Jubiläum
Encyclopedia
Jubiläum is an orchestral composition by Karlheinz Stockhausen
, work-number 45 in the composer’s catalogue of works.
Opera House, and has therefore been called Stockhausen’s "Operatic Festival Overture" (Griffiths 1980). It was premiered on 10 October 1977 by the Regional Orchestra of Lower Saxony
, conducted by George Albrecht. In February 1980 Stockhausen revised the score, and this version was first performed on 9 May 1980 at the Royal Festival Hall
, London, by the Philharmonia Orchestra
conducted by Andrew Davis
(Kurtz 1992, 208–209; Stockhausen 1989, 126). The score is dedicated to Péter Eötvös
.
, announced at the beginning as a massive hymn-like chant in the brass and low strings. The harmonic language of Jubiläum is reminiscent of the music of Stockhausen’s teacher Olivier Messiaen
, and the dramatic use of space recalls Hector Berlioz
. The formula is presented mainly in a series of dense textures overlaid with shimmering glissando
s and rapid melodic figurations, in a "mix of majestic confidence and restless activity" that produces a quality of "breathtaking splendour that is Stockhausen's alone" (Griffiths 1980).
The formula of Jubiläum is in the guise of a chorale
with a melody containing 15 pitches grouped into five segments of 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 tones:
C + F F + G D A + C B A E + G E B D G.
The five segments have durations of 2, 3 (1 + 2), 6 (3 + 1 + 2), 10 (2 + 4 +1 + 3), and 15 (4 + 1 + 2 + 3 + 5) crotchets
, and each is followed by a "coloured silence" of 2, 3, 4, 6, and 9 crotchets. These colourations are made in the lower instruments (horns, violas, cellos) by overtone glissandos
, in the middle register by natural-harmonic glissandos in the violins, and in the highest register by arpeggio
s on five triangles and a set of glass chimes (Stockhausen 1989, 127).
Each note of this melody is accompanied by a chord, and these chords fluctuate in density between two and five notes according to a serial distribution: 2 3 4 5 5 4 3 2 3 4 5 5 4 3 2 notes per chord. These chords collectively form a harmonic double "wave", whose chord densities rise and fall twice. At the same time, a single wave of level of dissonance first increases from a unison
at the beginning to a minor ninth in the middle, and then decreases back to perfect consonances (octave
and perfect fifth
) at the end (Stockhausen 1989, 126–27).
. Each layer is effectively a melodic "loop" of fifteen notes, constantly repeating but transformed in pitch and speed (Maconie 2005, 391).
The orchestra is arranged on the platform according to register, with the deepest instruments at the left, progressing across the stage to the highest instruments on the right—analogous to a piano keyboard (Maconie 2005, 390). A tenor layer (trumpets, horns, violas, and cellos) begins with a slow statement of the formula, and then the players begin repeating the formula independent of one another, gradually increasing speed until the fifteen notes of the formula compress into a "whirling band of sound" (Stockhausen 1978, 343; Stockhausen 1989, 128).
A mezzo-soprano group (flutes, clarinets, and violins) plays the formula a perfect eleventh
higher. This layer begins with the instruments playing independently and very fast, gradually slowing down and becoming synchronised at the middle, then accelerating and becoming independent again at the end. A very high group, recalling the "star-sound" colouring of Stockhausen's Formel, consisting of glockenspiels, piano (treble only, with sustaining pedal), and celesta, plays the formula two octaves and a major seventh higher than the bass group, and begins like the middle-register group, playing fast and independent of one another. They also slow down and begin to differentiate the rhythmic values of the formula, but do this more gradually than the middle-register group, achieving the slowest tempo only near the end, concluding with a synchronised statement of the formula in its slowest tempo, lasting about two minutes. These three layers unfold a combined shape in which the slow chorale is presented on successively higher steps (Stockhausen 1989, 128–29; Maconie 2005, 390).
The fourth, lowest instrumental group (bell plates, bassoons, and double basses) plays the formula seven times as a ground bass, synchronised each time to one of the other three groups:
The low brass break through the musical fabric with a statement of the formula from the back of the hall (or from a projecting balcony at the back or at one side) a little more than three minutes from the beginning, and the four oboes similarly play from offstage about nine-and-a-half minutes through the piece. The composer calls these events "sound windows" (Stockhausen 1978, 344). All four instrumental groups conclude the work with a synchronous formula statement, nearly four times the speed of the slowest tempo, to end in a "festive, brilliant, and confident" mode (Stockhausen 1989, 129).
These elements combine to produce a symmetrical form of nine sections plus the concluding (tenth) statement (Stockhausen 1989, 127):
In the revised version of 1980, one after another six solo instruments step forth from the orchestra, starting in the second stage with the first horn. In the fourth stage (just after the first window), a cumulation begins, first with a duet, then a trio, quartet, quintet, and finally a sextet, linking the polyphonic layers through all the registers and horizontalising their harmonies into concise melodic and rhythmic figures.
Like the rest of the orchestra, these instruments are distinctly separated in space (Stockhausen 1989, 129). Whereas the first version of the score relied solely on acoustical means to achieve dynamic balance, amplification
became a requirement for performance after the addition of the soloists in the revised version (Maconie 2005, 393).
Strings are doubled either as 8-8-8-6-6 or 10-10-8-6-6.
Karlheinz Stockhausen
Karlheinz Stockhausen was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. Another critic calls him "one of the great visionaries of 20th-century music"...
, work-number 45 in the composer’s catalogue of works.
History
Jubiläum is a relatively short work of about 15 minutes duration, written in 1977 on commission for the 125th-anniversary celebration of the HannoverHanover
Hanover or Hannover, on the river Leine, is the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony , Germany and was once by personal union the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, under their title as the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg...
Opera House, and has therefore been called Stockhausen’s "Operatic Festival Overture" (Griffiths 1980). It was premiered on 10 October 1977 by the Regional Orchestra of Lower Saxony
Lower Saxony
Lower Saxony is a German state situated in north-western Germany and is second in area and fourth in population among the sixteen states of Germany...
, conducted by George Albrecht. In February 1980 Stockhausen revised the score, and this version was first performed on 9 May 1980 at the Royal Festival Hall
Royal Festival Hall
The Royal Festival Hall is a 2,900-seat concert, dance and talks venue within Southbank Centre in London. It is situated on the South Bank of the River Thames, not far from Hungerford Bridge. It is a Grade I listed building - the first post-war building to become so protected...
, London, by the Philharmonia Orchestra
Philharmonia Orchestra
The Philharmonia Orchestra is one of the leading orchestras in Great Britain, based in London. Since 1995, it has been based in the Royal Festival Hall. In Britain it is also the resident orchestra at De Montfort Hall, Leicester and the Corn Exchange, Bedford, as well as The Anvil, Basingstoke...
conducted by Andrew Davis
Andrew Davis (conductor)
Sir Andrew Frank Davis CBE is a British conductor.Born in Ashridge, Hertfordshire to Robert J. Davis and his wife Florence J. née Badminton, Davis grew up in Chesham, Buckinghamshire, and in Watford. Davis attended Watford Boys' Grammar School, where he studied classics in his sixth form years...
(Kurtz 1992, 208–209; Stockhausen 1989, 126). The score is dedicated to Péter Eötvös
Peter Eötvös
Péter Eötvös is a Hungarian composer and conductor.Eötvös was born in Odorheiu Secuiesc/Székelyudvarhely, Szeklerland, Transylvania . He studied composition in Budapest and Cologne. From 1962, he composed for film in Hungary. Eötvös played regularly with the Stockhausen Ensemble between 1968 and...
.
Character of the work
In Jubiläum, Stockhausen composed an orchestral sound event with superimposed layers of different speeds, degrees of noise, degrees of indeterminacy and integration, and simultaneous transitions from ordered to disordered and back (Maconie 2005, 390). The work is built upon a formulaFormula composition
Formula composition is a serially-derived technique encountered principally in the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen, involving the projection, expansion, and Ausmultiplikation of either a single melody-formula, or a two- or three-voice contrapuntal construction .In contrast to serial music, where the...
, announced at the beginning as a massive hymn-like chant in the brass and low strings. The harmonic language of Jubiläum is reminiscent of the music of Stockhausen’s teacher Olivier Messiaen
Olivier Messiaen
Olivier Messiaen was a French composer, organist and ornithologist, one of the major composers of the 20th century. His music is rhythmically complex ; harmonically and melodically it is based on modes of limited transposition, which he abstracted from his early compositions and improvisations...
, and the dramatic use of space recalls Hector Berlioz
Hector Berlioz
Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande messe des morts . Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation. He specified huge orchestral forces for some of his works; as a...
. The formula is presented mainly in a series of dense textures overlaid with shimmering glissando
Glissando
In music, a glissando is a glide from one pitch to another. It is an Italianized musical term derived from the French glisser, to glide. In some contexts it is distinguished from the continuous portamento...
s and rapid melodic figurations, in a "mix of majestic confidence and restless activity" that produces a quality of "breathtaking splendour that is Stockhausen's alone" (Griffiths 1980).
The formula of Jubiläum is in the guise of a chorale
Chorale
A chorale was originally a hymn sung by a Christian congregation. In certain modern usage, this term may also include classical settings of such hymns and works of a similar character....
with a melody containing 15 pitches grouped into five segments of 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 tones:
The five segments have durations of 2, 3 (1 + 2), 6 (3 + 1 + 2), 10 (2 + 4 +1 + 3), and 15 (4 + 1 + 2 + 3 + 5) crotchets
Quarter note
A quarter note or crotchet is a note played for one quarter of the duration of a whole note . Often people will say that a crotchet is one beat, however, this is not always correct, as the beat is indicated by the time signature of the music; a quarter note may or may not be the beat...
, and each is followed by a "coloured silence" of 2, 3, 4, 6, and 9 crotchets. These colourations are made in the lower instruments (horns, violas, cellos) by overtone glissandos
Glissando
In music, a glissando is a glide from one pitch to another. It is an Italianized musical term derived from the French glisser, to glide. In some contexts it is distinguished from the continuous portamento...
, in the middle register by natural-harmonic glissandos in the violins, and in the highest register by arpeggio
Arpeggio
An arpeggio is a musical technique where notes in a chord are played or sung in sequence, one after the other, rather than ringing out simultaneously...
s on five triangles and a set of glass chimes (Stockhausen 1989, 127).
Each note of this melody is accompanied by a chord, and these chords fluctuate in density between two and five notes according to a serial distribution: 2 3 4 5 5 4 3 2 3 4 5 5 4 3 2 notes per chord. These chords collectively form a harmonic double "wave", whose chord densities rise and fall twice. At the same time, a single wave of level of dissonance first increases from a unison
Unison
In music, the word unison can be applied in more than one way. In general terms, it may refer to two notes sounding the same pitch, often but not always at the same time; or to the same musical voice being sounded by several voices or instruments together, either at the same pitch or at a distance...
at the beginning to a minor ninth in the middle, and then decreases back to perfect consonances (octave
Octave
In music, an octave is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music", the use of which is "common in most musical systems"...
and perfect fifth
Perfect fifth
In classical music from Western culture, a fifth is a musical interval encompassing five staff positions , and the perfect fifth is a fifth spanning seven semitones, or in meantone, four diatonic semitones and three chromatic semitones...
) at the end (Stockhausen 1989, 126–27).
Form
There are four superimposed instrumental layers corresponding to different musical processesProcess music
Process music is music that arises from a process. It may make that process audible to the listener, or the process may be concealed. Primarily begun in the 1960s, diverse composers have employed divergent methods and styles of process...
. Each layer is effectively a melodic "loop" of fifteen notes, constantly repeating but transformed in pitch and speed (Maconie 2005, 391).
The orchestra is arranged on the platform according to register, with the deepest instruments at the left, progressing across the stage to the highest instruments on the right—analogous to a piano keyboard (Maconie 2005, 390). A tenor layer (trumpets, horns, violas, and cellos) begins with a slow statement of the formula, and then the players begin repeating the formula independent of one another, gradually increasing speed until the fifteen notes of the formula compress into a "whirling band of sound" (Stockhausen 1978, 343; Stockhausen 1989, 128).
A mezzo-soprano group (flutes, clarinets, and violins) plays the formula a perfect eleventh
Eleventh
In music or music theory an eleventh is the note eleven scale degrees from the root of a chord and also the interval between the root and the eleventh....
higher. This layer begins with the instruments playing independently and very fast, gradually slowing down and becoming synchronised at the middle, then accelerating and becoming independent again at the end. A very high group, recalling the "star-sound" colouring of Stockhausen's Formel, consisting of glockenspiels, piano (treble only, with sustaining pedal), and celesta, plays the formula two octaves and a major seventh higher than the bass group, and begins like the middle-register group, playing fast and independent of one another. They also slow down and begin to differentiate the rhythmic values of the formula, but do this more gradually than the middle-register group, achieving the slowest tempo only near the end, concluding with a synchronised statement of the formula in its slowest tempo, lasting about two minutes. These three layers unfold a combined shape in which the slow chorale is presented on successively higher steps (Stockhausen 1989, 128–29; Maconie 2005, 390).
The fourth, lowest instrumental group (bell plates, bassoons, and double basses) plays the formula seven times as a ground bass, synchronised each time to one of the other three groups:
- with the bass group, very slow
- with the bass group, accelerando
- with the middle group, ritardando
- with the middle group, very slow
- with the middle group, accelerando
- with the high group, ritardando
- with the high group, very slow
The low brass break through the musical fabric with a statement of the formula from the back of the hall (or from a projecting balcony at the back or at one side) a little more than three minutes from the beginning, and the four oboes similarly play from offstage about nine-and-a-half minutes through the piece. The composer calls these events "sound windows" (Stockhausen 1978, 344). All four instrumental groups conclude the work with a synchronous formula statement, nearly four times the speed of the slowest tempo, to end in a "festive, brilliant, and confident" mode (Stockhausen 1989, 129).
These elements combine to produce a symmetrical form of nine sections plus the concluding (tenth) statement (Stockhausen 1989, 127):
- tenor chorale, ca. 2 mins.
- accel./rit., ca. 1½ mins.
- first window (trombones and tuba, back of the hall), ca. 1 min.
- rit./accel., ca. 1½ mins.
- mezzo-soprano chorale, ca. 2 mins.
- accel./rit., ca. 1½ mins.
- second window (offstage oboes), ca. 1 min.
- rit./accel., ca. 1½ mins.
- high chorale, ca. 2 minutes
- tutti codaCoda (music)Coda is a term used in music in a number of different senses, primarily to designate a passage that brings a piece to an end. Technically, it is an expanded cadence...
, ca. 37 secs.
In the revised version of 1980, one after another six solo instruments step forth from the orchestra, starting in the second stage with the first horn. In the fourth stage (just after the first window), a cumulation begins, first with a duet, then a trio, quartet, quintet, and finally a sextet, linking the polyphonic layers through all the registers and horizontalising their harmonies into concise melodic and rhythmic figures.
- in the second stage, the first horn
- from the fourth stage, adding the first trombone
- from the fifth stage, adding the first violin
- from the sixth stage, adding the first flute
- from the eighth stage (just after the second window), adding the first oboe
- from the ninth stage, adding the piano
Like the rest of the orchestra, these instruments are distinctly separated in space (Stockhausen 1989, 129). Whereas the first version of the score relied solely on acoustical means to achieve dynamic balance, amplification
Amplifier
Generally, an amplifier or simply amp, is a device for increasing the power of a signal.In popular use, the term usually describes an electronic amplifier, in which the input "signal" is usually a voltage or a current. In audio applications, amplifiers drive the loudspeakers used in PA systems to...
became a requirement for performance after the addition of the soloists in the revised version (Maconie 2005, 393).
Instrumentation
- 4 (or 2) flutes (4th doubling piccolo)
- 4 (or 2) oboes
- 4 (or 2) clarinets
- 3 (or 2) bassoons
- 1 contrabassoon
- 4 (or 2) horns (B/F double horns)
- 3 (or 2) trumpets (all with straight, cup, and wawa mutes)
- 4 (or 2) trombones (or 3 trombones and 1 additional horn—1st trombone with F-valve attachment)
- 1 tuba
- 2 keyboard glockenspiels (with pedal)
- 1 set of hanging glass chimes
- 5 triangles of different sizes
- 2 Percussionists:
- 1 chromatic set of sound plates (or plate bells, or a chromatic set of tuned gongs and tamtams)
- 1 piano
- 1 celesta
- first violins
- second violins
- violas
- cellos
- double basses
- (+ 10 microphones, 6 loudspeakers, and a mixing desk for a sound director)
Strings are doubled either as 8-8-8-6-6 or 10-10-8-6-6.
Discography
- Stockhausen, Karlheinz. Jubiläum für Orchester; TierkreisTierkreis (Stockhausen)Tierkreis is a musical composition by the German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen. The title is the German word for Zodiac, and the composition consists of twelve melodies, each representing one sign of the zodiac.-History:...
: Zehn Sternzeichen für Orchester; Tierkreis für das historische Glockenspiel des Kölner Rathauses. BBC Symphony Orchestra, cond. Oliver KnussenOliver KnussenOliver Knussen CBE is a British composer and conductor.-Biography:Oliver Knussen was born in Glasgow, Scotland. His father, Stuart Knussen, was principal double bass of the London Symphony Orchestra. Oliver Knussen studied composition with John Lambert, between 1963 and 1969 and also received...
(Jubiläum). Orchestra Mozart (Bologna), cond. Oliver Knussen (Tierkreis for orchestra); Cologne Town Hall Carillon, programmed by Bert Augustus (adaptation of a version of Tierkreis by Kathinka PasveerKathinka Pasveer-Biography:Kathinka Pasveer was born in Zaandam, North Holland, the daughter of a conductor who also taught at the Amsterdam Conservatory . She studied with Frans Vester at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, where she received her performer's diploma, with the distinction of the Nicolai Prize in...
and Suzanne StephensSuzanne StephensSuzanne Stephens is an American clarinetist, resident in Germany, described as "an outstanding performer and tireless promoter of the clarinet and basset horn" .-Biography:...
). Stockhausen Complete Edition CD 100. Kürten: Stockhausen-Verlag, 2010.
Further reading
- Frisius, Rudolf. 2008. Karlheinz Stockhausen II: Die Werke 1950–1977; Gespräch mit Karlheinz Stockhausen, "Es geht aufwärts". Mainz, London, Berlin, Madrid, New York, Paris, Prague, Tokyo, and Toronto: Schott Musik International. ISBN 9783795702496.
- Hewett, Ivan. 2010. "Troublesome Trip to the Heights of Radiance: Proms 2010". Daily Telegraph (30 July): 31.
- Rigoni, Michel. 1998. Stockhausen: ... un vaisseau lancé vers le ciel, 2nd edition, revised, corrected, and enlarged. Lillebonne: Millénaire III Editions. ISBN 2911906020.
External links
- Yáñez, Paco. 2011. "Se completa la Edición Stockhausen". Review of Stcokhausen Complete Edition CD 100. Mundoclasico.com (26 September) (Accessed 8 November 2011).