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Hans Werner Henze’s Concept of Musica Impura. On the Historical Significance of Music for Social Progress

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Abstract

The starting point for Henze’s concept of musica impura is his consideration of Bachmann’s and Neruda’s poetics. The idea that music should be pervaded with elements from psychological, social and political reality is particularly evident in his music theatre works, but not only. The complexity of reality is also reflected in his concert music. The means of his musica impura are manifold, they embrace sounds, rhythms. Instruments, musical motives from each genre and from all over the world. Therefore, applying and shortening the term opera impura to so-called “engaged operas” cannot meet Henze’s operatic oeuvre. One of Hans Werner Henze’s main concerns throughout his working life was to convey the linguistic nature of music; music understood as language becomes accessible to everyone if they learn it like the spoken language, its vocabulary, grammar, syntax and semantics. This is also how it is to be understood that, beyond his academic teaching activities, he has regularly carried out musical projects with amateurs, children and young people, as a teacher, organiser and artist. Beyond concrete composing, Henze’s conception of musica impura also encompasses a certain attitude towards the world and the desire to change it for the better. In this respect, his contributions to musical work with young people are a thoroughly measurable aspect and therefore significant for social progress.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Henze (1984, p. 30).

  2. 2.

    Ibid., p. 25.

  3. 3.

    Ibid., p. 28.

  4. 4.

    Jacobshagen (2007, p. 111).

  5. 5.

    Petersen (2005, p. 317).

  6. 6.

    Petersen (1995a, b, p. 75).

  7. 7.

    Henze (1949).

  8. 8.

    Lukian (1985, pp. 494–496).

  9. 9.

    Naso (1988, pp. 257).

  10. 10.

    Cf. Kerstan (2021, pp. 197–200).

  11. 11.

    Henze (1996a, b, c, p. 99).

  12. 12.

    Ibid., p. 112.

  13. 13.

    Trakl (1915, p. 58).

  14. 14.

    Henze (1984, p. 26).

  15. 15.

    Ibid., p. 27.

  16. 16.

    Schubart (1839, p. 383).

  17. 17.

    Henze (1984, pp. 52–61).

  18. 18.

    Bachmann (1959, pp. 161–166).

  19. 19.

    Ibid., cf. Bachmann (1978a, p. 342 f).

  20. 20.

    Bachmann (1971).

  21. 21.

    Bachmann (1978b, p. 141).

  22. 22.

    Cf. Cybenko (2005).

  23. 23.

    Bachmann (1995, p. 297).

  24. 24.

    cf. Petersen 2014, pp. 74–115.

  25. 25.

    Bachmann (1968, pp. 91–95).

  26. 26.

    Henze (1996a, b, c, p. 233).

  27. 27.

    Bachmann (1968, p. 91).

  28. 28.

    Höller (1998, p. 161).

  29. 29.

    Soproni (2008, p. 120).

  30. 30.

    Henze (1996c, p. 32).

  31. 31.

    Neruda (1935, p. 3).

  32. 32.

    This means, e.g., the Romantic-influenced striving for originality and innovation, the use of private symbols and metaphors, the self-sufficiency, purity, and authenticity of art, anti-realism (a poem should not mean, only be), the logical incoherence of symbolism (meaning of the subconscious and dreams). Intranscendence (abandonment of a “moral”), dissolution of logical connections; cf. Ortega y Gasset (1955) (orig. 1925).

  33. 33.

    Neruda (1935), op.cit.

  34. 34.

    Hanslick (1858, p. 23 f.): “What instrumental music cannot do, music must never be said to be able to do; for it alone is pure, absolute tonal art. (…) We must even reject sound pieces with certain headings or programs, whenever the ‘content’ of the music is concerned.”

  35. 35.

    Dahlhaus (1978).

  36. 36.

    Adorno (1970, p. 456): “The arts have no general laws, but objectively mandatory bans apply in each of its phases. They radiate from canonical works. Their existence immediately commands what is no longer possible from now on.“ Cf. Adorno (1990, p. 40): “The musical material commands a “canon of the illicit”—spent sounds, techniques and forms no longer available to the composer.”

  37. 37.

    Adorno (1970, p. 223): “Evident, for example, how much the composer who disposes with tonal material receives it from tradition. However, if he uses, critically against that, an autonomous: completely purified of terms like consonance and dissonance, triad, diatonic, then the negation contains the negated.”

  38. 38.

    Henze (1984, p. 154).

  39. 39.

    Ibid., p. 190.

  40. 40.

    Ibid., p. 191.

  41. 41.

    Ibid., p. 192.

  42. 42.

    Ibid.

  43. 43.

    Petersen (2005, p. 315).

  44. 44.

    Ibid.

  45. 45.

    Henze (1996a, p. 576).

  46. 46.

    Wenzel Lüdecke (1917–1989), movie-producer and founder of the Berliner Synchron, still one of the most important dubbing studios in Germany.

  47. 47.

    Luigi Nono (1924–1990), Italian composer; cf. Henze (1996a, b, c, p. 574).

  48. 48.

    Manfred Gäter (1928–1989), head of the music department of the WDR (West German Broadcast Company); cf. Henze (1996a, b, c, p. 450).

  49. 49.

    Dr. jur. Dieter Schidor (1948–87), movie-actor, -director und -producer; cf. Henze (1996a, b, c, p. 371 f).

  50. 50.

    Cf. Henze (1996a, b, c, pp. 573–578).

  51. 51.

    Mauser (2002, p. 56 f).

  52. 52.

    Ibid., p. 57.

  53. 53.

    Ibid.

  54. 54.

    Ibid., p. 58.

  55. 55.

    Henze (1996a, p. 577).

  56. 56.

    Mauser (2002, p. 59).

  57. 57.

    Ibid.

  58. 58.

    Ibid.

  59. 59.

    Ibid., p. 60.

  60. 60.

    Petersen (1995b, p. 267–302).

  61. 61.

    Henze (1999, p. 136).

  62. 62.

    Henze (1984, p. 102).

  63. 63.

    Petersen (1995a, p. 82).

  64. 64.

    Petersen (1988, p. 85).

  65. 65.

    Henze (1984, p. 263).

  66. 66.

    Ibid., p. 264.

  67. 67.

    Cf. Schmidt (2002).

  68. 68.

    Ibid., p. 15.

  69. 69.

    Ibid., p. 8.

  70. 70.

    Ibid.

  71. 71.

    Ibid.

  72. 72.

    Ibid.

  73. 73.

    Cf. Ibid., p. 57.

  74. 74.

    Ibid., p. 228.

  75. 75.

    Ibid., p. 160.

  76. 76.

    Ibid., p. 196.

  77. 77.

    Cf. Ibid., pp. 1, 2, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 160, 161, 162,163,165, 166, 167, 169, 175, 183, 197, 199, 206, 209, 222, 224, 231, 232.

  78. 78.

    Ibid., p. 183.

  79. 79.

    Cf. Förger (2003).

  80. 80.

    Henze (1984, p. 164).

  81. 81.

    Cf. Han (2009).

  82. 82.

    Henze (1984, p. 194).

  83. 83.

    Ibid., p. 165.

  84. 84.

    Ibid., p. 255.

  85. 85.

    Kerstan (2000, p. 16 f.); cf. Zuck (1980, p. 161): It was a job creation measure for unemployed musicians brought about by Roosevelt’s New Deal. In this context, the operas The Second Hurricane by Copland, The Cradle Will Rock by Marc Blitzstein and Der Jasager by Kurt Weill were produced, among others. These productions at the Henry Street Settlement Theatre marked the beginning of the career of the great director Orson Welles.

  86. 86.

    Noye’s Fludde from 1958.

  87. 87.

    Henze (1984, p. 351).

  88. 88.

    Ibid. p. 349.

  89. 89.

    Henze (1996a, p. 470).

  90. 90.

    Cf. Kerstan (2006, pp. 169–177).

  91. 91.

    Cf. Henze (1998).

  92. 92.

    Henze (1984, p. 191 f).

  93. 93.

    Henze (1988, p. 8).

  94. 94.

    Spahlinger (1995).

  95. 95.

    Ribeiro Silva (2016).

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  1. Hans Werner Henze Foundation, Munich, Germany

    Michael Kerstan

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    Hanns-Werner Heister

  2. Hamburg, Germany

    Hanjo Polk

  3. Hamburg, Germany

    Bernhard Rusam

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Kerstan, M. (2023). Hans Werner Henze’s Concept of Musica Impura. On the Historical Significance of Music for Social Progress. In: Heister, HW., Polk, H., Rusam, B. (eds) Word Art + Gesture Art = Tone Art . Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20109-7_13

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