Samuel Barber as Synthesizer: An Analytical and Critical Reappraisal

Abstract

Through an extended case study of the American composer Samuel Barber (1910–81), this dissertation freshly develops a perspective in music criticism and analysis: that of the “composer as synthesizer.” This flexible concept highlights the ways in which a composer engages in deliberate dialogue with music of the past, entailing analytical methods that draw upon topic theory, semiotic theory, and concepts of genre and intertextuality. In Barber’s First Symphony (Chapter 2), investigation reveals a sophisticated intertextual dialogue with Brahms’s symphonies and other historical musics. A close consideration of the Capricorn Concerto (Chapter 3) shows a composer slyly and strategically assimilating Igor Stravinsky’s neoclassical style into his synthesis even while musically critiquing aspects of that style. Chapter 4 draws upon semiotic theory to unpack how Barber’s Vanessa uses conventions of nineteenth-century ballroom dance music to capture something like Nietzsche’s “death of God,” offering critical comment on modernity through the character of Erika. Finally, Chapter 5’s consideration of works for voice and orchestra (Knoxville: Summer of 1915 and The Lovers) emphasizes Barber’s interpretation of texts through the mixing and matching of genre conventions. Collectively, the analyses suggest an intellectually viable alternative to modernist critical frameworks, promising not only fresh examination of music by composers previously derided as “outmoded,” “derivative,” or “eclectic” but an opportunity for fruitful new readings of such avant-garde figures as Arnold Schoenberg and Igor Stravinsky.