Norse Modes : On Geirr Tveitt’s Theory of Tonality
Peer reviewed, Journal article
Published version
Date
2022Metadata
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- Artikler og bokkapitler [390]
Original version
I: European Music Analysis and the Politics of Identity (DMO Special Issue 2022), s. 46-69Abstract
Abstract: -
In his treatise Tonalitätstheorie des parallelen Leittonsystems (1937), Norwegian composer Geirr Tveitt attempts to construct a theory of tonality based on Norwegian folk music as an alternative to the established “Inter-European” theories. He reframes four of the church modes as a specifically “Norwegian” or “Norse” tone system (even giving the scales new names based on Old Norse: rir, sum, fum, and tyr). The treatise received a mixed reception and has never been acknowledged by Norwegian music scholars. This article discusses Tveitt’s work discussed as a case of music theory entangled in radical nationalist ideology.