Luciano Berio’s Sequenza VIII and Its Intellectual Worlds

Sof’ya Devutskaya

Issue № 4 (788) | 2024

Research article

Luciano Berio’s Sequenza VIII and Its Intellectual Worlds

This article is written in Russian. You can read it here.

References

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Berio, L. “Commento alla Sequenza VIII.” http://lucianoberio.org/en/sequenza-viii-nota-dellautore (accessed October 2, 2024).
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Montague, E. “The compass of communication in Berio’s Sequenza VIII for violin.” Berio’s Sequenzas: Essays on Performance, Composition and Analysis, ed. by J. K. Halfyard, Aldershot : Ashgate Publishing, 2007, pp. 137–152, doi:10.4324/9781315096476-9.
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DOI 10.34690/431

Author Sof’ya A. Devutskaya

Affiliation The Gnesins Russian Academy of Music, Moscow, Russia

Email sofyadevuckaya@mail.ru

ORCID

0009-0001-1717-0300

Abstract

This article presents an overview of three analytical versions of Luciano Berio’s Sequenza VIII for solo violin, implemented by Pierre Boulez, Eugene Montague and the author of this paper at different times. Distinguished by methodological autonomy, they are intended to show the dependence of the content plan on the professional orientations and aesthetic experience of each researcher. In the author’s opinion, the multivariance of interpretations of the discursive text of the Sequenza is partly due to the composer’s commentary on the piece, which is filled with semantic “keys.” In his lecture “Moderne/Postmoderne,” Pierre Boulez offers an interpretation of the Sequenza independent of Berio’s explanations and explores the virtuoso composition through a fundamentally different, structuralist perspective. All three original theoretical concepts are united by the terms of the semiotic theory of Umberto Eco, a friend and associate of Luciano Berio.

Keywords musical analysis, postmodern music, music semiology, U. Eco, L. Berio, J. S. Bach’s Ciaccona for solo violin

For citation

Devutskaya, S. A. “Luciano Berio’s Sequenza VIII and its intellectual worlds.” Muzykal’naya akademiya [Music Academy], no. 4, 2024, pp. 60–73, doi:10.34690/431. (In Russ.)

Acknowledgments

gratitude to my scientific supervisor, Doctor of Art Criticism, Professor Tatyana V. Tsaregradskaya for valuable instructions and materials provided.

Published 24.02.2024

Approved 21.08.2024

Submitted 18.12.2024

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