LXXVI. LIGETI, György: Musica Ricercata

LXXVI. LIGETI, György (1923-2006)

Musica Ricercata (1951-53)
1. Sostenuto -- Misurato -- Prestissimo
2. Mesto rigido e cerimoniale
3. Allegro con spirito
4. Tempo di valse (poco vivace "à l'orgue de Barbarie")
5. Rubato. Lamentoso
6. Allegro molto capriccioso
7. Cantabile, molto legato
8. Vivace. Energico
9. (Béla Bartók in Memoriam) Adagio. Mesto -- Allegro maestoso
10. Vivace. Capriccioso
11. (Omaggio a Girolamo Frescobaldi) Andante misurato e tranquillo
Roman Rabinovich, piano
(27:24)

Born in Transylvania, Romania to Hungarian parents, Ligeti barely survived the Holocaust (he lost most of his immediate family) and then barely survived Communism.

It was only in 1956 when he made it to the West that his avant-garde impulses were rewarded with great admiration from the contemporary music establishment.

These eleven movements are astonishing examples of a modern re-thinking of an old style of composition called a ricecar, from the late Renaissance and early Baroque periods.

In music school, I was taught that a ricecar is basically just a fugue (with long notes). The exact meaning is "to search out" which is what happens in a typical fugue.

But what Ligeti does with the term is to "search out" new ideas about tonality and rhythmic complexity.

The first movement involves only one pitch class -- an A. The final note is a D, thus setting up his exploration ("searching out") ...

By the time you get to Movement 11, he uses all 12 notes of the chromatic scale.

The second movement may sound familiar if you've seen Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut (1999).

Kubrick first used Ligeti's music in 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) without his permission. A copyright lawsuit followed and they settled out of court.

He must not have held a grudge, because at the German premiere of Eyes, he escorted Kubrick's widow.

**

In my complete Ligeti collection (which seems now to be out-of-print), there is a recording of Pierre Charial playing this work on a barrel organ.