subtle quartet u strates any gratiication that might be gained through analytical perfection. One may be able to explain the geneses of the pitch content of the motive that appears at he conclusion of the second movement and disrupts the introduction of the third, but it does not account or how and why th ese our notes seemingly rip open the musical work, plunging the music into the violence that ollows. In addition, how does one understand the replication of the irst movement's closing material at the end of the third movement? The Seventh String Quartet, in shot, strips away the cfo aks meant to mask the inadequacies of the musical analytical enterprise. Time and again Shostkovich's music seems to expose the deiciencies of purely structural discussions. In one of the many ways this music can be said to "bear witness,"4 it displays how much is lost when we attempt to contain musical discussions in a purely ormal realm. Shostakovich's music orces us to pay attention to Adomo's injunction that to be able to do the music, and our listening selves, justice, we must not only gather 1 2 3 4

Adono, "On the Problem of Musical Analysis," p. 1 77. Susane Langer, Form and Feeling: A heoy ofArt (New York, 1 953), p. 27 . Ian MacDonald, The New Shostakovich (Boston, 1 990), p. 22 1 . I ren to this concept in the Epilogue, p. 1 1 7.

6

Composing the Moden Subject

the "analytical acts," but go beyond these acts, as this is the only way we may understand how and why this mus ic has the powerul efect that it does. The initial move scholrs tend to take when moving beyond "analyti cal acts" as a means of understanding music, is to look at the historical context in wh ich the work was created. In this vein, Patrick Mccreless, u sing Shostakovich's First String Qurtet as an example, has urged music theorists to be w illing "to step beyond structure," encouraging a "historical hearing, since it ties our listening more closely, and mor� imaginatively to human experience."5 From he v ery beginning Shostakovich's music has been routinely explained through how it relates to the composer's biography and historical context within the Soviet regime, alhough oten not with the analytical oundation provided by the likes of Mccreless. If one has ollowed the history of Shostakovich studies since the late 1 970s, one knows that this approach has led to many disagreements and a great deal ofpolemics.6 At times, it seems that lost among the dust of the skirmishes is the act that Shostakovich's iusic has a widespread audience of avid listeners, which now extends fr beyond the era and place in which it was created. There are many fans of Shostakovich's music that are not schooled in the history of he cultural context of its creation, and certainly do not have irst-hand knowledge of the experience. (A act which, Taruskin reminds us, is something in which we should "rejo ice."7) Thus, questions arise regarding why Shostakovich's music has remained so arresting not only to those within the Soviet culture, but also to Westen audiences that extend beyond the bounds of that cultur.especially since, we have to admit, such audiences sometimes are largely ignorant of the compositional context or even the biography of the composer. As· David Fanning notes: "Ater all, Shostakovich's music speaks to listeners who have never heard of Stalin's Great Terror or read Testimony."8 Faning's words point to the reality that Shostakovich's music holds meaning beyond the social context that produced it-that a more generalized, albeit Westen, audience continues to identiy with the music; the divisive arguments over Shostakovich's ideological leanings do little to explain this enduring resonance of Shostakovich's art. Scott Bunham notes, with respect to Beethoven and his music, "if the music did not hold such ascination or us, the acts of his lie would hardly matter. "9 There are many composers whose music we neither argue about, nor listen to. It is ater initially being drawn in by Shostakovich's art that many of us begin to relect on his lie. This is not to say that historical context is not 5 Patrick Mccreless, "Music Theory and Historical Awareness," Music Theoy Online VI/3 (August 2000) (accessed 5 July 2007) at htp://mto.societymusictheory.org/issues/ mto.00.6.3/mto.00.6.3.mccreless.html, section 1 0. 6 Of course I am reerring to the controversy begun with Solomon Volkov's publication of Testimony: The Memoirs ofDmitri Shostakovich as told to Solomon Volov, trans. Antonina Bouis (New York, 1 979). In "Shostakovich versus Volkov: hose Testimony?" Laurel Fay shows that Testimony is not the biography it claims to be. Fay's article is reprinted along with a new essay, "Volkov's Testimony reconsidered," in A Shostakovich Casebook, ed. Malcolm Hamrick B rown (Bloomington, 2004), pp. 1 1-2 1 and 22-66. 7 Taruskin, Deining Russia Musically, p. 497. 8 David Fanning, "Introduction: Talking about eggs-Musicology nd Shostkovich," in Shostakovich Studies (Cmbridge, 1 995), p. 6. 9 Scott Bham, Beethoven Heo (Princeton, 1 995), p. xvi.

Shostakovich and the Moden Subject

7

an important direction or scholarly investigations into Shostakovich and his music, but this is not the direction th at this work will take. Biographical circum stances can give valuable inormation, yet evei ater investigating contexual events, the music and its ability to hold meaning or a vast array oflisteners remains clouded in mystery. In no way do I . mean to give the impression that historical context is irelevant, but that I would l ike to propose an additional (not altenative), and what I believe to be just as relevant, means of reading this music. Mikhai l Bakhtin has noted, "meaning always responds to particular questions."1 0 The quest or discening musical meaning in this study is driven by two questions, wh ich approach the music rom diferent angles, yet reach or the sam e end. First, h ow can we make sense of rhetorical nd omal ruptures ound in Shostakovich's composit ion? Second, how can we com e to understand the sense ofmeaning that this music conveys to the broader Westen musical audience, one that extends beyond the· culture in which the music was created? In searching or viable nswers to these questions, my goal is to elucidate reasons or the proound hold Shostakovich's music coptinu es to have on Westen audiences, regardless of the listener 's knowledge of historical context. The Lacanian riad and the Real The complexity of meaning in music in general results in a situation in which meaning will never be deinable in a ixed way and this is no diferent or the compositions by Shostakovich. In act, the ambiguities that ill Shostakovich's music seem to put this undeinable moment on display, self-consciously highlighting the enigmatic qualities of music. Yet, Shostakovich's music continues to aticulate something to its audiences; the music does seem to mean. It is just that what is ound within the music consistently evades atempts to grasp hold of any speciic meaning. Shostakovich's music, illed with its own unique version of double-speak, constantly collapses, reverses, inverts, and denies-sometimes seemingly laughing at-attempts to hold it to an explicit intepretation. By putting the undeinable m oment on disp lay, Shostakovich's music is especially efective at problematizing the interpretive process. N onetheless, we continually eel compelled to attempt to deine m eaning. In short, as an ungraspable entity, m eaning in Shostakovich's music consistently re sists linguistic discourse, yet at the sam e time it unailingly sets an interpretive process in m otion-the music seems to dem and that discursive action be taken. The idea of an ungraspable entity that afects discourse is one elucidated by the Lacanian psychoanalytical concept of the "real." The real has been described metaphorically by social theorist Slavoj Zizek as "the rock upon which evey attempt at symbolization stumbles."11 More speciically, it is the empty center around which reality is constructed. According to Lacanian theory, a break rom the real occurs whe� the subject enters into language (when language becom es the means or negotiating existence). This break creates an unbridgeable gap between 10 Mihail Bahtin, Speech Genres and Other Late Essays, trans. Ven W. McGee (Austin, 1 986), p. 1 45 . 1 1 Slavoj Z ifek, h e Sublime Object ofIdeoloy New York, 1 989), p . 1 69.

8

Composing the Modern Subject

the real and reality. Realiy is created by the symbolic; it is "that which is named by language and can thus be thought and talked about. "12 As reality is constructed trough linguistic discourse, the gap occurs due to the undamental incapability of symbolic discourse to ully represent the living experience. This gap, or ho le, is created in the center of constructed reality, a space where that which cannot be symbolized resides. Ahard impenetrable kenel, th e real exists outside symbolization; it precedes he symbolization process and is also n excess created by this process,. The real is hus that which precedes discourse nd that which is let unstated in the symbolic process. Although the real cannot appear as an entity in reality (due to the act that, by deinition, it cnnot be placed in the symbolic order), its existence afects the subj ect's r eality, as the gap causes the creation of traumatic orms (e.g. ruptures, symptoms, stains, residues). These traum atic events create distortions in the symbolic universe, upsetting the smooth running of our discursively created universe and displaying its deiciencies, and, thus, ultimately displaying the empty kenel, the void or lack upon which reality rests.1 3 In addition to the real nd symbolic, Lacanian theory also includes the imaginary realm, which occurs between the real and symbolic during the subject's ormation. The move rom the real to the imaginary is the "transormation that takes place in the subject when he assumes an image."14 The imaginary realm appears ater the subj ect's break rom the real, but beore it ully enters into the symbolic, beore the subject can structure he world through language. It is the realm of images, both cons cious and subconscious. Whi le in the imaginary realm, a child is unable to clearly di stinguish between subject nd object. Lacan theorizes while in the imaginry realm he "mirror stage" of a child's development takes place.15 The mirror stage occurs when the child looks into a mirror and misrecognizes the image as itself, when the subject sees itself through he gaze of he (.)Other (that is, when he child sees hi/herself thr ough the gaze of some other, most usually the mother). During the mirror stage the child begins to move toward an integrated self-image, as in the imaginary stage the subject realizes that the universe is not a contiguous whole, but this stage occurs beore the subject can articulate the diference between "I" and "you." Consisting of all that is perceived or imagined, the imaginary consists of "illusory entities whose consistency is the efect of a kind of mirror-play-that is, thy have no real existence but are a mere structural efect."16 12 B ruce Fink, he Lacanian Subject: Between Language and Jouissance (Princeton, 1 995), p. 25 . 1 3 My account of the real is taken, or the most pat, rom Slavoj Zizek, Looking Awy: An Intoduction to Jacques Lacan though Popular Culture (Cambridge, 1 992) and The Sublime Object of Ideoloy. See also B ruce Fink, The Lacanian Subject. For an overview of how Lacnian psychonalysis has been used n critical theory see Terry Eagleton, Literay Theoy: An Introduction, 2nd edn (Minneapolis, 1 996), pp. 1 42-60. 14 Jacques Lacan, "The mirror stage as ormative of the unction of the I as revealed it psychoanalytic experience," in Ecrits: A Selection, trans. Alan Sheridan (New York, 1 977), p. 2. 15 See Lacn, "The mirror stage as ormative of the unction of the I as revealed in psychoanalytic experience," pp. 1-7, and Eagleton, Literay heoy, pp. 1 42-3 . 1 6 Zizek, The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 1 62.

Shostakovich and the Modern Subject

9

Where music its into the schema created by the real, symbolic, and imaginary is continually negotiable, as the properties of music and how it unction s within our constructed universe allow it to be c onceived as a representat ive of any of these three categories. This study l ocates music within the realm of the symbolic. 17 This assumes music to be a symbolic discourse in its own right, one that-similar to language, but explicitly not directly correlating to the linguisti c model-exists as an attempt by the subject to symbolize experience. Thus, ruptures within the musical discourse are viewed as traumati c orms caused by encounters w ith the real. While the real exists outside of, and resists deinition by, symbolic discourse, it takes shape in symbolic discourse in these deormations. In Z izek's words "the real is . . . contained in the V ery symbolic orm [the traumatic rens] : the real is immediately endered by this orm."18 Since the real can never be ully grasped through symbolization, it is through intepretative mediation of the orms that we are able to catch glimpses of the real rom which, in retrospect, we can reconstruct its aterimage. Similar to how these theories are use d in literary criticism, by ocusing on ' symptomatic' events in the musical text, we may be able to gain a "mode of access to the ' latent content"' of the work. 19 As noted, the traumatic events that ensue when symbolization stumbles over the rock that is the real become strange protuberances within discursively mediated reality. All of these traumatic orms come rom--within the constructed universe; as Zizek states, the real "must appear to be ound and not produced."20 In music, the ruptures are created when a musical obj ect (a motive, pitch set, key, ormal issure, perormance marking, etc.) within th e work, through some sort of deviation, stands out and takes on a heightened signiication. In the real's encounters with discourse three types of obj ects, represented by Lacan (and Zizek) as a, >, and S(') , are created that represent the real being rendered into a traumatic orm.21 The type of object created depends on where the maniestation of the real appears within the relationship between the imaginary, symbolic, and real. The relationship is represented in the Lacanian triad, shown in Figure 1 . 1 , where S(A) represents the symbolization of the imaginary; >, the materialization of the absent; and a, a lack or empty spot, which is the remainder of the real that sets the interpretive process in motion. 22

1 7 John Shepherd and Peter Wicke argue or music being considered within the symbolic order in their book Music and Cultural Theoy (Cambridge, 1 997). 18 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 39. 1 9 Eagleton, Literay heoy, p. 1 5 8 . 2 0 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 32. 21 See Lacan, On Feminine Sxuali, the Limits ofLove and Knowledge: The Seminar of Jacques Lacan, Boo� X (Encore), ed. Jacques-Alain Miller and trans. B ruce Fink (New York, 1 999), pp. 93 :5 ; Z izek, The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, pp. 1 82-5 and Looking Awy, pp. 1 33-6. 22 This graph, the "Lacanian triad," can be ound in Zizek's Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 1 84, Looking Awy, p. 1 35, The Plague ofFantasies (New York, 1 997), p. 1 75 and in Lacan, On Feminine Sxualiy, the Limits of Love and Knowledge, p. 90.

Composing the Moden Subject

10

Imaginary

S)

Symbolic Figure 1.1

Real The Lacanian triangle

a

More speciically, the object symbolized by a, also called the objet petit a, is a residue, a remnant of the symbolization process. It represents the lack created when the subject is severed rom the real; it becomes a substitute or the real ater the shit rom the real to symbolic order occurs. The objet petit a is described by Bruce Fink as "the cause that upsets the smooth unctioning of stucures, systems, and axiomatic ields, leading to aporias, paradoxes and conundrums o f all kinds. "23 As a signiier of what remains unsymbolized, the objet petit a in act sets the intepretive drive in motion. The concept of the objet petit a is used by Zizek in discussing the role of the "Sphinxes" in Schuman's Canaval. "Sphinx es" is the ninth of twenty­ one movements that make up Canaval, which is subtitled "M iniature scenes on our notes." "Sphix es," a movement that the perormer is instructed to not perform, provides, without harmony or rhythm, a set of our notes reerred to in the subtitle. Canaval is, or the most part, constructed ar ound these same pitches. To Z izek the movement is the work's "absent, impossible-real point of reerence. "24 The movement represents an excess that stands out rom the symbolic domain of the musical works; it is the empty kenel around which the work is constructed. (It is also a conundum that constantly drives scholars and perormers to intepretative actions.) S(. ) is a circulating object, passing between the symbolic and the imaginary. In reality it tkes the orm of an ordinary object (or example a button, a key, or a cadence) that comes to represent a little piece of the real. In other words, what normally is an unmarked, conventional object becomes marked, gaining new signiication in the process. As a little piece of the real, the object symbolizes the emptiness in the symbolic order-the act that the symbolic structure is ordered round an iiherent impossibility. Zizek uses the example of the cigarette lighter in Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train, an ordinary object that comes to mean much

23 Fik, he Lacanian Subject, p. xiii. 24 Zifek, The Plague ofFantasies, p. 207.

Shostakovich and the Modern Subject

11

more in the relationship between Bruno and Guy.25 A musical example of such n object might be created through the unusual repetition or unusual placement of a conventional igure within the piec e (a strateg ic marking of some sort). When the material becomes a signiier of a little piece of the real, the marking of the material creates a rupture in the musical discourse and what norma lly' is not a cause or notice warrants e.xamination. This unusual occurrence, the rupture, takes place when an attempt is made by the musical subj ect to ill the gap, cover up the hole, let by the separation rom the real. The third obj ect, >, is created when the imagination tries to objectiy the real. In doing so, the subj ect obsesse s to such an extent that the obj ect ends up being an overwhelming presence that canot be completely integrated into constructed reality-it becomes a materialization of the absence of the real. Zizek uses Alred Hitchcock's movie The Birs as an example of this object. In the movie, the birds ' "massive presence completely oversh adows the domestic drama" of the storyline.26 Likewise, if a prticul ar musical motive comes to dominate a work to the expense of all other musical ideas within the piece, the motive takes on the orm of >. Using the concept the real is not a new means of understanding music; Z izek himself constantly discusses music, although his work tends to ocus on texted music and not on issues that arise within musical structure. The precedent set by Lawrence r amer, however, is signiicant, as a considerable quantity of his writings use ideas gleaned rom psychoanalytical theory as an entry into understanding meaning in music. Speciically, Kramer's trilogy of books on musical hermeneutics uses the relation of music to the real in a broad sense, as an underlying concept in interpreting music. 27 ramer has long argued or understanding music not necessarily by means of what it ' says, ' but "by the way it models the symbolization of experience."28 The relationships ound in music can be interpreted as relections of the similar relations ound in its interpretive context.29 Kramer's goal with his three books is to elucidate how musical meaning is created through the " inteplay between musical experience and its contexts"30 in works or which dates of composition span multiple centuries and which cross many genres. Thus, his work is a broad application of the general interpret ive qualities of the concept of the real. The current study, on the other hand, may be better described as a case study-a highly detailed look at a ew works in the same genre and by one composer, using the speciic obj ects (a, >, and S (\ )) as subtle intepretive tools, in an attempt to produce viable interpretations of each individual work and the group as a whole.

25 Z izek, The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 1 83 . 2 6 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 1 05 . 27 ramer's three books t o which I am reerring are Music and Cultural Practice: 1801900 (Berkeley, 1 990), Clssical Music and Postmodern Knowledge (Berkeley, 1 995), and Music and Meaning: _oward a Critical Histoy (Berkeley, 200 1). 28 ramer, Musical Meaning, p. 7. 29 Kramer has used Lacanian concepts to discuss Shostakovich's music, in as much as his interpretation of the Eighth String Quartet, which I address in Chapter Four, implicitly relies on the concept of the real. See Kramer, Musical Meaning, pp. 23241 . 30 Kramer, Musical Meaning, p. 8.

Composing the Moden Subject

12

An Epic Cycle Described by Lacan as "the mystery of the speaking body,"3 1 enc ounters with the real can be seen as the orce that creates the ungraspable entity wihin Shostakovich's music that evades discourse. It has long b een argued that Shostakovich's music is ull of pathological utterances, musical enigmas ripe or interpretation. As Paul Griiths notes: there re diiculties of interpretation. Shostakovich's musical tragedy . . . was to be possessed of a style which is immediately recognizable and exremely adaptable but which could not gain rom him complete belie. The very elements of that style . . . all carry with them a sense of hollowness, alienation or irony, and so a certain disconcerting shadow inevitable hangs over anything he composed. 32

Lars Ellestrom writes that "[o]bviously, there re parts of Shostakovich's music that do not it very well with our acknowledged ways of apprehending a musical work,"33 and that Shostakovich's music presents a critical dilemma as "shrply difering moods display a rupture in the consistency of the whole."34 Eric Roseberry has noted that at times Shostakovich's music seems to be reerencing an '" obj ect' that lies, as it were outside the subjective reality of the piece itself."35 In the current context, this description could be interpreted as discussing the real; Roseberry instead inds himself "tempted" use the Kantian idea of "the thing in itself ' as a hermeneutical tool. 36 The reerence to Kant appears in a discussion where Roseberry is rying to describe a speciic aspect of Shostakovich's compositional style, the use of unvaried repetition. Yet, arguably Roseberry's n to Kant and my n to Lacan are both recognitions of the same general conundrums Griiths and Ellestrom describe. Thus, disconcerting shadows and ruptures re ound troughout Shostakovich' s oeuvre. While all of his string quartets display qualities that could be intepreted as being created by encounters with the real, I will ocus on our of the quartets. Speciically, I present interpretations of the Sixth rough Ninth String Quatets trough the lens of Zizek's Lacanian-inluenced critical theory in wh ich the concept of the real and the efects of the radical break of he real rom reality (the subject's symbolic universe) are central. While psychoanalytical concepts such as those developed by Lacan are routinely used as a means of analyzing cultural products in terms of gender construction and sexuality, that is not a course I take. My concen is with tacitly desexualized modem subjectivity (relecting the blakness created by the a lienation of modenity) and how the pathologies of this desexualized subject are relected in Shostakovich's music. 3 1 Lacan, On Feminine Sxualiy, p. 1 3 1 . 3 2 Paul Griiths, The String Quartet (Bath, 1 983), pp. 2 1 3-14. 33 Lars Ellestrom, "Some Notes on Irony in the Visual Arts and Music: The Examples of Magrite and Shostakovich," in Word & Image Xll/2 ( 1 996): 1 97-208, here p. 205. 34 Ibid., p. 206. 35 Eric Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Process in the Symphonies, Cello Concertos, and String Quartets ofShostakovich (London, 1 989), p. 378. 36 Ibid.

Shostaovich and the Moden Subject

13

A s discussed earlier, I will consider the quartets as i f they represent constructed realities created by the mod em subject. By approaching the quartets as if they embody the characteristics of the modem subject and that subj ect's constructed reality, pathological utterances ound in the music cal be analyzed as symptoms within his univ erse. 37 n interpretative approach to he ruptures as renderings of the real vi� p sychoanalytical theory provides the ramewo rk or deconstructing the disturbances so as to illuminate the processes by which they were created, allow ing or critical intepretation and a mens or encountering psychological content. The Lacanian relationship between the real and symbolic as used by Z izek in his critical theory works gives us a unique means of exploring the uptures in Shostakovich's music, one that explains how it speaks to the pathologies of the modem subject in general. In other words, in Shostakovich's music listeners ind articulations of their own anxieties and that the ambiguities in the music allow the listeners to redeploy the signiying act such that it relects how they experience existence. While seemingly all Shost akovich's string qutets have some sort of ' deormity, ' tl e Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Quatets can be interpreted as displaying maniestations of the real that creating one of the three objects (a, >, S(.)) created in the Lacanian triad. In the Sixth Quartet, discussed in Chapter Two, a conventionalized cadential gestur e comes to represent a little piece of the real (S(. ) ). Initially the cadence is grated onto the irst movement ater the movement has achieved syntactic closure but not structural closure, as a means of bringing a structural close to the movement. Yet, the cadence is not inter ated into the musical discourse of the movement; it stands apat both physically and syntactically. This lack of integration causes the traditionally unmarked cadential material to become marked; the cadence points to the arbitrariness of its use as a constructed closure. Its continual retun at the end of each and every movement that ollows creates an uncanny presence; the unusual repetition persistently displays the emptiness b ehind the use of the cadence as a sign of closure and, by extension, the arbitrariness of constucted realiy in general. In this chapter, I draw on the vrious epistemes ofhuman knowledge theorized by Michel Foucault to show that the irst three movements of the piece seek to avoid the upures caused by the ren of the real (as epitomized by the cadence). By acknowledging the arbitrary quality of the cadential igure, in the inal movement the rupture is n o longer avoided; instead the ca dence is integrated into reality, but w.ithout any attempts to suture over the ambiguities caused by the cadence's displaying of the real. Thus, the inal movement, trough its attempt to integrate the cadence, to a certain extent acknowledges the senselessness upon which reality is constructed. In the Seventh String Quartet, discussed in Chapter Tree, the ren of the coda rom the irst movement at the end of the third (and inal) movement raises questions regarding the reasoning behind the literal restatement of such a large amount of material within the piece and, on a more general level, the role of the coda in musical works. Using Jacques Derrida's idea of the supplement, I explore the ramiications of the coda as something that is used to complete that which is already completed. If Derrida is correct that the supplement is a signiier of death, it becomes possible 37 I use the prase modem subj ect to relect a generalized (albeit Westen) subj ectiviy where the Soviet subj ect is a smaller subset of the lager collective.

14

Composing the Modern Subject

to interpret these two codas in terms of death. Yet, why two deaths? Why does the quartet need to die twice? The concept of two deaths is a cultural trope deeply embedded within modem subjectivity-one death is literal (one ceases to exist); the other is symbolic (last rites or the uneral rite). If either of these deaths does not happen "properly," a gap is created, a space between the two deaths. In this gap the real is rendered as the living dead (the objet petit ' a), motivated by a "pure 'drive" demanding payment of the symbolic debt.38 I argue that in the Seventh Quartet, the objet petit a surfaces at the end of the second movement (the uneral rite) in the orm of a [0 1 34] pitch-class set signaling that somehing has gone wrong with respect to the two deaths. A gap, the space between the two deaths, opens in the third movement where a savage ugue representing the "pure drive" eupts. Once the ugue has paid the symbolic debt, the pure drive quickly dissipates and the postlude becomes a unctional uneral rite, closing the gap between the two deaths. The ren of the coda at the end of the inal movement then can end the cycle of retun ound in the piece. Chapter Four moves onto the Eighth String Qutet, where I argue that the abstract set rom the Seventh Qutet, the [O 1 34] tetrachord, becomes a proper name-that of the composer-in the orm of the DSCH motive, Shostakovich's moniker motive.39 This quartet, illed with the ghosts of musical works rom the past, raises the motive as proper name into an omnipresent entity, eventually excluding all else. The result is that the inal movement consists solely of a ugue on the DSCH motive, as the quotations that illed the previous movements are expelled rom the music's constructed reality. As an objectiication of the real (>), the proper name cannot be ully integrated into musical discourse; instead it is a massive presence that stands out and overwhelms the discourse. As a signiier of that which does not in act exist, the motive is shown to be empty, lacking signiication. Yet this materialization of absence is also the only thing hat truly exists, and thus the entity that marks the quartet's autonomy. The symbolic orms that represent an encounter with the real in the Sixth through Eighth Quartets are tied to each other through pitch material generated by the DSCH motive. The motive itself is the rupure in the Eighth Quartet, its pitches appear in vertical orm in the continually recurring cadence in the Sixth Quartet, and the rupture in the Seventh Quartet is derived rom the motive's pitch-class set. In addition to this conection between pitch or pitch-class content, there is an intensiication of the traumatic magnitude of the ren of the real with each succeeding quartet. This culminates with the overwhelming presence, the obj ectiication of the real (>), within the Eighth Quartet. If we were to read the three quartets together as a cycle, these quartets orm a catastrophic traj ectory of increasingly disurbing ruptures in

3 8 The representation in music ofa ' symbolic debt' is discussed by Kramer in his discussion ofBartok's Sixth String Quartet (see Musical Meaning, pp. 23 1 -2) and Shostakovich's Eighh String Quartet (see Musical Meaning, pp. 232-4 1 ). 39 The DSCH motive represents the composer 's name trough the use of the German musical alphabet, where S is E� and H is B�, and the German transliteration of the composer's name, !mitri Schostakowitsch.

Shostakovich and the Modern Subject

15

the musical discourse that comes to a head with the near dissolution of the musical universe in the inal movement of the Eighth Quartet. The ith chapter discusses this intensiication of the pathological ruptures of the real as outlined by the S ixth through Eighth Quartets and how .the narrative trajectory takes the orm of an apocalyptic epic. The absolute inality of this trajectory is reinorced .by a continual ren of closing material in each quartet, starting with a simple cadence (Sixth String Quartet), moving to a coda (Seventh String Quartet), and then to a signiicant portion of an entire movement (Eighth String Quatet). Thus, the amount of material that rens increases with each qurtet and this material is the only unctional closing material within the individual quartets. The trajectory thus deined leaves little room or additional quartets to continue the narrative, and to push beyond the boundaries deined by the Eighth Quartet raises the question of how to continue ater the apocalypse has occurred. The Ninth String Quartet thereore takes a diferent path. In this chapter I use Bakhtin's elucidations on the epic and novel to argue that the Ninth takes not the epic trajectory of the previous quartets, but instead the developing orm of the novel. Following the orm of that which is still being composed, the Ninth Quartet integrates the ren of the real into reality in a more constructive manner-one that does not hurtle towards the apocalyptic abyss. Reading the ambiguities written into the string qutets through the lens of the real reveals the arbitrary and contingent state of the musical subject's constructed universe. By interpreting these ruptures through Lacanian psychoanalytical concepts, I show the pathologies revealed in the string quartets to be endemic within the modem subject, as Shostkovich's musical subject is replete with ruptures, stains, and protuberances-musical enigmas that directly speak to the tensions and contradictions at the core of modem subjectivity. In listening to his music one hears, in a musical discourse, a rendition of the pathologies of modem existence. Ultimately, I argue, the music holds meaning because of its ability to put into orm the inexplicable ruptures of modem human experience.

Chapter 2

The End that is no End: Cadences and Closure in the Sixth String Quartet, Op. 1 0 1 ( 1 9 5 6)

God made everthing out of nothing. But the nothingness shows through. Paul Valery 1

The Sixth String Quartet's relatively upbeat rhetorical character and use of a standard our-movement orm oten cause commentators to reer to the quatet as 'pulling back, ' perhaps reerencing an earlier, seemingly more simple nd innocent, time. For instance, Michael Talbot states the Sixth Quartet "provides a convalescence ater the rigours of Quartet No. 5,"2 and Eric Roseberry describes the quartet as "impeccably classical. "3 In addition to being in a lighter, brighter style in comparison to the irst ive quartets, the Sixth Quartet has a second characteristic that is immediately notable on irst hearing-a cadence that retuns to end each and every movement. The cadence irst appears at the end of the opening phrase of the work. Example 2. 1 shows the movement stuttering to a start with a quarter-note drone that achieves a smooth, constant beat in R. 0.5. In the ollowing measure the violins enter with the melody in prallel thirds, ater which the cello makes its irst appearance with sporadic tonic­ triad bass support. In R. 0. 1 1-R. 1 . 1 , as the end of the irst melodic phrase elides with the second, the cello enters with a motive that consists of F2 moving upward to A�2 then E�3 beore leaping down to D2, which, ater a two�beat delay during which the violins begin the second prase, belatedly resolves to the tonic pitch, G2; and thus orms the irst cadence in the tonic of the work. Following in the vein of the erlier descriptions of he work, Judih Kn describes this staggered resolution of the cadence as "of-balanced in a witty, Haydnesque way."4 1 Quoted in Paul Epstein, Notes to the Emerson String Quartet recording Dmitri Shostakovich: he String Quartets (Deutsche Grmmophon 289 463 284-3 , 1 999), p. 46. 2 Michael Talbot, he Finale in Westen Instrumental Music (Oxord, 200 1), p. 2 1 5 . 3 Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Pocess, p. 248 . 4 Kuhn, "Shostakovich in Dialogue," p. 40 1 . The Sixth String Quatet is the one quartet that is discussed in detail by both Kun and me. Kuhn's chapter on the Sixth Quartet is, to use her phrase, "in dialogue" with the chapter on the Sixth Quartet rom my dissertation. This chapter continues the dialogue, as I respond to her thoughtul critique. Kun's discuss i on of the reception history combined with a thorough analysis is a must-read or anyone interested in the Sixth String Quartet. See Kuhn, "Shostakovich in Dialogue," pp. 370443.

Composing the Modern Subject

18

Example 2.1 Au

lgto

J�

)

Quartet No. 6, irst movement, primary-theme zone (P) of the irst movement Presentation 112 v

-

p

v- .

". ,

p .. dim.

l'

Au

,

p

� --------------------------. i. ...-

---

-

-

-

] Continuation --..

-

)

-

I

Cadence

�------· � ,

p

-........................................... .......................

A u

.-.

,

�

��

.�

I

-

I

-

,

I

•

". .

) I •

,

I

.

.

-

-

f

im.

f

dim.

f

dim. '-

.

Cadences and Closue in the Sxth String Quartet

J

A " r

I

19

1.

dim.

I

p

A u

.::; .

' I

>

dim.

..

dim.

dim.

�p I

f

�

I

mf

.. , , p

--� . �

.. .

.. . dim.

mf

.. . d.

I

m Restatement ····························· ····························· ····························· ··················

A "

I

;

p

-

· �

.

,

p

I

;;

I

I

;;

I

, ,

_,

I

� -

Example 2.2 shows this same cadential igure as it rens at the end of the movement, here preceded by hree measures of tonic in three, drawn-out repeated notes. David Fanning notes hat, at he cello's highest point in the cadence, the our insuments combine to orm a verticalized [0 1 34] pitch-class set using the pitches of the DSCH motive.5 As the movement's opening cadence, it is not suprising to hear this cadential motive ren at the end of this movement, but the cadence takes on a disturbing presence when, over the course of the piece, this cadential igre rens · to close al movements. To Rosebery, it "is as if Shostakovich is epitomizing the classical ' ideal' in closing each movement with the same gesture."6 Yet this ' ideal' has an nl, decidedly unclassical, quality to it due to its continuous, raher ilexible ren. hile many scholars have noted he cadential igure's continual ren at the end of each movement, the act that it is unvayingly tied to a gesture consisting of three repeated chords has been overlooked. Moreover, it is questionable whether the cadential igure, this "classical ideal," is able to create closure that is ue to the musical discourse that precedes it. At the end of the irst movement the trice-repeated tonic­ riad gesture brings a rhetorical sense of ending to the work, yet stuctural closure, as it is generally understood, isn't generated by the repeated notes, due to the continued use of 5 in the top voice. Unsatisied with the lack of structural closure, the cadential igue seems ed onto the end of the movement so as to bring a syntactical closure, one that makes use of harmonic motion to the tonic and has i in the uppermost voice. 5 6

David Fanning, Shostaovich: String Quartet No. 8 (Aldershot, 2004), pp. 44 1 . Rosebey, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Pocess, p. 3 1 1 .

Composing the Moden Subject

20

Example 2.2

DSCH - [0 1 34] �

.. �

.. -

A. �

,

Quartet No. 6, irst movement, inal measures

dim.

p

p

� -

,

dim. dim.

dim.

�

-

-� p

---

p

l�-

�

\

iP -

�

p

poco sp.

P

\

ep.

� .-

I

� p

,� '- -

poco esp:

-

By saying the cadence is "grated" onto the conclusion of the movement, I m reerring to Jacques Derrida's concept of the textual grat.7 The grat, in short, is the insertion of one discourse into another. In the Sixth Quatet the grat occurs in he blank space let by the anapest gesture's lack of structural closure, where the cadential igure is inserted as a signiier of syntactical closure. 8 That is to say, the movement uses a more conventional device to create a close it is unable to orge on its own. Robert Hatten has described traditional cadential material as being so general that "it appears to be unmarked material par xcelence."9 Yet, what in Hatten's analyses of Classical music is the ultimate in unmrked material, since its seeming ability to be exchanged between movements or pieces becomes very much marked in he Sixth Quartet. This marking occurs or multiple reasons. First, while reerring to more conventional closing material than the anapest that precedes it, the cadence does not adhere to convention, as neither the predominant nor dominant hamonies re stndard in themselves. In the upper voices, the cadential igure resolves rom the dissonant triad (C, D, B), which implies a dominnt seventh with an added sixh, to the tonic triad. Meanwhile, the cello outlines ive pitches in which the second and third outline a Neapolitan-inlected predominant (F to A� to E�), which moves to the dominnt (D) beore resolving to tonic along with the tree upper voices. Thus, the upper voices and he cello work together harmonically only or the inal dominant-tonic motion, and while the overall harmonic motion is rather conventional the harmonies themselves are not. Second, the cadential igure becomes marked because, as discussed earlier, it is not integrated into the musical 7 For a discussion of grats and grating see Jonathan Culler, On Deconstruction: Theoy and Criticism ater Structuralism (Ithaca, Y, 1 982), pp. 1 3-56. 8 See Jacques Derrida, Dissemination, trans. Barbara Johnson (Chicago, 1 98 1 ), p. 356. 9 Hatten; Musical Meaning in Beethoven, p. 1 1 8 . Hatten describes Classical musical material as having three ormal unctions: thematic/presentation, transitional/developmental, and cadential/closural. Transitional material is stylistically marked due to its aperiodicity, instability, and distinctive (trough complexity) material. Thematic material is marked due to its distinctive (through clarity) material. Cadential material is completely umrked due to its stable periodicity and tonality and its conventional material. See Hatten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven, pp. 1 1 5- 1 7 .

Cadences and Closure in the Sxth String Quartet

21

process-it stands apart rom the previous music both literally and rhetorically (physically due to the rest separating the anapest and the cadence, and syntactically because of the deormation of convention and abrupt change in musical rhetoric). Thus, the physical disconnection of the cadence rom the preceding music works to enhance the rhetorical sepration of musical discourses. tast,' as the piece progresses, the cadence becomes marked, contra Hatten's description, because it is exchanged among movements. By considering the inal cadence of the irst movement to be the equivalent of a textual grat, the marking of the cadence at the end of the irst movement of the Sixth Quatet suggests the grat has not been accepted. Reerring to a diferent musical time and standing apart rom the texture that preceded it, the grat seems appended ater the act and rejected by the text in which it was inserted. The Crisis of the End

Four years ater the composition ofthis quartet, Theodor W. Adono noted the problem of ending in modem music, stating that, with respect to Mahler's music, "he end here is that no end is any longer possible. "10 The irst movement of the Sixth Quartet presents an intriguing example of this predicament. The three repeated chords, perhaps reerences to the napest's rhythmic gestures used in the opening theme, provide a sense of inality, but are not able to bring the movement to a structural close. Yet, rather than accepting an ' end that does not end, ' the music ns to a more habitual usage of musical material to enorce closure. Conventionalized, the cadential igure meets what Koi Agawu calls the "syntactical obligation of closure,'.' 11 yet it is unable to convince rhetorically. By becoming marked, the cadential igure displays a crisis in the musical discourse, as now the closure provided by the conventionalized material rings hollow. The rej ection of the cadential grat can be interpreted to symbolize a repudiation of the older, more established style it initially represented. The cadential igure, through its lack of integration, exposes the arbitrariness of its conventional usage. Thus, as marked material, the cadence puts on display the emptiness behind the constructed musical system it represents, exposing the crisis of the end. With the mrking of routinely unmarked material, the signiication of that material is undmentally altered, as what was an ordinary, conventional objeche cadence-takes on greater signiicance. In this case, I argue the cadence becomes a physical entity representing the arbitrariness of convention and the emptiness upon which such constructions of reality are based. Ultimately, with its somewhat deceptive 'classical ' rhetoric and rej ection of the cadence, the piece points to the arbitrariness of all convention. In Lacanian terms, the cadence comes to symbolize the act that a closed, consistent reality does not exist. The cadential igure becomes a ' little piece of the real ' ; an embodiment of the lack in the Other, what in Lacanian theory is denoted by (S(J)). As a rupure in the musical reality, the cadence 10 Theodor W. Adono, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Chicago, 1 992), p. 1 3 8 . Originally published as Mahler: Eine musikalsche Physiognomik (Frt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1 97 1 ). 1 1 Ko.Agawu, Plying with Signs: A Semiotic Interpetation ofClassic Music (Princeton, 1 9 9 1 ), p. 69.

22

Composing the Modern Subject

(as a little piece of the real) becomes a physical reminder of the impossibility around which reality is structured nd subsequently points to he ultimate, yet necessary, nonsense behind our attempts to · create ictive beginnings, middles, and ends that represent meaningul unities. The result is, at the end of the irst movement, the grating of the cadence does not solve the musical crisis of ending, but instead puts the crisis on display. The rejection of the grat shows that musical orms, to use Adomo's words, can no longer "behave as if their mere existence [can] establish a meaning" when meaning "is no longer present in society."12 In Looking Awy, Zizek outlines various means of avoiding an encounter with the real, of circumventing the crisis caused by the arbitrariness of constructed reality. 13 One method of avoiding the crises of the real is trough a etishistic split. Here the crisis may be acknowledged, yet, eeling helpless, the subject reuses to integrate the problem into symbolic reality-i.e., the problem is ignored. A second mens of avoiding the real involves a transormation of the crisis into a traumatic kenel. The subject attempts to conrol every aspect of existence in order to stave of any ruptures that would result in encounters with he real. Lastly, a "neurotic transormation" occurs, as the subj ect proj ects meaning into the crisis. The crisis is seen as a mystical answer of the real-a sign rom some transcendental signiier to be interpreted. In the Sixth String Quartet, the compositional construction of the diferent movements, nd the movements ' eventual treatment of the cadence, cn be intepreted as relecting these various avoidance techniques that the moden subject uses when aced with n encounter with the real. We can better understand how the vrious avoidance techniques become a part of the musical discourse of the Sixth Quartet by recognizing how they relate to the diferent approaches humanity has developed to gain knowledge troughout history. The knowledge bases rom the Renaissance, Classical, and Modem periods, outlined by Michel Foucault in The Order of Things, all represent diferent means of negotiating the terms of existence. 14 As means of constructing reality, each of the knowledge epistemes has its own distinct way of avoiding an encounter with the real, which relect those outlined by Zizek. In the Renaissance episteme nowledge is gained through inding and interpreting resemblances, which reveal the unity of knowledge beyond the world. Ruptures in reality are to be read as divine signs. The crisis thus becomes a sign created beore signiication, which needs to be interpreted in order to ind knowledge. The Classical episteme of representation creates knowledge according to identity and diference, trough which an encyclopedic table can be created in which all knowledge is represented. This rational, scientiic view of the universe allows one to eel that all aspects ofreality can be controlled nd hat the disruptions will disappear into the lines of the grid that contains all knowledge. In the Modem, organic episteme, comparisons of representations no longer orm 12 Theodor Adono, Qusi una Fantasia: Essys on Moden Music, trans. Rodney Livingston (New York, 1 992), p. 88. Originally published as Quasi unafantsia: Musika/ische chrten II (Frt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1 963). 13 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 3 5 . , 14 Michel Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeooy of the Human Sciences (New York, 1 970).

Cadences and Closure in the Sxth String Quartet

23

the basis of knowledge, but rather various means of replication inorm knowledge. The Enlightenment's mechanized view of the various parts that create the whole is replaced with a biological view that ocuses on organic unity. This desire leads to the pursuit of a meta-unity rom which all others grow. In the desire to analyze the whole, the organic episteme leads to ''the pursuit of unities, commonalities, ultimate one-ness" .ater which one can deine the existence of a meta-unity. 15 Here uptures must be ignored, kept at a neutralized distance, as acknowledging the ruptures will only expose the arbitrriness of he meta-unity. As · noted earlier, the constructed musical realities of irst tree movements of the Sixth Qurtet can be analyzed as illustrating the various ways humanity, rough the three knowledge epistemes, has avoided acknowledging the emptiness behind constructed reality. The etishistic split that occurs in the modem tradition is exempliied in the irst movement as the music continually ignores ruptures within its structure; the neurotic attempt to control all variables, so as to avert any possible crisis, is relected in the construction of the second movement; and the interpretation of the crisis of the real as a mystical psychotic projection is reproduced in the passacaglia of the third movement. In doing so, the qutet exposes both the arbitrariness of the constructed universe (trough the unsuccessul grating of the cadential igure), and also humanity's neurotic methods or circumventing the empty kenel, which ultimately supports reality. The music's inability to ully assimilate the grat of the cadential igure at the close of the irst three movements signals the eventual ailure of each of the epistemes' attempts to circumvent the ruptures caused by the real. Ideally, or the subject to sustain oneself amidst the inconsistencies of constructed reality, the subject must acknowledge the real as an unavoidable part of existence, and not pathologize the rupture caused by the gap between the real and symbolization. The inal movement represents an attempt to posit such a reality, one that accepts the crisis of the real in its constructed reality. In doing so, the grat of the cadential igure is assimilated into its symbolic universe, as the nmsical subject begins to look or ways to accept the "senseless arbitry" of the real. 16 The Modern Episteme

The work begins with the irst movement in the most recent knowledge base, the Modem episteme. From the beginning, we can see how the movement tries to avoid acknowledging the emptiness behind its reality by acting as if rupures in its symbolic consuction do not exist. Yet, with the rejection of the grated cadential igure in the inal measures, the ruptures of the real can no longer be ignored. As shown in Figure 2. 1 , the movement is in sonata orm, the orm that has become the quintessential structure or organic unity in modem musical discourse, with an exposition-development-recapitulation outline supported by a harmonic structure of tonic-subordinate key-tonic, creating a meta-unity rom which all sonatas derive. Figure 2 . 1 illustrates that the exposition ollows the standard sonata paradigm with 15 Ruth Solie, "The Living Work: Organicism and Musical nalysis," J9'h-Centuy Music, IV/2 (Fall 1 980): 1 47-56, p. 1 5 1 . 1 6 Zizek, Looking Awy, p . 3 5 .

24

Composing the Moden Subject

the primy-theme zone (P) in the tonic key; a transition then moves the music towards he dominant or the secondary-theme zone (S), in which the thematic material shares many motivic similarities with the P material.17 The development divides into two sections, and has the stuctural orm of what Hepokoski and Darcy term a "rotational development" in that the material used in the development ollows the order in which it irst appered in the exposition. 1 8 The irst section, in tonic minor, uses material rom P, and the second section develops material rom S beore , admitting elements rom P in its push towards the movement's climax (R. 1 8-2 1 .4). The recapitulation varies rom the exposition with a telescoped retun of material rom the P and S themes, and by omitting the transition. Ater the recapitulation of S, the irst theme reappears mimicking the "ren" of the P theme in the opening of the development (as if another rotational block is begining). A orty-measure coda closes the movement. Described as an "ordinay sonata orm" by Talbot in what Roseberry calls the "Haydnish" key of G major, this movement is one of the ew "ull-scale" opening­ movement sonata orms to be ound in Shostakovich's string quartets.19 Even so, ruptures of the real seep into this sonata as, despite Talbot's claim, it is not exactly normal. As just discussed and illustrated by Figure 2. 1 , the movement does make Section Exposition Primary-theme zone (P) Transition Secondary-theme zone (S) Development First section Second section Recapitulation P Material S Material P Theme Coda Figure 2.1

Rehearsal numbers

Key

0-4.7 4.7-5 6-9 . 1 2

G

D

9. 1 3- 1 2 (accomp. 9.8) 1 3-2 1 .4

g - (#)

2 1 .5-24 25 30 (accomp. 29.4) 33

G e� G G

(M)

Quartet No. 6, irst movement: overview

1 7 In this book I will use Hepokoski and Darcy's system or labeling sections ofsonata orm. In Hepokoski and Darcy's system P stands or the primary-theme zone, TR or the trnsition zone, S or secondry-theme zone, and C or closing zone or closing space. For Hepokoski and Drcy's general overview and discussion of these labels see Elements of Sonata Theoy, pp. 1 4-22. 18 See Hepokoski and Darcy, Elements of Sonata heoy, pp. 205-2 1 9 and 6 1 1-14. 1 9 Talbot, The Finale in Westen Instrumental Music, p. 2 1 5 . Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and hematic Pocess, p. 248 . For an analtical oveview of all of the quatets, see McCreless, "Dmitri Shostakovich: The String Quartets," in Evan Jones (ed.), Intimate Voices: Aspects of Construction and Character in the Twentieth-Centuy String Quartet (Rochester, orthcoming). For a more in-depth discussion of the oms of String Qurtets Nos. 1-6 see Kuhn, "Shostakovich in Dialogue."

Cadences and Closue in the Sxth String Quartet

25

gestures towards sonata orm by having the requisite ormal sections, yet sectional boundaries are ill deined nd the music constantly slides away rom the hrmonic structure hat traditionally deines· the orm. Kn goes so far at to state that in the irst movement of the Sixth Quatet the "structural pillrs" of the sonata orm are "arguably more openly undermined than in any of Shostakovich's string quartet movements to date [String Quartets Nos. 1-5]."20 A closer look at vrious sections of the movement will illustrate how this raying of orm, trough harmonic derailment and lack of unctional closing sections, takes place. The opening prase of P (R. 0. 1-1 2 in Example 2 . 1 ), with its enegetic heme commencing with two ascending napests, is presented in R. 0.6-12, at he end of which the cadential igure irst appears. This irst phrase, while temporarily descending to the lat side, with minor dominnt and Neapolitan chords (in R. 0. 1 11 2), is solidly in G major resulting in a complete, closed statement in the tonic key. The second phrase, begining with the anacrusis to R. 1 , repeats the irst two measures of napests that open he irst prase, implying a consequent response, but ater two measures of imitation the music deviates greatly. hat ollows, shown in Example 2. 1 , is twenty-nine measures of continuation (beginning with the second prase at R. 1 ) during which he music slides away rom the tonic key. The second phrase never comes to a deinitive cadential or rhetorical close; instead, as the phrase loses momentum (beginning in R. 3 .4), the second violin recalls the opening quter-note drone on 5. This drone unctions to ren the music to the tonic by pure orce, not through harmonic motion. Begining at R. 4 the opening prase rens in ull in he tonic key, strongly closing P with the original cadential igure. The ormal construction of the main key area thus ollows the statement­ elaboration-closure pradigm that Hatten has described as a basic "section-building module" or musical orms in which each of the three sections has its own unction to play in creating the whole of the thematic area.21 According to Hatten, the statement section's unction is to present motivic and thematic material with the pupose of irmly establishing the tonic key. This section is characterized by straightorward periodicity and tonal stability. The middle section is a process-oriented section that has both a developmental or transitional quality and greater overall complexity. Harmonically, this section either prolongs the dominant or modulates to a new key. The third section has a cadential unction that typically combines a "reconceived re/resolution of ideas'022 with conventional melodic and hrmonic cadential material to emphasize closure. In the irst movement, P's opening prase ulills he statement unction in its presentation of a well-ormed thematic idea solidly grounded in the tonic key. 20 Kn, "Shostakovich in Dialogue," p. 397. 2 1 Hatten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven, p. 1 1 9. This three-pat process is described by mny theorists. The statement-elaborationclosure description comes rom Hatten (Musical Meaning in Beethove), pp. 1 1 2-1 9). Agawu uses the tems begining-middle-end or his detailed discussion (see Agawu, Plying with Signs, Chapter Three), while William Caplin's terminology is presentation-continuation-cadence (Caplin, Classical Form: A Theoy of Formal Functions for the Instrumental Music of Hydn, Mozart and Beethoven (New York, 1 998), pp. 9-1 5). 22 Hatten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven, p. 1 1 2.

26

Composing the Moden Subject

A raying of this structure begins in the continuation, which neither modulates nor prolongs the dominant as it should, but instead slips towards E� minor, lowering both i and 3 . Throughout the continuation section E� presents a clear half-step conlict with both he tonic and dominant harmony (with the key of E� clashng with the dominant, D, and the G� of the E� minor chord lowering he tonic pitch). Near the end of the continuation (with the anacrusis into R 3 .5), he second violin attempts to restat the dominant drone that opens he piece, but when the two lower instruments respond, to the second violins call, they are on Era half-step of. As shown in Example 2. 1 , the stutter-to-start rhym, as heard at he opening of the work, involves two pitches ollowed by two rests. Example 2. 1 also shows hat beginning at R. 3 .5, the lower insruments' quarter notes ill in the rst violin's rest with their own version ofhe drone. The shot-term result is one of dueling drones. Despite the second violin's attempt to orce the music back to G major, the two lower instruments remain in E� minor until the anacrusis into R. 4, where they slide back to G major or the closure section. The closure section, which should reconceive or resolve earlier musical ideas, does neither: instead the music reuses to acknowledge the deviations wihin he musical discourse and rens a restatement of the presentation section. This restatement of the opening musical phrase ignores the hrmonic digressions of the continuation section, blithely rening to G or he repetition of the presentation section. This leads Fanning to describe the Sixth Quartet as "deceptively innocent . . . because the naive G major of he opening keeps slipping rom view, to be reinstated as if nohing had happened.''23 The S material has close associations with the thematic material of P, linking the two sections through motivic relationships. Both sections have motives that outline perfect iths and brief, descending quater-note themes. Also, the motivic idea used in P to prepre the ren of the opening phrase (R. 3. 7) appears in S at R. 9, where it prepares the opening of the development (which ocuses · on P material). Structurally S, not suprisingly, mkes use of the same design as P, that of a statement-continuation-closure. As is normal or subordinate thematic areas, S is in a much looser orm than P and is not created by a tight-knit presentation.24 Instead, two- to tree-measure thematic ideas are introduced, separated by rests, which do not contain cadential conirmation of the new key. In what looks to be an attempt to contain the tendencies displayed by the continuation section of P of uninhibited growth, the thematic material of S seems to be created so as to restrict motion. Yet as Roseberry notes, the theme "with its unchanging solo phrase tethered to ie dry two-note ormulation of the alling minor third . . . begins to expand in spite of its nature. "25 In act, this material goes so far as to expand byond the quatet, introducing a descending trill igure taken rom the parallel section of the irst movement of Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 3 (see R. 7.4 in the Sixth Quartet and R. 6.5-6, 6. 1 5- 1 6 in the Third String Quartet).26 For the cadential section there is a telescoped, 23 David Faning, "Dmitri Shostakovich" (200 1 ) in L. Macy (ed.), New Grove Dictionay of Music and Musicians: ww.grovemusic.com (accessed 25 November 200 1 ), § 4.ii. 24 The teminology of tight-knit and loose-knit themes comes rom Caplin, Classical Form, pp. 1 9-20. 25 Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and hematic Pocess, p. 248. 26 McCreless, "Dmitri Shostakovich: The String Quartets."

Cadences and Cosure in the Sxth String Quartet

27

ragmented ren of the presentation prase, instead of a unctional closing section. As noted above, the thematic ideas of S lack any cadential coirmation of the new key. Without a strong sense of key, the continuation section's tonality becomes even more unstable. Thus, ifthe harmonic goal of S is to establish . the new key, this S zone is problematis as the music only hints at a new key. In addition, as in P, the closure part of the statement-elaboration-closure paradigm ails to accomplish its mission, as only ragmentation of the theme occurs, resulting in disintegration instead of conclusion. (Aptly, Kn portrays the "musical pause" at one measure beore R. 9 as "a proound in-cadence."27) Recalling the drone again circumvents the problem of closure-the ending of S then comes by deault, not with proper closure, but by orce with the beginning of a new section. Thus, at R. 9.8 the irst violin restarts the opening's stuttering quarter-note drone while the other instuments continue motives rom the S, where the music idea concludes on yet another 'uncadence. ' With the anacrusis to R. 10 the viola and second violin enter with the opening theme, initially suggesting a rondo-like ren of P. But immediately we hear that this is not n exact ren as both 3 and 5 are lat. Seemingly weighed down by the drone above them, the middle instruments cannot reach the all-important dominant pitch and are orced to abandon what might have been a minor-mode ren of the P theme. Instead, this music is he beginning of the relatively short irst section of a two-section rotational development. Ater this irst section, the second, signiicantly longer one begins at R. 1 3 , immediately striking a more strident tone. Here the motivic ideas are mostly rom S. The quarter­ note descents of the previous sections have tuned into intense marching ascents as the music pushes towards its climax illed with emphatic double-stop chords and intense cromaticism. The double-stop chords imitate the stuttering-to-a-start rhythm of the quater-note drone. As was the case with the ren of the drone in P, the irst violin and the lower instruments have ofset versions of the rhythm as the lower instruments play during the irst violin's rests, creating another instance of instruments in opposition with each other. The music, thickened by multistops, is raucous in its drive to the climax (see R. 19 and 20). The development, similar to previous sectional conclusions, also ends by deault. Example 2.3 shows the staggered entrance of the recapitulation as the irst violin begins the recapitulation of the irst theme at R. 2 1 .5 (the opening measure of the example) an octave lower. While the irst violin has the P theme in the tonic key (G), the lower three instuments continue with thematic ideas rom the development in a state of tonal conusion, altenating between A� and G. Fourteen measures later, at R. 23 .2, the second violin and viola inally enter with material rom P. (The cello is tacet.) The staggered ren obscures sectional boundaries, denies any sense of resolution that may have come wih the recapitulation and creates another avoided closure.28 The retun of the P material is cut short at R. 24.4 when the violins enter 27 Kun, "Shostakovich in Dialogue," p. 403 . 28 Kuhn perfectly summarizes the musical situation at this point when she states "This moment seems to encapsulate everything that has chracterized the work thus fr: uncertain and challenged tonality, blurred sectional divisions and a sense of proound unsettledness at points were [sic] resolution has been promised." Kun, "Shostakovich in Dialogue," p. 406.

Composing the Modern Subject

28

Example 2.3

Quartet No. 6, irst movement, transition rom development to recapitulation su! G al *

A • .. A •

.-- ---; · - __; ..- - -

�ffup=.

-

: ..

..

e

_

e

.. � .

_

l' >

A-

..

..

-

-·

- : -

: -

.

.-- ---; . ..-

: -

.. � ..

-

>

---

-

u

I

_..

-

u

I_

I � ...- - .- • •

:

A• >

h-

•

- - - - ..

• •

� ..

: -

-

- ..- -

-

-

�. �.

.

: ';.�..

>

>

�

u

-

f

csc.

>

.. :

-

>

, __ _

A •

A•

..

. .

f I

..

�

I

u

.

k�

�

..

f

-

with the stuttering drone, on G� and B �, signaling the beginning of he recapitulation of S. As implied by the drone pitches, when S rens in the recapitulation it is in the wrong key-in E� minor, instead of the tonic of G major. E� was the triad to which the continuation section of P slipped, meaning that, on the microcosm of P nd the macrocosm of the recapitulation, the music slides away rom the tonic to the same key, E� minor. To review, the problem of closure is similarly circumvented at the conclusion of the second-theme zone and the development as neither section closes on its own, but instead ends by deault with the beginning of a new section. When S rens in the recapitulation it is in the wrong key-E � minor instead of the tonic G maj or. Ultimately, the S-zone material is never to be heard in the tonic key. Thus, the rotational retun of P at the end of the recapitulation is necessary to reestablish the key center, unctioning in the same way as the retun of the statement in the primary-theme zone of the exposition was used to retun the music to G maj or ater the continuation had digressed rom tonic. The end of the retun of the S material is again signaled by the entrance of the stuttering quarter-note drone. The drone irst enters at R. 29.4 in the irst violin, on E�, and drops to the viola at R. 29 . 8 . Again, a direct conlict between E� and the tonic harmony is created, as the viola remains on an E� drone throughout the second retun of the presentation section of the P theme in the violins in G maj or. Not until the staggered resolution

Cadences and Closure in the Sxth String Quartet

29

of the cadence does the viola slip down to D (S in the tonic key). Once again, the music chooses to ignore deviations by using the opening material to reinstate the · tonic key as if nothing has happened. Admittedly, the ren of S in a key other than tonic does not represent a complete deviation rom · sonata orm. Hepokoski has shown, with respect to sonatas written in the depades surrounding 1 800, that the ren of the S in the tonic key is not necessarily a govening principle of sonata orm. 29 Hepokoski states the main unction of the S space is to drive the music towards essential expositional closure (EEC) in the exposition and towards essential structural close (ESC) in the recapitulation. 30 Yet, even in this view, the sonata of the irst movement of the Sixth Quatet ails, as the recapitulation of S neither retuns in the tonic key, nor does it move the music towrds a closure in the tonic (the ESC). Instead, the P theme must reun a third time to bring he music an ESC. Ater its telescoped retun, the P material ades into the coda at R. 3 3 . Slowing the anapest motion of the opening theme o quater notes and half notes (or whole notes tied to half notes), the coda uses material rom P and the transition beore settling on the repeated tonic-triad gesture ollowed by the cadential igure. When the three tonic chords appear, see R. 3 5 . 1 0, the irst violin enters on the downbeat with whole notes on D6. The lower tree instruments ollow two beats later with a G triad. With the entrances ofset by two beats, the igure directly reerences the points earlier in the movement where two sets of instruments had dueling drones (in P and the climax of the development). In this movement, the drone has consistently unctioned as an opening gesture, a signal of a new beginning, and oten the drone has orced sections to end by starting a new one. Here the drone lacks a new section to introduce, and the irst movement's inability to bring section divisions to proper closure is highlighted. The drone, a signiier of new beginnings, through elongation may be able to provide a rhetorical close, but it is not able to bring syntactical closure to the movement. Ater a beat of rest, the cadence enters, appended, not integrated. According to Foucault, the Modem episteme views all individual entities as organic replicas of the same orm. The result of this approach to knowledge is hat when the irst movement strays rom the harmonic and strucural norms, it must ignore-it must convince its listeners to ignore-the deviations or else have the undamental hpothesis of the nowledge base be shown as untenable. Yet the real cnnot be kept at a neutralized distance, so the disturbances caused by he real ooze into the music. The crisis of the end of the organic episteme's continual repetition is oreshadowed early in the movement as, in addition to the continual harmonic derailment, the sections do not close on their ownends are orced by the begining of new sections. In addition, with the irst presentation of S in D, the recapitulation of S in he unexpected key of E� (along with the ' slipping' of the P to E� in he continuation section), and the strong use of A� in · the development, the overall key scheme of the . movement relects the inal our pitches of the cadential igure 29 Hepokoski, "Beyond the Sonata Principle," Journal of American Musicological Sociey 55/ 1 (2002): 9 1 - 1 54. See also Hepokosi and Darcy, Sonata Form, pp. 242-5 . 30 Ibid., p. 1 34.

30

Composing the Moden Subject

(M, E�� D, and G). The pitches that make up the marked obj ect inect, as it were, the large-scale harmonic structure of the movement, creating a very murky tonal picture. In addition, as Kuhn notes, the of-balanced resolution of the initial cadence predicts the unsynchronized transitions between ormal sections.31 The movement has not been able to avoid the real; instead the real has seeped into the core of the ormal logic of modem discourse. Thus, while the grat is most noticeable in the inal measures, in retrospect we know that it is present throughout the entire piece. The grat is, in Derrida's words, a "prolierating allogene," an invading orce that is only recognizable "ater the act at the point at which it is dropped like a textual tail, like a remainder."32 When he movement comes to its inal measures it can no longer use the repeated notes to signal the end of the section with the beginning of another, and so resorts to the only music that had created a nctional conclusion in the entire movement: the cadence that closes the presentation material of P. What unctioned on the local level, however, does not suice in a more global environment in which organic growth ultimately creates a much larger entity duplicating the meta-unity. As the work develops rom the basic strucure into a ull-ledged sonata, so should the closing material by moving beyond the cadential igure. As it stands, the cadence has the orce to close an eight-measure statement, not an entire movement. The use of the cadence continues the regressive tendencies of the irst movement by ning towards previous materials in a reusal to deal with ruptures in the Modem episteme. The cadence, instead of creating a convincing conclusion-or, at the very least, covering up the music's inability to ind an ending-exposes the crisis of the end and the rupure of the real. .

.

The Classical Episteme

In the irst movement the Modem episteme's continual "unveiling of the Same"33 and its reusal to acknowledge deviations rom the recurrent replication of the "transcendent one-ness"34 ails, eventually exposing what it tried to ignore. Following the irst movement's precedence of ning to the past with the outmoded, historically reerenced cadence to attempt to suture over the rupture of the real, the second movement regresses to an older knowledge base, the Classical episteme. The Classical episteme's goal of arranging all knowledge on a table so that each and every aspect of a siuation has its place is a means of creating laboratory-like conditions, allowing the subject to eel that the crisis can be managed and averted by maintaining a highly controlled environment.

3 1 Kuhn, "Shostakovi Ch in Dialogue," p. 40 1 . Kuhn argues that E� and A� present altenative dominnt nd tonic harmonies to D and G. While this may be overstating the unctional role of E� and A�, they certainly do work to destabilize the prevailing hamonies. Kuhn, "Shostakovich in Dialogue," pp. 397-409. 32 Derrida, Dissemination, pp. 353-7. 33 Foucault, The Order of Things, p. 340. 34 Solie, "The Living Work," p. 1 52.

Cadences and Closure in the Sxth Sring Quartet

Section

Rehearsal numbers

Key

A B transition A2 c A3 B2 transition

36 38 39. 1 3 40 42 46 48 50 51

E� B�

c2

Figure 2.2

31

E� E� D (2 step oi) E�

Quartet No. 6, second movement: overview

On ormal and thematic levels, the second movement creates a table of sections all of which are clearly delineated and orgo thematic development. The movement is in a modiied compound-tenary form. The waltz-like opening section is itself in a tenary orm (ABA) and is ollowed by a trio (C), which unexpectedly rens at the end of the movement, instead of the inal A section. The sections are distinct and transitions are limited to two, both of which ollow the B sections. Thus, the overall orm is ABtrA2CA3B2trC2 (see Figure 2.2). The irst transition, which leads back to A2, is a short our measures while the second, leading into C2, is been expanded and includes reerences to materials rom the A section. In all but one case (the move rom C1 to A3), a move to a new section (whether it be a start of the new section or a transition which leads to the new section) is signaled by a measure of quarter notes, played either by a solo instrument on 3 or 5 of the new key or, in the case of the transition sections, a single harmony. The result is that all moves to new sections occur in a succinct, mechanized ashion. Motivic development does not play a role in the construction of the piece. As a whole, Shostkovich's motto rhythm, the napest, has been expelled rom the movement-the energetic, driving gesture is not allowed in the highly controlled microcosm of rationalized knowledge. n n efort to conrol all variables, the second movement seems obsessed with the various possible scoring permutations allowed by the qutet medium, creating a grid of identities and diferences of orchestration, where the sections group together n pairs of two such that the second section of each couple inverts the scoring of the section that preceded it (implying a melody or the tacet violin in the opening section) (see Figure 2.3). For example, in A1 the rst violin has the melody while the viola and cello play he accompanimental countermelody (the second violin is tacet). n the B1 section the viola nd cello have the melody while the violins play the accompniment. When the A section rens (A2) at R. 40 the tree upper instruments play he original melody over the countermelody in the cello. The weight of the scoring is inverted in the C1 section as the rst violin has the melody and he lower instruments accompny. The scorings or theA3 and B2 sections ollow that oftheA2 and C1 sections respectively, but now the use of pizzicato is introduced-in the melody of A3 and the accompniment ofB2. The C2 section begins by moving back to a two-and-wo scoring, with the melody in the top voices. Here, the grid of scoring shows signs of strain with the introduction of a countermelody that rst appers in the viola and cello at R. 5 1 .6. This countermelody

Composing the Moden Subject

32

Section

Melody

Accompaniment

A1 B1

Vlnl (Vln2 tacet) Via and Cello

Via and Cello Vln l n4 Vln2

A1 c1

Cello Vln l

Vln l , Vln2, Via Vln2, Via, Cello

C2 ('restoration') Disturbance (R52)

= A1 (with Vln2 in melody) Vln2, cello

Anapesf{'restoration ') Cadence (' inversion')

B2 (= C1 with accomp. pizzicato) = A2

Figure 2.3

= A2 with melodic pizzicato = C1 with accomp. pizzicato

Vln l , Via

Quartet No. 6, third movement: table of scoring

moves to he second violin and cello at R. 52. 1 , splitting he quartet texure or the irst time. By R. 52.9 n original version of the opening scoring has been restored, now with the second violin, which had been tacet, in the accompniment. The texture or both he repeated-chord gesture and he cadence has one solo voice against the hree other instruments with the cadence n inversion of the anapest. With the reerence to the scoring of the opening section at C2 and the 'anapest, ' the grid is completed by directly reerencing the irst section, the original state of the table of knowledge. This laboratory of scoring attempts to conrol the vaiables in each section such that each nstument respects its rnge nd each of the various mens of orchestration is presented in an environment that does not allow or unconrolled disurbances. Figure 2.2 helps to illustrate how disturbnces of the real creep into various compositional aspects of he movement. At a moderate tempo in � time, both the A nd B sections have a lilting waltz-like eel to · them. Boh melodies proceed in a steady maner without rhhmic syncopation or vriations beyond the standard eighth-note division of the beat. The melodic lines e ascending and in the major mode. hile at times extensions beyond a normal phrase length occur (as is tpical of Shostakovich), neither section is developmental. However, with the C section here is a lage, nd seemingly unmotivated, shit in mood rom the earlier sections. As opposed to the previous sections' rhyhmically steady, ascending melodies, he C section switches to a slithering, chromatic, descending melody which altenates between duple and triple divisions of the beat. With its sliding chromaticism nd continual chnging of the division of the beat, does the C section reveal what the upbeat, ascending major-mode waltzes of the earlier sections conceal: that something is awry in the table of knowledge? The act that all is not right comes to he oreground when the second B section (B2) misses its ren to he tonic key by a half step, rening in D major instead of E�. (This is a reversal rom the irst movement where S should have recapitulated in D, but instead rened in E�.) The key of the second movement is a key hat appered in he rupres of the previous movement. The use ofE� in he second movement could be intepreted

33

Cadences and Closure in the Sxth String Quartet

as pat of he movement's attempt to control and manage disurbances in he symbolic order of he irst movement. Yet, with the ren of B (B2) the destabilizing tug-of-wr between the two keys spreads into the second movement. Likewise, while the inal section does ren properly to tonic, it is he wrong section that rens, as the table of omal sections goes awry with the ren of the C seCtion (C2) instead of a inal A section. Although the extended ransition hints at the A section, the movement ends instead wih a ren of he highly chromatic, slithering C section. The C2 section is the ocal point in he movement where the neurotic attempt to conrol in he Classical episteme begins to ray. Not only does the ren of he C section upset the orm of the work, by eradicating the contnual ren of the A section and reintroducing its destabilizng cromaticism, it inroduces a melodic agent rom outside the work into the movement. At R. 5 1 .6 he viola and cello allude to the variation heme rom the rst movement of Shostkovich's Seventh Symphony.35 Appering in pizzicato, parallel octaves, and marked pino, this theme has n insidious quality. This uncanny "ren" of the Seventh Symphony's incessant heme brings a disurbance into the laboratoy setting, unsettling the creully conrolled environment and becoming an active agent in the disinteration of the grid of scoring at R. 52. Example 2.4

Quartet No. 6, second movement, inal measures

�------------..-

§"

.

�-

�-

�-

�- ;

�-

�-

�

§

J .

nz.

J

I

' z.

-- '

piz.

.

-.

.

.,

p dim .

. I

""·

"·

-

-· --

p dim. I

O

p

--

-

dim.

p

35 Mccreless terms the reference to the theme rom the Sevenh Symphony a "quotation . . . now darkened with the pc-set of the DSCH motive." n my opinion, the tem allusion is more appropriate as the theme is altered more signiicantly than a ' darkening' of pitch content implies. Mccreless, "Dmitri Shostakovich: The String Quartets."

34

Composing the Modern Subject

Again, the cadential igure is used to end the movement as if it were some scientiic method whose invocation will ind a solution. As shown in Example 2.4, in addition to transposing the cadence to E�, the only transposition of the cadence in the piece, Shostakovich makes subtle changes in the deployment of the repeated­ chord gesture and the cadential igure rom the irst movement to the end of the second movement. Here the irst violin holds a B �6 near the top of its range, as the three lower instruments pluck a tonic triad. There is one pizzicato note or every two bars as the three iterations of the tonic triad re spread over six measures as if trying to create a convincing conclusion purely via elongation. As in the irst movement, a rest separates the cadential igure rom the preceding music. When the cadence rens, spread over seven bars, it is again not integrated into the discourse, instead sounding perplexing in the second movement's repetition of the irst movement's unsuccessul closing igure. The Renaissance Episteme

With the ailure of the Classical episteme to deal with the ruptures of the real, the music regresses again, now to the episteme of the Renaissnce. If the laboratory conditions of the second movement prove insuicient in managing the ruptures, then maybe they are something beyond human control and understanding-signs rom some mystical being. The third movement can be seen as an attempt to read the ruptures in constructed reality as a transcendental sign-an answer rom the real. Here the crisis is understood to come rom a voice that precedes signiication, displayed as a signature to be intepreted in order to gain knowledge. The form of he movement, a passacaglia with a continuous recurrence of the cello 's ground, imitates the continual circle of knowledge, constructed by the Renaissance episteme, based on resemblnces in which signs continually reer to other signs. The ground, shown in Example 2.5, is constructed such that the inal note is tied to the opening note of the next statement creating a seamless, continuous circle. Historically, the passacaglia is indelibly associated with the Baroque period-a time controlled by the Classical (rather than the Renaissance) episteme. Yet as the term is applied today, the roots of the ground bass reach back to the early Renaissance. The term 'passacaglia' itself irst occurred in literature around the beginning of the seventeenth century,36 and originally reerred to music perormed while promenading with a guitar. 37 Initially, both passacaglias and chaconnes served a ritomello unction, as musical material used to introduce and conclude a wide variety of pieces.38 By the second quarter of the seventeenth century the passacaglia was beginning to be used as an ostinato orm. 39 In ostinato orm, 36 See Thomas Walker, "Ciaccona and Passacaglia: Remarks on their Origin and Early History," Jounal of the American Musicological Sociey XI ( 1 968): 3 00-320, here p. 305 and Richard Hudson, "Further Remarks on the Passacaglia and Ciaccona," Jounal of the American Musicological Sociey XIII ( 1 970) : 302-3 1 4, here p. 302. 3 7 Walker, "Ciaccona and Passacaglia: Remrks on their Origin nd Erly History," p. 305. 3 8 Ibid., p. 309. 3 9 Ibid., p. 3 1 3 .

35

Cadences and Closure in the Sxth String Quartet

Example 2.5

�

Quartet No. 6, third movement, passacaglia theme

Lento �- 1 1 6 � j 1e

"'�'' ";

. 1r

r

11r

11 i

-= � 1 ja

J

1e

1u

u u

1 =--1

the passacaglia becomes entwined in the lineage of the much older tradition of the ground bass, which can be traced back to as early as the thirteenth century, and began to take on modem orm in the repeated chord schemes of the Renaissance dance.40 Thus, by the Baroque era, the passacaglia already had an archaic, regressive sound. The passacaglia, as an older orm used within the Classical episteme, can be seen as the Classical period's representation of the resemblances that ruled an earlier knowledge base.41 The movement begins with a presentation of the theme by the solo cello. Over each of the next three repetitions a new instrument enters (moving upward rom the cello trough the viola, to the second violin and inally the irst violin) in a lyrical countepoint such that by the ourth iteration of the theme a dense, yet calm, polphonic texture is created. With the last cello note of the ourth iteration of the theme, the three upper instuments all together as a collective in two measures of steady quarter-notes where the ourth note of each measure drops by either a third or ourh. For the ith iteration the three upper instruments continue to play as a collective, ending again with the steady quarter-note harmony. The convergence of instuments to end the ith iteration seemingly causes a temporary suspension of the passacaglia's circular movement as the cello, instead of continuing on with another statement of the theme, drones on the inal note of the theme. The upper instruments repeat the quarter notes, but with one change as, through double stops, the viola and second violin take over the irst violin's part, efectively reeing the irst violin rom its duties in the our-pat texture. The violin thus takes light or a brief time, ree rom constraints, perorming a truly beautiul melody in which it, beginning on its highest note of the movement, B�5, loats lightly downward, evenually landing and rejoining the collective or the steady quarter-note motive. The violin's solo breaches the continuous circle, and its appearance begs or intepretation. The melody is presented as a signature to be interpreted as the answer of the real, but the solo's mysterious beauty is uninterpretable-it gives no new knowledge. In the Renaissance episteme each attempt to ind meaning by interpreting the signs via resemblances leads only to more resemblances. The signatures to be interpreted are empty of meaning in themselves: they only point to more signatures, creating a never-ending circle. The violin's melody, though beautiul, does not ofer a solution to the crisis of the end. Ater a general pause in all the voices, the irst violin restats the circular motion with the anacrusis into R. 60, ater which the viola and cello join with the theme in haunting parallel octaves. 40 Douglass Gree,, Form in Tonal Music: An Intouction to Tonal Analysis, 2nd edn (New York, 1 979), p. 1 88 and Richard Hudson, "Ground," in L. Macy (ed.), Nw Gove Dictionay of Music and Musicians, www.grovemusic.com (accessed 20 March 2002), § 1 . 4 1 See Walker, "Ciaccona and Passacaglia: Remarks on their Origin and Erly History," p. 305; Hudson, "Further Remarks on the Passacaglia and Ciaccona," p. 302; Green, Form in Tonal Music, p. 1 88; and Hudson, "Ground," § 1 .

36

Composing the Modern Subject

With the hollow octaves and tacet second violin, the sixth iteration is drained of presence; the emptiness of the continuous circle of resemblances has been exposed. The second violin joins the texture only at the end or the two measures of quarter notes. With the seventh iteration there is a retn of the ull texture that, at times, works motivic elements rom the ground through imitation in the viola, creating uther resemblances. Again the upper instruments repeat the quarter-note igure at the end of the passacaglia theme but, as now fully evident, this collective orce cannot bring an end to the circular repetition. With each resemblance creating a circular orm of similitudes that always leads only to rther resemblances, the Renaissance episteme is condemned in Foucault's words "to never nowing anything but the same thing, and to knowing that thing only at the unattainable end of an endless joumey."42 The compositional premise of a basso continuo problematizes concepts of closure, as theoretically the passacaglia theme could continue· on ad iinium. The passacaglia of the Sixth Quartet does not present a solution to his compositional dilemma. As shown in Example 2.6, the passacaglia is incapable of ending-even the grated cadential igure cannot stop the musical low. Instead, the cadential igure redirects the musical motion into the next movement by changing the key to that of the ourth movement and cadencing on the downbeat of the ourth movement. The entire cadential igure then is in the key of the fourth movement, G major, instead of that of the third movement, B � minor. Kuhn notes that problematic pitch centers introduced in the irst movement make an appearance near the end of the passacaglia.43 At R. 62.34, the collective upper voices play A� chords that resolve to E�. The reintroduction of the previously destabilizing A� nd E� harmonies sets up the subversive harmonic move to the key of the inale. In addition, the repeated-chord gesture and cadential igure are reversed; now coming ater the inal chord of the cadence, the repeated-chord gesture also occurs in the new key. Thus, the repeated­ chord gesure occurs as an opening raming gesture or the outh movement, in the key of that movement. A doubl_e br in the score or the outh movement visually separates the anapest rom the music that ollows. Aurally, the listener is let without a perceptible ending to the passacaglia, as one hears an unexpected tonal disjunction when the music changes keys with little harmonic preparation. Only ater the act does one realize the music has moved on to a new movement (theoretically leaving the passacaglia to continue on in its endless circle of resemblances). Unlike the previous two movements, the third movement lacks both a rhetorical and syntactical close, as the circle of signatures creates a never-ending cycle of empty signs. The passacaglia, which tried to read the rupure_ofthe real as a divine sign, inds the sign hauntingly beautiul, but untrnslatable.

42 Foucault, The Order of Things, p. 30. 43 Kn, "Shostakovich in Dialogue," p. 425 .

37

Cadences and Closue in the Sxth String Quartet

Example 2.6

Quartet No. 6, third movement, inal measures

�

"

v

I

A v

-

-

,p;; .. ;;; -_-:''==�

-

p spss.

�

J

aaca

poco spss1vo

� Lento J = 116

lleretto l

V

".

v

=

,

69

=--

".

,

"

p

p

:

�

�

.

.

� --

..

-._p

IJ� p

p

Towards a New Episteme

In signiying the arbitrariness of convention, the cadential igure suggests that an unbridgeable gap divides the real and the known modes of symbolization. While the gap will remain, a stable psychological existence is dependent on some sort of constructed reality. According to Zizek, the subject needs to somehow "accept the real . . . in its senseless actuality" in its constructed universe.44 For the obj ect to be integrated into reality the real cannot be avoided; it must be acknowledged-the gap between the real and symbolization must be understood "as something that deines our very condition humaine. "45 Foucault's ability to smmarize the Modem episteme implies the imminent dissolution of the episteme, as only with some semblance of historical diference can one begin to encapsulate the oundational knowledge base of an age. In the Sixth String Qurtet, this demise is signaled by he ruptures of the real in the irst movement-when the arbirariness of the meta-unity is exposed. The qutet's regression to the Classical and Renaissance episteme's means of symbolizing reality exposes the maner in which those epistemes avoid acknowledging the real. A solution let untried is to move toward the creation of a new knowledge base-a base that acknowledges the ruptures of the real and attempts to integrate them into 4 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 3 5 . 4 5 bid., p. 36.

38

Composing the Moden Subject

constructed reality. In The Order of Things Foucault does not endeavor to divine how a new way of creating knowledge may evolve; Jacques Attali, on the other hand, has made such an attempt in Noise: The Political Economy of Music.46 While Attali's book is described as a "history of music"47 (as opposed to Foucault's archeology of knowledge bases), it is easily interpreted· as being structured around Foucault's epistemes. Attali 's distinctions between the use of music as sacriice, ritual, and repetition are relections ofFoucault's Renaissance, Classical, and Moden epistemes. In Noise Attali argues that music itself can be intepreted as a "credible metaphor of the real"48 (his only mention of the concept), nd discusses society's use of music as a means of documenting changes in ideology, in short, changes in how society deals with the real. Attali's position is that a shit in music's use and unction wihin society precedes every signiicant shit in humanity's conceptualization of nowledge. Ater detailing music's use by society through sacriice (a means of chaneling violence), ritual (a means of exchange), and repetition (a means of stocpiling), in his inal chapter Attali theorizes about what, in his view, should ollow the Moden episteme with direct application to music, labeling the uture episteme one of self-composition. Atali envisions a radical upheaval with respect to how music is created in society, one that guably represents a utopian exreme, where the creation of the work of art is the end men, not the work's use or exchange value. Attali's ideas represent an attempt to theorize about how society may len to create a reality that deals with the real, as symbolized through music, in a more constructul manner. While Attali's ideas concen the literal creatio/perormance of music (he advocates or new instruments49) nd the use of this music in society, we can perhaps see relections of some of Attali's theorized changes in the microcosm of the ourh movement of the Sixth Quartet, and see how the quartet may suggest a new way to construct reality. Composing, in Attali 's vision, would entail a "collective creation, rather than an exchange of coded messages. "50 In creating the new episteme, music cannot artiicially "recreate the old codes in order to reinsert communication into them,"51 but, instead of relying on convention, such as the cadential igure as a signiier of closure, music must ind new orms of signiying. Working with material that is at hand, that of the previous movements, the ourth movement then may be able to compose "not a new music, but a new way of making music,"52 one that can hold meaning in the current context. In doing so, the movement would airm nowledge gained rom he previous episteme 's view of the world without regressing to those older epistemes. The ourth movement would reorient knowledge in a manner that attempts to accept the arbitrariness of everyday lie.

46 Jacques Attali, Noise: The Political conomy of Music, trans. Brain Massumi (Minneapolis, MN, 1 999). 47 Frederic Jameson, Foreword to Nose, p. vii. 48 Attali, Nose, p. 5. 49 Ibid., p. 1 44. 50 Ibid., p. 143. 51 Ibid., p. 1 34. 52 Ibid.

Cadences and Closure in the Sxth String Quartet

39

The inal movement ofhe Sixh Quatet moves towards some tpe ofunderstanding nd acceptance of the gap between the real nd symbolization, trough components of the previous movements in · an integtated, complex, sonata-rondo orm. Here, aspects rom each of he centers of knowledge of he previous movements are re-approached and integrated, some more successully thn others. For example, the ourh movement reerences ,the stuctures of the previous movements and also the keys of hese movements. The rondo aspect of the inale's sonata-rondo orm relects the continual ren of the A section in he compound ty . orm of the second movement. This ren of opening section at the end of the exposition in the inale appears in the key of the second movement, ther emphasizing its connection to the second movement. The passacaglia of the hird movement is referenced via a ren of its theme near the climax of the development. Here the theme appears in its original key, B � minor. In addition to ormal and harmonic reerences, impont motivic aspects of the earlier movements reappear. For example, n addition he ren of the passacaglia theme, he napest, so prominent in the irst movement, expelled rom the second, and absent rom the passacaglia, rens to its original stature in the musical texture, becoming a part of every section. Also, the quater-note drone of he rst movement reprises its role, and unctions as a means of stating he recapitulation. Signiicantly, the characteristic that was most closely associated the crisis of the real in the previous movements-the inability to combine syntactical and rhetorical closure-continues to haunt the music in the inale. Like the irst movement, as the inale progresses, the ailure to close occurs on an increasingly larger ormal scale. In the ourth movement, the problem is evaded through the using unctions wihin a section. For example, in the opening of the movement, ater a wandering solo introduction by the violin, the music settles down in G major at the A section at R. 64. This section has three expansive parts, similar to the statement-elaboration-closure structure used in the irst movement. But here the music that unctions as the closing section of the A section also serves as the transition into B.53 Without a rhetorical or syntactical signal of conclusion or A, the B section's begining (at R. 69) is marked by changes in key, meter, texture and character. A similar merging of unctions occurs on a larger scale at the end of the exposition, as the exposition also lacks in ormal closure by again using the two unctions into one section. Speciically, the B section slides into the rondo ren of the opening section (beginning at R. 73 with the introduction material in E�) without any ormal closure or the B section or exposition. At R. 75 the A section retuns in the key of G, with all instruments, but alterations in the material begin to occur two measures beore R. 77 and by R. 78 one realizes that the music has moved on to the development section. Thus, there is no clear close to the exposition, and the section beginning at R. 73 elides the unctions both as a rondo retun of A and as the opening of the development. By R. 78 the development is well underway, and the music begins pushing higher in register to prepare or the entrance of the passacaglia theme and the climax of the work. The passacaglia rens at R. 80 in the cello; two measures later the viola enters 53 This tpe of usion occurs on the most local level in the rst movement. At the end of P, at R. 4.6-7, the sense of closure provided by the cadence is signiicantly undercut by he elision of he cadence with the start of he ransition.

40

Composing the Modern Subject

with the theme. By not waiting until one cycle of resemblance is complete beore the next begins, the continuous circle of resemblances represented by the passacaglia becomes unbalanced, and the music is sent careening towards an extremely high, discordant climx that comes to its peak on a chord cluster in the lower instruments (C, D#, E, and G#) while the violins altenate between A# and B. Here, Shostakovich's tendency to put the climax of his sonata orms in the development, instead of with the entrnce of the recapitulation causes a compositional problem with respect to concluding the climax. 54 Similar to the irst movement, in the inale, ater the climax of the development, the texture thins to the two violins as the music descends, seemingly searching or a means of conclusion. Instead of concluding or introducing the recapitulation, the music disintegrates, nd two measures beore R. 84 he music alls into silence. The violins try again or one measure, but to no avail. The two separate moments ofrest silently underscore the structural crisis the music aces: the development has disintegrated into nothingness. Without introducing the reprise of the exposition, the minimum deining aspect of orm, the movement stnds on the brik of complete formal dissolution. The music thus reverts to the one motive that seemingly has never ailed in its ormal duties, as, ater two beats of rest, the cello enters, stuttering to a stt with the drone that played such an important role in suturing over the crisis of the real in the irst movement. The drone is on E�, thus rening he problematic pitch rom the irst movement, while seting up the retrograde retun of the B section in B� major. With the reprise of the A section the music rens to the tonic key, G. The A sections appears in a new meter, � vs. g , aid at a relaxed tempo of � = 126 versus the opening's J = 69. Nonetheless, even in this subdued state, the A section is still unable to create closure. As in the development, hree measures beore R. 94, the music disintegrates into silence. The quartet tries again or two measures, but R. 94. 1 begins with another two beats of silence. Example 2.7

l Lento J • u

J . .

=

Quartet No. 6, ourth movement, inal measures

100

p

.

,

J

p

..

p

spss.

"

�

�

spess.

p

p :

�� p

i

p

�

�

�

=== -

moendo

i

.

i ===-

.

.

== -

== =-

moen do

&

moendo

moendo

54 David Castro borrows Hepokoski and Drcy's terms when describing Shostakovich's tendency to place he climax in the development rather than at the stt of the recapitulation as "normative" or Shostakovich. Climaxes plac.ed elsewhere thus represent deormations. David Castro, "Sonata Form in the Music of Dmitri Shostakovich," p. 2 1 .

Cadences and Closure in the Sxth String Quartet

41

I n the inal measures of the movement, i n Example 2 . 7 , there is a ren o f the lento tempo marking that had accompanied the anapest gesture at the end of the passacaglia. Comparing Example 2.6 to Example 2.7 shows that the deployment of the cadence and repeated-chord gesture is similar to the opening of the movement (the close of the third movement). While the pitches re the same, the scoring is diferent, �s all instuments play the three tonic chords (whereas beore, the viola had a double-stop and the irst violin was tacet). Most signiicantly, or the irst time in the our iterations of these two motives, :both the repeated-chord gesture and the cadential igures are integrated and work together to end the piece; rests do not separate the two as the cadence lows directly into the three tonic chords. By preceding the repeated-chord gesture, the cadential igure, the grat that was rejected, is accepted and brought into the rhetorical old of the music. The signiier of the senseless arbitrry becomes a pat of the quatet's constructed reality. As beore, the cadence lowers the top voice to i, creating a syntactical close. This syntactical close is still a materialization of ultimate nonsense; the subject's ictive ends are just that-ictive-but the arbitrariness has been acknowledged and given a place in the constructed reality. By tking the grat that symbolizes the lack and mking it a part of the reality, he subject has ound a way of acknowledging the empty kenel behind the constructed universe. To use Zizek's words, the object ''that we can manipulate and hold in our hands like any other object" becomes a reminder of both the "absurdiy of ate" and the act that at one moment in time some semblance of control was elt.ss In the cadence, an everyday object unctions "to ill out the place of this void that gapes at the very her of the symbolic ."s6 By admitting the senselessness of the Other into its constructed universe, a reality can be created where the subject can sustain itself through lie's inconsistencies . Ater the cadential igure syntactically closes the work, the irst violin drops a ourth to 5 or the repeated-chord gesure. The gesture of the three chords, with a marking of morendo, now tkes its place as a rhetorical signiier of"the end that is no end" in the newly developing discourse. Here the music acknowledges the crisis of the end in hat it does not try to imitate older cadential ideals calling or ull closure. Instead, ·by repeating the same chords with a syntactically open 5 in the top voice, the work concedes Adomo's point that modem music "cnnot be hypostatized as a unity of actually presenting meaning."s7 Yet, while the music cannot make a consistent uniy of meaning, the movement proposes that some sort of meaning can still exist, albeit not in a closed, stable, coherent whole. As previously discussed, when we irst hear the three-chord gesture at the end of the opening movement, its scoring alludes to the drone stuttering to a stt (see page 29). Thus, the gesture holds the kenel of a new beginning within itself; it carries the implication of a new opening. Likewise, composing, according to Attali, will lead to a new conception of history that is open and unstable, that has a "permnent ragility of meaning."s8 The crisis of the end represents a crisis of identity as the subject tries to create self-closure. Not until the 55 56 57 58

Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 1 3 5 . Ibid., p . 3 3 . Adono, Mahler, p . 1 3 8 . Ali, Nose, p . 1 47.

42

Composing the Modern Subject

subject opens itself to otheness, allowing a place or the unknown in the constructed reality, does the crisis dissipate. As the piece cannot continue orever, the statement of the three repeated tonic chords allows the work to ade away wihout orcing an empty closure, · without expelling the ambiguities caused by the real. In the new episteme of composing, music must "create· its own code at he same time as the work,"59 and this is what happens with the anapest gesture, as by the end of the work it comes to signiy, or this piece, a new code or ending-one that acknowledges that there is no deinitive end. Again, the Sixth String Quartet has been viewed as an attempt to ren to a lighter, more innocent style, perhaps exempliying an intention to compose, in Fanning's words, "more straightorward and cheerul music."60 Yet, as Fanning notes elsewhere, a "sense of uneasy watchulness that increasingly makes itself elt beneath the Sixth Quartet's apparently benign surface."61 In truth, the qurtet is regressive, but only to the extent of displaying the aultiness in the attempt to escape with such regressions. For the quartet to become something other than an example of sentimental kitsch-or it to posit any meaning or the current reality-the piece canot succumb to the emptiness of pure nostalgia. In the Sixth Quartet, the music works to create new codes that hold meaning in the current context while not hiding the cause of the original crisis. The Sixth String Quartet at irst attempts to conceal the wound caused by he lack in the Other, but in the end does not suture over the crisis as at the end of the development and the movement, it exposes the nothingness behind its constructed reality. At the same time, the quatet does not pathologize the symptom-the wound and all its senselessness is accepted · as part of reality. The quartet thus manages to point to the uture by allowing the emptiness behind convention to be heard without pathologizing the rupture (the ormal and harmonic ailures) that symbolizes the arbitrariness of constructed reality. As the work ades away, the inal mrking on the score, the morendo, closes the piece in a manner that perhaps could be called "classical Shostakovich."

59 Ibid., p. 1 3 5 . 6 0 Faning, "Dmitri Shostakovich," § 4. 1 . 6 1 Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p . 40. Shostakovich wrote this work while on honeymoon ater his second mariage, to Margarita Kainova (see Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 40 and Fay, Shostakovich: A Lfe, p. 1 98). While the surface-level inocence of the work may perhaps relect this celebratory period, the "problem of tone" (Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 40), seems to have accurately oreshadowed the soon to be disastrous mariage.

Chapter 3

The Space Between: Codas, Death and the Seventh String Quatet, Op. 1 0 8 ( 1 960) 1

The coda to the irst movement of the Seventh String Quartet is a mere iteen measures long. As shown in Example 3 . 1 , the initial our measures consist of a legato melodic line that decrescendos as it descends. This music is then ollowed by eleven measures of an anapest-illed thematic idea that, in the concluding measures, slows down as it continues to soten. Example 3.1

Quartet No. 7, irst movement, coda til

.".

, .". ,

awn om he rnsision

�--

p

�·

-

.

•

'--" p

, -___ _.

,,� �·

!!�"

--

-JJ

�� �

"

:

. �·

-

--

JJ

, .".

,

�

--

..'-

I.

p

:

-="

�!

!'

>� �

ial rawn om heme A-->

JJ

JJ �

'��

-" -

�' ' � �

�

JJ

it.

�� � �1! !

'f

q! ! ! � � �·

� � �

�� � �

� � �

�! � �-

! ! !'

I q ! ! !.

. . .

�� � �· �

;, .

·--�

�

�-

�

�

�- .

_

i e� :. •

-

-

..4

�-

-'

�

--p -p --

..

-

Figure 3 . 1 illustrates that, in lieu of a development in this movement, a brief, nine-measure retransition conects the secondary-heme zone of the exposition to the retun of materials rom the primary space in the recapitulation. I The Seventh Sring Quartet is dedicated "To the memory of Nina Vasil ;yevna Shostakovich," Shostakovich's irst wie, who died a little over ive years beore the composition of the quartet.

44

Composing the Moden Subject

Exposition Primary-theme zone (P}-Theme A R. 0 Transition 1 3 .3 Secondary-theme zone (S) 5 Retransition 8 Recapitulation Primary-theme zone 9 11.l0 Transition 1 Secondary-theme zone 13 Coda Reransition and P materials 16 Figure 3.1

l l - ( c) - E V l E� E� - l l l - (c) - E V l l

Quartet No. 7, irst movement: overview

The irst our measures of the coda (Example 3 . l ) are, in act, a modiied version of this retransition (shown in Example 3 .2). The remainder of the coda (R. 1 6.S) derives rom the second half of the opening theme (Theme A) starting at R. 0.8 (see Example 3 .3). Thus, the coda draws its material rom the retransition and the second part of Theme A. The coda's breviy, ifnothing else, suggests that despite its recourse to previous musical material, its unction can hardly be compensatory (at least as the term is usually understood, as "correcting" or responding to events that had not been ully acknowledged within the sonata proper), since the two themes rom earlier in the movement reappear in tuncated orm and ate not developed in ny way.2 Far rom compensating or the movement's missing development, the coda emphasizes the lack of development; it imitates the retransition's simple passing rom exposition to recapitulation. The coda copies this um of events in microcosm, retransition materials ollowed by material drawn rom the opening theme. 3 From this point of view, the coda leaves the impression of being extraneous to the orm, apparently serving no unction within the ormal paradigm.

2 For a discussion regarding the compensatory unction of the coda see Caplin, Clssical Form, pp. 1 79-9 1 . 3 This coda could be considered an example of what Hepokoski and Darcy would label a tpe of rotational coda in that the coda (re)cycles hrough a thematic patten that was established at the outset of the movement. A movement created by rotational structures is hus a set of cycles of the patten (with appropriate adjustments). Although, in this ease of the irst movement of the Seventh Quartet, he coda begins with material taken rom the end of the P space. For their discussion of codas and rotation see Hepokoski and Darcy, Elements of Sonata Theoy, pp. 283-6. For their in-depth discussion of the term "rotation" see pp. 6 1 1-14. Hepokoski and Drcy note that while most recapitulatory rotations begin in the tonic nd subdominant, the altenative key used most oten i;; the submediant, p. 268. Here, the coda rotation begins on VI, which can be seen as yet another way the coda highlights the act hat the movement lacks a development by entering in the key in which the missing development could have begun. At the same time, by starting he recapitulation in the submediant (D maj or), the coda oreshadows the tonic of the second movement, which is in D minor.

45

Cods, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

Example 3.2

Quartet No. 7, irst movement, transition rom exposition to recapitulation Mateial d in coda

J_J

JJ

A ,

d;m.

f'eapess.

I

. ,

�

f esp!SS. _

..

f esp!u. I

�-

- - ;,

dim.

-�

h�

.___-

/�

�

.__/ - ---

-

-

-

.----

;;; ..

-

.__,

----

dim.

-

�

/ -.

�

f eSpNSS.

Example 3.3 Quartet No. 7, irst movement, primary theme (Theme A) letot J • ,

" M i

..._

v

J.J

�

p

. . .

_

-

�·

J.J

...

.._.

J.J

� -·

'--"

_

J.J

--

...� .

.

.

.. .

Mateial used n a

]

. . .

.

J.J

J.J

.

.

p . .

J.J

J.J

. " .

v

.. • p

p

Towards a Theory of the Coda: Coda as Supplement

While this coda appears to be extraneous to the orm, most would ague that a proper coda is never a superluous addition, that it is always necessary to the artistic whole. In he case of the irst movement of he Seventh, he coda conributes to this whole by emphasizing the movement's structural close through the cyclic diminishing of musical materials. The coda would thus have two, opposing, intepretationsone outside, inessential o the orm, the other absolutely indispensable to the musical whole. One way of negotiating this apparent contradiction of the coda might be to consider he heoretical unction of a coda. Yet, sonata-orm theory has litle deinitive to say about the coda. Joseph Kerman notes that "he notoriously imperfect insument,

46

Composing the Moden Subject

sonata-orm theory, breaks down completely at the coda" because, according to the theory, the orm should be complete at the end of the recapitulation.4 Kerman circumvents the diiculty his way: the coda "is the one term that does not reer to a musical unction, but merely a position."5 The coda is apparently just that which ollows the completion of the recapitulation. Indeed, he Nw Harvard Dictionay of Music states that a coda is "extraneous to the on," deining the coda as "ny concluding passage that can be understood as occurring ater the stucural conclusion . . . and hat serves as a ormal closing gesture."6 The Revised Nw Gove article on the coda lkewise describes it as n "addition . . . to a standard orm."7 While deining he coda as something extraterritorial to the orm itsel, boh aticles agree that the coda has nevertheless become a standard eaure of post-Beethovenian sonata orm. If so, one would presume that it has a somewhat more deinite unction in such music. Two recent works concening orm have urther highlighted the ambiguous role the coda plays in orm. William Caplin, or instance, tuns the coda's role as a place­ marker into a unction: "the primary unction of a coda is to express he temporal quality of ' ater the end'." Yet, Caplin also states it "unctions as the movement's general conclusion." Caplin immediately admits that these two unctions are contradictory, but he claims that the complexity of classical orms results in the two, seemingly opposing, deinitions.8 This colicting role or the coda has been noted beore. Robert Hopkins observes that the term coda is "a word that needs to reer not only to a concluding section ' extraneous to orm' but also . . . to a concluding section essential to orm".9 In Elements ofSonata Theoy, Hepokoski and Darcy set the coda apart rom what precedes it, deining the coda as a "parageneric space"10 that "stands outside the sonata orm."1 1 The length of a coda can range rom a ew bars, which may lead to the label "superluous,"12 to hundreds of bars where it arguably plays an essential part of the piece. Lengthy codas have been explained as compositionally necessary because the composer needs to redress some "problem" that occurred earlier in the work. In such cases the coda serves what Caplin calls a "compensatory unction. "13 The coda serves as a place where the piece rens to a "problem" not ully worked out earlier 4 Joseph Kenan, "Notes on Beehoven's Codas," in Alan Tyson (ed.), Beethoven Studies 3 (New York, 1 982), p. 1 4 1 . 5 Ibid. 6 Don Michael Randel (ed.), The New Harvard Dictionay of Music (Cambridge: The Benknap Press of Havard University Press, 2003), s.v. 'coda'. 7 Roger Bullivant and James Webster, "Coda" (200 1 ) in L. Macy (ed.) New Gove Dictionay of Music and Musicians, www.grovemusic.com (accessed 28 September 200 1 ). 8 Caplin, Clssical Form, p. 1 79. 9 Robert Hopkins, "When a Coda is More than a Coda: Relections on Beethoven," in Eugene Narmour and Ruth A. Solie (eds), Explorations in Music, the Arts, and Ides: Essys in Honor ofLeonard B. Meyer (Stuyvesant, , 1 988), p. 3 99. 10 Hepokoski and Drcy, Elements of Sonata Theoy, pp. 281-305. Chapter Thiteen of their book is titled "Parageneric Spaces: Coda and Introduction." 1 1 Ibid., p. 283. 1 2 The New Harvard Dictionay ofMusic, s.v. "coda." 13 See n. 2, p. 44.

47

Cods, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

in the movement (or piece). Yet, not all codas have a compensatory role. Hepokoski and Darcy label longer codas as "discursive," stating these codas are "a separate tableau, a surplus-conclusion ater 'the main event."14 The authors note because it alls outside sonata conventions, the coda can be treated quite reely. This can have provocative implications, as Hepokoski and Darcy state: "The mere existence of a coda-especially one of greater length-can provide a challenge to the preceding sonata."15 In doing so, the coda has the possibility to mark the preceding sonata as insuicient or inadequate. 1 6 Nonetheless, the end result is that while some codas may be explained as compensatory nd all as parageneric, a generalized pupose or the coda canot be deined. Both Caplin's contradictory unctions and Hepokoski nd Darcy's parageneric, rhetorical approaches suggest that the coda operates as what Derrida calls a "supplement."17 A supplement, Jonathan Culler writes, glossing Derrida's term, is "an inessential extra, added to something complete in itself, but the supplement is added in order to complete, to compensate or a lack in what was supposed to be complete in itself."18 According to Derrida, this double-edged meaning suggests that the coda is "exterior, outside of the positivity to which it is super-added,"19 similar to a rame that is outside a picure yet serves to deine the picture.20 Understood as a supplement, the coda serves as both an exterior and necessry raming device to the orm: music that comes ater the end of the piece, acting, as James Webster describes it, as a "gigantic ' aterbeat'. "2 1 Yet, the coda also plays a necessary role: it completes the work and demarcates the boundaries of the piece. That is to say, we know the orm of the piece because he coda deines the end. Deining the coda through the concept of the supplement may help account or what Alexander Ivashkin, in his discussion of Shostkovich and Scnittke's codas, describes as the irrationality of a coda: this music resists codiication, it canot be 14 Hepokosi and Darcy, Elements of Sonata heoy, pp. 284-6. 15 Ibid., p, 283 . 1 6 Ibid. Hepokoski and Darcy's use of the word "inadequate" comes rom Charles Rosen, Sonata Forms, rev. edn New York, 1 988), p. 297. 1 7 Derrida discusses the concept ofthe supplement throughout Part II of OfGrammatoloy (pp. 97-3 1 6). Michael lein uses the Derridian concept of supplement to describe the coda to Brahms' Intermezzo in A major, Op. 1 1 8, no. 1 . See Klein, lntertxtualiy in Westen Art Music (Bloomington, 2005), p. 99 and pp. 1 56-7, n26. 18 Jonathan Culler, On Deconstruction: Theoy and Criticism ater Structuralism (Ithaca, , 1 982), p. 1 03 . 1 9 Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatoloy ( 1 967), trans. Gayatri Charavorty Spivak (Baltimore, MD, 1 974), p. 145. 20 For a diferent take on Derrida's notions of raming devices as applied to music see Richard Littleield's article "The Silence of the Frames," in which Littleield uses Derida's concepts of rames being more than onamental-as it is because of rames that the artwork is deined-to discuss silence as unctioning as a rame or musical works. Richard Littleield, "The Silence of the Frames," Music Theoy Online WI (Janury 1 996) at www.societymusictheory.org/mto/mto96.2 . 1 .litleield.html (accessed 12 March 2003) . 2 1 James Webster, "Sonata om" (200 1 ) in L. Macy (ed.), New Gove Dictionay of Music and Musicians, www.grovemusic.com (accessed 28 September 200 1 ), § 3 .iv. .

48

Composing the Moden Subject

"logically explained."22 Ivashkin is not the only one to note the enigmatic nature of the coda, as Hepokoski has pointed out: ''what may happen within codas-as striking artistic surplus, extravagant exception, or high wormanship-should not be taken as evidence or what must happen in them."23 Scott Bunham has expressed a similar reservation with respect to Beehoven's codas: "regardless of the ormal unction we ascribe to the coda, the suspicion remains that the coda is in act not the strictly necessy, oganically, and stucturally inevitable continuation of that which precedes it."24 Thus, perhaps in interpreting the coda's unction one should ocus on issues other than structure, instead investigating how a coda may unction symbolically as a supplement. If we are to use the concept of the supplement as an interpretative tool or explaining the coda's symbolic role, then the question becomes: what can the coda as supplement symbolize? In Of Grammatoloy Derrida reveals a philosophical connection between the supplement and death, stating, "death is the master-name of the supplementary series."25 Death is, as it were, the supplement of lie, as through the idea of death-that which comes ater the end of life-we are able to structure lie. Death is extrinsic to lie, yet it also signals the completion of lie. In this sense, death lies completely outside the realm of lie while maintaining a dynamic symbolic signiicance in interpreting lie. With Derrida's philosophical ideas about the signiicance of the supplement in mind, we gain a powerul tool or probing and explaining the unction of the coda. Understood in the terms of a supplement, the coda, by coming aterthe end of the structure, becomes a signiier of the death of the movement: it gives lie to the rest of the music. As previously discussed, the coda to the irst movement of the Seventh String Quartet supplements what stats of as a remarkably straightorward sonata-orm movement or Shostakovich in that it has boh clearly a delimited primary and secondary spaces, as well as an exposition and recapiulation. What is notable about this movement is what it lacs- neither does the movement have a development section, nor are developmental techniques used to ny signiicant extent in the other sections. The movement is, in act, unusual or its pure simplicity of thematic presentation.26 As I noted at the opening of the chapter, this coda does not compensate 22 Alexander Ivashkin, "Shostakovich and Schnittke: the erosion of symphonic syntax," in David Faning (ed.), Shostakovich Studies (London, 1 995), pp. 259-60. 23 Hepokoski, "Beyond the Sonata Principle," p. 1 1 2. 24 Bham, Beethoven Heo, p. 53. 25 Derrida, O/Grammatoloy, p. 1 83 . 26 The o m o f the irst movements o f Shostakovich's previous six quartets, are all modiied in some way, yet one characteristic they have in common, with one exception, is signiicant use of developmental techniques, uther marking the lack of developmental work in the irst movement of the Seventh Quatet. (Kuhn argues that all are "ailed" sonata orms, . using Hepokoski and Darcy's deinition of the term in that the recapitulation does not resolve he tonal conlict of the movement.) The irst movement of the First String Qurtet is the most similar to the irst movement of the Seventh, being in an ABAB om with a brief transition section between the exposition and recapitulation. A complicating actor in interpreting this movement is that Shostakovich originally intended his movement to be the inale to the First String Quartet, and the inale to be he irst movement. The inale does have a ull development

Cods, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

49

or the lack of development. As a curtailed repetition ofthe move to the recapitulation, the coda ulills no unction within the orm other than serving as a bald coirmation of closure that only ther emphasfaes the sonata's developmental inadequacy. The coda marks the sonata as insuicient, not by being of a signiicant length so as to "challenge" the preceding orm, as Hepokoski and Darcy propose, but by replicating the sonata's inadequacy. Yet, through this display oflack, the coda efectively marks the end of the movement. As one can see in Example 3 . 1 , the coda creates the efect of demarcating boundaries and emphasizing closire with the shortened thematic segments, sotened dynamics, a ritenuto marking, and the elongated anapest rhythm sounding the tonic triad of the inal bars. Rening to Derrida's connection between supplement and death, we can understand this coda as signiying the "death" of the movement-the coda comes ater the end of the movement, conirming that the movement's musical lie, as it were, is over. Evocatively, the symbolization of he "death" of the movement is created through curtailed "remembrances" of previous musical material. New questions arise concening the coda's role in this quartet when we hear this same coda retun at the end of the Seventh Quartet's third and inal movement. Comparing Example 3 .4 to Example 3 . 1 , we can see that the two passages are almost identical, though Shostakovich introduces subtle changes. At the close of the coda in the irst movement all instruments execute a ritenuto and the cello is instructed to play expressively. This allows a certain amount of reedom or the perormers as to how to perorm the inal notes. In the inale, the ritenuto rom the irst movement is composed out (with the notes' lengths changing rom an eighth note on every beat to a quarter note evey two beats) and urther emphasized by the marking of morendo-the music ades away, literally "dies." Here the latitude of expressive reedom ound at the end of the irst movement has been reduced, with . the details of the ritenuto ixed in the score. Another notable change in the second version is that Shostakovich's signature anapest rhytm-a crucial igure to the quartet as a whole-is missing, its distinctive proile eroded in pat by the metrical shit rom � in the irst movement to � in the third. Comparing the two examples, one can see that the residue of the anapest rhthm shows up only once in the coda to the third movement, in the inal chord, now extended over multiple bars in a composed-out dissolution. In the closing measures of the quatet the anapest igure seemingly dies away with the sound. Thus, despite having the same pitch content, the two iterations of the coda have minute yet signiicant diferences. This highly unusual ren of pitch material - combined with the subtle, yet substantial change in rhetoric - immediately raises interpretive questions regarding the reason behind the simultaneiy of such an exact ren coupled with signiicant change. Moreover, if on some level the coda to the irst movement can be read as symbolizing the death of the movement, then one must ask what the ren of this music in the inale signiies. In other words, why must the Seventh String Quartet die twice? And, what is it that occurs between these two deaths? section. Kn discusses the possible reasons and interpretative implications of the composer 's switch in her chapter on the First String Quatet, pp. 374 1 , 52-9. See Kn, Shostaovich in Dialogue and McCreless, "Dmiri Shostakovich: The String Quartets."

50

Composing the Moden Subject

Example 3.4 Quartet No. 7, third movement, coda A

•

»

v

--

..

-·

p

A

A

� -

-

p

•

�

�

; �· � !'

p •

,

»

.

_

?

.

�

I 1

-�

�

�

*

-

q•

•

•

'

.

q� �

�

p

-· ·

..

pizz.

•

A

.

-

-

-:__-

,

A

...

-

p

,

----=,

!

�

�

;

·�

! . !. �

�

1 q�

�

�

pizz.

q� �- !'

,,_

q!' ! ' !

q�· �

pm.

!' !'

�

�

-

�

'

�

'

,

.

.

-

-

wo Deaths and the Space Between

-

..

.

� ... �

..

q•

-

I*

-

. •

� _,, -- -�

·-

-.f

.

-..: .

_

�

�

.-� ._'eo p

According to Zizek, the idea of two deaths is a cultural trope deeply rooted in the psychology of the modem subject.27 For Zifok, the two deaths register the cultural diference between actual and symbolic death; the interval between spans the time rom death to burial. In most cases the irst death is "merely" literal: something ceases to exist. The second death, by contrast, is igurative, a symbolic rite that recognizes the actuality of the irst death. If properly executed, the symbolic death of the uneral rite unctions as a mens of acknowledging deah and inscribing the memory, or symbolic orce, of the dead into a society's tradition. In other words, if we properly lay the dead to rest, they continue to live iguratively through memories.28 27 See Zizek, Looing Ay, pp. 2 147, and he Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, pp. 1 3 149. 28 Although these are the common orms of the two deaths as viewed by society, the order of actual ollowed by symbolic death is not ixed as the symbolic death can occur beore one ceases to exist. For example, the Catholic deathbed conession allows the individual to die symbolically beore his or her literal death.

Codas, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

51

But what if we ail to bury the dead? What i fwe are unable to inscribe the memory of the dead properly into the cultural memory? According to Zizek, when the second death-usually a proper burial-does not occur, a gap orms that is inhabited by the living dead. Zizek's most lucid examples are rom the gulag and the holocaust, whose victims "will continue to chase us as living dead Until we give them a decent burial, unti� we integrate the trauma of their death into our historical memory."29 The living dead are apparitions that ren to haunt. Most oten, and in the cases of the gulag and holocaust, the gap occurs because the living are unable to let the dead rest. However, a gap can also occur when the dead do not realize they are dead, or when someone dies symbolically, beore his or her literal death.3° Contemporary examples are death-row inmates, who are symbolically put to death by the state beore their literal death. The gap created can be a place ihabited by "sublime beauty" as in the case of Antigone, whose insistence on a proper burial or her brother, no matter what the cost, permeated her being with a noble resplendence.31 Terriying monsters, cliched versions of which are demonstrated by a wide variety of modem horror movies, also inhabit the gap, as Zifok detly illustrates on more than one occasion. 32 Most oten, the gap is a place or those who all in betwee-the weary ghosts of the untimely dead searching or peace.33 As noted earlier, society's means of acknowledging death requires the actual death to be properly ollowed by symbolic death, which inscribes he memory of the dead into societal tradition. Using this model as a means of interpreting the Seventh Quartet then exposes the "death" of the irst movement, which is ollowed by the uneral rite of the second. The Funeral ite

In the irst movement, the upper pitch of the inal chord (C#) becomes a leading tone that resolves directly into the accompanimental arpeggiation of the second movement, a surreal D-minor nocne in ABA' orm.34 The ,,ento movement, marked con sordino troughout, begins with rocking arpeggios in steady sixteenth 29 Zifok, Looking Awy, p. 23. 30 Zizek's prime example of a being unaware of his own death is Napoleon, Whose political lie on the continent was dead, but, because he didn't acknowledge it, had to be def�ated a second time at Waterloo (Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 44). 3 1 Antigone is another example of one who dies symbolically beore dying literally. 32 See Zizek, Looking Awy, pp. 2 1 -2. 33 An example of the living dead in recent literature is he "Thanatoids" in Thomas Pynchon's ineland. n ineland hose wih a 'Thanatoid personality' are deined as "like death, only diferent" ( 1 70) nd re "consrained . . . by history nd by ules of imbalnce nd restoration to eel little else beyond their ends or revenge" ( 1 7 1 ). Pynchon, ineland (Boston, 1 999). 34 The ning of a .consonnt q nto the leading tone of D as a means of linking attacca quartet movements has precedence n Beethoven's p. 1 3 1 , where the tonic of q of he rst movement becomes the leading tone into D major of the second movement. See Haten, Musical Meaning in Beethoven, p. 1 50 or a discussion of this exmple nd also he use of a similr trnsition n p. 1 8, no. 3. Also note, Shostkovich's Sevenh Qutet ends wih a q in the top voice, wich is "ollowed" by a D as the rst pitch of the Eighh et (in a diferent register).

52

Composing the Moden Subject

notes played by the second violin (section A of the second movement (R. 1 7-1 9. 1 0)). The arpeggios support a haunting melody (which I will call Theme B in relation to the material I labeled Theme A rom the irst movement) played by the irst violin in the upper extremes of its range (R. 1 7.5-1 8.3) nd then repeated, slightly altered, in uncated orm by the cello, again near the top of the instrument's range. The opening of this theme immediately reerences the preceding coda, as the irst our pitches of Theme B (R. 1 7.5-7) are taken directly rom the second through ith pitches of the coda (see R. 16. 1-5).35 In the B section (R. 1 9. 1 0-2 1 . 1 3), the second' violin once again plays the accompaniment, this time with a dotted rhythm of eighth nd sixteenth notes, a standard topos of a uneral march. The range of the melody is again extreme, with the cello and viola playing, in parallel octaves, at the bottom of their ranges. Ater the lower instuments complete the melody, the irst violin repeats it. A truncated version of the A section rens at R. 22 to complete the movement. The extreme ranges of the second movement, the con sordino marking coupled with the slow-paced, doted-rhyhm accompaniment, and the long, low melody hollowed out by the doubling at the octave imply a uneral procession and a time of mouning. As noted, the irst our pitches of the opening theme come directly rom the coda, which I interpret as the signiier of death in the previous movement. In addition, McCreless notes the melody of the B section "suggests" an allusion to the passacaglia liking scenes our and ive of Shostakovich's opera Lay Macbeth of the Mtsensk District at the same pitch-level as in Lay Macbeth (Fanning makes the connection between the two segments of music through the shared pitch collection).36 This interlude mrks a signiicant ning point in the opera, as scene our culminates with Katerina's poisoning of her ather-in-law, Boris, the irst of the opera's many untimely deaths. In short, in the Seventh Quartet, the Lento 's middle section alludes to music that ollows a literal death in the opera, intertextually strengthening the post-death aspect of the second movement. From the cod/supplement/death perspective, the quartet enacts the standard cultural trope of actual death ollowed by symbolic death, with the second movement seemingly perorming a uneral rite or the death marked by the coda of the irst movement. Yet, this interpretation would imply that the piece has run its course: like a coda, the inal movement would appear completely superluous. However, a mere seventy-six measures in length, the second movement seems incapable of standing on its own. In and of itself, it appears too shot, incomplete, and its ending is unstable. Its hollowness has the quality of orced grieving-like an untimely burial, the movement leaves a void within its lament. While the extreme ranges of the melodic ideas speak to the pain of mouning, the subj ect of the lament seems to be missing. 35 Kadja Gronke, "Zun Verfahren der harmonischen Keimzelle in den Streichquartetteh VI bis VII von Dmitrij Sostakovic und ihrer Relevanz r Harmonik, Melodik, Thematik und kompositorische GroBorm," paper read at the intenational symposium: "Der Komponist als Erzihler: Narritivitit in Dmitri Schostakowitschs Instrumentalmusik," Hanover, Germany, 24-26 November 2006. 36 McCreless and Fanning also note the melody rom the A section of the second movement is, in McCreless's words, "strongly reminiscent of the primary theme of the irst movement of the Fith Symphony." Mccreless, "Dmitri Shostakovich: The String Quartets" and Faning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 42.

53

Codas, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

Example 3.5 Quartet No. 7, second movement, inal measures ,

•

p __ __ -·_, �" '

,

dim�,

�

• __ . : .

=ff Moive A

p�

di---

--�

---

The con sordino marking, the thin, pinched sound caused by the severe ranges, and the hollowed-out prallel octaves in the cello and viola imbue the ceremony with emptiness. While not using this metaphor of burial, Fanning has pointed out the overall sense of absence in the Seventh Quartet, noting that the "requent 'absence' of instruments" her ehances this impression.37 In the second movement this absence is strikingly pronounced; all our instruments play in only eighteen of the seventy-six measures. Example 3.5 shows the close of the movement, the cello holding a D drone while the second violin is silent. The irst violin plays a languid melody using E�, D, C, and B, the pitches of the DSCH motive, which orms a member of the [0 1 34] pitch­ class set class. Four bars beore the end, the accompanimental igure in the viola slowly winds down as the second and third beats expand into descending eighth notes that create another descending tetrachord in the [0 1 34] set class (not using the pitches of the DSCH motive). In the penultimate measure all instruments ade out on the downbeat, only to have, ater a moment of rest, the viola enter alone with the same drawn-out tetrachord (labeled motive A, see Example 3 .5). The inal bar of the movement is silent-a silence that must be written into the score as the third movement begins attacca. With the two [01 34] sets that appear in the inal bars of the second movement we hear the culmination of the set's move rom a buried element to the surace of the musical texure. The set irst appears by chance, seemingly hidden rom view, in the opening bars of the work (on the irst beat of the second bar, as the irst violin plays q, q, B �, and A�), but slowly moves to more prominent places with its inal appearance outlined by the cello in the irst movement's coda (R. 1 6.2-3). The second movement contains conspicuous instances of the set in the accompniment. In the A section, as the second violin moves away rom the rocking arpeggios that deine D minor, it outlines a [O 1 34] set (R. 1 7 . 1 1 ). This also happens in the B section where, ater playing only a C# or the irst thiteen bars, the second violin moves away rom this q to again deine the set. In addition, as noted earlier, the inal phrase of the irst violin creates another version of the set. As Richard Longman

37 Fanning, Shostaovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 32 nd 42.

54

Composing the Modern Subject

states, "in the Seventh Quartet the motto theme is only gradually revealed,"38 and with the viola's inal notes of the second movement, the motive completes its move rom buried element to residing on the surface of he musical texure. As a surace-level event the motive does not impose any sense of harmonic stability of the end of the second movement. While the cello drones on the tonic D in the inal bars, neither the irst violin nor the viola help to secure closure in the tonic key. First, the irst violin ignores the tonic triad by playing a B (). Second, while � . ' and 5 (or their eharmonic equivalent) anchor iotive A, the chromaticism created by the octatonic quality of the set combined wih the mjor/minor ambivalence of the F and G� (i.e. F#) thwart any sense of stability that could have been created. Instead, by inishing with motive A, the movement ends ominously, with a proound sense of unease. Without syntactical or rhetorical closure the movement remains unsettled, its conclusion postponed. The bar of silence resounds: this is not the unmeasured interval of time that normally separates movements, but a moment of pure emptiness, an unsetled pause that is anything but a measure of rest. The endings of both the irst and second movements are thereore problematic, as neither successully combines a sense of closure with a deinitive ending. Although the last bars of the irst movement do instill an appropriate sense of closure, the movement does not in act end in that it lows directly into the second movement. Instead of proper completion ollowed by silence, as beits a signiier of death, the inal q ns into a leading tone nd he middle movement ollows attacca. The second movement takes this ambiguous inish a step ther; a measure of silence is necessary to orce some type of end to the movement as together the inal chord and motive A create an uneasy sense of instability. With the bar of silence the uneral rite peters out; the movement cannot complete its task of bringing symbolic closure to the death signiied by the coda. What went wrong? Why does the uneral rite ail to bring closure? A Disturbance in the ite

There has been "a disturbance in the symbolic rite."39 At the very end of he second movement motive A's emergence signals that something has gone awry; he gap between two deaths has ailed to close. The disturbance recurs in expanded orm three bars into the introduction of the, third movement, as the violins and cello are interrupted by the viola repeating m�tive A in long, drawn-out whole notes. As shown in Example 3 .6, the contrast between the introductory material and the viola's [0 1 34] interruption could not be greater. Set at an alero tempo, the introduction is ull of energy-perhaps too much energy. The irst violin plays a series of ascending anapests created by two sixteenhs and an eighth note (an altered inversion of the material that opens he irst movement). Accented staccato notes in the second violin 38 Richard Longman, Expession and Structure: Processes of Integration in the Lage­ scale Instrumental Music of Dmitri Shostakovich (2 vols, London, 1 989), vol. l , p. 1 8 1 . Michael Talbot concurs, stating that his "motto phrase" had been "previously concealed under layers of elaboration." Talbot, he Finale in Westen Instrumental Music, p. 2 1 6. 39 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 23 .

55

Codas, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

and cello ther emphasize the longest note of the anapest, and all three instruments have afortissimo dynamic marking. The viola, on the other hand, plays descending whole notes at pianissimo in a low noan that interupts the musical low. One may argue that the connection between Motive A and the DSCH motive is perilously thin, as the DSCH motive involves a speciic order of deined pitches while Motiye A represents the unordered pitch-class set.40 In addition to losing its moniker status, when the DSCH motive is abstracted into a [0 1 34] pitch-class set an important deining interval of the motive is lost to enharmonic equivalency. Speciically, the DSCH motive outlines a diminished ourth between E� nd B (a quality that Shostakovich uses in the Eighth String Quartet when the motive resolves inward to C minor). Yet, there are reasons, beyond a shared pitch-class set, to link motive A with the DSCH motive. When irst presented motive A emerges out of the accompaniment at the same time as the irst violin is descending rough the DSCH pitches. In addition, with he predominant occurrences of the [0 1 34] set in the Seventh Qutet-at the eid of the second movement, opening of the hird and the begining of the ugue subject-the diminished-ourth outline of the cell is maintained.41 Example 3.6 QuartetNo. 7, third movement, introduction

]• loconJ..i. '

-

; f •.!!::.. •....

.

""""""·

,

f

con d.

�

�..

.

"">

>

>

>

>

>

>

�

>

.

.

>

>

.

':

.

.

:

"'

':

�

:

f

•

'

•

'

"

.-

>

>

_

_

>

:

•:

�

�

�� - �

:

f$

_

.

.

.

>

f

_ ,,

>

q•-.

m

p

.

f-"�> ·--.. f-

_

""'"""·

.

�

.

..

-

.

"'

.

.

r

40 Colin Mason also makes connection between Motive A and the DSCH motive. See Colin Mason, "Fom in Shostakovich's Quartets," The Musical imes; CIII ( 1 962) : 5 3 1 -3, here p. 533. 4 1 My hanks to Levon Hakobian or pointing out the possible loss of the characteristic diminished ourth caused by abstracting the DSCH motive into a pitch-class set.

56

Composing the Moden Subject

A comparison of Examples 3.3 nd 3.6 shows that the introduction to the third movement rewrites the opening of the work in a severely distorted orm. The anapest line of the violin is an altered inversion of the napests that opened the erlier movement. The alteration is extreme: where as the irst movement opens with a solo texture, a metronome mrking of J= 1 20 and a.dynmic marking ofpiano, he inale has a tempo of J=l 70, with accented staccato notes in two accompanying insuments that emphasize he long note of the napest, and the entre quatet performing fortissimo. Despite the hunderous dynamics, all insruments are insructed to play con sordino, a' combination hat Esti Sheinberg describes as a "self-conradictory way of playing."42 This conradiction ther emphasizes the surreal aspect of he space where the music now resides. In efect, the lilt ofthe rst movement becomes he violence of the thrd­ he rst of many brutal inusions of material rom the previous two movements.43 Moreover, Example 3 .6 shows that 'the anapests of he third movement are all [0 1 3 ] sets, a subset o f the [0 1 34] pitch set. Exmple 3.7 illustrates hat upward-moving, juxtaposed [0 13] motives derive rom the nsition ofthe rst movement (R 3 .3-3 . 1 2). Now, in he introduction, the [0 13] set is presented melodically by the irst violin and harmonically on he last beat of the anapest by the violins nd cello, sauratng the music with the [0 1 3] sonoriy. The fanatical use ofthe [0 1 3 ] set in the introduction indicates to what extent the [0 1 3] nd [0 1 34] sets will inundate the music hat ollows. The introduction is orced to begin again ater the viola's interruption with Motive A in R. 23 .-7. Following a more complete version of the introduction, the viola again takes over rom the other ree instruments. However, this time the viola does not play motive A; instead with great intensity it traverses in fortissimo sixteenth notes wo new, overlapping [01 34] sets (F#, G, A, B� and A, B �, C, C#). Ater repeating this idea, the viola switches to a dotted-eigh/sixteenth motive that reers to the uneral mrch in the accompniment of the B section of the second movement (see R. 1 9 . 1 -2 1 . 1 3). Example 3.8 shows that rnning sixteenth notes (as the head) and doted-eight/ sixteenh notes (as the tail), inishing with a inal leap up a perfect ourh, create the subject of the ugue that ollows. Beyond the obvious conection to motive A, the idea of the head-a [0 1 34] set presented in running sixteenth notes-rst appeared in he A section of he second movement (R. 1 7 . 1 1 ); it is also related to the anapest rhhm, which has been heard in both ascending and descending orm, with he inal eighh note simply transormed into two sixteenh notes, making possible a low of constnt sixteenths. As with the introduction that preceded it, the ugue subject is completely created rom musical materials used earlier in the work. 42 Sheinberg, Iony, Satire, Paoy and the Gotesque in the Music of Shostakovich: A Theoy ofMusical Incongruities (Aldershot, 2000), p. 202. 43 Sheinberg nds the opening of the irst movement to have conradictory signiication of both euphoric (gay and lively) and dysphoric (violent and obsessive) purports. Her argument or the dysphoric signiications is that ''the tonality is far rom clear nd the meter keeps changing, conveying a peculiar eeling of sickly amusement" (202). is seems to be a case of yng too hard to ind the rotesque in Shostakovich's music, as, while he meter does chnge wih every measure, the beat, what we hear, is quite steady; and while the motive is ull of latted notes, every latted note des�ends directly to a tonal pitch, evey long beat of the napest is a tonal pitch (with three of he ive outlining the tonic triad), nd the nal anapest outlines the tonic triad, mly placing the theme in a lattened version ofF# minor. See Shenberg, Ion, Satie, Paoy and the Gotesque in the sic ofShostaovich, pp. 1 98-202.

57

Cods, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

Example 3.7 Quartet No. 7, irst movement, transition from P to S . ".

�

v

�

� . .

v

[013]

J.J

-..

/ '

• ·

�

�

�

[013]

.._

(013)

� �

� q_

p

.. .

� �--

Example 3.8 Quartet No. 7, third movement, fugue subject

�

"""""'·

R • •,m1 f

J.J

J.J

nn11 •p • •1m11JJJm1&a111 g a1�u D 10· a 11 � ---

.._

The Fugue as an Aural Image of the Real

Taken together, the tree movements of · the Seventh Quartet can be viewed as reerring to a large-scale sonata om, with the irst two movements unctioning as exposition and the third movement providing both the development and the recapitulation (see Figure 3 .2).44 From this perspective, the ugal section becomes the development section of the large-scale sonata. Fugues unctioning as development sections do occur in the literature, Shostakovich himself had done this erlier, in the irst movement of his Third String Quartet. But, ugal developments are not the norm, as less rigorously sequenced contrapuntal imitation is a more common 44 Roseberry, who labels the Seventh and other quartets of Shostakovich's that have an "overall application of the sonata concept" the "continuity quartets," briely discusses the Seventh String Quartet as a large-scale om. See Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Pocess, p. 266 nd his graph of the Seventh String Quartet, p. 295. Mccreless points out that this intepretation can be seen as problematic as the rst movement itself is in a sonata structure, and the ugue is oriented around F# minor, the tonic of the piece. Nevertheless, he states that viewing the quartet as in a large-scale sonata om "does suggest the degree to which the quartet goes in creating an overall single-movement om." Mccreless, "Dmitri Shostakovich: The String Quartets."

58

Composing the Moden Subject

Exposition First Movement (Theme A) Second Movement (Theme B) Development Third Movement: Fugue (Ren of Theme A nd B at climax) Recapitulation Third Movement: Postlude (retun of Fugue Subject and Theme A, new melodic idea) Coda Recollection of Coda rom First Movement Figure 3.2

Quartet No. 7, large-scale sonata orm

compositional procedure in development sections. From a semiotic standpoint, using Hatten's concept of markedness in music, the ugue-as-development is marked, as opposed to developments in general.45 By having the quality of markedness, the ugue/development has a greater speciicity of meaning than does a more general development section. This narrower range of meaning is created by the diferences between the treatment of musical ideas within a more standard, unmarked development and that in a ugue. What are then the diferences between a "standard" development and a ugal one that could work to create a more speciic meaning? The rst problem that rises in answering this question is that developments, like codas, do not have a well-deined set of compositional strategies. Hepokoski and Darcy point out that a wide range of strategies can be deployed and each development should be reated individually.46 Nevertheless, we can deine what is generaly expected to occur in a development. n the opening sentences in their chapter on developments, Hepokoski and Darcy note that the most characteristic procedure involves a ''working-out of expositional material.'"'7 Development sections usually involve a conscious altering of previously herd musical material (or perhaps new material) where the material oten changes signiicantly trough variation, trnsormation, and other types of reworking. According to Caplin, this oten involves a presentation of a model idea, which is hen treated to sequencing and liquidation, leading to the disintegration or signiicant alteration of he original model.48 The result is a multitude of possibilities, which re not easily categorized. Fugue hemes, on the other hnd, re not subject to signiicnt reworking, as it goes against the basic law of ugal writing to undamentally alter the ugue subject. Fugue subjects can submit to augmentation, diminution, inversion, motivicfortspinnung, and inor alterations, but the undmental sructure of the ugue subject does not change. Even in episodes, where the ugue subject may be ragmented, these ragments are 45 See Introduction, pp. 1-2. 46 Hepokosi and Darcy, Elements of Sonata heoy, p. 228. 47 Ibid., p. 1 95 . 4 8 Caplin, Classical Form, pp. 1 3 9-59. S e e Hepokoski and Darcy, Elements of Sonata heoy, pp. 228-9, or a critique of Caplin's model-sequence concept or nalyzing developments (which Caplin acnowledges does not describe all developments).

Codas, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

59

not completely reworked and the reworking is secondry to the subject itself. Thus, while the standrd development section has been historically viewed as a place or the organic unolding of musical ideas; and the "maturation" of a psychological chracter, the ugue is created hrough the persistent recurrence of n unchanging subject. Far rom orgnic in he sense of the constantly changing development section of a sonata, the ugue has a more mechnical chracter with its continual repetition of one theme. The ugue then, like the development, can be seen as obsessed, but it obsesses over a musical subject hat never changes, giving it the potential to saurate the music wih a single musical idea.49 It is this qualiy of obsessiveness hat characterizes the ugue at the opening of the inale in Shostakovich's quartet. Further, in the ugal section of inale of the Seventh Quartet we have a prime example of what Haten would call dysphoric plenitude. so In Intepreting Musical Gestues, Topics, and Topes Hatten deines the concept ofplenitude as a compositional premise and musical topic. As a topic, plenitude requires textural, registral, and activity-level saturation. This sauration (or repleteness) can result in the conveyance of "suused, contented ulillment" (43). While almost exclusively ocusing on the positive side of plenitude, Hatten briely notes that tragic obsessiveness can create a dysphoric plentitude, citing the Presto movement of Beethoven's Op. 1 3 0 as an example (43). Later, Hatten speciically applies the topic and premise of pleniude to Beethoven's late-style ugal movements. As a topic, plenitude is achieved through a variety of compositional strategies "ranging rom parallel imperfect consonances to stretto, rom thematic integration to double and triple ugue, and rom sauration of registral space to the diminutions and thematic layers that help saturate rhytmic and textural space" (265). The inherent ability ound in ugal procedures to compose music that is saturated on all levels (textural, rhythmic, registral, and thematic) gives the ugue the ability to convey a state of plenitude. According to Hatten, as a premise plenitude can guide the compositional process afecting omal procedures used in the creation of the work (265-6). Again, Hatten's discussion of ugues ocuses only on positive, nontragic uses of plenitude, no doubt due to the repertoire he is working with.51 Nevertheless, with his ew reerences to a ragic aspect of plenitude, it is easy to see how this topic may have a dysphoric side. As he notes, "This aspect of creativity in Beethoven's late style may be understood as a urther dramatization and elaboration of what was already present in Bach.s own dramatic and rhetorical invention-the move toward plenitude as textural, rhythmic, thematic, and ultimately expressive ulillment" (266). In Shostakovich's ugues, 49 In one of the ew discussions comparing the two compositional genres, August Halm notes "everything that happens n a ugue is related to a chief theme" while "the sonata orm is the truly insatiable, the xpansive om." Halm, "On Fugal Fom, Its Nature, and Its Relation to Sonata Form" in Edward A. Lippman (ed.), Musical Aesthetics: A Historical Reade, Vol. Ill The Twentieth Centuy (Stuyvesnt, 1 986), pp. 5 1-2 . 50 See Hatten, Interpreting Musical Gestures, Topics, and Topes. Hatten's initial discussion of plenitude can be ound on pp. 43-5 3 ; or his discussion of plenitude and ugues see pp. 249-66. 5 1 Although, beore he gets to his discussion of plenitude and ugues in speciic, Hatten gives a second example of a tragic-obsessive composition, the nale to Mozrt's Piano Sonata in A minor, K. 3 1 0. Hatten, Interpreting Musical Gestures, Topics and Tropes, p. 24 1 .

60

Composing the Moden Subject

we can see another generation in the process, as his ugues present a 'dramatization' of the dysphoric pleniude that may have been latently present in Beethoven's style. Similar to Beethoven's ugues discussed by Hatten, the ugue to the inale of the Seventh Quatet creates a musical abric saturated on the registral, rhythmic, and textural levels. Yet, as a negative plenitudeone that I will argue is demanding a rather dysphoric version of ulillment-some of Hatten's markers useul or identiying plenitude as ulillment are missing or altered. For instance, Shostakovich makes signiicant use of dissonant intervals, as opposed to Beethoven's sweet­ sounding, parallel imperfect consonances. In addition, thematic integration and manipulation of the ugue subject through inversion, augmentation, and diminution (diminution would be almost impossible given the make-up of the ugue subject in the Seventh Quartet) are not ound in this ugue. In act, as we will see, thematic integration and subject mnipulation would go against the compositional premise of dysphoric plenitude used in the Seventh Quartet's inale, as here the ugue represents the obsession of a single subject driven by an uncompromising objective. Thus, the ugue-as-development of the Seventh String Qutet, incessantly repeats one theme rather than reworking it as a musical idea. While the ugue subject derives rom previous material, it is not developed; instead, it can only be constantly reiterated. Even the motivic ideas of the episodes derive exclusively rom the subject, leaving no escape rom the extremely limited musical material. The only time the treatment of the ugue subject varies is through a stretto; that is, it becomes so obsessed with its theme that an iteration is not complete beore a second begins. The inherent qualities of the ugal genre, the nonvarying repetitions combined with the intenal make-up of the ugue-subject (with its coursing sixteenth notes and pounding, doted rhythm), produce a quality of mechanical insistence within the ugue. Thus, we hear a series of obsessional repetitions of a subject that ultimately takes shape out of motive A. Earlier, I argued that the, occurrences of motive A at the end of the second and begining of the third mo'�ents could be interpreted as disurbances in the symbolic rite. The second movement was not able to complete its task of properly putting the dead to rest. In the inal measures, then, a gap emerges between two deaths, creating an empty space within the symbolic order. Through these disturbances the set becomes a mniestation of the objet petit a, a letover of the real, what Zizek describes as "the sublime object placed in the interspace between two deaths."52 The (0 1 34] set, as the objet petit a, represents an emptiness, a lack that inevitably points to the empty kenel upon which reality is constructed. Lacan describes the objet petit a as "a semblance of being . . . it seems to give us support"53 and the [01 34] set has been shown to be undamental to the constructed reality of the quatet. This set, which rises to the musical surface near the end of the uneral rite, becomes a "'mystery' to be explained," setting n intepretive process into motion.54 The objet petit a becomes a signiier of that which remains unsigniied: in this case, the second death. Zizek rgues that in the space between two deaths there is a maniestation of the living dead who are diven by a "pure drive." 52 Zifok, he Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 145. 53 Lacan, On Feminine Sxualiy, p. 95. 54 Zizek, The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 1 85 .

Codas, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

61

The pure drive i s a orce devoid o f desire; instead the dead are let i n an unusual state of being driven by an- unconditional demand-insisting on such a demand, reusing to participate in the dialectical process of desire. 55 In shot, the dead persist relentlessly until exorcized, until the demand is met and they can die a second time. This notion of pure drive n music has been discussed by Naomi mng with respect to �teve Reich's Dffeent Trains.56 Cumming links the ''rn" n Reich's piece to he pre drive; he repetitive motion of he 'n gives ovet, objective appernce to the 'real' rive."57 While consistent repetition of the ugue subject in the Seventh Qutet difers greatly rom the continual motion of he "train" in Dfferent Trains, he ugue subject does persist with a similar srain of insistence. The relentlessness of the ugue n the Seventh et creates music that seems sngly similr to one of ZiZek's more lucid descriptions of the pure rive, hat of a "progrmmed automaton who . . . persists n his demnd . . . with no race of compromise or hesitation."58 The real is rendered audible through the irruption of the [0 1 34] set at the end of the second and inroduction to the third movements. This set then is a undamental kenel in the make-up of the ugue, ully emerging onto the symbolic stage when the viola completely takes control of the musical discourse, presenting the ugue subject as an aural image of pure drive. Pepetual motion movements in general, and ugues in particular, have an important musical correlation to the older style of Baroque music, and thus an authoritative quality. Here again, the Seventh Quatet illustrates a dysphoric side to such a correlation, as the auhority is associated with what Hatten describes as "relentless and implacable ateulness. "59 Without variation, the incessant pounding of the ugue subject eventually multiplies, creating exact clones of itself in a violent stretto with all voices ceaselessly surging orward creating a state of dysphoric plenitude. The mechanical drive is relentless; driven by the unconditional demand, it reaches an intense climax of an epic proportion. Played at the same brutal tempo as the opening of the movement (m �= 1 76) and with dynamics that never all below forte, the ugue subject alone oreshadows this climax with its renzied head section ollowed by the j olting, dotted-eight/sixteenth notes of the tail. With the combination of tempo, dynamics and short rhytmic values, Shostakovich may have perhaps ound another means of producing saturation-rough the problem of perormance. In a discussion of the diiculties of playing Shostakovich's qutets, Eugene Drucker, violinist or the Emerson Quartet, describes the ugue as "erocious," and notes the sheer diiculty of keeping the our pats "absolutely together."60 55 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 2 1 . 5 6 Naomi Cumming, "The Horrors of Identiication: Reich's Dffeent Trains," Perspectives ofNew Music XXV/ l (Winter 1 997): 1 29-52. 57 Ibid., p. 1 37. 5 8 Zifok, Looking Awy, p. 22. The "programmed automaton" Zizek reers to is the title character in The Terminator; Zizek notes that in the movie nold Schwarzenegger's character continues to track his victim even when what remains of the Terminator is only a legless chunk of metal : Zizek goes on to state "the terminator is the embodiment of the drive, devoid of desire." 59 Hatten, Interpreting Musical Gestues, Topics and Topes, p. 244. 60 Edith Eisler, "Shostakovich Live: Emerson Records he Complete Quartets in Concert," Strings (Februry-March 2000): 98, 1 00-1 05, here p. 1 03 .

62

Composing the Moden Subject

Example 3.9 Quartet No. 7, third movement, stretto section of fugue

�

J.J

L-

v

" v

f

� .

-

" v

_

-

"

"

f

l

"·

:

...,

,_._

f

�

.-._

- L-

�

L- h•

-

--.

-.._

-

-.._

-.._

f

"

-

---. -.._

-

v

�

-.._

�

--"

-"

--.-"

--. �

-.

.

...- ;

-

" v • ..

" v

.

1 11- i

·-·

--"

• • • --' f-· __·, -" -

f

_

...,

-"

-"

. � ... l b. ...�.." . .

-

f

The inal steady push to the climax begins with the ourth episode of the ugue (beginning with the anacusis into R. 33), which consists of running sixteenth notes in the two lower instruments, the head motive in quarter notes in the second violin, and a screaming, obstinately repeated q in the irst violin. Example 3 .9 shows the ugue subject as presented in stretto in the next statement, starting at R. 34. The spacing of he entries orces the sixteenth notes of the head motive always to be in contray motion with its pair in the stretto. Helping to create rhthmic sauration, the violins have alse entrances of the head when the viola and cello have the tail of the subject. (See R. 34.4-8, this layering is reversed at R. 3 5 .4-8 .) In this passage, the constant sixteenth notes, which irst appeared in the second theme area of the irst movement and then again as a light steady accompaniment in the trnquil second movement, re now relentless and aggressive. 61 The efect is one of increasing energy 6 1 During this iteen-measure period the music moves trough all three possible octatonic collections with the pitches in R. 34. 1-34.4 drawn rom octatonic III, R. 34.4-35.5 rom octatonic II, and R. 35.6-35 . 8 rom octatonic I. Shostakovich also references all tree octatonic collections in the exposition of the irst movement. In the second section of S the

Codas, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

63

and tension without giving a moment of respite. In the inal episode, beginning at R. 36, the cello perorms the sixteenth notes with verticalized trichords in the upper instruments that, strting in R. 365, orm [0 1 3] sets in a brutal recollection of the [0 1 3] sonorities rom the introduction to the movement. The continual beating of sixteenh notes intensiies in R. 3'6. 1 1 , wih the irst violin adding rhhmic jolts nd an ascending minor ninh leap every sixth sixteenh note (nd thus adding to the registral saturation). The second violin enters at R. 3 7, also with ceaseless sixteenth notes, thickening the texure and increasing the level of dissonance wih constant double stops. In addition, at R. 37, as the music pushes towards its climax, the two lower insuments enter with a theme rom the second movement (Theme B, see R. 1 7.4) at the same pitch level as the A' section of he earlier movement. As was the ren of he [0 1 3 ] sonorities rom the inroduction to the ugue (which in n was a violent reworkng of the irst bars of the irst movement), he ren of Theme B is a vicious retun-the melody of the second movement's uneral rite reappears as though screming. The heme, originally a sot melody mrked con sordino and supported by gentle apeggios, recurs in he viola and cello in parallel octaves at a fortssimo dynamic level. Against this, the second violin plays dissonant double stops that altenate registers every two sxteenth notes, while the irst violin has minor ninth leaps. The ren of Theme B adds a new rhmic layer to the music, n to a presentation of a ugue subject in augmentation. Thus, Shostakovich is able to create a sense of saturation of rhyhmic values without presenting his ugue subject in augmentation. In addition to creating a new level of saturation, Hatten notes that an augmented ugue subject "supports a culminating rhetorical efect."62 The ren of Theme B certainly has this characteristic, although here, unlike an augmented ugue subject (especially when it is in he bass), any sense of authoritative weight is missing. Theme B disintegrates under the orces ofhe music pushing toward the inal climax of the ugue (see R. 37. 1 3). The music thickens to a dissonant six-voice texture (with the irst violin and viola playing double stops) at R. 38, with all insuments performing two measures of anapests beore dissolving into straight sxteenth notes. The climax occurs at R. 3 8 .4 with the ren of the theme that opens he piece, Theme A. Again, it is a savage ren of previous material. Example 3 . 1 0 shows the thick texture of this section as all instruments play the rst part of the theme on diferent pitches-perect ourths separate the tree upper voices while the cello is a diminished ourth/major third below he viola. n addition, the viola has a G double stop acting as a drone, darkening even ther the almost opaque texture. n the second pat of the theme, the instruments all have octave doublings of the sme pitch atf.The piece has come ull circle; building on musical materials rom previous movements, the ugue brings back the two main themes rom he preceding movements in a brutal, climactic renzy. irst violin melody is created entirely of octatonic sets, with the exception of the initial our notes that outline ton!c, moving rom octatonic III, to octatonic II, nd octatonic I beore ending back in the octatonic III collection. I ollow Pieter van den Toon's numberings or the octatonic collections, where octatonic I is (C# D E F G M B� B), octatonic II is (D m F F# A� Aq B C), and octatonic III is (E� Eq F# G A B � C D�). See Van den Toon, Stravinsy and The ite of Spring: The Beginning ofa Musica� Language (Berkeley, 1 987), p. 143. 62 Hatten, Interpreting Musical Gestures, Topics and Tropes, p. 250.

64

Composing the Modern Subject

Example 3.10 Quartet No. 7, third movement, return of Theme A at climax of the fugue

The Postlude as Symbolic ite Let me review the intepretation I have been advncing: despite the act that the irst movement lacks a development, leaving it incomplete, the second movement nevertheless continued with the uneral. The second movement has all the musical markings of a uneral ceremony, yet it does not succeed in properly inscribing the subj ect's musical memory, depending instead on generic markers of mouning to give the sense of a burial. It has the orm of a ceremony, but none of the substance. Motive A's ominous disturbance of the rite, signiying the emergence of a gap between two deaths, along with the savage reworking of the opening of the irst movement at the start of the third movement, oreshadows the violence that is to come. In the ugue, the living dead ren as "terriying monsters," aural depictions of the pure drive that relentlessly persists in the ugue section until it has reached its goal. This ugue looks not towrd a uure, by expnding and developing motives into new themes; rather, it mechanically unwinds, signiying the pure, mechanical drive of the dead-those whose symbolic destinies were not properly realized in the previous movements.63 With the climactic retun of Theme B and the irst phrase of Theme A, the ugue reaches "the end," as the pure drive that symbolized the ren of the dead inally dissipates. The savagery and brutality drains rom the music and the subject can now die symbolically. The task of remembrance, the second death, which the second movement was unable to perform, is properly accomplished in the postlude to he ugue as the end of the third movement. Although the postlude lacks the standard eatures that give the second movement its unereal quality, it seems to remember the departed subject, allowing it to be properly laid to rest. As shown in Example 3 . 1 0, in the midst of the brutal ren of Theme A, all the instruments suddenly break rom the ive-voice texture, at one measure beore R. 39, or one bar off C#. This occurs again at R. 39.4 (not shown) as the retun 63 As stated earlier (see note 44), Mccreless points out that one of the problematic aspects of viewing the Seventh String Quartet as a large-scale sonata om is hat the ugue/ development is in the tonic key. On a structural level this is admittedly n issue, yet on a hermeneutical level it only enorces the idea of he ugue being backward looking nd mechanical in nature-obsessed with what took place (or, more literally, what did not take place) in the previous movements.

65

Cods, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

of Theme A again emphasizes the dominant pitch. Here then, at the end of what can be interpreted as unctioning as the development or the large-scale sonata orm, the instruments j oin together to stand orceully on · the dominant in preparation or the recapitulation. The postlude (beginning at R. 4 1 ) opens with the ugue subj ect, the most charged theme of the piece. Compared to· the initial presentation of the ugue subj ect in Example 3 . 8 , Example 3 . 1 1 shows just a recollection of the ugue subj ect, drained of its violence and appearing in a lilting � Allegretto, with the head in eighths and the tail in half and quarter notes. While the rhythmic values are elongated, the ugue subj ect is remembered at the same pitch level as its original presentation (compare R. 4 1 . l f with R. 24. l ) . Helping to create the aura of reminiscence, all instruments are instucted to play con sordino and piano. Initially, the irst violin recalls the ugue subject while the other instruments give harmonic support. The only other instrument that recollects the ugue subj ect is the viola (see R. 52. l f and R. 52.6), which had originally presented it, and was the voice in which motive A erupted to the surace. Note that the ugue, which in this interpretation exists in the empty space between the two deaths, does not use a key signature, even though it is has a pitch center of F # minor. Thus, the score itself marks the ugue as existing in a space outside of our symbolic reality, a place where the common key indicators of the constructed universe do not exist. Now that the gap has been closed, the postlude, which begins in the same key as the ugue, has an F# minor key signature, retuning to the societal "rules" of the constructed musical reality. Example 3.11 Quartet No. 7, third movement, opening of the postlude

] lleo J .. con sod .

. " .

v

,

JJ

---

p�

consod.

. . .

v

�·

u

consod.

..

""" '·

�

1

»

-

-

.

.

"'

.

A

-

_

-

p

J= J

-

-

:· ---.

-

---.

, . " .

. . :·

, .

�

,,

-

.. .

,,

''

•

-

.-

:·

-

:·

,,.

�·

,.

..

..

:·

66

Composing the Modern Subject

With the passing of the development/ugue, the postlude also recollects Theme A (with the irst appearance at R. 46) in the original key of F# minor as part of the recapitulation. Here, Theie A relinquishes its anapest rhythm, retuning instead as a sot reminiscence. Without the anapest, the instruments play in steady staccato eighth notes altenating with eighth rests, while the irst violin has the melody and the second violin supports it with an F# drone. During the postlude, the ugue theme and Theme A disintegrate, and the ragments are juxtaposed and interlaced along with a new, continually evolving melody based on perect outh s and semitone motions (or example see R. 42 .4-7, 43 .9f, 49. l f, etc.). While it seemingly comes out of nowhere, this new melody actually arises rom the shattered ragments of the preceding music. Comprised mostly of perect ourths and minor seconds, the melody is based on two of the most undamental elements of the work-recall the use of the perect ourth at the retun of Theme A at the climax of the ugue, and the semitone is undamental to the creation of motive A since it is constructed out of two half-steps separated by a whole tone. A brief perusal of important instances of two pairs of ourths, G-D and F#-C#, highlights the importance of perect ourths and minor seconds in the quartet. 64 The pitches in these two ourths emphasize important keys in the piece : the irst and third movements are in F # minor, the second movement A section in D minor, and the B section in q. In the irst movement, the irst cadence is rom F# to q with the cello moving down a perect ourth (R. 1 .7-8). This is repeated in R. 2.4-5 and again at R. 2.9- 1 0, with G descending to D. The two ourths retun in the recapitulation of the irst movement during the last bars of the second theme (R. 1 5 .2-1 6. 1 ). The ugue subj ect is created out of the [0 1 34] and [0 1 3] sets, with the exception of the last jump up a perect ourth (D-G in the initial statement). In the stretto section the subject enters on F# and q while the two alse entrances are on D and G. Throughout the work, the G-D ourth tends to unction as a semitone inlection to F#-C#, and it was with the inal q of the irst movement that it became the leading note to the D minor of the second. From these basic elements the melody of the postlude is created. The complete opposite of the ugue subject, this melody is in constant transormation, never stopping long enough to create a deinitive version. It thus can be interpreted as representing a kind of renewal, a way or the living to retain memories of the dead without being haunted by them. As the postlude winds down, a ragment of the head of the ugue leads the music directly into the coda-the altered version of the coda that ended the irst movement. The drama has ended, the development and recapitulation have occurred; the gap between the two deaths has closed. But, what of the coda? _

64 Throughout the work, Shostakovich uses the G-D dyad as a semitone inlection of the F#-C# dyad, disrupting the F# key center. Kn describes the relationship between the two as competing tonic-dominant complexes: see her chapter on the Seventh Quartet in Kn, Shostakovich in Dialogue: Form, Imagey and Ideas in 'Quartets I-7 (Aldershot, orthcoming).

Cods, Death and the Seventh String Quartet

67

Coda When discussing one of Mahler 's codas, Adono stated that the "coda relects all that has gone beore; in it the old storm inds a harmless echo."65 This statement holds true or the recollection of the coda in the inal movement. of the Seventh String Quartet as well; it is an echo of the original coda. As with all echoes, we are not in control over the reverberation. Rhytms nd dynamics dissipate, and what was once let to the performer is now predetermined with a composed-out ritenuto: the sound slowly dies away. The recollection of the coda is unnecessary to the ormal structure of the large-scale sonata recalled by the Seventh Quartet. The development and recapitulation of the ugue nd postlude completes the sonata om-any coda is extraneous and the ren of he same coda is unnecessary. It is also not needed to complete the narrative-the postlude has closed the gap between the two deaths by properly inscribing the memory of the dead. Yet, true to the nature of a supplement, the coda is of utmost importance on an aesthetic and symbolic level. One could say that the original coda was an empty supplement, an act of mimesis, an imitation of the structure of the irst movement that in itself was incomplete.66 Although only an echo, the second coda does add to the work by giving expression to what has taken place since the irst, empty coda. This emphasizes the interpretation of the irst coda as death-a death with which now, at the end of the third movement, the musical subject can come to terms. The coda to the inale is ull, it adds to the work, and completes it. In diferent terms, the irst coda emphasizes an absence of a presence; by the inal bars of the third movement the coda is able to reveal the presence of absence. In the Seventh String Quatet he goal of the third movement is to deine properly the second death. The coda signiies that the goal has been reached with the successul closure created by the postlude's uneral rite. The only way the coda can show successul completion of this goal is rom outside the process, and if the irst coda signiies the death of the subject in the irst movement, the second coda then signiies the death of the entire piece. Zizek notes that with the second death there is a "radical annihilation of nature's circular movement,"67 and with the recollection of the coda at the end of the last movement the circular repetition is complete. The coda of the third movement ades, and so ends the entire symbolic space in which the piece existed. The marking of morendo or the last notes is tuly appropriate. As they die away, so does the structure in which they have meaning.

65 Adono, Mahler, p. 1 1 . 66 See Derida, O/Grammatoloy, p. 203 . 67 Zizek, The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 1 3 5.

Chapter 4

Musical Hauntings : The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostakovich's Eighth String Quartet, Op. 1 1 0 ( 1 960) 1

A masterpiece always moves, by deinition, in the manner of a ghost. Jacques Derrida2

Shostakovich's Eighh String Qutet is haunted by musical ghosts-quotations, most oten self-quotations, ren rom the past to create much of the music of he irst our movements. The majoriy of the remainng material, including almost all of the ih and inal movement, is composed out of the DSCH motive, permeating the music with the composer's musical moniker. Set in a pticulrly ransprent maner, the quotations take center stage through a greater pat of he piece and in most discussions of the work, yet the DSCH motive is never fr away; its presence is constant. Over the course of the work, he motive comes to dominate he piece, becoming its central specter. By the end of the qutet, only this motive remains-the inale is devoid of musical quotes-as he motive is used to compose the movement, a ugue on DSCH. Thus, or all he use of musical quotations, it is the DSCH motive whose ghostly presence asks the hermeneutic riddles that will be the ocus of this chapter. Why does his motive seemingly conrol he piece? Why is it so persistent? And, what, ultimately, is its signiication? The Eighth is one of Shostakovich's more well-known works, with its fme initially due, in pat, o the extensive use of musical quotations. In addition, he unusually lge number of musical ideas associated with the composer brings into question the qutet's oicial dedication to the victims of wr nd ascism. The qutet's prominence was her ehanced with he publication of Shostkovich's letters to Isak Glikmn, in which Shostakovich wrote, in what is highly unusual detail or the reticent composer, his personal eelings regarding the work. 3 Already prominent in the scholrly literature, the qutet's stature in recent years has gained such renown that it is the subject of a book, David Fnning's Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, which submits the work 1 Shostkovich d�dicated the Eihth String Quartet "To he victims of Fascism nd Wr." 2 Jacques Derrida, Specters ofMax: The State ofDebt, the Work ofMouning, and the New International, trans. Peggy muf (New York, 1 994), p. 1 8. 3 In a leter dated July 1 9, 1 960. See Isaak Gliman, Stoy of a Frienship: The Letters of Dmiy Shostakovich to Isaak Gliman, 1941-1975, trans. nthony Phillips (Ithaca, , 200 1 ), pp. 90-9 1 .

70

Composing the Modern Subject

to a thoroughgoing nalytical, historical, and intepretive discussion.4 Yet, even n Fanning's work, questions raised by th� dominnce of the DSCH moniker in the work, especially in the inal movement, are relatively resolved. The Eighth Quartet consists of ive movements, with the irst, outh, and ith movements marked Largo, the second Allegro Molto, and the third Allegretto. Overall the work has an arch-like symetry with a slow-ast-slow structure (with movements two and three creating the ast section) and outer movements that shar� mny similarities and serve as n introduction and conclusion respectively. Despite having rather diferent characteristics, the two ast movements (the second and third movements) are both diabolical scherzos with the second of the two making use of a waltz nd trio ormat The ourth movement is a lugubrious lament. Most of the quotations in the piece are rom Shostakovich's own works, including the First Symphony, Second Pino Trio, First Cello Concerto, and his opera Lay Macbeth of the Mtsensk District. The one quotation rom outside his oeuvre is the Russian revolutionary song Zamuchen yzholoy nevoley ("Tormented by Harsh Captivity'').5 The quotes appear in the quartet roughly in the order that the compositions rom which they are taken were composed. For example, the irst work quoted is the First Symphony, composed in 1 924-25, The last work quoted is Lay Macbeth of the Mtsensk District. Although the opera was irst composed in 1 930-32, Shostakovich was in the process of revising it under the name of Katerina /smailova during the time that he composed the Eighth Quartet. 6 (The quoted music is ound in both versions of the opera.) While the quotations are either literal or close to literal restatements taken rom previously composed works, Shostakovich makes allusions to previously composed material through a variety of musical resemblances. Shostakovich alludes to his own music and to works by a wide variety of composers. In the letter to Glikman, Shostakovich explicitly states that he alludes to Wagner's Gotterdimmerung and Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony, but many more reerences have been ound by scholrs.7 4 David Fanning, Shostaovich: String Quartet No. 8. Other analytical discussions can be ound in Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Process and Longman, Expression and Structure. 5 See Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 52-3 or a chart detailing the quoted material with brief discussions of alterations. There are many variations on the translation of the revolutionry song's title; I am ollowing Fnning in his translation. For the complete text (with translation) of the song and a translation of Mikhail Drusin's discussion of the song's origin see Fnning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 1 4 14. 6 For a uller discussion of the chronological ordering of quotations see Kadja Groke, "Komponieren in Geschichte und Gegenwart: nalytische Aspekte der ersten acht Streichquartette von Dmitri Schostakowitsch," in Andreas Wehrmeyer (ed.), Schostakowitschs Streichquartette: Ein internationales Symposium (Berlin, 2002), pp. 57-8. 7 For a comprehensive list of musical allusions see Fanning's table of "allusions nd ainities" in the Qutet, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 54-5 . For discussions of allusions to speciic works see Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 58-9, Lawrence Kramer, Musical Meaning, pp. 236-7, and Timothy L. Jackson, "Dmitry Shostakovich: Composer as Jew," in Allan B. Ho and Dmitry Feofanov (eds), Shostakovich Reconsidered (London, 1 998), pp. 597-640, here pp. 60 1602.

he Ritual of Conjuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

71

The widespread use o f the DSCH motive, the near cronological unolding of the musical quotes, along with Shostakovich's statement in his letter to Glikman that the work was meant to be "dedicated to the memory of the composer of this quatet,"8 have led to many autobiographical readings of the quartet-a mniesto of the composer's existence.9 At the same time, Shostakovich's statements to Glikman and Leb L�bedinsky's recollections regarding the composer's state of mind at the time provide (disputed) evidence or the theory that the piece was written during a period of extreme self-loathing and, perhaps, was intended to be a suicide note. 1 0 Given the extensive use of the DSCH motive and the large number of quotations, some of which are of signiicant length, the Eighth Quartet has ew themes that were newly composed or the work itsel. I I When present, the quotations take the musical spotlight, yet throughout the work the motive is always near: directly introducing a quotation, hovering just in the background, or providing basic pitch and/or intervallic content or the music. It is as ifthe motive is the power controlling the progression of the quartet, as it seemingly summons the quotations into the musical present. Seen in this light, the DSCH motive then becomes the central specter in a work illed with ghosts rom the musical past. 8 Glikman, Stoy of a Frienship, pp. 90-9 1 . 9 An early article discussing the autobiographical aspect of the qutet is Yury Keldysh's "n Autobiographical Quartet," trns. Aln Lumsden he Musical ims, April 1 96 1 : 22--8 . Interpretive comentary and cursory statements regarding the meaning of the quatet are prouse in the literature. Short discussions re in MacDonald, The New Shostakovich, pp. 222-3 and Volkov, Testimony, p. 1 56. ichard Tauskin, Deining Russia Musically, pp. 493-7, and Kramer, Musical Meaning, pp. 2324 1 both have lengthier interpretations, which will be addressed later in this chapter. See also Andreas Wehrmeyer, "b erlegungen u Schostakowitschs Achte Streichquartett," ed. ndreas Wehrmeyer, chostakowitschs Steichquartette: Ein internationals Symposium (Berlin: Enst Kun, 2002), pp. 2 1 3-28. For a discussion rom a performer's perspective see Judith Glyde, "From oppression to expression," Strings, October .2002 : 28-32. 1 0 See Glikman, Stoy of a Friendship, pp. 9 1 -2, Wilson, Shostakovich: A Lfe Remembered, rev. edn, p. 3 8 1 , and Leb Lebedinsky, "Code, Quotation and Collage: Some Musical Allusions in the Works of Dmitry Shostakovich," trans. Tatjana M. Marovic Norbury and Ian McDonald, in Allan B. Ho and Dmitry Feofanov (eds), Shostakovich Reconsideed (London, 1 998), pp. 475-7, also translated in Faning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 1 48-50. Fnning vigorously disputes the claim that Shostakovich was suicidal at the time, citing personal conversations with the composer 's son, Maxim. See Fanning, Shostaovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 1 8 . 1 1 Richard Longman suggests that there e only our ideas i n the quartet not derived rom self-quotation or the DSCH motive: 1) the rhythmic igure that irst occurs at R. 4 and rens throughout the work, 2) the second theme of the third movement, 3) "the 'prisoner 's song' of the ourth movement," and 4) the ostinato igure which rst appears at R. 65.9 in the ith movement. See L�1gman, Expression and Structure, vol. 1 , pp. 1 8 1 -2. Taruskin notes that what is the ourth of Longman's "new music" is actually derived rom an accompanimental igure ound in the last scene of Lay Macbeth, a motive that Fnning has associated with the notion of sleeplessness. See Taruskin, Deining Russia Musically, p. 494. Fanning, "Leitmotif in Lay MacBeth," in David Fanning (ed.), Shostakovich Studies (Cambridge, 1 995), pp. 1 469 and Faning, String Quartet No. 8, p. 1 25 .

Composing the Moden Subject

72

The Proper Name The irst movement opens with the DSCH motive in the cello, shown in Example 4. 1 . By itself, the motive's harmonically stability is not assured, with D and C 'resolving' to E� and Bq by half-step motion, The majority of the time the inal pitch of he motive, B q, resolves back to the C, implying a dominant-to-tonic motion and establishing the key of C minor. Ater the cello's presentation of the motive, it is repeated in streto by the other instruments, moving upwrd through both the ; ensemble and pitch space. The motive prolierates, expanding into two new pitch levels, and literally brings the qutet into being as the DSCH motive initiates the opening statement in each. instrument. Thus, rom the very beginning of the work, there is a prousion of utterances of he motive. Example 4.1 A

Largo

J

d= 3

Quartet No. 8, irst movement, opening measures

D

A

s

,

-

J

p

:

D '·

p

s

c

H

p

---

c

n

_/

'

H

, ---'

p

q� �

� ' ---'

..

!' · -

�-

___

.

-

Yet what, if anything, does the motive actually mean? Yes, the motive represents the proper name of the composer, but what does this signiy? In semiotic terms, the proper name, similar to any other signiier, does not inherently carry signiication. Speciically, the proper name denotes without describing; it points to an obj ect but does not provide any substance regarding meaning with respect to that object. To quote Jean-Franyois Lyotard, "the proper name is a desination of reality . . . it does not . . . have signiication. It is not . . . the abridged equivalent of a deinitive description or of a bundle of descriptions. It is a pure mark of designative unction. " 1 2 Lyotard's description ollows that of Saul Kripke, who argues that proper names are rigid designators. A signiier is a rigid designator "if in every possible world it designates the same object."13 Kripke notes that there is a diference between giving a deinition and ixing a reerence; rigid designators ix a reerence as opposed to actually deining meaning. 14 This reerence remains ixed even as transormations 12 Jean-Fran:ois Lyotard, "The Diferend, the Reerent and he Proper Name," diacritics (Fall 1 984), p. 1 0. 1 3 Saul ripke, Naming and Necessiy (Cambridge, 1 980), p. 48. 14 ripke, Naming andNecessiy, pp. 58QO. Hatten uses the concept ofthe rigid designator in language as one acet in argung that just because meng n music cannot be securely stated n language it does not mean we cnnot "have access o it as it relates o a cultural niverse" (247). Hatten uses rigid designator as n example showing that language itself does not have stable semntic content. See Hatten, Msical Meaning and Beethoven, pp. 247-5 1 .

he Ritual of Cojuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

73

occur through the course of everyday lie. Contingent propeties within the code give meaning to the proper name, not inherent ones. 1 5 Z izek also correlates the proper name to a rigid designator, stating that the rigid designator is a "meaningless signiier without a signiied."16 Ultimately, then, while naming may be a necessity, the name itself lacks inate signiication. 17 · ristian Hibberd has discussed the problematic aspect of deining a mening or the DSCH motive, noting that the lack of theoretical discussion of the motive and its use at times causes an "oversimpliied understanding of the monogram and its unction."18 Hibberd uses a Bakhtinian ramework to discuss the numerous character roles the motive can assume (57-74). Speciically he looks at the various ways the motive-as-signature can unction in terms of the subject it represents, whether it be Shostakovich-as-person, Shostakovich-as-composer, or Shostakovich-as-hero; "each of which is created and experienced in undamentally diferent ways" (67). Hibberd concludes with the wning that "No longer can we regard the monogram simply as evidence of the composer ' signing' his compositions" (74). In his discussion speciic to the Eighth String Quartet, Hibberd notes that, in the letter to Gliman, Shostakovich had already begun to distance himself rom the subject who composed the quartet (in stating that the quartet was in memoriam to he "composer of the qurtet"). Thus, within days of writing the Eighth Quartet, Shostakovich personally was separating himself rom the composing subject represented in the quartet. In the letter to Glikman, Shostakovich describes the motive as ''the basic theme" of the quartet, which Hibberd points out is "immediately subsumed into a larger prase which cadences on C." Thus, paraprasing Derrida, Hibberd notes that there is an instantaneous departure rom the "monogram as a 'purely reproducible signature"' (59). In reality, the motive's unction in the piece goes far beyond the literal statement of the monogram and its participation in the expanded opening phrase. In the larger musical context, the motive interacts with the quotations in vrious ways: as an introductory and/or conclusionary raming device, eliding into the quote so that a seamless transition leads the motive into the quotation and at other times the quote seems to literally come out of, or be created by, the motive.19 Troughout the work, the motive is manipulated via transposition, alteration, and truncation; it is subj ect to change in both its presentation and role within the signiying context. From the very opening of the quatet, with the multiple utterances, the . nme automatically splits and redoubles, transposes to two new pitch levels and prolierates as a signiier. This replication of the name exempliies the duplicity of the signiier, 1 5 Kripke, Naming and Necessiy, pp. 56-7, 62-3 and p. 1 05 . 1 6 See Zizek, The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, pp. 94-7. 1 7 In Derrida's terms "a proper name . . . [is] but a word . . . a word distinct rom the thing or the concept." Jacques Derrida, On the Name, ed. Thomas Dutoit (Stanord, 1 995), p. 97. 18 ristin Hibberd, "Shostakovich nd Bakhtin: A Critical Investigation ofhe Late Works ( 1 974-1 975)," Ph.D. D.i ssertation (Goldsmiths College, University of London, 2005), p. 56. 19 Roseberry uses the Eighth to demonstrate how the DSCH motive is the primary cell out of which various quotes can be shown to have evolved in a discussion of how Shostakovich uses an "association of ideas" to create "large-scale integration and continuity" in what he terms the "continuity quatets" (Nos 7-9, 1 1- 1 3 , 1 5). See Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Pocess, pp. 268-76.

Composing the Modern Subject

74

and exposes its lack of inherent signiication. The multiple utterances create duplicitous versions of the rigid designator; nonetheless, increasing he quantity of rigid designators will not lead to the creation of signiication. The inevitable alteration of the motive urther undermines any status it may have · as having stable semantic content. Paradoxically, then, the more present the motive becomes in the work, the more the motive reveals its ormal rather than representative quality. The result is that the quatet is permeated by a signiier devoid of presence-a specter ' that marks the absence of the subject. The motive that was to represent the man signiies nothing. The multiple utterances of the DSCH motive in the opening measures have a ceremonial quality, as the repeated invocation of the proper name seemingly begins a ritual of conjuration that will summon the quotations, spirits of the past. The rerain-like ren of the motive in the irst movement then appears to act as a "magical incntation destined to evoke,"20 continually working to incite the ritual that is to come. Yet why smmon the quotations? Derrida's explication of "hauntology" gives a ramework or interpreting the ceremony presided over by the proper name and how the summoned quotations unction within the il. In Specters of Max Derrida discusses the act of conjuration, deining tree meanings, all of which involve a consolidation of power-the power to ight, to summon, and to expel.21 In the Eighth Quartet, I argue the DSCH motive uses this potentiality of summoning to amass a power, but power of a diferent kind-in this case, the ability to signiy. The motive conjures the quotations in an attempt to create a code of signiication in which the DSCH motive has meaning. In other words, the motive summons the quotations in hopes of conjuring up the identity of the subject so that the sign of absence may be illed by their presence. The Ceremony of Death The DSCH motive's conjuration of the quotations can be intepreted as creating a cere:ony of death in which the quotations ren in an intensiied, haunted manner. Although the irst movement, which serves as an introduction, is rather innocuous, in the ollowing movements the riual takes a decidedly violent tum, as the music depicts a ghoulish ceremony of death into which the quotations re summoned. The result is a quartet that enacts a macabre ritual of conjuration and visitation that reaches devastating proportions. Anticipating the structure of the quartet as a whole, the irst movement has n arch-like structure (in an BA' orm), with the two visitations by Shostakovich's First Symphony (A and A') raming an inner section (B), itself in a symmetrical orm (see Figure 4. 1 ). Within his structure, the DSCH motive recurs regularly, as if a rerain section.22 This arch orm is incomplete, as the ugato section that opens the work does not ren to conclude the movement. 23 Following the opening statement of the motive in all our instruments, the repetition 20 21 22. 23

Derrida, Specters of Max, p. 4 1 . See Derrida, Specters of Max, pp. 40-47. Groke, "Komponieren in Geschichte nd Gegenwart," p. 50. Fanning, Shostaovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 57.

he Ritual of Conjuration in Shostaovich s Eighth String Quartet

Section Fugato A

Musical Material DSCH DSCH First Symphony quotation DSCH

Rehearsal Number 0 0. 1 2 1 .4 1.ll

B

Tchaikovsky allusion DSCH Fith Symphony allusion DSCH Tchaikovsky allusion

2 3 4 6 7.2

A'

DSCH First Symphony quotation DSCH

9 9.6 1 0.3

Figure 4.1

75

Quartet No. 8, irst movement: overview

of the motive in the viola leads to a "cadence" on a half-diminished sevenh chord on A (at R. 0. 1 2). Ater an eighth-rest, the violins and cello enter with the DSCH motive in prallel octaves (at the name 's pitch level). The hollowed tripling of the name conjures orth the irst quotation, marked in Example 4.2--that of the opening melody of Shostakovich 's Symphony No. 1 , Op. 1 0. The irst violin holds its B4 or three and a half measures prior to playing the opening notes of the First Symphony (R. l .4b2). Meanwhile, beginning at R. 1 .3b2, the second violin plays the irst three notes of the DSCH motive beore segueing into the next section of the symphony quote. Eventually the viola enters with segments of the theme rom the symphony. As the quotation concludes, the irst violin restates the incantation, completing the rame or the quotation created by the motive. At R. 2 the irst violin has a descending chromatic line over a parallel­ octave/open-ifth drone in the lower instuments, Fanning notes that it is here that Shostakovich alludes to Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony.24 This haunting, pianissimo music ades, clearing the musical space or the cello, which recites the motive (at R. 3) beore the next section. At R. 4 the line becomes diatonic as a descending scalar theme enters, alluding this time to the irst movement of Shostakovich's Fith Symphony.25 Ater a brief interruption by the DSCH motive, at R. 6, the descending chromatic line retuns in the cello (R. 7.2, completing the tenary orm of the movement's B section). This section eventually leads the music back to the First Symphony material (R. 9.6). The quote rom the First Symphony is conjured a second time, continuing the symmetrical basis of the movement. Once again, octave doublings of the motive in the violins and cello summon the quote, continuing the prolieration of the name. Six measures into the second visitation, 24 For a direct comparison of the Shostakovich and Tchaikovsy see Fanning, String Quartet No. 8, 64. Roseberry argues this line derives rom the chromaticism of Shostakovich's First Symphony, Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Pocess, p. 27 1 . 2 5 Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Pocess, p . 272. Longman, Expession and Structure, vol. 1 , p. 1 82.

Composing the Modern Subject

76

Example 4.2 Quartet No. 8, irst movement, quotation rom Symphony No. 1 First Symphony .

A

J

A

J

6

dim.

�

A

J

A

J

� --'

. .

�-

..

-

�- p�· ---

-

..

�s P

.-

.. �

-

�

First Smnhony cont.)

�·

v

-

�

' P

P

:

---

. --'

p

..

i

dim.

' --

p

-

>

wlo

�.

----

:

I

p

dm.

�

·---

poco pssivo

" ---

� sempe

_

.

_

P sempe

�- .

�

�

First Sympl k>ny (cont.) I

I

� ·�

I!

..

at R. 9 . 1 1 , the quote is altered as the irst violin and viola's line slips downward by a half step rom the original music. The motivic sequence continues downwards or a third repetition beore the motives rom the First Symphony dissolve into the musical texture. While the ugal opening does not retun (leaving the arch orm incomplete), beore the movement ends the DSCH motive sounds one last time in the viola (see R. 1 0.3-5). As an opening to the quartet, the irst movement has a quiet intensity, with its solidity coming rom the steady orceulness of the continual repetition of the motive; here the "incantation repeats and ritualizes itself,"26 seemingly introducing the ceremony of death that ollows. The movement by itself seems rather harmless, with a seemingly innocent quotation rom Shostkovich's First Symphony recurring twice. Yet, as Fanning notes, he slower tempo and "heavier articulation" of the quoted material in comparison to its appearance in the First Symphony "signiicantly darken" the sound of the music.27 This new-ound weightiness oreshadows what is to come, as in the ollowing movements the ritual of conjuration presided over by the motive takes a macabre tum.

26 Deida, Specters of Marx, p. 52. 27 Fnning, Shostaovich : Sring Quartet No. 8, p. 53.

he Ritual of Cojuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

Example 4.3 A

Quartet No. 8, irst movement, inal measures

, . ----p

.

,

�

�

. p

.

A

p

:

••

i!

...

" p csc.

p csc. v

"-

. . �· --p =========--

u .

u .

v

�

p

p csc.

77

. -

"

u

"

aaca

"

At the end of the irst movement, as shown in Example 4.3, the music ades on an open ith on C almost into nothingness. The movement's apparent conclusion of a ading open ith, at R. 1 0.7-9, is beitting or music intepreted as initiating a ceremony of death. The stark, hollow quality of open iths resound with emptiness, as if the shell of a being without its soul, difering greatly rom the warmer, uller sound of a complete triad or an implied triad with an omitted ith. 28 But, two measures beore the end, beore the chord can ade completely, a G# stinger in the second violin, viola and cello violently punctures the musical abric. The G#s immediately bring a discord nd sense of oreboding into the work and, combined with an attacca mring, orceully propel the music into the next movement. Compared to the studied intensity of the irst movement, the second movement is purely diabolical. Dances of Death The Dance of Death has a long history in European culture, stemming rom the late middle ages and continuing through to modem times. Srah Webster Goodwin has traced the early precedents of the Dance of Death motif, its popularity in the iteenth centr, and their inluence on the resurgence of the motif in literature and graphic arts of the nineteenth century.29 Goodwin notes that the Dance of Death tends to gain in populrity in times of rebellion and ransition, whether the ransition be political or social (2 1). In the political realm, the Dance of Death was oten used as a signiier or war (88) and had, rom the very beginning, apocalyptical associations (55). In the nineteenth cenury, in addition to being used as commentary on generational and political revolution (notably the French revolution), the Dance of Death took on a new orm, responding to social changes and the bourgeois revolution. In doing so, the motif becomes indelibly linked to the new, scandalous dance, the waltz, and to 28 The intetextual reerence to the inal chord of Mozart's Requiem ther augments the allusion to death. 29 My inormation on the history of the Dance of Death motif comes rom Sarah Webster Goodwin's Kitsch and Cultue: the Dance of Death in Nineteenth-Centuy Literatue and Graphic Ars (New York, 1 988) and Robert Samuels, Mahler s Sxth Symphony: A Stuy in Musical Semiotics (Cambridge, 1 995), pp. 1 1 9-29. ·

78

Composing the Moden Subject

the masked ball. Along the way, the notion of the devilish iddler was picked up rom olklore and olded into the motif.30 While Goodwin's discussion ocuses on how the Dance ofDeath motif is depicted in literature and the graphic arts of the nineteenth century, Robert Samuels uses her work to help deine the characteristics of its musical representation. In addition to the obviously musical aspects of the waltz and iddle, Samuels notes that mrches, along with musical instruments and motives associated with military bands, can be used to characterize the Dance of Death in music. Samuels uses this inormation to discuss how, as a musical topic, the Dance of Death made its way into the scherzos of Mahler. Samuels argues that the scherzos of Mahler's Fith and Sixth Symphonies both reerence the genre, with the scherzo of the Fith Symphony being the most direct reerence. According to Samuels, Mahler does not depict the Dance of Death "in a direct ashion" (as does Saint-Saens); instead "the motif is an instance of cultural presupposition which enables the generic code to signiy intertextually."3 1 The Dance of Death "stands outside the text . . . but it animates the reatments of generic materials and its presence is signaled by the presence of cliches within the music."32 To Samuels, the omnipresent possibility of a repetition of the dance undermines the ormal pretensions of a teleological symphonic orm. In addition, due to the lance's ability to continue no mater who the partner, the constant quest or individuality and uniqueness is nulliied.33 Roseberry, noting hat Shostakovich "appropriated" the Mahlerian scherzo, describes Shostakovich's scherzos as "biting, bufoonish or (as in the danse macabre vein) weird, destructive or grotesque."34 Weird, destructive and grotesque are all suitable adjectives or the scherzos that comprise the second and third movements of the Eighth Quartet. Wih these movements, Shostakovich writes not one, but two versions of the Dance of Death, each its own unique means of evoking the topic. While both movements reerence a musical topic with a long historical lineage, in each of these movements Shostakovich augments the generic code of the motif so as to more adequately relect the twentieth-century context. The result is a viscerally brutal March of Death ollowed by a soulless Dance of the Dead. 35 The March of Death In an incredibly ast cut time, the second movement of the Eighth Quartet, spurred on by the iendish irst violin line, depicts an implacable march to the grave. The orm of the movement is best described as a two-part, ABCA'C'B' orm, where the A section (which itself divides into two parts) creates a scherzo, and the B and 30 Samuels, Mahler s Sxth Symphony, p. 125. 31 Ibid., pp. 1 28-9. 32 Ibid., p. 1 29. 3 3 Ibid., pp. 1 29-3 1 . 3 4 Roseberry, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and Thematic Process, p. 380. For a discussion of the grotesque in music see Sheinberg Iony, Satie, Paoy and the Grotesque in the Music ofShostakovich, pp. 207-309. 3 5 See Longmn, Expession and Structure, vol. 1, p. 1 83 .

The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

79

C sections combine together or the trio (see Figure 4.2).36 The movement ends with a strong sense of ormal and thematic incompletion, as the scherzo does not ren a third time to round of the orm, and the ren of the B section is cut of mid-phrase at the end of the movement. Marked Allego molto, and written in cut time with J= 1 20, this movement takes of at breakneck speed in comparison to the opening Lago.31 It opens with a hree-note motive in the irst violin created out of a [0 1 3 ] trichord-a subset of the DSCH's [0 1 34] tetrachord. The set is rhythmically pounded out via he composer's moto rhythm, the anapest. Esti Sheinberg argues that the anapest rhythm has the potential to "convey either gaiety and liveliness . . . or violence and obsessive compulsion."38 In the opening of the second movement the potential or positive expression is entirely absent; here its purport is one of utter brutality. Ater two iterations of the anapest motive, the violin completes the phrase with a chromatic line of steady quarter notes, beore the opening anapests retun with the consequent phrase. The solo violin's heme is at an extraordinarily quick pace, with intermittent chords, marked slfin the lower instruments, powerully punctuating the texture as harmonic support. The violin's orceul melody, combined with the lower instruments ' chords, alludes to the steady quarter notes and violent stop-chords that create the psychologically terriying third-movement scherzo in the composer 's Eighth Symphony, the second of his war symphonies. Section Scherzo

Musical Material Eighth Symphony allusion DSCH in canon Eighth Symphony allusion DSCH

Rehearsal Number 11 14 1 6.5 18 20

rio

Piano Trio quotation transition DSCH/triplet theme

21 22 23

Scherzo

Eighth Symphony allusion

27

rio

DSCH/triplet theme Piano Trio quotation

31 33

Figure 4.2

Quartet No. 8 , second movement: overview

36 For a detailed discussion of the ormal and thematic tension in the second movement see Roger Graybill, "Formal and Expressive Intensiication in Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 8, Second Movement," in Deborah Stein (ed.), Engaging Music: Essys in Music Analysis (New York, 2005): 1 9 1 -20 1 . Graybill interprets the movement through the lens of sonata om where he sees the irst part as a "potential sonata-om plan that is subsequently ustrated in Part 11" ( 1 94). hil. . using two diferent interpretations of om, both Graybill and I ind the strucure of the second movement to be incomplete. 37 See Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 73-5 or a more detailed discussion of the diferences n tempo between the two movements. 38 Sheinberg, Iony, Satire, Paroy and the Grotesque in the Music of Shostakovich, p. 1 98, also see Chapter 3, n. 43.

Composing the Moden Subject

80

Example 4.4 Quartet No. 8, second movement, canon on DSCH >

>

• • M

J • • •

J

>

>

/

"

:

I

D S C

• " M J

s

f...

a

�

D

s

c

J

'f

.

"

c

f

� q!

• • M

:

D S

/

f

L

Canon on DSCf

/ q� � �

>

C

D S C

/

>

D S C f

>

f

q�

� q!

.

D

] qe

•

,-

,f ,

: >

>

b�

i

qe

� q!

�·

f

>

I

>

>

I

�:

,>

>

> I

D S C

�

�

..

l

D S C f

qe

.

f...

I

�� ==

== L

L

L

L

'

Just thirty-two measures into the movement, at R. 1 3 .7, he DSCH motive is revealed to be the driving orce in this brutal march, as the proper name again rises to the oreront of the texture in parallel octaves in the cello and viola, and what appeared as a hrmless incntation in the irst movement quickly ns terriying in the second movement. The drama builds until R. 1 6.5, where, as shown in Example 4.4, the DSCH motive appears in imitation similar to that which opened the irst movement, except now the canon is hollowed out as all instruments write the name at the name's pitch level. Thus, taking place throughout this section is a prolieration of the signiier of the proper name concurrent with the literal emptying of harmonic content. At one measure beore R. 1 7, a new canon begins in quarter notes in the lower instuments, shortly ater which the violins take over (in R. 1 7 . 1 and 1 7 .2), continually repeating the motive in half notes. A second build-up begins at R. 20 as the cello, at the top of its range, begins yet another repetitive recitation of the name. At R. 20. 1 1 the violins quickly take over, but now repeating the name twice as ast and ofset by two beats, creating a duel between iterations of the name. The ritual builds to a climax at R. 2 1 , where the trio begins with the s ons of a quotation rom Shostakovich's Piano Trio No. 2, Op. 67, creating the B section of the movement. The theme rom he ourth movement of the Piano Trio appears in brutal orm as the violins scream the melody (originally in the piano) at a JJ dynamic level, while the viola and cello saw away at accompanimental triplets that

mm

he Ritual of Cojuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

81

Example 4.5 Quartet No. 8 , third movement, triplet theme A

D I 11 -

A

f espesio D I

, ,

j spssio

.

s

c

H �--·

A

, A

,

s

D

s

c

� �.�

H. .•

c

� '

a...

I

I

I

I

I

I

I

I

bi

g� � '

I

e E e� �.�

�

�

-E

!:

I

D

H . �

c_

s

!: -

� --__

�

�

e E e�

I

�e ��

'

�·�

�

�

'

�.�

:

span two octaves. The irst violin's high range and the instructions or the second violin to perform only on the G string or the duration of the quote serve to heighten the tension in the music. Ater the abrupt deparure of the Piano Trio quotation, the music does not relent in intensity, but brings in a new theme (and the C section) in R. 23 .4, shown in Example 4.5, that combines the orceul DSCH motive to open the melody, a DSCH ostinato, triplet tuns, high ranges and piercing dynamics, her ehancing the hysterical eel of the movement. Ater this camivalesque section, the movement rens to the music that started it of (R. 27), presenting a condensed version of the opening scherzo section. As noted, the trio section rens, also in a compressed version, with the order of the quotation of the Piano Trio and the triplet-um theme reversed. With the second, violent climatic visitation of the theme rom the Piano Trio, the music, almost unbelievably, has become even harsher, with the scoring lipped such that the violins are srieking the triplet accompaniment while the cello and viola play the melody in parallel octaves at he top of their ranges, begining on a F#4 and F#5 respectively. Starting at a .ff marking, the ins.ents crescendo into a void at the end of the penultimate measure of the movement, as the Trio's ghost again abruptly departs. A measure of stnned emptiness ollows. In the silence, the music reels rom the violence; yet, n attacca orces the music to continue into the next movement without a true break.

82

Composing the Modern Subject

Wind instruments have been associated with he Dance of Death or many centuries. In one of her many graphic illustrations, Goodwin shows one of Holbein's famous woodcuttings rom 1 538, entitled "A Cemetery," where the skeletons are marching through . the streets, perorming on wind instruments.J9 And, urther drawing rom the band associations, Samuels argues that the trills and n igures reerencing military marches can be used to suggest the Dance of Death motif.40 The second movement, with its mrch-like cut-time meter and the high-pitched tum motive ound in the C section, presents an allusion to military marches and the trills and tum igures perormed by the high wind instruments in military bands. But, this is not Holbein's sixteenth-century version of a Dance of Death-at an incredibly ast tempo, with orceul punctuations, this is a march or the irst half of the twentieth century, when tks, airplanes and bombs ano other ully automated mechanisms of military warfare became the agents of death. The intertextual musical reerences urther enhance the movement's updated take on the March of Death. As noted, the opening of the movement reers to the scherzo of the composer 's Eighth Symphony Op. 65 ( 1 943), and he quotation used in the movement is rom his Piano Trio No. 2, Op. 67 ( 1 943-44), both of which were written during the Second World War when the Axis and Allied powers were perorming a bloody ps de dex that consumed multiple continents and sent millions of soldiers and citizens to their graves.41 More speciically, Shostakovich began working on his Piano Trio No. 2, Op. 67, at the end of 1 943, completing it in 1 944. The timing and the substantial use of Jewish musical motives in he quartet has lead Elizabeth Wilson, along with other commentators, to suggest that Shostakovich was inluenced by Vassily Grossman's accounts of Treblika nd the stories of Jewish prisoners being orced to dance on graves they had reshly dug and undoubtedly would soon ill.42 Whether or not these reports afected the writing of the Trio, he work is indelibly linked to the period and has become a token in the expanded twentieth-century musical topic of the Dance of Deah.43 Goodwin notes hat in the nineteenth century "modem artists requently use the [Dance of Death] motif in explicit connection with an apocalyptic passage into a 39 Goodwin, Kitsch and Culture, plate 5 "A Cemetery." See also Smuels, Mahler s Sxth Symphony, p. 1 3 1 . 40 Samuels, Mahler s Sxth ymphony, p . 1 3 1 . 4 1 For a uller discussion o f the links between the Eighth String Quartet and the Third String Quartet, Eighth Symphony and Ninth Symphony see Kuhn, Shostakovich in Dialogue, pp. 201-206. 42 Wilson, Shostakovich: A Lfe Remembered, rev. edn, p. 225. See also Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 79; McCreless, "The Cycle of Strucure and the Cycle of Meaning in the Piano Trio in E minor, Op. 67," in David Fanning (ed.), Shostaovich Studies (Cambridge, 1 995), p. 1 1 3 . The un motive of the C section of the trio also adds Jewish elements. 43 For more 'personal' interpretations of the movement in which the sheer number of iterations of the DSCH motive in movement combined with the motivic linking of the DSCH motive to the Jewish elements rightly inspire readings of the movement as depicting Shostakovich's private identiication with repression, see Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 8 1 and Graybill, "Fomal and Expressive Intensiication in Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 8, Second Movement," pp. 1 99-200.

The Ritual of Cojuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

83

new world order."44 rguably, this scherzo's March of Death depicts the turbulence alicting the Westen world · during the irst half of the twentieth century, which indeed led to a disturbing new world order. The Dance of the Dead "Death can do any dance, but his Reigen oten begins with a waltz."45 The third movement's scherzo conorms more to the Dance of Deah motif Shostakovich inherited rom the nineteenth century. Here, the spotlight continues to shine on the violin, but now its role is as the master of ceremony at a ghoulish grand ball. Following the second movement's March of Death, the third movement, with its quotation rom Cello Concerto No. 1 , Op. 1 07 (which occurs twice, much like the visitations by the First Symphony and the Second Piano Trio in the previous movements), is, in efect, a Dance of the Dead. Where the second movement's Dance of Death is a maniestation of both physical and psychological terror, the succeeding Dance of the Dead has a more mechnical quality, conjuring an image of the lively copse. The movement is in a waltz and rio orm, nd the waltz section, wih its jolting staccato notes and cromaticism over the om-pa-pa accompaniment, smmons an image of skeletons clattering around in circles as they perform he ballroom dance. To quote Fanning: "or all its surface animation, the [hird movement] rings hollow because of he muted timbre, circling DSCH repetitions, open strings, ixated trills, etc, as though the personality of the music had drained away."46 The irst violin opens the movement wih afperformance of the DSCH motive, ending on an impish rill on the B q (which is doubled by the second violin). The violin then suts through a spellbinding solo, chromatically descending over two octaves. This inroduction sets the stage or the fantastical waltz where our staccato eighth notes ollowed by a quater note downbeat immediately bring to mind Saint-Saens' Danse macabe, Op. 40. At R. 39 a heme of newly composed music enters, initially lendng the waltz a slightly smooher eel, but the grotesquerie of the original theme soon works its way back into the music, and by R. 4 1 he opening waltz rens. At R. 4 1 . 1 4 the viola, with a shock, switches the meter to cut time. The irst violin enters on the obeat with a DSCH motive that instead of resolving up a half step, jumps a minor sixh, setting he stage or he visitation of he First Cello Concerto (R. 43). Imediately becoming a pt of the musical abric of the grotesque dance, the Cello Concerto's staccato, ascending melody serves o rnsition the music into the trio section of he movement. The trio, which begins at R. 44, presents an accompaniment ull of sliding cromaticism in parallel ourths and iths nd an unnaturally high melody or the cello.47 The move rom the waltz to the trio in efect seems to transport the music rom the physical dance to its psychological efects, as the slithering lines of the trio 44 Goodwin, Kitsch and Culture, p. 62. 45 Ibid., p. 1 32. 46 Faning, The Breath of the Symphonst: Shostakovich s Tenth (London, 1 988), p. 4 7. 47 Shostakovich uses sliding chromaticism in a trio section in the second movement of the Sixth Quartet, which I interpreted as a surface-level sign of the failure of the Classical episteme's attempt to control the rupture of the real. See p. 30. -

Composing the Moden Subject

84

suggest a musical enactment ofthe dizzying efects ofthe waltz's seductive pull. Much of Goodwin's work discusses he gendered aspects of he Dance of Death, arguing the masculine version is metaphor or rebellion, while the eminized representations are always eroticized. The masked ball and the waltz become, in the Dance of Death, a commentary on the downall of women. According to Goodwin ''the waltz spells trouble. It is oten a prooundly disturbing emblem of publicly-displayed sexuality, its dizzying movements a metaphorical vortex or all kinds of conusion."48 The waltz is a means of seduction and its afect is one of whirling conusion, leaving women dizzy and weak, seemingly powerless to Death's charm.49 The trio of the Eighth Quartet's third movement seemingly enacts this whirling dizziness, with its slithering cromaticism nd hrmonic instability, portraying the intoxicating efects of Death's waltz at its ull power. The cromatic accompaniment, combined with the strained timbre of the melody, also continues the otherworldly eel of the movement, and the tacet viola creates an absence in the core of the quartet akin to the emptiness of the bodies dancing without their souls. Not surprisingly, the DSCH motive seems to be in control of this vertiginous display, as the melody presiding over the ghostly spectacle springs rom none other than the motive. As shown in Example 4.6, the initial nine measures of the cello's melody never leave the pitches of the DSCH motive, and when the cello does move away rom the set, the melody remains predominantly octatonic (the exceptions being the [0 1 23] tetrachord in R. 44. 1 - 1 5 and the D � on the downbeat of R. 44. 1 6). Example 4.6 Quartet No. 8, third movement, cello theme in the trio

4'f

____!O_l�!___________

I r·

, ______[_O�!)_______ ,

-- - ---r--- - · 1 U

·---------------------

!�! ��' -

---------------------,

Pitches from the DSCH motive

Pitches from

a new )0134)

set

48 Goodwin, Kitsch and Cultue, p. 1 3 3 . 49 See Goodwin, pp. 1 236 1 and Smuels, Mahler s Sxth ymphony, p. 1 27.

The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

85

Ater the trio concludes, an abbreviated version of the waltz rens (at R. 46), bringing with it the Cello Concerto quotation rom which the transition to the ourth movement evolves. As the Dance ofDeath comes to an end, the note values elongate and the rate in change of pitches slows. The inal ive pitches of the movement, B q, A#, Bq, G#, and A#, create a [0 1 3] subset of the DSCH's pitch-class set and sound the irst ive iotes of the Dies Irae sequence-now that the March of Death and the Dance of the Dead have n their course, the uneral begins.50 The Funeral Lament Marked Lago, the ourth movement lacks the speed of the previous movements. It, however, is equal in intensity. With quotations rom a Russian revolutionary song, Shostakovich's opera Lay Macbeth, and allusions to death scenes (whether it be rom Shostakovich's ilm score or The oung Guard or Richard Wagner 's Gotterdimmerung), the movement is a searing evocation of emotional devastation. For the irst time in the quartet, music not written by Shostakovich is directly quoted­ with the initial visitation in the movement by the revolutionary song "Tormented by Harsh Captivity." Also, the cyclic aspect of the use of quotations within individual movements is broken. Instead of conjuring the irst quotation, the revolutionary song, a second time, the second visitation in the movement is of Katerina's inal love aria rom Shostakovich's opera Lay Macbeth of the Mtsensk Disrict, and both quotations appear in the same section. Example 4. 7 shows that the movement opens with a q minor key signature and two sets of eighth-note chords (consisting of Fe and Aq) repeated tree times under an A# drone in the irst violin. The two sets of chords ren tree times (moving rom an Fe/A# dyad, to a C#/D# dyad, to a third grouping where a C#/D# dyad in the irst set resolves to an F # major triad or the second set), separated by rests and an apeggiated triad (starting on the third, descending to the root and then upwards to the ith). While the repeated chords cetainly derive rom the accompaniment in the quote rom the Cello Conceto, they arguably also allude to the repeated chords of one of the most stunningly efective death scenes in musical history. In speciic, the repeated chords in the quartet reerence he "Deathblow" motive in Gotterdimmerung, heard directly ater Hagen murders Siegried. In Gotterdimmerung the "Deathblow" motive is a set of two chords performed twice, while in the Eighth Quartet three chords are played twice. Admittedly, the allusion to Siegried's death scene is hazy-in addition to the number of repetitions, the rhytmic accents are diferent, with both iterations of the set starting on the beat in the Eighth Qurtet, while the second set of chords in Gotterdimmerung begins on the upbeat (see Example 4.8). However, Faning, a skeptic of the ties to Gotterdimmerung, states that the programmatic associates to a "hero's uneral" is clear due to allusions to the "Death of Heroes" scene in Shostkovich's ilm score to The oung Guard. In addition, Shostakovich himse if stated that he reers to Gotterdimmerung in the quatet 50 For a brief discussion of he use of and allusions to the Dies Irae sequence n Shostakovich's music, see Rosebery, Ideoloy, Syle, Content, and hematic Pocess, p. 329.

Composing the Modern Subject

86

Example 4.7

�

" " I

Largo

u

Quartet No. 8, ourth movement, opening section (A)

Cq- 138)

•·

�

w sempe

senzasod.

" " »

> > >

�

> > >

> > >

u " " I

u

�·

�·

�·

v

-

v

� ,

.. "

..

t.

-

-

.

> > >

--

.

> > >

7·

... > > >

· �i

•

"> > >

��� f-

���

-

-·

.

.

-

>

> > >

I

•

"> > >

f

�·

f

-

i

,

"

> > >

f

�·

�·

� ;;

> > >

· �-

�·

i·

�·

,

> > >

:

�

..

�. > >

fpsante

�·

,

,

... > > > " " I

�· ,

fpesante

sez� sod. .

-

> > >

g pesante

s�.sod.

�·

>

>

" " I �

" " I

::

u

i·

,

� ,

" "

:

i·

,

..

csc.

•·

�

"1

--

•

��� f

..J v

•

> > >

I

"1

� � �

-

"

i·

t> > >

f

/

•

�·

> > >

. . .

> > >

Example 4.8 Comparison of rhythms : Goterdammerung vs. Quartet No. 8, ourth movement Ie

�' ' f �D ' � II

Goterdammerung

vs.

Quartet No. 8, ourth movement

The Ritual of Cojuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

87

(see the letter to Gliman), leading Fanning to allow that if there is an allusion to Gotterdimmerung in the work, this is it. 51 In addition to the ambiguous reerences to the "Deathblow" motive, the minor triad arpeggiations that ollow the two sets of repeated chords in the Eighth have the same melodic contour as that of the "Fate" motive in Gotte�dimmerung, which ollows shotly ater: the "'Deathblow" motives. (See Example 4.9 and Gotterdimmerung Act III, Scene 2, m. 852-3 , where the melodic line is in the irst trombone part, ive measures ater the irst iteration of the "Deathblow" motive. The motive is repeated with the melody in the trombone in mm. 8606 1 and the hon in 8634.) Together the repeated chords and the melodic contour of the melody that ollows create a shadowy reerence to Siegried's death. The ghost of Gotterdimmerung is truly spectral; its highly veiled presentation has an uncanny aspect, as we can never truly be convinced of its presence. The music rens twice in the ourth movement of the Eighth, creating A sections that rame two sections of slow-moving melodic material supported by hollow, drone-like accompniment, giving the movement a rondo orm (ABACA). Example 4.9 Goterdimmerung: Fate motive

: I H�

jJ

I ll1lO

The irst couplet (the B section of the rondo) has a duet between the irst violin and the lower instruments (in parallel octaves) consisting of stepwise melodies ull of the [0 1 34] set and the other octatonic tetrachord, the [023 5] set, within a small range. Near the end of the section, at R. 56, arguably another spectral allusion to Gotterdimmerung occurs, as the lower instruments imitate the contour of one of the "Love" motives sung by Brinnhilde in her inal scene. Speciically, the lower three instruments ' line at R. 56.34 is a transposed version of the intervals in Brinnhilde's melody when she sings "laut'rer als er" at mm. 1 288-9. Admittedly, this allusion may be an illusion, a too obscure sensation of the ghostly presence Brihilde. Ater these vague reverberations of Biinnhilde's aria, the section comes to a close and the "death chords" ren. The second couplet (C) contains the movement's, and perhaps the piece 's, most powerul moments, as it is here, with the last conjuration, that the music summons the most emotionally evocative ghosts. First, with the pickup into R. 5 8 , Shostakovich quotes at length a revolutionary song "Tormented by Harsh Captivity." The melody is in the irst violin over a drone in the cello and viola and slow-moving harmonic support in the second violin. The non-moving drone of the lower instruments efectively creates an aural (and somewhat visual, if looking at the score) cell that encages the violins, enhancing the extrinsic connotations brought to mind by the song.

5 1 Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 1 08-1 09. Boh Fanning and ramer discuss the resemblance of the repeated chords ollowed by the arpeggiation to another culural monument, Beethoven's "Muss es sein?" motive rom Op. 1 3 5 . See Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 1 08-1 09, and ramer, Musical Meaning, p. 238.

Composing the Moden Subject

88

Yet it is the quotation, which begins with the anacrusis into R. 62, that rguably is the emotional centerpiece of the work. As shown in Example 4. 1 0, the irst violin becomes one of the accompanimental instruments giving the melody to the cello, which reaches over the other instruments to the higher end of its range to quote Katerina's inal love melody rom the last scene in Shostakovich's opera Lay Macbeth of the Mtsensk District. Scoring the cello higher in registers gives the truly simple melodic line a raw, pinched sound and an achingly intense beauty. Example 4.10 Quartet No. 8, ourth movement, Katerina's aria A "

I

J

p)

A " M

__-'

J ..

pp)

"

A " M J

d· �pp)

�

-

-

p dolce

-

d·

o pe

n-

-

!·

!·

:

-·

-

a.D!

•

:

'

:

�

a, po -

y Xo

o

E:.Ha

Jing!­ MOJ!

'"

-

"

At­

_,

:

�

�

""

""

""

""

-

�-

d·

�-

�-

�-

-

. -_

- --- v

J

-

-

n-,

__

[Ser [Ce

"" I

-

-

-- -

" " I

J "

A "

"

I

.J

�_

-·

!.

�-

-

'

-

"

�-

-

�� e BAb

st!-­o!

..

we ay ' • AWi

log eH&

all o4

I

�· �-�

-

I

.

-

I

you!­ mz - 1ac&,

n't

A " I J

-

-

-

l " M ._,.._,

J

· �

-

--

-

--

:-

-

"

l " M .J

P__ d·

d· Ser - o Ce - pe

�-

-

�u] a!}

!·

!·

!·

---

-� -

-

�-

-

!___

=-

The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

89

The cello's range, the melodic simplicity, and the placement of the melody in a "stunned Largo" that has ollowed two brutal scherzos all combine to cause the quotation to radiate with excruciating clarity a eeling of emotional devastation. At the point in the opera when Katerina sings this melody, she has not realized that Sergei, her lover whom she · is blissully greeting .th this line, has moved on to another woman-in the opera it is truly a love ria. In retrospect, this melody, . with its repeated echo (at a lower dynamic level) of Katerina's last "Seryozha" (R; 62.23-27), which is not sung in the opera, takes on the painul edge of a love lost and lover's betrayal. Thus, arguably both couplets end with operatic reerences. The B section's inal melody seems to allude to one of opera's great stories of idealized love-that of Brinhilde and Siegried-taken rom Wagner's Gotterdimmerung. The allusion is rom the inal scene in Gotterdimmerung shortly beore Siegried's uneral pyre is lit, in which Binhilde self-immolates. The reerences to Gotterdimmerung are vague and murky, as if they are the last sounds still reverberating through the musical universe rom the long-gone world in which Valhalla once stood. The C section, meanwhile, comes to a close with reerences to Lay Macbeth, where the quotation is again rom the inal scene, shortly beore Katerina realizes Sergei 's betrayal. Her response to this treachery is an act of homicide/suicide when she lings herself nd Sergei's new love to their deaths in an ice-cold, surging river (a rather dysphoric parallel to Siegried and Binhi lde's deaths). The juxtaposition of the two operas (both of which have storylines involving iidelity), with the earlier ending in the ires of divine love and the later ending with the etenal rigidity of complete betrayal of love, seems to underscore Katerina's situation. Ater Katerina's aria there is little more to say: the death chords ren, and the violin's attempt at a melody dissolves into the DSCH motive. The movement closes with one measure of rest, ollowed by a drawn-out statement of the DSCH motive in the irst violin, with each pitch illing a ull measure; due to another attacca this lows directly into the ith movement. Ater the ritual that has taken place-the March of Death, the Dance of the Dead and the Funeral March-the proper name still haunts the music. All that Remains . . . The inal our pitches o f the outh movement re the only solo presentation of the ugue subj ect of the ith movement's ugue on DSCH. Ater this expository statement, the motive moves through the quartet, beginning in the cello, to create a ugal exposition, recalling the opening of the irst movement, as both movements open with the motive moving upward through the ensemble and pitch space. Unlike the irst movement, during the viola's answer to the cello's ugue subj ect the cello introduces a tree-measure countersubject which, as shown in Example 4. 1 1 , consists of a one-measure descending motive, repeated at pitch and then stated a third time a whole step lower. The one-measure motive creating this couitersubject is the only reerence to an extrinsic musical work in the inale, as the motive, along with the initial semitone conlict that rises with it, comes rom an accompanimental igure

90

Composing the Moden Subject

in the last scene of Shostakovich's opera Lay Macbeth of the Mtsensk District.52 (As we will see, the inal movement does reerence other movements of the Eighth Quatet.)This scene occurs ater Katerina's suicidal act, as the motive accompanies the prisoners' continued march to Siberia. In the Eighth Quartet, it accompanies the DSCH motive in its seemingly relentless march. While the rising statements . of the ugue subject in the inal movement recall the opening of the irst movement, this time the incantation ails to conjure a new quotation. Instead, ater a brief episode the subject retuns, but already the countersubject is unable to maintain its position of a steady complement to the subject. In the ollowing our ugal statements, the countersubject occurs with the subj ect only once-the other times it enters beore the subject, is incomplete, or is missing altogether. As shown in Exmple 4. 1 2, he one-measure motive that creates the countersubject is prominent beginning two measures beore R. 69. Yet this example also displays the countersubject motive's ailure to play a generative role in the creation of the music. Example 4. 1 2 shows that the viola's continuous descending statements of the countersubj ect's motive create a downward line. Two beats into R. 69.2 a brief subject rea begins with the DSCH motive in the irst violin, but by the inal measure of the viola's descent the other instruments have dropped out. In the ollowing measure all instruments rest. This measured silence resounds with emptiness. The countersubject has tried to weave a musical abric, but all it can do is knot repetitions of its one-measure motivic statement together in a downwrd sequence. Without he DSCH motive present to animate nd sustain the musical reality, the constructed universe of the quartet quickly dissipates. Ater the measure of rest, the second violin enters with a solo statement of the countersubject, which is ollowed by another two beats of rest. The brief, brooding solo has a sense of inadequacy, emphasizing that the countersubject is incapable of orming a substantive orce in the musical development. 53 The response to the second violin's abject solo statement of the countersubject is one of complete reversion as the music rens to the opening of the piece. In response the emptiness created by the countersubject's inability to be a creative orce within he movement, the DSCH motive enters in all our instruments in a srettoed presentation of the ugue subject, replicating the opening of he irst movement. Ater all that has taken place, with all the conjuring of the spirits, the piece has ound itself back where it stted. But the ren to the opening movement is a repetition with a diference: this time the motive ails to conjure a quotation. In the opening movement, ater the ugal exposition of the DSCH motive, he irst conjuration of the work (the First Symphony) occurs. In the ourth movement, ater the regression to the opening

52 See Truskin, Deining Russia Musicaly, p. 494; MacDonald, The New Shostakovich, p. 222; Faning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, pp. 1 22-5 . See n. 1 1 , p. 7 1 . 5 3 This interpretation difers rom Fanning's, who states that "one of the main musical nimating orces of the last movement - he counter-subject - has been given its own voice: the quite, but ininitely suggestive, voice of Music." Faning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 128. I disagree with Faning's argument that the nale transcends all contextual aspects nd becomes 'pure' music, as the ih movement ugue is predicated on the continued prolieration of the proper name.

91

The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

Example 4.11 Quartet No. 8 , ifth movement, fugue subject and countersubject \ J I J

�

p -

�-

--

p -

p

I

-

-

I

-

Countersubject

r

Example 4.12 Quartet No. 8, ifth movement, second and third episodes .

he

\

J I

I

f -

f

:

f

I

I

L �

[Fugue Subject]

I ---

-

-

m.

I " --.

I

�� "' �-� "'

"

g.

g.

I

I

I

L�

-

L- -

-

dim. -

-

-

I

-

.

---

p

I

..

J .. :

l �

�

, _

dim--

..____.. dim.

I

J

- u

f

J

I

al

-

p

� p ..

� ..

� &

--p

I

p

�

=-

� I

-

��

92

Composing the Moden Subject

of the work, the initial our pitches (B, C, G, E�) of the First Symphony quotation appear (see the irst violin at R. 7 1 .6-7), but the quotation never ully materializes­ the DSCH motive appears to have lost its power to summon. s4 The only music that can be called orth is that of he countersubject, which makes a inal appearnce in tndem wih a subject statement beore dissolving into a two-pitch, half-step descent. Now the music again collapses to a passage rom he irst movement, this time to the inal mesues of he opening movement. Stting three_ beats into R. 72. 1 the music replicates what occurs on the third beat of R. 1 0.3 in the irst movement. The work ends with an open ith, the viola and cello hold C2 nd the violins a G3, an empty shell of the triad, which, marked morendo, slowly dies away. As just discussed, what occurs in the second half of the ith movement is a retun of the irst movement-a repetition of the movement minus the quotations. As musical spirits summoned rom earlier works, the quotations serve as traces of the past-repressed ideas retuning to haunt the present. Zizek · labels such a retun of the repressed as symptoms - symptoms to be dealt with in the current context, in this case, in the Eighth Qurtet.ss Yet, according to Zizek, symptoms do not ren rom the past-but rom the uture. Initially, symptoms appear as traces emerging out of the musical horizon only to become ully ormed as the music progresses. In their haunting of the current musical context, the quotations become a part of the ongoing musical present and enter into the musical abric in the same way that the uture becomes the present. Here, the quotations become a part ofthe new signiying network of the Eighth Quartet, not just entities rom past musical works, holding signiication or the current work beyond their unction in earlier works.s6 By isolating a quotation of music rom its historical continuity, it is the signiier that is isolated, not strictly its signiication. As Z ifok states, "meaning is not discovered, excavated rom the hidden depth of the past, but constructed retroactively."s7 What is superimposed in the current context is that signiier's network; through this juxtaposition, transormations of signiication can occur.s8 As part of the ritual of 54 Fanning calls these pitches a quotation with a deleted continuation (Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 1 29)--given the sheer length of previous quotations in this work, I argue that, if anything, this is a conjuration denied. 55 Zizek, The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 55. 56 As Derida notes, the very act of writing a sign "carries with it a orce of breaking with its context . . . This orce is not an accidental predicate, but the very structure of the writen." Derrida, "Signature Event Context," in Magins of Philosophy, trans. Alan Bass (Chicago, 1 972), p. 3 1 7. 57 See Z izek, Sublime Object of Ideoloy, pp. 56 and 1 4 1 . Scholarly investigation into he issues of quotation in music is quickly becoming a signiicant ield of study, although questions paticulr to self-quotation have largely been untouched; or the latest discussion of quotation in music see David Metzer, Quotation and Cultural Meaning in Twentieth-Centuy Music (New York, 2003). For a recent discussion of allusion in music see Reynolds, Motives for Allusion: Contxt and Content in Nineteenth Centuy Music (Cambridge, 1 003), pp. 1-22. Discussions liking allusions to musical specters and the uncanny are in ramer, Musical Meaning, pp. 258-87 and Michael lein, lntertxtualiy in Westen Art Music, pp. 77- 1 07. 58 As Bakhtin notes, even past meanings are unstable, as they will change with development of the "dialogue." Bakhtin, Speech Genes and Other Late Essys, p. 1 70.

The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostaovich s Eighth String Quartet

93

conjuration, the ren of the repressed is worked trough and interpreted within the current context of the ceremony of death-they become part of the present, not just representatives of the past�and, accordingly, the symptoms dissolve. The conjuration cannot realize its purpose of illing the proper name with stable meaning, of giving it a deinition. History cannot be summoned in order to create a meaning or the name as, in Z izek's words, "every historical rupture . . . changes retroactively the meaning of historical tradition. "59 This is true or all signiiers, the proper name as well as the quotations. As Julia risteva has noted, "the eature peculiar to every proper name is that it does not have an 'historical truth' . "60 The continual reinterpretations concening Shostakovich in the decades ollowing his death worked to create such an "historical rupture" and serve as a prominent example of the instability of historical meaning. In a similar vein, the reintepretations of the musical quotations into the ritual of death that creates the Eighth Qurtet also reveal the mutability of their signiication. Thus, by attempting to create meaning rom the quotations, the DSCH motive could only come up empty. The inevitable ailure ofthe motive 's serch or meaning is signaled at the very start of he work­ as soon as the motive became self-conscious and began its quest or meaning, it divided nd alienated itself rom itself. With each repetition the subj ect slipped uther away, emphasizing the absence signiied by he ghost. The second half of he inal movement ully reveals this reality-the emptiness in the motive's quest or meaning-as at the end of the work, all that remains are hollow shells: that of the irst movement, of the triad, and of the proper name. Autonomy Through Failure At the end of the work, the motive, the empty signiier, is proven to be the only constant in he quartet. The quotations, as symptoms of the past, have come nd gone, dissolving into an augmented network of signiication. Yet the motive remains. It is a massive presence in the quartet, eventually obscuring all else as it completely overruns the inal movement. As aready noted early in the chapter, lacking signiication, the DSCH motive is, in efect, a materialization of absence. It is a positivization of emptiness, a rendering into symbolic orm of that which cannot be symbolized. This positivization of a lack is created when the imagination tries to objectiy the real (>)-when one tries to orce the real into symbolization-and is a signiier of the empty kenel round which reality is constructed. The motive, "an objectiication of a void,"61 represents something that does not exist; yet, at the same time, it is the only thing that does exist. With he hollowing out of the symbolic orm of the proper name we experience a symbolization of the relationship of our constructed universe with respect to the real as, in the end, reality is centered around emptiness in the same way the proper name is a shell emptied of signiication. 59 Zizek, Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 56. 60 Julia risteva, "The True-Real'', trans. Sen Hand, in The Kristeva Reader New York, 1 986), p. 23 5 . 6 1 Ziiek, h e Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p . 9 5 .

94

Composing the Moden Subject

Thus, in the inal movement the DSCH motive shows that it is more than a surface eature of he quartet; it is the quartet. In an attempt to create a historical truh or the motive, the quartet conjured the quotations only or the symptoms to dissipate as pt of the ceremony of death, yet the motive cannot be dissolved-the quartet canot work through this symptom. It is the f'indigestible rock" that is the real; a looming presence, obscuring all else and reusing to integrate.62 The motive resists all attempts at symbolic incorporation, creating a stiling atmosphere, as the motive seems to block the quartet's ability or musical development. A ubiquitous presence that permeates the work, the motive does not allow the piece to live reely. Yet, as shown towards the end of the inal movement when the countersubject winds down to silence, if the Eighth were to be ree of the motive, the quartet would no longer exist. The music can evoke and exorcise the other symptoms, but it cannot exorcise the very substance of its own existence. 63 The motive then is what orges the musical subjectivity of the Eighth. The issue of subjectivity brings up questions of aesthetic autonomy, as addressed by both Fanning and ramer in their interpretations of the Eighth Quartet. Fanning argues that the inal movement is the only complete musical orm in the entire quartet. Speciically, he describes the irst movement as employing "diversionary tactics" instead of creating a orm, while the two scherzos, both of which imply a dance and trio orm, are "telescoped in their later stages and let incomplete." The ourth movement then relects the idiosyncratic nature of the irst movement, conorming to no inherited orm. 64 He contends that the orm of the irst movement is a ailed ugue and that this failure creates a musical issue that the next three movements are incapable of rectiying. It is then let to the inal movement, a ully worked­ out ugue, to compensate, to "repair" the damage of the ailed irst movement (60). In Fanning's view, since the inale lacks musical quotations and ulills a purely musical orm, it transcends the contextual and musical boundaries constraining the preceding movements. "Above all the suppression of quotation and allusion ' in the last movement - their displacement by the ully worked-out ugue that was deliberately withheld rom the irst movement - suggests the overcoming of programmatic dependence and the ultimate triumph of philosophical relection" ( 1 3 7). Thus, to Faning the ith movement is an act of "tragedy absorbed nd transcended" ( 1 35). Nonetheless, while the ugue is emptied of quotations, one very important musical citation remains-the ugue is created by a musical subject that is he proper name. That is, the DSCH motive reaches new depths in its iiltration of the musical texture, becoming the only signiier of the movement. The music may have overcome programmatic dependence created by the conjurations of the quotations, but it is still ravaged by the proper name. Kramer interprets the DSCH motive as a maniestation of the pure drive that demands to be reconciled and argues the "quartet may be premised on he ailure

62 Ibid., p. 1 78. 63 To quote Daniel Chua, "the empty sign is both 'nothing nd everything' ." Daniel K.L. Chua, Absolute Music and the Construction of Meaning (Cambridge, 1 999), p. 1 70. 64 Faning, Shostakovich: String Quartet no. 8, p. 1 3 1 . Also see pp. 1 32-9.

The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostaovich :� Eighth String Quartet

95

or impossibility of any such reconciliation."65 Kramer contends hat the quartet is driven by a "rotary motion" and that the quartet, as a whole, is controlled by a "rigid," albeit complicated, symmetrical structure in a downward spiral. He states "the music appears to be bound on the wheel of a orm that has lost its capacity or meaning, but that clings desperately to the exhausted signiiers of past meaning" (236). The result, in Kramer's view, is a work that creates an imitation of tragedy, "pseudo tragedy," and that "behind the a�ade there is nothing-nothing let-at all" (23 3). Fanning notes that Kramer's interpretation of the strucure of the quartet is lawed, as the irst movement is not a ugue (as ramer agued) and thus the ully worked-out ugue in the inale indicates some type of change ("trnsiguration," in Fanning's terms).66 The result is that ramer leans heavily on a problematic interpretation of the work as a cyclical structure and ails to investigate what may lie behind the surace. Thus, while Fanning ignores the proper name by arguing that the inal movement creates meaning by transcending programmatic dependence, becoming "Music," empty of exterior signs, ramer argues that the emptiness behind the DSCH motive makes its presence in the inale meaningless. With its omnipresent dominance of the DSCH motive in the inale, the quartet ails in its quest to transcend the motive. Nonetheless, I argue it is in this very ailure that the qurtet marks its autonomy. In "t History and Autonomy," Gregg Horowitz ofers us a pticularly cogent model or how autonomy appears in artworks - that is, how autonomy is represented. He argues that or a work of art to be autonomous it must display its own unreedom-that it must "reveal itself as incapable of escaping the world it seeks to transcend. "67 Insofar as a work of art cannot exist ree of all constraints, a successul work is one that displays its nonreconciliation with the conditions in which it is able to exist (270). In terms of autonomy, this means that the work itself must not only necessarily ail at being autonomous because autonomy cannot transcend its material representation, but also that the representation can only succeed by being a ailed representation: the work must put its ailure of reedom on display. Horowitz uses Michelangelo's Captives to illustrate his point (270-72). In each of these large, uninished statues we see a man struggling to emerge rom the rock that, in the sculpture's incomplete state, still encases him. Yet, as Horowitz notes, "were they to escape the marble, they would be mere vapor" (270). In the Eighth String Quatet, the DSCH motive is the means of musical representation by which this quartet seeks to transcend the overwhelming and restrictive presence of its material. It is through its engagement with the motive that the quartet puts on display the ailure of its own autonomy. In the quartet we catch a glimpse of subjective nonexistence, the transmutation of the subj ect ofrepresentation into vapor, similar to what would ensue if Michelangelo 's Captives were to escape their stone, as near the end the piece we hear the blakness, the void, that occurs when the DSCH motive, the proper name, ceases to be a catalyst in the animation of the music. We have 65 ramer, Musical Meaning, p. 234, or his complete discussion see pp. 232-40. 66 Fanning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 1 29. 67 Horowitz, Gregg, "t History and Autonomy," in Tom Hun and Lambert Zuidervaart (eds), The Semblance ofSubjectiviy: Essays in Adorno s Aesthetic heoy (Cambridge, 1 997), p. 274.

96

Composing the Moden Subject

seen glimpses of the vacuum that occurs when the motive stops creating the music multiple times in he work. The irst occurrence is in the measure of emptiness at the end of the second movement, as the quotation of the Piano Trio crescendos into a deaening silence, A second maniestation of this absence takes place at R. 46 in the third movement where the music is seemingly ragmenting into nothing beore the motive enters to restart the ghoulish waltz. See also ive measures beore he end of the ourth movement. Kramer notes this absence, stating that here we witness the "subject's mantra on the edge of a void."68 In each- of these instnces, it is the motive hat restrts the music, repeatedly revealing he qutet's dependence on the motive or its very creation. Thus, because the motive will not integrate, in its vast presence, and the stubbonne ss ofrepetition, the inale is not completely empty of meaning, as Kramer would have us believe. Through its insistent repetition that displays a reusal to be incoporated, the DSCH motive orces a symbolic appropriation.69 To paraphrase Horowitz, the limit of the quartet's stuggle is at the same time what gives it the possibility of lie.70 While the conjuration of the spirits obscures the act that the motive is what constitutes the- identity of the music, toward the end of the work, the music's basic substance, the DSCH motive, is pushed to the oreront of the musical texture. However, in the inale the DSCH motive is shown to be the very matter that the work seeks to escape. In trying to break ree rom the motive, the music inds that the motive's dissolution will also cause the evaporation of the musical universe, and the music becomes, to use Horowitz's words, a "slave to what [it] seek[ s] to transcend. "71 While a historical constellation, such as the one created by the summoning of the quotations, can support a variety of interpretations, the proper name, the rigid designator, resists attempts at symbolic integration. Richard Taruskin inds the Eighth Quartet to be "weakened" due to its "stenographic" rendering of the quotations and the pervasiveness of the DSCH motive. The result is that he does not ind himself "rening to it with renewed anticipation of discovery". 72 What Taruskin points to is that, in essence, the motive, as n unmovable object, is emptying the quartet of content, thereby destroying the very texture of mening that it seeks to weave. By dominating the musical discourse to such an extent that it blocks the development of musical growth, the motive shows, in Zizek's words, that "on the symbolizing level, something 'has not worked out, ' . . . a certain failure assumes positive existence" (my italics).73 Taruskin also suggests that the rhetoric of the Eighth Quartet ultimately represents the unreedom of the composer.74 For, throughout the quartet, we hear the constraints of the everyday reality and cultural oppressiveness of existence in the Soviet regime. What weakens 68 Kramer, Musical Meaning, p. 235. 69 See Z izek, he Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, pp. 58-62. 70 See Horowitz, " t History and Autonomy," p. 272. 71 Ibid. 72 Taruskin, Deining Russia Msically, p. 495. 73 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 1 05 . 7 4 See Taruskin, Deining Russia Musically, p. 495 . Kramer echoes this sentiment, stating he quartet is a "meditation on shamming, understood as a necessary means of personal and aesthetic survival in a totalitrian state." Kramer, Musical Meaning, p; 232.

The Ritual of Conjuration in Shostakovich s Eighth String Quartet

97

the quatet (in Truskin's words) in this sense, however, also permits it to have this rhetorical symbolization. The materialization of ailure in the reusal of the motive to integrate into the symbolic universe, as signiying the unreedom of the composer, is also what gives the quartet a positive existence as the mark of the composer's autonomy. Ultimately, then, through its inability to integrate into the symbolic discourse, the signiier becomes symbolized. In oher words, it is via its display of ailure that he qutet is able to symbolize autonomy trough a ailed struggle or such autonomy. This difers rom Fanning's argument where he states the Eighth String Quatet "is music that liberates itself rom the shackles of its context."75 I ague that, by the very act that the music cannot break ree of the shackles of the DSCH motive, the quartet displays its ailure to be ree and, thereore, reveals its nomeconciliation, its easal to reconcile, with the conditions in which it exists. Just as in a purely musical context the quotation's haunting of the music's constucted reality obscures the act that the motive is more the work thn the work itself, purely autobiographical intepretations of the quartet obscure a more undamental mening of the piece-they cast a dark shadow over the work as the modem human subject sketched trough its own inhumanity. The ailed struggle depicted in the quartet is one that is waged not only by the composer and the Soviet citizen-as stark examples­ but also ultimately by every modem subject who seeks denied autonomy. By placing its ailure of autonomy on display, the Eighth String Quartet documents the unreedom of its composer in particular, but ultimately the unreedom of the modem subject in general. Trough this very porrayal of ailure, by displaying the proper name's resistance to all attempts of symbolic integration, the quartet becomes a maniesto of the human ability to survive. Through its dystopic depiction of existence, the quatet is able to give a glimpse (albeit negative) of a positive universe. Underscoring the quartet's dualistic representation of a utopian struggle for reedom against the brutality and arbitrary auhority that determines everyday existence, the inal markings on the score, the work's completion date, shows that this mniesto was completed on 1 4 July 1 960-Bastille Day.

75 Fnning, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8, p. 3 .

Chapter 5

The Indivisible Remainder: Novelization in the Ninth String Quartet, Op. 1 1 7 ( 1 964) 1

The whole iasco was, in reality, the apocalypse of history, whose failure let modenity at a loose end. What do you do when you re let behind ater your own apocalypse? Daniel Chua2 The description is laborious, but the music is magical. Niall O 'Loughlin, on the Ninth Quartet3

In the Sixth trough Eighth String Qutets an intensiication process occurs uniting these quartets into something resembling a cycle. This cycle begins with the comparatively lighthearted Sixth Quartet, moves trough the more death-like Sevenh and reaches its peak-or, in a sense, its nadir-with the utter desolation of the Eighth Quartet. Concurrent with this escalation of the emotional intensity in the music is an increase in the magnitude of the pathological disturbances of the real, all of which are tied to the DSCH motive in some way. The real maniests itself in the Sixth Quartet as an inocuous cadence whose presence becomes uncany when the same cadence recurs at he end of each and every movement. The pitches of the DSCH motive are present in vetical orm at the cello 's high point in its cadential movement (see Example 2.2, p. 20). I argue that the cadence's constant presence disupts the symbolic universes created in the individual movements, serving as a continual reminder that these realities are only constuctions. However one inteprets this unvarying ren, the cadence's perpetual recurrence subtly yet acutely redeines the qutet's musical narative: In the Seventh Quatet the rendering of the real seeps into the core of the quatet via the [0 1 34] set, the key pitch-class set of the piece. The [0 1 34] set eupts on the surface at the end of the second movement, setting into motion the inal movement where the ugue becomes a materialization of a pure, singular drive. Although this is an abstracted version of the DSCH motive's pitch set, the diminished ourth that is one of the deining characteristics of the The Ninth Quartet is dedicated to Irina A. Shostakovich. 2 Chua, Absolute Music and the Construction ofMeaning, p. 246. 3 Niall O'Loughlin, "Shostakovich's string quartets," The Musical imes, CXV/ 1 579 (September 1 974), p. 745 .

1 00

Composing the Moden Subject

motive is retained in the Seventh Quartet. Verticalized in the Sixth String Quartet and abstracted in the Seventh, in he Eighth the motive, in Longman's terms, makes "obvious whatthe earlier [Seventh] quartet deliberately concealed."4 The rendering of the real occurs from the outset of the Eighth Qurtet, as the DSCH motive opens the piece and goes on to become a ixation, . monotonously dominating the quartet. The continual ren of the motive, to the exclusion of everything else, drains the inal movement of all other musical material, and the motive comes to represent the lack upon which the modem subject's reality is based. Thus, although starting as a "trivial" grat at the end of each movement in the Sixth Quartet, by he Eighth Qutet the iruptions of the real have become an omnipresent eature in the musical discourse to the exclusion of all else. To a certain extent, each of the three quartets has a means of managing and containing the ruptures of the real within their constructed musical universe; yet, as the magnitude of the ruptures increases, the real shapes the quartets on an increasingly palpable level. In the Sixth Quartet, the little piece of the real afects the constructed universe in a minimally disruptive maner. In the Seventh Quartet, it takes the third movement, which unctions as a development and recapitulation or the large-scale sonata orm created by the work, to act as a payment of symbolic debt and bring an end to the pure drive. The rupture of the real is spread across the entire Eighth Quartet, and the devastation wrought in this work is truly catastrophic. Nearly all structures with which meaning might be created are annihilated by the end of the inale movement, which ends with ghostly voids-the empty shells of the motivic material, the irst movement, and the triad. In a sense, the quartet documents an almost apocalyptic destruction of its musical universe. But, the qualiier of"almost" is necessary; history is not closed with the Eighth. The close of the inale may be hollow, but it is not nonexistent-something has survived the near destruction of the quartet's musical subject. The sheer narrative power of the Eighth Quartet, in part through the unrelenting repetition of the DSCH motive, posits a survivor. Ultimately, the end of the quatet proves the continued existence of the quartet's subj ect by showing that, ater all that has passed, the subj ect still remains. While the Eighth demonstrates that catastrophe most deinitely exists, documenting a devastation of apocalyptic proportions, this apocalypse does not bring about a complete end. As the Eighth pushes towards its inal notes, a conclusive end is ound once more to be an impossibility. Frank Kermode has noted that the tragedy of an endless world ollows the apocalypse : "when he end comes it is not only more appalling than anybody expected, but a mere image of that horror, not the thing itself . . . the world goes oward in the hands of the exhausted survivors."5 The process of rendering the real, which begn in the Sixth Quatet, is pushed to the very limit in the Eighth Quartet, where the inal movement threatens to utterly dissolve the musical universe. However, "The End" does not come; in Kermode's terms exhausted individuals, the survivors, are 4 Longman, Expression and Structue, vol. 1 , p. 1 86. 5 Kermode, The Sense ofan Ending: Studies in the Theoy ofFiction (New York, 1 967), p. 82. See also Derrida "On the Apocalyptic Tone Recently Adopted in Philosophy," The Oxford Literay Review, VI/2 ( 1 984), pp. 3-37.

Novelzation in the Ninth String Quartet

101

let to carry on. Akin t o Kermode 's thesis, i n Lacanian psychoanalysis n o act i s ever considered complete: something always remains, an excess let unaccounted or. To Lacan survivors of such an apocal'ptic event are the "indivisible remainder," "the excess that cannot be accounted or by any symbolic idealization"6-embodiments, that is, of the real. In other words, the indivisible remainder represents what cannot be .expressed in an apocalyptic discourse-that there will be survivors. The exhausted survivors become representatives of a rendering of the real-they are the ruptures in symbolic reality. As discussed in chapter two, the gap between the real and symbolization must be accepted "as something that deines our very condition humaine. "1 Ater the apocalyptic event, these survivors are aced with the task of constructing a reality that integrates and accepts the senselessness of their continued existence. How does one ollow he end that does not bring an end? If there is to be a Ninth Quartet, how does one write ater the apocalypse? It would be impossible to continue the intensiication process ueled by the DSCH motive and its pitch-class set in the Sixth trough Eighth Quartets. With the Eighth Quartet the dysphoric, apocalyptic narrative is pushed to its limit as the piece is let with only hollow shells of the musical strucure. While not all of the acts surrounding composition of the Ninth Quartet are clear, we do now it took Shostakovich our years and multiple attempts beore he managed to compose a satisactory successor to the Eighth. 8 Whether intentional or not, in doing so Shostakovich composed a work that breaks rom the narrative trajectory of the earlier quatets, while nevertheless responding to the crisis expressed in the narrative of the Eighth. The Ninth String Quartet cn be interpreted as dissolving the barrier of the absolute distance created by the previous three quartets, and as integrating and humanizing the previously pathological irruptions of the [0 1 34] set within the qutet's symbolic reality. The Ninth Quartet's altenative narrative trajectory rom that which preceded it can be understood in terms of the diferences between the epic and the novel.

6 Zizek, The Ticklish Subject, p. 1 56. 7 Zizek, Looking Awy, p. 36. 8 In their preace to the recently discovered "Uinished Qurtet" Olga Digonskaya and Olga Dombrovskaya piece together .what we know about Shostakovich's attempts to write the Ninth String Quartet. Olga Digonskaya and Olga Dombrovskaya, Intoduction to Uinished Quartet by Dmitri Shostakovich (Moscow, 2005), pp. 6-8 . See also Elizabeth Wilson, Shostakovich: A Lfe Remembered, rev. en, pp. 43--5 . Between the composition of the Eighth String Quartet ( 1 960) and the Ninth ( 1 964), another work by Shostakovich rose rom the ashes of �er destruction-Shostakovich's opera Lay Macbeth of the Mtsensk Disrict was rebon as Katerina Izmailova ( 1 95-63 , premiered January 8, 1 96.3 ). Also, the irst work stted and completed ater the composition of the Eighth (other than the ilm score he was to be working on when he composed the Eighth) is his Symphony no. 1 3 ("Babi Yr"), a work that can be considered a memoriam to "apocalyptic" destruction and its survivors ( 1 962, premiered December 1 8, 1 962).

1 02

Composing the Moden Subject

Epic vs. Novel In "Epic and Novel," Mikhail Bakhtin diferentiates between the stylized, "absolute" past of the epic 1d the open-ended, developing reality ound in the novel.9 The epic is set in a past that is so distant that the gap created is unbreachable. It is a place where everything is "absolute and complete .. . . everything is inished, already over" ( 1 6). It is a place of unwavering protagonists and narrative trajectories that never divert rom the given route. The beginnings of epics are "idealized," the ' endings are "drkened" (20). Novels, on the other hand, do not speak to a distant experience but instead to current reality. Epics have one language, one voice that knows and tells all. In the novel there are multiple languages, a variety of voices caught in the act of development. In short, the epic is a single-voiced discourse; the novel a polvocal discourse. Where the epic prophesizes, the novel predicts (3 1 ); while the epic must end in death, novels depict "a lie process that is imperishable and orever renewing itself, orever contemporary" (36). The epic is closed and complete; the novel contains "an urealized surplus of humaness" (37). Using Bakhtin's deinitions, we can interpret the Sixth through Eighth Quartets as creating a narrative traj ectory of an epic orm. The Sixth begins with\ stylized innocence, an idealized utopia that speaks of an absolute past, "walled of' by the "impenetrable boundary" created by the cadence. 10 The Seventh narrows the ocus of the story where the [0 1 34] set begins to take over the musical discourse and prophesizes the violence of the ugue that ollows. The hardening of the epic distance is solidiied in the Eighth as the world in which the quartet relides is completely dominated by the single-voiced DSCH. In the Eighth there is a "canonizing of events"1 1 that leads up to the catastrophe that deprives the musical subject of any potential or continuation. 12 Thus, the three quartets traverse rom the 'idealized' beginning of the Sixth to the 'darkened' end of the Eighth. While the DSCH motive or the [0 1 34] pitch-class set play a signiicant role in creating the musical ruptures that lead to the philosophical crisis of the Eighth String Quartet, the predetermined, closed trajectory of the epic created by the individual quartets, and the group oftree quartets as a whole, is emphasized trough a repetition of closing material. Each quartet makes use of the same closing material multiple times, and the length of the repeated material increases in subsequent quartets. Furthermore, this closing material is present in the quartet's musical abric rom the very beginning-predetermining the music's end rom its very start. In Chapter Two, I discussed how in the Sixth Quatet each movement ends with the same cadential gesure, and that this cadence is also the irst cadence of the work (see Example 2. 1 on p. 1 8). In the Sevenh Sring Quatet, the coda rom the irst 9 Bakhtin, he )ialogic Imagination, trans. Cyl Emerson and Michael Holquist (Austin, 1 987), pp. 340. Bakhtin's conception of the novel is complex and varied; or an oveview see Simon Dentith, Bahtinian hought: An Intouctoy Reader (New York, 1 995), pp. 4164. For a ,semiotic reinterpretation of Bakhtin's distinction of the epic nd novel, see ulia risteva, "From Symbol to Sign," trns. Sean Hnd, in The Kristeva Reader, pp. 62-73. 10 Bakhtin, The Dialogic Imagination, p. 1 7 . 1 1 Ibid., p . 1 5 . 1 2 Ibid., p. 1 6 .

Novelization in the Ninth String Quartet

1 03

movement rens as the coda or the third and inal movement (see Examples 3 . 1 and 3 .4 on pp. 43 nd 50). The coda makes use of music rom the transition that bridges the exposition and recapitulation and opening musical theme · of the piece. Thus, the two movements in the Seventh that have a stable conclusion use the same conclusion, which is created in pat rom the music that opens the work.· Last, the second half of the inale of the Eighth Quartet is a replica of the outer sections of the irst movement, while the interior movements end with atacca mrkings and instability (and arguably all are in some way "ailed" sructures). In sum, despite being multi-movement works, each of the Sixth trough Eighth Quatets contains only one passage of unctional closing material, and this material reerences music that is ound in he opening of the respective works. The result is an augmented ren of closing material with each successive quartet concomitant with the increased magnitude of disturbances by the DSCH motive or its [0 1 34] set. This dual ampliication of closing material and rhetorical ruptures emphasizes a preordained, prophetic quality similr to that of he epic narrative created by the Sixth through Eighth String Quartets. But, Bahtin notes, as the novel becomes more prominent, its discursive eaures re capable of seeping into other genres, including the epic. 1 3 Novelization (to use Bakhtin's term) of the Eighth Quartet can be seen when the absolute distance of the apocalyptic Eighth begins to break down, when the theoretical set is given the proper name, linking the work with the indeterminate present. With the end of the Eighth comes the end of the epic cycle, but reality continues. What happens at the end of the Eighth is not the end of history but, to use Derrida's words, ''the end of a certain concept of history,"14 in this case an epic history that leads to an apocalyptic event. A more complete "novelization" of the string quatet discourse occurs in the Ninth, as here a single voice no longer speaks monologically rom an absolute, epic past. Instead, multiple voices sound rom the reality of lie in the atermath of the apocalypse, as constructed by the indivisible remainder. 15 The process in the Ninth Quartet ollows Attali's exhortations to create a new episteme or music, one that "leads to a . . . conception of history . . . that is open, unstable."16 The Ninth Quartet, similar to the inal movement of the Sixh, can be interpreted as enacting Attali's desire to create a new way of making music.17 With the complete break of absolute distance, the Ninth Quartet uses aspects rom the previous quartets in composing a newly ormed reality. In this sense, the Ninth ollows a path sketched by the ourth movement of the Sixth String Qutet (a path 1 3 Ibid., p. 6. 1 4 Derrida's italics. Derrida, Specters ofMax, p. 1 5 . 1 5 Pauline Fairclough points out hat, given the strong authorial presence through Shostakovich's oeuve, his music is not representative of "'polyphony' in the Bakhtinian sense" as "the notion of authorial voice in Shostakovich's music is, invariably, assumed." Pauline Fairclough, A Soviet Credo: Shostaovich s Fourth ymphony (Aldershot, 2006), pp. 63-4. Yet, if we take the concept of polyphony on a sliding scale, as Dentith suggests, the Ninth String Quartet qualiies as being "more polyphonic" in comparison to the previous quartets due to its lack of authorial signiier in the om of the DSCH motive, its pitches, or the rhetorically enhnced [0 1 34] pitch-class set. See Dentith, Bakhtinian Thought, p. 45. 1 6 Attali, Noise, p. 1 47. 1 7 Ibid� , p. 1 34.

1 04

Composing the Modern Subject

not taken by the Seventh and Eighth Quartets). The ourth movement of the Sixth does not avoid the real; instead it attempts to reorient knowledge so that the rupture of the real can be integrated without trauma into the movement's constructed reality. The ourth movement thus looks back to knowledge gained rom earlier movements (and epistemes) and uses that knowledge to help orge a new knowledge bas--one that acknowledges the senselessness of reality. Likewise, the Ninth Quartet does not tum away rom the previous quartets, as it borrows ormal designs rom the Seventh and Eighth Quartets. In particular, the ourth-movement Adagio ollows the design of that movement of the Eighth; and an expansive, cyclic inale with a ugue section, the layout of the inale of the Seventh, rens in the inal movement of the Ninth. Yet, while appropriating ormal designs rom the Seventh and Eighth, the Ninth brings the idea of composing a new episteme, barely outlined in the Sixth, to ruition on a much larger scale. By embarking on a diferent road rom that of the previous quartets, the Ninth orges a newly orming narrative of the not-yet composed, where parts of the erlier quartets are brought in close proximity with the everyday, creating a diuse, expansive quartet with the semantic and semiotic open-endedness of a contemporary reality. The Indivisible Remainder The Ninth Quatet consists of ive movements all played without pause. The work has a ast-slow-ast-slow-ast orm which includes an overall increase in the tempo via the ast movements (the irst movement is mrked Moderato con moto, the third movement Allegretto, and he ith movement Allegro). The irst our movements of the work are short character pieces, while the ith movement is a grnd inale hat summarizes the quartet as a whole. With a cyclic retun of material rom previous movements, the inale is an intense, ormidable movement. The orm of the ourth movement of the Ninth Quartet mimics that of the ourth movement of the Eighth Quartet. On the most basic level, they are both slow movements in ive-part rondo orms. Example 5 . 1 shows the irst A section of the ouh movement of the Ninth Quartet. The corresponding section of the Eighh (see Example 4.7, p. 86), is a comparable rerain: both are created with minimal melodic material in the lower three instuments over which the irst violin has a drone or drone-like accompaniment (the oscillating igure in the Ninth). In addition, in the Eighth Quartet there is a similarity between the two couplets (the B and C sections); this resemblance between the couplets increases in the Ninth Quartet. While these penultimate movements of the Eighth and Ninth Quartets have a similar ormal structure, their rhetoric difers greatly. The Eighth Quartet's rondo is a searing elegy, a dirge of a most extreme intensity where emphatic repeated chords of the rerains are contrasted by laments, in the couplets, equal in their emotional orce. The couplet sections in the Eighth Quartet use quotations rom the song "Tormented by Harsh Captivity" and Katerina's inal aria rom Lay Macbeth of the Mtsensk District. The rerain sections efectively create quotations marks or these reerences to the musical history preceding he quartet, denoting that the quotations re rom a distant, unreachable past.

1 05

Novelzation in the Ninth String Quartet

Example 5.1

� t

Quartet No. 9, ourth movement, A section

Ado J. 80 (con sord.)

"� .� pochss. ., �·-

p

(con.sord.)

A

p

.._,

..

Cn d.J

p

"'

I "� "� ·� -�� "� "� � . -.-

---.-

(con sord.)

.

�

�

�

p

"

,

"

,

�� .- • •

� -

fim.

p

fim.

p

fim.

p

,

.---.--

.�

' �- � � -� - � �

-

/

f im.

�--_/

f im.

�

.

"' ·

�

i

.� =

p

.

.

'

p

.

Example 5.2 Quartet No. 9, ourth movement, B section "

�

,

"

�

l/ p

qw

•

,

.�

·� �

: A

.. A

'

sa sord.

p.

.. f

LI

r

• I

.

LJ �

I

-

L�

>

> -

�

1 06

Composing the Modern Subject

In the ourth movement of the Ninth, by contrast, the rondo sections surround newly composed, highly individualistic utterances. While the rerains have slow­ moving, octatonic melodies with n oscillating accompaniment, the couplets consist of multiple distinctive recitative-like passages. The irst couplet,. the B section, shown in Example 5 .2, divides into two parts. The irst part is comprised of a short, chromatic solo in the irst violin while the second part consists of another solo, in the second violin, using a series of pizzicato, multi-stop chords. The top note s of these chords present a skeletal version of the A section's melody. The second couplet (C) is similarly designed with a melodic recitative ollowed by a pizzicato solo. (The pizzicato sections of both couplets make use almost entirely of octatonic subsets.) In addition, the second couplet (C) adds a third segment in which the lower tree instruments perorm a [0 1 2567] hexachordal drone over which the irst violin has a highly chromatic melody spanning three octaves (see Example 5.7, p. 1 1 1 ). Both couplets in the Ninth are highly cromatic, the linear solos are not really melodic, and the awkwardness of pizzicato sections cannot be hidden in performance. While the same orm of soloistic writing creates both sections, each solo has its own unique elements. I interpret these striking solos in the Ninth Quartet as the indivisible remainder rupturing the surface of the musical discourse. As such, the couplets then represent the individualized utterances of everyday reality, voices of Kermode's exhausted survivors. Unlike their counterparts in the Eighth Quartet, they are not the stylized, sublime laments of the epic, but the clangorous sounds of everyday lie. Much like the [0 1 34] set erupted to the surace of the second movement of the Seventh Quartet, in hese very individualized utterances the indivisible remainder comes to the surace of the musical discourse. Yet, here, in a rupture of the musical abric, trough a rendering of the real, the voices of the exhausted survivors re allowed to speak. In the Eighth Quartet the rondo is part of the prophecy that could only lead to urther devastation; the rondo in the Ninth is a place of rebirth. The ourth movement of the Ninth thus opens the way or the diuse inale that is, in Bkhtin's words, "a living contact with uninished, still-evolving contemporary reality."18 The "Open-ended" Present The inale is by far the longest movement in the quartet, more than double the length of any of the irst our movements. The cyclic ren of themes, along with the intensity and sheer length create a teleological trajectory or the work, which culminates in a complex sonata orm that is an exhausting tour de foce. The movement is a sonata in which every section has developmental tendencies and the recapitulation rens themes rom earlier in the inale· and rom previous movements. The complex ormal design of the movement is sketched in Figure 5 . 1 . The primary-theme zone has two themes (P1 and P2) that create a small-scale BA orm. hen P1 retuns (at R. 67), it is a half-step higher, on Eq, with an expanded accompaniment in the cello and viola creating a [0 1 34] set (using he pitch classes Eq, F, q, D) against a constant G drone, which maintains the octatonic quality of the 1 8 Bhtin, The Dialogic Imagination, p. 7.

Novelzation in the Ninth String Quartet

Exposition Reh. Thematic material Primary-theme zone 59 Primary Theme I (P1) 65 Primary Theme 2 (P2) 67 P1' 68 Transition (thematic) Secondary-theme zone 69 Second Theme I (S1) 71 Second Theme 2 (S2) 75 Transition Development 9.9 P1 80.9 Fugue based on P1 87 Climax to the Fugue 89 Cyclic Ren rom iv cello solo rom C3 cello pizz rom C2 cello solo rom C3 group pizz rom B2 91 Oscillating ig. Recapitulation 92 P1 96 S2-cello solo 98 S1 pl 1 00 1 03 Climax

Figure 5.1

1 07

Key center

Comments

E� (modal) e � b� (e)

g meter · stat of harmonic transition

b� (modal) ambiguous

Folk-like, octatonic, Cello solo as highest insrument

C (modal) c E� (?F?) E� c

E� ambiguous E�

Transition to Recapitulation

"Coda" involving cadential and oscillating motive, motive rom III, Gliss. Leaps, #4

Quartet No. 9, ifth movement: overiew

accompniment. (This accompniment later rens in ostinato orm.) The music builds to R. 68, where the lower two instruments all into open iths on B � that occasionally ascend an augmented ouh, marking the beginning of the thematic transition into the irst theme of the secondary-theme zone (S1, which begins at R. 69). As shown in Example 5 . 3 , S 1 's olk�like melody, above a bellowing accompaniment, ends with an octave leap ollowed by the second violin's orceul response in an arch _outline of a [0 1 34] set that ends with its own leap of an octave, now marked glissando. At R. 7 1 the second theme of the S space (S2) enters in the cello, which performs a melody at the high end of its register, and at most times above the pitches of the other instruments. The cello's meandering melody is highly chromatic, eventually hitting eleven out of the twelve pitches of the chromatic scale,

1 08

Composing the Modern Subject

Quartet No. 9, ifth movement, irst theme of S (S1)

Example 5.3

� ;; ,

�

,

...

I

,--.

--_ I

f

n

.

,,

,

.,

_;

._;

�

n

., >

>

>

_;

>

.,

_,

>

' 2.

-

.,

'

>

_,,

_,,

�

�

-..

�

, > ._.,

._.,

>

,

(non iss.)

)

_.

__,

I

I

• * j

:

>

.

�

•

._. >

>

__,

__,

�

._.

._.,

>

1.

>

>

.,

�

.,

_;

�:

_;

>

I

I

. . >

v

I

I

v

v

I

. "*

I

"*

*

_

.,

�

_,

�

.,

�

_;

.

---

�:

.__.

�:

I

0

�v

� fff

but, as shown in Example 5 .4, this chromaticism is organized though groupings of octatonic subsets hat use each of the three possible octatonic scales. As the cello completes the S2 melody, the texture begins to ragment, S1 makes a short ren and the exposition begins to dissolve into the development. For the development of the Ninth String Quartet's inale Shostakovich wrote a ugue, a compositional technique used in the opening half of the inale of the Seventh Quartet. Ater a brief introduction that involves the juxtaposition and layering of the P1 material and arch outline of the [0 1 34] set rom S 1 , the irst violin introduces the ugue subject in R. 80. 1 0 . As shown in Example 5 . 5 , the ugue is based on materials rom the P1 and created mostly of octatonic subsets (the measure of descending ouths, creating the [027] trichord, is the sole exception). As discussed previously,

1 09

Novelzation in the Ninth Sring Quartet

Example 5.4 Quartet No. 9, ifth movement, S2 cello melody

G

4· ' ir

l •r

nJ

1 spss.

4. r

Ir

r Oct. III

4. r

4. &J

Oct I

r

>

iJ Oct. II

Ir

Oct. I

4• �r 1J l •r 4· r

Ir

Example 5.5

4u

Oct. II

[0 13]

ur

ff

r

1,J •r

I

l •r 1J l •r l 1J

qJ

1 nJ F I f •r l nJ rDr

>

I'

I �r

Oct. II

>

r

l 1J

I �r

r

Ir

Oct. I

lj

J

Ir

11J

1,J F I f •r l l •r

Oct. I

Ir

1J

l •r

l •r 1J

J

1.J

Oct. III

r

ct. I

Quartet No. 9, ifth movement, fugue subject [0 1 34] [0 1 34] (DSCH) � �

Ir I

l nJ

11J Oct. II

J

I

•r

J 1 1J

Id

� I �r

I•

Ir

lJ

r

I' J

[0 13]

-

it t t it 1t t 1 t t r i u & u 1nr t it J o 1D? 1D? >

>

in the Seventh Quartet the ugue, with a subject created almost entirely out of octatonic subsets, also unctions as a development (on he larger scale or the sonata orm of the quartet as a whole). Thus, the ugue in the Seventh Quartet has a similar ormal unction to that of the ugue in the inale of the Ninth Quartet, and both ugues culminate in the climax of the movement and the work. Yet the compositional treatment of the ugue subject difers greatly in the Ninth Quartet, as this ugue lacks the characteristics that created the sense of dysphoric plentitude in the Seventh Quartet. In the Seventh, the ugue subj ect, with its coursing sixteenth notes and dotted rhythms, is incessantly repeated in a brutalizing ashion. The only 'manipulation' of the subject occurs when it is set against itself in a violent stretto. In the Ninth, the subject is mostly quarter notes, with just two (separated) measures of eighth notes, and this subj ect is manipulated through inversions (both strict and modiied). The jagged leaps and t,ick, harsh dissonances are absent. In the Ninth, parallel triads oten are used to thicken the texture, oten muddied with both the minor and major third. While the ugue in the Ninth does not consist solely of consonant intervals, as the texture thickens the music seems more to relect to cacophony of everyday lie, rather than the violent dissonance ound in the Seventh Quartet.

110

Composing the Modern Subject

Example 5.6 Quartet No. 9, ourth movement, C3 section

]A

>

,

r

A

,

q''�

"" >

: L?.

u � TP se"P"

J. �

,

f ,, ''· -

&

ffp;je �

u

-r

v

-

.

.

u

u

�

�

-

>

!�

�

.

.

u

u

L

·� .

. ,sPJ .

.--. --

.

.

u

�

�

-

u

-�

UP sepe ba .

,

��

'····�· ·· ·· .·········· ·· ·······:················ e �· b. � � �-! - - ;

��

'; :ba-�

J'

dim.

p

A

,

:

.

.

�

u

. ..

-� ------

-

.

�

�

.

..

.. - ..

..

. -

.. �

. -

.. �

�

•

=--

-

� �

::-

---

.

As the ugues in the Seventh and Ninth Quartets reach or their respective climaxes, the opening rhythmic gesture of the movement retuns, beore dissolving into a homorhythmic texture of either sixteenth notes or remolos. Wih the climax of the ugues in the Seventh and Ninth Quartets comes the ren of thematic material rom earlier in the work, but again the rhetoric of the rens is vastly diferent. 19 At the climax of the Seventh Quartet, the melody rom the second movement rens at pitch in a violent scream. This brutal version of the theme disintegrates under the orces of the music pushing towrd the inal climax of the ugue, which occurs six measures later with the ren of the theme that opens the piece. Again, it is a savage ren of what had come beore, with an impenetrable texture and a l dynamic marking. In he Ninth, the recitatives reappear in a new order and with diferent scorings and textures, as the indivisible remainder expands its many voices. Example 5.6 shows the third part of the second couplet of the Ninh Quartet's ourth movement. Here, the irst violin performs a melody over a hexachordal drone. The cyclic ren of this material is shown in Example 5. 7. In the ith movement, the cello performs a shortened version of the second couplet's melody over a new hexachord created by the tremolos. Example 5 . 7 shows the cello move into a quotation of the viola's pizzicato chords rom the second couplet of the ourth movement. 1 9 This is relected in he dedicatees of the two quartets. The Seventh was written in memoriam, dedicated to Shostakovich's irst wie, Nina, who had died almost ive years beore the work was composed; the Ninth is dedicated to the living, his wie at the time of the qutet's composition, Irina.

111

Novelization in the Ninth String Quartet

Example 5.7 .

.

.

·• I

- i"e

.

,

Quartet No. 9, ifth movement, cycic return of iv

I

I

"e

'

lpp

•

I

I

.

:o

lpp

s

M

I

� �

f.

"

"

.

L�

•

:

�.. I

.

,

I

. f p�z.

PP

-�

i ��lZZ,

PP

PP

"

ff �ZZ,

PP

T

-·

�

I

r � -

�

...

...

d

T

.

I

••

S

I

..

�

•

�

I

I

I

:

I

-

.

I

=-p =-

I

�-

,.

�

'

�-

I

I

f

P "-

.

-

"

"'

•

!] pmI z.

l

=

-

�

u

I

I

-

I

�.-. 1 b-

-

f

I

I

-

"

•

�

, -

"

zz,

I

b-

"

r

I

��; I b�1

continued

112

Composing the Modem Subject

Example 5. 7 concluded I

"

-

�

.

•

�

I ; '"'

-

I

,_ I

,_ I L

I I

I

I

I

I

·�

�

·� .

�

9

•

;

;

I

I

�

!

I

.1

��

�

r

r

.

" r

.

I

I

!

I

I

!

I

Ater this, the cello retuns with another shortened version of the couplet's melody, this time ending with the [0 1 3] descending trichord on the original pitch. There is a measure of silence beore the inal ren of the recitative statements in which all of the instruments join together to perorm a expnded, modiied version of the pitzzicato chords rom the B section rom the ourth movement. Ater the last of the pizzicato chords, the music rests beore the start of the recapitulation. The recapitulation begins with the irst violin playing a slow, diminishing, undulating motive on C and D�, directly reerring to the CID� oscillations that introduced the A sections of the ourth movement. The Shostakovichian thematic brutalization that occurs so requently in his music, and in the inale of the Seventh String Quartet, is clearly not a rhetorical eaure of the Ninth Quartet. Here, thematic ideas reun not to be subj ected to savage, mechanical replication, but to be developed and expanded in a more lexible manner. Multiple Voices Another aspect of the inale to the Ninth warrants discussion: in the inal measures of the work the music unexpectedly moves to A major beore cadencing in he · tonic key of E�. The use of 4, speciically Aq, has precedence in Ninth Quartet. In the opening melodic presentation of the irst movement, shown in Example 5 . 8 , the irst violin enters with a haunting opening motive that ends on Aq, unctioning as #4. This same Aq rens at the end of the movement as a drone connecting the irst and second movements, becoming � in the second movement's tonic key of F# minor. Nevertheless, a move to and expansion of #IV directly beore the inal cadence of the piece is an unusual move. However, the use of t4 can be explained through the use of the octatonic collection, speciically a version of the collection that is presented in ull orm in the recapiulation. As the texture begins to thicken in the recapitulation, an ostinato accompaniment using staccato quter notes begins to emerge in the upper voices with continual melodic repetitions of wo [0 1 3 ] sets (C, D�, E� and D �, E�, H) which combine to create one [0 1 34] set. Hovering wihin the [0 1 3] trichords is a steady Gq in the second violin, which is also a member of the same octatonic set. As the recapitulatioQ continues, S2 enters at R. 96, again in the high end of the cello's range. Two brs

113

Novelization in the Ninth String Quartet

Example 5.8 ,

Quartet No. 9, ifth movement, opening measures

Mod erato con moto J= 160)

SU

J

P

, J

ID

-

anquillo

__.:

�

I

--

p anq illo �--

p anquillo

1

'--

-

-

-__

-

-

--

'-

:

Example 5.9 Quartet No. 9, ifth movement, R. 98.13-14 . I

I

I

I

-'

I

beore R. 98, a motive consisting of a set of anapests ollowed by altenating ourths enters, announcing the ren of S 1 , and the ostinato is moved to the viola and cello (both using double stops). At the end ofthe presentation ofthe theme, as the irst violin holds the inal note of the melody or two measures (at R. 98. 1 3- 1 4), a sixth pitch, Gralso a member of the octatonic collection-is added to the accompaniment in the viola and cello. Example 5 . 9 shows these two measures. In addition, the second violin perorms a measure of altenating ourths ollowed by n inversion of motivic material rom S 1 • With the addition of the second violin to the irst violin's drone and the viola and cello 's ostinato, a complete octatonic collection is presented in these two measures. Using E� as ''tonic," the spelling of the octatonic scale can be represented as ollows: E�, Eq, F�, G, A, B �, C, D�. Sets rom the octatonic collection have been making appearances throughout the work, and in these two measures the abstract collection is given a deinitive orm. In the coda, which begins at R. 1 00, signiicant motives rom the work make a inal ren, including glissando octave leaps and a cadential idea rom the irst movement consisting of a melodic i-3-2-i motive. (This cadential motive appears at various times troughout the work, sometimes with the major third or the minor

Composing the Moden Subject

1 14

Example 5.10 Quartet No. 9, ifth movement, inal measures

]

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

C'r · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·

J'

third, with the diatonic second and lat second.) The inal measures of the movement are shown in Example 5 . 1 0. Here, the oscillating motive appears in the second violin and the cadential motive in the irst violin. At ive measures ater R. 1 05 the glissando leaps take the music into a higher range and away rom the key center of E� to A-i. Ater our measures, the music then moves directly to its inal cadence in the key of m. The retun and expansion of A� at the end of the inal movement, and indeed the continual use of ti is understood through this octatonic scale, as it does not contain the diatonic 4 or E�, but it does have i Like the Sixh through Eighth Quartets, the Ninth is illed with octatonic subsets, but in the Ninth the [0 1 34] set is not pathologized into an uncanny cadence, a violent ugue or a massive, obsessive presence. In addition, to remain a representation of the open-ended present, the Ninth cannot completely regress into past tonal structures-the idealized stylization of the Sixth had already proven "innocence can never be completely recaptured."20 Umberto Eco, in his discussion of the open work, notes that when a communication system has become "extraneous to the historical situation" the artist must invent "new ormal structures."21 Remaining in the present, the Ninth instead "composes" a .

20 Paul Epstein, Notes to the Emerson String Quartet recording Dmiri Shostakovich: he String Quartets, p. 25. 2 1 Umberto Eco, he Open Work, trans. Anna Cncogni (Cambridge, 1 989), p. 143.

Novelzation in the Ninth String Quartet

115

new strucure by allowing or multiple languages through layering, juxtaposing and ultimately integrating tonality and octatonicism. Thus, while the key of the piece may center on E�, the various scale degrees come rom both the E� diatonic scales and the E� octatonic scale, as presented in Example 5 . 0. The use of #4 throughout the quartet is explained through the role of this dominant " octatonic scale as this scale does not contain a diatonic 4 or E�, but it does have 4. As the octatonic set is woven into the musical reality, 4 takes on a greater role. Here, in the inal measures, the integration of the octatonic scale within the work is complete, showing that he Ninth is not created rom a "unitary completely inished-of and indisputable language," but instead it has "a living mix of varied and opposing voices."22 Ater loudly declaring A major, the instruments drop two octaves or one inal iteration of the cadential motive in E�. (Thus, with #4 also unctioning as �5, A major serves as the only possible dominant or the inal cadence.) However, even here the octatonic scale continues to exert its presence as both Gq and G� remain in the musical discourse. Although ending with a f, orceul cadential igure, the music does not have an absolute ending; the Gq/G� dissonance in the penultimate measure muddies the sound and inserts ambiguities into the music. In addition to the pitches marked in the score, there is also the act that a string quartet performing this work will have now performed ive movements all attacca, i.e. without a tuning break. Intonation problems are written into the work. By these inal measures, even without the Gq /G� dissonance, absolute clarity of pitch would be diicult given the use of open strings. The piece ends with a very orceul cadence, but with a cadence muddied through the integration of the diatonic and octatonic scale systems and by the very nature of the work. Lastly, the Ninth does not fade away-the morendo marking ound in the previous quartets is absent. The inal cadence of the Ninth marks the act that its reality "is only one of many possible realities; it is not inevitable, not arbitrary, it bears within itself other possibilities."23 The qutet ends with an emphatic statement made by'the exhausted suvivors, now epitomized by the performers, dirtied by the excesses ound in reality.

22 Bhtin, he Dialogic Imagination, p. 49. 23 bid., p. 37.

Epilogue

Music and the Real

There cann.t be a uniied (single) contextual mening. Thereore, there can neither be a irst nor a last meaning; it always exists among other meanings as a link in the chain of meaning, which in its totality is the only thing that can be real. M.M. Bakhtin 1 The time is out ofjoint. Hamlet

What does Hmlet mean when he states, ''the time is out ofjoint"? In Specters ofMax, Derida spends innumerable pages deconsucting this sentence, ning it over, inside out, looing down on it nd up rom below, a rhetorical act that ew could perform eloquently. At one point in the process, Derida raher clearly states a deinition: "'The time is out of joint' : something in the present is not going well, it is not going as it ought to go."2 Whatever it is that is happening, it is not normal. The ultimate cause of this "out ofjoint" eeling cannot necessrily be ticulated, but it can be elt. Similrly, Zizek writes: "modem subjectivity emerges when the subject perceives himself as 'out of joint,' as xcluded rom the positive 'order of hings. "'3 Modem subjectivity hus arises rough a negativity, n exclusion, via the sense that something is not corect, that there exists a lack. This, I argue; is where music enters, as perhaps through music the sense of being "out ofjoint" cn be given a material presence. Lawrence Kramer notes that, in text and images, the excess remainder that drives the hermeneutic process-the ruptures of the real-oten are imaterial, ''traces of the unsaid or unseen."4 In contrast, Kramer argues, in music the real is given a positive presence; through music the remainder "is material and sensuous. Grasping it i s undamental to both musical pleasure and musical power. Music does more than 'have' a remainder; it embodies its remainder."5 In this discussion, ramer is looking at a speciic phenomenon in music, what he calls "speaking melody," which occurs when a melody associated wih a text occurs without the words. Yet Kramer 's Bakhtin, Speech Genes and Other Late Essys, p. 146 . 2 Derrida, Specters of Max, p. 23. 3 Zifok, he ickish Subject, p. 1 57. 4 Lawrence ramer, "Speaing Melody, Melodic Speech," in Critical Musicoloy and the Responsibiliy of Response: Selected Essays (Aldershot, 2006), pp. 263-79, here P ·. 269. This essay represents one of ramer's most direct discussions of the real and Zizek's use of the concept. 5 Ibid., p. 269.

118

Composing the Moden Subject

argument about the materiality of music holds true on a more undamental level, as in one sense when listening to music, including Shostakovich's music, one experiences an irruption of the real, as the music itself is an irruption of the real. As discussed at the beginning of this study, with one 's entrnce into language a gap is produced, as language is ultimately inadequate in its ·attempt to articulate the whole of the living experience. To paraprase Adono, the sy:bolic order does not exhaust the thing conceived, and humans are let to constantly attempt to ill this void. 6 Music , then can be viewed as a positive embodiment of the void created in the linguistic symbolization process, and is thus one way that we try "to plug the gap at the very center of our being."7 Music becomes the supplement to language, as with music we her what canot be stated in words-music gives positive orm to eelings that would be otherwise unarticulated. Understood rom this point of view, Shostakovich's music sounds what cannot be articulated in the linguistic process, what remains excluded rom the symbolic; that which comes beore and lies beyond words. I argue that in Shostkovich's t we hear what cannot be said when Hamlet states "the time is out of joint"-this music gives a positive expression of the disjunctures, incongruities and ambiguities that are basic experiences in the creation of modem subjectivity. The enormous capacity Shostakovich's music has or meaning thus lies in its ability to give a positive orm to this sense of absence. The pleasure, as well as displeasure, of the listener's experience when listening to Shostakovich's music stems rom the music's ability to put in material terms the lack of positivity elt in modem subj ectivity. By articulating the eeling of being "out ofjoint," of exclusion, Shostakovich's music articulates the most undamental element ound at the core of modem subjectivity. In doing so, the music works to ill the gap let by the subj ect's entrance into language, by the radical brek rom the real. What the modem subj ect cannot place into the symbolic order is given voice. The subject hears a symbolization of the perception of things being not right: the point of dislocation within reality. Interpreting Shostakovich Adono once stated, "the dignity of Mahler 's musical language lies in the act that it can be understood and understands itself, but eludes the hand that would grasp what has been understood."8 Again, Adomo's statements on Mahler 's music ring true or Shostakovich's art as well. As a representative of the positive symbolization of the lack, his music sets into motion a "symbolic motion of interpretation." It becomes "a pure semblance of the 'mystery' to be explained"9 and motivates our constant attempts to deine "what music means." However, the real constantly 6 "It [contradiction] indicates the untruth of identity, the act that the concept does not exhaust the thing conceived." Adono, Negative Dialectics, trans. E.B. Ashton New York, 1 973), p. 5. Originally published as Negative Dialetik (Frut m Main: Surkamp Verlag, 1 966). 7 Eagleton, Literay Theoy, p. 1 46. 8 Adono, Mahler, p. 25. 9 Z ifok, The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy, p. 1 85 .

Msic and the Real

1 19

resists this interpretive drive, as music will always resist our attempts to ix meaning. Instead, it can unction as a blank space onto which we can proj ect our desires-a "screen or the proj ects of our fantasy narrations."10 Shostakovich seems to have been particularly adept at creating such a black screens; it seems he was a master at writing music that could relect our narrations. As Taruskin writes, "his music was at once an irresistible conveyance and a tabula rasa on which all and sunY could inscribe their various messages with a minimum of resistance."11 As seen in its reception history, Shostakovich's music is able to support a wide variety of ideological interpretations; the ' double-voicedness' in the music, the multiple languages, allows or the relection of multiple antasies at once. As Taruskin pithily notes: "Guns go bang whether wielded by Czarists or Soviets, and all Shostakovich put into his score (that is, into 'the music itself') was the bang."12 Thus, when an ideological reading is ound in the music it is because of its ability to act as a screen or such antasy projections, not because a particular ideology is written into the music. With every new political ideology that gains popularity, a new Shostakovich can be ound. This is not to say that music can say whatever we want; the ruptures, the "bang" Taruskin discusses, are very much in the music and should not be ignored. As Eco notes, with respect to the open text, "you cannot use the text as you want, but only as the text wants you to use it. An open text . . . cannot aford whatever interpretation."13 Meaning does not reside solely in the piece, nor does it exist only in the interpreter; rather, meaning arises in the interplay between the music, the interpreter and context. My goal has been to present plausible interpretations of these works, ones that relect both the 'music itself' and the listener 's undamental experience. These discussions are not meant to be the deining word on the quatets; no intepretation can constiute a complete representation of the musical work. Instead, I aim to present a segment of "a collection of partial complexes, which together constitute something larger."14 Ultimately, this "something larger" is this ungraspable entity, the 'real of music analysis' perhaps, of which we can only catch glimpses through the many acets of intepretation. Since it is with music that we attempt to ill a gap created by the linguistic symbolization process, it is with music that we y to create a coherent whole by bringing into discourse something that cannot enter into language. Here I retun to a concept mentioned at he beginning of this study, the ability of Shostakovich's music to 'bear witness. ' At the time, I was reemng to the act that Shostakovich's music displayed the issures and ruptures in the modem analytical enterprise. Yet this is arguably one of the more supericial ways the music unctions, as when Shostakovich's music is said to 'bear witness' it is most oten in I O Z izek, Looking Awy, p. 1 3 5 .

1 1 Tauskin, "Double Trouble," i n The New Republic, CCV/26 (24 December 200 1): 26-34, here p. 26. 12 Ibid., p. 30. 13 Eco, The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Txts (Bloomington, 1 979), p. 9. 1 4 Williams, "Tom Halves: Structure and Subjectivity in Analysis," Music Analysis XVI/3 ( 1 998), p. 288.

1 20

Composing the Modern Subject

the context as a witness or the citizenry of the Soviet State. 1 5 This argument seems to be undeniably rue, yet I have argued that this music transcends the culture in which it was created by being able to speak to the most basic tensions of modem existence. In this view, Shostkovich's music, a little piece of the real, a seemingly unobtrusive adoment to language, speaks to the ultimate nonsense of modem reality and, at the same time, presents us with a means of preserving our sense of humanity within the midst of universal nonsense.

15 See Tuskin, Deining Russia Musicaly, p. 496.

Bibliography

Adono, Theodor W., Negative Dialectics, trans. E.B. Ashton (New York: The Seabury Press, 1 973). _, "On the Problem of Musical Analysis," trans. Max Paddison, Music Analysis 112 ( 1 982): 1 69-87. _, Mahler: A Musical Physiognomy, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1 992). _, Quasi una Fantasia: Essys on Moden Music, trans. Rodney Livingston (New York: Verso, 1 992). Agawu, Koi, Plying with Signs: A Semiotic Interpretation of Classic Music (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1 99 1 ) . Attali, Jacques, Noise: The Political Economy of Music, trans. Brian Massumi (Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press, 1 999). Bakhtin, Mikhail M., The Dialogic Imagination, trns. Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1 987). _, Speech Genres and Other Late Essays, trans. Ven W. McGee, ed. Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2006). Bartlett, Rosamund (ed.), Shostakovich in Contxt (Oxord: Oxord University Press, 2000). Brown, Malcolm Hamrick (ed.), A Shostaovich Casebook (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004). Buhler, James, '"Breaktrough' as Critique of Form: The Finale in Mahler 's First Symphony," 19th-Centuy Music, X/2 (Fall 1 996): 125-43 . Bullivant, Roger and Jmes Webster, "Coda" (200 1 ), in L. Macy (ed.), New Gove Dictionay of Music and Musicians, ww.grovemusic.com (accessed 28 September 200 1 ). Bham, Scott, Beethoven Heo (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1 995). Caplin, William E., Classical Form: A Theoy of Formal Functions for the Instrumental Music of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven (New York: Oxord University Press, 1 998). Castro, David, "Sonata Form in the Music ofDmitri Shostakovich," Ph.D. dissertation (University of Oregon: 2005). Chua, Daniel K.L., Absolute Music and the Consruction of Meaning (Cambridge: Cmbridge University Press, 1 999). Culler, Jonathan, On Deconstruction: Theoy and Criticism ater Structuralism (Ithaca: Conell University Press, 1 982). Cmming, Naomi, "The Horrors of Identiication: Reich's Dfferent Trains," Perspectives ofNew Music, XXV/1 (Winter 1 997) : 1 29-52. Dentith, Simon, Bahtinian Thought: An Intoductoy Reader (New York: Routledge, 1 995).

1 22

Composing the Moden Subject

Derrida, Jacques, "Signature-Event-Context," in Magins ofPhilosophy, trans. Alan Bass (Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1 972), pp. 309-330. _, OfGrammatoloy, trans. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1 974). _, Dissemination, trans. Barbara Jonson (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1 98 1 ). _, "Of an Apocalptic Tone Recently Adopted in Philosophy," trns. John P. Leavey, Jr., The Oxford Literay Review, VI/ 2 ( 1 984): 3-3 7 . _ , Specters of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mouning, and the New Intenational, trans. Peggy Kamuf (New York: Routledge, 1 994). _, On the Name, trans. Ian. McLeod (Stanord: Stanord University Press, 1 995). Digonskaya, Olga and Olga Dombrovskaya, introduction to Uninished Quartet, by Dmitri Shostakovich (Moscow: DSCH Publishers, 2005). Eagleton, Terry, Literay Theoy: An Intoduction, 2nd edn (Minneapolis : The University of Minnesota Press, 1 996). Eco, Umberto, The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Txts (Bloomington: Indiana Universiy Press, 1 979). _, The Open Work, trans. Anna Cancogni (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1 989). Eisler, Edith, "Shostakovich Live: Emerson Records the Complete Quartets in Concet," Strings (Febuary-Mrch 2000): 98, 1 00-1 05 . Ellestrom, Lars, "Some Notes on Irony in the Visual s and Music: The Examples of Magritte and Shostakovich," Word & Image Xl/2 ( 1 996): 1 97-208 . Epstein, Paul, Notes t o the Emerson String Quartet recording Dmitri Shostakovich: The String Quartets (Deutsche Grmmophon 289 463 284-3, 1 999). Fairclough, Pauline, A Soviet Credo: Shostakovich s Fourth Symphony (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006). Fanning, David, The Breath ofthe Symphonist: Shostakovich s Tenth (London: Royal Musical Association, 1 988). _, "Leitmotif in Lay MacBeth," in David Fanning (ed.), Shostakovich Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge Universiy Press, 1 995), pp. 1 37-59. _ (ed.), Shostakovich Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1 995). _, "Dmitri Shostakovich" (200 1 ), in L. Macy (ed.), Nw Gove Dictionay ofMusic and Musicians, ww.grovemusic.com (accessed 25 November 200 1 ) . _, Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 8 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004). Fay, Laurel, Shostakovich: A Lfe (Oxord: Oxord University Press, 2000). _, "Shostakovich versus Volkov: Whose Testimony?" in Malcolm Hamrick Brown (ed.), A Shostakovich Casebook (Bloomington: Indina University Press, 2004), pp. 1 1-2 1 . _, "Volkov's Testimony reconsidered," in Malcom Hamrick Brown (ed.), A Shostakovich Casebook (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004), pp. 2266. _ (ed.), Shostakovich and His World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004). Fik, Bruce, he Lacanian Subject: Between Language and Jouissance (Pinceton: Princeton University Press, 1 995).

Biblioraphy

1 23

Foucault, Michel, The Order of Things: An Archaeoloy of the Human Sciences (New York: Pantheon, 1 970). Glikman, Isaak, Stoy of a Friendshp: The Letters ofDmiy Shostakovich to Isaak Gliman, 1941-19 75, trans. Anthony Phillips (Ithaca: Conell University Press, 200 1 ) . Glyde, Judith, "From Oppression t o Expression: Interpreting the String Quartets of Dmitri S hostakovich," Strings XVIl/3 : 1 05 (October 2002): 28-32. Goodwin, Sarah Webster, Kitsch and Cultue: he Dance ofDeath in the Nineteenth­ Centuy Literature and Graphic Arts (New York, Garland: 1 988). Graybill, Roger, "Formal and Expressive Intensiication in Shostakovich's String Quatet No. 8, Second Movement," in Deborh Stein (ed.), Engaging Music: Essys in Music Analysis (New York: Oxord Universiy Press, 2005), pp. 1 9 1 -20 1 . Green, Douglass M., Form in Tonal Music: A n Introduction to Analysis, 2nd edn (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1 979). Griiths, Paul, The String Quartet (Bath: The Pitman Press, 1 983). Gronke, Kadja, "Komponieren in Geschichte und Gegenwrt: AnalytischeAspete der ersten acht Streichquartette von Dmitri Schostakowitsch," in Andreas Whermeyer (ed.), chostakowitschs Streichquartette: Ein intenationales Symposium (Berlin: Enst Kuhn, 2002), pp. 4 1 -80. "Zun Veraren der harmonischen Keimzelle in den Streichqurtetten VI bis VII von Dmitrij S ostakovic und irer Relevanz ir Harmonik, Melodik, Thematik und kompositorische GroBorm," paper read at the intenational symposium "Der Komponist als Erzahler: Narrtivitat in Dmitri Schostakowitschs Instrumentalmusik," Hanover, Germany, 24-26 November 2006. Halm, August, "On Fugal Form, Its Nature, and Its Relation to Sonata Form," in Edward A. Lippman (ed.), Musical Aesthetics: A Historical Reade, Vol. I, The Twentieth Centuy (Stuyvesant: Pendragon Press, 1 986). Hatten, Robert, Musical Meaning in Beethoven: Markedness, Correlation and Interpretation (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1 994). Interpreting Musical Gestures, Topics and Topes: Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004). Hepokoski, James, "Beyond the Sonata Principle," Journal of the American Musicological Sociey LV/1 (2002) : 9 1-1 54. Hepokoski, James and William Drcy, Elements of Sonata Theoy: Norms, Types, and Defomations in the Late-Eighteenth-Centuy Sonata (New York: Oxord University Press, 2006). Hibberd, ristian P.G., "Shostakovich and Bahtin: A Critical Investigation of the Late Works ( 1 974-1 975)," Ph.D. dissertation (Goldsmiths College, University of London: 2005). Ho, Allan B. and Dmitry Feofanov (eds), Shostakovich Reconsidered (London: Toccata Press, 1 998). Hopkins, Robert, "When a Coda is More than a Coda: Relections on Beethoven," in Eugene Narmour nd Ruth A. Solie (eds), Explorations in Music, the Arts, and Ideas: Essys in Honor ofLeonard B. Meyer (Suyvesant: Pendragon .Press, 1 988), pp. 3934 1 0.

_,

_,

1 24

Composing the Modern Subject

Horowitz, Gregg, "t History and Autonomy," in Tom Huhn and Lmbert Zuidervaart (eds), The Semblance of Subjectiviy: Essays in Adono s Aesthetic Theoy (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1 997), pp. 259-8 5 . Hudson, Richard, ."Further Remarks o n h e Passacaglia and Ciaccona," Jounal of the American Musicological Sociey, III ( 1970) : 302-3 1 4 [reply to Walker, 1 968] . _, "Ground" (200 1 ), in L. Macy (ed.), New Gove Dictionay of Music and Musicians, ww.grovemusic.com (accessed 20 March 2002). Ivashkin, Alexander, "Shostakovich and Schnittke: the erosion of symphonic syntax," in David Fanning (ed.), Shostakovich Studies (London: Toccata Press, 1 995), pp: 597-640. Jackson, Timohy L., "Dimitry Shostkovich: The Composer as Jew," in Allan B. Ho and Dmitry Feofanov (eds), Shostakovich Reconsidered (London: Toccata Press, 1 998), pp. 597-640. Jameson, Frederic, Foreword to Noise: The Political Economy of Music by Jacques Attali (Mineapolis: Minnesota University Press, 1 999), pp. vii-xiv. Keldysh, Yury, "n Autobiographical Quatet," trans. Alan Lumsden, The Musical Times (April 1 96 1 ) : 226-8 . Kerman, Joseph, "Notes on Beethoven's Codas," in Alan Tyson (ed.), Beethoven Studies 3 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1 982), pp. 1 4 1-59. Kermode, Frank, The Sense of an Ending: Studies in the Theoy of Fiction (New York: Oxord University Press, 1 967). holopov, Yuriy, "Form in Shostakovich's Instrumental Works," in David Fnning (ed.), Shostakovich Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1 995), pp. 57-75. Klein, Michael, "Chopin's Fourth Ballade as Musical Narrative," Music Theoy Spectrum, XXVl/1 (Spring 2004): 23-5 5 . _ , Intertxtualiy in Westen Art Music (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2005). Kramer, Lawrence, Music and Cultural Practice: 1 80-1900 (Berkeley: University of Calionia Press, 1 990). _, Classical Music and Postmoden Knowledge (Berkeley: University of Calionia Press, 1 995). _, Musical Meaning: Toward a Critical Histoy (Berkeley: University of Calionia Press, 200 1 ) . _, "Speaking Melody, Melodic Speech," in Critical Musicoloy and the Responsibiliy of Response: Selected Essys (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), pp. 263-79. ripke, Saul, Naming and Necessiy (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1 980). Kristeva, Julia, "From Symbol to Sign" ( 1 970), trans. Sean Hand, in The Kristeva Reader (New York: Columbia University Press, 1 986), pp. 62-7 3 . _, "The True-Real" ( 1 979), trans. Sean Hand, i n The Kristeva Reader (New York: Columbia University Press, 1 986), pp. 2 1 4-3 7. Kun, Judih, "Shostakovich in Dialogue: Form and Imagery in the First Six Quartets," Ph.D. dissertation (University of Manchester: 2005).

Bibliography

1 25

_, Shostakovich in Dialogue: Form, Imagey anddes in Quartets 1-7 (Aldershot: Ashgate, othcoming). Lacan, Jacques, Ecrits: A Selection, trans. Alan Sheridan (New York: W.W. Noton and Co., 1 977). _, On Feminine Sxualiy, the Limits of Love and Knowledge: The Seminar of Jacques Lacan, Book X (Encore) ed. Jacques-Alain Miller, trans. Bruce Fink (New York: .W. Noton & Company, 1 999). Langer, Susanne, Form and Feeling: A Theoy ofArt (New York: Scibner, 1 953). Lebedinsky, Leb; "Code, Quotation and Collage: Some Musical Allusions in the Works of Dmitry Shostakovich," trans. Tatjana M. Marovic Norbury and Ian McDonald, in Allan B. Ho and Dmitry Feofanov (eds), Shostakovich Reconsidered (London: Toccata Press 1 998), pp. 372482. Littleield, Richard, "The Silence of the Frames," Music Theoy Online II/ I (Janury 1 996) at ww. societymusictheory.org/mto/mto96.2. 1 .littleield.html (accessed 12 March 2003). Longman, Richard M., Expession and Strucure: Processes of Integration in the Lage-scale Instrumental Music ofDmitri Shostakovich (2 vols, London: Garlnd Publishing Inc., 1 989). Lyotard, Jean-Franyois, "The Diferend, the Reerent, and the Proper Name," trans. Georges Van den Abbeele, diacritics (Fall 1 984): 4-14. MacDonald, Ian, The New Shostakovich (Boston: Notheasten University Press, 1 990). Mason, Colin, "Form in Shostakovich's Quartets," The Musical imes CIII ( 1 962): 53 1-3 . Mccreless, Patrick, "The Cycle o f Structure and the Cycle o f Meaning in the Piano Trio in E minor, Op. 67," in David Fanning (ed.), Shostakovich Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1 995), pp. 1 1 3-36. "Music Theory and Historical Awareness," Music Theoy Online Vl/3 (August 2000) at http://mto.societymusictheory.org/issues/mto.00.6.3/ mto.00.6.3 .mccreless.html (accessed 5 July 2007). _, "The String Quatets of Dmitri Shostakovich," in Evan Jones (ed.), Intimate Voices: Aspects of Construction and Character in the Twentieth-Centuy String Quartet (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, orthcoming). Metzer, David, Quotation and Cultural Meaning in Twentieth-Centuy Music (New York: Cambidge University Press, 2003). O'Loughlin, Niall, "Shostakovich's String Qutets," The Musical imes CXV/1 579 (September 1 974) : 744-6. Pynchon, Thomas, ineland (Boston: Little, Brown and Compny, 1 999). Reynolds, Cristopher, Motives for Allusion: Contxt and Content in Nineteenth­ Centuy Music (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003). Roseberry, Eric, Ideolo, Syle, Content, and Thematic Pocess in the Symphonies, Cello Concerto_, and String Quartets of Shostaovich (London: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1 989). Rosen, Charles, Sonata Forms, rev. edn New York: Norton, 1 988). Samuels, Robet, Mahler s Sxth Symphony: A Stuy in Musical Semiotics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1 995).

_,

1 26

Composing the Moden Subject

Sheinberg, Esti, Ion, Satire, Paroy and the Grotesque in the Music ofShostakovich: A heoy ofMusical Incongruities (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000). Shepherd, Jon and Peter Wicke, Music and Cultural Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1 997). Solie, Ruth, "The Living Work: Organicism · and Musical nalysis," 19th-CentUy Music IV/2 (Fall 1 980) : 1 47-56. Talbot, Michael, The Finale in Westen Instrumental Music (Oxord: Oxord Universiy Press, 200 1 ). Taruskin, Richard, Deining Russia Musically: Historical and Hemeneutical Essays (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1 997). _, "Double Trouble," The New Republic CXXV/26 (24 December 200 1 ) : 26-34. Van den Toom, Pieter C., Stravinsy and The Rite of Spring: The Beginning of a Musical Language (Berkeley: University of Calionia Press, 1 987). Volkov, Solomon, Testimony: The Memoirs of Dmiri Shostakovich as told to Solomon Volkov, trans. Antonina Bouis (New York: Haper and Row, 1 979). Walker, Thomas, "Ciaccona and Passacaglia: Remarks on their Origin and Early History," Jounal of the American Musicological Sociey XXI ( 1 968): 300-320. Webster, James, "Sonata Form" (200 1), in L. Macy (ed.), New Gove Dictionay of Music and Musicians, ww.grovemusic.com (accessed 28 September 200 1 ) . Wehrmeyer, Andreas, "Uberlegungen u Schostakowitschs Achte Streichquartett," in Andreas Wehrmeyer (ed.), Schostakowitschs Steichquartette: Ein internationals Symposium (Berlin: Enst Kuhn, 2002), pp. 2 1 3-28. _ (ed.), Schostakowitschs Streichquartette: Ein internationales Symposium (Berlin: Enst Kuhn, 2002). Williams, Alastair, "Tom Halves: Structure and Subjectivity in Analysis," Music Analysis XVIl/3 ( 1 998): 2 8 1 -93 . Wilson, Elizabeth, Shostakovich: A Lfe Remembered 2nd ed. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006). Zizek, Slavoj , The Sublime Object ofIdeoloy (New York: Verso, 1 989). _, Looking Awy: An Inoduction to Jacques Lacan though Popular Culture (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1 992). The Plague ofFantasies (New York: Verso, 1 997). The Ticklish Subject: The Absent Centre ofPolitical Ontoloy (New York: Verso, 2000). _, Did Someone Sy Totalitarianism ? (New York: Verso, 200 1 ) . _,

_,

Index

Adono, Theodor W. 1 , 3 , 5 , 22, 4 1 , l l 8 on Mahler 2 1 , 67, l l 8 Agawu, Koi 2 1 , 2 5 n.2 1 Attali, Jacques 38, 4 1 -2, 1 03 Bakhtin, Mikhail M. 7, 1 5, 73, 92 n.58, l l 7 Epic and Novel 1 02-3 , 1 06 Beethoven, Ludwig van 1 , 6, 48, 5 1 n.34, 59-60 Buhler, James 3 Bham, Scott 6, 48 Caplin, William E., 25 n.2 1 , 26 n.24, 44 n.2, 46-7, 58 Castro, David 2 n.6, 40 n.54 Chua, Daniel K.L. 94 n.63, 99 codas 1 3-14, 44 n.3, 45-9, 67 Culler, Jonathn 20 n.7, 47 Cumming, Naomi 6 1 dance of death (danse macabre) 77-8, 82, 83, 84 Darcy, William see Hepokoski, James Sonata theory Dentith, Simon 1 02 n.9, 1 03 n. 1 5 Derrida, Jacques 69 on grats 20, 30 on Hamlet l l 7 on hauntologf74 on history 1 03 on proper names 73 n. 1 7 on signatures 73, 9 2 n.56 on supplements 13, 47, 48, 49 developments 24, 57-9 Digonskaya, Olga and Olga Dombrovskaya 1 0 1 n.8 Eagleton, Terry 8 n. 1 3 , 8 n. 1 5 Eco, Umberto on the open work 1 1 4, 1 1 9 Ellestrom, Lars l l 2 Epstein, Paul l 7n l , l l 4 n.20

Fairclough, Pauline 1 03 n. 1 5 Fanning, David 6 on Eighth String Quartet 69-70, 7 1 n. 1 0-l l , 7 1 n. l l , 7 5 , 76, 8 3 , 8 5 , 87, 90 n.53, 92 n. 54, 9--5 , 97 on Seventh Quartet 52, 53 on Sixth String Quartet 1 9, 26, 42, 56 n.6 1 Fay, Laurel 6 n.6 Fink, Bruce I O Foucault, Michel 1 3 Epistemes o f Knowledge 22 Classical 22, 30, 33, 34, 35, 3 8 Modem 22-3, 2 9 , 3 0 , 37-8 Renaissance 22, 34, 35, 36, 37, 3 8 The Order of hings 22, 38 ugues nd authority 6 1 , 63 as developments 57-9, 60 and plenitude 59-60, 6 1 a s representations o f h e pure drive 1 4, 60-6 1 , 64 Glikman, Isaak 69, 70-7 1 , 73 Goodwin, Sarah Webster 77-8, 82, 84 grats 20-2 1 , 22, 23, 30, 41 Graybill, Roger 79 n.36 Griiths, Paul 12 Halm, August 59 n.49 Haten, Robert 25, 6 1 , 63, 72 n. 1 4 o n intepretation 2 on markedness 1-2, 20, 58 on plenitude 59-60 Hepokosi, James 29 Hepokoski, James nd William Darcy Sonata theory 2-3 on codas 46-8, 49 on developments 58 on rotational oms 24, 44 n.3 Hibberd, Kristian P.O. on the DSCH motive 73

1 28

Composing the Modern Subject

Hitchcock, Alred The Birs 1 1 Strangers on a Train 1 0-1 1 Holbein, Hns he Younger "A Cemetery" 82 Hopkins, Robert 46 Horowitz, Gregg 95-6 intepretation of music 1-2, 1 1 7-1 8 see also Shostakovich, issues of interpretation lvasin, Alexander 4 7-8

·

Kerman, Joseph 45-6 Kermode, Frank 1 00- 1 0 1 , 1 06 Klein, Michael 2, 92 n.57 Kramer, Lawrence 1 4 n.38, 92 n.57 on Eighth Quartet 94-5, 96 on interpreting Music 1 1 , 1 1 7-1 8 Kripke, Saul 72 Kristeva, Julia 93, 1 02 n.9 Kun, Judith 2 n.6, 48 n.26, 82 n.4 1 on Seventh Quartet 66 n.64 on Sixth Quatet 17, 25, 27, 30, 36 Lacan, Jacques 8, 9, 12, 60 Lacanian psychonalysis 7-1 0, 1 2, 1 3 , 1 5, 21, 101 Langer, Susanne 5 Lebedinsky, Leb 7 1 Littleield, ichard 4 7 n.20 Longman, ichard M. on Eighth Quartet 71 n. 1 1 , 1 00 on Seventh Quartet 534, Lyotard, Jean-Fran�ois 72 MacDonald, Ian 5 Mccreless, Patrick 6, 33 n.35, 52, 57 n.44, 64 n.63 Mahler, Gustav 78 see Adono, Theodor W. markedness 1-2, 1 0-1 1 , 1 3 , 20-2 1 , 58 O'Loughlin, Niall 99 passacaglias, the history of 34-5 plenitude 596 1 proper name, the 14, 724, 93, 96, 97 pure drive, the 1 4, 60-6 1 , 64, 99-100 Pynchon, Thomas ineland 5 1 n.33

the real, concept in Lacanian theory 7-1 3, 1 5 , 22-3 , 6-61 , 934, 99-1 0 1 , 1 1 7-20 see also Lacan, Jacques and Zizek, Slavoj Re ich, Steve Dfferent Trains 6 1 rigid designator see proper name Roseberry, Eric 1 2, 57 n.44, 78 on Eighth Quartet 73 n. 1 9, 89 n.24 on Sixth Quartet 1 7, 1 9, 24, 26 Saint-Saens, Camille Danse Macabre, Op. 40 83 Samuels, Robert 78, 82 Schuman, Robert Carnaval 1 0 Shakespeare, William Hamlet 1 1 7 Sheinberg, Esti 56, 79 Shostakovich, Dmitri bearing witness 5, 1 1 9-20 issues of interpretation 3, 5-7, 12, 1 1 8-20 see also nterpretation letters to Glikman 69, 70, 7 1 , 73 suidde, thoughts of 7 1 Works passim Cello Concerto No. 1 , 70, 83, 85 Katerina Izmailova 70, 1 0 1 n. 8 Lay MacBeth of the Mtsensk District 52, 70, 85, 88, 89, 90, 1 0 1 n.8, 1 04 Piano Trio No. 2 70, 79, 80, 8 1 , 82, 83, 96 String Quartet No. 3 26 Symphony No. 1 70, 74, 75, 76, 83, 90, 92 Symphony No. 5 75 Symphony No. 7 33 Symphony No. 8 79, 82 Symphony No. 13 1 0 1 n.8 The Young Guard 85 Solie, Ruth on organicism 23 supplement 13, 47-8, 49, 52, 67, 1 1 8 Talbot, Michael 1 7, 24, 5 4 n.38 Tauskin, Richard 6 on Eighth Quartet 7 1 n. 1 1 , 96-7 on Shostakovich's music 3, 1 1 9

Indx

Tchaikovsky, Pyotr Ilyich Symphony No. 6 70, 75 he Terminator 6 1 n.58 "Tormented by Harsh Captivity" 70, 85, 87, 104 Volkov, Solomon Testimony 6 Wagner, ichard Gotterdimmerung 70, 85-7, 89 Webster, James 47

1 29

Williams, Alastair 1 1 9 n: 1 4 Wilson, Elizabeh 82 Zizek, Slavoj 1 2-1 3 , 96 on dealing with the crisis of the real 22, 23, 37; 4 1 o n moden subjectivity 1 1 7 on the proper name 73 on he pure drive 60-6 1 on the real 7-1 1 , 1 0 1 , 1 1 8- 1 9 o n symptoms 92-3 on two deaths 50-5 1 , 6-61 , 67