Yahoo Tuning Groups Ultimate Backup tuning AW.: Nancarrow

In einer Nachricht vom 12/12/99 12:36:48 AM (MEZ) Mitteleurop�ische
Zeitschreibt josephpehrson@compuserve.com:

<< The important part of this is simply the fact that he had NO
instrumentalists in Mexico City who could perform his music anywhere near
the concepts he had in mind.
<<<

This isn't quite right. He already had the player piano in mind before he
left the US. His early pieces published in the New Music Edition were
already rhythmically complex, on the border of playability.

<<
This is how he came to the player piano... so this "exile" problem is
significant.
>>

No. As an exile of sorts from the US as well, and someone who knew Nancarrow
a bit, I think you are confusing matters somewhat. Exile is an extremely
personal matter, and Nancarrow's music, while perhaps made possible by the
relative isolation in which he lived, comes out of non-or anti-expressive
aesthetic shared with his idols Bach and Stravinsky. He would have written
the same kind of music had he stayed in Boston, but probably less of it.

>>>
It's lucky that he did, since his player piano music is the most
interesting stuff he has done and really his "claim to fame" or the way he
got recognized through this novelty.
<<<

There is a great misunderstanding here. Nancarrow never sought out any fame
as a composer; it was just not in his personality, and until the devaluation
of the peso that preceded his winning the MacArthur award, he managed to get
along without music as a source of income. Even when a circle of his friends
organized a concert in the Belles Artes in Mexico City in the 1950's, which
was apparently a great success, he would later claim exactly the opposite to
avoid the hassel of hauling his pianos across town again. The most important
publications of his work were all done largely without his active
participation: Elliot Carter's arranging score publication in New Music, John
Cage and Merce Cunningham using a recording to accompany a dance, the
Columbia and 1715 Arch recordings and the score publications by Peter
Garland's _Soundings_: these were all labors of love within a small circle of
friends.

>>
I believe Kyle Gann is writing a book on Nancarrow... Gann has transcribed
most of the Nancarrow music for synthesizer.
>>

Gann's book has been out for a year or two. Several others have made
electronic transcriptions, of which K. Barlow's version of Study #20 presents
some interesting solutions to the limitations of midi. Yvar Mikhashoff did
several transcriptions for ensembles, under Nancarrow's authorization
(although the enthusiasm N. had for these is a matter of some controversy).
They are recorded by Ensemble Modern.

<<<<<
I am not certain whether Nancarrow did anything outside of 12-tET. It's
possible, but I'm not certain...
>>

Aside from some very tentative work with preparing his pianos and his
collaborations with Trimpin, he stuck to 12tet, and some of the canons are
based upon approximations of tempo ratios corresponding to 12tet ratios. He
did, however, punch the roll for James Tenney's wonderful _Spectral Canon_,
which is for a retuned piano.

AW.: Nancarrow

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🔗David Beardsley <xouoxno@xxxx.xxxx>