Dodecaphonic Composition in 1950s and 1960s Europe: The Ideological Issue of Rightist or Leftist Orientation

Serialism and tonal music in Eastern and Western Europe during the 1950s and 1960s can be given opposite classifications from ideological points of view. The communists, within the ideology of “socialist realism,” were aggressively promoting “progressivist music,” that is, music for the people: accessible, diatonic, tonal, and folklore-oriented. On the other hand, Western avant garde ideals—especially serialism—were considered by the communists as decadent and forbidden. At the same time, however, important serialist composers associated with Darmstadt (representing Adorno's ideas of musical “progress”), such as Hans Werner Henze and Luigi Nono, were leftists, even communists. The purpose of this article is to show these two possible definitions of music written with the same dodecaphonic technique operated in two different geographical areas and ideological contexts: Romania and Western Europe.