In Reply to: Now I know why the 4th is my least favorite... posted by krisjan on August 23, 2014 at 06:50:41:
I hear keys in it (i.e., certain keys more in control than others) when I listen, but maybe that's just me. Didn't some theorist write a long time ago that even when we listen to atonal music (or, even more incredibly, 12-tone music), most of us as listeners (and I'm certainly one) will try to impose a key structure on it as we listen, even though the music itself is deliberately written to orient the listener AWAY from any sense of key structure. (There are some exceptions, such as the Berg Violin Concerto of course.) I guess I just never hear Bartok as being atonal in the sense that the composers of the Second Vienna School are atonal in some of their best known works.
Edits: 08/23/14
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Follow Ups
- It's very dissonant, but is it atonal? - Chris from Lafayette 16:06:42 08/23/14 (2)
- To my ear, there is a continuum... - krisjan 17:33:42 08/23/14 (0)
- RE: It's very dissonant, but is it atonal? - rbolaw 16:47:15 08/23/14 (0)