Harmonielehre (John Adams)
Encyclopedia
Harmonielehre is a 1985 composition by American
composer John Adams. The composition's title, German
for "study of harmony," also the title of a book by Arnold Schoenberg
, hints at the work's combination of Schoenberg's harmonic principles with those of minimalism
.
Adams has stated that the piece was inspired by a dream he had in which he was driving across the San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge and saw an oil tanker on the surface of the water abruptly turn upright and take off like a Saturn V
rocket. This dream and the following composition of the piece ended a writer's block
Adams had been experiencing for eighteen months, and the movements reflect his situation, representing, respectively, liberation (I), spiritual sickness (II), and grace (III).
The composition is in three movements:
The work was first premiered by the San Francisco Symphony
. A performance of the piece typically takes about 40 minutes.
Harmonielehre appears in the Modern Era soundtrack of Civilization IV
, along with several other pieces by Adams. The composition also appears in the video game Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
.
s), 3 bassoons, contrabassoon
, 4 horns
in F, 4 trumpets in C, 3 trombones, 2 tubas
, timpani
, 4 percussionists handling 2 marimbas, vibraphone
(bowed and struck), xylophone
, tubular bell
s, crotales
(bowed and struck), glockenspiel
, 2 suspended cymbal
s (high and low), sizzle cymbal
, small crash cymbals, bell tree
, 2 tamtams
(2 actually referred to as "Medium Gong" in the second movement), 2 triangles (different pitches), bass drum
, 2 harp
s, piano
, celesta
and strings
.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
composer John Adams. The composition's title, German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
for "study of harmony," also the title of a book by Arnold Schoenberg
Arnold Schoenberg
Arnold Schoenberg was an Austrian composer, associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School...
, hints at the work's combination of Schoenberg's harmonic principles with those of minimalism
Minimalism
Minimalism describes movements in various forms of art and design, especially visual art and music, where the work is set out to expose the essence, essentials or identity of a subject through eliminating all non-essential forms, features or concepts...
.
Adams has stated that the piece was inspired by a dream he had in which he was driving across the San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge and saw an oil tanker on the surface of the water abruptly turn upright and take off like a Saturn V
Saturn V
The Saturn V was an American human-rated expendable rocket used by NASA's Apollo and Skylab programs from 1967 until 1973. A multistage liquid-fueled launch vehicle, NASA launched 13 Saturn Vs from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida with no loss of crew or payload...
rocket. This dream and the following composition of the piece ended a writer's block
Writer's block
Writer's block is a condition, primarily associated with writing as a profession, in which an author loses the ability to produce new work. The condition varies widely in intensity. It can be trivial, a temporary difficulty in dealing with the task at hand. At the other extreme, some "blocked"...
Adams had been experiencing for eighteen months, and the movements reflect his situation, representing, respectively, liberation (I), spiritual sickness (II), and grace (III).
The composition is in three movements:
- I. The first movement, which is unnamed, begins with the repetition of chords in E minor in minimalist fashion. These chords form a recurring theme throughout the movement, interspersed with motoric episodes which use Schoenberg's harmonic progressions as chordal "gates" (a name coined by Adams to describe juxtapositions of harmonic areas in his music). However, about halfway through the movement the celloCelloThe cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
s begin to play an expressive melody that is eventually taken up by the entire orchestra.
- II. The Anfortas Wound. The brooding second movement, based on the legend of the Fisher KingFisher KingThe Fisher King, or the Wounded King, figures in Arthurian legend as the latest in a line charged with keeping the Holy Grail. Versions of his story vary widely, but he is always wounded in the legs or groin, and incapable of moving on his own...
, also shuns minimalistic processes, favoring bleak SibeliusJean SibeliusJean Sibelius was a Finnish composer of the later Romantic period whose music played an important role in the formation of the Finnish national identity. His mastery of the orchestra has been described as "prodigious."...
-like soundscapes, building inexorably slowly to twin climaxes of brutal dissonance, the second of which is drawn from the climactic sonority of the first movement of Gustav MahlerGustav MahlerGustav Mahler was a late-Romantic Austrian composer and one of the leading conductors of his generation. He was born in the village of Kalischt, Bohemia, in what was then Austria-Hungary, now Kaliště in the Czech Republic...
's unfinished Tenth SymphonySymphony No. 10 (Mahler)The Symphony No. 10 by Gustav Mahler was written in the summer of 1910, and was his final composition. At the time of Mahler's death the composition was substantially complete in the form of a continuous draft; but not being fully elaborated at every point, and mostly not orchestrated, it was not...
. Like the unhealed wounds of the legendary Anfortas that provided the inspiration for this movement and reflect Adams' situation before the composition, the music's tensions are never truly resolved.
- III. Meister Eckhardt and Quackie. The third movement, according to Adams, is inspired by a dream that he had about his daughter Emily, whom he and his wife had nicknamed "Quackie." In the dream, young Emily rides through outer space upon the shoulders of 14th-century mystic Meister EckhartMeister EckhartEckhart von Hochheim O.P. , commonly known as Meister Eckhart, was a German theologian, philosopher and mystic, born near Gotha, in the Landgraviate of Thuringia in the Holy Roman Empire. Meister is German for "Master", referring to the academic title Magister in theologia he obtained in Paris...
. In this movement, components of minimalism return with the return of repetitive rhythms and short snippets of melody. The work ends with a triumphant affirmation of tonality with an "empty" fifth chord on E flat.
The work was first premiered by the San Francisco Symphony
San Francisco Symphony
The San Francisco Symphony is an orchestra based in San Francisco, California. Since 1980, the orchestra has performed at the Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall. The San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra and the San Francisco Symphony Chorus are part of the organization...
. A performance of the piece typically takes about 40 minutes.
Harmonielehre appears in the Modern Era soundtrack of Civilization IV
Civilization IV
Sid Meier's Civilization IV is a turn-based strategy, 4X computer game released in 2005 and developed by lead designer Soren Johnson under the direction of Sid Meier and Meier's studio Firaxis Games. It is the fourth installment of the Civilization series...
, along with several other pieces by Adams. The composition also appears in the video game Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (video game)
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is a action-adventure game published by Electronic Arts and developed by both EA's internal development team and Eurocom for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube and Game Boy Advance systems. It was simultaneously co-developed by Amaze Entertainment for...
.
Instrumentation
4 flutes (2, 3, 4 double piccolos), 3 oboes (3 doubles english horn), 4 clarinets in B flat (all double clarinets in A, while 3 and 4 double bass clarinetBass clarinet
The bass clarinet is a musical instrument of the clarinet family. Like the more common soprano B clarinet, it is usually pitched in B , but it plays notes an octave below the soprano B clarinet...
s), 3 bassoons, contrabassoon
Contrabassoon
The contrabassoon, also known as the double bassoon or double-bassoon, is a larger version of the bassoon, sounding an octave lower...
, 4 horns
Horn (instrument)
The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....
in F, 4 trumpets in C, 3 trombones, 2 tubas
Tubas
Tubas or Toubas is a small Palestinian city in the northeastern West Bank, located northeast of Nablus, a few kilometers west of the Jordan River. A city of over 16,000 inhabitants, it serves as the economic and administrative center of the Tubas Governorate. Its urban area consists of 2,271 dunams...
, timpani
Timpani
Timpani, or kettledrums, are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum, they consist of a skin called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally made of copper. They are played by striking the head with a specialized drum stick called a timpani stick or timpani mallet...
, 4 percussionists handling 2 marimbas, vibraphone
Vibraphone
The vibraphone, sometimes called the vibraharp or simply the vibes, is a musical instrument in the struck idiophone subfamily of the percussion family....
(bowed and struck), xylophone
Xylophone
The xylophone is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars struck by mallets...
, tubular bell
Tubular bell
Tubular bells are musical instruments in the percussion family. Each bell is a metal tube, 30–38 mm in diameter, tuned by altering its length. Its standard range is from C4-F5, though many professional instruments reach G5 . Tubular bells are often replaced by studio chimes, which are a smaller...
s, crotales
Crotales
thumb|right|Crotales are often used with other mallet percussionCrotales , sometimes called antique cymbals, are percussion instruments consisting of small, tuned bronze or brass disks. Each is about 4 inches in diameter with a flat top surface and a nipple on the base. They are commonly...
(bowed and struck), glockenspiel
Glockenspiel
A glockenspiel is a percussion instrument composed of a set of tuned keys arranged in the fashion of the keyboard of a piano. In this way, it is similar to the xylophone; however, the xylophone's bars are made of wood, while the glockenspiel's are metal plates or tubes, and making it a metallophone...
, 2 suspended cymbal
Suspended cymbal
right|thumb|Classical suspended cymbalA suspended cymbal is any single cymbal played with a stick or beater rather than struck against another cymbal. A common abbreviation used is sus. cym., or sus. cymb. .-History:...
s (high and low), sizzle cymbal
Sizzle cymbal
A sizzle cymbal is a cymbal to which rivets, chains or other rattles have been added to modify the sound, attached either by means of holes bored in the cymbal or by means of an attachment known as a sizzler....
, small crash cymbals, bell tree
Bell tree
A bell tree is a percussion instrument, consisting of vertically nested inverted metal bowls. The bowls, placed on a vertical rod, are arranged in order of pitch . The number of bowls can vary between approximately 14 and 28...
, 2 tamtams
TamTam
The tamtam is a percussion instrument that is similar to a gong. It is sometimes spelled tam-tam.TamTam, Tam-Tam, tamtam, or tam-tam may also refer to:* Tam-Tams, a weekly drum circle held Sundays in the summer in Montreal...
(2 actually referred to as "Medium Gong" in the second movement), 2 triangles (different pitches), bass drum
Bass drum
Bass drums are percussion instruments that can vary in size and are used in several musical genres. Three major types of bass drums can be distinguished. The type usually seen or heard in orchestral, ensemble or concert band music is the orchestral, or concert bass drum . It is the largest drum of...
, 2 harp
Harp
The harp is a multi-stringed instrument which has the plane of its strings positioned perpendicularly to the soundboard. Organologically, it is in the general category of chordophones and has its own sub category . All harps have a neck, resonator and strings...
s, piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
, celesta
Celesta
The celesta or celeste is a struck idiophone operated by a keyboard. Its appearance is similar to that of an upright piano or of a large wooden music box . The keys are connected to hammers which strike a graduated set of metal plates suspended over wooden resonators...
and strings
String section
The string section is the largest body of the standard orchestra and consists of bowed string instruments of the violin family.It normally comprises five sections: the first violins, the second violins, the violas, the cellos, and the double basses...
.