Contemporary atonal composition techniques

Hi!

I'm interested in learning about the atonal composition techniques of contemporary composers. I'm especially interested in Henze,Birtwistle and Dutilleux. I've read that Henze uses the twelve note technique but his use of the rows seems to be very distinct and different from the viennese or Darmstadt schools. Are there any books or websites you could recommend ?

Depending on your level of patience with hardcore analysis texts, I would recommend starting from something like the Grove Dictionary articles for these composers. David Cope's Techniques of the Contemporary Composer covers the main trends in atonal composition (in fact an excellent book for many subjects) as will any other study of post-war composition. There is a fairly recent biographical interview with Dutilleux in which he explains some of his compositional processes (Henri Dutilleux: Music, Mystery and Memory - Conversations with Claude Glayman). To be honest, there isn't yet much material on the compositional techniques of these composers (mostly because of their recent vintage) so unless you can get hold of some research papers or enrol on a university course it can be quite difficult to get beyond a basic summery of their style. Listening and studying scores will provide you with the best resource, of course.

+ Vincent Persichetti - Twentieth Century Harmony

BTW, would you really love to compose your own music in such a way or would do it to not sound old-fashioned and to be 'accepted' by many others who are concerned with this 'to sound modern' thing? Asking just out of curiosity.

Thanks for your advice!

No, I don't want to compose in the same style. I am just curious because I find the music of these composers interesting and I would like to learn about as many styles of composition as possible. It might also be an inspiration for my own music but I generally don't care if my music is considered "academically acceptable " or not.