# Nono: Como una ola de fuerza y luz [1972]



## science (Oct 14, 2010)

This fascinating work is currently on the 46th tier of the Talk Classical community's favorite and most highly recommended works, but I believe it deserves to be even better known than that!

First of all, the composer Luigi Nono was a fascinating person, and all of his works reward attention and study.

But this particular work is special. The wikipedia article about it is pretty good.

Anyway, as usual, the main questions of this thread are: *Do you like this work? Do you love it? Why? What do you like about it? Do you have any reservations about it?

And of course, what are your favorite recordings?*

I believe that the first recording of it was the one featuring Pollini at the piano. If you're willing to listen to Youtube, you can hear it here.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Interesting sounds, with due respect, I must say it genuinely reminded of film score/sounds for a horror movie or at least a scene leading up to some dramatic scare. For that quality, I think it does well.

This is the final scene of _The Witch_ (2015) horror movie. If you have not viewed it, but you are interested in my comments for comparison, then go straight to about [4:00]. Please be warned this is a movie clip with some explicit scenes.






And the Nono work here reminded me of the film score above:


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Was Nono the only politically oriented Darmstadt composer? This piece, for example, has an explicit allusion to Mao in _The Long March Ascending into the Heights._ There's a strange coincidence in this. I've been listening to Rebecca Saunders' _Skin_ this week, and there's something in common here I think, the violence of the sounds, the expressiveness of the voices, the role of silence - it may be my imagination, I'll be interested whether other people think the same, I've never heard her mention Nono as a composer she admires.

That Wikipedia article maybe doesn't stress enough the narrative structure.


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

^
^

There would also have been Hans-Werner Henze, had he stuck around. In terms of the Darmstadt School's artistic aims it seems that Henze found that the prime movers (especially Boulez) set parameters which were far too narrow and disassociated himself from the movement quite quickly. I don't know to what extent political views played a part, if they actually ever did.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Ah yes, Henze, I forgot.


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## calvinpv (Apr 20, 2015)

A new recording of _Como una ola de fuerza y luz_ came out a couple years ago on the Kairos label. I don't know how it compares to the Pollini/Abbado recording, but it can be heard here:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_m8ZlIKEjilS7000tL9ClchG2BatrRzooI

Here are the liner notes:

https://www.kairos-music.com/sites/default/files/downloads/0015022KAI_nono_webbooklet.pdf


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## calvinpv (Apr 20, 2015)

Mandryka said:


> Ah yes, Henze, I forgot.


Don't forget Lachenmann, who, I believe, had some private lessons with Nono.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

But the way I was taught, Darmstadt was self-consciously apolitical -- neither left nor right -- a sort of reaction against the war. Stockhausen, for example, talks of "purity" as a drive of post war Darmstadt composers, I don't know about Boulez's politics. I have a book on Lachenmann, I'll look later about his relationship with Darmstadt. There's also Ligeti to think about.

Has anyone who posts here been to a Darmstadt Ferienkurse? I wonder whether it's now a lively melting pot of political ideas.


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## HenryPenfold (Apr 29, 2018)

Mandryka said:


> But the way I was taught, Darmstadt was self-consciously apolitical -- neither left nor right -- a sort of reaction against the war. Stockhausen, for example, talks of "purity" as a drive of post war Darmstadt composers, I don't know about Boulez's politics. I have a book on Lachenmann, I'll look later about his relationship with Darmstadt. There's also Ligeti to think about.
> 
> Has anyone who posts here been to a Darmstadt Ferienkurse? I wonder whether it's now a lively melting pot of political ideas.


I think Boulez was undemonstrative about politics and the like. He didn't even come out concerning his homosexuality, as far as I know.


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## Red Terror (Dec 10, 2018)

HenryPenfold said:


> I think Boulez was undemonstrative about politics and the like. He didn't even come out concerning his homosexuality, as far as I know.


That is mere heresay. But so what if he was? Sexuality is only a small component of a human being's makeup. Our culture's emphasis on comparatively superficial attributes is thoroughly unhealthy and destructive. Such obsessions are at the root of all prejudice.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Red Terror said:


> That is mere heresay. But so what if he was? Sexuality is only a small component of a human being's makeup. Our culture's emphasis on comparatively superficial attributes is thoroughly unhealthy and destructive.


Sexuality is not superficial. And previously the way that male heterosexuality dominated was, IMO, much more unhealthy and much more destructive.


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## HenryPenfold (Apr 29, 2018)

Red Terror said:


> That is mere heresay. But so what if he was? Sexuality is only a small component of a human being's makeup. Our culture's emphasis on comparatively superficial attributes is thoroughly unhealthy and destructive. Such obsessions are at the root of all prejudice.


No, he was homosexual. My point was that he never bothered to come out, and I think that's because he was very uninterested in that side of life. Not sure why you're getting excited.


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## Red Terror (Dec 10, 2018)

Mandryka said:


> Sexuality is not superficial. And previously the way that male heterosexuality dominated was, IMO, much more unhealthy and much more destructive.


You're certainly entitled to hold an opinion, but don't expect everyone to agree with it.


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## Red Terror (Dec 10, 2018)

HenryPenfold said:


> No, he was homosexual. My point was that he never bothered to come out, and I think that's because he was very uninterested in that side of life. Not sure why you're getting excited.


Fact: I don't get excited about much of anything, especially not the above. ^^^


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## HenryPenfold (Apr 29, 2018)

Red Terror said:


> Fact: I don't get excited about much of anything, especially not the above. ^^^


Best way ...... :tiphat:


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Red Terror said:


> Fact: I don't get excited about much of anything, especially not the above. ^^^


That's something you have in common with Boulez by the sound of it!


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Anyone care to add a speech balloon?


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

ArtMusic said:


> Interesting sounds, with due respect, I must say it genuinely reminded of film score/sounds for a horror movie or at least a scene leading up to some dramatic scare. For that quality, I think it does well.
> 
> This is the final scene of _The Witch_ (2015) horror movie. If you have not viewed it, but you are interested in my comments for comparison, then go straight to about [4:00]. Please be warned this is a movie clip with some explicit scenes.
> 
> ...


Film music composers have often been influenced by earlier masterpieces - and I certainly feel that the Nono piece was a great one and one that I have often enjoyed over the years. That it influenced later film music doesn't mean the two share the same aesthetic or value or purpose or ... .

The OP asks which recordings we like. I have only heard the DG one mentioned. I would like to hear of others.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Enthusiast said:


> The OP asks which recordings we like. I have only heard the DG one mentioned. I would like to hear of others.


In fact I listened to the one on Kairos when this thread was started. I thought it was very good -- without having any recollection of Pollini in the same music. This is from the booklet



> An important feature of the recording presented in
> this CD is that it uses a newly produced reconstruction of the original stereo tape. The original tape was
> stereophonic, as can be heard in the working tapes
> preserved at the Archivio Luigi Nono and in several
> ...


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