Leonardo Balada and Surrealism in Music

Surrealism from its inception in 1919 has been an interarts movement encompassing the visual arts, film, theater, literature, and music. Many people can point to the surrealist paintings of Dali, Magritte, and de Chirico, the poetry and prose of Apollonaire and Breton, the films of Cocteau and Bunuel -- but music is a different matter. How does one create music that sounds like melting clocks or has the dreamlike structure of automatic writing? In this book the authors provide a theory for understanding surrealism in music by focusing on the works of Catalan-American composer Leonardo Balada, whose creative style has been labeled "Dali's surrealism in music." By examining in historical and cultural context Balada's core compositional technique of sound transformation and demonstrating congruent practices among composers ranging from Satie to Takemitsu, the authors demonstrate that Balada is not only a consummate composer but also a reliable guide to understanding surrealism in music across the 20th and 21st centuries.