Materials and Techniques of Post-Tonal Music

Materials and Techniques of Post-Tonal Music, Fifth Edition provides the most comprehensive introduction to post-tonal music and its analysis available. Covering music from the end of the nineteenth century through the beginning of the twenty-first, it offers students a clear guide to understanding the diverse and innovative compositional strategies that emerged in the post-tonal era, from Impressionism to computer music. This updated fifth edition features: chapters revised throughout to include new examples from recent music and insights from the latest scholarship; the introduction of several new concepts and topics, including parsimonius voice-leading, scalar transformations, the New Complexity, and set theory in less chromatic contexts; expanded discussions of spectralism and electronic music; timelines in each chapter, grounding the music discussed in its chronological context; acompanion website that provides students with links to recordings of musical examples discussed in the text and provides instructors with an instructor’s manual that covers all of the exercises in each chapter. Offering accessible explanations of complex concepts, Materials and Techniques of Post-Tonal Music, Fifth Edition is an essential text for all students of post-tonal music theory.

1. THE TWILIGHT OF THE TONAL SYSTEM 2. SCALE FORMATIONS IN POST-TONAL MUSIC 3. THE VERTICAL DIMENSION: CHORDS AND SIMULTANEITIES 4. THE HORIZONTAL DIMENSION: MELODY AND VOICE LEADING 5. HARMONIC PROGRESSION AND TONALITY 6. DEVELOPMENTS IN RHYTHM 7. FORM IN POST-TONAL MUSIC 8. IMPORTS AND ALLUSIONS 9. NONSERIAL ATONALITY 10. CLASSICAL SERIALISM 11. TIMBRE AND TEXTURE: ACOUSTIC 12. TIMBRE AND TEXTURE: ELECTRONIC 13. SERIALISM AFTER 1945 14. THE ROLES OF CHANCE AND CHOICE IN POST-TONAL MUSIC 15. MINIMALISM AND BEYOND APPENDIX: PRIME FORMS, FORTE LABELS, AND INTERVAL-CLASS VECTORS

Stefan Kostka is Professor Emeritus of Music Theory at the Butler School of Music at The University of Texas at Austin. Matthew Santa is Professor of Theory and Chair of the Music Theory and Composition Area at the Texas Tech University School of Music.