Explorations in Schenkerian Analysis ed. by David Beach and Su Yin Mak (review)

My first exposure to the person and work of Edward Laufer was probably not much different from many other budding Schenkerians. I was attending the Fourth International Schenker Symposium at the Mannes School of Music in 2006. There were several familiar scholars presenting, with a constant stream of new insights. But during nearly every pause between papers and during the breaks between the early sessions on that first day, I repeatedly heard other attendees speaking a name unknown to me. This man was to deliver a paper with a rather unassuming title: "On Chopin's Ballades (Opp. 23, 47, 52)." As I eavesdropped, the question "I wonder what the handout will look like" became a constant refrain. My curiosity piqued, I sat in anticipation as the elderly man rose to the stage and the handout was distributed. It was immense and tangled, full of ideas but, at the time for me, nearly impossible to parse. (The published version of these graphs [in the chapter "On Chopin's Fourth Ballade," in Keys to the Drama: Nine Perspectives on Sonata Form, ed. Gordon Sly (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2009), 157–75] hardly do the originals justice insofar as part of the impact of that handout derived from the sheer onslaught of information.) His scattered presentation touched on hidden motivic connections that he tapped out on the piano, but referred to only a mere fraction of the graphic analyses on his handout. I will admit I was utterly bemused.

Over the course of the following weeks, months, and years, I found myself returning to that handout, working my way through its insights and learning to appreciate its author's perspicacity and the clarity of the graphing technique—finally apparent to me once I had become adept at seeing it in the right way. My improved understanding of the graphs led to hearing Chopin in new and compelling ways. It was through the careful perusal of that handout that I came to be enamored with the possibilities that Schenkerian analysis seemed to offer.

Laufer passed away in 2014, leaving a void in Schenker studies. The recent collection of essays, Explorations in Schenkerian Analysis, edited by David Beach and Su Yin Mak, pays homage to him through fifteen chapters contributed by Schenkerians, concluding with an interview that Stephen Slottow conducted with Laufer in 2003. The essays, arranged roughly chronologically according to the pieces examined, are divided into three large groupings by time period (eighteenth, early nineteenth, and late nineteenth centuries). But more importantly, these writings employ Schenkerian techniques to explore many different analytical concerns; prominent among them are issues of sonata form, motivic expansion and linkage, the hermeneutic implications of voice-leading analysis, and the application of a Schenkerian lens to little-studied repertoire or works that fall outside of the typical "Schenkerian canon." This book is a major contribution to Schenker studies and a touching tribute to Laufer.

Part one opens with "A Letter about the C-Major Fugue from The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I" by Charles Burkhart, sent to Laufer shortly before his death. The conversational tone and willingness to question his own readings of certain difficult passages belie the acuity of analytical insight Burkhart brings to this familiar piece. Most intriguing is Burkhart's handling of two difficult passages: m. 11 and mm. 17–19. The part of the discussion that relays a lack of complete satisfaction with his treatment of m. 11 is particularly helpful. Too often in Schenkerian studies (including other essays in this collection), theorists present problematic or complex readings without frank acknowledgments of the difficulties involved; the fact that Burkhart finds a hidden motivic connection in mm. 17–19 reinforces his clever reading of this passage. Mark Anson-Cartwright then examines the opening tonal complex of Johann Sebastian Bach's Matthäuspassion (St. Matthew Passion) in an attempt to reveal...