PIERRE BOULEZ - STRUCTURES BOOK 1A

CRITIQUE
World War II marks a dividing line in the history of the world, of the human race, and of the arts.
This is particularly true of European classical or art music, where it is quite easy to speak of pre- and
post-war music. The feeling that a new era had begun and a new aesthetic was needed to accurately
reflect the world which was now inhabited can certainly be traced to the years immediately
following the conclusion of the Second World War. When humankind entered the nuclear age many
basic assumptions were obliterated, the constant impending threat of total annihilation, or as close to
it as could be perceived, became a daily reality. The seeds of destruction had apparently been sown,
and what fruit was to be reaped remained to be seen.
The notion of destruction became a frequent metaphor in the arts. It seemed after all inevitable, one
shaky finger on the wrong button and the world could be blown to oblivion. It seemed that the only
hope was to allow destruction, perhaps even to embrace the notion of destruction, then to continue
afresh. Only through destruction, it seemed, could anything truly new be created. When we are rid of
all that is old and decayed, then we may begin to embrace a future, certainly not a continuation of
what came before, but a new beginning from scratch, a new Genesis.
It was quite within this spirit that the notion of total serialism in music took hold. In Structures for
Two Pianos, Book Ia, Pierre Boulez set himself the task of "eradicating every trace of derivation
from his musical vocabulary" and then to "recapture - step by step ... the various phases of
composition"
1
. He wanted to "make a clean sweep of one's heritage and start all over again from
scratch"
2
. He was not, however, claiming this to be a sign that we had reached the ultimate end of
music (or the world). Quite to the contrary he said "All those predictions of an aborted Apocalypse
are a burlesque spectacle", claiming "that few epochs in musical life have been so exalting to live in"
3
. Music had not reached its end, it had simply arrived "at the ends of fruitful land"
4
, the title of a
painting by Paul Klee originally intended to be used by Boulez for this piece.
It was as a pupil of Olivier Messian that he had his first exposure to the music of Schoenberg,
Webern and Berg, and hearing the Schoenberg Wind Quintet in performance proved to be a
"revelation"
5
. He would eventually react against this work, finding it's adherence to classical
structural models to be an aberration of the serial method Schoenberg had pioneered in the domain of
pitch. Through further studies with Rene Liebowitz, Boulez would master the elements of "classical"
twelve-tone composition. His dissatisfaction with Schoenbergs conservative formal methods finally
led him to look to the music of Webern as being the most prophetic composer of the Second
Vienesse School, following the implications of Schoenbergs serial methods farthest along the lines to
their logical conclusions, the application of the serial method to the aspects of composition other
than pitch. Boulez' earliest works showed a distinctive approach to and expansion of the serial
methods of his predecessors. After what was an impressive early career (his first two piano sonatas,
two important cantatas, and the Sonatina for Flute and Piano were all written by the age of twenty-
three) he took it upon himself to push the new system to it's furthest possible extremes. The task he
set himself was to reduce the form, not to zero, but to a minimum, and to produce a work "without
(or almost without) the composers intervention"
6
. Then and only then would it be possible to renew
musical composition in a meaningful way.
There were prior examples in the literature of attempts at total serialization of all musical parameters.
The most important to site, and presumably the most important to Boulez, would be the piano piece
Mode de valeurs et d'intensites by Olivier Messian (written in Darmstadt in 1949). In this piece
Messian made an initial attempt at controlling those other parameters of a musical composition with
the same degree of control that serialism had given the composer over pitch. Rhythm and dynamics
in particular were brought into the serial web, while pitch was treated not in the manner of the
Viennese serialist, but rather like a twelve-tone "mode" (or more precisely three different twelve-
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tone modes in this particular piece). Messian would not follow the implications of this piece to their
ultimate conclusions though, that would remain for his pupil, Boulez.
The historical notoriety accorded to Structures 1a is well deserved. It is widely perceived as the first
thorough going discourse carried out in the language of integral serialism. In addition to its
immediate predecessor, Messians Modes de valeurs, there were other composers who, contemporary
with Boulez, were after the same goal. Milton Babbits' Three Compositions for Piano even pre-dates
Boulez' Structures, but it did not receive international attention until much later. Karlheinz
Stockhausens' Kreuzspiel is also from the same time, and took on the same issues though not in as
rigorous or thorough-going a fashion. Neither of these compositions, however, had the impact of the
Boulez piece. This composition, and Boulez' article "Eventuellement..." proved to inspire a whole
generation of composers to follow the path of total serialization in their compositions
7
.
This level of compositional predetermination proved to be an isolated instance in Boulez' output. His
dissatisfaction with the lack of invention afforded him in this piece, as well as in Polyphonie X of the
same time, made itself apparent in the increased malleability of his material in Books 1b and 1c of
Structures
8
. He expressed some of this dissatisfaction, for his own works as well as the works of
composers who blindly followed his lead without understanding the deeper implications of his work,
in the articles "Recherches maintenant" and "...Apres et au loin", ridiculing "timetables of trains that
never leave"
9
. All of this research was, however, essential if he was to be able to continue on his
course, and these experiments yeilded great rewards in his next piece, Le Marteau sans maitre.
Structures Book 1a stands as a unique achievement, "a milestone in post-war music"
10
, both a
beginning and an end for Boulez and for music. It was a necessary step to take, a step which was in
full accord with the spirit of its time. It was not until Boulez had reached the "ends of fruitful lands"
that the demolition could be considered complete, the plans drawn up, and the rebuilding begin
11
.

l

Pierre Boulez. Structures for Two Pianos, Alfons and Aloys Kontarsky, Wergo WER 60011. Liner
notes.

2
Pierre Boulez, Conversations with Celestin Deliege (London: Eulenburg Books, 1976), 56.


3
Pierre Boulez, Notes of an Apprenticeship (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1968), 146.


4
Paul Griffiths, Boulez (London, New York, Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1978), 24.


5
William Glock, ed., Pierre Boulez, A Symposium (London: Eulenburg Books, 1986), 10.


6
Glock, 94.


7
Reginald Smith Brindle, The New Music, the Avant-Garde since 1945 (Oxford, New York: Oxford
University Press, 1989), 23.

8
Glock, 158.


9
Glock, 15.


10
Glock, 14.


11
Glock, 159.

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META-CRITIQUE
An historical analysis is quite apropos for this work of Boulez. It is largely as an historical document
that the piece is considered. Its position in the history of 20th century music wasn't secured by
aesthetic value alone, but largely because of historical significance. The works it was influenced by,
and in turn the works it influenced help to form a mystique around the work which has become more
important than the work itself. The type of analysis it inspired, the way it drew up battle lines for the
serialist vs. the non-serialists, the way it pointed to a depersonalized musical grammar divorced both
from the past and from John Cages' aleatoric music, all add to the historic relevance of this work. A
detailed musical analysis, while fascinating, reads like so much number crunching. Its position in
history, on the contrary, makes for a much livelier tale.

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