Book review: Music at Darmstadt. Nono, Stockhausen, Cage, and Boulez by Martin Iddon.

International audienceIn the best sociological tradition, Martin Iddon uses his limpid prose to show us that things are not what they seem: the serialists were never fully serial, and there is a cavern of critique, interpretation, and analysis separating discourse and practice. The thrust of this richly documented volume is an analysis of the controversy regarding the legacy of Webern within the context of the early years, under Wolfgang Steinecke’s direction (1949-1961), of what would become the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt. In the end, Iddon shows that Webern would be used to legitimize the rise of serialism; his music became a calling card for the ‘school’ of multiple serialism which brought together composers who, despite the halo of discourse and founts of critique, only marginally actually fully applied this technique in their own compositions. Iddon convincingly argues that the identity of this fledgling movement crystallized thanks to the controversy surrounding it, with one of the key players being that of Theodor W. Adorno and his scathing critique of the composers involved (notably of Pierre Boulez and Karel Goeyvaerts). This school took hold more thanks to the discourse produced about it than to the compositions actually being produced within it