JACQUES-LOUIS MONOD

Jacques-Louis Monod (b. February 25, 1927 - ) is an influential French-born, American domiciled composer, pianist and conductor of 20th century and contemporary music.

Contents

Biography

Notable Relatives

Early Years in Paris

Pianist and Studies

USA

Conductor

New York City

1950s

Great Britain

1960s

New York City

1970s-1990s

Composer

List of Compositions

Pedagogue

Theorist and Editor

Summary of his Work

Monod and the Dialectics of Contemporary American Music

External Links

Biography

Notable Relatives

Descended from among the oldest families in French ancestry; his father, Pierre Monod was a noted surgeon. His cousins include the naturalist Théodore Monod; the industrialist-politician Jérôme Monod; Jacques Lucien Monod, the Nobel Prize-winning biologist; and the film director Jean-Luc Godard.
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Early Years in Paris

Born in Asnières (now Asnières-sur-Seine), a northwestern suburb of Paris to an affluent family of French Protestant affiliation, early indications of Monod’s musical prowess were apparent when he enrolled at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Paris as a child prodigy at age 7, under the official age of nine. Monod's teachers at the Paris Conservatoire were Yves Nat and Olivier Messiaen; including tutelage under his godfather, Paul-Silva Hérard, Organist at the St. Ambroise Church in Paris.
While in Paris, Monod also took private lessons beginning in 1944 under the French composer and conductor, René Leibowitz, a Webern disciple and émigré from Warsaw, Poland (n.b. rumor has it that during the German occupation of France, which lasted until December of 1944, the young Monod surreptitiously brought food to Leibowitz, a member of the French Resistance). Leibowitz soon became Monod’s principal teacher and mentor among a circle of devote pupils, including Jean Prodromidès, Antoine Duhamel, Pierre Chan, Michel Philippot, Serge Nigg, André Casanova, Claude Helffer and for a brief period, Pierre Boulez. Compared to Boulez - who was a former but distant classmate of Monod’s at the Paris Conservatoire - Monod's oeuvre remains significant among the early cadre of post-WWII proponents of the New Modernism in Paris (ca. 1945-51), promoting initially the music of Schoenberg; and later, the serial music of Webern. Schoenberg's music - considered "radical" for a brief period in France after WWII - was soon regarded as outmoded and superseded by the music of his pupil, Webern. However, Monod would not abandon Schoenberg's music throughout his long career - as many in the French avant-garde had decided under Boulez' direction with his (and others) subsequent influence upon the development of "experimental" serialism and related music at Darmstadt. Monod's debut (1949) as a pianist took place in Paris at a concert organized by Leibowitz for Schoenberg's 75th birthday. His performance of Schoenberg's ''Phantasy for Violin and Piano Accompaniment'', Op. 47 missed being the world premiere by only a few hours (n.b. the world premiere took place in Los Angeles on September 13, 1949 with Leonard Stein on piano and Adolf Koldofsky on violin).

Pianist and Studies

USA

Upon Leibowitz’s earliest travels to the United States (first in 1947 to visit Schoenberg in Los Angeles), Monod arrived in 1950, accompanying Leibowitz to New York City, who was to hear the legendary jazz musician and saxophonist Charlie Parker perform in Harlem; while Monod met with Milton Babbitt and undertook post-graduate studies at Columbia University (conducting under R. Thomas and H. Allendorf) and at the Juilliard School (composition under B. Wagenaar); and during this period, performed as a pianist throughout the 1950s (n.b. Monod had also accompanied Leibowitz in 1948 to the earliest composition seminars in Darmstadt at the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik; and later during the early 1950s, Monod attended B. Blacher's composition seminar and the analysis seminar of J. Rufer's in Berlin).
At a time when the musics of Schoenberg, Berg and Webern were least performed in America, Monod was among the earliest performers of their music. He performed and recorded the piano part of Berg's ''Chamber Concerto,'' Schoenberg's ''Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte'', Op. 41; and with Leibowitz, performed on historic recordings of chamber music of Berg and Webern during the early 1950s for the Dial Records label (n.b. the record company was founded by Ross Russell, who also produced historic jazz recordings of Charlie Parker and Miles Davis). At Juilliard, Monod performed in a special concert of Alban Berg's chamber music on December 18, 1950, featuring the premiere of Berg's ''Two Songs'' (unedited extract from Die Musik 1930) with the virtuosic soprano, Bethany Beardslee. The duo also performed Berg's ''Seven Early Songs'' (1905–08) and ''Four Songs'', Op. 2 (1908-10).
Also evident during Monod's initial studies in the USA were his prodigious display of musical strengths: while attending a graduate seminar at Columbia on 20th century music by the Varèse disciple, Chou Wen-chung, Monod's cogent analysis of Varèse's ''Ionisation'' led to his teaching the course.

Conductor

New York City

1950s

In the early 1950s, Monod gave American premieres of many works of Anton Webern, directing the first all-Webern concert in New York City as an assistant to Richard Franco Goldman (of Goldman Band notoriety) with the world premiere of Webern’s ''Five Canons on Latin Texts'', Op. 16 on May 8, 1951; and on March 16, 1952, he also gave world premieres of Webern's ''Three Traditional Rhymes'', Op. 17 and the ''Three Songs on Poems of Hildegard Jone'', Op. 25, all with his then-wife, Ms. Beardslee, with whom for years, they performed critically-acclaimed concerts of new music under Monod's directorship with the Camera Concerts. Further, the composer whose music bears a certain degree of aesthetic similarity to Monod's is the Webern disciple, Leopold Spinner, whose ''Fünf Lieder'', op. 8 for voice and piano was premiered by Monod and Ms. Beardslee on March 15, 1954.
As the conductor Hermann Scherchen (with an introduction by Boulez) was premiering Edgard Varèse’s ''Déserts'' in Paris on January 20, 1954; Monod conducted its American premiere at Town Hall (December, 1955) with Varèse participating, controlling the Ampex tape recorder. In 1956, Monod received an Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters for his creative work in music.

Great Britain

1960s

During the height of serialism in Great Britain in the 1960s and under the influence of Sir William Glock and Hans Keller, Monod was in London and appointed conductor of contemporary music for the BBC Third Programme from 1960 to 1966, directing dozens of premieres in Europe and in South America, including works by Roberto Gerhard, Peter Maxwell Davies, Luigi Dallapiccola; and Luigi Nono, whom he befriended during Monod’s London premiere of Nono’s, ''Polifonica-Monodica-Ritmica''. Included was Monod's 1962 world premiere of Roberto Gerhard's ''Concert for Eight'' with the Melos Ensemble of London and his 1963 performance/recording of Gerhard's music for Lindsay Anderson's critically acclaimed, ''This Sporting Life'', a British New Wave film.
Monod also directed contemporary music with notable ensembles in London and Zurich during the 1960s to early 1970s: in 1962, Monod directed and recorded for Epic Records Elliot Carter's ''Suite from Pocahontus'' with the Zurich Radio Symphony Orchestra. Further, his interpretation of Seymour Shifrin's ''Three Pieces for Orchestra'' with the London Sinfonietta received the Walter W. Naumburg Foundation, Inc. Award in 1970 for best recording; whereas, his performance (1962, recording issued, 1966) of Schoenberg's ''Serenade'', Op. 24 with the Melos Ensemble was the first time the pianist and Schoenberg amanuensis-editor Leonard Stein had encountered Monod's masterly interpretations of Schoenberg's music.
N.b. More extensive and further research is required for the 1960s in Great Britain, which represent a creative and productive period for Monod and for serialism.

New York City

1970s-1990s

In 1975, he founded, and for 20 years served as president of the Guild of Composers, a New York-based group that produced concerts of "uptown" contemporary music. At the Guild of Composers concerts, which often took place at Columbia University's Miller Theater, performances included the music of Elliott Carter, Mario Davidovsky, Seymour Shifrin, Earl Kim, Donald Martino, George Edwards, Robert Helps, David Lewin; and Milton Babbitt, who composed an earlier work, ''Du'', dedicated to Monod and Ms. Beardslee. During 1995-2000, concerts of the Guild of Composers were directed by the Monod protégé, Daniel Plante.
New York City during the 1960s through to the 1980s played host to numerous concerts and "happenings" devoted to contemporary music: the development of a "downtown" contemporary music scene during the 1960s and mid-1970s for instance, may have been a reaction to and/or caused by "uptown" contemporary music promulgated at the Juilliard School in Lincoln Center - which remains a beacon to this day of European-derived, 'high-art' music - and primarily at Columbia University with concerts of the Guild of Composers; and earlier, with The Group for Contemporary Music concerts, directed initially from 1961 to the 1970s by two former Columbia students, Charles Wourinen and Harvey Sollberger. Columbia's music department - which had previously invited composers as diverse as Bartok and Varèse during the 1940s and 1950s - were superseded during much of the 1970s and 1980s by the predominance of Columbia- and Princeton-trained composers and theorists: many shared a strong bias toward espousing the European-derived, historically deterministic role and theories of Schoenberg - which composers from the downtown music scene opposed, developing instead, their multi-cultural, improvisatory and pop-influenced music, and inspired by the indeterminate music of John Cage, who paradoxically was a former pupil of Schoenberg's; and from the earlier movement of the 1950s - 1960s of composers from the New York School of American experimental music.
Along with the influence of Babbitt and his adherents - Monod was a major proponent in New York City of "non-experimental" serialism, promoting the music of American composers from the so-called, Princeton-Columbia "axis" (and to a lesser degree, Harvard) at the Guild of Composers concerts. Although not to overstate their significance, the music performed for 25 years at the Guild of Composers concerts exemplified the ideological view that contemporary American music remains very much a part of the Western polyphonic tradition. Further, Boulez' provocative work as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center during 1971 - 1977 also contributed to the public's increased awareness of concerts devoted to contemporary music, albeit with a much wider palette of musical works performed.
Throughout much of the 1970s and 1980s, Monod also continued to promote and advance the music of Schoenberg, leading the music critic Allan Kozinn to write an article published in the New York Times (March, 1985), acknowledging Monod's expertise as the 'Guardian of the Schoenberg Flame'. His specialization in the music of Schoenberg include a notable performance in the early 1980s of Schoenberg's ''Pierrot Lunaire'', Op. 21 with commentary from George Perle.

Composer

Monod’s music is based upon historical precedents of Webern’s music and represents the French school of post-WWII serialism, combined with subtle lyricism. His doctoral dissertation, completed at Columbia in 1975, consists of a detailed exposition of a seminal work, ''Cantus Contra Cantum II'' for Violin and Cello, which represents a tour de force in rhythmic and serial complexity. A central tenet of Monod's compositional system consists of "prioritized" pitch classes within derived sets or series, that have hierarchical properties and relations for contrapuntal treatment and harmonic development.
Unlike the music of his compatriots, such as the music of Boulez, which has received international interest and notoriety with frequent performances for its trendsetting nature, Monod's music is by comparison 'purist' and more accurately described as "modern classicist"; although his music has been performed sparingly and has yet to be fully recognized. As in the music of Webern, there are no extraneous musical elements nor is there any degree of fortuitousness in Monod's rigorously composed music, which gives the discerning listener a means to distinguish musical relationships with aesthetically compelling results. The strict formal characteristics of his non-experimental and non-improvisational, highly controlled music requires superior technical demands upon performers. Moreover, the overly-mechanical and superficial aspects exhibited in earlier works of integral or total serialism are entirely absent and circumvented in Monod's music; which ironically, provides listeners with lyrical attributes. The title for his serial compositions, "Cantus Contra Cantum" refers to the late-medieval concept of "line against line" as a progression beyond "punctus contra punctum", i.e., creating advanced music that is correlated to the development of modern Western polyphony: "music-synergy", wherein the interaction of two or more parts or voices in each work creates a combined effect that is greater than the sum of their individual effects. Monod's music eschews fashionable trends of experimentalism by the avant-garde, and remains understated with the singular focus to achieving the sublime - analogous to refined works of the European artists and writer, Giorgio Morandi, Balthus and Giuseppe di Lampedusa.
In 1979, the ISCM in New York City performed his ''Cantus Contra Cantum I'' for Soprano and Chamber Orchestra, the first of a series of works that realizes Monod's advancement of a polyphonic "langue". More recent performances took place in New York City during February of 1987 and in March of 1989 of his provocative, "Tränen des Vaterlandes - Anno 1636" (''Cantus Contra Cantum IV''), a four-minute choral work accompanied by "sackbuts", based upon "a gruesome poetic depiction of carnage and devastation by Andreas Gryphius...[the music is] stark but appropriate for the horrors described" (John Rockwell, NYT: 3-30-89); and his two a capella works, ''Elergies'', evoking "the ghost of Anton Webern...music as exquisitely beautiful as any this listener has heard in some time" (Tim Page, music critic, NYT: 2-5-87).
Monod's music is published by Jerona Music Corp.

List of Compositions

A partial list of Monod's compositions include works from the series, ''Cantus Contra Cantum'':

★ ''Cantus Contra Cantum I'' for Soprano and Chamber Orchestra

★ ''Cantus Contra Cantum II'' for Violin and Cello

★ ''Cantus Contra Cantum III'' for Chorus (a Piano reduction exists)

★ ''Cantus Contra Cantum IV (Tränen des Vaterlandes - Anno 1636)'' for Mixed Chorus and Sackbuts or Trombones

★ ''Cantus Contra Cantum V'' for Orchestra

★ ''Cantus Contra Cantum VI'' for Mixed Choir and Chamber Orchestra

★ ''2 Elegies'' (incl. ''Canonic Vocalise'')

★ ''Chamber Aria'' (or the ''Passacaglia'')

Pedagogue

Monod was also an uncompromising and demanding pedagogue, who sought a level of technical perfection from his students. With his nearly obsessive, methodical attention to details to render greater musical clarity, Monod has taught for over 25 years at various schools, including the New England Conservatory of Music, Brandeis University, Harvard University, Princeton University, the Sorbonne, the Juilliard School, and for many years, at Columbia University. During the summer of 1977, when Paris was all the rage for the newly designed, Centre Georges Pompidou and IRCAM, Monod returned to Paris to direct an advanced composition seminar at Reid Hall, which was attended primarily by Columbia and Harvard students, and included the guest instructors and Schoenberg disciples, Max Deutsch and Richard Hoffmann, and a Varèse pupil, Marc Wilkinson. Later during the 1980s, Monod taught at the Sorbonne; and in the 1990s, he taught advanced theory and analysis, composition and conducting at the Juilliard School. Over the years, Monod has also given private lessons to talented musicians, including those influenced by mathematics and the computer sciences: many are occupying various professional positions in the USA and abroad in the areas of conducting, composition and theory.
Although Monod's theoretical work and pedagogy have focused upon the development of Western polyphony from the earliest examples of Gregorian Chant to works by J.S. Bach, through to the modern repertoire of Schoenberg; whereas, the music of his many former students (and those who were affiliated with Monod through his editorial work), reflect a diverse array of genres, cultures and styles, from contemporary "classical" music to electronic music and beyond: e.g., Bruce Hobson, Robert Pollock, Martin Matalon, Manuel Sosa, Dariush Dolat-shahi, Eve Beglarian, Eugene Lee, Conrad Pope, Thanassis Rikakis, Maurice Wright, Pablo Ortiz, Eric B. Chernov, Tod Machover, Joel E. Suben, Mark Hagerty, Daniel Plante, David Winkler, Michael Rothkopf, James Walsh, Harold Bott, Jr., et al.
Delivering exacting and rigorously prepared performances, Monod has had a galvanizing effect for many years upon the American, British and French contemporary music scenes. Though retired from academia and performing, and a near recluse, Monod is giving private lessons, and continues to compose and write on music.

Theorist and Editor

Monod has done substantial work in music theory which has yet to be published. Showing similarities to writings on scale tendency and tetrachordal relations by the 19th-century music theorist and instructor at the Paris Conservatoire, François-Joseph Fétis, Monod's theory consists of an advanced hermeneutics on the Western polyphonic tradition with the development of a cognitive system, comprised of linear and segmental associations of pitch organization, supported with extensive examples of analyses of contrapuntal-harmonic relations from early Gregorian Chant to the advanced tonality of Max Reger and the music of Schoenberg. Although an apartment fire in the early 1980s nearly destroyed his manuscripts, Monod was able to continue his magnum opus for the past twenty-five years: a theoretical study that includes the fourth piece of Arnold Schoenberg's ''Sechs Kleine Klavierstücke'', Op. 19.
In addition, Monod has edited numerous works for publication at Mobart Music Publications/Boelke-Bomart, Inc. (now part of Jerona Music Corp.), where he was editor-in-chief during 1952-1982, including Charles Ives' ''Central Park in the Dark'', ''Hallowe'en'' and ''The Pond''; Schoenberg's ''Kol nidre'', Op. 39, ''String Trio'', Op. 45, ''A Survivor from Warsaw'', Op. 46, ''Three Songs'', Op. 48; and Webern's ''Quintet for Strings and Piano''. Monod has also edited works for the Association for the Promotion of New Music (APNM), including Godfrey Winham's ''Composition for Orchestra'' and Stephen Peles' ''Intermezzo'' for solo piano. The composer and musicologist Ethan Haimo has compared Monod's editions of Schoenberg's music as the standard by which other [editions] are to be judged ("Editing Schoenberg’s Twelve-tone Music," Journal of the A. Schoenberg Institute, 8/2, 1984, pp. 141-57). In 1983, Monod edited and published at Mobart, "René Leibowitz 1913-1972. A Register of His Works and Writings".

Summary of his Work

There are three major phases of development in Monod's oeuvre: first, his initial education in Paris during the 1940s, bearing distinctively French characteristics (e.g. extensive training at the Paris Conservatoire, studies under Messiaen and later, Leibowitz); followed by his relocation abroad during the 1950s and 1960s to NYC and London as a pianist and conductor, with the advancement of contemporary music by composers of non-French origins, particularly American music (e.g. C. Ives, E. Carter, M. Babbitt and S. Shifrin) and the works of Schoenberg and his School (e.g. A. Berg, A. Webern, R. Gerhard, L. Spinner, L. Nono, et al.), including the music of a fellow émigré, Varèse; and thirdly, his own musical legacy as a composer and pedagogue during the 1970s and 1980s, primarily at Columbia University and at the Guild of Composers concerts with the advancement of "non-experimental" works by composers - many who were directly associated with Monod. Throughout his long career, there appears to be a deliberate effort by Monod to avoid the transient nature in much of contemporary music, evidently propelled by the post-WWII avant-garde credo of experimentation to create music that emphasized 'novelty'.

Monod and the Dialectics of Contemporary American Music

It remains to be determined whether the influence of Monod will have long-standing ramifications in the development of contemporary American music in the new millenium. The situation today is pessimistic. The current ebbs and flows of American music for example, seem mired in a mixture of appealing to mass consumer interests as well as to the comparatively few who are interested in the contemporary music promoted by Monod, et al. during the past 50+ years. As more orchestras and ensembles are finding it difficult to economically sustain their contemporary music objectives, the future also appears uncertain as to how modern music will survive in America as an artistic genre without having the financial resources of the interested public. Another difficult assessment pertains to whether the specific "non-experimental" music promoted by Babbitt, Monod, et al. will have lasting significance in supporting the cause for contemporary music performance practice in America, without sacrificing artistic standards in lieu of artistic compromise, which presumably is the premise of the above-mentioned artists and their work. Monod's own music has yet to be fully assessed in view of the avant-garde and modernist music of his contemporaries, such as the works of Boulez and Babbitt, respectively. Certainly, the complexity of his music as well as our times make the task all the more difficult, given the challenge of what it means to attribute Monod's uncompromising persona and musical legacy as specifically being that of a "modern classicist". The various conflicting forces and/or 'differences' in contemporary American music today represent a 'crossroads' for Western music that may be better understood from a dialectical perspective.
If on the other hand, popular music and related popular culture in America continue to grow among the general public, the effects of the economic system would render the appeal toward contemporary "serious" music for limited tastes only, and within more limited budgets and more elite conditions for performance practice, thereby alienating further the general public from acquiring access, and from having any understanding and appreciation for contemporary "serious" music. Their interest and support if any, for serious music-making would be doubtful. The current socio-economic conditions in America for instance, indicate that contemporary "serious" music persists to a limited extent through isolated instances of independent recordings made and issued, and with a diminishing list of uncompromising composers and their few supporters, committed conductors and the few capable performers.
Other important issues relate to the overriding concerns of Monod's legacy, namely the future of the Western polyphonic tradition in America, since demographic shifts in America with the development of non-Western musical forms influencing the public, have generated a considerable amount of interest and support today for a multi-cultural agenda with multi-cultural perspectives toward creating music, creating new art and in teaching. Notwithstanding, the Western polyphonic tradition constitutes a specific musical repertory and substantial theoretical discourse, that entails hundreds of years of musical development - the relatively recent advent of non-Western musical influences in 20th century Western music and performance practice with mutually exclusive compositional criteria, will undoubtedly effect Western music's continual development in America - presumably inhibitive. That there are "cross-over" effects and relations in contemporary American music with both Western and non-Western compositional elements are at best a musical compromise, since American composers who have advocated and have applied non-Western compositional criteria in their music have yet to contribute to the underlying tenets of advancing polyphony, as this may not have been their aesthetic intentions nor interests. Thus the apparent dichotomy and position taken that "non-experimental" and "experimental" serial music have little in common - other than their common source of origin (e.g. Schoenberg-Webern) - may be tenable, since the avant-garde music of the experimental serialists have generated a multitude of various styles (e.g. chance, aleatoric, minimalism, free-jazz, etc.), each having little to do with the music that has been promulgated by Monod, et al. in the Western polyphonic tradition. Further, the American experimental tradition in music is more likely to develop into an indigenous musical culture and repertory, having less in common musically with their European-derived influences (n.b. it may be interesting to note that Monod's editorial work include one of America's earliest 'experimental' composers, namely the music of Charles Ives).
Moreover, to state that the development of Western polyphonic music has been the result of a largely "Euro-centric" activity is inaccurate, since the history of modern Western music during the 20th century for example, has been very much a "multi-cultural" creation, if taking into consideration that creating and promoting Western music has been a widely-practiced activity and international in scope; and is therefore by definition a multi-cultural phenomenon, albeit derived from European sources. To a certain extent, the advanced polyphonic music and legacy of Schoenberg has left an indelible mark in the history of mid- to late 20th century contemporary music in America and abroad, as a result of major promoters, such as the work by Monod, et al. Well-endowed orchestras and ensembles in America will also continue to include the music of Schoenberg and the Second Viennese School in their repertory. However, if the over-arching concern is whether there would be a role and future for 'new' American "serious" music (e.g. music that is polyphonic and European-derived) promoted by the likes of Monod and others, their influence may appear less over time, as this genre of music may be relegated to the larger category of non-correlated musical genres, including non-Western musical forms and practices in contemporary American music; while the influence of a solely Western and more specifically, an European-derived, American "polyphonic" music, appear either gradually assimilated or ultimately ignored for the time being by the forces of American popular culture, the masses and of modern society. It may take generations before a renewal of interest occurs in America for contemporary serious music with European influences.

External Links

★ Review by Tim Page in the New York Times: Music: Guild of Composers Concert

★ Review by Dika Newlin on Jacques-Louis Monod's, Passacaille for Soprano and Seven Instruments, No. 1

★ Review by Allan Kozinn in the New York Times: Guardian of the Schoenberg Flame

★ Review by Robert G. Kopelson in The Harvard Crimson: Jacques-Louis Monod and Chamber Ensemble

★ Review by John Rockwell in the New York Times: Music: Composers Guild

★ Citation by Michael Steinberg in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2nd Ed.

★ Boelke-Bomart, Inc./Jerona Music Corporation Website

★ Review by Paul Griffiths in the New York Times: Music Review; Composers' Guild Honors Its Founder in a Concert

★ Review by Tim Page in the New York Times: Concert: New-Music Ensemble

★ Review by Richard G. Swift on Jacques-Louis Monod's ediiton of Schoenberg's A Survivor from Warsaw, Op. 46

★ Citation by Jeni Dahmus on the Juilliard Concert of Berg's chamber music with Jacques-Louis Monod and Bethany Beardslee

★ Review by Tom Cleman on Jacques-Louis Monod's edition of Schoenberg's String Trio, Op. 45

★ Jacques-Louis Monod at Columbia