ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the external influences that have had an effect on post-tonal music. The use of plainsong melodies in Renaissance polyphonic compositions and the borrowed themes for sets of variations are but two examples. But quotation in post-tonal music is of a different sort, at times a dramatic juxtaposition of contrasting styles, at others an almost poetic allusion to another composer. Neoclassicism was a reactionary movement in the sense that it rejected the chromatic saturation and other characteristics of both the late Romantic style and atonality. The middle voice in the texture moves more quickly than the bass but more slowly than the upper pair, and it seems to emphasize the important notes of the topmost voice. Some composers have reached out in other directions—to folk music, to jazz, and rock, to the music of other cultures—and have adapted the new materials and techniques to their own needs.
