In the third and final book of his iconic piano etudes Gyoergy Ligeti charts a new path relative to the rest of his musical output, representing a significant arrival in a composer's oeuvre known for its stylistic transformations. This monograph is the first dedicated study of these capstone works, investigating them through a novel lens of statistical-graphical analysis that illuminates their compositional uniqueness as well as broader questions regarding the perception of stability in musical texture.

With nearly 200 graphical illustrations and a detailed commentary, this examination reveals the unique manner in which Ligeti treads between tonality and atonality-a key idea in his late style-and the centrality of processes related to broader scale areas (or "macroharmony") in articulating structures and narratives. The analytical techniques developed here are a powerful tool for investigating macroharmonic stability that can be applied to a wide range of repertoire beyond these works.


This book is intended for graduate-level and professional music theorists, musicologists, performers and mathematicians.