Diegetics

[vinteuil]

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This was a new word and concept for me.

I encountered it the other day in relation to the sound of the guillotine in Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmelites. - after the recent Met performance friends were discussing how the sound of the guillotine would best be made * - and researching later I came across this interesting piece :

http://renewablemusic.blogspot.com/2010/09/this-is-not-guillotine.html

The word 'diegetic' in the last line called for further research...

Apart from the highly technical use of 'diegesis' in lit crit, 'diegetic' is most often met with in film studies - and I found this little video very helpful:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jd0kQLD7JS8

Searching on this forum I have only found one use of the term, from William McCrum back in 2013 :

... There is no composer of the 20th Century, no major composer, who hasn't dabbled with film music. Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Walton, Vaughan-Williams, Bliss, Copland, ... the list is endless, and all of them enjoyed and praised the medium as a vehicle for the SERIOUS composer. Many splendid composers like Miklos Rozsa, Bernard Herrmann, Erich Wolfgang Korngold etc. had double lives writing for both cinema and concert-hall. To cite The 'Warsaw Concerto' is ridiculous, since it was an on-scene diegetic concerto to be played by a concert-pianist on-scene in the film, and is not therefore film-music.
...

I am glad to have encountered this concept.

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* apparently the premiere at la Scala used a replica guillotine, but recent productions have tended to use a couple of percussionists or a recorded effect. The score isn't terribly enlightening :

https://music.utah.edu/mckay-music-library/dialogues/Production_History.php

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[french frank]

Yes, interesting indeed. Though I'm not sure I will be introducing it into my everyday lexicon in the near future.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

When I taught Film music as part of an "A"-level course, it was a word I used quite regularly, but in the twelve years since then, I don't think ever.

[Padraig]

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This was a new word and concept for me.

Great post vinteuil, and thank you.

Why I appreciate it is that I have long been mightily impressed by the horror of that last scene in the Dialogues. Apart from the feelings of pity and admiration for the sisters, that unmistakable sound of the guillotine, blended into the music, had a powerful effect on my listening and imagination. You have given me the word that I did not know I needed, and which adds to the horror I had already felt.

[Dave2002]

Another one - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=H_4hOY-9nKA