Cicchetti Youth
Don Cicchetti
>Don Cicchetti started out with such promise, but today he's trying
>patience. To Wolf he says:
>
>>>It's quite simple: she and I like different types of music. As fond as I
>>>am of some of the old songs, things got a whole lot better starting in the
>>>mid-sixties IMHO. I disagree with her premise so it's only natural that
>>>I would disagree with her conclusions.
I said:
>> It's not simple, and if you saw this sort of blind rejection in a
>>student reading a challenging physics text, you would fail them. Put away
>>your debating chops for a couple hours, read her book, and come back with
>>something more informed please. To reduce her thesis to stylistic
>>differences is a woefully inadequate response. I really wish you would
>>read the book before your mind snaps shut on this subject.
>
>Wolf struck me as offering a summation of the gist of Bayles' message,
>not a blind rejection. I don't think Wolf is capable of being that
>short-sighted or of dismissing a point out-of-hand like a McDonald's wrapper.
He's not offering any sort of understanding at all, but that's ok, I guess
he's not interested in this subject. "Her premise" is that cultural,
historical, and artistic trends inform the making of popular music in a
profound way. Wolf has never indicated that he understood that premise in
any way, but rather assumed Bayles was a fan of certain types of music, and
was using "intellectual" means to push her own likes and dislikes. This
is simply not the case. when he says:
>>>It's quite simple: she and I like different types of music. As fond as I
>>>am of some of the old songs, things got a whole lot better starting in the
>>>mid-sixties IMHO. I disagree with her premise so it's only natural that
>>>I would disagree with her conclusions.
He clearly indicates that he does not understand her premise at all. I do
respect his reasoning powers, and was attempting to re-engage them so I
could hear his perspective. I was (and am), disappointed to be denied the
enjoyment that comes from genuine discourse on a shared subject. Simple
dismissal of a misunderstood premise denies that possibility.
>To St. Stephen he says:
>
>>> Note that we have discussed at times why it is that "mainstream" music
>>>is such a music wasteland, but most of these discussions have centered on
>>>economic issues: the marketplace, coporate record companies, advertising, our
>>>consumer culture, etc. I think this is a much more fruitful avenue to
>>>explore
>>>the paucity of "good" music in the "mainstream" than is some philosophical
>>>analysis based on "life affirming" values.
I didn't say the above paragraph, Steve did.
This was my response:
>>Nonsense. All those marketplace-based explanations have been floating
>>around for years, and have not resolved anything. Bayles book explores the
>>movements that inform the marketplace, and it is a vastly more powerful
>>paradigm in explaining the current state of music than are simple market
>>explanations.
Steven said
>>> I want to point out that the same sort of comment could be made about
>>>other
>>>art forms; painting, writting, theatre, etc. This is nothing more than the
>>>(tired?) criticism of "modernism". I'm thinking now that it's just a little
>>>too bit simple. It's the kind of thinking that dismissed Stravinksy and
>>>Prokofiev and Bartok and Glass ....
I said
>>What "tired" critique of modernism are you speaking of? Bayles explores
>>many positive influences of modernism as well. She presents a rich and
>>complex view of modernism that you have not begun to describe yet. It's
>>NOT simple, it's not tired, and you need to read her book.
Don T. said:
>These statements are simply too strident to be taken in a context other
>than a petulant "No it's not!!" Further, Don C. seems to be beating folks
>over the head with "read the book!" which I find unbecoming.
Strident? I made it very clear how much I appreciated Steve's thought and
obvious effort he put into his three posts. Your defining my response as
a "petulant no its not" misses the many supports I made for that response.
The fact is, she has a complex view of modernism, and the view that she
represents "the tired critique of modernism" misunderstands her critique
(and support) of modernism. She finds a strong element of optomism, and
faith in the future in modernism, as do I, and sees many artists, both
musical and visual, in that tradition. She also points out the cult of
the self, and of celebrity fueled by the electronic media as a source with
some of its roots in what she calls "perverse modernism". I simply do not
have the time to present her entire book, point by point, in this forum.
Sooner or later, someone who wants to respond in an informed way will need
to read it themselves.
>To Chuck a/k/a Conan the Librarian:
>
>>>And wrong again. The connotations of words or phrases usually don't make
>>>it into a dictionary, and it seems to be the connotations that are
>>>important here. I haven't a clue as to what "life-affirming" is
>>>supposed to mean in this context, and a check of my Webster's leaves me
>>>no wiser. "Gregarious" is even worse: is this music performed by more
>>>than one person or Social Realism or what?
>>
>>Can't help with with your cluelessness...
Don T. said:
>Withering . . . simply withering . . .
When someone raises an issue in a large forum, there are always some who
will say: "Interesting, let's talk more", and others who will spend a week
with you asking you to "define your terms please", so you spend all that
time "defining" common terms in everyday use THEN you get to argue if the
presentation in the book reflects the definitions.. blah blah blah I
tried to tell both those guys that I simply wasn't interested in providing
definitions of "gregarious and life-affirming", for them to then play
lawyer with. I am interested in chatting with those of you who already
know what "gregarious and life-affirming", is in music. It's simply a
much better conversation.
>>>> You will find no age in history to have
>>>>the level of sophistry, calculated images, and planned outrageousness that
>>>>the mid to late 20th century has experienced because the electronic media
>>>>is required for these things to exist.
>>>
>>>Utterly bogus. Check out Louis XIV, Elizabeth I, Jacobean masques,
>>>Tuscan city processionals, and more generally, just about every ruling
>>>house in Europe from the Carolingians 'til the accession of George V.
>>>Jarry could tell you a thing or two about planned outrageousness, as
>>>could the Parisians of Victor Hugo's day. Then there were the Incroyables
>>>et les Merveilleuses during the Revolution, if you just want to get into
>>>outrageous dressing (-: I could go on, but why bother? If you are
>>>accurately summarizing Bayles, then neither of you knows what you are
>>>talking about.
>>
>> Go empty what passes for a brain of this nonsense, because all of those
>>examples AND all the ones you aren't "bothering with" wouldn't equal one
>>week of effort from the OJ defense team, let alone Madonna's publicist.
>
>This is supposed to be a rebuttal?? It's a non-sequitor and what looks
>like a willful blindness to the good rebuttal Chuck made.
Chuck made a fallacious rebuttal by raising historical examples of hype and
promotion in a time before the electronic media. The human desire for
fame and fortune is not new, the apparatus to conduct that desire on the
world stage is! Chucks rebuttal is the equivalient of walking on the
Somme battlefield after WWI, where humanity first witnessed the reality of
mechanized, industrialized death, and comparing it to a battle fought in
the middle ages with swords by saying "oh, see! there is nothing new under
the sun, people make weapons, and people die, nothing changes...." But
something has changed, the mechanism, the apparatus, the mechanical
servants of human desire. In the same way, the electronic media has
amplified the human trait for the seeking of fame and fortune to a level no
previous age can compare to. I did not offer a non-sequiter as a
rebuttal, you just did not recognize what I was saying. I didn't have
enough time to really expound on it at length. Hope this helps.
>>You have not made your case here, and are trying to flex intellectual
>>muscles you do not posess.
>
>Talk about talking out of school . . . there's no justification for this
>statement.
Oh yes there is.... I was dealt with in a most high-handed and dismissive
manner. He's a big boy, if he can dish it, he can take it.... Having
said that, I do wish I had been nicer... sorry.
>I didn't see a need for a reactionary defense of Bayles. It looked like
>folks here were saying she was thought-provoking, just not necessarily
>hitting the nail on the head. But if Don C. persists in what looks to me
>like defensive reasoning, I don't think I'll bother reading his posts
>much longer.
Don T., you may read my posts or not, it's fine with me. My only request
is that there be some informed quality to responses. If arch debates, and
clever putdowns are what you guys are about, I'm just not interested. In
the future I will simply delete the antagonistic stuff, and respond to
those who want to actually discuss something No harm, no foul.
bye for now...
Don C.
________________________________________________
Don Cicchetti
La Sierra University Library Media Services
Audio/Video/Computer/Satellite
Event Services & Studio Production
dcic...@vega.lasierra.edu
See, when you over-play
You get too loud
And people are gonna mistake what you're doing
For a hole in the Air
--Albert King
________________________________________________
Don Thomason
patience. To Wolf he says:
>>It's quite simple: she and I like different types of music. As fond as I
>>am of some of the old songs, things got a whole lot better starting in the
>>mid-sixties IMHO. I disagree with her premise so it's only natural that
>>I would disagree with her conclusions.
>
> It's not simple, and if you saw this sort of blind rejection in a
>student reading a challenging physics text, you would fail them. Put away
>your debating chops for a couple hours, read her book, and come back with
>something more informed please. To reduce her thesis to stylistic
>differences is a woefully inadequate response. I really wish you would
>read the book before your mind snaps shut on this subject.
Wolf struck me as offering a summation of the gist of Bayles' message,
not a blind rejection. I don't think Wolf is capable of being that
short-sighted or of dismissing a point out-of-hand like a McDonald's wrapper.
To St. Stephen he says:
>> Note that we have discussed at times why it is that "mainstream" music
>>is such a music wasteland, but most of these discussions have centered on
>>economic issues: the marketplace, coporate record companies, advertising, our
>>consumer culture, etc. I think this is a much more fruitful avenue to explore
>>the paucity of "good" music in the "mainstream" than is some philosophical
>>analysis based on "life affirming" values.
>
>Nonsense. All those marketplace-based explanations have been floating
>around for years, and have not resolved anything. Bayles book explores the
>movements that inform the marketplace, and it is a vastly more powerful
>paradigm in explaining the current state of music than are simple market
>explanations.
>
>> I want to point out that the same sort of comment could be made about other
>>art forms; painting, writting, theatre, etc. This is nothing more than the
>>(tired?) criticism of "modernism". I'm thinking now that it's just a little
>>too bit simple. It's the kind of thinking that dismissed Stravinksy and
>>Prokofiev and Bartok and Glass ....
>
>What "tired" critique of modernism are you speaking of? Bayles explores
>many positive influences of modernism as well. She presents a rich and
>complex view of modernism that you have not begun to describe yet. It's
>NOT simple, it's not tired, and you need to read her book.
These statements are simply too strident to be taken in a context other
than a petulant "No it's not!!" Further, Don C. seems to be beating folks
over the head with "read the book!" which I find unbecoming.
To Chuck a/k/a Conan the Librarian:
>>And wrong again. The connotations of words or phrases usually don't make
>>it into a dictionary, and it seems to be the connotations that are
>>important here. I haven't a clue as to what "life-affirming" is
>>supposed to mean in this context, and a check of my Webster's leaves me
>>no wiser. "Gregarious" is even worse: is this music performed by more
>>than one person or Social Realism or what?
>
>Can't help with with your cluelessness...
Withering . . . simply withering . . .
>>>scope of Bayles' book is what I am interested in, not arguing the
>>>definition of "life-affirming, gregarious spirit" with people. If you
>>
>>Because you can't argue it--it's like trying to argue religion. That's
>>why it doesn't sound like a very useful term to me, and if the rest of
>>the analysis is equally nebulous, you haven't given me any reason to
>>do anything but put the book on my "never waste time with this" list.
>
>Can argue it, don't care to, and don't care to convince you of anything.
Looks like the feeling is mutual between the two of you.
>>>want to know why she feels some music does not fit that description, read
>>>her book. I can't spend a week arguing over definitions with someone just
>>>to finally get to something of substance.
>>
>>Let's see. You want us to discuss this book, but you don't want to do
>>any of the scutwork involved, like actually figuring out what this cloud
>>of prose is all about. Presumably, we all just drift into a refined
>>state of consciousness wherein such niceties as actually meaning
>>something never crassly intrude themselves.
>
>Man, I have been doing "scutwork" on this topic for three days now! I'm
>simply not going to argue definitions with you or Earl. Which part of
>this statement do you not understand?
At this point, if you haven't figured it out, you won't.
>>> You will find no age in history to have
>>>the level of sophistry, calculated images, and planned outrageousness that
>>>the mid to late 20th century has experienced because the electronic media
>>>is required for these things to exist.
>>
>>Utterly bogus. Check out Louis XIV, Elizabeth I, Jacobean masques,
>>Tuscan city processionals, and more generally, just about every ruling
>>house in Europe from the Carolingians 'til the accession of George V.
>>Jarry could tell you a thing or two about planned outrageousness, as
>>could the Parisians of Victor Hugo's day. Then there were the Incroyables
>>et les Merveilleuses during the Revolution, if you just want to get into
>>outrageous dressing (-: I could go on, but why bother? If you are
>>accurately summarizing Bayles, then neither of you knows what you are
>>talking about.
>
> Go empty what passes for a brain of this nonsense, because all of those
>examples AND all the ones you aren't "bothering with" wouldn't equal one
>week of effort from the OJ defense team, let alone Madonna's publicist.
This is supposed to be a rebuttal?? It's a non-sequitor and what looks
like a willful blindness to the good rebuttal Chuck made.
>You have not made your case here, and are trying to flex intellectual
>muscles you do not posess.
Talk about talking out of school . . . there's no justification for this
statement.
I didn't see a need for a reactionary defense of Bayles. It looked like
folks here were saying she was thought-provoking, just not necessarily
hitting the nail on the head. But if Don C. persists in what looks to me
like defensive reasoning, I don't think I'll bother reading his posts
much longer.
Don Thomason ~ This Modern Efficiency you are hearing
a/k/a zzt...@acc.wuacc.edu ~ about is the same old Hard Work your
Washburn University of Topeka ~ grandfather dreaded. - E. W. Howe