During the early twentieth century, music began to move in new directions. There were composers writing music that broke all rules of traditional harmony. There was also newfound interest in new types of sounds. Theodore Norman was one such composer who became interested in these different types of timbre, and so he turned to the guitar.

In the twentieth-century the classical guitar experienced an unprecedented amount of growth. The man who is undisputedly responsible for this is the legendary guitarist Andres Segovia. He brought the classical guitar to a place it had never been before, the concert stage. He spent his life trying to establish the guitar’s reputation as a concert instrument, one respected among classical musicians. This is why Segovia never played flamenco even though he was from Spain. For much of the guitar’s existence it was thought of as a folk instrument not capable of serious music. This way of thinking is evident in the music written for this plucked instrument. Although there are some exception like J.S. Bach’s lute suites, or Heitor Villa-Lobos’ guitar music, by and large, many of history’s great composers never wrote for the guitar. Consequently many of the pieces played by Segovia as he was making a name for the classical guitar were transcriptions. Segovia himself was a Romantic ,born in the late nineteenth century, so he played many of his own transcriptions of Romantic works as well as from those eras before him. One genre of music that Segovia was not particularly fond of was the style of music simply called Modern or Twentieth-Century. Segovia was even reported to have turned down an offer from Igor Stravinsky to write him a piece. And since Segovia was the one championing the classical guitar, his technique of playing the guitar as well as his taste of music were adopted by thousands of new guitarists. Every one aspired to be like Segovia. Segovia had and continues to have a tremendous influence on today’s guitarist. Segovia lived well into the 1980’s playing a concert a week before he died. And since his taste never changed for 94 years, today’s guitarist still lean to a more romantic view of the guitar. While music was evolving for decades, the classical guitar repertoire seemed to be frozen in time. There were exceptions of course. The most notable was Theodore Norman.

Theodore Norman was born in Montreal, Canada on March 12, 1912. He began studying piano at the age of five and then soon after moved with his family to Los Angeles, CA. where at the age of eleven he began to study the violin, which became his main instrument. In 1930 Norman traveled to Europe where he studied violin with Issay Barmus in Berlin, violin with the virtuoso and Joachim alumnus Willy Hess in Darmstadt, and composition with bassoonist/composer Adolph Weiss. Weiss himself studied closely with Arnold Schoenberg. Norman himself was an accomplished violinist and held first chair with the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1935-1942. It was during this time that Norman played under such notables as Albert Coates, John Barbirolli, Bruno Walter, Arnold Schoenberg and Igor Stravinsky.

During World War II Norman began studies with Adolph Weiss who himself studied with Arnold Schoenberg in Berlin (1925-26). Weiss has been credited with being one of the firsts to introduce 12-tone techniques to the USA. Norman studied with Weiss for nine years. This period of study extremely influenced Norman’s life as a composer.

After the war Norman dedicated most of his time to composing. He was still in contact with such composers such as Schoenberg and Stravinsky. During this time Norman began to compose his ballet Metamorphosis in 1944, based the novel by Franz Kafka; this was the piece that would change the course of his life.

While writing the Metamorphosis, Norman wanted the guitar to have a part in the orchestration of the piece. The problem was that Norman was completely unfamiliar with this instrument. So he bought a guitar for 50 cents and began experimenting. “I became enchanted with the instrument…and went into the hills of Los Angeles to learn how it worked.”(Hodel 24) This speaks something about the lure of the guitar. After the Metamorphosis Norman continued to write music for the guitar. In fact he wrote the first 12-tone pieces ever published for the classical guitar, Two twelve-Tone Pieces for Solo Guitar. This work was groundbreaking considering the traditional music being written for guitar.

In 1956 Norman traveled through Europe with his wife Ruth to increase his knowledge of the guitar. Norman, who was self-taught until now, took his only formal lessons with a student of Segovia, Aurelio Herrero. While in Paris Norman met Emilio Pujol, another big name among classical guitarists. Emilio Pujol was somewhat interested in Norman’s music. Norman even wrote a piece dedicated to Pujol, Essay for Solo Guitar. Later that year, Pujol introduced Norman to Andres Segovia, who unlike Pujol, did not care very much for Norman’s music. Segovia was very narrow minded when it came to music. Despite such different views of music Norman and Segovia became good friends, and Segovia was a regular visitor to Norman’s home in Los Angeles until his death in 1987.

Upon Norman’s return to Los Angeles he became acquainted with Ernst Krenek, whom he approached about writing a piece for solo guitar. Krenek agreed and produced Suite for Guitar Solo. Krenek worked closely with Norman in light of writing effectively for the guitar. Krenek stated:

I remember that he told me that I shouldn’t worry about writing “guitar-like” music, that I should just write what I wanted to write and he would play it, no problem. Since I felt that I was a complete layman as far as guitar playing goes, I thought that I would just write for the instrument within the range and with an idea of the possibilities of the stops available and arpeggios and glissandos and what have you, and he played it. With very good results apparently. He liked the piece and I liked his playing, and ever since it has been played many times here and n Europe. So I think that that was my first encounter with the instrument. (Schneider 262)

Norman premiered the piece on a Monday Evening Concert at the Los Angeles Museum of Art. Norman participated regularly in these Monday Night Evening Concerts that became very famous in Europe for presenting modern music. (Yates) Igor Stravinsky was in attendance during this premier whom Norman knew from his time as first violinist for the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Stravinsky later asked Norman if he would play a part for a performance of his Le Rossignol. Norman agreed and later spent time with Stravinsky in Venice, Italy. Norman was later asked by Stravinsky to transcribe his piano composition Les Cinq Doigts for two guitars, which he did.

In 1957, Robert Craft set out to record Scheonberg’s Serenade (1923). In this composition Schoenberg makes use of the guitar, but finding a guitarist to record it was not easy. First he looked to Segovia, but he would only play it if it could be modified. Segovia said, “I will be glad to work on it and to play the part in my performance if Schoenberg will accept suggestions.” (Craft 51) Well he wouldn’t. The only other guitarist who was technically capable and most importantly musically capable was Norman. There weren’t many guitarist that could read such modern scores. And unlike many guitarists, when Norman began studying guitar he already had a solid background in performance and composition in mainstream and contemporary classical music. During one of the recording sessions Pierre Boulez was in attendance as was and was very interested in hearing such modern music on the guitar. The next year Norman recorded the guitar part for Le Marteau sans Maître for Columbia Records with Robert Craft.

Theodore Norman’s compositions, while influenced by Adolph Weiss and Arnold Schoenberg still maintain a strong sense individuality. Norman uses many different approaches to composing, including tonality, free atonality, and his own individual use of the twelve-tone system. He also uses such traditional forms such as sonata and dance forms, including waltz, tango, samba and mambo. But for the bulk of his output he uses his own individual use of twelve-tone.

For Norman, the tone-row is seen as a resource that can be used freely in the expression of musical ideas. Norman’s music in many ways is distinct from that of Schoenberg or the highly organized music of Webern. With Norman, the rules of twelve-tone composition involving repetition of pitches are seldom followed and frequently the row is nearly impossible to trace. However, like Webern, Norman does rely on dramatic contrasts, juxtaposing different textures and employing large registeral shifts….Norman does not avoid tonal sounding events or progressions in his twelve-tone music….[His] music frequently has a programmatic element, as in his ballet Metamorphosis, and it often has some relation to the visual arts. (Marsh 7)

Norman’s twelve-tone music is unmetered, and the bar lines usually serve to separate musical ideas. Norman’s Two Preludes in Twelve Tone: I, dedicated to Count and Countess Antonio Poja, is an example his style of composition. In this piece you see that there is no meter indicated and that there are varying amount of beats per measure. You can see the large registeral shifts suggested by Marsh. You also hear a very pretty Bmaj7 chord in the midst of many dissonant chords in measure 15, thus showing that Norman would not avoid tonal soundings. The rhythms in this piece are very complicated and very characteristic of his music. Prelude 1 from Two Preludes In Twelve Tone is included in the works cited section of this paper.

While Norman was influenced by Adolph Weiss, Schoenberg and other well know modern composers, he was also influenced by many other styles like samba. He was also very interested in music from Brazil. His brother, Ralph Norman a cellist, lived in Brazil and would often bring recordings for Norman. Norman was very intrigued by this strong rhythmic music. Norman was not a sentimental person and had no patience for music he didn’t like. He felt that most of the most of the music being played on the guitar was flashy with no substance. Some of this music he thought only Segovia could make something of it. (Yates)

Norman was well respected among his colleagues, none of which were guitarist. During the recording of Norman’s Metamophosis Norman wanted to pay the musicians but they refused. One musician said “I don’t understand his music, but he hears it.”(Yates)

Besides Norman’s new ideas for classical guitar music, he also had innovative approaches to teaching. Probably the most innovative method he uses in teaching guitar is giving all his students composition assignments. For example, he has assigned projects that consist of writing a whole composition based on two intervals, and creating tone rows to the rhythm patterns of the Magdalena Bach Book. Norman would also take on other challenges in education. He went on to develop a system to show a blind girl how to read music. He used a footboard with raised shaped that represented notes. He later taught guitar and violin to a girl with spastic paralysis. “This work, which paralleled Norman’s curiosity about paralysis caused when musicians overpractice, resulted in his inventing a device now standard in hospitals throughout the country- a double arm harness for hemopheligiacs” (Hodel 26) Norman was later asked to give a lecture on “The Creative Years”, Aldous Huxley’s “Potential of Man” symposium. Huxley asked Norman to give this lecture after hearing of his work with blind students.

Norman also adopted a completely different notating system for the guitar. Even today, there is no standard system for some guitar notations. Norman decided to adopt the convention of other stringed instruments, like marking of strings by roman numerals rather than Arabic numerals in a circle. Norman had a very different approach to the guitar than did Andres Segovia.

Theodore Norman was a guitarist who went against the grain of classical guitar mainstream. But he never had to prove anything to anybody; he was already a well respected musician and composer. While the classical guitar’s repertoire was at a standstill Norman was at the forefront of bringing the classical guitar into the Twentieth-Century. It’s actually quite awkward talking about his style as revolutionary when other composers had already been writing like this, and musicians playing this music for years. Norman just wanted to improve the repertoire of the classical guitar. He did so with hundreds of transcriptions and many of his own compositions. Norman knew that the guitar was capable of much more than just the traditional pieces, which were being played by many of the day’s guitarists.

Norman died on May 29, 1997 at the age of 85 in Los Angeles. Over his many years as a teacher he taught well over 10,000 students the guitar. ”Many of these students remember him warmly and carry his ideals with them and to others in their careers as performers, composers, and teachers”. The world of the classical guitar is better off having known him.

Craft, Robert. Stravinsky: Chronicle of a Friendship. Nashville : Vanderbilt University
Press, 1994

Hodel, Brian. “The Art of Theodore Norman” Guitar Review Fall (1988): 24-27

Hodel, Brian. “The Elgart & Yates Classical Guitar Duo” Guitar Review Sum (1989): 1-3

Gudehus, Donald H.. Theodore Norman Memorial Web Site. 1 April 2001 http://parfaitole.com/ted_norman/index.html

March, Walter. Theodore Norman. Diss. U of California , Los Angeles , 1995

Norman, Theodore. Two Preludes In Twelve Tone: 1. G. Schimer 1955

Schneider, John. “A Conversation with Ernst Krenek,” Soundboard November (1981)

Yates, Peter. Personal Interview. 27 February 2002 .