MUSICAL LANGUAGE AND FORMAL DESIGN IN DALLAPICCOLA'S SICUT UMBRA

Abstract

The goal of music analysis is to understand musical structure using constituent elements and to explain how these elements shape the piece. The purpose of this dissertation is to promote a better understanding of the interrelation between form and text as well as the relevance of Dallapiccola's concept of polarity in Sicut Umbra (1970). Dallapiccola's full recognition of the difference between tonal and twelve-tone music enables him to create his musical concept, Polarity, which is the simple answer to understanding and appreciating his twelve-tone music.

This analysis focuses on how the musical surface contributes to the creation of form and how the musical setting provides a better understanding of the text. The analysis of each movement reaches to several results: (1) the development of individual elements and their interrelations contribute to the progress of movement; (2) the trace of every member of the dyads ([01] and [06]) and the trichords ([012], [013], [014], [016]) suggests the development of sonorities; (3) the developed sonority forms the coherence especially in shaping form; and (4) the musical elements contribute to the text setting and in achieving a better understanding of the poems. Understanding this structure gives several insights into Dallapiccola's compositional style: (1) deeper understanding of his use of pitches (both row and outside row), rhythm, texture, and sonority, (2) an interpretation of how these elements shape the form and create the unique relationship to the text, and (3) appreciation for the combination of classical and twelve-tone techniques involved in polarity. Dallapiccola's polarity is not a technique for composition, but is a concept inseparable from the set musical elements, their development, and functions and is essential to Dallapiccola's construction of musical form for expression and coherence.