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Chess and music are frequently connected, indeed rightly so. Of celebrated composers, Sergei Prokofiev was a talented player of master strength. Aggressive and tactical in style, the

composer of the heroic score for Alexander Nevsky and the romantic ballet, Romeo and Juliet, once defeated Capablanca in a simultaneous display. His surviving games gave ample evidence of

his creative abilities over the chessboard. Jose Raul Capablanca vs. Sergei Prokofiev (simultaneous display) Sergei Prokofiev vs. Maurice Ravel Maurice Delage vs. Sergei Prokofiev In

contrast, the avant-garde composer John Cage, learnt chess, primarily in order to communicate osmotically with his artistic hero, Marcel Duchamp. If there was a chessboard parallel to Cage,

it was former world champion (1963-1969) Tigran Petrosian at his most “mysterious”, as British Master Peter Clarke described Petrosianic strategy in his anthology of the Maestro’s most

outstanding games. Tigran Petrosian vs. Wlodzimierz Schmidt  On playing over the above game for the first time, the following question occurred to me: to what extent is the development of

new strategic ideas still possible in modern chess? Let me attempt to elaborate on this point. A century and a half ago, the profound chess thinker Steinitz systematically collected (for the

first time) a wealth of information concerning the positional and strategic elements that go up to make the game of chess. Never before had there existed information (embedded in Steinitz’s

own games and annotations) concerning the desirability of establishing pawn centres; of seizing the bishop pair; of avoiding pawn weaknesses in one’s own camp while inflicting such evils on

the adversary’s position; of creating a pawn majority on the Q-side, and much more. The Steinitzian theories were formulated into “rules” by the Praeceptor Germaniae, Siegbert Tarrasch, and

this massive achievement on the part of the German Grandmaster represented the close of the first major stage in the development of chess strategic thought. Since the time of Tarrasch there

have been two more significant movements, bringing with them an advance in our grasp of the strategic possibilities and limitations of the chessboard. I mean the Hypermodern revolution and

the rise of the dynamic Soviet school of chess. All three movements, the Classical, the Hypermodern and the Soviet, added something new to our thinking about chess, but, to a very large

extent, the two latter movements also embodied a denial of their intellectual ancestor, the Classical school. For example: the theory of the Hypermodern masters (Reti, Grünfeld . . .)

concerning the establishment of pawn centres was not so much an entirely new concept (as was the original theory concerning pawn centres) but a reversal, in certain situations, of the

Classical rules. The historical stage reached by modern chess is: the Eclectic. The best of modern chess has evolved into an amalgam of all previous theories: the classical approach of Boris

Spassky; the Romanticism of Tal; nowadays we see top Grandmasters gaily setting up massive pawn centres in true classical style in some of their games , while demolishing identical centres

(all according to Reti) in others. Today any strategic idea will gain acceptance if it works, and it is rare that a strategic conception will be condemned on purely abstract grounds without

the support of at least some analysis. Everything goes, if it is successful. The following quotation from Peter Clarke’s collection of Tal’s games typifies the modern approach: “A very good

rule says that one should avoid weakening one’s King position by advancing pawns. However, rules are meant to guide, not to enslave. One of the blessings of present-day chess is that it is

freer than ever from dogma. Many of the most valuable ideas would never have been investigated , had not masters persevered with ‘bad’ moves”. Clarke is referring to Black’s 11th move in the

 variation: 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 Bg7 4. e4 d6 5. f3 O-O 6. Be3 e5 7. Nge2 c6 8. d5 cxd5 9. cxd5 a6 10. Qd2 Nbd7 11. g4 h5 11… h5 is in fact so strong that the whole variation has now

been virtually abandoned from White’s side. So, in view of all this, can we assert that it is still possible for progress to occur in the history of chess ideas, even when we have formulated

all the rules and also discovered when it is possible to violate our own formulations? In the present game versus Schmidt, Petrosian provides a possible answer to this creative dilemma. In

the previous examples I quoted the Classical rules were reversed for very good and valid reasons (a further example is the good, yet backward, black Q-pawn in certain variations of the

Sicilian Defence). If one accepts that chess contains an element of art in its complex make-up then one can perhaps gain some insight into Petrosian’s mystical conduct of this game. Against

Schmidt, Petrosian certainly reverses all Classical principles, but are the reasons ones which we can recognize as good and healthy? It is possible to argue that the era of truly creative

Western art has now passed and that all which remains for art to achieve is to parody former greatness. Does modern art have truly original statements to make, or is it painfully aware of

the achievements of the past, even in its very own act of creation? I would be the last to deny that the work of Mahler contains elements of profound and moving beauty, but structurally this

work is dominated by “symphonies”. If one compares Mahler’s 7th or 9th Symphony with any symphony by Mozart, Beethoven or Brahms, one will begin to appreciate the factor of parody concealed

in the artistic consciousness of the twentieth century. Examples nearer our own time are Philip Glass, Andy Warhol, and Dmitri Shostakovich, who often creates the effect in his work of

laughing at himself (e.g. the pure circus music of Shostakovich’s 9th Symphony.) Paradoxically, Shostakovitch had been commissioned by Stalin , no less, after the composer’s triumph with his

Leningrad Symphony, to compose a work celebrating the Soviet victory against Hitler. Even more extreme — approaching artistic nihilism — are Stockhausen and Cage, in particular the latter’s

 _Four Minutes 33 seconds,_ in which the virtuoso pianist does absolutely nothing during the stipulated time period. In Petrosian’s games this artistic crisis is sometimes translated into

chess terms. If it is no longer possible to invent ideas that are truly original then it is still possible, as an act of creative defiance, to parody all the Classical rules. In this game

Petrosian simply reverses all of good old Dr Tarrasch’s formulations, as a sheer act of technical virtuosity. This mysterious encounter shows Petrosian mocking all the principles by which

other players live, and in a sense this is chess without soul – just as so much of modern art lacks true soul. Further we might say that Petrosian’s play here corresponds to that

twentieth-century music which lacks all tonal centre. I suspect that the initial impulses going to create atonal music represented just as much a negative or reversal of traditional tonality

as the consciousness of being involved in the genuine process of artistic achievements. As we have seen, Cage goes even further! I knew Cage and played against him many times, even

organising a birthday celebration for him at the Chelsea Arts Club and conspiring with then Vice President, Barry Martin, to present a birthday cake in the shape of Duchamp’s Fontaine, in

other words an inverted, white ceramic urinal. On his sad passing, I was invited in December 1993 to deliver his funerary oration at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles. When the

German composer Paul Hindemith (1895-1963) wrote his symphony _Die Harmonie der Welt_ (later to metamorphose into an opera of the same name) I doubt that he had chess in mind. However, there

is, I believe a connection. Hindemith’s Harmony of the World focuses on the life of astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) a student of the eccentric Tycho Brahe. Brahe was himself a

groundbreaking observer of the universe. He inhabited a castle called the “Fortress of the Stars” (Uraniborg) and wore a false bronze nose for everyday use, saving his gold and silver

prosthetic noses for best. Tycho’s original nose had been slashed in a duel, not blasted by celestial lightning from the heavens, which so obsessed him. Kepler led a less dramatic existence,

concentrating, without much incident, on establishing the harmonic relationship between earth, the remaining planets and the sun. And this is where chess comes into the equation. World

chess champion Vassily Smyslov once published an anthology of his chessboard masterpieces entitled _In Search of Harmony_ — a volume, by the way, in which I figure as one of the great man’s

victims. Chess is an area of human endeavour, which, in common with mathematics and music, allows child prodigies to demonstrate astounding genius. And I suggest that “Harmony” is the key.

Consider the young Mozart. Among so many other precocious musical achievements, such as composing a Minuet and Trio in G Major aged five, he was able to reconstruct and transcribe Allegri’s 

Miserere from memory, having heard the closely guarded score just once during a visit to The Vatican. It should be recalled that at the age of fourteen, Mozart also wrote his first opera: 

Mitridate Re di Ponto, or “Mithridates, King of Pontus”. In mathematics alarming precocity was displayed by, for example, Ruth Lawrence, who graduated from Oxford University age thirteen

with a starred first class Honours Degree; not to mention John Nunn, who went up to Oxford at the age of fifteen to pursue his mathematical studies. Nunn, who also distinguished himself as a

chess-playing prodigy, went on to become a grandmaster and professional player, who numbered even the legendary Anatoly Karpov amongst his scalps. Indeed, accounts abound of amazingly

youthful chess prodigies, including José Capablanca who allegedly picked up the moves of the game aged four, simply by watching his father play. Then there was Paul Morphy who at twelve

defeated the illustrious European Master Lowenthal, and perhaps most spectacular of all, Bobby Fischer, US champion at the age of fourteen and victor of the so-called Game of the Century 

when he was thirteen. It seems to me that there must be some quality which links chess, music and mathematics. I believe that quality to be an inner harmony which connects all three

activities and which the youthful human brain is capable of identifying. The striking factor is that prodigies in chess, music and mathematics are capable of performing at the highest level

without significant prior experience. It would be unthinkable for a child or young teenager to paint like Leonardo da Vinci or write with the depth of Tolstoy or Shakespeare, since the

relative life experience would not yet have been accumulated — in general such dimensions would be missing. For music, maths and chess, on the other hand, the prodigies appear to be able to

leap the chasm of experience and tap directly into an underlying harmony, a harmony which most of us cannot easily perceive. Apart from John Nunn, who was proficient in both maths and chess

from an early age, it is worth noting that Smyslov (World Chess Champion from 1957-1958) was also an accomplished opera singer. Meanwhile, Soviet Chess Grandmaster Mark Taimanov enjoyed a

second career as a concert pianist. With the advent of computers, such as the Demis Hassabis AlphaZero, new dimensions of harmony are now constantly being revealed. At first sight, or to the

uninitiated, the moves and strategies of AlphaZero may appear opaque. Queens moved to fantastically improbable attacking squares such as h1, at the rearwards furthest extremity of the

board, or sacrifices made for no apparent immediate compensation. Yet the former World Champion Magnus Carlsen has carried out a deep study of the programme’s games and drawn advantageous

conclusions for his own strategies. Harmony is there and Magnus has located it. RAY’S 206TH BOOK, “  CHESS IN THE YEAR OF THE KING  ”, WRITTEN IN COLLABORATION WITH ADAM BLACK, AND HIS

207TH, “  NAPOLEON AND GOETHE: THE TOUCHSTONE OF GENIUS  ” (WHICH DISCUSSES THEIR RELATIONSHIP WITH CHESS) ARE AVAILABLE FROM AMAZON AND BLACKWELLS.  A MESSAGE FROM THEARTICLE _We are the

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