Claus Steffen Mahnkopf Book order

Content and substance (Gehalt) in music is the difficult theme of this volume. The central questions are the following: in what manner is music more than immanence, structure, and autonomous meaning, and to what degree do „extramusical“ ideas and conceptions shape the work so that more appears to be in it than music alone. This theme is above all relevant for contemporary music of the twenty-first century, as ever more composers are interested both in cultural discourse and in a content-orientation for their music. How they approach such themes varies widely. The present volume presents essays by Mark Barden, Dániel Péter Biró, Frank Cox, Suzanne Farrin, Wieland Hoban, Claus-Steffen Mahnkopf, Timothy McCormack, Kai Johannes Polzhofer, Wolfram Schurig, Hannes Seidl, Steven Kazuo Takasugi, and Ming Tsao. All of these composers were invited to ponder the relationship between musical structure and the substance of music in light of their own musical practices.

Time and again, New Music has been described as a great process entailing the expansion of musical material. Although the progress of material has always also been criticized, it can be said that it has proved irrefutable over long periods. Postmodernity too, without intending it, expanded the range of material. Three new areas became available: the art music of the past, popular music (of the present) and ethnic music (of the world's peoples). Now that postmodernism has itself been „exhausted,“ and thus become historical, it is time to ask how composers today approach the expanded forms of material and integrate them into their musical work. The essays by Michael Beil, Dániel Péter Biró, Franklin Cox, Clemens Gadenstätter, Wieland Hoban, Johannes Kreidler, Claus-Steffen Mahnkopf, Christopher Trebue Moore, Wolfram Schurig, Alexander Sigman, Steven Kazuo Takasugi and Ming Tsao explore the space between immanent logic and specific external references.

The Second Modernity aims to present a viable alternative to the postmodern musical and cultural self-conception, to express solidarity with the historical avant-garde and the classical Modernity, to place its trust in reflexion, to point out directions into the future, and, concomitantly, to offer a platform to composers of the younger and middle generations so that they might be able to articulate their aims. Over the last few years there are clear signs of the presence of this concept in musical discourse: in prominent festivals, in theoretical texts, and in discussions. What this might signify in musical, aesthetic, and compositional terms is appears in essays by ten composers analyzing their own works: Aaron Cassidy, Sebastian Claren, Frank Cox, Chaya Czernowin, Michael Edgerton, Claus-Steffen Mahnkopf, Brice Pauset, Wolfram Schurig, Steven Kazuo Takasugi und Hans Thomalla.

Critical composition is generally associated with compositional approaches sharing a fundamental left-leaning political stance in relation to their own position in society that can lead to a decided political commitment, and is carried by the conviction that the treatment of musical material must be »critically« oriented. These positions have meanwhile gained astounding recognition, which must now – in the face of the rapid societal changes since the late 1980s and also the »competing venture« of post-modernity, which seemingly denies the younger and middle generations access to a critical form of composition – be problematized. In order to render the transition from a First to a Second Modernity comprehensible, essays have been requested from composers, musicologists, philosophers and sociologists. The contributors to the present volume are the following: Frank Cox, Gordon Downie, Ernst Helmuth Flammer, Harry Lehmann, Claus-Steffen Mahnkopf, Günter Mayer, Dieter Mersch, Rainer Nonnenmann, Nicola Sani, Gerhard Stäbler, and Ferdinand Zehentreiter.

Twelve artists – from composers to creators of sound installations – present their work in this volume. These pieces were all created in recent years, and represent the current state of technological options and their musical and artistic potential. Mark Applebaum, Sidney Corbett, Frank Cox, Georg Klein, Claus-Steffen Mahnkopf, Chris Mercer, Christoph Ogiermann, João Rafael, Alexander Stankowski, Steven Kazuo Takasugi, Ian Willcock, and Gerhard Winkler offer detailed analyses primarily of the technical aspects in relation to their respective poetic intentions.