Table Of ContentRoger Sessions on Music
Roger Sessions on Music
COLLECTED ESSAYS
EDITED BY Edward T. Cone
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS
P R I N C E T O N , N E W J E R S E Y
Copyright © 1979 by Princeton University Press
Published by Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey
In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press,
Guildford, Surrey
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Contents
Editor's Note Vll
Preface IX
I. The Composer's Craft
The Composer and His Message (1939) 3
Music in Crisis (1933) 27
The New Musical Horizon (1937) 45
Song and Pattern in Music Today (1956) 53
Problems and Issues Facing the Composer
Today (1960) 71
Style and "Styles" in Music (1961) 88
II. The Composer and His Audience
Art, Freedom, and the Individual (1957) 105
Composer and Critic (1934) 120
America Moves to the Avant-Scene (1937) 123
To Revitalize Opera (1938) 137
The Scope of Music Criticism (1947) 146
Music in a Busines,s Economy (1948) 157
How a "Difficult" Composer Gets
That Way (1950) 169
III. Education and Training
Music and the Crisis of the Arts (1954) 175
New Vistas in Musical Education (1934) 187
The Composer in the University (1949) 193
What Can Be Taught? (1967) 204
IV. The Limits of Theory
Heinrich Schenker's Contribution (1935) 231
Hindemithon Theory (1937) 241
Exposition by Krenek (1938) 249
Escape by Theory (1938) 256
The Function of Theory (1938) 263
v
Contents
V. Music and the World Confiict
Music and Nationalism (1933) 27 I
Vienna-Vale, Ave (1938) 282
On the American Future (1940) 288
American Music and the Crisis (1941) 295
No More Business-as-Usual (1942) 304
Artists and This War (1942) 313
Europe Comes 1:0 America (1945) 319
VI. Five Composers
Ernest Bloch (1927) 329
On Oedipus Rex (1928) 339
Hindemith's Mathis der Maler (1934) 347
Schoenberg in the United States
( 1944, revised 1972) 353
Some Notes on Schoenberg (1952) 370
Thoughts on Stravinsky (1957) 376
In Memoriam Igor Stravinsky (197 I) 386
In Memoriam Luigi Dallapiccola (1975) 387
VI
Editor's Note
The essays that constitute this book are more accurately
described as "collected" than as "selected." In reviewing
Roger Sessions' output in this form—articles, lectures, ad
dresses, spanning almost half a century—the editor found
very little that should not be included. Some of the omitted
items would have resulted in undue repetition: a lecture
here that furnished material for an essay there, or an early
attempt to deal with a subject that was superseded by a more
definitive version. A few others were rejected as too nar
rowly topical or occasional. Into this category fall some
book reviews and some program notes for performances of
Sessions' own works. The last would no doubt be of general
interest, but Sessions feels that there is inevitably an ele
ment of impermanence, if not of falsification, in all such
self-explanatory attempts, and is loath to see them canonized,
so to speak.
Naturally, it has not been possible to avoid all repetition,
nor would that have been desirable. The present collection
affords the opportunity to follow certain themes as the
author develops them through various stages of his own
musical and intellectual development. In particular, his view
of the problems created by the course of musical evolution
in the nineteenth century and of the ensuing twentieth-cen
tury crisis can be traced from his early "Music in Crisis"
of l933-> through other essays in Sections i, iv, and vi, to the
recent notes (19η2) appended to uSchoenberg in the United
States."
Other progressive themes, however, are not so overtly
stated, but can be inferred by a comparison of the author's
word with the composer's music. In this regard it is most
interesting to read "To Revitalize Opera," an essay of 1938,
in the light of Sessions' subsequent career as a composer of
operas. With The Trial of Lucullus (1941) and Montezuma
Editor's Note
(1962) he brilliantly demonstrated that, like all his other
speculation, his theorizing here had been based on intense
personal conviction and was ultimately practical in its aims.
The division of the essays into sections should be taken
in no rigid sense, although it is hoped that each section, read
consecutively, creates a unified effect of its own. Certainly
that is true of Section iv, most of which was written as a
unit, and of Section v, which comments on successive phases
of the world conflict of 1933-1945. But in other cases one
might well argue against the chosen grouping. uAmerica
Moves to the Avant-Scene," for example, has close connec
tions with Sections III and v, although it is placed in Sec
tion 1; and "Music and the Crisis of the Arts," although
given the leading position in Section 111, might equally well
be assigned to Section 11.
Within each group the essays are in general arranged
chronologically. The only exceptions are the leading articles
of Sections 1, 11, and 111, each of which was chosen because
it seemed to strike the keynote of the section so accurately.
The chronological arrangement may at times seem too
strictly applied, as when an early account of Oedipus Rex
is widely separated from the later remarks on Stravinsky.
But one who reads the section in order will find that the
sandwiching of the Schoenberg essays between those dealing
with Stravinsky throws revealing light on the author's de
veloping attitudes toward both composers.
The essays are presented with a minimum of alteration
from their original forms. A few references have been up
dated; a few topical allusions, now irrelevant, have been de
leted. The dates assigned to each article are normally those
of publication, but essays originally delivered orally are
dated accordingly. Introductory material and footnotes are
by the editor, except as otherwise specified.
EDWARD T. CONE
Preface
First of all, I wish to thank my dear friend Edward Cone
for his initiative and his energy in collecting these various
papers of mine, and his sensitive expertise in editing and
classifying them. Those that were previously published, in
some cases as much as fifty years ago—had to be sought out
and gathered from a number of sources, in England as well
as the United States; others were found among my own
archives, often in the form of penciled sheets from which
I originally read them, with no thought that they might
eventually be published. Professor Cone has done a superb
piece of work in selecting these, preparing them for readers,
and classifying them in regard to their various topics. It is
a happy privilege to express my warmest gratitude to him;
and in view of his very high achievements both as a mu
sician and a writer on music, I cannot help feeling very
deeply honored.
It has been both interesting and, in a very personal sense,
enlightening, for me to re-read these papers. They reflect
the nature of my own musical reactions through the course
of the years which they cover, and through the various
places where I have lived. The oldest among them were
written in 1927, in Florence where I had already resided for
two years. Since the preceding autumn I had occupied the
guest house on Bernard Berenson's estate, where I spent the
following year as well. I was a frequent guest at the Beren-
son Villa, "I Tatti," where I met many people of distinction
in the cultural world not only of Italy, but of other coun
tries of Europe, as well as England and the United States.
I became vividly aware of both the cultural and the political
situation on the European continent as it was at that time.
My principal musical contacts at that time, however, were
formed by occasional visits to Paris, to Vienna, and to the
United States, where my First Symphony (composed in
