Musical Ekphrasis:
Composers Responding to Poetry and Painting

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	xiii
Introduction	xv

PART I: Mapping the Territorial Boundaries of Musical Ekphrasis

Music and the Sister Arts		5
	Ekphrasis	5
	Representation	9
	Narration	20
	Musical Ekphrasis Versus Program Music	27
	Poems or Paintings... And Music? In Music? Into Music?	35
	The Challenge of Verbal Mediation	49

Variations of Ekphrastic Stance: Once Again, Poems on Paintings		55
	Transposition	57
	Supplementation	64
	Association	67
	Interpretation	72
	Play	77

Literature and Painting Imitating Music		81
	Literature and Painting as Music, or like Music	82
	Literature and Painting about Music	94

 

PART II From Word to Sound: Non-vocal Music Responds to a Literary Text

Maeterlinck’s Death Drama in Two Musical Depictions		107
	Death in the Works of Maurice Maeterlinck	107
	Tintagiles—Tintagel	110
	Maurice Maeterlinck, La mort de Tintagiles	113
	Symphonic Responses	117
	Bohuslav Martinu, Smrt Tintagilova: Music to Maurice Maeterlinck’s Marionette Drama	119
	Charles Martin Loeffler, La mort de Tintagiles: Poème dramatique d’après le drame de Maeterlinck	123
	Summary: Two Ways of Portraying the Incomprehensible	140

Schoenberg’s Musical Representations of Fateful Love Triangles		141
	Arnold Schoenberg and His Poets	141
	Maurice Maeterlinck’s Innocent ménage à trois	143
	Symbolism and Allusion in Pelléas et Mélisande	146
	Dehmel’s Verklärte Nacht: Anxiety, Reassurance, and Symmetry	149
	Frames and Voices in Schoenberg’s Verklärte Nacht	159
	The Woman’s Voice	163
	The Man’s Voice	167
	The Third Voice	170
	The Unfolding of the Tragedy in Pelleas und Melisande	172
	The Protagonists and Their Threefold 3 + 1 Motifs	178
	Motifs of the Fate, Jealousy, Love, and Death	188
	Summary: Schoenberg’s Characters and Their Development	193

Elliott Carter’s American Narratives		195
	A Composer Exploring Complementary View of America	195
	Saint-John Perse’s Vents (Winds)	200
	Structure and Texture, Themes and Voices	206
	Elliott Carter’s Concerto for Orchestra	212
	Summary: Carter’s Modes of Transmedializing Perse	219

 

PART III From Image to Sound: Music on Works of Visual Art

A Twentieth-Century Composer’s Quattrocento Triptych		223
	Musical Transmedializations of Visual Narratives	223
	Respighi’s Affinity to Botticelli	224
	Botticelli’s Primavera	226
	Respighi’s "Primavera"	231
	Botticelli’s Adorazione dei Magi	242
	Respighi’s "Adorazione dei Magi"	247
	Botticelli’s Nascita di Venere	253
	Respighi’s "Nascita di Venere"	256
	Summary: Respighi’s Trittico botticelliano	262

Music for Blessings in Stained Glass		269
	Chagall’s Stained-Glass Windows	269
	John McCabe, The Chagall Windows	286
	Jacob Gilboa, The Twelve Jerusalem Chagall Windows	288
	Two Musical Readings of Chagall’s Visual Interpretations	291
	Prelude: Music about Images in Stained Glass Reuben Simeon Levi Judah Zebulun Issachar Dan Gad Asher Naphtali Joseph Benjamin Summary: McCabe’s and Gilboa’s Musical Responses to Chagall	291 294 300 306 309 315 319 324 329 335 340 345 352 358

The Twittering Machine: Sound Symbol of Modernity		361
	The Artist-Musician	361
	Paul Klee and His Zwitschermaschine	362
	Peter Maxwell Davies’s Joyful, Crank-Assisted Bird Concert	366
	Gunther Schuller and the Pitfalls of Mechanized Bird Song	372
	Giselher Klebe’s Four Twittering Creatures in Distress	376
	Summary: Three Ways of Listening to Birds Hooked to a Crank	380

 

PART IV The Faun and the Virgin, the Saint and the Reaper: Multi-tiered Transmedializations

Two Pictorial Cycles and Their Mediated Paths Towards Music		383
	Claudel in Basel, Hindemith in Florence: How the Stories Began	383
	The Dance of Death—The Dance of the Dead	385
	The Early Woodcuts after the Dance of Death at Basel	390
	Hans Holbein’s Woodcuts	394
	The Spirit and Theology of Claudel and Honegger’s Danse des morts	399
	Reframing Ezekiel: Dialogue (I) and God’s Reply (V)	404
	The Frolicking of the Dead (II)	414
	Laments and Sobs (III, IV)	421
	Hope and Affirmation (VI, VII)	425
	The Symbolic Usage of Instrumentation and Vocal Textures in La danse des morts	431
	Saint Francis of Assisi and the Early Writings about His Life	435
	Giotto’s Depictions of Saint Francis	438
	Hindemith and Massine’s Design for a Ballet on Saint Francis	446
	Hindemith’s Music for the Ballet Nobilissima Visione	452
	The Musical Forms and Their Messages	453
	The Musical Representation of Characters and Conflicts	456
	The Development of Saint Francis’s Motifs	462
	Summary: Pictorial Cycles Mediated Into Music	466

Two Mallarmé Poems and Their Way through Music to Dance		469
	The Symbolist Poet	469
	The "Scène" from Hérodiade: Fragment of a Lyrical Drama	471
	Hérodiade: The Tale and Its Background	473
	The Introduction of the Protagonist	475
	Scène (text and prose translation)	476
	The Dialogue	482
	The Themes	483
	The Symbols	488
	Hérodiade and L’après-midi d’un faune: Sister Poems	494
	The Background of the Faun Story	494
	The Tale, Told One Hot Afternoon	495
	L’après-midi d’un faune (text and prose translation)	498
	Form and Language	502
	Hérodiade and L’après-midi d’un faune: Parallels and Contrasts	505
	Poetic Transformations, Further Transmedialized	509
	Debussy and Mallarmé	512
	Debussy’s Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune	514
	Hindemith’s Approach to Mallarmé	523
	Where are the Words?	527
	Hindemith’s "orchestral recitation," Hérodiade	529
	From Music to Dance: Martha Graham and Vaslav Nijinsky	543
	L’après-midi d’un faune: Mallarmé, Debussy, Nijinsky	548
	Summary: Mallarmé’s Poems and Their Transmedializations	557

PART V Musical Re-presentations of Visual and Verbal Works of Art

Depiction and Reference		561
	Inherent or Acquired Signification in Musical Devices	561
	The Listener’s Contribution	563
	The Object of Musical Representation: Form and Content	563

Means of Musical Transmedialization		566
	Rhythmic Signifiers	566
	Pitches, Intervals, and Contours	567
	Timbres, Conventional and Circumstantial	569
	Structural and Textural Means	571
	Allusions and Quotations	572

Variations of Ekphrastic Stance		575
	Transposition	575
	Supplementation	576
	Association	578
	Interpretation	580
	Playfulness	582

Musical Ekphrasis and the Benefit of the Given Topic

583

APPENDIX

Biographical Sketches I: The Artists		589
	Giotto, Painter of Saint Francis	589
	Sandro Botticelli and Neoplatonic Aesthetics	590
	Hans Holbein, Portraitist of Death’s Clients	591
	Marc Chagall: Rediscovering the Bible	592
	Paul Klee, Artist and Musician	595

Biographical Sketches II: The Poets		597
	Stéphane Mallarmé and Symbolist Poetry	597
	Maurice Maeterlinck and Symbolist Drama	599
	Paul Claudel and the Renewal of Faith	603
	Richard Dehmel and Confident Sensuality	605
	Saint-John-Perse and Hart Crane: Interpreting America	606

Biographical Sketches III: The Composers		608
	C.M.T. Loeffler and B. Martinu: Chronicling a Child’s Death	608
	Arthur Honegger: Staging the Totentanz	612
	Ottorino Respighi: Assembling a Mythological Triptych	614
	Elliott Carter: Sonic Quests for America	616
	Jacob Gilboa and John McCabe: Translucent Pictures	618
	G.Schuller, G.Klebe, and P.M.Davies: Imaging Mechanization	621

Biographical Sketches IV: The Choreographers		626
	Vaslav Nijinsky: Sublimated Sexual Ecstasy	626
	Léonide Massine: Liturgical Ballets	628
	Martha Graham: Exploring a Woman’s Feelings	631

Bibliography		633
	Primary Sources	633
	Secondary Sources	635
	On Ekphrasis, Representation, and Program Music	635
	Some Collections of Ekphrastic Poetry	637
	On the Painters	638
	On the Poets	641
	On the Composers	644
	On the Choreographers	649
	On Saint Francis of Assisi	650

Lists of Plates, Figures, and Musical Examples	651
Index	657
About the Author	669