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TRANS-CULTURAL COMPOSITION
Dale A. Craig
THE MOST REMARKABLE development in 20th-century music has been the gradual rise of trans-
cultural music to status as the dominant activity of composers. Interaction between musics of
various types within the same culture, and between cultures (including those separated from us
in historical time), has been more important than the conventionally-recognized classifications
(in its purist, Eurocentric stance), serialism, total serialism, chance, and minimalism (when it
in the works of Bla Bart6k. Styles which were thought of as the new international styles for a
at the time, thought of as narrowly confined to single nations had much more to express to the
world as a whole.
Before long, all musical traditions will be learning new possibilities from many others. Far
from creating standardization, this will create a plethora of ever-subtler stylistic makeups and
distinctions. D'Indy was thought of as a rather Germanized French composer. How would we
today, in 1983, describe Charles Camilleri, Alan Hovhaness, or Chick Corea? It would require a
list of influences, such as Chick Corea provides on his Three Quartets recording: Bart6k,
Beethoven, Berg, Miles Davis, Bill Evans, Dizzy Gillespie, Herbie Hancock, Thelonius Monk,
Charlie Parker, Bud Powell, Peter Serkin, and Wayne Shorter (among others).
One of the most certain and striking occurences of the early 1980's is that 'serious' and
'commercial' (for want of better terms) composers have joined into a common stream:
4. There is less reliance on scores and more on framework instructions for improvisation
5. The musical heritage of both is extremely varied and has touched upon tribal, folk,
Anthony Braxton, for his Six Compositions: Quartet recording, gives elaborate theory sup-
ported by abstract drawings. Although he gives as his forebears Henderson, Ellington, Mingus,
Parker, Tristano, Coleman, and Dolphy, the actual sound and spirit of his work is very much
like the 'serious' music written by academic composers, just as his theories read like theirs.
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TRANS-CULTURAL COMPOSITION
If we turn to a 'serious' composer, however, we find almost the reverse: Philip Glass's
Glassworks disc uses electric organ, bass synthesizer, soprano sax and tenor sax in addition to
more expected instruments; credit is given to his sound engineers, just as on popular albums;
and the simple but elegant look of the packaging is as for a commercial avant-garde jazz
recording or a pop album by one of the more advanced, subtle groups. The sound of the music
approaches that still but sensuous trancelike quality which many pop groups also have created.
There is a 20th-century modern music literature, outside Europe and the United States, of
which the Wester world is barely aware. Music reflective of 20th-century tensions, of explosion
of information, of pain, and also of refreshing, healing synthesis has been composed in Japan,
Korea, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, India, and Islamic countries of West Asia. This music needs
to be discussed in order to give balance to our world view of 20th-century music. To read Paul
Griffiths's Modem Music: The Avant Garde since 1945 one would think that modern music since
World War II was composed solely in France, America, Germany, Italy, England, Poland, and
Holland.
who mainly write their music down and those who favour live encounters between musicians
who may not even know each other's tradition. Much of the synthesis which is occuring is
unconscious, and some of the best trans-cultural music happens in this way. Many composers,
music.
Some composers have already entered a very high level of creation which draws upon all their
past learning, no matter what its source may have been. They are making a transcendental
world music, and it is the most communal musical evolution man has known since his
beginnings. In this music we can hear not only the difficulties but also the spiritual heights of our
future as a species. Charles Ives, speaking of'Music and Its Future', said:
The future of music may not lie entirely with music itself, but rather in the way it encourages and extends, rather than
limits, aspirations and ideals of the people, in the way it makes itself a part with the finer things that humanity does and
dreams of.
Charles Seeger made the useful distinction between musical types, all of which might be
found within the borders of one country: art, folk, tribal, and popular music. Art, or cultivated,
music includes advanced musics of Oriental high cultures. Folk music includes Asian music of
the people as well as the music of European villages and rural areas. Tribal music includes that of
the earliest peoples to occupy Vietnam, India, Oceania, Australia, Africa, Alaska, and the
Americas. 'Popular' means just what it says: we cannot have a rigid definition, but we could
An ancient country like China has all four of these: the many forms of cultivated music of the
Han people; the various folk musics like clapper tales or nan yin (Southern songs); tribal music of
the Miao, Zhuang, and other groups; popular music like patriotic songs or even the 'Chinese
Violin Concerto' Liang Shan Bo & Zhu Yin Tai; and, if we stretch present political boundaries,
commercial popular music in the Mandarin Pop of Hong Kong and Taiwan. It is useful to think
of the various strata which exist in other countries today and to consider all the types of music
What is the value to the composer of knowing about these types of music in a number of
countries? His or her history and world consist of all these, not the limited vocabulary of
resources to which he/she may imagine being restricted. This is the first time in world history
when it has been possible to know such a variety of musics and to create new musics which
express the multiplicity of humankind and also the common humanity which we all share.
The recordings we see in the 'international' sections of record shops represent some of the
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17
TEMPO
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musics of the world: world musics. But when a composer creates, using an immense array of
between musics:
a. When music educators iron out all folk music into one bland, equal-tempered type (with piano accompaniment!).
b. When an Indonesian angklung band plays harmonic Western songs in a chordal way which denies their
distinctive heritage of composite melodies, with their communal interlocking and interplay.
b. Ravi Shankar's two Concertos for Sitarand Orchestra, both of which arc strangely stilted and forced; we sense a
a. Olivier Messiaen's abstraction of Indian talas so that they lose their visceral rhythmic feeling and instead
b. Ton de Leeuw's Gamelan, which uses the gamelan in a Western way; and his Music for Strings, which is
ostensibly about India but in which it is difficult to hear anything Indian except the major-sixth drone at
And it is heard in works like Stockhausen's Stimmung and later ones in which he, like some
others, appears to be trying to cash in on a trend. This sort of composer does not seek to know
Asian music but wishes to drain it for what it can contribute to an idea-bank. (This is as suspect
But there have been more successful (that is, sincere, understanding, and authentic) occurences
of trans-cultural music. Tony Scott, thejazz clarinettist, has used the koto, shakuhachi and sitar in
order to expand and enrich his art. (Musicfor Zen Meditation; Musicfor Yoga Meditation.) Dewey
Redman uses the Chinese conical oboe Suona very effectively on KeithJarrett's Yawuh disc. On
the recording Jugalbandi the English pianist John Barham improvises on the piano with sarod
player Ashish Khan in a raga/tala, and the Gibson String Quartet plays an excellent piece created
by Ashish Khan. Yuan Lee Tchen's Orchid and Orange, for flute and cello, is serial but
emphasizes pentatonic modes. Isany Yun's Loyang and Reak suggest Korean court ensembles.
Most of these examples show the composer as being bi-musical, familiar with two or more
sitar/raga/tala clarinet/jazz
Another area besides trans-cultural music which is occupying many composers' intellects and
energies is what we might call 'Eco-music', the non-romantic 20th-century music of Nature;
this is music which shows awareness of the relationship between man, his music, and his natural
environment.
As composers become not just bi-musical but polymusical and increasingly aware of their
strong connexions to the natural environment, they move beyond localized concerns and begin
to think globally. They begin to create a transcendental world music which draws upon all the
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