Examination of The Evolution of Multi-Percussion

Edith Cowan University
Research Online
Theses: Doctorates and Masters Theses
10-10-2020
Examination of the evolution of multi-percussion

Thomas Alexander Robertson
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Robertson, T. A. (2020). Examination of the evolution of multi-percussion. https://ro.ecu.edu.au/theses/
2366
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Examination of the Evolution of
Multi-percussion
This dissertation is presented for the degree of
Master of Arts (Performing Arts)
Thomas Alexander Michael Robertson
Supervisors: Helen Rusak (Principal) Philip Everall (Associate) Tim White (Assistant)
Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts

2020
i
Declaration Page
I certify that this thesis does not, to the best of my knowledge and belief:
o incorporate without acknowledgment any material previously

submitted for a degree or diploma in any institution of higher
education;
o contain any material previously published or written by another person
except where due reference is made in the text of this thesis; or
o contain any defamatory material;
Date: 20/10/2020
ii
Acknowledgments
I would like to express my sincere appreciation to the many persons who so generously
contributed their time, knowledge, and support during the preparation and completion of this
thesis. Special thanks are extended to my supervisors Helen Rusak, Philip Everall and Tim
White.
Special appreciation is given to Brian Maloney and Alex Timcke who helped me
prepare for my recital and performances surrounding this masters.
Lastly, I am extremely thankful to my parents for encouraging my musical and
educational pursuits and all the support they have given me over the many years of my
studies.
iii
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments................................................................................................................................... ii
Table of Contents ................................................................................................................................... iii
Abstract ................................................................................................................................................... 1
1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................................ 2
1.1 Topic overview .............................................................................................................................. 2
1.2 Aims of the project........................................................................................................................ 4
2. Methodology ....................................................................................................................................... 5
3. Early use of percussion ....................................................................................................................... 9
3.1 The use of percussion in the orchestra before the start of the twentieth century ...................... 9
3.1.1 New uses of percussion in orchestral works........................................................................ 10
3.1.2 Percussion as a feature in orchestral works ........................................................................ 12
3.2 Early drum kit and its influence .................................................................................................. 14
3.2.1 New Orleans brass bands ..................................................................................................... 14
3.2.2 First semblance of a drum kit .............................................................................................. 15
3.3 Influence on the writing of multi-percussion ............................................................................. 16
4. Multi-percussion in chamber music works ....................................................................................... 17
4.1 Multi-percussion as a part of a chamber work ........................................................................... 17
4.1.1 The first multi-percussion setups......................................................................................... 17
4.1.2 Alternative ways of writing for multi-percussion ................................................................ 20
4.2 Percussion ensemble music ........................................................................................................ 21
4.2.1 Ritmica No.5 and No.6 (1930) .............................................................................................. 21
4.2.2 Ionisation (1931) .................................................................................................................. 22
4.2.3 John Cage’s percussion ensemble........................................................................................ 24
4.3 Soloistic multi-percussion works ................................................................................................ 25
4.3.1 Concerto for Percussion and Small Orchestra (1932) .......................................................... 25
4.3.2 Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion (1937) ..................................................................... 26
5. First generation of solo multi-percussion works .............................................................................. 28
5.1 John Cage .................................................................................................................................... 28
5.2 The start of solo multi-percussion .............................................................................................. 29
5.2.1 Cage’s 27’ 10.554” for a Percussionist (1955) ...................................................................... 29
5.2.2 Stockhausen’s Zyklus (1959) ................................................................................................ 30
5.2.3 Morton Feldman’s The King of Denmark (1965).................................................................. 32
iv
5.2.4 Wuorinen’s Janissary Music (1966) ..................................................................................... 34

5.3 Percussionist’s influence ............................................................................................................. 35
6. Emergence of virtuosi ....................................................................................................................... 36
6.1 Max Neuhaus .............................................................................................................................. 36
6.2 Jean-Pierre Drouet ...................................................................................................................... 37
6.2.1 Vinko Globokar’s Toucher (1973) ......................................................................................... 38
6.3 Sumire Yoshihara ........................................................................................................................ 39
6.3.1 Norio Fukushi’s Ground (1973) ............................................................................................ 40
6.4 Sylvio Gualda ............................................................................................................................... 41
6.4.1 Xenakis’s Psappha (1975) .................................................................................................... 41
6.4.2 Xenakis’s Rebonds (1987-89) ............................................................................................... 42
6.5 Issues with the first generation .................................................................................................. 43
7. The second generation of solo multi-percussion works ................................................................... 44
7.1 Exhaustive works......................................................................................................................... 44
7.1.1 Per Nørgård’s I Ching (1982) ................................................................................................ 45
7.2 Limited instrumentation works................................................................................................... 47
7.2.1 Frederic Rzewski’s To the Earth (1985) ................................................................................ 47
7.2.2 Brian Ferneyhough’s Bone Alphabet (1991) ........................................................................ 49
7.3 Multi-drum works ....................................................................................................................... 51
7.3.1 Ishii Maki’s Thirteen Drums (1985) ...................................................................................... 52
7.3.1.1 Atsushi Sugahara .................................................................................................................. 53
7.3.2 Michael Gordon’s XY (1997)................................................................................................. 53
7.4 Influence of the second generation of multi-percussion works ................................................. 54
8 Conclusion .......................................................................................................................................... 56
Appendix 1 ............................................................................................................................................ 59
Bibliography .......................................................................................................................................... 61
1
Abstract
The twentieth century belonged to percussion. In previous centuries, percussion performed a

supporting function with its primary role being to accentuate chordal changes and reinforce
the beat. By the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries orchestras expanded in size and
instrumentation with percussion taking on a more prominent role, particularly in the works of
composers such as Debussy, Stravinsky, and Mahler. It was at this moment in time that
percussion assumed a new and unique role to express changes in colour and timbre, alongside
its rhythmic function. The percussion repertoire of the twentieth century reflected the
Zeitgeist, and composers exploited the creative potential of this sonic and textural pallete.
This led to the development of various settings of multi-percussion; orchestral, chamber,
percussion ensembles, and solo multi-percussion works. This thesis will examine this
development throughout the twentieth century focusing on, and clearly defining, the impetus
of each setting of multi-percussion composition. It questions the assumption that L’histoire
du soldat was the flashpoint in the development of multi-percussion and finds that there were
a myriad of factors that contributed to the rapid expansion of the art form.
2
1. Introduction
1.1 Topic overview

Percussion dominated the musical fabric of Western Art Music in the twentieth century.
Previously used to punctuate harmony and reinforce rhythm in orchestral music, the vast
array of textures and timbres that percussion can produce saw this family of instruments
develop a new distinctive voice. Composers such as Stravinsky, Cage, and Edgard Varese
plumbed the depths of possibilities inherent in the percussion section and thrust it into the
spotlight.
This new era required a new mindset; a different approach to writing for percussion.
Rather than limiting individual players to single instruments, an array of percussion
instruments could be grouped together and played by one musician. In Stravinsky’s L’histoire
du soldat 1 (referred from here on as L’histoire), the percussionist was required to play bass
drum, snare drum, marching drum, tambourine, triangle, and cymbals concurrently. This
unprecedented scoring necessitated new approaches to notation, instrument setup, playing
technique, and conceptualisation of the percussionist’s role. Thus “multi-percussion” as its
own entity was born.
Following this work multi-percussion writing began to evolve outside of chamber
music due to a variety of influences including:
• New roles for percussion
• Access to instruments
• New percussionists and percussion education
• Processional multi-percussionists
• Changes in compositional process
These influences combined to create a new world to explore for the next generation of
composers and percussionists which led to countless new works written for orchestra, opera,
ballet, and even solo repertoire for multi-percussion. Although L’histoire is the first work to
contain such a setup, it was not as significant an influence on the development of percussion
compositions as it originally appears to be. This raises a clear question, if the development of
1
Igor Stravinsky, Histoire du Soldat (London: J. & W. Chester, Ltd, 1918)
3
multi-percussion does not stem directly from L’histoire and its effect on multi-percussion
works then how and why did it develop at such a rapid pace over twentieth century to become
a core part of modern percussion repertoire alongside timpani, snare drum and keyboard
percussion.
4
1.2 Aims of the project

To address the thesis question, I will explore how the genre of multi-percussion developed
into one of the cornerstones of percussion literature alongside keyboard instruments, snare
drum, and timpani. In addition to this I will address the key influences that surround the
development of multi-percussion to fully explore this art style. There are four clear settings
that multi-percussion was being written for throughout the century:
• Orchestral works.
• Chamber works.
• Ensemble works.
• Solo works.
These will be thoroughly examined, to identify how the following influences helped
shape the different settings of multi-percussion:
• Late nineteenth and early twentieth century composers use of percussion in the
orchestra.
• Jazz and the drum kit.
• Percussion ensemble works of Roldan, Varese, and John Cage.
• Percussion virtuosi; Neuhaus, Drouet, and Steven Schick.
This project will identify how these major influences in the development of multi-
percussion came together to launch multi-percussion to the forefront of creativity. 2 The aim is
to combine the research in the field to thoroughly explore the impetus behind these different
settings and how that has led to the world of multi-percussion that is present in the twenty-
first century.
2
Colby Snider, "Suggested Audition Repertoire," The University of Tennessee at Martin, accessed April 4, 2018,
https://www.utm.edu/departments/percussion/audition_repertoire.php.
5
2. Methodology
The original hypothesis was to explore how significant an impact L’histoire made on the
development of multi-percussion throughout the twentieth century. However, early in the
research process it became clear that this work was not as influential on the rest of this style
as was originally hypothesised. (This will be explored in 4.1.1.1). Once the realisation that
L’histoire did not continue to directly influence multi-percussion’s growth an important
question was raised: why did this style of writing develop in such a substantial way through
the twentieth century?
This question has caused the research to become focused on the overarching
influences that dramatically affected the way multi-percussion was being written throughout
the century. Database research and a literature review unearthed the range of secondary
sources available on the topic, however, although there is a significant body of literature it
became evident that academic research on the topic was patchy and sometimes non-existent.
Seminal scholarship in the field was found in Steve Schick’s The Percussionist’s Art: Same
Bed Different Dreams, 3 The Modern Percussion Revolution: Journeys of the Progressive
Artist edited by Kevin Lewis, 4 The Cambridge Companion to Percussion edited by Russell
Hartenberger, 5 and Louise Devenish’s Global Percussion Innovations: the Australian
Perspective. 6
In the process of exploring the works throughout the twentieth century, again the
sources were limited. Whilst not entirely credible as peer reviewed articles Percussive Arts
Society (PAS) articles, program notes, and biographies provide excellent ephemeral and
contemporaneous debates on the multi-percussion compositions. Many of the PAS articles
are written by leaders in the percussion field, including Jan Williams, and provide insights
into the mindset of percussionists and composers during the twentieth century.
3
Steven Schick, The Percussionist’s Art: Same Bed Different Dreams (New York: University of Rochester Press,
2006).
4
Kevin Lewis and Gustavo Aguilar, eds., The Modern Percussion Revolution: Journeys of the Progressive Artist
(New York: Routledge, 2014).
5
Russell Hartenberger, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Percussion (United Kingdom: Cambridge University
Press, 2016).
6
Louise Devenish, Global Percussion Innovations: The Australian Perspective (United Kingdom: Routledge,
2018).
6
The sources by Schick, Lewis and Hartenberger, in addition to the PAS articles have
clearly pointed towards the works and soloists that should be discussed in relation to this
topic. The works selected to be explored in this dissertation are the first works to be
composed in the seminal trends that occurred during the development of the genre, this
method was chosen as it was the most effective way to focus the topic in this thesis.
The key works that have been identified by the sources are:
• L’histoire du soldat by Igor Stravinsky (1918)
• La création du monde by Darius Milhaud (1922)
• Concerto for Percussion and Small Orchestra by Darius Milhaud (1932)
• 27’ 10.554” for a Percussionist by John Cage (1956)
• Zyklus by Karlheinz Stockhausen (1962)
• The King of Denmark by Morton Feldman (1964)
• Janissary Music by Charles Wuorinen (1966)
• Ground by Norio Fukushi (1973)
• Toucher by Vinko Globokar (1973)
• Psappha by Iannis Xenakis (1975)
• Rebonds By Iannis Xenakis (1987)
• I Ching by Per Nørgård (1982)
• Thirteen Drums by Ishii Maki (1985)
• To the Earth by Frederic Rzewski (1985)
• Bone Alphabet by Brian Ferneyhough (1991)
• XY by Michael Gordan (1999)
The method for choosing works to explore in this thesis has many positives regarding
refining the scope of the thesis. However, there are some negatives which need to be
highlighted regarding the accidental omission of some significant figures throughout the
twentieth century. These include important female composers such as Lucia Dlugoszewski,
who has been identified by Lloyd-Jones 7, and percussionists such as Micheal Askill 8 and
Jean-Charles François. 9 The people mentioned here are only a few of the names that have
7
Rebecca Lloyd-Jones, “A Space for Women as Women Exploring a Gendered Feminine Percussion Practice
through the work of Lucia Dlugoszewski“ (paper presented at Transplanted Roots Research Symposium 2019,
Universidad de Guanajuato, 12-14 September 2019),
https://rebeccalloydjones.files.wordpress.com/2020/03/a-space-for-women-as-women-exploring-a-gendered-
feminine-percussion-practice-through-the-work-of-lucia-dlugoszewski.pdf.
8
Devenish, Global Percussion Innovations: The Australian Perspective, 52.
9
“Jean-Charles François” Dare Conferences, accessed September 20, 2020.
https://dareconferences.org/dare_author/jean-charles-francois/.
7
been omitted due to them being outside the scope of this thesis. However, there should be
more research done, similarly to the work done by Lloyd-Jones, to explore how each person
has specifically influence the areas that will be highlighted in this thesis.
Part of this research was to perform a recital of works that showcases how multi-
percussion as a style of writing has developed. A recital was chosen to be performed as part
of this research as information regarding the works and their place in the repertoire were
discussed during the performance. The research also informed specific performance practise
in the preparation for the recital. Five works were chosen to represent the different trends in
multi-percussion writing during the twentieth century.
• Cha-Cha-Cha by Poul Ruders
o A one-person Latin band and was chosen to represent percussion ensemble
works.
• I Ching, "III. The Gentle, the Penetrating (hexagram no. 57)” by Per Nørgård
o Represents the later generations of works, highlighting the significance of it
being the first work to have multiple movements.
o As there was not enough time to perform the entire work in this recital the
third movement was chosen as it is the smallest setup out of the four
movements.
• Cadenza for 6 Pauken by Peter Sadlo
o Represents jazz’s influence on the field of multi-percussion, as this work
predominantly features boogie woogie jazz, as well as the Saints Come
Marching in.
• To the Earth by Fredric Rzewski
o Represents the limited instrumentation works (explored in 7.2) part of the
second generation of multi-percussion works involving smaller setups.
o Is representative of the first work in the generation (Toucher) as it has
commonalities in its use of limited instrumentation and speech.
• Psappha by Iannis Xenakis
o Considered to be one of the masterworks of multi-percussion by many major
writers and percussionists, including Steven Schick.
8
Although the choice of a timpani work is unusual in a multi-percussion recital the

choice was made as it was the most effective way of expressing the influence jazz had on the
field of multi-percussion.
It is clear through the research on the field that there is substantial information on the
works, composers, and percussionists that will be discussed. However, it has become evident
that there is little research done on the impetus that led to the creation of the different setting
of multi-percussion throughout the twentieth century. This dissertation aims to fill this gap of
knowledge and will focus purely on the impetus that led to creation of an incredibly varied
catalogue of works for multi-percussion that have emerged over the course of the twentieth
century.
9
3. Early use of percussion
This chapter explores the development and varied uses of percussion in the orchestra and
marching bands in the early twentieth century. The focus will be on the changing roles of
percussion in the orchestra as well as the rise of the drum kit in American marching bands. It
is proposed that these new roles were substantially influential on the development of multi-
percussion as they allowed composers to see the expressive and soloistic potential of these
instruments.
Throughout this chapter there will be a distinction between timpani and percussion in
the orchestra. These instruments developed at different times as timpani has been a part of the
orchestra for much longer than percussion, this suggests that the development of timpani does
not correlate with the rise of multi-percussion works. Therefore, the development of timpani
is beyond the scope of this research. This excludes discussing the use of timpani by Berlioz,
Beethoven, and Wagner despite their importance to the development of timpani in the
orchestra. When discussing percussion in the orchestra it will be specifically referring to the
percussion section, which differs from the timpanist and the timpani section.
3.1 The use of percussion in the orchestra before the start

of the twentieth century
The most common orchestral percussion instruments came from the Turkish military bands
(Janissary music) where the army would march with bass drums, cymbals, triangles, and the
Turkish crescent (an instrument that didn't transition well into orchestral percussion). Mozart
uses these instruments in The Abduction from the Seraglio (1782) to evoke the exotic
atmosphere of the Turkish Seraglio. 10 Beethoven also makes a reference to Janissary bands in
the fourth movement of his 9th Symphony, where he uses bass drum, cymbals, and triangle, to
represent a Turkish march. 11 The expectation for a percussionist in these works was for them
to play one instrument each; three players would be required for Beethoven’s 9th Symphony
(bass drum, cymbals, and triangle). 12
10
John Beck, Encyclopedia of Percussion (New York: Garland Publishing, Inc, 1995), 257.
11
D. Doran Bugg, "The role of Turkish percussion in the history and development of the orchestral percussion
section" (DMA Major Paper, Louisiana State University, 2003), 31,
https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_majorpapers/27.
12
James Blades, Percussion Instruments and their History (Wesport: The Bold Strummer, Ltd., 2005), 266-267.
10
These works highlight the the role of the percussionist and percussion instruments
before the twentieth century which was to accentuate and emphasise the “structural harmonic
movements”,this was achieved by using rhythmic and colouristic effects. 13 Percussion was
used this way for a significant portion of orchestral music leading up to the end of the
nineteenth century where things would begin to change. Percussion began to receive more
significant roles in the music which in turn led to an increase in the number of percussionists
and instruments that were being used. 14
3.1.1 New uses of percussion in orchestral works

Significant changes in the number of percussionists needed, the types of instruments, and
their uses were central to the new roles for percussion in the orchestra. This can be found in
such works as Rimsky-Korsakov’s Capriccio Espagnol (1887) and Debussy’s La Mer (1903-
5). 15 Opposed to many of the works written in the eighteenth and nineteenth century, these
works required a greater number of percussionists, in addition to using new, exotic, and
strange instruments that were yet to be used in a purely orchestral setting. These changes
were stepping beyond the uses of the instruments from the Turkish military bands as new
cultures and sound worlds began to emerge.
Capriccio Espagnol 16 uses percussion to create new and exotic sounds worlds, as
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov uses percussion in new and interesting ways. The first example is
his use of castanets, to evoke an exotic Spanish sound. He uses these instruments throughout
his work to accentuate changes and colour the sound created with his use of melody and
harmony, which makes the work overflow with the Spanish culture. Another significant way
that he wrote for percussion was by increasing and changing its role in the orchestra by
writing for timpani, triangle, and snare drum rolls to underpin various solos in other
instruments throughout the fourth movement of this work. 17
There were many composers who also experimented with new and non-traditional
uses for percussion instruments including Strauss in Eine Alpensinfonie (1911-1915) and
Mahler in his 4th,6th and 7th Symphonies written in 1900, 1904, and 1905 respectively. In Eine
Alpensinfonie Strauss uses multiple cowbells to musically illustrate cows grazing on the
13
Beck, Encyclopedia of Percussion, 257.
14
Blades, Percussion Instruments and their History, 418.
15
16
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Capriccio espagnol (Leipzig: M.P. Belaieff, 1888).
17
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Mvt. IV, “Scena e canto gitano,” Capriccio espagnol (Leipzig: M.P. Belaieff, 1888).
11
mountain plateau. In addition to this he wrote for two thunder sheets and wind machines to
represent the “storm”, which is believed to be the first example of these instruments being
used in a concert hall outside of an operatic setting. 18
Mahler also employs unusual instruments in his symphonies such as sleighbells
opening his 4th Symphony to conjure horses pulling a cart in the minds of the audience, the
hammer sound in his 6th Symphony to illustrate the three blows of Fate on his life, 19 and
multiple cowbells in his 7th Symphony 20 to represent cows in a meadow, similar to Strauss’
Eine Alpensinfonie. These two composers show that the role of percussion instruments was
beginning to change as they were starting to be acknowledged for their sonic potential instead
of just their rhythmical qualities.
There were countless composers at this time who were writing percussion in new and
interesting ways such as Debussy’s use of antique cymbals in Afternoon of the Faun (1894)
and Igor Stravinsky use of snare drum and timpani interludes in Petrushka. Works like these
allowed many composers to begin experimenting with the role of percussion and
subsequently the technical challenges for percussionists were expanding. One example of a
work that shows the new choices a percussionist was expected to make is La Mer, by
Debussy as it features a cymbal part which focuses on the orchestral colours and timbres that
are possible out of cymbals, parts like this adds to the potential musical decisions that the
percussionist can and were being expected to make. 21
As these parts were being written percussionists were expected to make more musical
choices in the parts they were playing. The cymbal parts being written are a clear
representation of this as there are countless sounds that one person can make with a single
pair of cymbals. This can be seen in Frank Epstein’s book Cymbalisms, 22 which discusses
twenty-two different strokes, each being used for a different purpose. 23 The twenty-two
strokes combined with countless choices in sizes, makes, and weights of cymbals creates
almost infinite choices one player can make with a single crash cymbal note at mezzo-forte.
18
Jonathan Minnick, “Richard Strauss’s Eine Alpensinfonie: An Analysis of Origins, Topics, and Symphonic
Characteristics” (Honour’s Thesis, University of North Carolina, 2016), 20,
https://cdr.lib.unc.edu/concern/honors_theses/8623j276t.
19
Naill O’Loughlin, “Interconnection Musicologies Decoding Mahler sixth Symphony,” Musicological Annual 39,
no. 1 (January 2003): 38, https://doi.org/10.4312/mz.39.1.31-49.
20
21
Frank Epstein, Cymbalism (Milwaukee: Hal Leonard, 2007), 58
22
Epstein, Cymbalism, iii.
23
Epstein, Cymbalism, v.
12
John Beck states percussion instruments have a great “timbre efficiency” as they are
instruments that can produce an enormous variety of sounds in the hands of only a few
players. This became a major focus of composers in the twentieth century as composers
started making music that was focusing on timbre change instead of just focusing on melody
and harmony. 24 Since percussion instruments were so efficient and effective at changing
timbre they were an obvious choice for these composers to experiment with. 25
In addition to the works discussed in this chapter there are many notable works that
also show the extended use of percussion in the twentieth century, (see Appendix 1).
3.1.2 Percussion as a feature in orchestral works

As the roles of percussion instruments began developing more composers started
experimenting with new and radical using these instruments. Alexander Tcherepnin was one
of these composers who made a radical change regarding the use of percussion in the
orchestra. 26 In 1927 he began to write his Symphony No.1 and would expand upon the role of
percussion in a more radical and soloistic way. This radical use of percussion appears in his
symphony’s second movement which he wrote “to be treated like a concerto for percussion
instruments” 27 the first time in the history of the orchestral music where percussion was used
in this way. 28
Using percussion in this way was Tcherepnin’s attempt to separate the orchestra and
himself from the conventions that had been set in the history of Western Art Music. This
work did not receive critical acclaim for its use of percussion, it was instead shunned and
dismissed by audience members, who at the premier of this work called him a “barbarian”. 29
After its premier this work only received a few subsequent performances, and it was not until
1999 that the work was recorded in its entirety by the Singapore Symphony Orchestra.
24
Beck, Encyclopedia of Percussion, 257.
25
Schick, The Percussionist’s Art, 2.
26
Benjamin Andrew Charles, “Multi-Percussion in Undergraduate Percussion Curriculum” (Doctoral Essay,
University of Miami, 2014), 1,
https://scholarlyrepository.miami.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2342&context=oa_dissertations.
27
Ludmila Korabelnikova, Alexander Tcherepnin: The Saga of a Russian Emigré Composer, trans. Anna
Winestein, ed. Sue Ellen Hershman-Tcherepnin (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2008),
93
28
Korabelnikova, Alexander Tcherepnin, 84.
29
Willi Reich, Alexander Tcherepnin (Bonn: M.P. Belaieff, 1970), 33.
13
This work may have fallen out of the musical canon 30 however it is important to
mention as it shows how a multitude of composers at this time were attempting to write for
percussion. Another composer who was experimenting with more radical uses of percussion
was Shostakovich in his ballet The Nose (1928). 31 He features percussion in a musical
interlude where they are the only family of instruments playing. 32
There is little to no evidence suggesting that these works were influential on each
other or any works that followed in the development of multi-percussion, therefore a deeper
analysis of these works is beyond the scope of the research. However, a brief discussion of
these works is important as they show how writing for percussion was reaching the forefront
of composers creative thought, which hints at a new setting for percussion, which will be
explored in 4.2 (the percussion ensemble).
30
Joshua Lee Bedford, “Alexander Tcherepnin’s Symphony No.1: Validating the Work Within the Canon of
Symphonic Composition” (Master’s Thesis, Indiana State University, 2011), 1,
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/d5f8/c419420e7c53cb5a8826c3315efc7b26bc27.pdf.
31
Dimitri Shostakovich, “Interlude No. 4,” Die Nase (Austria: Universal Edition, 1930), 46-60.
32
“Dmitri Shostakovich The Nose,” Boosey & Hawkes, accessed December 14, 2019,
https://www.boosey.com/cr/music/Dmitri-Shostakovich-The-Nose/15661.
14
3.2 Early drum kit and its influence

The growth of the percussion section into an early drum kit in the New Orleans brass bands
during the late nineteenth century also had a significant effect on the development of multi-
percussion.
3.2.1 New Orleans brass bands

Major brass bands were scattered throughout most cities in America in the late nineteenth
century, and each of these major bands had different ways of playing due to the variety of
influences they received from the different migration cultures that were present in various
states. The European military bands were a major influence in the development of percussion
in the American brass bands leading to innovative approaches to writing and performing
percussion. Throughout America these European military bands featured brass and
percussion instruments performing in a marching style. 33
Each of these bands had their own distinct voice reflecting the cultural characteristic
of the region. Some of the most prominent and influential bands upon the development of
percussion were the New Orleans brass bands, as there was a strong tradition of African
music and dance in the city. 34 This blend of military bands and the traditional African music
created a unique style that became incredibly popular. This music was a combination of
ragtime, blues, spirituals, marches, European dances, Latin American rhythms, and American
popular song. 35 When these styles combined, they became linked with everyday life playing
at public events, such as funerals, baseball games, and business gatherings. 36
The early and most enduring groups in the New Orleans brass bands scene were
Excelsior (1880-1930), Onward (1885-1930), Reliance (1892-1918), Tuxedo (1917-25), and
Eureka (1920-75). 37 Reimer states that these bands were made up of eight to fifteen players,
the standard instruments included, but were not limited to, cornets, trombones, alto, baritone
horn, sousaphone, snare drums, and bass drums (with attached cymbal). He also mentions
33
Benjamin N. Reimer, “Defining the Role of Drumset Performance in Contemporary Music” (PhD diss., McGill
University, 2013), 10, https://www.pas.org/docs/default-source/thesisdissertations/Reimer_-
_Defining_the_Role_of_Drumset_Performance_in_Contemporary_Music.pdf.
34
Reimer, “Defining the Role of Drumset,” 11.
35
Driscoll, “New Orleans Brass Band,” 31.
36
Matthew Thomas Driscoll, “New Orleans brass band traditions and popular music: elements of style in the
music of mama digdown 's brass band and youngblood brass band” (Doctor of Musical Arts, University of Iowa,
2012), 31, https://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3288&context=etd.
37
Driscoll, “New Orleans Brass Band,” 24.
15
that the early history of these bands would typically have two or more percussionists playing
either a snare drum or a bass drum with cymbal attachment, there are some occasions where
there would be a specific cymbal player however that was not common. 38 The development
and rise of these New Orleans brass bands are directly linked to the emergence of jazz.
3.2.2 First semblance of a drum kit

As the popularity of these bands increased so did the performance opportunities. Many of
these opportunities were no longer outdoors in a marching setting, they were in theatre pits.
The transition from a marching band to indoor performances created major issues for the
number of performers that could fit in the limited space in these venues. 39 The solution was to
cut the number of performers and since percussion instruments took up the most space it was
a logical choice to reduce the size of the percussion section in the band. 40 As this section was
still necessary to recreate the now popular sound of the brass bands, a tradition of double
drumming developed, where a single player would play bass drum on the floor to the right
and snare drum resting on a chair to the left. 41 Due to this setup the percussionists rhythms
were unable to be overly complicated.
Double drumming became commonplace in these bands; however, both the music and
percussionists began to require more complicated rhythms and freedom to play these
instruments. After much experimentation to achieve more control, in 1909 the bass drum
pedal was invented by the Ludwig Drum Company. This development allowed the drummers
to play the bass drum with their feet while keeping their hands free to play these complicated
passages on the snare or other instruments. 42 The combination of snare drum, bass drum, and
cymbals would become the basis of what would become the drum kit.
The drum kit started to expand beyond the snare drum, bass drum, and cymbals setup,
to add other instruments including; woodblocks, cow bells, tam-tam, toms/Chinese toms,
high-hats, low-hats. The drum kit is a prime example of early multi-percussion, however it is
not often referred to as multi-percussion as this setup has become standardised. 43 This setup
38
39
Georges Paczynski, Une Histoire de la Batterie de Jazz, 3 vols., vol. 1 (Paris: Outre Mesure, 1999), 44.
40
Paczynski, Une Histoire de la Batterie de Jazz, 44.
41
Geoff Nicholls, The Drum Book: A History of the Rock Drum Kit, 2nd ed. (New York: Backbeat Book, 2008),
12.
42
43
16
would remain consistent throughout the century with each drummer adding their own
personal flavour to their version of it.
3.3 Influence on the writing of multi-percussion

The development of percussion in orchestral and brass band music has made a significant
impact on the writing of percussion throughout the twentieth century. Composers began to
absorb the new sounds that were developing in percussion and turned their attention to
engaging some of the new instrumental options available to them. The drum kit had more of a
direct impact on the world of multi-percussion, which will be explored in 4.1, as it acts like a
catalyst triggering a reaction from composers such as Stravinsky and Milhaud. In addition to
these influences, another key influence that will be explored in 4.2 is the new experimental
compositional ideas present in the works by Varese and Cage.
17
4. Multi-percussion in chamber music

works
The new and expanded uses of percussion in orchestral music and creation of the drum kit,
allowed composers to see the potential of these instruments and led to the emergence of
percussion being used in the setting of chamber works. Igor Stravinsky, Darius Milhaud,
Amadeo Roldan, Edgard Varese, Béla Bartók, and John Cage were some of the composers
who experimented with writing for multi-percussion, as the interest in percussion was gaining
significant traction.
4.1 Multi-percussion as a part of a chamber work

There were two ways that percussion was being written in chamber works; firstly as a multi-
percussion setup featuring percussionists playing multiple instruments concurrently, the other
is a percussionist moving between instruments in the work. The first style is of more interest
to this topic however there will be a brief discussion into the second style of writing. Both
styles were heavily influenced by jazz and the drum kit, highlighting its importance in this
early phase of multi-percussion. 44 The following section is devoted to the early works that
feature multi-percussion parts in various settings.
4.1.1 The first multi-percussion setups
4.1.1.1 L’histoire du soldat (1918)

1918 was a ground-breaking moment in the composition of percussion when Stravinsky
wrote L’histoire, a chamber work for seven instrumentalists and a narrator. 45 One of the
instrumental parts is for multi-percussion setup, the very first of its kind. Stravinsky’s choice
to write for multi-percussion is heavily influenced by jazz and the drum kit.
44
45
Eric Walter White, Stravinsky: The Composer and his Works (Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California
Press, 1966), 225.
18
Ernest Ansermet, a close friend who conducted many of Stravinsky’s works, 46

brought ragtime scores to Stravinsky after the Russian Ballet’s second American tour in
1917. 47 Ansermet acquired these scores in New Orleans where he experienced the New
Orleans brass bands and the drum kit in action. This sparked his interest in this style of
writing which he wanted to share with Stravinsky. 48
Stravinsky upon seeing these parts became so engrossed in jazz that he instantly
started composing “the ragtime part in L’histoire”. 49 His obsession continued after
completing L’histoire as he instantly started another work in a similar style, Ragtime with 11
Instruments, which also includes a multi-percussion setup. 50 Even though he wrote these two
works in a ragtime style, he was yet to hear jazz played live, and his entire knowledge on the
field was based on the sheet music he had received. 51
Other than the drum kit and jazz heavily influencing the creation of the multi-
percussion part there are two other factors that could have influenced Stravinsky’s writing.
Firstly, it was written during Stravinsky’s exile to Switzerland creating an issue of available
players. 52 Secondly, this was composed in the years of following the First World War, when
Stravinsky and much of the world was in poverty. 53 To survive through this time financially
Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz (author of the text in L’histoire) and Stravinsky decided to create
L’histoire as a show that would tour around Europe. 54
In creating such a revolutionary multi-percussion part there were countless issues that
Stravinsky had to overcome. The two main issues were the notation and the setup. 55
Stravinsky was required to create his own notational system as there were no conventions set
46
47
“Timeline of Ballet Russes,” Library of Congress, accessed December 18, 2019,
https://www.loc.gov/collections/ballets-russes-de-serge-diaghilev/articles-and-essays/timeline-of-ballets-
russes/.
48
Igor Stravinsky & Robert Craft, Dialogues and a Diary (United Kingdom: Faber & Faber, 1963), 87.
49
Igor Stravinsky & Robert Craft, Dialogues and a Diary (United Kingdom: Faber & Faber, 1963), 87.
50
Barbara B. Heyman, “Stravinsky and Ragtime,” The Musical Quarterly 68, no. 4 (October 1982): 547,
www.jstor.org/stable/742157.
51
White, Stravinsky: The Composer and his Works, 232.
52
White, Stravinsky: The Composer and his Works, 226-227.
53
Heyman, “Stravinsky and Ragtime,” 544.
54
Al Payson, "Multiple Percussion at the School Level By Al Payson," Percussive Notes 11, no. 3 (1973): 16-17,
accessed April 24, 2017, http://publications.pas.org/Archive/pnv11n3/articles/pnv11n3.16-17.pdf.
55
Stravinsky, Histoire du Soldat
19
in place for him to follow. 56 This led him to create a part that is in many ways almost
impossible to read at first. 57
The setup was also of great concern as he was required to discover the best way of
arranging the instruments and an effective way of notating it for future performers. The desire
to write the part led him to begin experimenting with playing these instruments in different
combinations and setups. These experiments were done in his kitchen using drums that he
had bought from a local store in Lausanne. 58
The style of playing in this work is similar to double drumming (3.2.2) the style of
drumming that was done before the invention of the bass drum pedal. One possible reason for
this is that he potentially would not have had access to a pedal although he would have heard
of it.
These experiments in setup and playing approach caused Stravinsky to write many
unusual and counter intuitive performance notes for the percussionist. 59 One such instruction
is for the percussionist to position the field drum and snare drum very close together and
play semi-quavers by moving one hand between them (horizontally). A modern percussionist
would just simply use two hands to play the two separate drums, potentially the setup that
Stravinsky used had made that option impossible. 60 The modern way that this work is played
generally avoids using Stravinsky’s original music or setup design as technological and
notational improvements have made them obsolete outside of historical interest. 61
Although Ramuz and Stravinsky had planned for this work to tour around Europe it
was not to be, as its tour was stopped short after its first performance. The Spanish influenza
had struck Stravinsky and members of the cast and the musicians which stopped any chance
of continuing the tour at this time. It was not performed again for another five years, after the
next few works featuring multi-percussion setups began to emerge. As this tour was cut short,
it changes this work from being the watershed moment it should have been. L’histoire is still
important due to it being the first work written, however there is little to no evidence
suggesting it would go on to influence the later works in this field.
56
David Early, “Percussion Performance Issues in Stravinsky’s Histoire du Soldat,” Percussive Notes 31, No. 5
(June 1993): 69, http://publications.pas.org/archive/pnv31n5/articles/pnv31n5.69-
75.pdf#search=%22histoir%20du%20soldat%22.
57
Early, “Percussion Performance Issues” 71.
58
Heyman, “Stravinsky and Ragtime,” 552.
59
Early, “Percussion Performance Issues”
60
Early, “Percussion Performance Issues” 71.
61
Early, "Percussion Performance Issues," 69
20
4.1.1.2 La création du monde (1922)

Darius Milhaud is similarly influenced by jazz music and the drum kit as La creation du
monde is overflowing with musical ideas that are direct references to this style. 62 References
range from Milhaud’s choice of chords, musical ideas, as well as the multi-percussion part,
which resembles a drum kit, with the addition of a tambourine. 63
Milhaud had direct contact with jazz as he travelled to America in 1922, part of his
trip was to find the “Authentic” sounds of jazz. 64 One of the places he travelled to was
Harlem and it was here that he saw the brass bands and more importantly the drum kit in
action. 65 Milhaud was always interested in the “problems of percussion”; this combined with
experiencing the drum kit inspired Milhaud to started writing La creation du monde as soon
as he had arrived back in France. 66
La création du monde and L’histoire’s percussion parts have many commonalities
however there are some key differences in the instrumentation and setups. One of these major
differences is the inclusion of the bass drum pedal in La création du monde, which could also
simultaneously strike a cymbal attached to the bass drum. 67 This difference could have
occurred as Milhaud would have had access to a pedal and Stravinsky either didn’t or chose
not to write for it.
4.1.2 Alternative ways of writing for multi-percussion

Both Stravinsky and Milhaud were writing works that involve percussionists playing an array
of instruments concurrently. At the same time there were also composers such as William
Walton and Aaron Copland, in Façade (1922) and Music for the Theatre (1925), 68 who were
writing multi-percussion parts that require players to move between different instruments,
and only rarely play multiple instruments at the same time. Although there is a major
62
Reimer, “Defining the Role of Drumset,” 39-48.
63
Reimer, “Defining the Role of Drumset,”40-41.
64
Darius Milhaud, Notes Without Music, trans. Donald Evans, ed. Rollo H. Myers (London: Dennis Dobson Ltd.,
1952), 118.
65
Darius Milhaud, My Happy Life, Trans. Donald Evans, George Hall, and Christopher Palmer (London, New
York: Marion Boyars, 1987, 1995), 109.
66
Warren Howe, “The Percussionist’s Guide to Darius Milhaud’s La Creation du Monde,” Percussionist 17, no.
1 (Fall 1979): 38, http://publications.pas.org/archive/resfal79/articles/resfal79.37-
48.pdf#search=%22creation%20du%20monde%22.
67
Russ Girsberger, “Darius Milhaud’s “La Cration du Monde”: The Problems with the Parts,” Percussive Notes
38, no. 3 (June 2000): 55, http://publications.pas.org/archive/Jun00/articles/00.06.55-
68
“Aaron Copland Music for the Theatre,” Boosey & Hawkes, access December 1, 2019,
https://www.boosey.com/cr/music/Aaron-Copland-Music-for-the-Theatre/6728.
21
difference in the way the percussion parts have been written 69 a commonality that they share
with L’histoire and La création du monde is the influence of jazz. 70 An in-depth discussion of
these works is out of the range of this dissertation as the focus is on multi-percussion where
multiple instruments are played concurrently.
4.2 Percussion ensemble music

The percussion ensemble was the next major setting in the writing of multi-percussion. The
writing in this setting is a continuation of the works by Tcherepnin and Shostakovich who
were discussed in 3.1.2, as it is the first evidence of percussion instruments existing in
Western Art Music without any support of harmony or melody. The major composers who
began to write in this setting were Roldan, Varese, and Cage.
4.2.1 Ritmica No.5 and No.6 (1930)

Amadeo Roldan’s works Ritmica No.5 and No.6 are the first known works for percussion
ensemble to be fully notated in Western Art Music. 71 Roldan is one of Cuba’s most
celebrated composers with many of his major orchestral works featuring a large number of
percussion parts, in particular traditional Cuban instruments. 72 This is due to him finding the
voice of his compositional style to be inspired by Cuban nationalism. 73 A large part of Cuban
music was focused on the many percussion instruments that are native to that area. Examples
of these instruments are claves, cenerros (cowbells), maracas, quijada (jawbone), guiro,
bongo, timbales, and marimbula all of which appear in both Ritmica No.5 74 and No.6. 75 The
only instruments in these works that are not directly from a Cuban background are the
69
Howard Pollack, Aaron Copland: The Life and Work of An Uncommon Man (Urbana: University of Illinois
Press, 1999), 113.
70
Brett Andrew Richardson, “Aaron Copland’s Music for the Theatre: A Transcription for Wind Band” (PhD
Diss., Indiana University, 2014), 14,
https://scholarworks.iu.edu/dspace/bitstream/handle/2022/18474/Richardson%2C%20Brett%20%28DM%20
Wind%20Cond%29.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y.
71
John Richard Hall, “Development of the Percussion Ensemble Through the Contributions of the Latin
American Composers Amadeo Roldan, Jose Ardevol, Carlos Chavez and Alberto Ginastera” (DMA Document,
Ohio State University, 2008), ii,
https://etd.ohiolink.edu/!etd.send_file?accession=osu1211553990&disposition=inline.
72
Hall, “Development of the Percussion Ensemble,” 23, 27.
73
Hall, “Development of the Percussion Ensemble,” 8.
74
Amadeo Roldan, Ritmica No.5 (New York & Hamburg: Peer Music, 1967)
75
Amadeo Roldan, Ritmica No.6 (New York & Hamburg: Peer Music, 1967).
22
timpani and bass drum, although the bass drum could be representing a low drum from Cuban
traditional music. 76
This work does not feature any multi-percussion parts however it is of great interest to
this topic as it signifies the first time in which western audiences could have experienced a
chamber ensemble music made entirely of percussionists. This work is often overlooked and
is generally not considered to be the first work for percussion ensemble even though it was
written one year before Varese's Ionisation (1931). 77 There are some scholars who suggest
that Roldan’s friendship with Varese influenced some of the instrumentation in Ionisation as
Varese received a package from Roldan while he was writing Ionisation which contained “a
guiro, a pair of maracas, two claves, and a cowbell” 78 all which appear in the score of
Ionisation. 79
4.2.2 Ionisation (1931)

Ionisation, written in 1931 by Varese is another work for percussion ensemble and is
generally credited with being the first work of this genre for two reasons. Firstly, he started
writing it in 1929 only to finish it in 1931,80 which leads to the speculation that the ideas of a
percussion ensemble were circulating with Varese before Roldan’s work was created. 81 The
other reason is that Varese was a very well-known composer, due to him being the head and
one of the founding members of the International Composers’ Guild, suggesting more people
would have heard of Ionisation and not of Ritmica No.5 or No.6. 82
Whether it is the first work for percussion ensemble or not is unimportant in this
discussion as the focus on these works is the influence that they had on the many composers
and music critics that experienced them. Nicholas Martnez suggested that the Western Art
Music was not sufficiently prepared for a work that was written for unpitched percussion
instruments. 83 The premier of Ionisation led to discussions on whether music without any
pitch should be considered to be music at all, with the New York Times stating that it “could
76
Larry Dean Vanlandingham, “The Percussion Ensemble: 1930-1945.” (PhD diss., Florida State University,
1971), 7-9.
77
78
Hall, “Development of the Percussion Ensemble,”32-33.
79
80
Hall, “Development of the Percussion Ensemble,” 16-17.
81
Odile Vivier, Varèse (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1973), 93.
82
Hall, “Development of the Percussion Ensemble,” 49-50.
83
Fernand Ouellette, Edgard Varese, trans. Derek Coltman (New York: Da Capo Press, 1981), 124.
23
hardly be called music”. 84 Although Varese received considerable disapproval and disgust
from conservative audience members he was praised by many of the “musical elite”. 85
Ionisation is written for thirteen percussionists who together play forty different
instruments including; bass drums, tenor drums, snare drums, tarole (piccolo snare drum),
bongos, tambourine, field drum, crash cymbal, suspended cymbals, tam-tams, gongs, anvils,
triangles, sleigh bells, cowbell, chimes, glockenspiel, pinnao, temple blocks, claves, maracas,
castanets, whip, guiro, high and low sirens, and a lion's roar. 86 There are a few reasons why
Varese could have chosen to write a work which only featured percussion instruments, the
main one being that it was a continuation ideas that appear in many of his earlier
compositions, which were focused on rhythms and percussion. This can be seen most clearly
in his orchestral works, Ameriques (1921) and Arcana (1927), which the New York Times
states as being strongly influenced by Debussy, Stravinsky, and the sounds of Varese’s
“adopted home, New York”. 87 They also state that no composer until Varese had approached
writing for percussion with this level of sophistication and subtly. 88
Ionisation was also the first work that Varese had written that was going to be
recorded. 89 It was originally planned to be recorded by the percussionists of the New York
Philharmonic but, as Nicolas Slonimky states in his biography Perfect Pitch, 90 “it soon
became clear that they could never master the rhythms” that Varese had written. This led to
the recording being done in 1933 by Carlo Salzedo, Paul Creston, Wallingford Riegger, and
William Schuman, 91 which suggests that this work alone increased the skill level that was
needed of a percussionist in the twentieth century. 92
This recording would go on to influence many major composers and performers to
follow, some of these are Pierre Boulez, who said “it was like an object coming from Mars” 93
as well as Morton Feldman and John Cage, who point out that “Ionisation” startled “even the
84
Howard Thompson, “New Music Given by Pan-Americans,” The New York Times, April 16, 1934,
https://www.nytimes.com/1934/04/16/archives/new-music-given-by-panamericans-compositions-by-varese-
ives-and.html.
85
Fernand Ouellette, Edgard Varese, trans. Derek Coltman (New York: Da Capo Press, 1981), 124
86
Edgard Varese, Ionisation (New York: Edgar Varese, 1934).
87
Steve Smith, “Banging Out a Revolution in 91 Mearsures,” The New York Times, July 16, 2010,
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/18/arts/music/18varese.html.
88
Smith, “Banging Out a Revolution in 91 Mearsures.”
89
Jed Distler, “The First Recordings of Edgard Varèse and Charles Ives,” Classical Net, accessed November 8,
2019, http://www.classical.net/music/recs/reviews/distler/slonimsky.php.
90
Distler, “The First Recordings of Edgard Varèse and Charles Ives.”
91
“1933 Premiere and First Recording of Varese’s Ionisation,” Nexus percussion, accessed January 26, 2020,
http://www.nexuspercussion.com/2010/02/1933-world-premiere-of-vareses-ionisation/.
92
Distler, “The First Recordings of Edgard Varèse and Charles Ives.”
93
The One All Alone, Directed by Frank Scheffer (2009; Netherlands: Kasander Film Company 2009), DVD.
24
most sophisticated musical thinkers”. 94 The New York Times article states that the world of
percussion and “the explosive proliferation of percussion music that came after “Ionisation”
owes nearly everything to Varèse’s mysterious masterpiece”. 95
4.2.3 John Cage’s percussion ensemble

John Cage is one of the most influential composers in the evolution of multi-percussion and
percussion in general 96 and will be discussed in more detail in 5.1. Cage was exceptionally
influential in the percussion ensemble, between 1930-1950 as he wrote sixteen percussion
ensemble works. The more well-known works from this time are Cage’s Constructions, the
First, Second and Third Constructions in Metal written in 1939, 1940, and 1941
respectively. 97 The most popular work in this series is his Third Construction which is for
four players each playing a multi-percussion setup of uncommon instruments, and is filled
with complicated rhythmic ideas. 98
Many of these works would not be performed until the 1950s as they contained
extremely difficult rhythms and were a challenge to play for technically untrained
percussionists. 99 This changed in 1950s as percussionists began to receive a more official
education as a percussion curriculum was created and implemented at the University of
Illinois and the Manhattan School of Music. 100 The department at the University of Illinois,
under the guidance of Paul Price created the first percussion ensemble that was counted as an
accredited unit. Price would then continue this work at Manhattan School of Music where he
would lead many of his students, in particular Max Neuhaus (6.1) and Jan Williams (7.2.1.1),
down the path to become extremely influential on the world of multi-percussion as will be
explored in later chapters. At this time the percussion curriculum did not contain multi-
percussion solo works as the first solo work for multi-percussion was yet to be written. 101
94
95
96
David Revill, “John Cage Hall of Fame,” Percussive Arts Society, accessed December 13, 2019,
https://www.pas.org/about/hall-of-fame/john-cage.
97
Cage, Third Constuction.
98
Cage, Third Constuction.
99
100
Frederick D. Fairchild, “Paul Price Hall of Fame,” Percussive Arts Society, accessed November 20, 2019,
https://www.pas.org/about/hall-of-fame/paul-price.
101
Charles, “Multi-Percussion in Undergraduate Percussion Curriculum,” 7.
25
4.3 Soloistic multi-percussion works

Multi-percussion writing was on the cusp of exploding into the solo music scene due to the
success of multi-percussion in chamber works and percussion ensembles. There are two
works that show this transition to solo writing; these works are Milhaud’s Concerto for
Percussion and Small Orchestra (1929) and Béla Bartók’s Sonata for Two Pianos and
Percussion (1937).
4.3.1 Concerto for Percussion and Small Orchestra (1932)

The success of works such as La création du monde led to the first opportunity for this style
of writing to be used as a soloist rather than just a part of the ensemble.
Milhaud was asked by Theo Coutelier to write a percussion concerto as a test piece
for Coutelier’s percussion classes. 102 This composition became known as Concerto for
Percussion and Small Orchestra (1929) and was the first work that began to use percussion
as more of a soloistic feature. 103 This work is the first multi-percussion concerto to be written
and was a benchmark of what was to come in the field of multi-percussion writing as it
requires the use of over 19 instruments (4 timpani and 15 percussion instruments).
Unlike La création du monde, Milhaud made a decision to write this work in a way
that it wouldn’t be reminiscent of jazz. 104 This is especially interesting as it was written
during the peak of early jazz and more importantly all the works featuring multi-percussion
parts up until then had a jazz influence. 105 Although this is technically a solo multi-
percussion work there are many moments that Milhaud wrote the percussion part to resemble
one player playing all the instruments in an orchestral percussion section rather being purely
soloistic. 106 This could be the case as the art form was not yet developed to a point where
percussion could exist without melody or harmony.
102
“Darius Milhaud: Konzert for percussion and small orchestra,” Universal Edition, accessed December 6,
2019, https://www.universaledition.com/darius-milhaud-480/works/konzert-3188.
103
“Concerto for Percussion and Small Orchestra,” Perc Tek, accessed December 18, 2019,
http://www.perctek.com/index.php?title=Concerto_for_Percussion_and_Small_Orchestra.
104
Micheal Thomas Roeder, A History of the Concerto (United Kingdom: Amadeus Press, 1994), 365.
105
Perc Tek, “Concerto for Percussion and Small Orchestra.”
106
Perc Tek, “Concerto for Percussion and Small Orchestra.”
26
4.3.2 Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion (1937)

Another masterwork which shows how percussion was developing into more of a soloistic
instrument is Béla Bartók 's Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion (1937). 107 He wrote this
work following a highly successful commission from the Basel Chamber Orchestra which led
to him writing Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta, the instrumentation of which was
given to him by the Orchestra when they commissioned the work. 108 The organisers were so
delighted with this composition that they quickly requested another work from him however,
this time they left the instrumentation open, which gave him the opportunity to be more
creative. 109 He quickly settled on the idea of writing a quartet for two pianos and two
percussionists, and began writing for these instruments as if they were equals. 110
In Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion Bartók only uses seven percussion
instruments; timpani, bass drum, cymbals, gong, snare drum, tenor drum, and xylophone. 111
This work was written in such a way that only two people would be needed. 112 Bartok states
that this is only possible if one player never plays the xylophone and one player never plays
the timpani, which creates two different multi-percussion setups. One of the most ground-
breaking part of this writing is, as Bartok discusses, the percussion instruments have been
written to be equal in rank to the piano. 113 The percussion part constantly changes its role
within the music accentuating important passages, introducing musical ideas against the
pianos lines, as well as playing the themes as solos throughout the work. 114
Haley Simons suggests that Bartok's use of percussion expanded what it was capable
of which allows it to equal, if not surpass, the musical capabilities of the piano. 115 This work
is emblematic of this moment in the evolution of multi-percussion as it shows these setups
taking equal stage presence with the piano, which was and continues to be one of the
dominating instruments in solo playing. 116
The works in this chapter outline how percussion was developing from being a part of
chamber works to be a major feature, and eventually soloist. These changes show how
107
Haley A. Simons, “Béla Bartok's Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion” (Phd diss., University of Alberta), 2,
http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp02/NQ59918.pdf.
108
Simons, “Béla Bartok's Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion,” 18.
109
110
111
Béla Bartók, Sonata for 2 Pianos and Percussion (London: Hawkes & Son, 1942).
112
Simons, “Béla Bartók 's Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion,” 19.
113
Béla Bartók, Béla Bartók Essays, ed. Benjamin Suchoff (Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 1992), 417.
114
Béla Bartók, Béla Bartók 417.
115
116
27
percussion was coming into its own as a solo instrument and opened the door for the first
generation of solo multi-percussion works.
28
5. First generation of solo multi-

percussion works
The writing of percussion was evolving in complexity and scale as more composers were
becoming interested in the possibilities of percussion. These composers wrote what is known
as the first generation of multi-percussion solos. John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and
Morton Feldman all wrote major percussion solos which changed what was being expected
from percussionists.
5.1 John Cage

John Cage is one of the most influential composers in the evolution of percussion, as
explored in 4.2.3 he wrote many important percussion ensemble works. In addition to this his
experiments in percussion made him the first person to write a work for solo multi-
percussion. 117
Before Cage began to write extensively for percussion, he was one of Schoenberg’s
students and attempting to extend his dodecaphonic serial method. However, this didn’t keep
his interest for long as he turned away from Schoenberg’s school of composition after
Schoenberg told his students that his compositional rules were “trying to make it impossible
for them (anyone) to write music”. 118 Hearing this from Schoenberg caused Cage to leave his
studies as he decided to revolt against these ideas and made him more than ever determined
to write new music. 119
While finding his new way of writing music he began to work at the University of
California. 120 His work at this university was to accompany dance classes, write music for
dance choreographies, and teaching a course on “Musical Accompaniments for Rhythmic
Expression” all of which culminated to create a profound interest in rhythm, percussion, and
sound. 121
117
David Revill, “John Cage Hall of Fame,” Percussive Arts Society, accessed December 13, 2019,
118
Micheal Broyles, Mavericks and Other Traditions in American Music (New Haven & London: Yale University
Press, 2004), 177.
119
Broyles, Mavericks and Other Traditions in American Music, 177.
120
David Revill, The Roaring Silence: John Cage, a Life (New York: Arcade Publishing, 1992), 55.
121
Revill, The Roaring Silence, 55.
29
Cage became attracted to the use of unorthodox instruments such as metal sheets and
household items, as he was interested in sound in its most basic state. 122 While experimenting
with these unorthodox instruments he was also writing his percussion ensemble music
(4.2.3), as can be seen in the instrumentation of Third Construction using tin cans.
Revill states that following his newly acquired focus in dance and percussion he
moved to San Francisco in 1938 so he could work with fellow composer Lou Harrison, who
was also fascinated by the music of percussion and dance. Soon after this Cage moved to the
Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, where he first began performing his percussion
ensemble works, with an ensemble he created at his school that toured the West Coast. This
ensemble was mainly made up of percussionists who were trained dancers/composers. There
were not many orchestral percussionists who were working with Cage as, allegedly, these
musicians looked down on Cage and what he was trying to accomplish. 123
5.2 The start of solo multi-percussion

Following these performances by his universities ensemble in the 1950’s Cage began
to experiment in chance music which led to him to write a series known as the “10 000 things
project”. 124 This project is made up of six solos for a variety of instruments with the notation
and musical ideas being chance based. His fascination with chance and percussion
culminated in his final work in the series 27’ 10.554” for a Percussionist (1956). 125 In this
work Cage created a new way of writing for percussion, the first piece for an unaccompanied
solo for multi-percussion. This innovative work and those that followed will be examined in
this next section.
5.2.1 Cage’s 27’ 10.554” for a Percussionist (1955)

It may be said that the world of solo multi-percussion music started in 1956 with
Cage’s 27’10.554” for a Percussionist. Written as part of the 10,000 things project, other
works written in this series were; Six Short Pieces for a String Player, An Unfinished Work
for Magnetic Tape, 45′ for a Speaker, 34’46.776” for a Pianist, 31’57.9864” for a Pianist,
122
Stuart Saunders, "Having Words with John Cage Interview," Percussive Notes 30, no. 3 (1992): Page,
http://publications.pas.org/Archive/pnv30n3/articles/pnv30n3.48-53.pdf. 48
123
Revill, “John Cage.”
124
“27' 10.554" for a percussionist,” John Cage, accessed November 24, 2019, https://johncage.org/pp/John-
Cage-Work-Detail.cfm?work_ID=14.
125
30
and 26’1.1499 for a String Player. 126 All the works in the 10,000 things project are written in
graphic notation and contain many indeterminate factors. Cage’s plan in this series was to
write for a range of instruments which have the possibility to be played as solos or
simultaneously play these works in any combination to create a new work. The first recording
of these works is a performance containing 45′ for a Speaker, 34′ 46.776” for a Pianist, 31′
57.9864” for a Pianist, 27′ 10.554” for a Percussionist, and 26′ 1.1499” for a String Player
all being performed simultaneously. 127
Unlike Milhaud’s Concerto for Percussion and Small Orchestra, Cage’s work doesn’t
require any melodic instruments to make the performance a success. It is entirely a solo work,
with nothing required other than the percussionist and some thought. 128 Another significant
difference in this work is the indeterminacy in its writing, as the notation, setup, and
instrument selection are all unspecified and this is a drastic change from what has had seen
earlier in the field of multi-percussion. 129
27’ 10.554” was not written for a performance that Cage had in mind, as it was one of
Cage’s experiments. This caused 27’ 10.554” to not be premiered until February 2nd 1962 130
where it was performed in a limited capacity by Siegfried Rockstroh in Munich, who
performed a shortened version named 7’7.614. The entire work was not performed until 2nd
of June 1964 by Max Neuhaus (who will be explored in 6.1) at Carnegie Hall. 131 Due to 27’
10.554’s delayed premier the honour of the first work for multi-percussion that was
performed goes to Stockhausen in 1959.
5.2.2 Stockhausen’s Zyklus (1959)

Stockhausen's work Zyklus (1959) was the second work to be written for solo multi-
percussion, the first work of solo multi-percussion by a European composer, and the first solo
multi-percussion work to be performed. This work was premiered by Christoph Caskell on
the 25th of august 1959 at Darmstadt. 132 There were many influences that led to the creation
of this work. Firstly, he was trying to raise the skill level of percussionists as it was not where
126
Samuel Solomon, “John Cage – 27’10.554” for a percussionist (1956),” Samuel z. Solomon, access
November 20, 2019, http://szsolomon.com/john-cage-27-10-554-percussionist-1956/.
127
Solomon, “John Cage – 27’10.554” for a percussionist (1956).”
128
Revill, “John Cage.”
129
130
John Cage, “27' 10.554" for a percussionist.”
131
“10000 things notes,” MicroFest Record, accessed September 21, 2020,
https://microfestrecords.com/10000-things-notes/.
132
Martin Iddon, New Music at Darmstadt (United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2013) 235.
31
he wanted them to be and, secondly, there is a small possibility that this is a response to Cage
and his multi-percussion work.
Although there is no direct evidence, this possible influence from John Cage could
have occurred during Cage’s trip to Europe in 1958 where he did a series of talks in
Darmstadt. Before Cage had arrived in Europe Pierre Boulez had written his infamous essay
titled “Schoenberg is Dead” where he discusses that any composer not writing works in a
surrealist style were wasting their time 133 as they are “useless”. 134 The timing of this essay
was not an accident as it was Boulez throwing the gauntlet at Cage just before his arrival.
Cage had taken this as a personal attack (as was intended), and caused Cage to change his
second talk in Darmstadt which he called “composition as a process”. 135 These talks were
Cage’s attempts at attacking the serialism style of composition and the major European
composers who wrote those works such as Boulez and, in particular, Stockhausen.
Cage’s second talk was primarily focused on “indeterminacy.” During the lecture
Cage gave many examples of music that was written in Europe, and in particular German
composers, that he considered to have works that are in an indeterminate style or have aspects
that were indeterminate. The composers that Cage discussed ranged from Bach to
Stockhausen, to demonstrate his point. Cage used Bach to add historical depth to his topic
and Stockhausen was used to “criticizes modern European appropriation of his (Cage’s)
works”. 136
Cage’s criticism of Stockhausen is pointed, as he considered Stockhausen's use of
“indeterminacy to be unnecessary since it is ineffective” when discussing Stockhausen’s
work Klavierstück XI (1956). Cage states that it should have been written in a completely
determinate style, as the indeterminant parts served no purpose. He also went on to attack
Stockhausen further as he mentioned that the most interesting aspect of the work was that it
was “written on an unusually large sheet of paper”. 137 This was a significant criticism of
Stockhausen's music as Stockhausen had prided himself on his passion for innovation and
newness, which was, in fact, comparable to Cage and his music. 138
133
David Nicholls and Jonathan Cross, eds. John Cage the Cambridge companion (United Kingdom: Cambridge
University Press, 2002), 36.
134
Pierre Boulez, “Schoenberg Is Dead,” In Stock takings of an apprenticeship, ed. Paule Thevenin, trans.
Steven Walsh, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 214.
135
136
137
138
32
Despite this information there is no direct evidence that has been found which
suggests that Cage’s criticism of Klavierstück XI has influenced Stockhausen writing of
Zyklus. There are however many sources that compare the indeterminacy within Zyklus with
Klavierstück XI. 139 This along with the fact that it is a work for multi-percussion leads to the
speculation that he wrote Zyklus as somewhat of a reaction to 27’ 10.554”.
In addition to Cage’s attack on his musical ideas, the other possible moment that led
to Stockhausen writing a multi-percussion solo work were the challenges that arose in the
percussion parts in his work Gruppen III. A massive work requiring three orchestras and 109
musicians, twelve of which are percussionists who play fifty-seven different instruments in
total, requiring a skill level higher than was typically expected. 140 This may have led
Stockhausen to realise that percussionists needed a more exclusive and higher level of
training.
Stockhausen stated that “percussion players must become as important as the
pianists." 141 As an attempt to raise the skill level and importance of percussionists
Stockhausen approached Wolfgang Steinecke, the Director of the Darmstadt courses at the
time, 142 to request that he start a percussion competition. As there were no percussion works
to use in a competition Stockhausen offered to write one, 143 which led to the creation of
Zyklus. 144
5.2.3 Morton Feldman’s The King of Denmark (1965)

The King of Denmark is an important work in the field as it has been described as an “anti-
percussion” work 145 as it is unlike all works that have previously been written that include
percussion and multi-percussion. Anti-percussion is a perfect description of this work as it is
139
Elliot Antokoletz, A History of Twentieth-Century Music in a Theoretic-Analytical Context (New York:
Routledge, 2014), 398-399.
140
“Instrumentation works for Orchestra Gruppen,” Karlheinz Stockhausen, accessed January 17, 2020,
http://www.karlheinzstockhausen.org/gruppen_english.htm.
141
Michael Udow, “An Interview With Karlheinz Stockhausen,” Percussive Notes Research Edition 23, no. 4
(September 1985): 17, http://publications.pas.org/archive/ressept85/articles/ressept85.04-
47.pdf#search=%22zyklus%20how%20and%20why%22.
142
Stuart W. Gerber, “Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Solo Percussion Music: A Comprehensive Study” (DMA thesis,
2003), 10, https://etd.ohiolink.edu/pg_10?::NO:10:P10_ETD_SUBID:79364#abstract-files.
143
Paul Griffith, Modern Music and After (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), 210.
144
Udow, “An Interview With Karlheinz Stockhausen,” 17.
145
Steven Schick, “The King of Denmark,” Chris Villars, accessed November 26, 2019,
https://www.cnvill.net/mfschick.htm.
33
revolting against the idea of what percussion is; by avoiding the classic loud bangs and
crashes for which percussion had been known up until then. 146
Feldman used unconventional notation and planning which contributed to his unique
compositional style based on gesture, timbre, and non-metric relationships. 147 He first studied
composition with Wallingford Riegger and Stefan Wolpe in the 1950’s. 148 However, as he
began composing his aesthetic was strongly influenced by abstract expressionist painters,
such as Mark Rothko, Jackson Pollock, Franz Kline and his great friend at the time Philip
Guston. 149 These artists helped him to create a sound world like nothing that had come
before, this also one of the reasons that many of his earlier works were in graphic notation. 150
In the early 1950’s people started comparing and associating him with composers
such as Earle Brown, Christian Wolff, David Tudor, and John Cage, 151 many of whom
Feldman was friends with, and had a strong influence on his compositional process.
Especially Cage’s exploration in “chance music” led Feldman to experiment with the idea of
indeterminacy however this was later given up for music that was more specifically
notated. 152 This change in his writing happened before The King of Denmark was written,
however he returned to write in an indeterminate setting for this work. There are suggestions
that this decision was made to continue the tradition of indeterminate writing in multi-
percussion works by Cage and Stockhausen. 153
Feldman calls this work “the American answer to Zyklus” 154 as Zyklus is sometimes
“frenzied and often loud” 155 and The King of Denmark is “calm and always quiet”. 156 The
way that this work answers Zyklus is through a “silent resistance to Stockhausen’s
expressivity”. 157 These two works can be seen as a reflection of each other. In Zyklus
Stockhausen is very specific in which instruments are required, the setup and sticks. There
are only a few moments that are unclear and up to the performer to decide. 158 However, The
146
Schick, “The King of Denmark.”
147
Cline, The Graph Music of Morton Feldman, 66-67.
148
“Morton Feldman,” Chris Villars, accessed November 26, 2019, https://www.cnvill.net/mfbio.htm.
149
Jan Williams, “An interview with Morton Feldman, Jan Williams,” Chris Villars, accessed December 3, 2019,
https://www.cnvill.net/mfjw1.htm.
150
Cline, The Graph Music of Morton Feldman, 293.
151
Chris Villars, “Morton Feldman.”
152
Chris Villars, “Morton Feldman.”
153
Eberhard Blum, “Notes on Morton Feldman’s “The King of Denmark” by Eberhard Blum,” trans. Peter
Soderberg, Chris Villars, accessed December 4, 2019, https://www.cnvill.net/mfblumking_eng.pdf.
154
Blum, “Notes on Morton Feldman’s “The King of Denmark.”
155
David Cline, The Graph Music of Morton Feldman (United Kingdom: Cambridge university Press, 2016), 67.
156
Cline, The Graph Music of Morton Feldman, 67.
157
158
Karlheinz Stockhausen, No. 9: Zyklus (London: Universal Edition, 1961).
34
King of Denmark is incredibly vague on all these fronts, the instrumentation, and notation are
very ambiguous which allows the performer to come up with their own ideas, while preparing
to play this work. 159
Feldman does however control the way the performer interprets the score through
specific instructions in the score to explain what symbols mean and how to measure time
through the piece. Two of these rules that oppose the pre-constructed notions of what was
expected of percussion instruments; these are to play without sticks as he requests the
performer to create sounds only using the hands, fingers or arms, and that the dynamic range
be as “soft as possible”. 160
This work is also incredibly important to the field as it was the first work to be written
for a specific percussionist as the work was dedicated to Max Neuhaus (to be explored in
6.1). During the writing of this work Neuhaus and Feldman met on many occasions to work
out different rules and ways of making Feldman’s image of a “percussion soundscape” come
to life. 161 Feldman was dogmatically asking Neuhaus to find different ways of playing the
piece as quietly as possible until one meeting, Neuhaus tried to only use his fingers.
as percussion students, we used to practice our parts on stage just before a concert
started. In order that the audience not hear us, we used our fingers instead of sticks, so
I put my sticks down and started to play with just my fingers. Morty was dumbstruck,
‘that’s it, that’s it!’ he yelled 162
This shows how percussionists were beginning to have more of an influence on the
compositional process.
5.2.4 Wuorinen’s Janissary Music (1966)

Another new work from this emerging world of solo multi-percussion is Wuorinen’s
Janissary Music, premiered by Raymond DesRoches in 1966. This work is important for
several reasons, one is that it is the first work that breaks from the idea of indeterminacy in
the writing and to be written in traditional notation. 163
159
Morton Feldman, King of Denmark (New York: Peters Corporation, 1965).
160
Feldman, King of Denmark.
161
162
Max Neuhaus, “Morton Feldman, The King of Denmark (Realization date, 1964),” Chris Villars, accessed
September 19, 2019, https://www.cnvill.net/mfneuhaus.htm.
163
35
It is the first multi-percussion work to be written in an entirely determinate style

through a fully notated score in a traditional style, and the use of the twelve-tone row system
of writing. The setup and instrumentation is also entirely set: marimba, vibraphone, twelve
metal instruments, and twelve drums surround the performer.
These key changes in this work show that the development of multi-percussion solos
has moved to the point where the composers does not need to invent their own notation
system, as everything can be accomplished in traditional notation. 164
5.3 Percussionist’s influence

These four works make up the beginnings of the first generation of solo works. These works
were generally written as experiments of the composer, without any significant influence
from a percussionist, with The King of Denmark being the one exception. Cage wrote his
work as an experimentation, Stockhausen to improve the general skill level of percussionists,
and Feldman to react to Stockhausen.
A major change that was to occur in the latter half of the first generation is the
percussionist becoming more involved in the works that were being written. This involves the
first virtuosi in the field coming to the forefront of the development of multi-percussion.
164
36
6. Emergence of virtuosi
Solo multi-percussion continued to develop beyond their early stages of exploration and
started to become a core part of the repertoire for percussionists. As these works approached
the latter half of their first generation they began to be dedicated to specific percussionists.
Max Neuhaus, Jean-Pierre Drouet, Sumire Yoshihara,Sylvio Gualda are some of the major
percussionists who had works dedicated to them which helped push the art style forward.
Many of these compositions foreshadow the second generation of multi-percussion works as
percussionist were beginning to have more of an influence over the works being written.
6.1 Max Neuhaus

Max Neuhaus is considered to be the first and one of the most prominent early American solo
percussionists. He was the first percussionist to champion these early works. His studies
involved drumming with Gene Krupa, an American jazz drummer who was influential in the
jazz drumming world. 165 His other main teacher was Paul Price at Manhattan School of
Music, who introduced Neuhaus to many of the influential composers he would work with
throughout his career. 166
The contact that he had with leading composers of the time caused him to play many
of the early multi-percussion works including Zyklus and The King of Denmark. One of his
first performances was after he joined Pierre Boulez’s contemporary chamber music
ensemble. As part of this ensemble he was able to give solo recitals at Carnegie Hall and to
tour Europe playing many of Stockhausen’s works including the “impossible” Zyklus. These
opportunities meant he performed over forty-five shows between 1959 and 1969 including
solos and ensembles works. 167
As stated in 5.2.3 The King of Denmark was dedicated to Neuhaus due to his
influence on the work. 168 In addition to Feldman, Neuhaus worked with a large number of
165
Stuart Morgan, “Max Neuhaus,” Frieze 25, November – December, 1995, https://frieze.com/article/max-
neuhaus.
166
“Biography,” Bard Faculty News, accessed December 19, 2019,
http://www.bard.edu/faculty/details/?id=2897.
167
Megan Murph, “Max Neuhaus and the Musical Avant-Garde” (Master’s Thesis, Louisiana State University,
2013), 14, https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/2f29/382f35d1abf402bac238f1ca8ac96715ab7a.pdf.
168
Murph, “Max Neuhaus and the Musical Avant-Garde,” 43.
37
composers and was leading the field of solo percussion until 1969 when Neuhaus had a major
shift in career. 169 Neuhaus began to focus on sound installations over percussion
performance, one of the possible reasons he decided to change his career direction is due to
the logistics of transporting “2,000 pounds of gear” for each performance. 170 This was
particularly challenging and frustrating for Neuhaus on his European tour. 171
The challenge of moving gear and instruments required for exhaustive works in the
first generation is incredibly influential. This problem is one that nearly every solo
percussionist that followed Neuhaus would have to deal with. Which makes it a clear trigger
into the creation of the second generation’s category of limited instrumentation works which
will be explored in detail in 7.2
6.2 Jean-Pierre Drouet

Jean-Pierre Drouet is a French born multi-instrumentalist and composer. The work
Toucher (1989) by Vinko Globokar 172 was written for him and is the first work to involve a
limited instrumentation and human voice, which is symbolic of the changing of the
generations.
Drouet originally was intending to be a concert pianist however due to an accident at
a young age he had to deviate from this and started to explore percussion, trumpet, and
composition. 173 He studied percussion with Felix Passerone, and composition with André
Hodeir. 174 Following his studies in France he moved to India to learn how to play traditional
Indian instruments such as the tabla and tumbek. 175 At this point in his musical journey he
wasn't looking for a career in classical percussion as he was more interested in jazz and other
improvised art forms.
A chance encounter with Luciano Berio changed his plan and turned him from this
path and down the way of contemporary percussion. As part of his work in this field he began
work with many leading composers of the time including Berio, Stockhausen, and
Globokar. 176 Eventually his journey lead him to perform and record Bartok’s Sonata for Two
169
170
171
172
Vinko Globokar, Toucher (New York: Edition Peters, 1973)
173
“Jean-Pierre Drouet Biography,” Cdmc, accessed December 4, 2019,
http://www.cdmc.asso.fr/en/ressources/compositeurs/biographies/drouet-jean-pierre-1935.
174
Cdmc, “Jean-Pierre Drouet Biography.”
175
176
38
Pianos and Percussion with another French percussion/timpani virtuoso Sylvio Gualda (who
will be discussed in 6.4).
This experience and new focus on contemporary percussion playing did not stop him
from playing jazz and improvised music. He became a member of New Phonic Art alongside
fellow performers Michel Portal, Vinko Globokar, and Carlos Roqué Alsina. 177 This group’s
mission was to perform music in a “completely unrestricted improvisation” style, it was also
used as an opportunity for these performers/composers to have their music played. 178
6.2.1 Vinko Globokar’s Toucher (1973)

Toucher was written while Globokar and Drouet were working together in the New Phonic
Art ensemble. 179 Toucher was written as part of a larger collection of solo and chamber
works for ten players and a variety of instruments called Laboratorium. This collection also
includes ?Corporel (1985), 180 which is another major percussion work which features a
percussionists using voice and their own body. Although this work is important in the
evolution of percussion it is out of the scope of this thesis as it fits outside the definition of
multi-percussion. 181 Toucher is written for a relatively small number of instruments and voice
with the instruments representing the vowels in the French language. 182 These two aspects
make this work ground-breaking as it is the first work to be written for a small number of
instruments (limited instrumentation) to make a setup that doesn’t engulf the performer. 183
The other aspect is that it is the first work to be published that features a speaking
percussionist. 184 The use of speech and playing are entwined in this work in such a way to
make the sounds of the instruments appear to be an extension of the voice as they are
intended to sound like French vowels. 185 Toucher is the first in line of works that start
pointing towards the second generation of multi-percussion works which generally uses
smaller setups which will be explored fully in 7.2.
177
Miguel Ficher, Martha Furman Schleifer, John M. Furman, Latin American Classical Composers: A
Biographical Dictionary (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2002), 24.
178
Miguel Ficher, Martha Furman Schleifer, John M. Furman, Latin American Classical Composers: A
Biographical Dictionary (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2002), 24.
179
180
Bonnie Whiting, “The Speaking Percussionist as Story teller,” The Modern Percussion Revolution: Journeys
of the Progressive Artist, ed. Kevin Lewis and Gustavo Aguilar (New York: Routledge, 2014) 103.
181
Whiting, “The Speaking Percussionist as Story teller,” 106.
182
Whiting, “The Speaking Percussionist as Story teller,” 106.
183
184
185
Globokar, Toucher
39
6.3 Sumire Yoshihara

Sumire Yoshihara (born 1949) is considered by some as one of the most well-known and
well-rounded freelance percussionists in Japan. Her career has spanned five decades, and she
can still be seen working. In the 1970’s she appeared on nearly every recording of chamber
music that included percussion, 186 as well as premiering numerous works for solo percussion.
In an article on the Percussive Arts Society journal database she is accredited with giving
seven premiers out of the eighteen solo percussion works that were written between 1971 and
1982. 187
At a young age Yoshihara started playing mallet percussion instruments as she was
following in a growing trend in Japan due to marimba virtuosos such as Keiko Abe. 188 This
was until she saw a performance in early high school by Yamaguchi where he performed
Zyklus as well as two works by Japanese composers, Yoshirō Irino and Makoto Moroi. After
seeing the concert Yoshihara said that she “decided, forget the marimba, I’m going to be a
percussionist. I can’t deny the fact that the marimba was the hottest thing, Michiko was there,
Keiko Abe, it was like everyone was pursuing the marimba, I also wanted to do something
different.” 189
In 1972 Yoshihara won several awards at the Geneva International Music
Competition including First Prize, the Prix American, and the Grand Prize. These awards led
to her emerging as an active soloist in Europe and America. 190 Soon after this competition
she came to the realisation, as many other solo percussionists did at the time, that it was
immensely difficult to find enough repertoire to keep up with her performance demands.
She mentions that she “had just graduated, quickly won the competition, made a
splashy debut, and found (herself) out of repertoire instantly”. There were only a couple of
works that were at a high enough performance standard, so her life became a cycle of
commissioning new works and performing them. Many of these commissions were from
major Japanese composers, such as Fukushi (Ground), Kitazume (Shadows IIIa), Takahashi
(Turn the Corner of the Morning), Ichiyanagi (Arrangements), and Kondo, (Pendulums). The
186
Ryan C. W. Scott, “The Art of Marimba in Tokyo: Emergence in the Twentieth Century” (DMA thesis,
University of Toronto, 2015), 65, https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/handle/1807/71624.
187
Keiko Abe, “Japanese Percussion and Marimba Music,” Percussive Notes 22, no. 3 (April 1984): 51,
http://publications.pas.org/archive/8404/articles/84.04.51-60.pdf#search=%22norio%22.
188
Scott, “The Art of Marimba in Tokyo,” 123.
189
190
40
instrumentation of these works varied as some were for marimba while many others were
multi-percussion pieces. 191
Yoshihara is important as she represents how percussionists were running out of
repertoire after they performed the early works in the first generation. Many of them played
Zyklus and The King of Denmark and then ran out of repertoire, this highlights a trend that
emerges in the second generation of multi-percussion solos, percussionists commissioning
works for themselves to perform. This will be explored in detail in 7.
6.3.1 Norio Fukushi’s Ground (1973)

Out of all the works Yoshihara had commissioned the one that will be explored is Ground by
Norio Fukushi as it uses one of the largest number of instruments written for a solo
performance at this point. Fukushi originally studied composition at Tokyo University of the
Arts before moving to France where he was taught by Olivier Messiaen (1973). 192 He was a
composer who had already written for a large number of mediums before writing for multi-
percussion. Many of these works were for orchestra, chamber, vocals, and solo instrumental
works, with a number including traditional Japanese instruments alongside more standard
European instruments.
He was commissioned to write Ground by Yoshihara in 1973, which he saw as a
chance to write for a large range of instruments from both Japanese and European cultures as
mixing these two cultures sounds was a major interest of his. Ground follows the trend of
many of the first generation of multi-percussion solos to surround the soloist with gear. This
work does however take it to another extreme as the work contains forty-four different
percussion instruments, to make it one of the largest solo multi-percussion work to date. 193
These forty-four different instruments include multiple bass drums, cymbals, cow
bells, woodblocks, temple blocks multiple snare drums, tam tams, wind chimes, crotales,
harmonica and a marimba. 194 This number of instruments come with a significant number of
negatives as the performer would need to commit a significant amount of time to find all the
instruments and to design a setup for this work, let alone learn the work. Any way this work
191
192
“Norio Fukushi,” Music From Japan, accessed November 4, 2019, http://www.musicfromjapan.org/cgi-
bin/new/composer.py/composer/62.
193
194
Norio Fukushi, Ground (Tokyo: Ongaku No Tomo Sha Corp,`1970).
41
is set up it makes the performer appear to be trapped in a cage of percussion instruments,

which can be an issue of space and ability to perform.
6.4 Sylvio Gualda

Sylvio Gualda was another influential percussionist in the latter half of the first generation of
multi-percussion works. He was appointed as the solo timpanist of Paris Opera Orchestra in
1968 and, soon after he won this position, he also started his career as a soloist with a
performance of Zyklus. 195 However, this wasn’t a typical performance of Zyklus as Gualda’s
playing was accompanied by ballet dancers, choreographed by Michel Descomby, who was
the main choreographer of the ballet in Paris at the time. 196
In 1970 Gualda began working with Jean-Pierre Drouet, and pianists Katia and
Merielle Labeque (sisters). This ensemble premiered works by Marius Constant and Berio, in
addition to numerous performances of Bartok’s Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion. 197
From this moment on Gualda worked closely with many composers with one of the most
important being Xenakis whose works Gualda frequently performed.
6.4.1 Xenakis’s Psappha (1975)

Xenakis is a Greek French composer who was interested in music from a young age, however
it wasn’t until he was in France in the 1950’s that he started looking for a composition
teacher. His efforts however were in vain as he was rejected by numerous teachers in Paris as
his music was too unconventional. 198
After countless rejections Xenakis was told to meet with Messiaen who, after seeing
his music, noticed that he was not like the other students he had come across. 199 Messiaen
told Xenakis he should take advantage of his strengths, being his Greek heritage,
mathematics, and architecture. This led him to base many of his compositions on
mathematical formulas as well as writing a significant number of compositions for
percussion. 200
195
Sylvio Gualda, “The academy for creation,” accessed September 20, 2019,
https://acanthes.ircam.fr/centre_2009/bio_2009/gualda_gb.htm.
196
“Biography of Michel Descombey,” The Biography, accessed January 11, 2020,
https://thebiography.us/en/descombey-michel.
197
The academy for creation, “Sylvio Gualda.”
198
“Iannis Xenakis,” Hellenica world, accessed January 1, 2020,
http://hellenicaworld.com/Greece////Person/en/IannisXenakis.html.
199
Hellenica world, “Iannis Xenakis.”
200
Hellenica world, “Iannis Xenakis.”
42
Psappha in many ways is one of the master works in the field of percussion, its
writing and subsequent worldwide touring with Gualda made sure that the work would reach
many percussionists. Xenakis wrote this work in 1975 and dedicated it to Gualda, who
performed the world premiere later that year in London. 201 In the years that followed Gualda
toured the world, championing this work and many others like it. This tour included a visit to
Australia where he performed in Melbourne and Sydney. Schick, a major percussionist to be
discussed in 7.2.2.1, states that:
Psappha, as we now know, is savage and frightening. The sheer loudness of it, the
naked rhythms, the brutal mechanics of composition-the implications were staggering.
It has been so widely played, taught, and discussed that it is very nearly a piece of
classical music. There are even schools of thought about interpretative approaches.
Psappha has become a principal model with which to compare all other percussion
solos. It changed everything about how we listened to and played percussion music
from Zyklus onward. 202
This work follows the trend in the first generation of writing an exhaustive work that
engulfs the performer. There are at least nineteen instruments required for this work after
being separated into six different groups, A-F. 203 An area in which this work is very original
is that it leaves the instrument choice very open leaving the performer to select instruments
with, pitch, sound and colours being the only requirement. Another aspect of this work is it
being written in a purely grid format. 204
The work’s name comes from “Sappho”, a Greek poet. Sappho had a very clear style,
which is sensual and melodic, strangely enough neither of these words would be used to
describe Psappha. 205 However, the name allegedly comes from the idea that her works have a
distinct rhythmic structures and passages, which Psappha shares. 206
6.4.2 Xenakis’s Rebonds (1987-89)

Xenakis wrote another major work for percussion, Rebonds (1987-89), also dedicated
to Gualda. This work is also considered one of his masterpieces and was premiered in 1988
by Gualda. Rebonds was written in two parts (a and b) and can be performed in either order,
201
202
203
Iannis Xenakis, Psappha (Paris: Editions Salabert, 1976).
204
Xenakis, Psappha.
205
Samuel Solomon, “Iannis Xenakis, Psappha (1975),” Samuel z. Solomon, access November 20, 2019,
http://szsolomon.com/iannis-xenakis-psappha-1975/.
206
Solomon, “Iannis Xenakis, Psappha (1975).”
43
ab or ba. It is a work that pushed what was technically thought as possible to play on
percussion instruments. 207 Rebonds a is focused on rhythms and gradually increase in
intensity through increasing the number of notes that are being played in quick succession. 208
Rebonds b is much groovier through the use of repeated ideas and is driven with sixteenth
notes on the high bongo. 209 Unlike Psappha the notation is written in a traditional way and
the instrument choice is more standard, which makes Rebonds easier to follow. 210
6.5 Issues with the first generation

Many of the works written in the first generation of multi-percussion solos follow a similar
trend of being written in an exhaustive mind set, where the focus is on quantity of sounds
rather than quality of sounds. This became a major issue for many of the early percussionists
such as Neuhaus, due to the logistics of traveling with these works becoming too immense to
deal with. Other problems that this caused were sourcing the instruments; finding a space
large enough to practice the works; and then traveling with the setups. 211
This combined with the limited number of high level works available to touring
performers created a need to commission new works which would fill this gap in the
repertoire. 212 These changes would lead to the second generation of works which are similar
to Toucher’s use of limited instrumentation. 213
The key factors that make up the second generation are the percussionists
commissioning new works that fit their needs for travel, and the new categories of multi-
percussion works being limited instrumentation (7.2) and multi-drum (7.3).
207
Schick, The Percussionist’s Art, 203- 213.
208
James Harley, Xenakis: His Life in Music (Nebraska: Psychology Press, 2004), 192-193.
209
xenakis: His Life in Music, 192-193.
210
Iannis Xenakis, Rebonds (Paris: Editions Salabert, 1991).
211
“Max Neuhaus,” Monoskop, accessed November 14, 2019, https://monoskop.org/Max_Neuhaus.
212
213
44
7. The second generation of solo multi-

percussion works
The first generation features the trend of composers who reached out and wrote works for
specific percussionists, the one of the second generation of solo multi-percussion most
significant change is that this is now inverted and percussionists started to start the
conversation with composers and began commissioning works. These commissions led to
more varied types of compositions, which required new ways of categorisation.
All works discussed throughout this dissertation can fit into three categories
exhaustive, limited instrumentation, and multi-drum works. The table below outlines how
they are separated. (Works in bold are yet to be discussed in detail)
Exhaustive Limited Instrumentation Multi-drum
Milhaud’s Concerto for percussion Globokar Toucher (1973) Maki Ishi’s Thirteen Drums
and small orchestra (1932) Frederic Rzewski’s To The (1985)
Cage’s 27’ 10.553” (1955) Earth (1985) Kevin Volans’ She who sleeps
Stockhausen Zyklus (1959) Brian Ferneyhough’s Bone with a small blanket (1985)
Feldman’s King of Denmark (1965) Alphabet (1991)
Wuorinen’s Janissary music (1966) Michael Gordon’s XY (1997)
Tircuit’s Percussion concerto (1969)
Fukushi’s Ground (1973)
Xenakis’ Psappha (1975)
Per Nørgård’s I Ching (1982)
This table show that the majority of works written after the 1980’s are placed in the
limited instrumentation category as the ability to travel with a setup was becoming
increasingly important.
7.1 Exhaustive works

Exhaustive works focus on the sounds coming from a large quantity of instruments, for
example multiple drums, metal and wooden instrument. 214 These works surrounded and
engulfed the performer entirely, sometimes the set up for these works could take longer than
214
45
performing them. This category of work was most common throughout the first generation of
multi-percussion works. (27’ 10.554”, Zyklus, and Psappha). While this category is less
popular throughout the second generation of works, there are still a few works that can be
classified as exhaustive.
7.1.1 Per Nørgård’s I Ching (1982)

I Ching was commissioned by Gert Mortenson (explored in 7.1.1.1). It is exceptionally
important for two reasons: it is the first multi-percussion solo to last for longer than 30
minutes, as well as being the first multi-percussion solo to be written over multiple
movements.
Per Nørgård (born 1932), began studying with Danish composer Vagn Holmboe, a
major figure in the Danish music scene, at the age of seventeen. Nørgård is considered by
many as potentially the most prominent and influential composer from Denmark since Carl
Nielsen. 215 Many of his compositions are evenly distributed between all forms of writing;
chamber, orchestral, solo, opera, theatre, and soundtracks.
I Ching (1982), is not the first work that Per Nørgård wrote for percussion, the first
work is Waves written in 1969, some of the ideas that he uses in Waves are reinvented in I
Ching. One of these ideas was his compositional technique, which he refers to as the ‘infinity
series’ and is used extensively in both of the works that he wrote for percussion. 216
There are many reasons why this work is influential, one of these being that it is the
first work of solo multi-percussion to be written over multiple movements. 217
I. Thunder Repeated: The Image of Shock (hexagram no. 51)
II. The Taming Power of the Small - 9 sounds (hexagram no. 9)
III. The Gentle, the Penetrating (hexagram no. 57)
IV. Towards Completion: Fire over Water (hexagram no. 64)
Each of these movements have substantially different setups, 218 leading it to be an
exhaustive work. The vast array of instruments in these four different setups results in there
being an enormous number of instruments on the stage in a performance of the entire work.
In some performances of this work percussionists pick a selection of movements to perform,
215
“Per Norgard Biography,” Musical Sales Classical, accessed November 2, 2019,
http://www.musicsalesclassical.com/composer/short-bio/Per-N%C3%B8rg%C3%A5rd.
216
Musical Sales Classical, “Per Norgard Biography.”
217
218
Per Norgard, I Ching, (Copenhagen: Edition Wilhelm Hansen, 1982).
46
purely due to the instrumentation of the movements. The first movement in particular is hard
to perform as it is difficult to obtain all the instruments especially the multiple tuned nipple
gongs, which can be quite rare. 219 The third movement is one of the most popular as it only
uses timpani, two temple bowls, a kalimba, and ankle bells, making it a movement that is of
limited instrumentation.
As this work is written over four movements it also makes it the longest multi-
percussion solo written since 27’10.554”, which is a significant outlier as the majority of solo
percussion works are less than 15 minutes. As can be seen in the following table.
Works Examined Average Duration (mins)
27’ 10.554” 27:10.554
Zyklus 11:00
King of Denmark 6:00
Janissary music 12:30
Toucher 9:30
Ground 15:40
Psappha 10:00-14:00
I Ching 35:00-40:00
1st 10:00-11:00
2nd 10:00-11:00
3rd 5:00-6:00
4th 10:00-11:00
This begins to show that multi-percussion has continued to develop as it has become
an instrument that can sustain interest over a longer performance.
7.1.1.1 Gert Mortensen

This work was commissioned by Gert Mortensen (born in Denmark in 1958) who studied at
the Royal Academy of Music in Copenhagen, as part of the soloist program. Following this
time he became the principal percussionist with the Royal Danish Orchestra and held this
position for twenty-five years. As he became more interested in being a soloist, he began to
219
Samuel Z. Solomon, How to Write for Percussion: A Comprehensive Guide to Percussion Composition, 2nd
ed. (United Kingdom: Oxford University Press, 2016), 154.
47
perform in Europe, USA, Japan, Australia, and China. He is currently the head of Timpani
and Percussion at the Royal Academy of Music, and he still has a very active role touring
especially around China. 220
As part of his career as a touring performer he needed there to be more works that
were up to an elite enough standard to perform, which led him to commission a large number
of works from various leading Scandinavian composers. Per Nørgård, Sven-david Sandström,
Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen, Poul Ruders, and Áskell Másson., among those who were
commissioned. 221
I Ching is the most important of these works in the development of multi-percussion,
and Mortenson had a significant effect on the writing of this work in particular the third
movement. When commissioning the work Mortensen approached Nørgård with some ideas,
including using kalimba, Tibetan cup bells, and a drum as a resonating platform to make the
kalimba louder, which directly led to the creation of the third movement of I Ching. 222
7.2 Limited instrumentation works

Almost as a reaction to the works that fit into the category of exhaustive, countless works that
fit into the category of limited instrumentation started to be written in the 1980’s. These
works follow in the footsteps of Toucher by Globokar, the works that fit into this category
focus on the quality of the sounds from a relatively small number of instruments rather than
the sheer quantity of sounds through the use of a large number of instruments. 223 These works
were being requested by percussionists who wanted and needed works that would be easy to
travel with. Steven Schick suggests that these changes are the tell-tale signs of the second
generation of multi-percussion works. 224
7.2.1 Frederic Rzewski’s To the Earth (1985)

This work is symbolic of the rise of limited instrumentation works and the influence that
percussionists were having on the field. The first work being explored in this category is To
the Earth by Frederic Rzewski and is very similar to Toucher.
220
“Biography,” Gert Mortenson, accessed November 1, 2019, https://gertmortensen.com/biography/.
221
Gert Mortenson, “Biography.”
222
Gert Mortensen, “I Ching Kalimba,” Kalimba Magic, accessed November 2, 2019,
https://www.kalimbamagic.com/newsletters/newsletter10.01/iching.shtml.
223
224
Schick, The Percussionist’s Art, 25
48
Although these two works are very similar there does not appear to be any direct
connection between these two composers. Both of these works share: the setup being written
for a small number of instruments and the performer speaking while playing. To the Earth
approaches these two features in a very different way to Toucher, which combines the voice
and the instruments to create a unified sound. Compared to To the Earth which is an ancient
prayer to the goddess of the earth and the percussion instruments are used to support the
atmosphere created in the text. The text in this work is a pseudo-Homeric hymn that was
potentially written during the 7th century titled “The Earth Mother of All” and uses four
flowerpots as part of this prayer to create the atmosphere of an ancient ritual. 225
To the Earth was created after percussionist Jan Williams requested that Frederic
Rzewski compose a work that used a small number of instruments that could be easily
transported while on tour. Rzewski decided to use flower pots as his instrument as “Not only
do they have a beautiful sound but they don’t have to be carried around at all: in every place
where one plays the piece, they can be bought for a total cost of about one dollar”. 226 The
choice in this instrumentation made it very easy for Williams to travel with.
Another work that Rzewski wrote for Jan Williams at this time is Lost and Found,
which is a piece where the performer is asked to be as close to naked as possible, while
performing actions on a table, chair, and reciting a text from a soldier in the Vietnam war. 227
This is another work that would have been very easy to travel with.
7.2.1.1 Jan Williams

Jan Williams was in the same generation of players as Max Neuhaus; they were both students
under Paul Price at the Manhattan School of Music. 228 Here they played in the percussion
ensemble and created links with many major composers which helped their careers. This
ensemble was the first group to perform the early percussion ensemble music including the
works Cage wrote in the 1930’s, as well as commissioning new works from significant
composers of the time. 229
225
“Focus day 2010 Ecology of Percussion Concert Program,” Percussive Arts Society, accessed December 4,
2019, https://www.pas.org/docs/default-source/web-extras-audio-
files/2010FocusDay.pdf?sfvrsn=0&sfvrsn=0.
226
Percussive Arts Society, “Focus day 2010 Ecology of Percussion Concert Program.”
227
Frederic Rzewski, Lost and Found (Brussels: Sound Pool Music, 1985).
228
229
Fairchild, “Paul Price Hall of Fame.”
49
Playing in this ensemble led the students (Neuhaus and Williams) to create strong
connections with many of the leading composers of the time. 230 After his studies he was
invited to be part of the Creative Associates for the Centre of the Creative and Performing
Arts in 1964, as part of the Buffalo University. 231 It was here that he started the Buffalo
University Percussion Ensemble, which he ran in similar way to Price’s. Williams was one of
the most influential early percussionists due to his connections with many of the major
composers of the time. 232
7.2.2 Brian Ferneyhough’s Bone Alphabet (1991)

Bone Alphabet is a work written by Brian Ferneyhough in a style known as New
Complexity, 233 which is achieved in this work by overlapping difficult cross-rhythms. This
work was commissioned by Steven Schick, who commissioned over 150 solos for percussion
throughout his career. This work is so complex that it took Schick multiple days to learn the
first bar of the work when he was preparing for the premier.
Schick met Ferneyhough in 1991, on his first day on staff at the University of
California, and on this day he requested that Ferneyhough write a piece for him. 234 The only
restriction being that the instruments are “small enough to be transportable as part of the
performer’s personal luggage when traveling by air”. 235 Schick was performing around
America so frequently it was very important for him to be able to easily travel by plane.
After playing around with multiple ideas Ferneyhough decided to write a piece for
seven different instruments (can be non-traditional instruments). 236 Each of these instruments
are to be chosen by the performer as they are unspecified. There are however a few rules that
the performer must follow when choosing each instrument. These rules are;
• They must be able to have an extremely large dynamic range, match each
other with “similar attack and decay characteristics”.
• Instruments next to each other are not meant to be made of the same material.
230
Fairchild, “Paul Price Hall of Fame.”
231
232
Micheal Rosen, “Jan Williams: Pioneer and Visionary,” Percussive Notes 56, No.5 (November 2018): 68,
http://publications.pas.org/archive/November2018/1811.68-71.pdf#search=%22jan%20williams%22.
233
234
Lewis and Aguilar: The Modern Percussion Revolution, 208.
235
Brian Ferneyhough, “Bone Alphabet Programme Note,” Steve Weiss Music, accessed November 3, 2019,
https://www.steveweissmusic.com/product/bone-alphabet-ferneyhough/multi-percussion-solo.
236
Lewis and Aguilar: The Modern Percussion Revolution, 208.
50
This leaves the performers choice of instruments very open while restricting them
enough so they can’t deviating from the original intention of the work. 237
7.2.2.1 Steven Schick

Schick is known by many as one of the most influential percussionists of his generation and
by the time he was finishing his undergraduate recitals, he had performed nearly all the works
written for percussion at the time. 238
Schick has contributed extensively to the development of the field of multi-percussion
due to his strong interest in contemporary music, which started from very early on in his time
at university. As a student he was part of the Centre for New Music, a performance
organisation devoted to modern repertoire. This organisation gave composers at the
university a chance to test their music and perform them for the general public. 239 At one of
these performances he saw a percussionist perform a work by Stockhausen and he realised he
was at the beginning of a new and special art form involving percussion (multi-percussion).
He realised that he “related to the idea that something important was being invented and
discovered, and I could be a part of that”. 240
After finishing his studies at the University of Iowa he travelled to Germany, on a
Fulbright Scholarship, to study under Bernhard Wulff, which allowed him to be thrown into
the German percussion scene. 241 Schick states Wulff was the “Photographic Negative” of his
old teacher in Iowa. He mentions both his teachers had a focus on fundamental technique,
which also became the foundation of his ideologies. The most important lesson was one he
received from Wulff who instilled the idea that “contemporary music was never this crazy
you-could-do-whatever-you-want-to thing; it mattered whether or not you could play a decent
roll.” 242
When Schick returned to the America, he joined the staff at the California State
University-Fresno. He brought many major contemporary ensemble works back from Europe
so he would be able to play them with his students including Xenakis’ Persephassa. 243 The
California State University-Fresno did not focus on performing or teaching contemporary
237
238
Lauren Vogel Weiss, “Steven Schick Hall of Fame,” Percussive Arts Society, accessed December 13, 2019,
https://www.pas.org/about/hall-of-fame/steven-schick.
239
Weiss, “Steven Schick.”
240
241
242
243
51
music, regardless of this Schick still decided to play this work and ones like it with his
students. Schick realised while playing these works with students, who were not purely
focused on contemporary music, that this music was for everyone not just the “musical
elite”. 244
Around this same time Schick began a six weeks assignment with a not-for-profit
organisation which put new up and coming performers into performance spaces that were
public and very unconventional. Over these 6 weeks he would perform Zyklus during lunch
breaks at a fruit packing plant, at a Kiwanis Club, in libraries, and old-folks homes, basically
to anyone who would be willing to listen. These experiences with musically untrained
audiences led to him to the understanding that this modern repertoire could be for everyone,
and the only difference was “whether you intended it for them or not”. 245
In 1991 Schick accepted a position at the University of California-San Diego where
he still teaches. A university that commits a large amount of its time and resources into new
music works and performances. As part of this he has created an ensemble known as Red
Fish Blue Fish, which performs many works for percussion ensemble. 246 He has taught a
large number students who have become major members of the solo percussion scene. These
include Terry Longshore, Vanessa Tomlinson, Brett Reed, Ivan Manzanilla, Aiyun Huang,
Morris Palter, and Fiona Digney.
Throughout his career he has commissioned and premiered more than 150 different
works for solo percussion. Some of the more notable works are Anvil Chorus (1991) by
David Lang, and Bone Alphabet by Brian Ferneyhough (1992).
7.3 Multi-drum works

This category is used to explore works that only use drums (Membranophones), the most
significant works that fit into this category are Ishii Maki’s Thirteen Drums (1985) and
Michael Gordan’s XY (1999). Unlike the previous two categories this one can be considered a
sub-category as works within this category can also be either limited Instrumentation or
exhaustive. For example, XY is a multi-drum work that uses four small drums which means it
technically fits into limited instrumentation, while Thirteen Drum could also be considered an
exhaustive work. 247
244
245
246
247
52
7.3.1 Ishii Maki’s Thirteen Drums (1985)

Ishii Maki is a Japanese composer who wrote works which combined classic European and
Japanese musical styles. Some of his most famous works are Monochrome, 248 a work for
orchestra and Taiko drumming (a Japanese style of drumming), and works for Kodo, which is
Japan’s premier taiko group. Maki was very interested in drumming of all types as he was
aware that it was a relatively new world of music to explore that has only gained full
recognition in the twentieth century. 249
Maki was of the opinion that percussion was an underdeveloped field, especially
when compared with the writing and playing of other traditional Western classical
instruments, with violin and piano being two of the most developed. 250 Maki also felt that
percussion was unconnected with the history of Western Art Music, which meant he could
achieve something new when he wrote for those instruments. 251 This made Maki a great
advocate for percussion and, in his research into the field, he found that it was a naturally
powerful instrument that was full of expressivity which he tried to bring out in his writing.
In an attempt to further develop the style, he wrote many works for percussion and
percussion ensemble, a great number were for solo works for multi-percussion. These works
are Gray (1978), Afro-Concerto (1982), Thirteen Drums (1985), For Lily (1988), Percussion
Concerto -- South - Fire – Summer (1992), and Fourteen Percussions (2000). 252 Through
these compositions it can be seen that his style of writing percussion works features many
ideas and characteristics of taiko drumming and combines them with the world of Western
classical percussion. In development of these pieces Maki worked with many major Japanese
percussionists including Keiko Abe, Sumire Yoshihara, Yasunori Yamaguchi, and Atsushi
Sugahara. 253 Out of all of these works Thirteen Drums is his most well-known and is the
most frequently played worldwide.
248
Yi-Jan Liu, “Temporality and Rhythmic Structure in Thirteen Drums by Makir Ishii and Rebonds A by Iannis
Xenakis” (DMA diss., University of North Texas, 2014), 9,
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/8396/215afde6391293adb52f9bf628c467356590.pdf.
249
Liu, “Temporality and Rhythmic Structure,” 9.
250
251
252
“Ishi Maki Composition list,” All music, accessed December 14, 2019,
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/maki-ishii-mn0001637615/compositions.
253
All music, “Ishi Maki Composition list.”
53
7.3.1.1 Atsushi Sugahara

Atsushi Sugahara (born 1947) commissioned what was to become Thirteen Drums. 254
Sugahara is a Japanese percussionist and throughout his career he commissioned many
works. In addition to performing as a soloist he formed two percussion ensembles
(Percussion Museum and Percussion Gallery) and held the role of principal timpanist of the
Yomiuri Nippon Symphony for many years.
When Sugahara commissioned Thirteen Drums, he requested Maki to write him a
“simple piece” that had characteristics that are similar to taiko drumming. 255 However, when
Maki had finished the work it was anything but simple as Sugahara had requested, as there
were many passages in this work that were impossible to play, and Maki was forced to
recompose it many times to make the work playable. 256
Writing this work for Sugahara was of great interest to Maki due to his previous work
in percussion and expertise on taiko instruments, which allowed him the space to explore the
potential of membranophones. Maki wrote for thirteen different drums as he based the
compositional ideas on the chromatic scale, in an attempt to represent melody and harmony,
musical aspects not generally explored in drum music. 257 Maki made the choice to write for
membranophones as his understanding at the time is that multi-percussion solo required
drums, cymbals, and gongs to create a world of colours and sounds, however he decided to
fly in the face of this as he was trying to show the dynamic possibilities of drums. 258
7.3.2 Michael Gordon’s XY (1997)

XY written by Michael Gordon in 1997 is a solo for five tuned drums and explores the sounds
of the right and the left hand overlapping in dynamic and rhythmic complexity. 259 This work
was commissioned by Evelyn Glennie in 1997 however, she generously let Schick premier
the work after he asked to play it as part of an exploration on solo percussion works that had
been written up to 1998. 260 This work can be seen as being both multi-drum as well as limited
254
255
256
257
All music, “Ishi Maki Composition list.”
258
259
“XY,” Michael Gordon, accessed January 3, 2020, https://michaelgordonmusic.com/music/xy.
260
54
instrumentation as there are only five drums that are used to explore complicated ideas of
polyrhythmic structures. 261
7.3.2.1 Dame Evelyn Glennie

Dame Evelyn Glennie is the first person to create and sustain a full-time career as a solo
percussionist. 262 Starting at the age of twelve she was hooked on percussion ,from the
moment she first struck a snare drum. 263 From here her career expanded by performing with
groups from “Bjork to Fred Frith” including a leading role at the 2012 London Olympics
Games and working with the Gregory Dorna/The Royal Shakespeare Company. 264
Unlike many of the percussionists who have been discussed throughout this paper she
has successfully created a career that is made up almost entirely of performances with
orchestras or part of an ensemble, there are some suggestions that she does over 100 concerts
a year. 265 However earlier in her career, as many of the percussionists explored throughout
this paper, she had to deal with people saying “you cannot be a solo percussionist”, as what
would she play? 266 This lead her to commission over 200 works for solo percussion, many
from leading composers. 267 A significant number of these works were for multi-percussion,
with one of the most influential being XY by Micheal Gordon.
7.4 Influence of the second generation of multi-percussion

works
This chapter explored the influence that percussionists were having on the development of
multi-percussion, as many of them were needing works that were easier to travel with, which
was the predominant influence leading up until the end of the twentieth century. This started
to put the compositional ideas and control of the art style into the hands of the percussionists.
Which made the modern era of composition to be spearheaded by the percussionists
themselves.
261
262
“Evelyn Glennie Biography 721 words,” Evelyn Glennie, accessed January 3, 2020,
https://www.evelyn.co.uk/biography/.
263
Evelyn Glennie, “Evelyn Glennie Biography 721 words.”
264
“Evelyn Glennie Biography 721 words,” Evelyn Glennie, accessed January 3, 2020,
265
Lauren Vogel Weiss, “Evelyn Glenni Hall of Fame,” Percussive Arts Society, accessed January 3, 2020,
https://www.pas.org/about/hall-of-fame/dame-evelyn-glennie.
266
Weiss, “Evelyn Glenni Hall of Fame.”
267
Evelyn Glennie, “Evelyn Glennie Biography 721 words.”
55
There are many percussionists who have taken up the mantle of composer.
Composers/Performers such as Casey Cangelosi 268 and Gene Koshinski 269 who are key
examples of these new percussionist composers. When writing works in the field of multi-
percussion they would create works that are reflections themselves. As more percussionists
began writing works with each subsequent work becoming more diverse, as each composer
had different interests or passages that they enjoyed playing. This creates an explosion of
compositions that differ in size, instrumentation, and notation as the influence of previous
generations has created a incredibly open art form.
268
“Biography,” Casey Cangelossi percussionist/composer, accessed January 4, 2020,
https://www.caseycangelosi.com/.
269
“About,” Gene Koshinski, accessed January 3, 2020, http://www.genekoshinski.com/about.php.
56
8 Conclusion
The twentieth century belonged to percussion; the changes and development in the field of
percussion rippled throughout all of the Western Art Music. Each subsequent change affected
all composers who would follow, as music became more focused on textural and timbral
change. Percussion has changed an enormous amount at the same time, as it has moved from
being a part of the orchestra to being written in chamber, percussion ensemble and solo
works.
In my view there is a popular misconception that the innovative multi-percussion part
in L’histoire du soldat was the driving force in the development of multi-percussion in the
twentieth century. I believe this not to be the case, for two reasons: firstly because L’histoire
received only one public performance prior to 1923, and remained relatively unknown for
several decades; and secondly because several more fundamental and impactful elements
were at play. Elements which created a ‘perfect storm’ of conditions which led to a tectonic
shift in composers’ and performers’ perception and use of percussion. In my view, the multi-
percussion part in L’histoire is simply a manifestation of this broad-based change, rather than
a key driver of it.
The fundamental drivers of change in the field of multi-percussion in the twentieth
century can be seen as:
• The new roles of percussion in the orchestra.
• The development of multi-instrument percussion performance in the USA in the field
of jazz music.
• Developments in percussion education and technique, which gave percussionists the
skills necessary to work with multi-percussion setups, notation, mallet choice, and
other issues.
• An exponential increase in the number and type of instruments available to Western
percussionists and composers, and in particular, a growing awareness amongst
Western composers and performers of percussion instruments, sounds, and aesthetics
from other musical cultures.
• A broad-based view amongst twentieth century composers (particularly in the wake of
the two world wars) that it was time to explore new musical ideas, concepts, and
aesthetics.
57
• Percussion instruments and sounds opened the doors to a brave new world of musical
possibilities, creating opportunities to explore the musical elements of rhythm and
timbre, which resulted in the first Western works composed for percussion
instruments alone.
• The appearance of fulltime professional multi-percussionists, whose enthusiasm for
the genre and whose efforts to broaden its repertoire and build its public profile
resulted in rapid developments in all aspects of the field of multi-percussion.
• The more recent emergence of several generations of percussionist composers;
professional performers who have enthusiastically grasped the opportunity to create
and compose new works for themselves and for others.
These influences combined to allow enough creative freedom for the composers
throughout the century to be able write the major works in the field.
The changes in early twentieth century orchestral works changed how other
composers saw the potential of percussion. Which allowed the role of percussion in orchestral
music to reach new highs of expressive and sonic potential with the introduction of
instruments such as wind machines, hammers, and castanets. This continued until composers
were writing works that featured moments of only percussion instruments playing such as
Tcherepnin and Shostakovich. Which points towards the creation of percussion ensemble
music as these instruments were beginning to stand alone without any melodic or harmonic
support.
The next major influence in the development of multi-percussion was jazz and the
drum kit as it showed composers how successful using combinations of percussion
instruments could be. These changes acted as a catalyst and directly influenced Stravinsky
and Milhaud to write their chamber works that included a multi-percussion setup.
Jazz heavily influenced the first four chamber music works that were written that
involve multi-percussion parts. The creation of these works would influence many composers
to see the potential of percussion instruments to efficiently create significant timbre changes.
The success of these works would lead to composers experimenting further with percussion
music, until percussion ensemble works would begin to form.
John Cage experimented in the field of percussion writing many of these percussion
ensemble works until his experimentation led to the creation of the first multi-percussion
solo. This began the first generation of solo works with 27’ 10.554”, Zyklus, and The King of
58
Denmark. These works would make way for the rise of percussion education and soloists
who would help shape the world of multi-percussion writing.
As the world of multi-percussion continued to develop so did the performers who
would play these works. Which led to an enormous demand for more repertoire at an elite
level, to satisfy a soloist’s career. The works commissioned in the first generation of multi-
percussion writing were not complicated or overly developed as these percussionists were
merely looking for more works for them to add to their repertoire.
These commissions became more complicated and specific in the second generation
of works as many of these players were dealing with similar issues of transporting gear for
performances. As a reaction to this percussionists started commissioning works that can be
easily transported or purchased at the venue. The tell-tale sign of the second generation was
the percussionists having more control over the types of works that were being written for
their craft.
Eventually this would lead to the most recent generation of percussionists who would
become percussionist composers, professional performers who started writing works that
would shape the medium of multi-percussion writing. These changes expanded the setting of
percussion as it became a reflection of the percussionists and the kind of works they enjoyed
performing.
All these influences have caused the world of multi-percussion to have a rich
repertoire list to allow new percussionists to have a career in the field. Currently in 2020 the
world of percussion is at a fantastic place as this style of writing is flourishing and many of
the early composers and performers are still alive and willing to share their knowledge of
living through the development of multi-percussion and their influence on it.
59
Appendix 1
Composer Work/Number of Instrument list

players
T= Timpanists
P= Percussionists
Nikolai Capriccio Espagnol Orchestral bass drum, crash cymbals, suspended cymbal,
Rimsky- (1887) castanets, triangle, tambourine, snare drum
Korsakov T+5P
Nikolai Scheherazade Tam-tam, triangle, snare drum, clash cymbals, orchestral bass
Rimsky- (1888) drum, tambourine
Korsakov T+5P
Nikolai Russian Easter Tam-tam, glockenspiel, snare drum, orchestral bass drum,
Rimsky- Festival Overture clash cymbals
Korsakov (1888)
T+5P
Gustav Symphony No.1 Orchestral bass drum, clash cymbals, small orchestral bass
Mahler (1888) drum with cymbals attached, triangle, tam tam
2T + 3P
Gustav Symphony No.2 Large tam tam, small tam tam, triangle, glockenspiel, 3 snare
Mahler (1894) drums, 3 low bells (bass bells or bell plates), ruthe, orchestral
2T+5P bass drum, clash cymbals, suspended cymbal
Claude Afternoon of the Antique Cymbals

Debussy Faun (1894)
1P
Gustav Symphony No.3 3 pairs crash cymbals, 2 glockenspiel, triangle, tambourine,

Mahler (1896) orchestral bass drum, small orchestral bass drum with cymbals
2T+5P attached, tubular bells + low Bb, ruthe, 3 snare drums off
stage
Richard Don Quixote (1896- Wind machine, snare drum, glockenspiel, triangle,
Strauss 7) tambourine, orchestral bass drum, clash cymbals
T+3P
Gustav Symphony No.4 Orchestral bass drum, crash cymbals, triangle, sleighbells,
Mahler (1900) glockenspiel, tam tam
T+4P
Arnold Pelleas und Tam-tam, crash cymbals, suspended cymbal, orchestral bass
Schoenberg Mélisande (1902) drum, glockenspiel, tenor drum, triangle
2T+4P
60
Claude La Mer Tam-tam, glockenspiel, orchestral bass drum, crash cymbals,

Debussy T+3P suspended cymbal, triangle
Gustav Symphony No.6 Orchestral bass drum, crash cymbals, triangle, tam tam, snare
Mahler (1904) drum, 3 deep bells, xylophone, glockenspiel, suspended
2T +4P cymbal, ruthe, hammer effect, tuned cowbells
Claude Images (1905) Tubular bells, crash cymbals, suspended cymbal, tenor drum,
Debussy 1T+5P triangle, tambourine, snare drum, castanets, xylophone,
orchestral bass drum
Gustav Symphony No.7 Snare drum, tambourine, triangle, tam tam, glockenspiel,
Mahler (1905) keyed glockenspiel, orchestral bass drum, clash cymbals,
T+5P suspended cymbal, ruthe, 3 deep bells, assorted tuned
cowbells with clappers
Igor Firebird (1910) Crash cymbals, orchestral bass drum, xylophone, glockenspiel,
Stravinsky T+5P tam-tam, triangle, suspended cymbal, tambourine, 2 offstage
bells,
Igor Petrushka (1911) Xylophone, glockenspiel, tam-tam, tambourine, triangle,

Stravinsky T+6P orchestral bass drum, small orchestral bass drum with crash
cymbals attached, suspended cymbal, crash cymbals, snare
drum
Richard Eine Alpensinfonie Thunder sheet, triangle, clash cymbals, orchestral bass drum,
Strauss (1911-15) snare drum, suspended cymbal, assorted tuned cowbells with
2T+4P clappers, wind machine
Igor Rite of Spring (1913) Chains, 2 orchestral bass drums, 2 crash cymbals, tam tam,
Stravinsky 2T+5P tambourine, triangle, 2 crotales, 2 washboards
Igor Les Noces (1914-17) Triangle, xylophone, 2 crotales, orchestral bass drum with
Stravinsky T+6P crash cymbals attached, crash cymbals, 2 snare drums, 2
piccolo snare drums, orchestral bass drum, suspended cymbal,
tambourine
Eric Satie Parade (1913-1917) 2 octaves bottle phone (D to D in Bb major), orchestral bass
T+4P drum, ship's siren, tambourine, starting pistol, snare drum,
clash cymbals, suspended cymbal, ratchet, tenor drum, wood
block, typewriter, xylophone, tam-tam, triangle, siren
61
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Examination of The Evolution of Multi-Percussion

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Edith Cowan University

Theses: Doctorates and Masters Theses

Examination of the evolution of multi-percussion

Follow this and additional works at: https://ro.ecu.edu.au/theses

Part of the Music Commons

This Thesis is posted at Research Online.

This dissertation is presented for the degree of

Master of Arts (Performing Arts)

Thomas Alexander Michael Robertson

Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts

o incorporate without acknowledgment any material previously

5.2.4 Wuorinen’s Janissary Music (1966) ..................................................................................... 34

The twentieth century belonged to percussion. In previous centuries, percussion performed a

1.1 Topic overview

1.2 Aims of the project

Although the choice of a timpani work is unusual in a multi-percussion recital the

3. Early use of percussion

3.1 The use of percussion in the orchestra before the start

3.1.1 New uses of percussion in orchestral works

3.1.2 Percussion as a feature in orchestral works

3.2 Early drum kit and its influence

3.2.1 New Orleans brass bands

3.2.2 First semblance of a drum kit

3.3 Influence on the writing of multi-percussion

4. Multi-percussion in chamber music

4.1 Multi-percussion as a part of a chamber work

4.1.1 The first multi-percussion setups

4.1.1.1 L’histoire du soldat (1918)

Ernest Ansermet, a close friend who conducted many of Stravinsky’s works, 46

4.1.1.2 La création du monde (1922)

4.1.2 Alternative ways of writing for multi-percussion

4.2 Percussion ensemble music

4.2.1 Ritmica No.5 and No.6 (1930)

4.2.2 Ionisation (1931)

4.2.3 John Cage’s percussion ensemble

4.3 Soloistic multi-percussion works

4.3.1 Concerto for Percussion and Small Orchestra (1932)

4.3.2 Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion (1937)

5. First generation of solo multi-

5.1 John Cage

5.2 The start of solo multi-percussion

5.2.1 Cage’s 27’ 10.554” for a Percussionist (1955)

5.2.2 Stockhausen’s Zyklus (1959)

5.2.3 Morton Feldman’s The King of Denmark (1965)

5.2.4 Wuorinen’s Janissary Music (1966)

It is the first multi-percussion work to be written in an entirely determinate style

5.3 Percussionist’s influence

6.1 Max Neuhaus

6.2 Jean-Pierre Drouet

6.2.1 Vinko Globokar’s Toucher (1973)

6.3 Sumire Yoshihara

6.3.1 Norio Fukushi’s Ground (1973)

is set up it makes the performer appear to be trapped in a cage of percussion instruments,

6.4 Sylvio Gualda

6.4.1 Xenakis’s Psappha (1975)

6.4.2 Xenakis’s Rebonds (1987-89)

6.5 Issues with the first generation

7. The second generation of solo multi-

Exhaustive Limited Instrumentation Multi-drum