Monolog For Bassoon By Isang Yun Music Essay

Monolog For Bassoon By Isang Yun medicine EssayIsang Yun was a composer with Korean ethnicity who is strong known in the music world especi onlyy in Europe as he worn-out(a) a major plowsh are of his life in Ger many a(prenominal) and died there too. In his initial years of composing, his paternitys were not fountainhead known in Korea due to the political issues surrounding the eastern United States Berlin Event. Inferring from his biography, it seemed that he wished to see Korea as a unified nation.Between the rate of flow of 1956 to 1995, Isang Yun still music in Germany and other European countries. He besides be vast amount of pieces and his deeds were pen in close to ever soy genre, such as instrumental sonatas, operas, symphonies, and evoketatas. era his lams father been largely performed and studied in Europe, Japan, and even North Korea, S bring outh Korean officials have thoroughly prohibited his music and consider the composer dangerous politically. Isan g Yun very much visited North Korea without permission from the South as North Korea supported scholarships and animate expenses for him. However, after(prenominal) a change of regime in 1982, the national music orchestra of South Korea first introduced his track downs in South Korea. From this time, Yuns music began to be studied by musicians in the South.This paper will discuss in musical theoretical detail one of his working, Monolog for crypticaloonHis well composed work, Monolog for Bassoon was composed in 1983, this was the mid period of Yuns well accomplished compositional career. During this baksheeshedness of his life, he had already achieved mastery over the formal techniques of the European venturesome and had moved much into composing at bottom a more palliate atonal style. The Monolog for bassoon is quintessential of Yuns typical mature style wherein he fusions the pulmonary tuberculosis of free atonality with elements from his ethnic Korean lineage.The Monolog for bassoon, which has so far been put down by at least five prominent bassoonists, is a cover testament to Yuns growing prominence as a 20th cytosine composer. It armys Yuns unique compositional angle which uniquely connects ethnic Korean inspirations in a work for bassoon, which is a distinctly westward instrument. The Monolog for bassoon also warrants a close study, as it is his precisely solo work for bassoon, and is an emerging exemplar of 20th century avant-garde bassoon repertoire.During his initial years into composing, Yun was fond of and got acquaint with European music and constantly found different sought out ways to learn more about European music history, style, and compositional methods. Because of his inclination towards western music more so European music, he also developed inspiration in the musical traditions of his home country, Korea. It was only after his journey to Europe that Yun began to foster and incorporate tralatitious Korean elements into his music. Yun himself admitted this truth through the quest quote When I was in Korea, I enjoyed and listened to our rich Korean musical traditions for entertainment. But I realized the unfathomable treasures of Korean traditional music for the first time only after I came to Europe. Keith Howard notes that prior to Yuns journey to Europe, his works show no search to incorporate elements from Korean traditional music. Yun later removed all works from circulation that he had written prior to his study in Europe as he felt they were not representative of his mature compositional voice. Whilst presenting into intercommunicate broadcasts in Freiburg in 1960 on the subject of traditional eastside Asiatic music, he began to develop his distinct and unique composing style. Yun also spent a major give of his time to study traditional East Asian music so he could play them in his broadcasts. collectible to this research Yun was inspired to compose Loyang, a beautifully compose d work that incorporated the mood of ancient court music, the voices of traditional Korean instruments, as well as the principles of Taoism. But Yuns method of incorporating these elements was not literal in the least. Jeongmee Kim explains He was not interested in quoting folk tunes, nor borrowing traditional Asian instruments, nor composing nostalgic song lyrics. Yuns Korean musical inheritance is expressed through more abstract, philosophical, and internalized use of ethnic materials, in contingent Hauptton/Hauptklang technique. He relied on the use of Korean unequivocal musical forms and Asian philosophy to compete with the equivalent in Europe. These shape and propel the breaks and organize of his works, while the Western musical heritage and its instruments provide the physical authority to articulate Yuns complex sound world. Quite centric to Yuns music can be found a Korean view of sound. While Western ears are accustomed to hearing a melodic figure attended by conso nant progression, Eastern music relies heavily on the consumption of an individual or primal tone. The tone itself is celebrated adorned with a huge variety of ornaments. These ornaments are not intended to encompass the central tone within a melody, rather they are an essential part of how the tone is able to express itself. The concept of the central tone is paramount in many Asian countries and spans various genres of Asian music. Yun describes this phenomenon in a speech he gave at a conference in BerlinWhile in European music the concept of form plays a crucial part, and notes become significant only when a whole group of them are related horizontally as melody or vertically as harmony, the thousand-year-old tradition of Eastern Asiatic music places the single note, the constructive element, in the foreground. In European music only a series of notes comes to life, so that the individual tone can be relatively abstract, but with us the single tone is alive in its own right. Our notes can be compared to brush strokes as foreign to pencil lines. From setoff to end individually note is subject to transformations it is decked out with embellishments, grace notes, fluctuations, glissandi, and dynamic changes above all, the lifelike vibration of all(prenominal) note is consciously employed by a means of expression. A notes changes in pitch are regarded less as intervals forming a melody than as an ornamental function and part of the depart of expression of one and the same note. This method of treating individual notes sets my music unconnected from other contemporary works. It gives it an unmistakably Asiatic color, which is evident even to the uncultivated listener.Keith Howard discusses some meaningful reasons which explain the reason for Korean music universe structured in that way. The initial part is the ironic yet well complementing relationship between yin and yang. After which is the concept of never-ending ride. Nature is held in high re gard in the east asian culture more so with the continuous flow of elements like water, air etc. at present from an abstract or musical view, the flow of sound is thought to be continuous as well. Music exists before sound begins, and continues after sound ends. This is one of the reasons why Yun compares the single tone to brush strokes as opposed to pencil lines. A pencil line has a definite beginning and ending, as well as a uniform shape and concord throughout. But in a brush stroke it is hard to run across where the actual beginning and ending occur. Although to the naked eyes it may show as a single line, it can show different views in a myriad of ways and also have contrasting qualities within each unique stroke, which more precisely mimics the flow of nature. He goes on more to explain his view of continuous flow in an audience with Bruce Duffie where he quotes My music doesnt have a beginning or an end. You could combine elements from one piece into another piece very we ll. Music flows in the cosmos and I have an antenna which is able to carving out a piece of the stream. The part which Ive cut out is organise and formed through my own thought and body processes, and I come in it to paper. Thats why my music is evermore continuous like the clouds that are constantly the same but are never alike one to another.Howard also suggests that the physical structure and musical capabilities of traditional Korean instruments have had a profound impact on the Korean concept of tone. While each instrument is unique in tone and structure, they all are extremely malleable in terms of pitch. Many instruments are so flexible that it can be difficult to produce a steady tone. This is instantly linked to the Korean musical ideal of sound being embellished and ever changing.As Yun chiefly did composing in the sphere of Western art music, wherein a comprehensive intelligence of Korean ornamentation is not mandatory, he does not leave the art of ornamentatio n up to the performer. He makes it a point to word minute details of the ornamentation, few of which exist within the framework of Western notation, others of which he must create new symbols and explanations for, as they are not part of the conventional vocabulary for Western musicians. This was a challenging process for Yun because in his thoughts he held a meticulously expatiate vision of what the ornamentation should sound like. On this part he was quoted as, I wrote down the playing techniques for instrumentalists as they are apply in Korea on the old instruments, thus as a very accurate vibrato and many sorts of glissando. In Korea there are of course about thirty kinds of glissando. To actually emulate the sounds of traditional Korean instruments, Yun had to create new, and often very difficult, techniques for the performers.Isang Yuns Monolog for bassoon was of importly composed between the years 1983 to 1984, however the actual roots of this work had begun some years pr ior along with his other work Clarinet Concerto. The Clarinet Concerto was composed by Yun in the year 1981 especially for Swiss clarinetist Eduard Brunner, who was the oral sex clarinetist of Munichs Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra for about 30 years. He premiered the work in Munich on January 29, 1982. Certain points which were notable about the Clarinet Concerto is the practice of bass clarinet instead of clarinet because of the solo voice during the middle movement. In the following year, Yun removed the solo line from the second movement and then used it as the structural basis for a solo bass clarinet work. The resulting composition of this which was written for Dutch bass clarinet virtuoso Harry Sparnaay, became Yuns Monolog for bass clarinet and was then premiered on April 9, 1983. Expecting some changes and more likely to accommodate range, Yun also print a version of the same work for bassoon. Yun was quoted in an interview with Bruce Duffie in 1987 that he composed strictly by commission, and his scores typically include a dedication to the commissioner. However, the Monolog for bassoon contains no such dedication and it is unknown whether it was created for a particular individual. It was premiered on February 3, 1985 by French bassoonist Alexandre Ouzounoff. Precedent for Yuns solo works being performed on other instruments had been set several years prior with Piri, a composition for solo oboe. Piri was composed in 1971 for oboist Georg Meerwin, which immediately gained rapid popularity. Before long, musicians of other instruments took notice of Piri and began to perform it. Clarinetists specifically performed and recorded Piri, which also including Eduard Brunner. Wolfgang Sparrer was quoted on his observation about about Piri as Although it was originally written for oboe, the composer has allowed interpretations for other instruments. Due to its high demands regarding playing technique and successful fit between construction and expres sion, Piri achieved so much popularity within only a few years that it was often chosen as a dogmatic piece in music competitions. Due to this well spread word meaning and versatility of Piri, Yun may have anticipated the idea of creating an alternate edition of Monolog for bass clarinet for bassoon. Since there are distinct differences in range, key, and clef notation between the ii instruments, publishing a new version of the work for bassoon was necessary to sanction performances. As this analysis specifically addresses the Monolog for bassoon, an in-depth discussion of Yuns Monolog for bass clarinet will not be included with the exception of highlighting the differences between the bassoon and bass clarinet versions as explained below.In a discussion of his compositional process, Yun was quoted by Luise Rinser I do not exhaust my possibilities in any one piece. There always remains something unsolved in form. I make that the starting point of another work. I must always take something new as a challenge. If someday no more new ideas come up, I would stop composing. This statement not just shows the well synergized and critical split in Yuns works, but also provides an answer for his use of the middle movement of the Clarinet Concerto as the basis for an expanded work that would eventually become the Monolog for bassoon.The Monolog for bassoon well showcases Yuns unique compositional fusion of Eastern and Western elements. Although this work at an initial look seems like a general late twentieth century avant-garde work for bassoon utilizing extended techniques within a non-tonal compositional context, Yuns compositional approach looks to specifically convey traditional Korean philosophies, sound ideals, and instrumental techniques. Understanding his compositional method is a key to the performers acquaintance of the work. If only viewed with a Western outlook analysis of this work, there is a possibility to overlook critical elements in the work like main tone versus ornament, or treatment of the ornaments themselves, while making other analytic associations which he did not intend, such as relying on motivic development and harmonic motion to propel the music rather than melodic growth. Just with all musical genres, it is more feasible to have a comprehensive understanding of the main composers musical perspective. This understanding also holds true for music of the twentieth-century than it is for in the first place periods, particularly as modern musical influences become more and more diverse and reach beyond the bounds of traditional Western classical music.Bibliography / DiscographyHur, Dae-Sik. A Combination of Asian Language with Foundations of Western Music An abridgment of Isang Yuns Salomo for Flute Solo or Alto Flute Solo. PhD diss., University of North Texas, 2005.Kim, Jeongmee. melodic Syncretism in Isang Yuns Gasa. In Locating East Asia in Western artistic production Music, edited by Yayoi Uno Everett and Fr ederick Lau, 168-192. Middletown, Conn Wesleyan University Press, 2004.Choi, Yulee. The Problem of Musical entitle Analysis of Selected Instrumental Music of the Korean-Born Composer Isang Yun. Ph.D. diss., New York University, 1992.Helicon, David Currnings, ed. Yun, Isang. Random House cyclopedia Dictionary of Classical Music. Publishing Ltd., Oxford, 1997. 749... Yun, Isang. In Contemporary Composers. Edited by Brian Morton and Pamela Collins. New York St James Press, 1992.Kim, Chul-Hwa. The Musical Ideology and Style of Isang Yun, As Reflected in His Concerto for Violoncello and Orchestra (1975/76). Ph.D. diss., University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign, 1997.Kim, Doosook. A Recording and an Analytical Overview of Two fiddle Works by Isang Yun. Ph.D. diss., Arizona State University, 1996.Kim, Jeongmee. The Diaporic Composer The Fusion of Korean and German Musical Cultures in the work of Isang Yun. Ph.D. diss., University of California, 1999.Kim, Yongwan. Yun Isang Yun Ku. Seo ul Hankuk Yesul Jonghap Hakgou Press, 2001.Kunz, H. Yun, Isang. In The New orchard Dictionary of Music and Musicians Vol. 27. Edited by Stanley Sadie. London Macmillan, Publishers, 2001. 696-697.Musique pour Basson et lightly Vol.2Performer Dag Jensen, Midori KitagawaComposer Paul Hindemith, Olav Berg, Othmar Schoeck, Otmar Nussio, Isang Yun, et al. Audio CD (March 23, 1999) Label MDG Records