GEORGE ANTHEIL (1900–1959)Five Songs (1919–1920)

This chapter discusses Five Songs by George Antheil. As one of the first composers to incorporate jazz elements in a classical context, he was fond of experimenting with odd instrumental combinations and electronic devices. This chapter provides examples of Antheil’s vocal work to demonstrate the composer’s originality. The piano writing is dramatic and often dense in texture. Moreover, the vocal tessitura descends as the cycle progresses, while the piano becomes more dominant. The first three songs are very short, but the last two have an almost orchestral richness. Texts are aphoristic and concise, and voice parts are correspondingly plain and unadorned, moving for the most part in a combination of declamatory speech patterns, long slow spans, often on a monotone, and close intervals, leaving the piano to illustrate the imagery and atmosphere of the words.