One of the best lectures on any composer I have ever watched anywhere. Just a magnificent clarity of thought and presentation. Bravo & thank you dearly for making this available for us.
I really like the depth of this video! If anyone wants a practical toolkit/guide for composers about Arvo Pärt's style, I've put that up over on my channel.
Once a serialist, always a serialist! Thank you for this illuminating lecture. I believe that Arvo Part is the great composer of our time. He represents an artistic shift. A tectonic shift. One we have yet to absorb. This lecture is a great help in doing so.
Part uses modernist techniques to transcend modernism to express Tradition. He is a new paradigm. Not only for composers, but for poets, theologians, and contemplatives, etc. Thank you for opening up his compositional process further.
The genius is Arvo Pärt isn't (just) in coming with these interesting patterns and rules for generating music, but in working out which ones sound good and can be realized in a way that is musical. We don't know how many variations of a pattern he tries out to find the best one :-)
The octaves in Spiegel im Spiegel work out according to the following pattern: the first (low) octave is played on bar 2, and the next one after 4 bars, followed by another 4 bars, then 5, 5, 6, 6, 7, 7, 8, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10, 11, 11, 12, and the final octave breaks the sequence after only three bars. The high octaves are played at the each _first_ odd number in the series (5, 7, 9, 10, 11, and the last 3). This makes a pattern of 3 low octaves + 1 high octave, which is also played out with the accompaniment tintinnabuli voices: every fourth phrase begins with a low accompaniment tone as opposed to the usual high one. (And I'm sure you've figured it out, but the accompanying voices are either two F triad notes above the diatonic scale note or one triad note below it.) This was a fantastic presentation, too! It gave me a whole new appreciation to Pärt's music to be able to see the parametrization and the strict processes behind the pieces. It almost makes them seem greater than they already were.
Thanks for the lesson, Milton. The philosophical part where the M-voice is a human being and the T-voice is the eternal presence of God touched me. Beautiful composition technique. Cheers.
Thank you Milton for this incredible explanation of Arvo Pärt's music. His music touches my soul and now because of your analysis of his process I can understand why. There is a fundamental connection to the harmonies of this universe in his compositions that is unlike any other music I have listened to. Infinity.... I remember 10 years ago I decided to get back into playing piano and started taking lessons after a career in fashion. I had to perform a song for my new teacher. I chose to play Fur Elina. It was actually quite funny because I was quite a novice at the piano and I remember trying to express this huge emotion I was feeling all through the two opening notes of B and D. I think I got through the first 4 bars and she said " OK, what else have you got?!" 10 years later I am still at it and I love playing this piece. Your analysis has opened a door of understanding - not just a window. Sincere thanks for this beautiful lecture. Evalina
Arvo Pärt is one of my favorite composers of all time, and his music is sublimely beautiful. Thank you for this lecture on the amazing structure of his work.
Wonderful video. A little note about "Sarah was Ninety Years Old" at about 14:30. The voice progress is actually simpler. After each cell, the bottom voice moved to the top voice and the top voice moves to the bottom voice and skips one note. ABCDE (1) flip to bottom BCDEA (2) flip to top and repeat BCDEA (3) while the bottom voice does the same; play, flip to top and repeat, flip to bottom and move one note forward, flip to to and repeat, flip to bottom and move one note forward. Thanks!
You Sir, are to me, one of the most inspired persons to comment upon music I have heard in my 55 years on this planet. It was a joy to listen to you for a number of reasons, one because my whole idea of what music was, got completely blown apart. I had no idea that the divinely beautiful music of Arvo Part was so mathematically composed, I fully believed that he was hearing this and writing it down. Also your analysis and explanation was so clear and precise it was like no presentation I had ever heard before. But the real joy in your work is your character. You come across as being completely in love with the music and the composer and not at all in any competition with him. I think the word is non-envious. This is so rare in this world. I am grateful to you for the life changing education I have received today on music that I love very much. I am now going to search You Tube for music composed by your good self, and I am fully confident that I am going to find something very beautiful. Thankyou very much. Hare Krishna
Also a lot of this does remind a lot of serialism and some techniques messiaen used... It's like a place in between serialism and minimalism, landing it in a place with good balance between complexity and simplicity!
What a fantastic lecture. I have been a fan of Arvo Pärt music for some years now and its simplicity and ethereal atmosphere always enchanted me, so much so that I always recommend people to listen to either Fratres or Spiegel im Spiegel once in their lifetime. Thank you so much for explaining Arvo Pärt's techniques in such an accessible way. I feel like I have now a bag of toys with which I want to play. :D
I think this might be the best thing I have ever found on youtube, thanks so much for such clear analysis and explanation. I'm gonna go make a tintinnabulator rack in ableton now using an instrument rack with a scale midi plug in on one synth to automatically add the tintinnabuli
@@miltonline Thanks yes I already downloaded it eaerlier when I noticed you with it on screen, but I prefer to build it out myself first for the joy of the practice - and also to be able to have fun bending the rules by putting making a whole stack of different presets for the scale plugin to try out different patterns easily
One thing I've always found interesting is that Part's Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten is as structurally rigid as Boulez's Structures I. Both are nearly 100% algorithmic music, which implies that the composer's will and emotions play no role in the compositional process . And yet, Boulez's music is seen by most people as dry, soulless, academic music while Part brings people to tears. If one asks why, the reasons are quite mundane. Part's music is diatonic while Boulez's is chromatic. Part uses long notes, which create a dense texture, while Boulez uses very short to medium length notes, creating a sparse texture. Those 2 factors are enough to completely change people's emotional reaction.
Much gratitude for this wonderfully well explained/narrated account on some of Arvo Pärt composition techniques and his geniality and inventive.As mentioned by other people prior to me on this video, I also wished that the Tintinnabulalator was also available as a VST plugin or stand alone app. Kind regards and blessings, MaxT
This is a beautifully prepared and delivered lecture and your admiration for Pärt's music comes over abundantly. I find his style the most convincing of the Big Three Holy Minimalists and it was fascinating to follow your explanation of the composer's various techniques.
@@miltonline I have just watched this the second time and enjoyed it even more. This lecture really repays repeated study. I would like to find my own form of minimalism, but I have not yet been able to make anything quite work. I think the key could well be found here. There are some interesting parallels with the work of Josquin. Many of Josquin's pieces are controlled by an almost bone-headedly simple structural principle ("Miserere mei, Deus" being a good example with its stepwise ostinato iterations). Yet, as with Pärt, there is always a something else, but it doesn't have to anything enormous. A little ingenuity is all that's needed, but it goes such a long way.
@@TamsinJones Thank you Tamsin, I'm with you! Part (and others) somehow find a small but profound twist of something almost naively simple. The additive rotations of 'Sarah was" and Tintin in general can be explained in 2 minutes but create a whole compositional identity and body of works...
12:28 Trying to explain how he worked this out: he probably just had the idea of creating the maximum number of variation of the 12 rhytmical unity (seen as a block at this point), starting every variation with a different note of the 8 starting values (thus obtaining 8 variation of the rhytmic pattern). Finally he ordinated these units in a way that every one of them started with the last note of the precedent unit, giving this way a sense of continuity and hiding the otherwise too obvious mathematical trick.
Thank you! I now understand -- a little bit of -- Pärt's minimalism. The tintinnabli technique is rooted in his physical/cultural place and the religious nature of much of his music. So, while I'm tempted to just start using it, the real challenge is to _develop_ harmony based on one's own place and concerns. Not an easy task!
This is an AMAZING resource, thank you so much for uploading! The Tintinnabulalator is especially cool! I wish it was a VST so I could use it in Reaper. I have a pet project where I try to program serialistic music in programs like Wwise. Getting to Spiegel Im Spiegel to work could be so much fun!
I can't tell you how much I appreciate this. This is a treasure trove both for my own compositions but understanding more deeply Pärt's work. I could feel the depth of his composition, and now with your help I understand it more deeply. Thank you so very very much.
this is amazing. really. i'm so thankful. his composing mindset feels so close to me for some reason. this video helped me a lot, especially I can't read sheet music, so it is imposibble to me to discover rules and patterns under the surface. you helped me a lot. sending much love to you!
This is so wonderfully clear and helpful. I marvel that such simple process music can be so deeply communicative, and you help me understand that. Thank you!
about 12:29 3 and 8 are coprimes. Any musician interested in theory knows stuff like this by looking at how a fifth generates all the chromatic scale and a minor third doesn't Otherwise its basic cyclic groups about 14:06 i find it simpler to tell that the voice below goes above and the voice above is going below being shifted by one. thus any two positions, the first configuration is just completely shifted by one and after twice the length of the motif, we are back to start to me the mastership is more on the non rigid choices made in these rigid situations, but i am no expert ^^ his attention to the accoustic qualiy
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't believe Pärt actually completes a pivot group around C# in The Beatitudes. It sounds like he stops on C# major in the middle of the Amen, before progressing through all previous keys in reverse.
I'm not super clear on how the sets in Psalom affect the variation. Is each set supposed to represent the notes you play and their order? As in {2 3 0 2 1} {EFBCD} would mean play E twice , then play F, skip B, play C twice, and D once? Or is it more like a set of parameters to then use for constructing the melody for that length of time?
I know that Pärt usually writes music to latin text but how does he usually do it when the text has many one-syllable words? I mean so it doesn´t became boring.
One of the best lectures on any composer I have ever watched anywhere. Just a magnificent clarity of thought and presentation. Bravo & thank you dearly for making this available for us.
I really like the depth of this video! If anyone wants a practical toolkit/guide for composers about Arvo Pärt's style, I've put that up over on my channel.
Once a serialist, always a serialist! Thank you for this illuminating lecture. I believe that Arvo Part is the great composer of our time. He represents an artistic shift. A tectonic shift. One we have yet to absorb. This lecture is a great help in doing so.
Part uses modernist techniques to transcend modernism to express Tradition. He is a new paradigm. Not only for composers, but for poets, theologians, and contemplatives, etc. Thank you for opening up his compositional process further.
The genius is Arvo Pärt isn't (just) in coming with these interesting patterns and rules for generating music, but in working out which ones sound good and can be realized in a way that is musical. We don't know how many variations of a pattern he tries out to find the best one :-)
All those ASMR channels need to bow in respect to this, you have an amazing voice! The content is fantastic as well of course. 😊
this has been one of the most inspirational videos about music theory I've ever seen. Thank you.
The octaves in Spiegel im Spiegel work out according to the following pattern: the first (low) octave is played on bar 2, and the next one after 4 bars, followed by another 4 bars, then 5, 5, 6, 6, 7, 7, 8, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10, 11, 11, 12, and the final octave breaks the sequence after only three bars. The high octaves are played at the each _first_ odd number in the series (5, 7, 9, 10, 11, and the last 3). This makes a pattern of 3 low octaves + 1 high octave, which is also played out with the accompaniment tintinnabuli voices: every fourth phrase begins with a low accompaniment tone as opposed to the usual high one. (And I'm sure you've figured it out, but the accompanying voices are either two F triad notes above the diatonic scale note or one triad note below it.)
This was a fantastic presentation, too! It gave me a whole new appreciation to Pärt's music to be able to see the parametrization and the strict processes behind the pieces. It almost makes them seem greater than they already were.
Wonderful, thanks I will investigate and attempt to illustrate succinctly those patterns. Much appreciated!
my lecturer showed us this at uni, and you had the whole class so transfixed and excited about Arvo Pärt's concepts !
Oh that's cool, thanks James - which university may I ask?
@@miltonline it was bimm london!
@@jamescasper2422 Oh great thanks - I have several wonderful friends musicians teaching there - enjoy :)
Thanks for the lesson, Milton.
The philosophical part where the M-voice is a human being and the T-voice is the eternal presence of God touched me. Beautiful composition technique. Cheers.
Thank you Milton for this incredible explanation of Arvo Pärt's music. His music touches my soul and now because of your analysis of his process I can understand why. There is a fundamental connection to the harmonies of this universe in his compositions that is unlike any other music I have listened to. Infinity.... I remember 10 years ago I decided to get back into playing piano and started taking lessons after a career in fashion. I had to perform a song for my new teacher. I chose to play Fur Elina. It was actually quite funny because I was quite a novice at the piano and I remember trying to express this huge emotion I was feeling all through the two opening notes of B and D. I think I got through the first 4 bars and she said " OK, what else have you got?!" 10 years later I am still at it and I love playing this piece. Your analysis has opened a door of understanding - not just a window. Sincere thanks for this beautiful lecture.
Evalina
Arvo Pärt is one of my favorite composers of all time, and his music is sublimely beautiful. Thank you for this lecture on the amazing structure of his work.
I think that this is the best video on UA-cam
Wonderful video. A little note about "Sarah was Ninety Years Old" at about 14:30. The voice progress is actually simpler. After each cell, the bottom voice moved to the top voice and the top voice moves to the bottom voice and skips one note. ABCDE (1) flip to bottom BCDEA (2) flip to top and repeat BCDEA (3) while the bottom voice does the same; play, flip to top and repeat, flip to bottom and move one note forward, flip to to and repeat, flip to bottom and move one note forward. Thanks!
Thank you very much! This would make a beguiling animation...
Lovely analysis, relaxing voice... That's one really underappreciated channel you've got!
Have you also being able to reduce "Summa" to simple concepts? This one seems harder to analyse.
@@matekon2 Yes, please help crack the code of Summa!
@@matekon2 I shall explore thanks!
You Sir, are to me, one of the most inspired persons to comment upon music I have heard in my 55 years on this planet. It was a joy to listen to you for a number of reasons, one because my whole idea of what music was, got completely blown apart. I had no idea that the divinely beautiful music of Arvo Part was so mathematically composed, I fully believed that he was hearing this and writing it down. Also your analysis and explanation was so clear and precise it was like no presentation I had ever heard before. But the real joy in your work is your character. You come across as being completely in love with the music and the composer and not at all in any competition with him. I think the word is non-envious. This is so rare in this world. I am grateful to you for the life changing education I have received today on music that I love very much. I am now going to search You Tube for music composed by your good self, and I am fully confident that I am going to find something very beautiful. Thankyou very much. Hare Krishna
Thank you so much for the support!
you make the world (and UA-cam) a better place. Thank you!
Also a lot of this does remind a lot of serialism and some techniques messiaen used... It's like a place in between serialism and minimalism, landing it in a place with good balance between complexity and simplicity!
Precisely my thoughts :)
What a fantastic lecture. I have been a fan of Arvo Pärt music for some years now and its simplicity and ethereal atmosphere always enchanted me, so much so that I always recommend people to listen to either Fratres or Spiegel im Spiegel once in their lifetime. Thank you so much for explaining Arvo Pärt's techniques in such an accessible way. I feel like I have now a bag of toys with which I want to play. :D
Great to hear thank you!
Fantastic analysis, even for someone practically unintroduced to Pärt!
I think this might be the best thing I have ever found on youtube, thanks so much for such clear analysis and explanation. I'm gonna go make a tintinnabulator rack in ableton now using an instrument rack with a scale midi plug in on one synth to automatically add the tintinnabuli
Thank you! That’s a good idea :) if you have live suite you could use this patch I made maxforlive.com/library/device/7569/tintinnabulator
Enjoy
@@miltonline Thanks yes I already downloaded it eaerlier when I noticed you with it on screen, but I prefer to build it out myself first for the joy of the practice - and also to be able to have fun bending the rules by putting making a whole stack of different presets for the scale plugin to try out different patterns easily
Cool enjoy.
thank you so much! one of the best lecture online!
Astonishing work all round. Thank you!
This was very much appreciated as it confirmed the veracity of some elements of the way I go about composing
One thing I've always found interesting is that Part's Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten is as structurally rigid as Boulez's Structures I. Both are nearly 100% algorithmic music, which implies that the composer's will and emotions play no role in the compositional process . And yet, Boulez's music is seen by most people as dry, soulless, academic music while Part brings people to tears. If one asks why, the reasons are quite mundane. Part's music is diatonic while Boulez's is chromatic. Part uses long notes, which create a dense texture, while Boulez uses very short to medium length notes, creating a sparse texture. Those 2 factors are enough to completely change people's emotional reaction.
A fantastic video! Thank you!!
Again, absolutely stunning. Fantastic and inspiring work by both Pärt and yourself!
This was one of the best youtube videos I've ever seen. Thank you
very impressive....I am in a doctorate about him and will use some phrases and ideas from here......thanks!
Much gratitude for this wonderfully well explained/narrated account on some of Arvo Pärt composition techniques and his geniality and inventive.As mentioned by other people prior to me on this video, I also wished that the Tintinnabulalator was also available as a VST plugin or stand alone app. Kind regards and blessings, MaxT
This is a beautifully prepared and delivered lecture and your admiration for Pärt's music comes over abundantly. I find his style the most convincing of the Big Three Holy Minimalists and it was fascinating to follow your explanation of the composer's various techniques.
Thank you Tamsin - very kind.
@@miltonline I have just watched this the second time and enjoyed it even more. This lecture really repays repeated study. I would like to find my own form of minimalism, but I have not yet been able to make anything quite work. I think the key could well be found here. There are some interesting parallels with the work of Josquin. Many of Josquin's pieces are controlled by an almost bone-headedly simple structural principle ("Miserere mei, Deus" being a good example with its stepwise ostinato iterations). Yet, as with Pärt, there is always a something else, but it doesn't have to anything enormous. A little ingenuity is all that's needed, but it goes such a long way.
@@TamsinJones Thank you Tamsin, I'm with you! Part (and others) somehow find a small but profound twist of something almost naively simple. The additive rotations of 'Sarah was" and Tintin in general can be explained in 2 minutes but create a whole compositional identity and body of works...
Big Three Holy Minimalists..who could they be, I wonder.
@@barbarasmith6005 Pärt, Gorecki and Tavener are the names you hear most often with respect to Holy Minimalism but there are many others.
12:28 Trying to explain how he worked this out: he probably just had the idea of creating the maximum number of variation of the 12 rhytmical unity (seen as a block at this point), starting every variation with a different note of the 8 starting values (thus obtaining 8 variation of the rhytmic pattern). Finally he ordinated these units in a way that every one of them started with the last note of the precedent unit, giving this way a sense of continuity and hiding the otherwise too obvious mathematical trick.
Inspiring analysis of the best sort - the kind that leads to increased appreciation of the music ... many thanks
Dear Milton, thank you for this most enlightening and illuminating lecture beautifully delivered. Gilbert Biberian.
My pleasure Gilbert!
This is wonderfully detailed, well explained and accessible. Thank you so much.
34:15 Tintinnabulator! Beautiful and improved my understanding.Thank you for your lecture!
Very interesting. It is evening now at the moment and I am too tired for watching and listening. But for another time it is fine. Thank you.
Gosto muito do Arvo PÄRT
Faz part de um tempo meu de
Meditaçáo e contemplação divina .
Gratidão ! 💛🌻
Fantastic lecture, never heard of the first piece before but absolutely beautiful!
Thank you! I now understand -- a little bit of -- Pärt's minimalism. The tintinnabli technique is rooted in his physical/cultural place and the religious nature of much of his music. So, while I'm tempted to just start using it, the real challenge is to _develop_ harmony based on one's own place and concerns. Not an easy task!
Great analysis mate. One day I'd love to find some kind of explanation for Summa, I can't quite wrap my head around it!
in Lockdown and this is most inspiring and certainly a lift and desire to learn..thank you..
This is an AMAZING resource, thank you so much for uploading!
The Tintinnabulalator is especially cool! I wish it was a VST so I could use it in Reaper.
I have a pet project where I try to program serialistic music in programs like Wwise. Getting to Spiegel Im Spiegel to work could be so much fun!
A fantastic and well constructed lecture. Bravo and thank you!
A masterclass. Bravo Maestro!
What a beautiful video. Thank you for sharing it!! It is just what I needed. 🙏🏼🙏🏼
love it Avor Pärts and your work!! thank you.
Great video.thank you.
Amazing work! Thank you very, very much!
I can't tell you how much I appreciate this. This is a treasure trove both for my own compositions but understanding more deeply Pärt's work. I could feel the depth of his composition, and now with your help I understand it more deeply. Thank you so very very much.
You're very welcome!
this is amazing. really. i'm so thankful. his composing mindset feels so close to me for some reason. this video helped me a lot, especially I can't read sheet music, so it is imposibble to me to discover rules and patterns under the surface. you helped me a lot. sending much love to you!
I have been waiting for a lecture like this!! Brilliant!! Thank you for sharing!
this is very inspiring. it shows me what's people can get away with when trying to devise how to 'compose' their own music.
Great analysis. Very inspiring to hear about the process.
Thank you very much for this. A great lecture full of unexpected details and beautifully presented.
Thank you for this amazing analysis. Priceless!
Amazing lecture! Thank you so much!
Yeaaaaah! Thank you so much !
Wonderful lecture, Milton!
Thank you Ryan!
This is so wonderfully clear and helpful. I marvel that such simple process music can be so deeply communicative, and you help me understand that. Thank you!
Señor Milton, thank you very much for this great conference, its very useful great content and the delivery its perfect!
It's very interesting. Could you do the same with the music of Steve Reich (rhythm and harmony). Thank you
Fantastic lecture. I would love to see this on other composers’ techniques.
More to come!
Spellbinding! Both the content and the gentle, clear and precise delivery. Thank you for sharing!
Wonderful work! Thank you so much for sharing : )
Question: How does Pärt choose which mode, modes, the T-part to have in a work.
Great lecture, thank you!
Thank you very much!!
Thanks. I only find his early serial works bearable but interesting trajectory. The later music is unfortunate.
Heartfelt thanks!
Excellent. Great work!
Thank you very much!
Absolutely great video! I learned about "Cantus" in class and tho the tinntinnabuli technique was explained in principle, but never named.
great job sir, Any place I can listen to Sarah Was Ninety Years Old?
Thanks you very much for your time and explanation :)
Wow this is so beautiful
Thank you!
So clear and well explained, thank you
really great content. Thank you!
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you
What a fantastic video analysis!
about 12:29
3 and 8 are coprimes.
Any musician interested in theory knows stuff like this by looking at how a fifth generates all the chromatic scale and a minor third doesn't
Otherwise its basic cyclic groups
about 14:06
i find it simpler to tell that the voice below goes above and the voice above is going below being shifted by one. thus any two positions, the first configuration is just completely shifted by one and after twice the length of the motif, we are back to start
to me the mastership is more on the non rigid choices made in these rigid situations, but i am no expert ^^
his attention to the accoustic qualiy
This really is great. Thank you so much for sharing this!
I 🖤Arvo and I 🖤 this analysis 🙏🏼👊🏽
thank you for such a brilliant lecture
Marvellous!
Thank you for sharing this🙏🏻
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't believe Pärt actually completes a pivot group around C# in The Beatitudes. It sounds like he stops on C# major in the middle of the Amen, before progressing through all previous keys in reverse.
very great lecture ! Does anyone know the name of the piece right at the beginning ?
thank you very much!!
where can I get the Tintinnabulator??
Thank you deeply for creating this 🖤
I'm not super clear on how the sets in Psalom affect the variation. Is each set supposed to represent the notes you play and their order? As in {2 3 0 2 1} {EFBCD} would mean play E twice , then play F, skip B, play C twice, and D once? Or is it more like a set of parameters to then use for constructing the melody for that length of time?
I know that Pärt usually writes music to latin text but how does he usually do it when the text has many one-syllable words? I mean so it doesn´t became boring.
This is just graet! thanks!!!
Oh gosh I wish the tintinnabulator was available for use 💯 would be the most peaceful plug-in in the world
thank you so much you saved my day with your knowledge!
Fascinating!
This started it all
Wow you deserve so many subs
lovely. thank you.
Anyone wanna drop the name of the first song?
I never really liked Part until I saw this :O