Kang, Angela (2012) Musical chinoiserie. PhD thesis, University of Nottingham.

357 Pages·2016·50.62 MB·English

by  Christine Middleton

MUSICAL CHINOISERIE
ANGELA KANG, BMus, MPhil
Thesis submitted to the University ofNottingham
for the degree ofDoctor ofPhilosophy
September 2011
Abstract
Chinoiserie remains relatively unexplored inthe context of music and is
usually isolated as a mid-eighteenth-century phenomenon
characterized by the use of decorative Chinese motifs and concepts in
Western art, porcelain, furniture, and architecture. This thesis enriches
possible readings of musical chinoiserie by exploring its relationship to
the intensefashion for Chinese commodities, its correlation to particular
social and political climates, and its connection to the eternal themes of
the feminine and utopian pastoral. As a recurring and evolving
phenomenon, chinoiserie has been manifested across the past three
centuries in various genres and works central to Western music. The
following chapters provide case studies which draw attention to
particularly rich constellations of ideas about chinoiserie, and analyse
the various ways that 'the West' has confronted, represented, and
appropriated Chinese difference in music.
Chapter two examines the emergence of eighteenth-century European
music theatre/ drama inspired by China and its interrelation with royalty
and nobility, consumer goods, fashion, and aesthetic sensibility.
Chapter three explores early twentieth-century French musical works
by Debussy, De Falla, and Roussel, which are inspired by nostalgic
and utopian Chinese landscapes. In chapter four, the music of Mahler,
Puccini, and Stravinsky reveal alternative fin de steele approaches to
chinoiserie. Common themes include an increased interest in
authenticity; overt and subsumed Chinese elements; and the
integration of chinoiserie into existing programmes. As a counterpoint
to this, chapter five turns to popular music genres which directly
responded to the social and political reality of Chinese immigration to
America. The straightforward, formulaic, and market driven style of Tin
Pan Alley songs provides the most explicit examples of musical
chinoiserie, which upon examination reveal a variety of hidden beliefs,
prejudices, aspirations and idealized visions of China. By no means are
these chapters intended to offer a comprehensive survey of musical
chinoiserie, but they provide case studies which demonstrate the ways
in which a musical work can interact with a multiplicity of intellectual
and emotional responses to the West's encounter with China during
important social, political, and historical events.
Acknowledgements
To begin with, I am thankful for having had the great opportunity to
indulge in a subject which is close to my heart, and for being able to
listen to, play on the piano, write about, and imagine about, the musical
delights explored in this thesis. Without the Nottingham University
School of Humanities Scholarship none of this would have been
possible.
Thank you to Professor Paula Higgins for believing in my project from
the outset, and for your enthusiasm and passion. Dr Robert Adlington -
thank you for your absolutely wonderful kind support throughout the
entire process. Thank you to Philip Weller, Nick Baragwanath, and
Mervyn Cooke for your keen interest and excellent advice. There are
also some special people whose kindness, love, and support have been
instrumental to the completion of my thesis; Lynne McCormack, Edwina
Lawson, Wendy Wong, and Luisa Silva. To Pato; thank you for
magically appearing and helping me to put the icing on the cake!
A very special thank you to my supervisor, Dr Sarah Hibberd; your
kindness, encouragement, and enduring support over the last few years
has been truly incredible.
Finally, a loving thank you to my dear family; Rosalind, Francis, Shiong,
and Anneka. To my father (Francis Kee Seng Kang); thank you for
being the most inspiring, optimistic, motivated, enthusiastic, and
innovative person I know.
Contents
CHAPTER 1: CHINOISERIE: WESTERN IMAGES OF CHINA 1
The China Tea Cup: Understanding Chinoiserie 3
Methodology 13
Chinoiserie and Music 38
CHAPTER 2: ROYALTY, LUXURY, AND CHINOISERIE IN THE
ENLIGHTENMENT 45
Queen Mary of England and The Fairy Queen (1692) .48
Chinoiserie Chic: A sign of Wealth and Sophistication 73
Empress Maria Therese and Le Cinesi (1754} 83
CHAPTER 3: NOSTALGIC CHINESE LANDSCAPES IN FRENCH
MUSIC (1880-1910) 106
An Early Chinese Soundscape: 'Rondel Chinois' (1881) 108
Avant Garde Chinese Soundscapes: 'Pagodes' (1903) 125
'Et la lune descend sur le temple qui fut' (1907) 138
Debussy, De Falla, and Roussel: 'La Machine Chinoise' 149
CHAPTER 4: LA MACHINE CHINOISE AND ACOUSTIC
SHARAWADGI .................................................•................................ 164
Overt Sounds: 'La Machine Chinoise' 170
Mahler and Das Lied von der Erde (1908) 170
Stravinsky and The Nightingale (1914) 187
Puccini and Turandot (1926) 206
Submerged Sounds: 'Acoustic Sharawadgi' 221
'Der Abschied' [The Farewell] 221
A Haunting Voice: The Nightingale 236
'Signore Ascolta! [Lord, listen!] 247
CHAPTER 5: TRAVERSING THE FOREIGN AND FAMILIAR:
CHINOISERIE IN THE POPULAR SONGS OF TIN PAN ALLEY 257
The Arrival of 'The Heathen Chinee' (1870) 262
Musical Tourism in Chinatown (1900-1920) 278
Chinoiserie and the Purchased Feminine 303
EPILOGUE 326
BIBLIOGRAPHY 337
Chapter One
Chinoiserie: Western Images of China
Chinoiserie is the product of the Western fascination with China.
Commonly isolated as a mid-eighteenth-century phenomenon, it is
usually characterized as the use of decorative Chinese motifs and
concepts in Western art, porcelain, furniture, and architecture. This
limited definition describes the taste in decorative arts of that period
rather than a wide ranging and complex phenomenon that began inthe
fourteenth century and which has continued in various manifestations
ever since. Chinoiserie can be understood in four interrelated ways.
Firstly, as a Western phenomenon, which Hugh Honour describes as
'the expression of the European vision of Cathay'; this vision of China
not only represents Western thoughts about the Chinese, but also
reveals the basic human instinctto define 'us' from 'them'.' Secondly,at
its most basic level, chinoiserie is a decorative system that can be
applied to a range of art forms - from paintings, blue and white
ceramics, to architectural monuments such as the Trianon de
Porcelaine, Drottingholm Palace, and Brighton Pavilion. It may also be
understood in relation to more abstract art forms, such as music,
through the manipulation of musical signifiers that, through learned
Hugh Honour, Chinoiserie: The Vision of Cathay (New York: Harper and Row, 1973),
1
7-8.
1
cultural codes, evoke concepts associated with all manner of things
'Chinese'. Thirdly, this decorative system often evokes a visual or aural
utopian notion of the Chinese pastoral. Finally, such works of art
became fashionable and highly marketable commodities.
Chinoiserie remains relatively unexplored inthe context of music,where
it links awork to a fascinating, utopian, or fearsome China, and tends to
depict inhabitants who are almost always set in an ancient and
nostalgic Chinese landscape. This thesis aims to show how the
phenomenon of musical chinoiserie has been embraced by composers,
performers, and listeners, and considers what broader cultural work it
carries out. This cultural work includes the ways in which a popular
song, instrumental piece, or opera, reflects and shapes the multiplicity
of intellectual and emotional responses to the West's encounter with
China during important social, political, and historical events. The
chapters in this thesis examine case studies drawn from the late
seventeenth century to the early twentieth century, and analyse the
various ways that the West has confronted, represented, and
appropriated Chinese difference in music. The main focus is on
Western art music, but the advent of popular music in the early
twentieth century is also considered.
2
The China Tea Cup: Understanding Chinoiserie
Figure 1.1:Chinese porcelain cup. Made byMiles Mason. Lane Delph, Stoke-on-
Trent, Staffordshire, ca. 1810 (Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 2662-1901).
My approach, revealing the wider implications and possibilities of
chinoiserie is encapsulated by the china tea cup. Viewing this picture of
a typical Lane Delph china tea cup, one first notices its design: intricate
blue and white motifs and asymmetrical forms. Chinoiserie can be
understood as a 'decorative style', and this is precisely what creates its
sense of novelty, charm, exoticism, and aesthetic programme. On
closer inspection, one notices the depiction of a supposed Chinese
landscape with willow trees, pagodas, water streams and people; the
china cup thus offers images of an idyllic, utopian pastoral. The result is
a unique and recognisable Chinese style, with a distinctly aristocratic
chic which stems from its association with being an expensive and
desired commodity in high society.
3
Because the china cup was so unlike anything produced in Europe, it
was initially regarded as a treasured object imbued with mythical
qualities. As early as the Middle Ages, small quantities of porcelain
began to trickle their way into Europe. Paintings of this period such as
'The Adoration of the Magi' (c.1490) by Andrea Mantegna reveal how
the rarity and exoticism of such items as the china cup made it a fitting
gift to embellish scenes of the Holy family or pagan gods (Fig.1.2).
Naturally the preciousness of these items appealed to European royalty
and nobility who could boast of owning such priceless rarities. Queen
Mary II of England (1662-1694) had a dedicated chamber to safeguard
her huge collection of chinoiserie artefacts; the Countess of Suffolk
Henrietta Howard (c1688-1767) and Lady Elizabeth Montagu (1718-
1800) were also renowned for their extensive porcelain collections."
According to David Porter, 'unlike the taste for other stylish commodities
of the time, a taste for things Chinese potentially occupied a dialectically
charged position as at once both ancient and modern, and justified a
claim to status on the grounds of both their fashionable newness and
unimpeachable pedigree,.3The appeal of such objects as the china cup
was therefore its simultaneous claim to modern fashion and its
association with Chinese antiquity.
2 David Beevers, ed., Chinese Whispers: Chinoiserie in Britain 1650-1930 (Brighton:
The Royal Pavilion and Museums, 2008), 20.
3David Porter, 'Monstrous Beauty: Eighteenth Century Fashion and the Chinese
Taste', Eighteenth-Century Studies 35/3 (2002): 395-411 [399].
4
Figure 1.2: Detail from The Adoration of the Magi. By Andrea Mantegna, c.1490.
Dawn Jacobson, Chinoiserie (London: Phaidon Press, 1999),25.
This precious and mythical china cup also encapsulated the dream of
utopia. The Chinese styled willow pattern design represented European
interpretations of idyllic Chinese landscapes, which were transformed
into fanciful and familiar scenes for domestic consumption. For Michel
Foucault, the word 'China' alone constituted for the West a vast
reservoir of utopias:
In our dream world, is not China precisely this privileged site of
space? In our traditional imagery, the Chinese culture is the most
meticulous, the most rigidly ordered, the one most deaf to
temporal events, most attached to the pure delineation of space;
we think of it as a civilization of dikes and dams beneath the
5