Music After World War II (1945-Present) - Session 12

Music After World War II

The search for originality on the part of every composer has led to a great variety of expression, reversion to past historical styles, neo-Classicism, neo-Romanticism, serial composition, electronic music, microtonal music, minimalism, etc. The insistence of originality and the seek of the "new thing" is so compelling that its end results often appear questionable, is that real music? Isn't that just pure mathematic? Is silence also considered music?

The development of audio recording technology, along with the ability to quickly and cheaply distribute recordings and scores, were central to the revolutions of modern music. Recording technology also provided composers with a new "instrument": sounds were easily manipulated and transformed, according to the composer's will. Further advances in audio technology gave rise to electronically-produced sounds.

Total serialism - not only pitches but dynamics, articulation and dynamics were planned in a row system; indeterminacy - in which the composer deliberately abstains from clearly defining certain aspects of a composition; extended techniques, all of these are features of the post-modernism movement.


The role of performer is also questioned, as well as challenged. Playing in a crazy rhythm, with a wide range of dynamics and pitches, and needing to be perfect to match the recording that is going on, is a live performer really crucial for the process of making music?

All the questions above have no answer for me, we will need to wait and see where the development of music will take us from now on. Like in all the past music periods changes are slow and take a lot to settle in and actually make sense.

Here are some cool post-modern pieces that I really liked listening to, I hope you enjoy:

Karlheinz Stockhausen - Helicopter String Quartet 



John Cage - 4'33":



Laurie Anderson - O Superman:





Now that I went over the different time periods that music has traversed through in a serious manner, lets have a little fun with Youtube videos! These videos are an attempt of the performers to represent the evolution of music. It is very interesting to watch those, now that I gain so much more background knowledge from this course.

String quartets are very important in music history, so here is The Stringfever History Music:

I'd call this the evolution of pop music, by A capella group Pentatonix: