Luigi Dallapiccola was one of the most prominent composers of the 20th century, the first Italian musician who mastered the method of dodecaphony. It’s important, that his mastering of dodecaphony was organically related to national Italian traditions. Contacts with the art of Schoenberg (1924), Berg (1934), Webern (1935) are significant, and he left important reminiscences about that in his articles and essays.
The vocal cycle of Dallapiccola (for high voice and chamber orchestra), analyzed in this paper, follows medieval texts and contains images and emotional states inherent to ancient Italian laudas. This source helped the composer to find the expression that will later appeared in his most significat works, including operas («Volo di notte», «Prigioniero», «Ulisse») and others.
Study of the composer’s methods of using poetic text shows how syllable counting, common to medieval Italian syllabic poetry, creates a 12-tone row (syntaxically) and makes the use of dodecaphony natural.
Abstract