The Society for Music Theory promotes the development of and engagement with music theory as a scholarly and pedagogical discipline. We construe this discipline broadly as embracing all approaches, from conceptual to practical, and all perspectives, including those of the scholar, listener, composer, performer, teacher, and student. The Society is committed to fostering diversity, inclusivity, and gender equity in the field.
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John Covach deposited Review essay: “Dahlhaus, Schoenberg, and the New Music,” In Theory Only 12 (1991): 19 42. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 2 weeks, 5 days agoReview of a collection of essays by Carl Dahlhaus, translated by Derrick Puffett and Alfred Clayton and entitled Schoenberg and the New Music.
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John Covach deposited Review of Edward Lippman, A History of Western Musical Aesthetics and John Rahn, ed., Perspectives on Musical Aesthetics, Music Theory Spectrum 17/2 (1995): 275-82. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 2 weeks, 5 days agoReview of the Lippman and Rahn books, both devoted to music aeathetics.
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John Covach deposited Review of Allen Forte, The American Popular Ballad of the Golden Era, 1924-1950, College Music Symposium 36 (1996): 168-72. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 2 weeks, 5 days agoReview of Forte’s book devoted to the analysis of Tin Pan Alley popular music.
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John Covach deposited Triple review of Edward Macan, Rockin’ the Classics: Progressive Rock and the Counterculture; Paul Stump, The Music’s All That Matters: A History of Progressive Rock; and Bill Martin, Listening to the Future: The Time of Progressive Rock, 1968-78, MLA Notes (September 1998). in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 2 weeks, 5 days agoReview of three books devoted to progressive rock snd its history.
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John Covach deposited Review of Robert Freeman, The Crisis of Classical Music: Lessons from a Life in the Education of Musicians, Music Theory Online 21/2 (June 2015). in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 2 weeks, 5 days agoReviews Freeman/s book with special attention paid to the development of music school curricula.
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John Covach deposited Review of Alastair Borthwick, Music Theory and Analysis: The Limitations of Logic, MLA Notes (June 1996): 1192-94. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 2 weeks, 5 days agoReview of Borthwick’s book, which approaches music theory from a point of view informed by philosophy.
Sam Reenan deposited Types and Applications of P3,0 Seventh-Chord Transformations in Late Nineteenth-Century Music in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 2 days agoThe expression P3,0 refers to one class of parsimonious voice-leading transformations between seventh chords introduced in a 1998 article by Jack Douthett and Peter Steinbach as Pm,n (Journal of Music Theory 42 (2): 241–63). In addition to tones that may be held in common, the subscripts indicate the number of voices that move by half step (m) o…[Read more]
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John Covach deposited “The Zwölftonspiel of Josef Matthias Hauer,” Journal of Music Theory 36.1 (1992): 149-84. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 2 days agoThis article provides a detailed examination of Hauer’s late 12-tone compositions, identifying the practices and procedures employed across a body of more than 100 pieces.
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John Covach deposited “Schoenberg and the Occult: Some Reflections on the Musical Idea,” Theory and Practice 17 (1992): 103-18. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 2 days agoThis article explores the influence of sources outside the institutional framework of organized religion (“occult” sources) on Schoenberg’s aesthetic thinking and writing, especially with regard to the musical idea..
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John Covach deposited “The Quest of the Absolute: Schoenberg, Hauer, and the Twelve-Tone Idea,” in Jon Michael Spencer, ed., Theomusicology, special issue of Black Sacred Music: A Journal of Theomusicology 8/1 (Duke University Press, 1994): 158-77. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 2 days agoThis article examines the spiritual dimension of early twelve-tone theoretical writing, with a focus on the writing and music of Arnold Schoenberg and Josef Matthias Hauer.
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John Covach deposited “Balzacian Mysticism, Palindromic Design, and Heavenly Time in Berg’s Music,” in Encryted Messages in Alban Berg’s Music, ed. Siglind Bruhn (Garland Publishing, 1998), 5-29. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 2 days agoThis article explores the influence of mysticism in early 20th-century Vienna on the palindromic designs that can found n Berg’s music.
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John Covach deposited “The Sources of Schoenberg’s ‘Aesthetic Theology,’” 19th-Century Music 19/3 (1996): 252-62. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 2 days agoThis article explores the sources of what Dahlhaus calls Schoenberg’s “aesthetic theology” in the philosophical, literary, and mystical writings of late 19th- and early 20th-century Europe.
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John Covach deposited “Schoenberg’s ‘Poetics of Music’ and the Twelve-Tone Idea,” in Schoenberg and Words, ed. R. Berman and C. Cross (Garland Publishing, 2000), 309-46. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 4 days agoThis chapter examines Schoenberg’s theoretical ideas on musical structure with particular emphasis on his Variations for Orchestra, op 31.
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John Covach deposited “Twelve-Tone Theory,” in The Cambridge History of Western Music Theory, ed. Thomas Christensen, (Cambridge University Press, 2002), 603-627. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 4 days agoThis chapter traces the development of the twelve-tone idea in twentieth-century music theory.
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John Covach deposited “Schoenberg’s (Analytical) Gaze: Musical Time, The Organic Ideal, and Analytical Perspectivism,” Theory and Practice 42 (2017): 141-59. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 4 days agoThis article explores Schoenberg’s engagement with organicism, casting it as an aesthetic ideal.
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John Covach deposited “Josef Matthias Hauer,” in Music of the Twentieth Century Avant-Garde, ed. Larry Sitsky (Greenwood Publishing, 2003), 197-202. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 4 days agoThis chapter provides a biographical sketch of Hauer’s life and music.
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John Covach deposited “The Americanization of Arnold Schoenberg? Theory, Analysis, and Reception,” Zeitschrift der Gesellschaft für Musiktheorie 15/2 (2018): 155-75. in the group
Society for Music Theory (SMT) on Humanities Commons 3 weeks, 4 days agoThis article traces the reception of Schoenberg’s theoretical ideas in the English-language music theory community.