Thema (Omaggio a Joyce)

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Thema (Omaggio a Joyce)
Thema (Omaggio a Joyce) is an electroacoustic composition by Luciano Berio, for voice and tape. Composed
between 1958 and 1959, it is based on the interpretative reading of the poem "Sirens" from chapter 11 of the novel
Ulysses by James Joyce by Cathy Berberian and on the elaboration of her recorded voice by technological means.
History and context of the composition
According to the definitive piece published in 1995 (CD BMG 09026-68302-2), the text and the interpretation of it
by Berberian can be heard in the first part (1 minute and 56 seconds), while the electroacoustic elaboration of it can
be heard in the second part (6 minutes and 13 seconds); the complete length of the definitive composition is 8
minutes and 9 seconds.
The piece was originally composed to be part of a never broadcast radio program by Luciano Berio and Umberto
Eco titled Omaggio a Joyce. Documenti sulla qualit onomatopeica del linguaggio poetico. Subsequently, the piece,
conceived for four channels, was recorded in stereo in two versions, the first titled Thema (Omaggio a Joyce) (LP
Turnabout TV 34177), 1958; the second titled Omaggio a Joyce (LP Limelight LS 86047), 1959. In 1995 it was
digitally restored in stereo (CD BMG 09026-68302-2) and this is the version Berio declared as definitive (8 minutes
and 9 seconds).
Musical form
The work resumes the linguistic studies the composer has been carried on for some years in collaboration with Eco
during the first stages of the Studio di fonologia in Milan; these studies were focused on one hand on the sonorous
relationships between many different European languages; on the other hand, on the pure vocalism from several
point of view: linguistic, phonetic, anthropological, musical. In particular, the construction of a new musical form
based on the oscillation between music, literature and multimedia languages can be seen as the result of the
interdisciplinary studies carried on at the Studio di Fonologia.
Luciano Berio aimed to the synthesis of different fields to break down the borders of the artistic and scientific
specializations between music, poetry and technology. So first of all, the main feature of the composition is the
oscillation between oblivion and construction which reminds directly to the poetic writing form. The work is based
on the idea of the electroacoustic montage of sounds as well.
This is the first time in history of music a recorded intelligible text was literally "broke into
pieces".Wikipedia:Disputed statement In particular, the composer had classified the recorded words included in
"Sirens" according to their resonance colors, in relation to the resonance point of the vocal apparatus. The colors are
chosen in considerations of the phonetic and their sonorous matter and then elaborated and mixed by the analogical
technology of the Studio di Fonologia consisting of nine oscillators during a very long work which was handmade as
technological.
The compositional category of the contemporary musical art, using words and vocals as a primary source, playing
with the tension between semantic and musical characteristics, through the technology, has been constituted from
this moment on.
The intrinsic musicality of the language and the research of infinite possibilities of combining phonemes are very
important in this work as well. The tension/relationship between construction of the words and a new elaboration of
them and meaning of sounds, which is a peculiar element of the Joyce's writings, is transposed from the silent written
form to a new musical, electroacoustic form. In this way, Berio fragments the Joyce's text read by Berberian to
recompose it in a new technologically elaborated form. The electroacustic elaborations and the montage are realized
in the words and texts as on the sounds and noises produced by the voice. In particular, as Berio said, the sound
object transformation must take into account the near-musical attributes that are contained in the sound object itself.
Thema (Omaggio a Joyce)
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To the degrees of the sound object transformation then corresponds a different degree of significance in relation to
the original rough state of the object itself.
The composition features a very peculiar structure away from every know musical theory, to create a
poetical-musical opera done not through themes but with the forms of language it-self. In this oscillation and in the
deconstruction of the meaning of the words, in the research of pure timbre and resonances, "the sound becomes
meaning" and the voice becomes the symbol of the human body it-self and its expressive sign, as the "symbol of
language" or the principle of the "languages of things", according with the well known Walter Benjamin theory.
References
Article Sources and Contributors
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Article Sources and Contributors
Thema (Omaggio a Joyce) Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=605010096 Contributors: Arjayay, EdithLane, Graham87, Jerome Kohl, John of Reading, Jonesey95, Michael
Bednarek, Ost316, Woohookitty,
License
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
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