In composer Paul Moravec's tribute to colleague Fred Lerdahl, found in the booklet of the Bridge disc Music of Fred Lerdahl, Moravec stated, "Fred Lerdahl became an influence on my own musical world in my freshman year at Harvard, in 1975. Fred seemed to me simply the smartest musician I ever met. And 31 years later, he still does." Moravec, who won the Pulitzer Prize for music in 2004, knows what he's talking about; Lerdahl is a very smart composer, and author of two books, A Generative Theory of Tonal Music and Tonal Pitch Space, "both of which model musical listening from the perspective of cognitive science." Whoa!
For one listener who can respond to these concepts there are many whose eyes will glaze over at the mere mention of "cognitive science." Lerdahl seeks to incorporate the listener's cognitive ability as a factor to be considered in formalized composition, something he finds lacking in the music of arch-serial composers like Pierre Boulez. Lerdahl is a little vague about how his theoretical work applies to his own compositions; not every composer who is also a theorist necessarily uses the tools one develops. Among Lerdahl's comments about the matter is "The best theory feels so intuitive that it disappears into the musical fabric. My theoretical work has given my music its own stylistic trajectory and enabled it to become complex yet cognitively transparent." Fine, but does it work? Does Lerdahl's music allow us to step away from the textbooks and to experience it purely as music?
If Bridge's disc Music of Fred Lerdahl is any indication, the answer to this question seems to depend on which work is under consideration. Time After Time for chamber ensemble is reliant to some degree on motives derived from familiar twentieth century music; parts of Milhaud's La création du monde are on a collision course with other parts of Schoenberg's Serenade, Op. 25, with a little of Bartók's Contrasts thrown in. It does keep one's attention, follows a logical progression of ideas, and the clarinet writing in both this and Marches is very good, making use of the full range of the instrument. In Marches, which Moravec stated "takes off from the music of Sousa and Mahler," Lerdahl's approach to deconstructing the march is reminiscent of Stefan Wolpe's work in this milieu -- one hears Mahler, but not Sousa. The Wind Quintet seems to carry the least baggage of the four; its fleet and rapid passagework and trio sonata-like instrumentation results in a loose, aviary-like atmosphere that is ultimately mesmerizing -- this is the "purest" music on the disc. Waves is taken from an older recording by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and the more like minimalism it is, the easier it is to follow.
Lerdahl has been extremely lucky in terms of securing superb ensembles to interpret his music. La Fenice, a group from Brooklyn founded in the wake of 9/11, has tremendous promise and here realizes Lerdahl's difficult music with a definite sense of shape and style -- this is the ensemble's first recording. The Columbia Sinfonietta is the in-house chamber orchestra at Columbia University where Lerdahl teaches, and it does a superb job of transmitting Time After Time in a way that both honors the composer and the group itself. The other performances are expert, as well, and Bridge's recording lovingly represents this music down to the last instrument; even the older Deutsche Grammophon recording included here isn't quite as good. In terms of practicing a certain tasteful amount of polystylism, and being quite capable in scoring for instruments, Lerdahl is very accomplished -- a "smart musician" indeed. Nevertheless, Lerdahl's music does not necessarily seem more "cognitive" than Le marteau sans maître; comparatively, Joseph Matthias Hauer's Zwölftonspiele for home orchestra seems more "cognitive" than either, due to the familiar-sounding salon milieu in which the piece is conceived and its corresponding instrumentation, rather than from any compositional technique employed. Music of Fred Lerdahl is certainly not for everyone, but for that "one listener" mentioned earlier, the degree to which it is thought-provoking and interesting should be indicated by the mere length of this article.
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