By: Michael Berry
Abstract:
Sofia Gubaidulina is not a name typically associated with serial music, but she did experiment with the technique early in her career. In this video I discuss her piano sonata, which dates from 1965. The work is not strictly serial: some formal sections are filled with diatonic or freely atonal pitch material; others feature her version of the twelve-tone method. I focus on the second movement, which is the most straightforwardly serial of the three movements. E-flat5 serves as a focal pitch throughout most of the movement as the row unfolds and is transformed around it. An improvised cadenza is supported by a repeated ostinato comprising F, Gb, and G. Following one last statement of the unadorned row, the third movement opens with a vibrant rhythmic ostinato that gradually introduces segments of the row.
Selected Bibliography:
Cojbasic, Ivana. 1998. Content and musical language in the piano sonata of Sofia Gubaidulina. DMA diss.,
University of North Texas.
Kurtz, Michael. 2007. Sofia Gubaidulina: A biography. Trans. Christoph Lohmann. Ed. Malcolm Hamrick Brown.
Indiana: Indiana U. Press.
Schmelz, Peter. 2005. Andrey Volkonsky and the beginnings of unofficial music in the Soviet Union. Journal of the
American Musicological Society 58/1: 139-208.
-------. 2004. “Shostakovich’s ‘twelve-tone’ compositions and the politics and practice of Soviet serialism.” in
Shostakovich and his world ed. Laurel Fay. Princeton: Princeton U. Press. 303-354.
About the Author:
Michael Berry is an orchestra teacher in the Puyallup, WA, school district. Prior to that he taught music classes at the University of Washington and Texas Tech University. He has published widely on Gubaidulina’s music before turning his attention to rap music.