# Can someone explain the music of Sorabji?



## soni (Jul 3, 2018)

I wasn't sure if this was better suited for the music theory forum, but here it is. The music of Sorabji is somehow stunningly beautiful and nostalgic for me (though some people seem to think it's garbage) - for example in this piece: 



. However, I'd appreciate some explanation of the musical ideas in Sorabji's music, as he uses harmonies that I've never heard in any other composers' music, and I can never even come close to reproducing them when composing. Can anyone analyse for example the piece I listed, as I'd like to know what Sorabji is actually doing here. Bonus if you can offer pointers to similar composers.


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## chill782002 (Jan 12, 2017)

I also like Sorabji, a unique composer. I can't think of any other composer who wrote a piano sonata that takes over two and a half hours to perform and fills three cds (Piano Sonata 4). His Nocturnes for piano like "Gulistan", "Djami" and "Le Jardin Parfumé" are particularly lovely and of a much more reasonable length, only 20 - 30 minutes or so. However, I'm afraid I don't have anything like the technical knowledge to formally analyse any of his compositions. I can only say that there are some fleeting similarities to keyboard works by people like Scriabin and Medtner.


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## Guest (Jul 3, 2018)

I've only heard Scriabin and Roslavets to have a vaguely similar approach; but I'm no composer or performer.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

I think the "gesture" of the music is important here. He seems to be interested in harmonic color. You couldn't analyze this tonally; but some of what he does can be identified. The first thing I noticed was the ascending 'arpeggio' at 0:20-0:32 which goes up by thirds. There's an augmented-sounding arpeggio before that, so I suspect he is "projecting" thirds. Augmenteds are also unstable (no fifth), so he wants a floating sense of tonality that is "coming apart."

He always seems to "ground" the music harmonically by using bass notes, so some sense of harmonic centricity is conveyed, but it's not tonal. He seems to be avoiding suggestions of centricity or tonality. He likes high-register clusters, so he likes color. It sounds etheral, like an atonal Debussy.

He does not seem interested in creating any kind of stable harmonic centricity, except very momentarily, if at all. In this sense, it's like atonality with color.

He creates harmonic color without it being "centric," as one might do with triads or fifths, so the upper parts sound like lines without chordal grounding, going in intervals or steps.

What distinguishes this, for me, from pure atonality, is the way the music is not always totally chromatic. It does not "leap" like atonality, so it coheres as if it were outlining scale steps, or intervals of thirds which "suggest" chords but are not.

Then, at the end, we hear more stable triadic entities, declamatory, not unlike Messiaen. Like Messiaen, he seems to be conveying something "mystic."

The problem with "pinning down" an analysis is that he's using a variety of techniques, ways of approaching the chromatic collection. Look at Vincent Persichetti's book on modern harmonic techniques, and there are a variety of different strategies possible.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

I feel like that's similar to Feldman in its lack of tonality and its calm, gentle mood. However it seems more rhythmic than Feldman.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

He was a big fan of Busoni. Somewhat post-Romantic in style like Debussy, but also has some atonality. He's a hybrid. I prefer one or the other.


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## Jake1963 (Apr 24, 2018)

Yet while Sorabji is mystical, polytonalic or natural sounding, I recall his music being strongly structured, with A-B sonatas, fugues and the like. In this sense, I compare his music with a large filagreed gothic vaulted archway covered in vines. The variagated, organized solid structure below and the bushy, haphazard and mysterious living things above it.
Yes, like Messaien, but more structure, far more activity, more contrasts. Sorabji is marvelous!


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## Guest (Jul 5, 2018)

Pretty sure Sorabji saw himself as a natural progression on from the 19th century piano virtuoso composer like Liszt, although I am not sure if there is much evidence of Sorabji playing his own piano works. Because he lived in a time that certainly was not the 19th century, it's not hard to imagine that the style and purpose of his piano music was not exactly going to thrive so easily in the 20th century world of the concert pianist and their repertoire, however quite a bit of his music seems well preserved by enthusiasts of his music. The music itself is full of rhythmic and textural complexity, doesn't really find much grounding in a harmonic sense but to me it sounds more like notes fly freely through an atmosphere of post-tonal harmonies................


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## Myriadi (Mar 6, 2016)

Why not just purchase a score or two from the Sorabji Archive and analyze them? I remember a forum from a long time ago where one of their key employees was active, and they seemed like a very pleasant person. Looking at the website, you can have a PDF of e.g. Le Jardin Parfumé for just £5 in PDF. And that way you'll also be sponsoring future editions and recordings.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

No and I don't think he could either! 

There is the story that the Manchester group got hold of Sorabji's Opus Classicum (over two hours of it) and John Ogdon sight read the whole thing while everyone else looked on with open mouths!


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I don't know Sorabji's music and have so far avoided it on purpose. One of the things I like about this forum is that people talk about the music! So far, on other sites, all I have learned about Sorabji is that he was a weirdo who wrote music that is nearly impossible to play and that goes on for so long that listening also can be a real effort. People make a virtue out of knowing him. But not here. I can't remember hearing about beauty in his music or even about how he fits in the tradition. It has all been about difficulty for player and listener. That's why I've avoided him. But there are several posts here that make me want to listen and to make up my own mind.


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## Myriadi (Mar 6, 2016)

Enthusiast said:


> I don't know Sorabji's music and have so far avoided it on purpose. One of the things I like about this forum is that people talk about the music! So far, on other sites, all I have learned about Sorabji is that he was a weirdo who wrote music that is nearly impossible to play and that goes on for so long that listening also can be a real effort. People make a virtue out of knowing him. But not here. I can't remember hearing about beauty in his music or even about how he fits in the tradition. It has all been about difficulty for player and listener. That's why I've avoided him. But there are several posts here that make me want to listen and to make up my own mind.


Sorabji's work is multifaceted. If you're intimidated by long pieces, you could try the 100 Transcendental Studies, most of which are quite short. They're virtuosic pieces by their very nature, harmonically and melodically a very intriguing extension of Godowsky's, Busoni's, Alkan's styles, with a healthy dose of Debussy and Scriabin. But I think most people's favorite works - and mine too - are the nocturnes: Le Jardin Parfumé, Djami, and Gulistan (and a few others which are parts of larger pieces). Each goes on for about 20 minutes and consists, for a lack of better description, almost entirely of very numerous and delicately interwoven arabesques, ornaments. I haven't yet encountered anybody who'd find them difficult listening. And finally there are Sorabji's sonata forms and contrapuntal studies: those can indeed be very intimidating. I never warmed to those myself, so I can't recommend any. This category to me includes the famous _Opus clavicembalisticum_.


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## chill782002 (Jan 12, 2017)

DavidA said:


> No and I don't think he could either!
> 
> There is the story that the Manchester group got hold of Sorabji's Opus Classicum (over two hours of it) and John Ogdon sight read the whole thing while everyone else looked on with open mouths!


Some critics claimed that Sorabji couldn't even play the piano. John Ogdon considered him the equivalent of Beethoven or Brahms in terms of his playing ability. Not many composers divide opinion to that sort of extent.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Myriadi said:


> Sorabji's work is multifaceted. If you're intimidated by long pieces, you could try the 100 Transcendental Studies, most of which are quite short. They're virtuosic pieces by their very nature, harmonically and melodically a very intriguing extension of Godowsky's, Busoni's, Alkan's styles, with a healthy dose of Debussy and Scriabin. But I think most people's favorite works - and mine too - are the nocturnes: Le Jardin Parfumé, Djami, and Gulistan (and a few others which are parts of larger pieces). Each goes on for about 20 minutes and consists, for a lack of better description, almost entirely of very numerous and delicately interwoven arabesques, ornaments. I haven't yet encountered anybody who'd find them difficult listening. And finally there are Sorabji's sonata forms and contrapuntal studies: those can indeed be very intimidating. I never warmed to those myself, so I can't recommend any. This category to me includes the famous _Opus clavicembalisticum_.


Thanks! I'll try both (Nocturnes and T Studies). It wasn't the difficulty or length that put me off so much as the fact that I hadn't seen anyone saying I love this without also implying that the music was more endurance sport than pleasure!


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

chill782002 said:


> Some critics claimed that Sorabji couldn't even play the piano. John Ogdon considered him the equivalent of Beethoven or Brahms in terms of his playing ability. Not many composers divide opinion to that sort of extent.


The Wikipedia entry on him does suggest that he could play - _"He gave his last public performance of his music on 16 December 1936 in Glasgow, when he premiered his Piano Toccata No. 2, and afterwards withdrew from the concert platform for the rest of his life."_


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