Ralph Shapey - Citizendia

Ralph Shapey

Ralph Shapey (March 12, 1921 - June 13, 2002) was an American composer and conductor. Events 538 - Witiges, king of the Ostrogoths ends his siege of Rome and retreats to Ravenna, leaving Year 1921 ( MCMXXI) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link will display full 1921 calendar of the Gregorian calendar Events 1525 - Martin Luther marries Katharina von Bora, against the Celibacy rule decreed by the Roman Catholic Church for See also 2002 (disambiguation Year 2002 ( MMII) was a Common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the A composer (literally meaning 'one who puts together' is a person who creates Music, usually in the medium of notation, for Interpretation and Performance Conducting is the act of directing a Musical performance by way of visible gestures He is well-known for his work as a composition professor at the University of Chicago, where he founded and directed the Contemporary Chamber Players. The University of Chicago is a Private university located principally in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago. Shapey was a MacArthur Fellow in 1982. The MacArthur Fellows Program or MacArthur Fellowship (sometimes Nicknamed the "genius grant") is an award given by the John D

Although Shapey's style is characterized by angularity, irony, and technical rigor, it eschews the pointillism, anti-emotionalism, and detached austerity of much twelve-tone music. Punctualism (commonly also called "pointillism" or "point music" is a style of musical composition prevalent in Europe between 1949 and 1955 "whose Twelve-tone technique (also dodecaphony, especially in British usage twelve-note composition) is a method of musical composition devised by Arnold His work's insistence instead on sweeping gesture, frenetic passion, rhythmic vitality, lyrical melody, and dramatic arc recall Romanticism. Romanticism is a complex artistic literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Western Europe, and gained strength during the Shapey was dubbed by critics Leonard Meyer and Bernard Jacobson as a "radical traditionalist," which pleased him immensely -- he held a deep respect for the masters of the past, whom he regarded as his finest teachers.

The French-American composer Edgard Varèse was among Shapey's most important influences. WikipediaWikiProject Composers#Lead section --> Edgard Victor Achille Charles Varèse, whose name was also spelled Edgar Varèse Both composers shared a fascination with unusual sonorities, counterpoint masses, and the outer extremes of pitch space. In Music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more voices that are independent in contour and Rhythm, and interdependent in Harmony In Music theory, pitch spaces model relationships between pitches The coordination of static "sound blocks" in Shapey's music also reminds one of another great French composer, Olivier Messiaen, though Shapey reportedly found Messiaen's music saccharine and maudlin. Olivier Messiaen ( December 10 1908 &ndash April 27 1992 was a French Composer, organist and ornithologist. Shapey also studied with Stefan Wolpe. Stefan Wolpe ( August 25, 1902 &ndash April 4, 1972) was a German -born Composer.

Although comparisons are useful, Shapey's compositional voice is undoubtedly personal and distinctive. Many listeners would call his music "atonal," but Shapey himself denied the label. He considered himself a tonal composer, and indeed his work, though couched in a highly dissonant harmonic idiom rich in interval classes 1 and 6, does adhere to certain organizational features of tonal music, including pitch hierarchy and object permanence. In Musical set theory, an interval class (usual abbreviation ic) is the shortest distance in Pitch class space between two unordered Pitch classes Object permanence is the term used to describe the Awareness that objects continue to exist even when they are no longer visible

In 1992 the Pulitzer Prize for Music jury, which that year consisted of George Perle, Roger Reynolds, and Harvey Sollberger, selected Shapey's "Concerto Fantastique" for the award. Year 1992 ( MCMXCII) was a Leap year starting on Wednesday (link will display full 1992 Gregorian calendar) The Pulitzer Prize for Music was first awarded in 1943 Joseph Pulitzer did not call for such a prize in his will but had arranged for a music scholarship to be awarded George Perle (born May 6, 1915 in Bayonne New Jersey) is a Composer and music theorist. American Composer and teacher at the University of California at San Diego Roger Reynolds was born July 18, 1934 in Detroit, Michigan Harvey Sollberger (b Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 1938) is an American composer flutist and conductor specializing in Contemporary classical music However, the Pulitzer Board rejected that decision and choose to give the prize to the jury's second choice, Wayne Peterson. Wayne Peterson (b 1927, Albert Lea Minnesota) is a musical composer pianist and educator The music jury responded with a public statement stating that they had not been consulted in that decision and that the Board was not professionally qualified to make such a decision. The Board responded that the "Pulitzers are enhanced by having, in addition to the professional's point of view, the layman's or consumer's point of view," and they did not rescind their decision. [1]

Shapey created a body of over 200 works, many of which have been published by Presser. Presser also offers his textbook A Basic Course in Music Composition, written after over fifty years of teaching the subject. Recordings of Shapey's music are available on the CRI, Opus One, and New World labels. Max Schubel (b April 11, 1932) is an American composer of Contemporary classical music. Shapey's works have been catologued by Dr. Patrick D. Finley in A Catalogue of the Works of Ralph Shapey, published by Pendragon Press

His students include Gerald Levinson, Gordon Marsh, Michael Eckert, Lawrence Fritts, James Anthony Walker, Frank Retzel, Jorge Liderman, Jonathan Elliott, Deborah Drattell, Ursula Mamlok, Shulamit Ran, Terry Winter Owens and a very broad and exceptional list of others. Gerald Levinson (b Westport, Connecticut, June 22 1951) is an American composer of Contemporary classical music. Shulamit Ran (שולמית רן born October 21, 1949 in Tel Aviv Israel) is an Israeli-American composer

Statement by Ralph Shapey about his work

Shapey the conductor

“Radical traditionalist” is what I’ve been called. My music combines two fundamentally contradictory impulses–-radical language and romantic sensibility. The melodies are disjunct and dissonant; they contain "atonal" harmonies and extremes in register, dynamics, and textural contrast. Yet the musical structures are grandly formed and run the gamut of dramatic gestures. Like the Romantics, I conceive of art in a deeply spiritual way. A great work of art transcends the immediate moment into a world of infinity.

My credo is: 1) The music must speak for itself. 2) Great art is a miracle. 3) What the mind can conceive will be done.

External links

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