A Study on the Music of Twentieth Century

Suh,In-Jung

The twentieth century has been the century of transition. In the beginning of the century A. Schönberg(1874-1951) opened the new era of modernism. He believed that the musical language of the new century could not be the traditional harmonic one. He replaced the harmonic system of tonal music with the mathematically rationalized nonharmonic system of twelve-tone music. By treating all twelve tones in an octave as being equal, the hierarchical and dynamic system of tonality, originated from the natural overtones, was destroyed. A. Webern, who studied with Schönberg, tried to rationalize other paradigms of music as well. The changes which have taken place in music since World War II have been quite unusally radical. Two diametrically opposed tendencies, total-serial music and indeterminate music, appeared. The young avant-gardists of the early 1950’s, particularly the multiple serialists of the Darmstadt School, serialized all paradigms of music by mathematical and intellectual methods. They regarded Webern, not Schönberg, as being really radical in the evolution of serial music. According to them, Schönberg used the twelve-tone technique just like a traditional thematic technique. and thus he could not fully realized the new world of serial music. The introduction of indeterminacy and chance into composition by J. Cage had far-reaching effects. Chance operations resulted in the total dissolution of the traditional musical form for two hundred years. The disintegration of the logic of musical form opened the new era of post-modernism after 1960’s. Post-modern composers argued that the meaning of musical works ultimately could not be determined. During the latter half of the twentieth century electro-acoustic music has played an especially important role. Electronic music as the new medium had been greatly enlarged by the introduction of purely electronic sound synthesis. The advances in the field included the development of electronic music synthesizers, the progressive refinement of computer techniques for handling sound, and the growth of live electronic music. Since 1970’s, contemporary music has concerned not so much with musical composition in the abstract as with the effect of music on the listener. The composition is not an object with a clear identity. An important part of the musical experience may thus be provided by the listener. Therefore, composers have been obliged to give attention to the reach of musical understanding. Today, plurality is the single distinctive feature. There have been a dissolution of the creative fellowship among composers, and it has become no longer possible to speak of a unified thrust of musical endeavour.

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