First men and women singing in unison produced music in octaves, 1 and 2 of the harmonic series. Next came the centuries of organum when the parts were sung in fifths and fourths, 2, 3, and 4 of the harmonic series. Then followed the centuries of the major triad (c-e-g), 4, 5, and 6 of the harmonic series. When the 7th overtone in the harmonic series appeared, we had the very important dominant 7th chord (c-e-g-b♭), looked upon as outrageous heresy and dissonance! It was years, even centuries, before it was admitted as a respectable member of the family! The 9th harmonic forming the dominant 9th chord (c-e-g-b♭-d) had the same hard row to hoe, and is one of our modern chords. César Franck shocked the musicians by opening his famous violin sonata with this chord! We can trace the whole-tone scale of Debussy to the 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th overtones of the series, (b♭-c-d-e-f#). Scriabin’s “mystic chord” is formed from the 8th, 11th, 7th, 10th, 14th, and 9th overtones (c-f#–b♭-e-a-d). It is a short step now to polytonality and atonality, to Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Milhaud, and Honegger.

You have seen the white ray of sunlight enter your window, which upon a second glimpse divides into all the colors of the rainbow. In other words, the white light is the fundamental tone, which is the sum of all the other colors, much as any single tone is the sum of its overtones, and it is with these overtones that our modern composers are experimenting. Here we see that modern music is the result of evolution (slow growth) and not revolution!

Heart Music Disappears

Stravinsky, l’enfant terrible in music, the most daring composer of a most daring period has thrown over all restraint! His music has no heart quality, and so strongly is he influencing the younger men, that “heart music” has gone out of style, a brusque, ugly music taking its place, because the composers are afraid that to show sentiment would be weakness! However, the high class music of today is trying to express humor, activity and vigor, for which reason our jazz appeals to Europeans. The War made Stravinsky the “man of the hour” in music. He is the direct opposite of the refined, beauty-worshipping Debussy and mystic Scriabin. The composers upset by the devastating war, needed strong food, and they hungrily pounced upon the morsels flung to them by Stravinsky, the ring-leader.

But withal, “the worm will turn” and already, those with ears to hear, realize a change in the air, and they foretell a new classic period made out of this hurly-burly of many forms, touched by the fairy wand, “Things-that-Live”! And Stravinsky himself has turned.

After Stravinsky had written several ballets for his countryman, Diaghilev, he turned his attention to chamber music, and wrote works for small groups of wind instruments and a string quartet, Concertino, and a concerto for piano and wind instruments, in which he tried all sorts of experiments. He believes in absolute music, and has written these without program, making the music express what he has to say. Whether he has succeeded, must be laid before Judge Time. He is supreme master of orchestration, and is largely responsible for treating each instrument as though it were playing a solo, which we described as poly-instrumentation. We should not have enjoyed Stravinsky as a neighbor, for he begged, borrowed or bought every kind of instrument and learned all their tricks by trying them out himself.

We know very little of what is going on in Russia today, but Serge Prokofiev, one of the younger Russian composers, has left his home and lives in Paris where his works are often given. He has written piano concertos, violin concertos, and the best we have heard from his pen is a chorus with orchestral accompaniment, Sept, ils sont Sept (Seven, they are seven). He has also written ballets and operas.

A fellow-student with Serge Prokofiev in the Petrograd conservatory was Nicolai Miaskovsky, now living in Moscow where he heads the musical movement. His principal works are symphonies, one of which was played in Paris by a countryman, Lazare Saminsky, in June, 1925.

Another young composer whose piano sonatas have come out of Russia is Samuel Feinberg. They are somewhat in the style of Scriabin.

The two Tcherepnins, father and son, are living in Paris. The son, Alexander, has written chamber music in 20th century style.