dodecafonia

Dodecafonia, also known as twelve-tone technique or twelve-tone serialism, is a method of musical composition developed by Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg in the early 1920s. It is a form of serialism, a broader compositional technique that organizes musical elements into a series. In dodecafonia, all twelve notes of the chromatic scale are used in a predetermined order, known as a tone row or series. This series ensures that no single note is emphasized more than any other, creating a sense of atonal equality.

The composer establishes a specific order for the twelve pitches. This original row can then be manipulated in several ways: it can be played backward (retrograde), inverted (upside down), or retrograde-inverted. These transformations maintain the intervallic relationships established in the original row. Dodecaphonic music often sounds dissonant to ears accustomed to traditional tonal harmony, as it avoids the hierarchical relationships of tonic and dominant chords.

While Schoenberg is credited with its invention, other composers like Alban Berg and Anton Webern also developed and utilized the twelve-tone technique. Composers outside the Second Viennese School, such as Igor Stravinsky and Luigi Dallapiccola, also experimented with dodecaphonia. The technique has been influential in shaping the course of 20th-century classical music, though its strict application has been less common in recent decades, with many composers incorporating its principles more flexibly.