Milton Babbitt

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News for Babbitt

Milton Babbitt dies at 94
[posted 31 January 2011]
The influential American composer Milton Babbitt died last Saturday. He was 94 years old.
Babbitt, also a theorist and a teacher, wrote very rational music, which was not understood by everyone. As a follower of Arnold Schönberg, his methods became the basis of the “total serialism”, in which not only the 12 notes, but also many other musical elements were ordered in rows.
He taught at Princeton, where, during WWII he also taught mathematics. His composition students included Mario Davidovsky, John Eaton, and the theater composer Stephen Sondheim.
[Source: www.nytimes.com]

Music

List of compositions at Netherlands Radio Music Library.

Instrumental

Orchestra:

Generatrix, 1935, inc., withdrawn
Composition for Str Orch, 1940, withdrawn
Sym., 1941, inc., withdrawn
Into the Good Ground, film score, 1949, inc., withdrawn
Relata I, 1965; Relata II, 1968
Ars combinatoria, small orch, 1981
Conc. for Pf and Orch, 1985
Transfigured Notes, str orch, 1986
Conc. no.2, pf, orch, 1998

Chamber:

Str Trio, 1941, withdrawn
Composition for 4 Insts, fl, cl, vn, vc, 1948
Composition for 12 Insts, wind qnt, tpt, hp, cel, str trio, db, 1948, rev. 1954
Str Qt no.1, 1948, withdrawn
Composition for Va and Pf, 1950
Ww Qt, 1953
Str Qt no.2, 1954
All Set, a sax, t sax, tpt, trbn, db, pf, vib, perc, 1957
Sextets, vn, pf, 1966
Str Qt no.3, 1969–70
Str Qt no.4, 1970
Arie da capo, fl, cl + b cl, pf, vn, vc, 1973–4
Paraphrases, fl, ob + eng hn, cl, b cl, bn, hn, tpt, trbn, tuba, pf, 1979
Dual, vc, pf, 1980
Str Qt no.5, 1982
Groupwise, pic + fl + a fl, vn, va, vc, pf, 1983
Four Play, cl, vn, vc, pf, 1984
The Joy of More Sextets, vn, pf, 1986
Fanfare, 4 hn, 4 tpt, 3 trbn, tuba, 1987
Souper, spkr, fl, cl, vn, vc, pf, 1987
Whirled Series, a sax, pf, 1987
The Crowded Air, fl, ob, cl, bn, pf, mar, gui, vn, va, vc, db, 1988
Consortini, fl, pf, vib, mar, vc, 1989
Soli e Duettini, 2 gui, 1989
Soli e Duettini, fl, gui, 1989
Soli e Duettini, vn, va, 1990
Counterparts, 2 tpt, hn, trbn, tuba, 1992
Septet, but Equal, 2 cl, cl + b cl, vn, va, vc, pf, 1992
Fanfare for All, 2 tpt, hn, trbn, tuba, 1993
Str Qt no.6, 1993
Accompanied Recitative, s sax, pf, 1994
Arrivals and Departures, 2 vn, 1994
Triad, cl, va, pf, 1994
Bicenquinquagenary Fanfare, 2 tpt, hn, trbn, tuba, 1995
Pf Qt, 1995
Qnt, cl, 2 vn, va, vc, 1996
When Shall We Three Meet Again?, fl, cl, vib, 1996
Little Goes a Long Way, vn, pf, 2000
Swan Song #2, fl, ob, vn, vc, 2 gui, 2002

Piano:

3 Compositions for Pf, 1947
Duet, 1956
Semi-Simple Variations, 1956
Partitions, 1957
Post-Partitions, 1966
Tableaux, 1972
Minute Waltz (3/4 — 1/8), 1977
Playing for Time, 1977
My Complements to Roger, 1978
About Time, 1982
Don, pf 4 hands, 1981
Canonical Form, 1983
Playing for Time, 1983
It Takes Twelve to Tango, 1984
Lagniappe, 1985
Overtime, 1987
In his Own Words, spkr, pf, 1988
Emblems (Ars Emblematica), 1989
Envoi, pf 4 hands, 1990
Preludes, Interludes and Postlude, 1991
Tutte le corde, 1994
The Old Order Changeth, 1998
Allegro Penseroso, 1999

Other solo instruments:

My Ends are my Beginnings, cl, 1978
Melismata, vn, 1982
Sheer Pluck (Composition for Gui), 1984
Homily, snare drum, 1987
Beaten Paths, mar, 1988
Play it Again Sam, va, 1989
None but the Lonely Flute, fl, 1991
Around the Horn, hn, 1993
Manifold Music, org, 1995
Composition For One Instrument, cel, 1999
Concerto Piccolino, vibr, 1999;

Vocal

Dramatic:

Fabulous Voyage (musical, R. Childs, R. Koch, Babbitt), 1946

Choral:

Music for the Mass I, SATB, 1940, withdrawn
Music for the Mass II, SATB, 1941, withdrawn
4 Canons, female chorus, 1968 [after Schoenberg]
More Phonemena, 12vv, 1978
An Elizabethan Sextette, female chorus 6vv, 1979
Glosses, boys’ choir, 1988

Solo vocal:

Three Theatrical Songs, 1v, pf, 1946 [from musical Fabulous Voyage]
The Widow’s Lament in Springtime (W.C. Williams), S, pf, 1950
Du (Stramm), song cycle, S, pf, 1951
Vision and Prayer, S, pf, 1954, unpubd, unperf.
2 Sonnets (G.M. Hopkins), Bar, cl, va, vc, 1955
Composition for Tenor and 6 Insts, T, fl, ob, vn, va, vc, hpd, 1960
Sounds and Words, S, pf, 1960
Phonemena, S, pf, 1969–70
A Solo Requiem (W. Shakespeare, Hopkins, G. Meredith, Stramm, J. Dryden), S, 2 pf, 1976–7
The Head of the Bed (J. Hollander), S, fl, cl, vn, vc, 1982
The Virginal Book, C, pf, 1988
4 Cavalier Settings (R. Herrick, T. Carew), T, gui, 1991
Mehr “Du” (Stramm), Mez, va, pf, 1991
Quatrains, S, 2 cl, 1993
No Longer Very Clear, S, fl, cl, vn, vc, 1994
Pantuns, S, pf, 2000
From the Psalter, S, str orch (Sir Philip Sidney), 2002
Now evening after evening, S, pf (D. Walcott), 2002

Works with tape:

Composition for Synthesizer, 4-track tape, 1961
Vision and Prayer (D. Thomas), S, 4-track tape, 1961
Ensembles for Synthesizer, 4-track tape, 1962–4
Philomel (Hollander), S, 4-track tape, 1964
Correspondences, str orch, tape, 1967
Occasional Variations, 4-track tape, 1971
Concerti, vn, small orch, tape, 1974–6
Phonemena, S, tape, 1975
Reflections, pf, tape, 1975
Images, sax, tape, 1979

Life

Brought up in Jackson, Mississippi, he started playing the violin at the age of four and several years later also studied clarinet and saxophone. He graduated from high school in 1931, having already demonstrated considerable skills in jazz ensemble performance and the composition of popular songs. His fatherâs professional involvement with mathematics (as an actuary) was influential in shaping Babbittâs intellectual environment. In 1931 Babbitt entered the University of Pennsylvania with the intention of becoming a mathematician, but he soon transferred to New York University, concentrating on music under Marion Bauer and Philip James. He received the BA in music in 1935. As a student and during the ensuing years, Babbitt immersed himself in the intellectual milieu of New York, encountering influential philosophers such as Sidney Hook and James Wheelright, developing a life-long engagement with analytical philosophy, and reading widely in rapidly emerging and sometimes short-lived journals such as Symposium and Politics. His early attraction to the music of Varèse and Stravinsky soon gave way to an absorption in that of Schoenberg, Berg and Webern — particularly significant at a time when 12-note music was unknown to many and viewed with scepticism by others.

After graduation Babbitt studied privately with Sessions, wrote criticism for the Musical Leader, and then enrolled for graduate work at Princeton University, where he continued his association with Sessions. In 1938 he joined the Princeton music faculty and in 1942 received one of Princeton’s first MFAs in music. His Composition for String Orchestra, a straightforward 12-note work, was completed in 1940.

During World War II Babbitt divided his time between Washington, DC, where he was engaged in mathematical research, and Princeton, as a member of the mathematics faculty (1943-5). Musically, these were years of thought and discovery, rather than of actual composition; they resulted in 1946 in a paper entitled The Function of Set Structure in the Twelve-Tone System, which was the first formal and systematic investigation of Schoenberg’s compositional method. (The paper, which remained unpublished, finally gained Babbitt the PhD in 1992.) Between 1946 and 1948, shuttling between Jackson and New York, he once again directed his energies to composition, writing some film scores and an unsuccessful Broadway musical.

In 1948 Babbitt rejoined the music faculty at Princeton, eventually becoming Conant Professor of Music (1960); in 1973 he became a member of the composition faculty of the Juilliard School. He has also taught at the Salzburg Seminar in American Studies, the Berkshire Music Center, the New England Conservatory of Music and the Darmstadt summer courses. He has received several honorary doctorates and other honours, including a National Institute of Arts and Letters Award (1959), a Guggenheim Fellowship (1960â61) and membership in the National Institute (1965). He became a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1974, received a Pulitzer Prize Special Citation in 1982, and in 1986 was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters (he also received its Gold Medal in Music in 1988). Throughout his career, he has been actively involved in contemporary music organizations, including the ISCM (he was president of the American section, 1951â2), the American Music Center, Perspectives of New Music (as a member of its editorial board) and the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center (as director from 1959). A prolific writer of articles and reviews, he has also travelled widely as a lecturer perceptive and adept at logical extemporization: his 1983 Madison lectures are published under the title Words about Music. He is also an inveterate follower of popular sports, a raconteur and punster, and an omnivorous reader.