Crumb's Apparition and Emerson's Compensation

Society for Music Theory
Crumbs Apparition and Emersons Compensation

Author(s): Robert C. Cook
Source: Music Theory Spectrum, Vol. 34, No. 2 (Fall 2012), pp. 1-25
Published by: {oupl} on behalf of the Society for Music Theory
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Crumbs Apparition and Emersons Compensation
robert c. cook
This essay addresses the problems of variety and eclecticism in the music of George Crumb through
a study of the song cycle Apparition (1979). I adopt Ralph Waldo Emersons Compensation
a broad, plural principle embracing cyclicity, periodicity, binary opposition, and convergence with the
divineas the perspective from which to interpret motivic threads that gather in the cycles fifth
song. I trace Emersonian themes in the cycles text (a portion of Walt Whitmans When Lilacs Last
in the Dooryard Bloomd) and music, identifying interactions among the pitch-class collections in
Crumbs diverse palette as expressions of various, sometimes irreconcilable, categories of Compen-
sation. This approach thus avoids choosing between labeling Crumbs music as novelty and asserting
hidden structure.
Keywords: Apparition, George Crumb, Ralph Waldo Emerson, text-music relations, transforma-
tional theory, Walt Whitman
T
hree times in Come Lovely and Soothing Death, Rehearsal numbers 26 and 27; the third Call, at Rehearsal 341,
the fifth song of George Crumbs Apparition (1979), ends the song. Though each Call uses a pair of descending
the soprano summons Death. Example 1 excerpts the whole-tone dyads, each pair makes a different sort of tetrachord:
passages, which I shall refer to as the Calls to Death. The first the first is whole-tone, 4-21[0246]; the second is octatonic or
and second Calls are near the beginning of the song, at possibly diatonic, 4-10[0235]; and the third is chromatic,
4-1[0123]. On the one hand, intentions of motivic unity are
clear: each utterance follows a soft striking, in time with the
sopranos initial eighth rest, of undamped strings in the pianos
lowest octave or so; Crumb calls for articulations and dynamics
that are identical or similar. On the other hand, the collectional
diversity resists ascription of unity on bases more comfortable
for theorists to formalize than subset inclusion or poetic
association.
The analytical problem raised by the Calls and other passages
in Apparition is representative of central concerns in scholarly
approaches to Crumbs music. Musicians are familiar with
Crumbs diverse palette of pitch materialnot to mention the
array of unconventional instrumental techniques, performance
directions, and even costumesof which the Calls are a rela-
tively orderly expression. In response to critical assessments of
Crumbs music as no more than an assemblage of spooky
effects1 or not a mere assemblage of sound effects but a sus-
tained and beautiful dream vision of the deep,2 scholars have
asserted logical and organic structure3 and motivically uni-
fied, complete musical structures4 that synthesize Crumbs
multiple juxtaposed figures and sonorities, despite . . . surface
Research for this study was supported by an Old Gold Summer Fellowship
from the University of Iowa and a Stanley-University of Iowa Foundation
Support Organization travel grant. Earlier versions of this paper were
presented at the annual meeting of Music Theory Midwest in Lawrence,
Kansas, in April 2007, and at the Sixth European Music Analysis
example 1. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing Conference, Freiburg, Germany, October 2007.
Death, Calls to Death: (a) at Rehearsal 26, whole-tone; (b) at
Rehearsal 27, octatonic or diatonic; (c) one after Rehearsal 34, 1 Moevs (1976, 302).
2 Porter (1973, 136).
chromatic. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by
3 Wilkinson (1986, 61).
permission. 4 Bass (1994, 182).
2 music theory spectrum 34 (2012)
simplicity.5 This work illuminates Crumbs interest in sym- the question is still begged; what if the diverse figures and
metry and motivic connections within and among movements, shifting referential collections in Crumbs music are meant to
but an interpretive dilemma remains: make no claims for remain distinct, to express variety as much as his instrumenta-
a controlling structure and risk a disintegrated interpretation, or tion and use of timbre? This is the question I seek to answer in
assert a single underlyingand hiddenorder and risk an this article. I presume that unity in Apparition is one of pur-
interpretation that dismisses as mere surface the composers pose in the travels of various figures, drawn from different ref-
strong stylistic eclecticism.6 To say that Crumbs music is a erential collections, along common transformational paths.
dynamic, organically conceived union of idiosyncratic and extra- Turning analytical attention from pitch-class-set identity and
musical elements with those involving more traditional structural inclusion to the transformational conditions orienting multiple
parameters, including that of pitch7 (emphasis mine) ac- paths through and among referential collections in Apparition, I
knowledges the dilemma but situates analytical study clearly on argue that pitch and pitch-class figures in Come Lovely and
the side of structure and unity. Soothing Death move in recognizably related ways through
To be sure, studies by Richard Bass, Dave Headlam, Edward distinct referential pitch-class collections.14 I interpret collec-
Pearsall, Ciro Scotto, and others8 broaden analytical under- tional diversity in the song and related movements of the cycle
standing of Crumbs music and, from different perspectives, as the changing environment across which figures move and
respect both the divergent characteristics of the music and the change independently, though in response to the same trans-
expediency of discerning a coherent set of principles and tech- formational conditions.15 No unified structure need be asserted;
niques through which one imagines it to have been composed. indeed, my interpretation shows how both music and text in
Bass investigates transformational intersections between col- Apparition actively avoid synthesis.16
lections;9 Headlam uses spectrographic analysis to support in- There are resonances in my approach with studies by Steven
terpretations that integrate pitch-class and timbre analyses; Bruns of multivalent intertextuality in Crumbs music.17 Bruns
Pearsall discerns in Crumbs music the articulation of overarch- explores intertextual associations of instrumentation, motive and
ing principlesdialectics, pitch symmetry, collection comple- motivic transformation, form, pitch-class centricity, and genre
tionor structural paradigms according to which motives with music by Haydn, Mahler, and Bartok. Bruns hears
and their relations may be ordered;10 Scottos analysis of Pro- Crumbs music in multiple contexts, echoing or responding
cessional traces aggregate-completing partitioning and transpo- to music of the antique tonal tradition.18 From this perspective,
sitional combination techniques to show that these surface Crumbs music is neither critique nor synthesis of received tra-
formations are the result of deeper or hidden processes.11 dition but a different voice seeking unity of purpose, singing not
Despite recognition of and sensitivity to Crumbs kaleido- in unison but in response.
scopic12 technique, the analytical work cited here ultimately The analytical framework for my argument, presented in
argues for structure and unity in his music within the framework Part I, takes up an observation Bass makes but does not pur-
of Western compositional traditions, identifying contrast and sue.19 I identify the transpositional and inversional conditions
restatement, varied repetition and development, long-range under which the initially whole-tone Call to Death becomes first
composing-out of musical ideas, and underlying motivic con-
nections, all of which cooperate to provide both a sense of unity
and a structural contour.13 14 My purpose here is not simply to shift the focus of analysis from object
(pitch-class set, motive, etc.) to relation (inclusion, transformation, etc.).
Perhaps the role of unity and structure is better understood as
Rather, I want to avoid interpreting objects as necessarily hierarchized by
coherently representing analytic engagement with Crumbs relations; or, I wish to avoid fixing a particular set of relations as structural
music than as asserting something immanent in the music. But and then fulfilled by objects. The metaphor of landscape or terrain through
which I shall argue is apt: if, as Lewin puts it, we can . . . regard them
5 De Dobay (1984, 90). [transformations] as ways of structuring an abstract space . . . through which
In a glowing review of a performance of Vox Balaenae, Porter substitutes the piece moves (Lewin [1993, 34]), we can also regard transformations as
one description entailing no expectation of logical order for another (Porter articulating the space as pathsand impassable placesmapping a land-
[1973]). Reviews by Lewis (1965) and Henahan (1968) are laudatory but scape through which the figures of a piece move. And two different figures
focus on Crumbs timbral effects and motivic collage, as does Moevss less may not move the same way.
positive essay. 15 This essay does not propose an interpretive model for timbre, including
6 Headlam (2005) offers a similar binary opposition. The hypothetical poles instrumentation and extended performance technique, in Apparition.
are perhaps extreme, but they mark out a heuristic frame for music that Headlams (2005) integrative approach offers much insight regarding the
resists delimitation by genre and/or medium. contributions of these features to pitch and rhythmic structure in Madrigals,
7 Bass (1991, 19). but a full account of timbre in Crumbs music will require investigation of
8 Bass (1991) and (1994); Headlam (2005); Pearsall (2004a) and (2005); and for lack of a better termsoundscapes, particularly the natural ones to
Scotto (2002). which many of Crumbs works make reference. That is a subject for
9 Bass (1994, 165"67, 176"82). another study.
10 Pearsall (2005), (2004a), and (2005, 58), respectively. 16 Cf. Szutor (1994, 2).
11 Scotto (2002, [5]). 17 Bruns (1993) and (2005).
12 Castanet (2009, 31). 18 Bruns (1993, 10).
13 Bass (2002, 59"60). 19 Bass (1994, 165"67).
crumbs apparition and emersons compensation 3
table 1. Labeling conventions for referential collections. flora, fauna, and human endeavor celebrated in Whitmans
poetry. From the combined analytical and metaphysical perspec-
Pitch-Class Collection Label tives of Parts I and II, Parts III and IV interpret Come Lovely
and Soothing Death and other movements of Apparition as
fC,D,E,F ,A ,B g WTC Compensatory music, heterophonies of poetic and musical
fD ,E ,F,G,A,Bg WTD expression unified only by a common purpose.
fC,D ,E ,E,F ,G,A,B g OCTC,D i. transformational conditions and inversional

fD ,D,E,F,G,A ,B ,Bg OCTD ,D counterpoint
fC,D,E ,F,F ,A ,A,Bg OCTC,D terms and concepts
I use referential collection,21 as numerous theorists do, to

octatonic and finally chromatic. Part II then broadens the inter- denote a relatively large pitch-class collection to which smaller
pretation by promoting Ralph Waldo Emersons concept of figures make reference, not simply as literal or abstract subsets,
Compensation as a framework within which to understand both but as expressions of the larger collections harmonic influence.
textual and musical landscapes of the song. Compensation is Table 1 lists the labels used in this article for whole-tone and
a plural principle embracing cyclicity, periodicity, binary oppo- octatonic collections. Pitch-class subscripts refer to a convenient
sition, and convergence toward the divine. These themes are index present in the collection but not in the others of the same
familiar in Walt Whitmans poetry; they are easily traced in set class. For example, the dyad fC,D g is present in OCTC,D
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomd, from which but not in OCTD ,D or OCTC,D.22
Crumb drew the text for his song. Adopted as a mode of musical I adopt Basss usage of figure for brief, distinct pitch-rhythm
interpretation, Compensation seeks unity of purpose among gestures and strain for longer gestures.23 Table 2 lists the three
independent, even irreconcilable materials, in contrast to the principal figures and two strains of Come Lovely and Soothing
conventional, loosely Hegelian, post-Beethoven mode that seeks Death. The table cites an instance of each figure (or, to conserve
a synthesis in which salient motivic materials are subsumed by space, a portion thereof), indicates the larger pitch-class collec-
unity.20 I argue that Apparitions music is thus conceptually tion or collections to which the figure refers, and cites the places
consonant with the staggering diversity of North American in the score at which passages containing the figure begin.
Warble is the first figure heard in the song, and its moves
20 The locus classicus of Hegelian interpretation is E. T. A. Hoffmanns review lend significance to a number of transformational paths. For
of Beethovens Fifth Symphony (Hoffmann [1810]). The works of A. B. convenience, I shall refer to each Warble by an anchor note, (e.g.,
Warble on B ), a toggle note above the anchor, and a 3-3[014]
Marx and Moritz Hauptmann are also strongly Hegelian. The explicitly
dialectical perspective is familiar from the writings of Carl Dahlhaus (1991,
54"55, 116"17) and Theodor Adorno ([1949] 2006, 46). See also tail. Example 2 marks these components in Warble on G.
Schmalfeldt (1995). Several Warbles have two toggles: a T10 toggle a minor seventh
The degree to which analytical habits across the discipline are formally above the anchor, as Warble on G has in Example 2, and a T1
dialectical, or specifically Hegelian, is not the issue here: I am suggesting toggle a minor ninth above the anchor. When present, the
neither that most analysts are avowedly Hegelian nor that Crumb is alternate T1 toggle to a given anchor clarifies the orientation of
unaware of or hostile to compositional practices of the last two centuries. pitch-class space. Warbles with T10 toggles are 4-Z15[0146]
Instead, I propose that many analysts, intentionally or not, seek tonal or
motivic dichotomies to be resolved or unified; and that deliberate efforts to
tetrachords. This set-class membership matters little for most
seek plural relations requiring no resolution may yield more satisfying of the analysis to come, though it will be relevant in Part IV.
interpretations of Crumbs music. The transformational conditions of a composition or pas-
Pearsall (2005, 78) proposes dialectics as a paradigm for directed motion sage are all of the transpositional and inversional paths by
in Crumbs music and Scotto (2002, 39) suggests that object (pitch-class
set) and process (transformational combination, aggregate completion) in 21 In the sense of Berger (1963, 12).
Processional peacefully coexist and reinforce each other, and that, In the 22 I could have chosen [04] or [05] dyads as indices. Given the frequency of
spirit of Hegel, Processional is a synthesis of compositional procedures that semitones and whole tones in Crumbs music, my intuition tends more
often assume the roles of thesis and antithesis in the dialectic. The musical toward [01] and [02] indices.
contrasts Pearsall cites are not always clearly oppositional; they comprise Basss (1991, 10), (1994, 159) labels for octatonic and whole-tone collec-
a particular effect and its absence, rather than an effect and its negation. Still, tions and mine correspond as follows:
one might follow Pearsall to Michael Cherlins invocation of a non- Bass Oct-I: OCTC,D
synthetic Heraclitean dialectic in which the resultant (Cherlin [2007, Bass Oct-II: OCTC,D
45]) of the opposition of referential collections or of pitch-class figures in Bass Oct-III: OCTD ,D
Crumbs music is the effect of the variety itself. Such a perspective would be Bass WT-I: WTC
consonant with mine here, but would rely too much on binary relations. Bass WT-II: WTD .
I hear the salient relations in Apparition as more thoroughly plural. The 23 Bass (1991, 2). I reserve motive for combinations of musical gesture and
dialectic Scotto asserts is, I argue, a characteristic analytical attitude more expressive purpose that emerge in earlier movements of the cycle. I examine
than a musical effect. these in Part IV.
table 2. Crumb, Apparition, principal figures and strains. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by permission.
Referential Score
Label Sample Collection Locations
Figures
Warble Octatonic Beginning,

R262, 32
Call to Death Whole-tone R26
Octatonic R27
Chromatic R341
Arrive Octatonic before R29,

before 31
Strains
R28, 30,
Undulate Octatonic
before 33
Dirge Diatonic R29, 31, 33
which a figure moves, or might plausibly be considered as an octatonic figure to move within its original octatonic
moving, with respect to some referential collection.24 For collection by certain transpositions and inversions, and to
example, a given set of transformational conditions permit the other octatonic collections by certain other transpositions
and inversions. Examples with a contrapuntal design can
24 Despite the similarity of locutions to Pearsalls transformational also move into other referential collections. I mean the term
communities and transformational streams, transformational to have topographical connotations rather than, say, logical
conditions are in a sense the opposite of the former and inclusive of the or meteorological. I make the assumption that, though in
latter. The constituents of Pearsalls communities are motives that contain principle any transformation of a figure is possible, only
the same shapes and ordered interval content as the original (2004b, 72), a selection of possible transformations is available for a given
while the elements of my conditions are transformations. Pearsalls streams
figure. Metaphorically speaking, a given figure in Apparition
demarcate the step-by-step evolution of a motive toward new motivic
constructions that may differ quite radically from the source motive (77),
inhabits a terrain through which some transformational
while my conditions, were they expanded to include rotations, retrogrades, paths are accessible but not others; alternatively, a given
and motivic transmutations (73), would include such progressions along figure is able to travel through the landscape by some
with other possible transformational paths. transformational paths but not by others. These other
example 2. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing

Death, components of Warble. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters
Corporation. Used by permission.
pathsother transformationsmay take a figure to a dif-

ferent landscape.25
Bass has noted that transpositional patterns of octatonic or
whole-tone subsets may complete a single collection or project
another according to the transpositional symmetry of the orig- example 3. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing
inal collection.26 He does not discuss inversional symmetry. Death, transformational conditions in the Calls to Death:
Table 3 combines transpositions and inversions and rearranges (a) subsets of referential collections; (b) transformational conditions,
Basss presentation of the former. Rather than list transformations by [02] dyads.
in order by index number, I have grouped them according to their
effects on the octatonic collections. The arrangement encourages
us to view transformational conditions as orientations of paths by suggests these processes; it does not show the transformations
whichor terrains through whichfigures move. by which we might understand the process to happen.
Indeed, by itself, Example 3(a) explicitly asserts only the
transformational conditions of the calls to death collectional membership of the dyads, tetrachords, and penta-
chords in the Calls, not the transformational terrain of that
The transformational conditions under which the Calls to habitat. Example 3(b) sketches the transpositional conditions of
Deathand specifically the descending [02] dyads of which the that terrain and adds some collection membership information
Calls are composedprogress are those under which neither that did not fit easily in Example 3(a).28 The transformational
octatonic nor whole-tone membership can be entirely preserved. conditions shown here are not strictly those of octatonic, whole-
Example 3 offers an analysis of the Calls, first by intersections tone, or chromatic collections, but those of [02] dyads. The
among referential collections (Example 3[a]) and then by trans- inaccuracy is slight, however. A given [02] belongs to only one
position (Example 3[b]). We shall add inversion shortly. In both whole-tone collection and only one octatonic collection and may
parts of the example, stem direction indicates dyad order in each thus stand as a synecdoche for the larger sets.29
Call: the first dyad has stems up; the second dyad has stems down. Together, Examples 3(a) and 3(b) convey the sense of
Example 3(a) shows the shared subsets of referential collections in progression through the Calls at which Example 3(a) alone hints.
Calls after the manner of Bass.27 The analysis suggests a process From the second, octatonic Call to the third, chromatic Call, T5
in pitch-class space by which the whole-tone tetrachord of the and T7 belong to the collections of transpositions that take
first Call splits by whole-tone dyads that move to a semitone apart elements of OCTD,D to elements of the other two octatonic
in the octatonic second Call, and finally overlap in the chromatic collections: T5 moves to OCTC,D while T7 goes to OCTC,D.
third Call. In so doing, the upper dyads of the second and third Likewise, T5 and T7 transform elements of one whole-tone col-
Calls alternate whole-tone collections. The analysis also suggests lection to elements of the other. Transpositional distance between
that upper dyads move through the G-major pentatonic collection dyads within each Call widens from the first through the last Call.
in counterpoint to the lower dyads as they proceed through the We might make one or more of three provisional interpretations:
B-major pentatonic collection. I say the analysis in Example 3(a)
28 Examples 3(a) and 3(b) could have been merged, but the many crossing
25 One might think of Lewins transformation-graph for Weberns Op. 5, lines, some indicating collection membership, some indicating
No. 2 (Lewin [1982"83, 324, Fig. 8]) as an illustration of the transformations, would be uncomfortably disorganized. The reader can
transformational conditions for the trichord X, fG,B,C g, and the easily annotate one with features of the other if desired.
tetrachord Y, fG,B,C,C g. The figures and strains of Come Lovely are 29 The interpretation in Example 3(b) could also be expressed using
not always so closely related as Lewins X and Y, however. transpositional combination. Cohn (1987, 212"14, 306"9) uses passages
26 Bass (1994, 167). from Apparition, including the Undulate strain (307, Example 4.22a), to
27 Bass (1991), (1994). illustrate aspects of the approach.
table 3. Transformational conditions in octatonic and whole-tone collections.
1. The Calls express the progressive chromaticization of pitch-

class space, represented by the progression of whole-tone,
octatonic, and chromatic tetrachords.
2. The Calls express divergence of two dyad series, represented
by the widening interval of transposition between upper and
lower [02] dyads in successive Calls. The series move in
contrary motion, though not entirely symmetrically so.
3. There is no particular significance to the transpositions
themselves. Rather, the Calls and the resultant intersections
between referential collections are surface effects of the
motivic treatment of [02].
There is much useful information in Example 3, but it is

inconclusive. Apart from the informal notion that there is
a progression of sonorities in the song, the analysis conveys little
if any necessary temporal progression. Neither the analysis nor (c)
the provisional interpretations would be less effective if the order 26 27 34+1
of elements were reversed. Furthermore, although we shall see B E A
T10 T10 T10
the [02] dyador more accurately, T10emerge as both an
internal and a progressive motive in the song,30 we are seeking A D G
an interpretation that resists the conventional desideratum of I0 I3 I3
atonal analysis, a surface composing-out of an undifferentiated
E D A
aggregate. T10 T10 T10
Example 4(a) interprets the three Calls to Death as two-voice
counterpoint against pitch axes, turning attention from the set- C B F
class identities of Calls toward articulations of the pitch space
through which the Calls move. The contrapuntal voices revolve T3 T0
about a pitch axis, marked by lozenge-shaped notes: F 4 in the
first Call, A 4-and-G4 in the second, and D4-and-C 4 in the example 4. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing
third. (The example also indicates that the second and third axes Death, Calls to Death as counterpoint about inversional axes:
are pitch-class equivalents, a correspondence to which we will (a) inversions about pitch axes; (b) with third axis exchanged for its
return below.) Soprano and bass are inversionally related, as are pitch-class equivalent; (c) network interpretation.
alto and tenor. Example 4(b) offers an equivalent interpretation
that exchanges pitch accuracy of the Calls for pitch-class equiv- transpositionbetween dyad series. Table 4 displays the effects
alency of inversional axes. The example transposes the begin- of all such shifts on the axes about which octatonic and whole-
ning of the third Call, A and G, up one octave. This move allows tone collections are invariant. The shifting transformations, or
the use of the same axis as in the second Call, A 4-and-G4. The transpositions of axes, are notated here as network transfor-
shift to a pitch-class-equivalent axis for the second and third mations hT n i familiar from literature on Klumpenhouwer
Calls emphasizes the effect of contrary motion between the networks.
upper and lower dyad series. Example 4(c) analyzes the counterpoint of the Calls as
Earlier, Example 3 recognized the progression of the Calls a progression of Klumpenhouwer networks. I am not interested
from whole-tone to octatonic to chromatic and the widening, in renewing the recent methodological debate but for one aspect
albeit an irregular widening, of distance between upper and that is relevant to salient moments in Come Lovely and
lower dyad series. Examples 4(a) and 4(b) clarify both the nature Soothing Death. Two-voice (voice meant loosely) counter-
and direction of this progression and, together with Example 3, point about an axis is the appropriate aural image to form,31
the role of various transformations in these conditions. The and the network transformation hT3i analyzes the transfor-
particular transpositions from dyad to dyad ensure that the mational conditions under which one recognizes this counter-
figures move through all octatonic and both whole-tone col- point.32 Readers familiar with the debate might wonder why I
lections, or conversely, that only OCTD ,D is home to a Call,
but it is the shift from an even axis in the first Call to an
31 Cf. Buchler (2007, [56]).
odd axis in the second Call that makes the migration of 32 Imagine learning to sing the Calls by first removing the pesky register shifts.
the Call from WTD to OCTD ,D possible; there was no way You might begin by mastering three descending tetrachords: 4-21[0246],
to do so with symmetrical contrary motionexpressed as 4-10[0235], and 4-1[0123]. Then you would transpose one [02] dyad in
each tetrachord down an octave to make the Calls proper. But in the
30 Lewin (1982"83, 342). process, you would very likely recognize the narrowing of the interval
table 4. Effects of network transpositions on axes of invariance, by initial octatonic or whole-tone collections.
have not chosen, as Buchler does with his examples, to express The counterpoint through the Calls illustrates the different
the progression with Shaugn ODonnells dual-transposition responses of referential collections to changing transformational
networks. Certainly T5T10hT3i and T5T7hT0i, which conditions. The Calls can move from WTD to OCTD ,D to the
register the Call-to-Call transpositions in the dyad series, are chromatic because hT3i shifts the contrapuntal axis from F 4 (or
also pertinent to the transformational conditions through I0), about which pitch classes in WTD can only move to other
which the Calls move.33 I have chosen these elements of the pitch classes in WTD , to A 4-and-G4 (or I3), about which pitch
system because inversion and axis shifts are the most prominent classes in one whole-tone collection can only proceed to pitch
components of transformational conditions under which classes in the other whole-tone collection. The particular dyads
figures move between referential collections in the song. The in OCTD ,D that constitute the second Call (other 4-10[0235]
analyses in this article will otherwise remain neutral on the tetrachords are possible) are the result of dyad-to-dyad transpo-
appropriateness and efficacy of competing models for atonal sitions T5 and T10. The former flips whole-tone collection
voice leading.34 membership; the latter preserves it. About the new axis, I3, pitch
classes in OCTD ,D can only move to other pitch classes in
OCTD ,D, but the dyad-to-dyad transpositions from the second
between the [02] dyads as you move from tetrachord to tetrachord, and you Call to the third can only relay the pitch classes in OCTD ,D to
might characterize the situation as a sort of counterpoint between what
become the upper and lower series of [02] dyads in the Calls. This
one of the two other octatonic collections.
characterization might be enough for you, but if you wished to analyze Example 4s analysis of the Calls also engages the central
the situation, you would soon find that the axis of the counterpoint image of Deaths approach in Whitmans text, Deaths active
shifts. hT3i indexes the shift precisely. The correspondence between the response to the poets and singers summons; we will explore that
phenomenology of some music and a Klumpenhouwer-network analysis engagement in Part II.
of it might not be close enough to be useful, but it is in the case of Come
Lovely and Soothing Death.
33 ODonnell (1997).
34 I have also avoided the connections between Perles cyclic sets and leading is not so intuitive. I am interested in voice leading among figures
Klumpenhouwer networks (Perle [1993]; Headlam [2002]). While the in Come Lovely more than I am in the ways in which these figures are
Perle-cyclic perspective is useful for studying affiliations among sets embedded in cyclic set complexes. On Klumpenhouwer networks as
represented as Klumpenhouwer networks, the connection with voice interpretations of voice leading, see Klumpenhouwer (1991, 8:1"8:28).
ii. emersonian compensation in whitmans when lilacs a hermit thrush, whose voice is that of a Nature spirit and of
last in the dooryard bloomd Whitmans own, sings a carol of death for Abraham Lin-
coln.41 Crumb chooses the first of the carols seven stanzas,
whitmans text and crumbs text which summons and welcomes Death:
Music in general but especially songas pastime and as Come lovely and soothing death,
metonym for transcendental expressionwas important to Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving,
Whitman. Studies of his musical interests have examined the In the day, in the night, to all, to each,
role of opera in his life and thought, and the influence of musical Sooner or later delicate death.
form on his poetry.35 Indeed, Manuel Villar Raso proposes
reading When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomd in sonata Crumb alters the text of Whitmans carol by repeating the first
form.36 Rasos reading relies on a misunderstanding of tonal and line twice and the second line once, as well as repeating several
developmental principles in sonata practice, but some analogy to individual words:
music is inescapable. Writing of Lilacs in 1866, John Bur-
roughs said it is like intricate and involved music, with subtle, Come lovely and soothing death, mm
far-reaching harmonies.37 More to the point here, Burroughs Come lovely and soothing death, mm
writes, It is dramatic, yet there is no procession of events or Undulate mm round the world, mm, serenely arriving, arriving, mm
development of plot, but a constant interplaya turning and
re-turning of images and sentiments . . . .38 Whitmans famous Undulate, undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving
first section speaks not simply of Aprils blooms and stars recal- In the day, in the night, to all, to each,
Sooner or later delicate death.
ling Lincolns assassination, but of a cyclic return in Mircea
Eliades sense of eternal return:39 Come lovely and soothing death. mm
When lilacs last in the dooryard bloomd, The alterations focus attention on the pair of Undulate
And the great star early droopd in the western sky in the night, round the world lines, framed by the second statement of
I mournd, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring. Come lovely and soothing death and description of deaths
impartiality, In the day, in the night, to all, to each,/Sooner or
Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring,
later delicate death. The first and third statements of the
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,
Come lovely and soothing death then frame the whole, as the
And thought of him I love.
antiphon of a liturgical proper chant frames a psalm verse.
The death of the republics father/Captain/Martyr Chief is
re-experienced, always and again, in the smell of lilacs and
undulation and emersons compensation
brightness of Venus at dusk.40 The delicacy of the lilac-
perfumed, bird-haunted evening; the universal experience of
In Whitmans lengthy poem on Death, Undulate round the
death and the national experience for Whitmans America of
world is one of only two descriptions of Deaths approach.42
mourning the murdered president; the complementaryand
Both the phrase and the themes of Whitmans poem echo
contentiousvariety of peoples, occupations, and politics; and
portions of Emersons 1837 address to Harvards Phi Beta
the welcome summoning of Death are themes thatto borrow
Kappa Society, The American Scholar. Emerson said:
Burroughss termsdo not develop but are in constant inter-
play. Put another way, Lilacs spins out diverse themes and images That great principle of Undulation in nature, that shows itself in
that nonetheless act toward a common metaphysical purpose. the inspiring and expiring of the breath; in desire and satiety; in
The text of Come Lovely and Soothing Death comes from the ebb and flow of the sea, in day and night, in heat and cold,
Section 14 of Lilacs. At the emotional apex of the poem, and as yet more deeply ingrained in every atom and every fluid, is
known to us under the name of Polarity,these fits of easy
35 Faner (1951); Mayhan (1996); Picker (2000). See also Reynolds (2005,
transmission and reflection, as Newton called them, are the law
49"56).
of nature because they are the law of spirit.43
36 Raso (1994, 189"201).
37 Burroughs (1866, 612).
38 Ibid. (613). In 1841, Emerson renamed this principle Compensation,
39 Eliade (1954, 51"92). and in the essay of that title listed some of its manifestations.
40 Whitman names Lincoln father and Captain in O Captain! My
Captain (1982, 467) and Martyr Chief in the 1879 lecture Death of 41 Rugoff (2000, 134).
Abraham Lincoln (1047). Whitman speaks in the lecture of gathering 42 The other is gliding near with soft feet, two stanzas later in the carol and
annually for tragic reminiscence (1037) and of the cyclic, evocative set by Crumb in Apparition, III, Dark Mother Always Gliding Near with
powers of Nature at mid-April: It never fails (1041). See also Warble Soft Feet.
for Lilac-Time (505"6), written in 1870. 43 Emerson (1971, 61).
Polarity, or action and reaction, we meet in every part of nature;

in darkness and light; in heat and cold; in the ebb and flow of
waters; in male and female; in the inspiration and expiration of
plants and animals; in the equation of quantity and quality in the
fluids of the animal body; in the systole and diastole of the heart;
in the undulations of fluids, and of sound; in the centrifugal and
centripetal gravity; in electricity, galvanism, and chemical
affinity. . . . An inevitable dualism bisects nature, so that each
thing is a half, and suggests another thing to make it whole; as
spirit, matter; man, woman; odd, even; subjective, objective; in,
out; upper, under; motion, rest; yea, nay.44
There are three rough categories here; Example 5 depicts

them schematically: (a) static polarity or balance, (b) periodic or
cyclic motion, and (c) convergence. One can discern all three in
Lilacs: for example, (1) the large unconscious scenery of the
American countryside across which the train bore Lincolns
coffin, (2) the perennial lilac that is a metonym for Nature (both
unchanging and periodic), and (3) the ultimate convergence in
death all humans share, sooner or later. Likewise, all three
categories of Compensation capture ways of moving through
Crumbs song, in a sense reading the themes of Whitmans
entire poem between the lines of this one stanza.
iii. transformational conditions in come lovely and

soothing death
Compensation is an advantageous attitude of approach to

Crumbs music because it encourages the analyst to respect the
distinctive variety of Crumbs pitch-class materials, and not to
seek an architectural or teleological scheme for reconciling moti-
vic diversity. The transformational approach to Come Lovely
taken here is Compensatory in the ways it recognizes common
transformational trajectories followed by collections belonging
to different set classes, doing so without requiring taxonomic
identity among pitch-class collections and common member-
ship in larger background collections. One might object that any
systematic attention restricted to equal-tempered chromatic
pitch or pitch-class relations necessarily asserts controlling struc-
ture or order. Grounds for the objection will seem especially firm
in the interpretation of Warble passages, in which motion exclu-
sively within and among octatonic collections articulates a trans-
formational arrangement of pitch-class space (see the product
network in Example 8 below and the associated discussion). To
this objection I would make two responses. First, a performance example 5. Schemata for Emersons Compensation: (a) balance; (b)
of Come Lovely would establish motivic contexts that cannot periodicity; (c) convergence.
be present in the same way in a study focusing on the song. We
will explore some of these contexts in Part IV below. Second, the
two longer Warble passages begin the song, and it is only after The discussion in Part I above of the transformational con-
we consider other figures and strains, and engage the text and its ditions through which the Calls move was Compensatory,
setting in our interpretation, that we fully recognize the trans- although it began by recognizing intersections of referential
formational conditions and the plural response of various figures collections. While the remaining figures and strains remain
and strains to them. collectionally distinct, interpretation of their responses to
common transformational conditions connects Crumbs music
44 Emerson (1979, 57). with Emersons and Whitmans metaphysics. In this part of the
article, we examine each of the remaining figures and strains The tail of the final complete Warble on F is echoed by the
individually, establishing a musical Compensatory landscape tail of Warble on G (marked echo of d in Example 6[b]). T10
within which we may situate Come Lovely and other move- began the piece as an internal transformation in Warble and the
ments of the cycle with respect to one another. Calls, characteristic of both octatonic and whole-tone figures.
But T10 can also be a progressive transformation, a means of
leaving one octatonic collection for another: the first series of
warble45 Warbles ends with Warble on G and the second ends with
Warble on F, a T10 then echoed by the T2-related tails of
Example 6 shows the opening of the song (Example 6[a]) Warbles on F and G (as one imagines the song of Whitmans
and the two other passages (Examples 6[b] and [c]) involving bird echoes in the Long Island swamp) across the landscape
Warble, a strictly octatonic figure that moves within and among emerging out of Warbles transformations.
the octatonic collections by transposition. There is more to The transposition scheme of the Warble music discourages
Warbles motivic salience than its pitch-class features, and we intuitions of counterpoint that are encouraged by the Calls to
will explore its context in the preceding songs of Apparition in Death, but the scheme outlines an orientation of pitch-class
Part IV below. For now, though, we will study the transforma- space and associated transformational conditions through which
tions of Warble as transformational paths that articulate the inversional counterpoint will move in the future. Example 7
pitch-class terrain and point to other possible paths. shows how Warble articulates this space; the networks in the
Each Warble in Example 6 bears an italic label for ease of example model Warbles as anchor-toggle nodes. In some cases,
reference in the analysis to come. The first series of Warbles, such as Example 7(a), these nodes contain three pitch classes:
shown in Example 6(a), moves through OD ,D by T6 and T3 anchor, T10 toggle, and T1 toggle. In other cases, the nodes
(figured from anchors). Both kinds of toggle are present, at least contain the anchor and T10 toggle only. Each node is labeled
in Warbles on B (with toggles G , labeled a in the example, and for easy reference to the annotated scores in Example 6.
C , labeled b) and on G (toggles F, labeled d, and A , labeled e). The first series of Warbles, analyzed in Example 7(a), sug-
Warble on E, just before Rehearsal 25 and marked c, appears gests a T9 cycle of anchors, articulated T6"T3, above which the
only with toggle D. But there is at least a hint of Warble on E toggles make a second T9 cycle. The union of the two cycles is
with toggle F. The third figure in series of Warbles on G, OCTD ,D, of which the only element not heard in the first series
labeled f, follows F6 with E5. E is out of place in the context of of Warbles is C . (Indeed C is the only pitch class not to appear
Warbles on G, but F6 and E5 would have been likely toggle and as anchor or toggle; it is part of the tail of Warbles on B and A.)
anchor pitches in a series of Warbles on E. Examples 7(b) and 7(c) rotate the positions of pitch-class names
The Warbles on B are followed at T6 with Warble on E; one on the page to keep the T3 transformation in the same position it
might expect Warbles on G to be followed at T6 with Warble on occupied in Example 7(a) and to eliminate the need for nodes
C . Instead, the soprano sings the first Call to Death, the end of that must cross from the top to the bottom of the example, but
which appears again in Example 6(b).46 The first Call begins on otherwise the pitch-class landscape is identical. These net-
B4 and ends on C 4, however; this is the correct pitch interval works illustrate the unexpected appearancewith respect to
if not the correct figurefor a Warble on C and its T10 toggle. the first series of Warblesof Warble on A in the second
After the Call, Warble music returns at Rehearsal 262. The series, and the eventualand expectedprogression of
connection between the first series of Warbles, the first Call, and Warble on D to Warble on G in the third series.
this next series of Warbles, is C 4, sung by the soprano in the One way to depict the orientation of pitch-class space, the
first Call and picked up immediately by the pianist as a pizzicato transformational conditions in which we hear Warble, is
accompaniment to Warble on D (g). a T1$T9 product network, as shown in Example 8. T10, which
The overall T3 motion through OCTC,D in the second set of has been particularly salient in both Calls and Warbles, is the
Warbles, from Warble on D to Warble on F, is similar enough ascending rightward diagonal. Each adjacent pair of T9 series
to the motion from Warble on B to Warble on G in the first set (the top and bottom series are adjacent) form one of the octa-
that we should expect Warble on G or B between Warbles on D tonic collections. The Warbles move about this network by
and F. Instead, the intervening Warble is on A (h, in OCTC,D ), transposition, but, as Table 3 indicates, a figure might also move
and the passage concludes with Warbles on F (i, j). Example within and among octatonic collections, and therefore between
6(c) begins with the sopranos Sooner or later delicate death, rows, columns, and diagonals of this network, by inversion.47
just after Rehearsal 32, followed by the third set of Warbles,
which follows Warble on D with Warble on G , labeled k, as 47 Strictly speaking, we may add only certain contextual inversions (Lewin
anticipated earlier. [1993] and [2008]; Kochavi [1998]; Clough [1998]; and Lambert
[2000]) to preserve the networks commutative structure. For example,
45 In the swamp in secluded recesses,/A shy and hidden bird is warbling we might define I 1 as inversion-about-the-ic1-adjacent-pc-in-
a song, from Lilacs, Part 4 (Whitman [1982, 459]). fB ,G,E,C g, I2 as inversion-about-the-ic2-adjacent-pc-in-fB ,G,E,C g,
46 Here and below I refer to Warbles as expected or unexpected with J inversions likewise about elements of fB,G ,F,Dg, and K inversions
respect to Warbles heard before. I mean it in precisely this empirical way, similarly about elements of fA,F ,D ,Cg. That step is unnecessary for the
not in the sense that the unexpected disrupts coherent motivic development. present analysis, however.
example 6. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing Death, Warbles: (a) beginning through Rehearsal 25; (b) Rehearsal 262
to just before 27; (c) after Rehearsal 32. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by permission.
(a) B G F D
C A F D
a, b d, e c, f?
B G E C
B G E C
T3 T10
T1
T6
A F D C
(b) T9
B G T7 E C
example 8. Product network derived from Warble series.
h
T5 were some loose strand of yarn in a sweater would unravel the
A G D C network into two distinct whole-tone cycles. Likewise, tugging
on a T1 vertical would unravel the network into a chromatic
i, j cycle. Other passages in Come Lovely and Soothing Death
g
exploit these reorientations of pitch-class space.
G F D B undulate and arrive

T3
? Crumbs two settings of Undulate round the world/serenely

arriving, arriving express the implicit periodicity of undulation
(c) and the convergence of mortality with Death.48 The Undulate
figure itself literally undulates, wave-like, and the motion of the
A F D C
figure within and among the three octatonic collections suggests
the crests and troughs of periodic motion about a zero line.
k g Example 9 excerpts these passages. Example 9(a) shows the first
setting at Rehearsal 28, at which the pianist plays Undulate in
G F D B OCTD ,D with the left hand and, at T10, in OCTC,D with the
right hand. The soprano echoes portions of the left-hand part.
As Undulate subsides, just before Rehearsal 29, the soprano
T6 begins a series of Arrives by T9. But she does not quite arrive,
at least not on the B 3 that would complete a T9 cycle of Arrives,
example 7. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing the pitch class that has been the point of departure for much
Death, Warbles, analyses: (a) beginning through Rehearsal 25; (b) of what has gone before: the opening Warble of the song, the
Rehearsal 262 to 27; (c) after Rehearsal 32. left-hand Undulate at Rehearsal 28, and the sopranos
Undulate.49
The second setting of Undulate . . . , shown in Example
Pitch-class axes run through the terrain of the network like fault 9(b), begins just after Rehearsal 30. The pianist begins with
lines at which verticals, horizontals, or diagonals may slip, reor- Undulate in OCTC,D in the left hand and at T10 in OCTC,D in
ienting the transformational paths. Opening both transposi- the right hand. Once again, the soprano takes her material from
tional and inversional paths among figures increases the the pianists left-hand part. After the soprano sings Undulate in
opportunities for figures to move between collections in the OCT C,D , the pianist plays the figure again, this time in
same class, for figures residing in other referential collection OCTC,D , anticipating the next move of the soprano. As if
classes to respond to the same conditions, and for figures to backing up into the first series of Arrive, just before Rehearsal
move to referential collections in different set classes, just as the 31 she begins the figure on E4 and this time does arrive on B 3.
Call figure does. The middle sections of the song, setting the Her inversion at serenely is an inversion about A4, moving
text that describes various ways Death approaches, explore these
48 A third Undulate passage just before Rehearsal 33 is an abbreviation of the
different responses.
second Undulate passage and is not discussed here.
Though we arrived at Example 8 by studying the octatonic 49 B is present in the piano at Rehearsal 29 (not shown in the example), but
Warbles, the network easily accommodates the whole-tone and there it takes part in a contrapuntal process not yet related to the Undulate/
chromatic Calls studied above. Tugging on a T10 diagonal as if it Arrive music.
example 9. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing Death, Undulate passages: (a) Rehearsal 28 to 291; (b) Rehearsal 30 to 31.
Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by permission.
from the OCTC,D of her Undulate to the OCTC,D of Arrive.50 The sopranos Undulate and Arrive passages trace trans-
As if taking a step back into the first serenely arriving, here positional paths along the T9 rows of the product network
she begins the figure on E4 and arrives on B 3 just before shown in Example 8; her moves from Undulate to Arrive trace
Rehearsal 31. inversional paths among these rows. The networks in Example
10 illustrate. Here I have inclined the T1 arrows upward and to
50 The soprano does not recall the G4 she sang earlier by singing A4. Instead,
she sings . . . round the world to alternating D5 "E 5 , followed by the right to depict the temporal order of pitch classes in the
serenely arriving to E4"E 5. E is the other pitch class on the I6 axis figures. Example 10(a) shows how the soprano sings Undulate
and so here stands in for A4, about which D5 inverts to E4. (Rehearsal 28) by beginning in the same T9 row that had
(a) 2829 3031
Piano RH: OCTC,D OCTC,D

I 0,3,6,9 I 4,7,10,1
T10 T10
Piano LH, Soprano: OCTD ,D OCTC,D OCTC,D OCTC,D

I2 I6
(b)
T4

Death, transformational conditions of Undulate passages.
space to express this convergence among the three octatonic

collections.
The setting of the ensuing text challenges any sense of
Death, Undulate passages, analyses: (a) Rehearsal 28 to 291; (b)
convergence as closure, as it reinforces intuitions of balance
Rehearsal 30 to 31.
associated with whole-tone collections. The soprano now sings
the setting of In the day, in the night, to all to each in her first
previously anchored the pianists Warbles. As she sings Arrival whole-tone music since the initial Call. The passage appears in
(just before Rehearsal 29), I2 flips the T9 rows along which the Example 12; three analyses follow in Example 13.
figures move. Example 10(b) presents an analysis of the analo- The soprano begins In the day on the same F 4 with which
gous I6 inversion in the second Undulate"Arrive passage, in she just ended Arrival. Instead of another octatonic figure, she
which the soprano sings the boxed B just before Rehearsal 31. sings one in WTC composed of [02] dyadsreminiscent of the
Through T10 between the pianists left- and right-hand parts, Calls to Death. Example 13(a) reproduces the right side of
as well as I2 and I6 between Undulate and Arrive in the sopranos Example 10(b) and shows how we might interpret the change
line, the figures move through all three octatonic collections. of figure in relation to Undulate and Arrive. The network
They do not do so equitably, however. The arrangement sug- shows two locations for the three other pitch classes setting
gests the progression among octatonic collections shown in In the dayE, D, and C, indicating more or less where
Example 11. OCTD ,D appears only in the first passage, as the they would be if the music remained octatonic after I6. These
beginning of the Undulate"Arrive progression to OCTC,D ; the pitch classes are shown gray, however, because In the
analogous progression in the second passage is from OCTC,D to day . . . is whole-tone. The network also shows these pitch
OCTC,D . The incompleteness of the OCTD ,D"OCTC,D classes along the T10 diagonal, as if the soprano pulls on the
progression in the first passage, expressed by the missing line, separating the original product network into two whole-
B 3, is satisfied and balanced by the OCTC,D to OCTC,D pro- tone strands.
gression in the second passage, expressed by the arrival of B 3. As the beginning of the top staff in Example 13(b) shows, I6
The network transformation hT4i indicates how the inversions is expressed here as a pitch inversion about A4, the note pre-
performed by the soprano reorient paths in the pitch-class ceding F 4 in the last Arrive. Thus [02] dyads, expressed through
example 12. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing Death, setting of In the day, in the night, to all, to each, Rehearsal 31 to
313. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by permission.
(a)
(b)
(c)
example 13. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing Death, In the day, in the night, to all, to each, analyses: (a) in relation to
the end of second serenely arriving; (b) inversional counterpoint; (c) Klumpenhouwer-network interpretation.
T10, return here as both an internal figural unit and a progressive of the (Rehearsal 311, last eighth note) prevent D 4"G4
transformation between different referential collection classes. from disturbing the otherwise WTC In the day, in the night,
The example continues by taking note of the common-tone link but the dyad opens up a path to the other whole-tone strand,
C5 between the end of In the day and the beginning of in the WTD , in which the soprano sings the to all, to each. The
night. The [02] dyadic arrangement of the passage dissolves bottom staff of Example 13(b) interprets the tritone F 4"C5,
here; the line continues to express WTC arranged about the both notes of which are common tones linking two figures in the
pitch axis E 5. Registral separation and grammatical function soprano line, as part of a pivot about G4-and-F 4 to D 4"G4.
D 4 "G 4 then moves to B 3 "F 4 about E 4 , a pitch-class- dirge51

equivalent axis to E 5 about which the notes of the upper register
(and top staff in the example) have just moved. When the dyadic Between the first and second Undulate/Arrive passages, the
arrangement returns in to all, to each, shown in the top staff of pianist plays an incongruous strain in nearly undisturbed E
Example 13(b) as inversion about G4, whole-tone balance is dou- majorincongruous only because we have not heard the dia-
bly expressed: between [02] dyads in each four-note figure, and tonic collection so clearly expressed elsewhere in Apparition.52
between whole-tone collections that are intervallically identical Example 14(a) reproduces the passage.53 It begins on an E -
but, with respect to pitch-class, mutually exclusive. major triad; the bass ascends through the E -major scale, and the
The analysis of In the day, in the night, to all, to each thus passage ends a whole tone lower on D major. The voice-leading
far asserts not just a two-voice counterpoint about pitch axes, but sketch in Example 14(b) interprets the first three bars as an
rather two two-voice counterpoints about pitch axes: the top expansion of E major through a voice exchange combined with
staff of Example 13(b) depicts one counterpoint; the bottom a 5"6 exchange (Rehearsal 29 through 292).54 The dominant
staff shows the second, which emerges from the notes used as begins on a plausible V42 in which E 3, retained from the previous
common tones in the first, opens WTD , and then rejoins the measure, should have passed to F3 (Rehearsal 293). The last in
first counterpoint at the end of the passage. Example 13(c) the series of 3-8[026] chords in WTD to follow is a plausible
interprets this structure in Klumpenhouwer networks. In the V 65, completing an exchange between the outer voices (Rehearsal
main upper counterpoint, hT 8 i changes transformational 294 through 296). The next chord may not be the correct
conditions represented by I2 and I6. (This relation reverses the tonic, but it is in the same register and voicing as the initial E
hT4i change made in the Undulate passages.) In the lower major triad (Rehearsal 30).
counterpoint, hT 5i shifts the whole-tone conditions from Example 14(c) interprets Dirge from a different voice-
those restricting motion to WTC to those restricting motion leading perspective: counterpoint about an axis. The 5 "6
to WTD . exchange and voice exchanges are composed such that the voice
We cannot compare all of the Klumpenhouwer network leading clearly expresses I10.55 In the tonic portion of Dirge, the
interpretations made thus far because not all of them are com- bass expresses I10 as inversion about the F2 at Rehearsal 291,
mensurate. We can, however, compare the changes in trans- while the top and middle voices express I10 as inversion about
formational conditions they illustrate: F3the note we might expect in the middle voice at Rehearsal
293. In the dominant part of the passage, the bass expresses I10
1. Example 11 associates hT4i, the shift from I2 to I6, with two as inversion about B2 while the top voice does so as inversion
Undulate"Arrive moves into OCTC,D , the first incom- about F4. Example 14(c) also shows I10 relations including the
plete motion from OCTD ,D (score shown in Example middle voice.
9[a]), and the second from OCTC,D, completed by the D major arrives at Rehearsal 30, where we expect to hear E
arrival of B 3. hT4i is thus associated with periodic octa- resolving its dominant, in the same register and voicing. Though
tonic motion about OCTC,D , with convergence in the D major is not the proper tonic triad, it is a conceivable reso-
chromatic of the three overlapping octatonic collections, lution to the preceding progression; it is in the same register and
and with the arrival of Death described by the text. voicing in which E major began the passage at Rehearsal 29 and
2. Example 13(c) associates hT8i, the shift from I6 to I2, with D s 5, 7, and 2 are all present at Rehearsal 296the first in
the setting of In the day, in the night, to all, to each, the 3-8[026] V 65 of the preceding E , the second and third as
which is split between the two whole-tone collections. the highest and lowest pitches in the measure respectively. At
hT8i, the inverse of hT4i, is thus associated with the bal-
ance and disjunction of the whole-tone collections in the 51 With dirges through the night, with the thousand voices rising strong and
chromatic, and with the balanced, egalitarian approach of solemn, from Lilacs, Part 6, in which the poet tells of the crowds lining
Death. the tracks as the train bearing Lincolns body made its way from
3. Example 4(c) associates hT3i, the shift from I0 to I3, with Washington, D.C., to Illinois (Whitman [1982, 460]).
52 Szutor (1994, 58"60) notes a similarity in voicing and progression between
the Call to Death changing from a whole-tone figure to an
Dirge and the Arietta of Beethovens Piano Sonata in C Minor, Op. 111.
octatonic figure, from which it then becomes chromatic. 53 I shall not discuss the figures in the treble staff, except to note that they are
hT3i is thus associated with a gradual chromatic filling-in related to the anchor-toggle portion of Warble, specifically the opening
of a whole-tone collection, and with the efficacy of the series.
singers summons of Death. 54 Hence the unusual bass figures; the bracketed 6 beneath Rehearsal 292
refers to the completion of the 5"6 exchange over tonic.
Although the octatonic and whole-tone figures are subject to 55 Though the inversional symmetry of the voice-leading components in the
5"6/voice-exchange configuration arises because of the diatonic collections
the same transformational conditions, only the Call is mobile
invariance about the 2 pitch class in its major mode, and might therefore be
and instigates cross-collectional synthesis in the chromatic. The thought trivial, the dominant of a progression starting I"VI need not be
responses of figures to the conditions are recognizably related, configured to emphasize this axis. Indeed, the progression here uses two
however; they retain distinct identities while displaying a unity chromatic pitch classes (with reference to E major) in the whole-tone
of purpose. expansion of V.
example 14. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing Death, Dirge in E : (a) score; (b) voice-leading sketch; (c) inversional
counterpoint. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by permission.
the same time, however, the arrival on D effects progression, Dirge in D major (Rehearsal 31 to 32) supports the setting of
not only of one consonant triad to another, but within the songs In the day, in the night, to all, to each, ending on a B-major
transformational conditions. E "D presents T10, as the other triad (Rehearsal 32). Dirge in B major (Rehearsal 33 to 34) ends
figures and strains have done. While I10 preserves OCTC,D , on an A-major triad (Rehearsal 34), after which the soprano
which is the home of the preceding serenely arriving and of the sings the third Call to close the song. Example 15 summarizes
E major triad, and I6 preserves OCTD ,D, which is the home of the Dirges voice leading, including the first. The example takes
the D -major triad, both inversions retain whole-tone collection some analytic license with the register and direction of the upper
membership. voice in order to highlight the inversional conditions of each
Dirge appears two additional times in the song, each instance passage. From our Compensatory perspectivethat is, from the
a strict transposition down a whole tone of the previous one. perspective that says figures residing in different referential
example 15. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing Death, synopsis of voice leading in Dirge passages.
collections respond differently to identical transformational con- appears in each of the first two measures; B and D are the only
ditionsthe Dirges integrate the familiar goal-directedness of two pitch classes not in figuration of the top and middle staves at
the diatonic collection as it ascends the major scale and as tonic- Rehearsal 33, and only E is absent from the top and middle
functioning harmonies progress to dominant-functioning har- staves at Rehearsal 331. The third measure lacks only C .
monies with the balance of whole-tone collections, the absence of Though all twelve pitch classes have been present in earlier
motions converging on a goal. Counterpoint about a single axis passages, the figures and referential collections to which they
within each Dirge emphasizes convergence; axis transpositions belong have been much more clear. Soon after, of course, the
by hT8i between passages emphasize balance because they do song closes with the chromatic tetrachord of the third Call to
not alter the inversional dispositions of whole-tone sonorities Death.
but do cycle through the inversional dispositions of octatonic We can find textual conceptual support, too, for the idea that
sonorities. hT8i is not a shift that takes the diatonic collection of the chromatic is both a goal and a source. For Emerson,
each Dirge to the next; in fact, shifting the active axis of inver- Compensation was but the nature of Nature. The spirit did not
sion in the E -major collection from I10 to I6 produces the B- partake of Compensation. Emerson writes,
major collection rather than the D -major collection, and similar
relations obtain among successive pairs of diatonic collections. The soul is not a compensation, but a life. The soul is. Under
Rather, hT8i is one of the axis transpositions that preserves all this running sea of circumstance, whose waters ebb and
whole-tone collection membership of pitch classes inverted flow with perfect balance, lies the aboriginal abyss of real
about the new axis, an effect that is aurally reinforced by the Being. Essence, or God, is not a relation, or a part, but the
series of 3-8[026] chords in the dominant section of each pas- whole. Being is the vast affirmative, excluding negation, self-
sage and the overall T10 progression from one diatonic collection balanced, and swallowing up all relations, parts and times,
to the next. In short, the passage moves in both balanced and within itself.56
convergent pathspaths in which intuitions of motion are in
one case balanced, in the other case convergent. In the death mourned and welcomed by Whitman, the spirit
unites with that Unity, that Over-Soul, . . . the eternal ONE .57
This sentiment, though, is precisely the sort of grand syn-
iv. apparition and compensation thesis avoided by the song, the cycle, Whitmans poetry beyond
Lilacs, and indeed even Emersons thought.58 As we saw in
The transformational conditions under which we hear Example 15, the structural downbeats marked by the diatonic
Come Lovely and Soothing Death are common to all refer- passages articulate a descending whole-tone tetrachord, the final
ential collections at work in any passage, but the responses of the A major of which rings on until just before the sopranos closing
figures are different according to the collection to which each utterance. That is, the song projects whole-tone balance, a resis-
figure is referred. Under changing conditions, specifically shifts tance to closure, on a relatively long-range scale even as the
of inversional axes, we recognize both the related ways the
figures respond to the conditions and the distinct collectional 56 Emerson (1979, 70).
57 Ibid. (160).
characters of the figures, which are not synthesized in a com-
58 Whitmans famous lists in Song of Myself (see especially the section
mon chromatic background. Still, one might be tempted to beginning The pure contralto sings in the organ loft [Whitman f1982,
assign figures and strains in Come Lovely and Soothing 200"3g]) speak of this diversity. Emersons address The Transcendental-
Death neatly to various categories of Compensation: whole- ist (1971, 201"16) is an exploration of the irreconcilability and the mutual
tone figures represent balance, octatonic figures and strains necessity of both mundane concerns and visions of spiritual transcendence
stand for periodicity, and diatonic strains indicate convergence. rather than an account of unified thought. Whatever its shortcomings as
The closing page of the song even lends some support to this a philosophical exposition, writes Lawrence Buell (2003, 206), as a per-
formance of . . . dilemmas The Transcendentalist is elegantly suggestive.
interpretation.
In his introduction to Emersons collected writings, Robert Spiller ascribes
At Rehearsal 33, as Dirge in B major begins, figural clarity to Emerson a suspended dualism of natural and moral laws in parallel, with
and collectional differentiation break down. Example 16 shows which one could live only if one found a way to accept apparent contra-
the first three measures of the passage. The chromatic aggregate dictions and to forego final answers (Emerson [1971, xviii]).
example 16. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing Death, Rehearsal 33 through 332. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters
Corporation. Used by permission.
progression of the Calls projects convergence. Although the the second in Example 17, the pianist is directed to depress the
closing section of the song is more fully chromatic than any keys for a progression of minor triads in first inversion,
other, this is not an all-subsuming chromatic of a divine aborig- A"G"E"D, suggesting a latentor at least virtually inaudi-
inal abyss but a heterophony of whole-tone, octatonic, diatonic, blepair of descending [02] dyads forming a 4-23[0257]
and chromatic voicesa natural soundscape out of which figures tetrachord.
emerge and into which they recede.59 Preceding movements of The second movement, Vocalise 1: Summer Sounds,
the cycle create that soundscape and thence emerge the Call to continues the association of 3-3[014] figures with the night
Death and Warble in which the voices of the poet and hermit soundscape in which we now clearly hear [02] figures, perhaps
thrush are joined. bird calls; Example 18 shows these passages. These bird calls are
The opening song of Apparition, The Night in Silence under not yet entirely separate from the soundscape. In Examples 18(a)
Many a Star, describes the spring evening on which the song of and 18(c), the pianos major-seventh dyads include a pitch class
the hermit thrush becomes, for Whitman, a carol for the chromatically adjacent to one or both pitch classes in the sopra-
assassinated Lincoln. Above strums of the piano strings nos [02], blurring the dyad. In Example 18(b), the soprano
marked like a sound of nature and in fact much like the supplies such pitch classes herself. It is only at the very end of
continuous insect noise of a summer (N.B. not April!) night or the Vocalise, shown in Example 18(d), that the bird sings out in
the steady lapping of ocean waves on a calm nightthe soprano a figure Crumb marks as a Turtle-dove effect.
sings the first line of text, which the pianist answers with Thus out of the nights silence, which is no true silence at all
a pianississimo arpeggio strain. (Example 17 reproduces the but a soundscape teeming with quiet voices to which Whitmans
piano part.) The pianos response to the soprano is, but for the speaker will soon attend, emerge two motives. Figures using
A6"E7 fifth midway through the second system, a series of 3-3[014] begin to articulate a musical analogue to the space and
3-3[014] trichords drawn, again with the exception of A6 in the processes of the natural soundscape. We will hear 3-3[014] in
third and sixth figures and C7 in the last figure, from Come Lovely and Soothing Death as the tail of Warble,
OCTD ,D.60 At the end of the first system and the beginning of through which we learn the paths of the network in Example 8,
and we hear it as Arrive, through which the soprano portrays the
spiraling approach of Death. Figures using descending [02]
59 Crumbs own comments suggest that we should hear his music this way
dyads shape the tentative call of a singer bashful and tender,61
(Varga [1984, 200]).
60 With the exceptions of the cited As and Cs in the piano strain, A, C, and D
at a few places in the soprano part are the only played or sung notes in The
Night that are not elements of OCTD ,D. 61 Whitman (1982, 461).
example 17. Crumb, Apparition, I. The Night in Silence under Many a Star, piano. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by
permission.
foreshadowing the Calls to Death and their tetrachords made of Example 19 gives Vocalise 3 in its entirety. At the beginning
such dyads.62 and the end of this brief vocalise, a four-note figure consisting of
But the thrushs song is not yet the carol of death that [02] dyads articulates a 4-1[0123] tetrachord with the registral
Whitmans speaker and the bird sing togetherAnd the voice separation characteristic of the Calls in the next movement.
of my spirit tallied the song of the bird.63 That joining of voices From this figure the middle of the vocalise derives
requires some mutual transformation in which the birds song a 4-Z15[0146] tetrachord, an inversion of Warble. Example 20
embodies some recognizable human purpose and the speakers illustrates.
spirit sings in an avian voice.64 This transformation happens in The vocalise is short enough that the score requires no
Vocalise 3: Death Carol (Song of the Nightbird), which rehearsal numbers or system breaks, so for ease of reference,
immediately precedes Come Lovely and Soothing Death. Example 20 includes dashed bar lines at analytically useful
points and the discussion to follow refers to measures, corre-
spondingly. A second staff shows a new figure emerging in the
62 There are five tetrachord classes made of two [02] dyads. The Calls belong
middle of the vocalise, as the [02] dyads in the opening and
to three of them, 4-1[0123], 4-10[0235], and 4-21[0246], and to all, to
each (see Example 12) belongs to a fourth, 4-25[0268]. The fifth class, closing measures of the top staff move in contrary motion about
4-23[0257], lurks in the sound of nature at the beginning of the cycle. F4-and-E4, or I9. This figure is an inversion of the third Call,
Szutor (1994, 15, 33, 56) notes the importance of [02] dyads but does not while the contrary motion of the dyadsthat is, one dyad
explore motivic connections among figures involving the dyad in any detail. descends while the other ascendswill be picked up by the
63 Whitman (1982, 464). setting of to all, to each (see the end of Example 12). The
64 This is not to say that a birds song does not embody some purpose or figure in the second measure (not including B4 , which is shown
direction toward a goal, only that such a purpose or goal might not be
as part of a different figure in the lower staff), is T6 of the first
recognizable to a human. Thus I disagree with Szutors assertion that the
bird in Lilacs and bird sounds in Vocalise 1 initially are heard as figure and the contrapuntal arrangement of its constituent dyads
inarticulate sounds of nature that are later transformed into language that about B4-and-B 4 likewise expresses I9, but the dyads involved
we understand (1994, 26). are now [01]. B4 at the end of the figure is one of the axis
example 18. Crumb, Apparition, Vocalise 1: Summer Sounds, 3-3[014] figures and [02] bird calls: (a) beginning; (b) Rehearsal 5;
(c) before Rehearsal 7; (d) end. Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by permission.
example 19. Crumb, Apparition, Vocalise 3: Death Carol (Song of the Nightbird). Copyright 1979 by C. F. Peters Corporation. Used by
permission.
of their common pitch-class spacedistinct, but joined by com-

mon citizenship.
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All rights reserved. Please direct all requests for permission to photocopy or
reproduce article content through the University of California Presss
Rights and Permissions website, at http://www.ucpressjournals.com/
reprintinfo.asp. DOI: 10.1525/mts.2012.34.2.1

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Crumbs Apparition and Emersons Compensation

fC,D ,E ,E,F ,G,A,B g OCTC,D i. transformational conditions and inversional

fC,D,E ,F,F ,A ,A,Bg OCTC,D terms and concepts

I use referential collection,21 as numerous theorists do, to

Warble Octatonic Beginning,

Call to Death Whole-tone R26

Arrive Octatonic before R29,

Dirge Diatonic R29, 31, 33

example 2. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing

pathsother transformationsmay take a figure to a dif-

table 3. Transformational conditions in octatonic and whole-tone collections.

1. The Calls express the progressive chromaticization of pitch-

There is much useful information in Example 3, but it is

Polarity, or action and reaction, we meet in every part of nature;

There are three rough categories here; Example 5 depicts

iii. transformational conditions in come lovely and

Compensation is an advantageous attitude of approach to

G F D B undulate and arrive

? Crumbs two settings of Undulate round the world/serenely

(a) 2829 3031

Piano RH: OCTC,D OCTC,D

Piano LH, Soprano: OCTD ,D OCTC,D OCTC,D OCTC,D

example 11. Crumb, Apparition, V. Come Lovely and Soothing

space to express this convergence among the three octatonic

D 4 "G 4 then moves to B 3 "F 4 about E 4 , a pitch-class- dirge51

of their common pitch-class spacedistinct, but joined by com-

Adorno, Theodor W. [1949] 2006. Philosophy of New Music.

Schmalfeldt, Janet. 1995. Form as the Process of Becoming:

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