Studia Musicologica
Volume/Issue:
Volume 64: Issue 1-2
The Widow in the Old House or The Elevator is Out of Order
Author:
Péter Laki Bard College, 30 Campus Rd, Annandale-On-Hudson, 12504, New York, NY, USA

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Pages:
43–50
Online Publication Date:
01 Feb 2024
Publication Date:
01 Feb 2024
Article Category:
Research Article
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1556/6.2023.00011
Keywords:
György Ligeti; Gyula Krúdy; meccanico style
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Abstract

On several occasions, Ligeti spoke about an early literary memory that he credited with the origins of his meccanico style. He recalled reading a short story by Gyula Krúdy (1878–1933) at the age of five, in which Krúdy supposedly wrote about a widow who lived in an old house filled with constantly ticking clocks. To date, the best Krúdy experts have been unable to identify the story in question, and it is reasonable to assume that in Ligeti's mind, actual elements from the writer's work were freely recombined and reimagined at a time when the compositions partly inspired by the Krúdy experience had already been written. Ligeti's published interviews contain references to Krúdy that go beyond the story with the clocks, it may be assumed that the writer's influence on the composer goes deeper than what has been acknowledged so far.

In addition, there is an aspect of Ligeti's recollection of the Krúdy story that has not received all the attention it deserves. In his conversations with Péter Várnai, the composer spoke of machines that were working or not working (emphasis mine), and elevators stopping at the wrong floor, or not starting at all. Some of the meccanico works are worth revisiting in search of such “malfunctions” as we try to reimagine the old house where not all the clocks might have been running like clockwork.

  • Cadagin, Joseph. “’Everything is Chance’: György Ligeti in Conversation with John Tusa, 28 October 1997,” in “I don’t belong anywhere:” György Ligeti at 100, ed. by Wolfgang Marx (Turnhout: Brepols, 2022), 247–272.

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  • Clendinning, Jane Piper. “The Pattern-Meccanico Compositions of György Ligeti,” Perspectives of New Music 31/1 (Winter, 1993), 192–234.

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  • Jack, Adrian. “Classic Music: Said the Spider to the Fly…,” <https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/classical-music-said-the-spider-to-the-fly-1295308.html> (accessed: February 10, 2023).

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  • Levy, Benjamin R. Metamorphosis in Music: The Compositions of György Ligeti in the 1950s and 1960s (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017).

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  • Lichtenfeld, Monika (ed.). György Ligeti: Gesammelte Schriften, 2 vols. (Mainz: Schott, 2007).

  • Pulido, Alejandro. “Differentiation and Integration in Ligeti’s Chamber Concerto, III.,” Sonus: A Journal of Investigations into Global Musical Possibilities 9/1 (Fall, 1988), 59–80.

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  • Roelcke, Eckhard. Träumen Sie in Farbe? György Ligeti im Gespräch mit Eckhard Roelcke (Wien: Zsolnay, 2003).

  • Steinitz, Richard. “À qui un hommage? Genesis of the Piano Concerto and the Horn Trio,” in György Ligeti: Of Foreign Lands and Strange Sounds, ed. by Louise Duchesneau, and Wolfgang Marx (Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2011), 169–212.

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Cover Studia Musicologica
Studia Musicologica
Print ISSN:
1788-6244
Online ISSN:
1789-2422

Senior editors

Editor(s)-in-Chief: Péter BOZÓ (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)

Review Editor: Lynn HOOKER (Purdue University, West Lafayette, USA)

Assistant Editor(s):
Patrick DEVINE (Maynooth University, Maynooth, IRL)
Anna LASKAI (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)

Editorial Board

  • Anja BUNZEL (Institute of Art History, Czech Academy of Sciences, CZ)
  • William A. EVERETT (Conservatory University of Missouri-Kansas City, USA)
  • Denis HERLIN (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris, F)
  • Vjera KATALINIĆ (HR)
  • Katalin KOMLÓS (professor emerita, Liszt Academy of Music, Budapest, H)
  • Valeria LUCENTINI (University of Bern, CH)
  • Tatjana MARKOVIĆ (Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien, A)
  • Pál RICHTER (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)
  • László SOMFAI (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)
  • László VIKÁRIUS (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)

 

Editorial Secretary

  • István Csaba NÉMETH (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)

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Studia Musicologica
Language English
French
German
Size B5
Year of
Foundation		 2007 (1961)
Volumes
per Year		 1
Issues
per Year		 4
Founder Magyar Tudományos Akadémia
Founder's
Address		 H-1051 Budapest, Hungary, Széchenyi István tér 9.
Publisher Akadémiai Kiadó
Publisher's
Address		 H-1117 Budapest, Hungary 1516 Budapest, PO Box 245.
Responsible
Publisher		 Chief Executive Officer, Akadémiai Kiadó
ISSN 1788-6244 (Print)
ISSN 1789-2422 (Online)

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