Serialism and music as a language in Gustavo Becerra-Schmidt’s Taller 4. Enrique Rivera’s La ausencia (1962) and Fernando García’s América insurrecta (1962)

Abstract

The Chilean composer Gustavo Becerra-Schmidt cultivated serialism until the mid-1950s. However, a trip to Europe, where he visited conservatories in Austria, Spain and Italy, as well as the Summer Courses of Contemporary Music in Darmstadt (1955), led him to distance himself from this method. Instead, he proposed a renewal of composition teaching in Chile, based on the idea of music as a form of communication. He addressed these ideas in his composition class, which became colloquially known as “Taller 44” around 1960. This article analyses two pieces by Becerra-Schmidt’s students that were successfully premiered in 1962: La ausencia by Enrique Rivera and América insurrecta by Fernando García. They both make use of Spanish-language poetry and procedures associated with serialism, ranging from complex twelve-tone techniques to seemingly free total chromaticism. The article aims to study how the composers of these works combine musical, expressive and semantic aspects in their search for a music capable of communicating a message –as their teacher expected– without renouncing serial procedures.