The Application of Tone-Clock Theory to Contemporary Jazz Composition - ISJAC 2024

International Society of Jazz Composers and Arrangers (ISJAC)
International Jazz Composers' Symposium 2024:

Paper Presentation:
The Application of Tone-Clock Theory to Contemporary Jazz Composition
by Jonathan Lindhorst

Abstract:

Despite jazz’s unique ability to engage with and assimilate diverse influences from across the world, it has largely resisted adopting aspects of atonal or twelve-tone music, especially in an improvised context. However, in recent years, some jazz improvisers have begun to develop a post-tonal approach to improvisation using Tone-Clock Theory (TCT), a harmonic system and chromatic “map” that is free of the restrictions typically associated with serial or twelve-tone music. Codified in 1982 by Dutch composer Peter Schat and later vastly expanded by New Zealand composer Jenny McLeod, TCT identifies twelve “chromatic tonalities” derived from the twelve possible atonal triads (Allen Forte’s trichordal set classes), which are labelled as “Hours” and organized around a circular clock face. Using a transpositional operation called ‘steering,’ these triadic sets can then be expanded to assemble a non-repeating twelve-tone harmonic field based on its interval-class, each with its own distinct ‘harmonic flavour.’

In my paper, I will give a brief explanation of the foundational principles of TCT and, drawing from the compositional concepts of Schat and McLeod, demonstrate a few ways that I have adapted Tone-Clock Theory into my own creative practice as an improvising composer, showing how twelve-tone and atonal concepts can be used freely and musically in contemporary jazz.

Presented on May 18th, 2024, at the Blair School of Music, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee.

This presentation was made possible by the generous support of:
The Schulich School of Music, McGill University
The Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Media and Technology (CIRMMT)
We Acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.

www.jonathanlindhorst.com