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. . . It used to be said
frequently, for example, that
the trouble with the whole twelve-tone idea is that it’s too mechanical,
too mechanistic, and it forces too many things upon you. You don’t have
the great freedom of will which artists of the past enjoyed. The truth
is that if anyone is concerned to dismiss a whole body of music—and
it’s
a rather futile and undesirable pastime—I would suggest you could say
quite the opposite. You could say the trouble with any twelve-tone work,
by virtue of the whole notion of the twelve-tone concept, is that it’s
too contextual. It’s too self-contained. The communal aspect shared by
a twelve-tone work, and therefore what you can bring from one twelve-tone
work to another or even from one piece of the same composer to another,
is really not enough. . . .
Milton Babbitt
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