Introductory text covering all the most important aspects of serial composition, including discussion of melody-writing, twelve-note harmony, polyphonic writing, forms, orchestrations, etc.

Widely recognized as the definitive work in its field ever since its original publication in 1962, Serial Composition and Atonality remains an unsurpassed introduction to the technical features of what is probably the most revolutionary body of work since the beginnings of polyphony. In the analysis of specific compositions there is first and last of all a concern with the musical surface—an attempt to trace connections and distinctions there before offering any deeper-level constructions, and to offer none where their effects are not obvious on more immediate levels of musical experience. In this sixth edition of the book, George Perle employs the new and more consistent terminology for the identification of transpositional levels of twelve-tone sets that he first proposed in Twelve-Tone Tonality (1977).

Originally published: New York: Longman, c1979.

Serial music was one of the most important aesthetic movements to emerge in post-war Europe, but its uncompromising music and modernist aesthetic has often been misunderstood. This book focuses on the controversial journal die Reihe, whose major contributors included Stockhausen, Eimert, Pousseur, Dieter Schnebel and G. M. Koenig, and discusses it in connection with many lesser-known sources in German musicology. It traces serialism's debt to the theories of Klee and Mondrian, and its relationship to developments in concrete art, modern poetry and the information aesthetics and semiotics of Max Bense and Umberto Eco. M. J. Grant sketches an aesthetic theory of serialism as experimental music, arguing that serial theory's embrace of both rigorous intellectualism and aleatoric processes is not, as many have suggested, a paradox, but the key to serial thought and to its relevance for contemporary theory.

First Published in 1994. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The idea of this monograph is to present an overview of decisive theoretical, computational, technological, aesthetical, artistic, economical, and sociological directions to create future music. It features a unique insight into dominant scientific and artistic new directions, which are guaranteed by the authors' prominent publications in books, software, musical, and dance productions. Applying recent research results from mathematical and computational music theory and software as well as new ideas of embodiment approaches and non-Western music cultures, this book presents new composition methods and technologies. Mathematical, computational, and semiotic models of artistic presence (imaginary time, gestural creativity) as well as strategies are also covered. This book will be of interest to composers, music technicians, and organizers in the internet-based music industry, who are offered concrete conceptual architectures and tools for their future strategies in musical creativity and production.