The Politics of Poetics

Abstract

Abstract This two-part chapter introduces Boulez’s new writings on electronics, chance, and open form as a reflection of other changes in his experiments as a composer. Despite their progressive tone, his writings tacitly define clear boundaries of his experimentalism. In part one, aspects of a museum-culture conservatism that plagued his writings during this period appear in tension with his ongoing experiments with composition. In effect, his writings reveal ongoing conflicts between a static conception of the aesthetics of serialism and a much freer application of serial processes in his own compositions. In part two, these tensions help contextualize Boulez’s ill-fated obligations at the Darmstadt summer music courses and Cage’s corresponding rise to prominence at the festival (as a replacement for Boulez) in 1958.