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An Introduction to Charles Burchfield

Posted in Art, Modern, Videos with tags , on February 9, 2012 by Nell

 Guide: Charles Burchfield (1893-1967), painter

Charles Ephraim Burchfield (1893-1967) was born and raised in Ohio (first in Ashtabula, then Salem). He graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Art, and was employed as a wallpaper designer at H.M. Birge in Buffalo, New York. He eventually quit to pursue painting full-time, and lived thereafter in Gardenville (West Seneca), a suburb of Buffalo.

Burchfield’s middle-period work (roughly the 1920s-early 1940s) focused on realist paintings depicting American small-town and industrial life, which brought him popularity and acclaim in his time. However, the visionary works of his early and late output may appear even more remarkable to us today: Burchfield’s mystical, abstract nature imagery is arrestingly unique.

The videos below were produced by Beyond the Notes and feature Nancy Weekly, Curator and Head of Collections at the Burchfield Penney Art Center, who has written and edited several books on Burchfield including Charles E. Burchfield: The Sacred Woods, and co-curated the recent exhibit Sensory Crossovers: Synesthesia in American Art.

Fear, Hope, and the Sublime in Burchfield’s Paintings

The co-existing themes of fear and hope were central to the character of Burchfield’s artwork. Many of his paintings have an ominous or negative quality, but ultimately his output as a whole may be seen to portray an optimistic outlook.

Burchfield’s Canvas Expansion Technique

Some of Charles Burchfield’s later works were revisions and expansions on paintings that he had created decades earlier, including Autumnal Fantasy and Sun and Rocks, which were started when Burchfield was in his 20s and completed when he was in his 50s. He started with the kernel of an early painting and attached new sections of canvas to create a more expansive and more fully realized vision.

Burchfield’s Influences from Music and Sound

Music had major influence on Burchfield’s paintings and his aesthetic. From Burchfield’s early days in art school when he idolized composer Richard Wagner and sketched abstract symbols representing musical motifs from the opera “Siegfried”, to the maturity of his career when he drew on Beethoven and Sibelius for inspiration in his large-scale watercolor paintings, music served as an ongoing source of inspiration and a reference point for his artwork.

Charles Burchfield is thought to have had synesthesia (check out my video “An Introduction to Synesthesia”). Although we can’t be sure (Burchfield himself never addressed it), some scholars find ideas in his art and journals that are distinctly synesthetic in character.

Related Topics:

Martha Graham, “Frontier” (1935)

Posted in Dance, Modern with tags , on February 7, 2012 by Nell
Graham performing in "Frontier"

Graham performing in "Frontier"

 Guide: Modern Dance in America

DANCE IN PROFILE: Martha Graham, Frontier (1935)

Watch the video on YouTube with an introduction by Martha Graham. (Performance filmed 1976. Danced by Janet Eilber.)

Choreography and costume design by Martha Graham.
Music by Louis Horst.
Set design by Isamu Noguchi.

Frontier is a relatively early work by Martha Graham, created less than a decade after she began dancing on her own after leaving the Denishawn School, where she danced under the instruction of Ted Shawn. During this early period (roughly 1926-1938) she focused on creating solo dances for herself to perform, before developing the theatrical group dances of the 1940s that would define her later career and secure her popularity (such as Night Journey, which depicts a scene from Oedipus Rex, and Appalachian Spring, which depicts an original story of a pioneering husband and bride.)

This beautiful dance embodies some of the major themes and creative methods developed in her early works that would continue to factor into work for years to come, including:

  • Close collaborations with designers and composers to develop a cohesive atmosphere. Graham worked with sculptor Isamu Noguchi and composer Louis Horst on Frontier. They were both important ongoing collaborators for her (particularly Horst, who was her teacher, advocate, lover, and collaborator for many years). It has been said that in her collaborations, Graham was always the director. In this context, she believed the other art forms should ultimately serve the vision of the dance.
  • Exploration of national identity through the eyes of archetypal characters from history. In this dance, a pioneer woman surveys a vast Western landscape (suggested by the sparseness and broadness of Noguchi’s minimalist set). The dancer is a representation of Western expansion: Americans’ progress into the unknown and their hunger for space. As always, Graham imbues this generic woman with a remarkably intimate emotional expression and individual identity. This piece foreshadows the Pennsylvanian pioneers of Appalachian Spring (1944).
  • The use of costume to evoke a setting, to imply a character, and to complement the dance vocabulary. In Frontier, the dancer wears the long-skirted dress closely identified with Graham’s costume designs (she always designed the costumes for her own works). In this case, the dress also refers to the style of dress of 19th century pioneer women. The light pink hue—colors were carefully considered by Graham—suggests optimism and freshness.

In Graham’s method, the contraction and release of the torso (a motion organically derived from the act of breathing) is the center from which all of her sweeping, expressive movements extend. The dress accentuates the movements of the dancer, particularly by elongating the motion of her limbs.

  • The use of the floor as a plane for expressive movement. Graham was intentionally anti-ballet and anti-establishment, and one of the many ways in which she radically broke from ballet aesthetics was the use—rather than the denial—of gravity. (In this, she was apparently influenced by some avante garde German dance.) She often danced while sitting, or fell gracefully onto the ground.

Check out this quotation from Graham’s autobiography Blood Memory:

The designs that Isamu brought to Frontier came from our discussion of the hold the frontier had always had on me as an American, as a symbol of a journey into the unknown. Traveling to California by train, the endless tracks were to me a reiteration of that frontier.
When at last I asked Isamu for an image of them in my dance, he brought to me the tracks, as endless ropes into the future.
(…)
I had the idea of Frontier in my mind as a frontier of exploration. a frontier of discovery, and not one of limitation.(…) It makes me triumphant to think that nothing lasts but the spirit of man and the union of man. People cross the border from East to West to shake the hands of those they have not seen before. In a way, they have become each others’ frontier.

Here are images of Graham performing this piece in 1935:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/haggertymuseum/5269091334/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/haggertymuseum/5264120495/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/haggertymuseum/5268683563/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/haggertymuseum/5269295392/

I consulted these sources in researching Graham’s work:

Mazo, Joseph H. Prime Movers: The Makers of Modern Dance in America. Princeton, 2000.
Reynolds, Nancy, and Malcolm McCormick. No Fixed Points: Dance in the Twentieth Century. Yale UP, 2003.

Madrigal and Word Painting

Posted in Music, Renaissance with tags , , , , , , on January 30, 2012 by Nell

Guide: Vocal Music in the Medieval and Renaissance Periods

Madrigal was a form of non-religious (secular) Renaissance vocal music for two or more singers, which reached the peak of its popularity in the 16th century. In France, the equivalent form was known as chanson.

Unlike most sacred music of the time, madrigals were composed in the vernacular language (English, French, Italian, etc) rather than Latin. Composers generally used secular poetry as texts, and sometimes utilized word painting (see below) as a notable compositional device.

What to listen for:

  • Madrigal was sung in the vernacular, i.e. the common tongue, rather than Latin.
  • The use of word painting (it’s not in every madrigal, but it’s in a lot of them).
  • Madrigals are often (though not always) playful, lively, and clever in tone.
Word painting is a device used frequently in Renaissance vocal music, especially madrigals—although it certainly also appeared in church music—in which the musical events are designed to illustrate or reflect the text. (Examples below.) This practice is still very much alive in music today, although it used differently. Word painting is related to the concepts of tone painting and program music, in which instrumental music tells a story without text.

Recommended listening:

This piece a classic and clear example of word painting. Pay special attention to the way the words and phrases “ascending,” “descending,” “running down,” “two by two,” etc, are treated by the composer in this piece! To begin with, I suggest you listen and look at the score to perceive this on your own—but here’s a “cheat sheet” of notable moments.

I personally think this chanson (French madrigal) is completely fantastic, and it’s a great example of word painting and musical depiction. In this piece, titled “The Song of the Birds,” the singers imitate bird calls as a musical illustration of the content of the text. (Check out the music 3 minutes in!) Here’s a translation of the French lyrics into English:

Wake up sleeping heads! The God of Love calls you! The birds will work wonders this May Day to dispel your worries. Unplug your ears.

Everyone will be filled with joy, for the season is pleasant, and the song-thrush will make sweet, original music. Everyone will laugh and rejoice. The nightingale sets the woods ringing with twittering throat.

Flee regrets, tears, and cares! The season is pleasant. Away Mister Cuckoo, everyone regards you as a traitor. “Cuckoo” . . . treacherously laying eggs in each nest uninvited. Wake up sleeping heads! The God of Love calls you!

[Source for this translation]

Further reading:

Wikipedia article on madrigal

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Chant

Posted in Medieval, Music with tags , on January 30, 2012 by Nell
Gregorian chant

Gregorian chant

Guide: Vocal Music in the Medieval and Renaissance Periods

Gregorian chant, plainchant, plainsong, or simply chant are terms referring to a genre of church music codified and written down during the 10th to 13th centuries, mostly created by anonymous composers.

This music represents the first significant body of music in Western culture that was notated and preserved in writing (although it was very different from our modern notation).

What to listen for:

  • Chant (in its original state) is all monophonic, meaning there is a single melodic line which all singers perform simultaneously.
  • In organum, composers began using chants to create a cantus firmus—a fixed melody—and they would compose new, original music on top of the chant. Chants are often still present and intact in very complex polyphonic music by 16th century composers, even though they are somewhat hidden and obscured.
  • Chant was written using a system of musical scales called the church modes (which were derived from ancient Greek modes). As a result, chant may sound strange or exotic in comparison to later music, which is built around different rules of music theory.

Recommended listening:

Further reading:

Wikipedia article on Gregorian chant

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Organum

Posted in Medieval, Music with tags , , on January 30, 2012 by Nell

Guide: Vocal Music in the Medieval and Renaissance Periods

Organum is a genre of Medieval polyphonic music (music with two or more simultaneous, different voice parts) that reached the peak of its sophistication during the late 1100s-early 1200s in France. In organum, new music would be composed and sometimes improvised on top of the “fixed” music of older Gregorian chant.

At first there were just two parts — one for the chant and the other to provide harmony or, in later music, to provide a faster, melodic part that decorated the chant. As more voices were added and the rhythmic and harmony behind the music became more sophisticated, it evolved into new musical forms such as the motet.

What to listen for:

  • In organum, the chant is always in the “tenor” voice (this is different from the kind of singer—“tenor” is a Medieval term referring to the lowest voice part, basically, and could actually be an alto or bass singer).
  • A notable feature of most forms of organum is that the tenor voice is usually singing very long notes (the chant has been stretched out in time) while the upper voice(s) are singing much faster music, creating a sense of two different tempos happening simultaneously.
  • Like the chant on which it is based, organum is derived from a modal pitch system rather than the tonal system.

Recommended listening:

These two are from a useful playlist of Medieval music created by a YouTube user. Check out those video descriptions for more information.

Further reading:

Wikipedia article on organum

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Polyphony

Posted in Medieval, Music, Renaissance with tags , , , , , , on January 30, 2012 by Nell

Guide: Vocal Music in the Medieval and Renaissance Periods

Music by Orlando di Lassus

Music by Orlando di Lassus (click to view source)

The term polyphony can be used to describe a general style of music from the Medieval and Renaissance periods or, more broadly, to refer to any musical texture of more than one distinct, simultaneous melodic lines.

Polyphony emerged out of Medieval church music (chant) around the 12th century with the invention of organum (the earliest named composers of organum were Leonin and Perotin, both working at Notre Dame in Paris).

This form of music reached the peak of its popularity and sophistication in the Renaissance in the 16th century (Palestrina and Lassus, aka Lasso, are considered the defining composers of that period).

Polyphony may be found in motets, masses, and madrigals, the dominant genres of vocal ensemble music during the 14th-16th centuries.

What to listen for in Renaissance polyphony:

  • Polyphony utilizes mostly contrapuntal textures (often mixed with short passages of homophony, in which all the voices sing in the same rhythm but with different pitches), rather than melody-and-accompaniment type of textures (what we think of as “song”).
  • Each of the different voices have equal importance in the overall sound of the music. (This is in contrast to monophony, in which there is one melody which performers would sing simultaneously.)
  • Polyphony often involves canon, a compositional technique utilizing imitative counterpoint, where two or more voices perform the same, or very similar, melodies in a sequence of overlapping entrances. (Think “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.”) Sometimes the melodies are transposed (i.e. starting on a different pitch) or otherwise altered.
  • The harmonic system used in this music was derived from the church modes (see chant for more info) and therefore sounds noticeably different from the tonal music of the Baroque and Classical periods.

Recommended listening:

See organum to hear the very earliest polyphony, which is stylistically and technically different than this later music.

Late Medieval polyphony:

Renaissance polyphony:

Further reading:

Wikipedia article on polyphony

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Vocal Music in the Medieval and Renaissance Periods [GUIDE]

Posted in Guides, Medieval, Music, Renaissance, Videos with tags , , on January 30, 2012 by Nell

 Vocal music in the Medieval and Renaissance periods is some of the most interesting and beautiful music of all time. Use this guide as a jumping-off point to explore some of the more important genres and techniques in the Medieval era through the Renaissance (ending around 1600).

Topics:

Exercises:

…video coming soon!

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A Very Brief History of Ballet

Posted in Dance with tags , , , on January 29, 2012 by Nell

To give context for the Modern dancers and choreographers I’m surveying (see previous posts), I’m gathering some information about the history of ballet—which was perceived as the antithesis to Modern dance, until choreographers began synthesizing the two streams in the latter half of the 20th century. This division has broken down over the last few decades, and many major ballet companies perform works by “Modern” choreographers such as William Forsythe and Mark Morris.

  • Ballet was derived from the dance of Italian courts during the Renaissance (15th-16th centuries). It spread to the French court of Catherine de Medici.
  • Classical ballet as we know it was created in the court of King Louis XIV (who also patronized Lully, Couperin, Moliere, Racine, et al), who himself was a dancer. Dance was an important part of French opera (notably the operas of Lully), and it was an outgrowth of opera performances that ballet was formally established. (View a film recreating dance in the court of Louis XIV.) Louis XIV founded the Academie Royale de Danse (the Paris Opera Ballet) in 1661, which created and codified standards for ballet technique and pedagogy. In the 1680s it was headed by Pierre Beauchamp, who codified the five positions of the feet. The Paris Opera Ballet, a component of the Paris Opera, became the first professional ballet company during the 1670s and ’80s.
  • The Royal Danish Ballet and the Imperial Ballet of the Russian Empire were founded in the 1740s, and ballet in Denmark and Russia, as well as Italy, grew as ballet declined in popularity in France after the mid-1800s.
  • Romantic ballet in the 19th century saw the introduction of pointework (dancing en pointe, with pointed shoes) and the tutu. Russia became the leader in ballet during this time, giving rise to the famous ballets of Tchaikovsky in the 1870s-90s. (Example: Swan Lake, 1876.)
  • Around 1907, ballet was re-introduced to France and re-invigorated in Paris, notably by the Russian company Ballets Russes and its innovative producer Sergei Diaghilev who was responsible for the avante garde ballets of Igor Stravinsky and Vaslav Nijinsky (choreographer). (Example: The Rite of Spring, 1913.) The vibrancy of Russian ballet in Paris increased ballet’s influence in the USA and other non-European countries.
  • George Balanchine, a Russian-born composer who moved to the States in the 1920s, is known for creating neoclassical ballet: a genre that bridged traditional and contemporary style and influenced Modern choreographers. (Example: Apollo, 1928.) He founded the New York City Ballet in 1948.
  • Postmodern dance in the 1970s and ’80s saw the emergence of conscious synthesis between ballet and Modern styles. Collaborations between ballet dancer and choreographer Mikhail Baryshnikov and Modern choreographer Twyla Tharp, such as Push Comes to Shove (1976), are particularly notable.

See this Wikipedia article for more on these topics.

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Isadora Duncan: The Dancer of the Future [VIDEO]

Posted in Dance, Modern, Videos with tags , on January 25, 2012 by Nell

 Guide: Modern Dance in America

In this video, I discuss Isadora Duncan’s philosophy, influences, and aesthetic. I intend to put together a second video covering her biography and her influence on the following generation of dancers.

This is the second in my series of videos charting the evolution of Modern dance in America. In the first video in this series, I surveyed the atmosphere that gave birth to pioneering dancer Loie Fuller.

I’m teaching as I learn, so it’s possible there may be errors of fact or overly broad generalizations in this video. Feel free to comment with corrections or additions (and please provide a citation if possible). My sources are:

Mazo, Joseph H. Prime Movers: The Makers of Modern Dance in America. Princeton, 2000.
Reynolds, Nancy, and Malcolm McCormick. No Fixed Points: Dance in the Twentieth Century. Yale UP, 2003.

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Loie Fuller and the Beginnings of American Modern Dance [VIDEO]

Posted in Dance, Modern, Videos with tags , , on January 22, 2012 by Nell

 Guide: Modern Dance in America

This is the first in my forthcoming series of videos charting the evolution of Modern dance in America. Here I briefly survey the atmosphere that gave birth to pioneering dancers Loie Fuller, Isadora Duncan, Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn, and explore the performance style and impact of Loie Fuller (1862-1928). While her career took place primarily in Europe (and particularly Paris), her work was well known in America. Loie paved the way for—or was perhaps a precursor to—Modern dance.

I’m teaching as I learn, so it’s possible there may be errors of fact or overly broad generalizations in this video. Feel free to comment with corrections or additions (and please provide a citation if possible). My main sources were:

Mazo, Joseph H. Prime Movers: The Makers of Modern Dance in America. Princeton, 2000. pp. 13-34.
Reynolds, Nancy, and Malcolm McCormick. No Fixed Points: Dance in the Twentieth Century. Yale UP, 2003. pp. 1-10.

Supplemental Viewing

Given how early Fuller’s work was, there is very little photographic documentation. Here’s a short film clip from 1896 of Fuller’s Danse Serpentine posted on YouTube (I have read conflicting reports on whether this film depicts Fuller herself or a follower of her work). This is hand-colored, frame-by-frame, to create the illusion of colored lighting.

P.S. On the wish list for when I win the lottery: this crazy Art Nouveau bronze sculptural lamp of Loie Fuller: http://bit.ly/wq5Ymp

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