UC San Diego

With few exceptions, the understanding of the commedia dell’arte character of Pierrot in musicology focuses on aesthetic progress and the representation of the lonely artist. This dissertation examines a wide range of examples of Pierrots at the turn of the twentieth century, and argues that composers and performers used the character to express social-political identities, commentaries, and critiques.

My study of French Pierrots focuses on music for pantomimes, outdoor spectacles, and piano. These Pierrots offered commentaries on gender, class, the social-medical condition of hysteria, national identity, the French military, and other issues. The Russian composer Igor Stravinsky composed Petrushka (1911) – a blend of French Pierrot and traditional Russian Petrushka – which musically constructed Russian national identity in France.

Pierrots in the Francophone world made an oft-neglected impression on Pierrots in the German-speaking world. Hausmusik composers, catering to the middle class, consciously sought to distance Pierrot from any direct social-political critiques. Pierrots in cabaret-inspired music, exemplified by Arnold Schoenberg’s Pierrot lunaire (1912), align more closely with the carnival origins of commedia dell’arte. Using Mikhail Bakhtin’s carnival theory, I reveal Schoenberg’s religious commentaries on social issues through sacred parody, as well as the song cycle’s connection to existing German literature in presenting social critique through the themes of blood and death.

The idea and practice of black Pierrots test the limit of the white-faced Pierrot character. I focus on a black Pierrot depicted by Brazilian-born, Italian-trained composer José Cândido da Gama Malcher. My analysis shows that Pierrot, taken to the extreme, can ultimately serve dehumanizing ends.

My work reconnects the musical study of Pierrot with the character’s deep social ties as part of the commedia dell’arte tradition. As a result, it urges composers and performers to consider social and political aspects as they create and perform new commedia dell’arte characters.