Musical frauds
mif...@my-deja.com
by a sizable portion of the art community. While many admire, even
revere, the works of Warhol, Leichtenstein, Pollock, and others, many
believe these artists were laughing all the way to the bank. (I
personally take no side in this issue.) A gullible and uneducated public
can often be fooled into believing a scribble is the work of genius
under the right circumstances. Is there a parallel in the world of
classical music? Does anyone here believe that certain respected
composers (or performers), while deserving of a short-lived
"fad-appeal," should not even be taken as seriously as they are today?
(Please out the Vanessa Maes and Linda Bravas among performers. I'm
talking about composers and performers who have a "respected" following
along the lines of the artists I named above.)
MIFrost
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
MTaboada
accusation was that someone else wrote his music). I don't know what
truth there is to this. I do know that his music is terrible. Besides
Scelsi, I don't know of any other classical composer who was fraudulent
or was accused of fraud. This topic has been discussed before, and I'll
repeat what I said then: fraud is very unlikely in a classical composer
or performer. What about engineering fraud, where engineers fix a
recording so that it misrepresents the actual talent of the artist? This
would indeed be fraud, though I don't know of any specific instances --
Pinchas Zukerman claims that this kind of fraud is rampant (he was
referring, in particular, to some HIP recordings).
Regards,
MrT
mif...@my-deja.com
MTaboada <matr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> The late Giacinto Scelsi was accused of being a fraud (specifically,
the
> accusation was that someone else wrote his music). I don't know what
> truth there is to this. I do know that his music is terrible. Besides
> Scelsi, I don't know of any other classical composer who was
fraudulent
> or was accused of fraud. This topic has been discussed before, and
I'll
> repeat what I said then: fraud is very unlikely in a classical
composer
> or performer.
>
>
> MrT
>
I suppose "fraud" is the wrong word. I guess I mean composers whose
music does not merit a place alongside the great and near-great
composers of the past, yet are given equally serious attention by many
music scholars and critics today. Would anyone like to point to a
particular composer and say "This emporer has no clothes"? It's more
than being "not-as-good",say, as Mozart. It's being downright awful and,
in your opinion, meritless as music. Yet it is critiqued seriously in
books and magazines. Maybe I'm just being pointlessly provocative.
Hmmm. It wouldn't be the first time.
John Harkness
wrote:
>The late Giacinto Scelsi was accused of being a fraud (specifically, the
>accusation was that someone else wrote his music). I don't know what
>truth there is to this. I do know that his music is terrible. Besides
>Scelsi, I don't know of any other classical composer who was fraudulent
>or was accused of fraud. This topic has been discussed before, and I'll
>repeat what I said then: fraud is very unlikely in a classical composer
>or performer. What about engineering fraud, where engineers fix a
>recording so that it misrepresents the actual talent of the artist? This
>would indeed be fraud, though I don't know of any specific instances --
>Pinchas Zukerman claims that this kind of fraud is rampant (he was
>referring, in particular, to some HIP recordings).
>
>Regards,
>
>MrT
Well, Zukerman would, wouldn't he? -- the authenticists were breaking
his rice bowl. That was the thing about Zukerman's claims -- he
wouldn't name names. He also claimed at least one major "period music"
conductor couldn't read music. Without naming any names, of course.
John Harkness
Ward Hardman
: Certain "artists" in the world of art have long been considered frauds
: by a sizable portion of the art community. While many admire, even
: revere, the works of Warhol, Leichtenstein, Pollock, and others, many
: believe these artists were laughing all the way to the bank. (I
: personally take no side in this issue.) A gullible and uneducated public
: can often be fooled into believing a scribble is the work of genius
: under the right circumstances. Is there a parallel in the world of
: classical music?
Some people believe that the music of Eric Satie gets much more respect
and attention than it deserves, due to the droll titles he affixed to
his works. (I enjoy the Gymnopedies and Gnossiennes myself.)
--Ward Hardman
"The older I get, the more I admire and crave competence, just simple
competence, in any field from adultery to zoology."
- H.L. Mencken
CosyFunnyTutu
>
>Certain "artists" in the world of art have long been considered frauds
>by a sizable portion of the art community. While many admire, even
>revere, the works of Warhol, Leichtenstein, Pollock, and others, many
>believe these artists were laughing all the way to the bank. (I
>personally take no side in this issue.) A gullible and uneducated public
>can often be fooled into believing a scribble is the work of genius
>under the right circumstances. Is there a parallel in the world of
>classical music? Does anyone here believe that certain respected
>composers (or performers), while deserving of a short-lived
>"fad-appeal," should not even be taken as seriously as they are today?
>(Please out the Vanessa Maes and Linda Bravas among performers. I'm
>talking about composers and performers who have a "respected" following
>along the lines of the artists I named above.)
>
>MIFrost
Don't give them an excuse to start another Glass-bashing thread.
mif...@my-deja.com
Ward Hardman <har...@sciences.sdsu.edu> wrote:
>
> Some people believe that the music of Eric Satie gets much more
respect
> and attention than it deserves, due to the droll titles he affixed to
> his works. (I enjoy the Gymnopedies and Gnossiennes myself.)
>
> --Ward Hardman
I'll agree with that. I'm also waiting for someone to bring up the
serialists of just after the turn of the century. But maybe they're not
taken so seriously any more anyway. If Paul McCartney's latest excursion
into CM was programmed into regular concerts I suppose he'd qualify.
(I've never heard his "classical" music but I express disdain anyway. It
doesn't matter. I "love" and "hate" movies I've never seen also.) Anyone
find Leonard Bernstein's compositions, er, overrated? Steve Reich?
Previn's opera "Streetcar Named Desire"?
MIFrost
Matthew B. Tepper
<blau2t0g17b31h30d...@4ax.com>:
Too late! Philip Glass is my nominee.
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://www.deltanet.com/~ducky/index.htm
My main music page --- http://www.deltanet.com/~ducky/berlioz.htm
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
"Compassionate Conservatism?" * "Tight Slacks?" * "Jumbo Shrimp?"
vaneyes
> Well, Zukerman would, wouldn't he? -- the authenticists were breaking
> his rice bowl. That was the thing about Zukerman's claims -- he
> wouldn't name names. He also claimed at least one major "period music"
> conductor couldn't read music. Without naming any names, of course.
In Fanfare March/April 1991, Zukerman did name names in his interview
with David K. Nelson, namely Hogwood and Norrington. He also cited
conversations with some of Norrington's "Classical Players" (those
players weren't named) and they, he said, agreed with his criticism.
The name of the period conductor who couldn't read music was omitted
for legal reasons. One clue mentioned was the mis-conducting of
Dumbarton Oaks on tour.
Regards
John Thomas
> In article <3A2FE5...@yahoo.com>,
> MTaboada <matr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > The late Giacinto Scelsi was accused of being a fraud (specifically,
> the
> > accusation was that someone else wrote his music). I don't know what
> > truth there is to this. I do know that his music is terrible. Besides
> > Scelsi, I don't know of any other classical composer who was
> fraudulent
> > or was accused of fraud. This topic has been discussed before, and
> I'll
> > repeat what I said then: fraud is very unlikely in a classical
> composer
> > or performer.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > MrT
> >
>
> I suppose "fraud" is the wrong word. I guess I mean composers whose
> music does not merit a place alongside the great and near-great
> composers of the past, yet are given equally serious attention by many
> music scholars and critics today. Would anyone like to point to a
> particular composer and say "This emporer has no clothes"? It's more
> than being "not-as-good",say, as Mozart. It's being downright awful and,
> in your opinion, meritless as music. Yet it is critiqued seriously in
> books and magazines. Maybe I'm just being pointlessly provocative.
> Hmmm. It wouldn't be the first time.
Bruckner. Anyone disagree...;-)?
--
Regards,
John Thomas
Alain Dagher
hard to be a total fraud in music. There is Helfgot for example, but as a
rule if you just can't play your instrument, other musicians are bound to
notice. The rise of concept art and the inflated art market of the 80's
might have played a role in the careers of several painters who were frauds.
This reminds me of that nice review by Robert Hughes of the film "Basquiat"
by Julian Schnabel: "a film about the world's worst dead artist by the
world's worst living artist."
Alain
<mif...@my-deja.com> wrote in message news:90oubk$2ml$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...
CosyFunnyTutu
<al...@bic.mni.mcgill.ca> wrote:
>It is perhaps easier to be a fraud in the visual arts.
No, it isn't.
>It is probably very
>hard to be a total fraud in music.
It's like this (In My Grumbled Opinion): People who know and
appreciate classical music, are generally able to link their personal
taste to a rationalized view on quality. Those views are poured into
standardized formulas that are understandable to most other music
lovers. Thus a communis opinio is formed about what is good and what
is not, even though this is still all about taste. The snag is, that
the compositions that are considered tasteful, cannot be seen as
something other than 'good'. We all do it.
My area of expertise are the visual arts. Replace 'music' with 'visual
arts', and there you are...
CosyFunnyTutu
"
"I agree with that. Leaving performers aside, a painter can produce
"simplistic and pretentious works of "art" and fool a great many
people
"for a long time. Unless it is truly repellent it can hang in the
Museum
"of Modern Art as an example of 20th Century genius for decades. But
for
"a musical composition to gain acceptance it must "please" the
"senses"
"of a great many people or it will get no audience. That's harder to
do.
"Nevertheless, I suspect some do ("and with no more brains than you
"have, scarecrow.")
"
"MIFrost
No, the MOMA doesn't have works of frauds. Go have a look
Raymond Hall
Not at all, because I don't believe the above music was ever really
over-rated in the first place. Good music, yes, but certainly not over-rated
surely ?
Now Andrew Lloyd Webber is TOTALLY over-rated. Musical rubbish. And Glass
is, contrary to some opinions, not a fraud imho. He found a formula that
nobody else discovered. I don't find that fraudulent at all. But ALW
borrowed half of his music from others, and frankly it is just abominable
stuff imho.
Regards,
# Classical Music WebSite Links (mostly RMCR) :
http://www.users.bigpond.com/hallraylily/tassiedevil2.htm
# Main Page, To Conductors, Jazz Songstresses :
http://www.users.bigpond.com/hallraylily/index.html
Ray, Sydney
mif...@my-deja.com
"Alain Dagher" <al...@bic.mni.mcgill.ca> wrote:
> It is perhaps easier to be a fraud in the visual arts. It is probably
very
> hard to be a total fraud in music. There is Helfgot for example, but
as a
> rule if you just can't play your instrument, other musicians are
bound to
> notice. The rise of concept art and the inflated art market of the
80's
> might have played a role in the careers of several painters who were
frauds.
>
I agree with that. Leaving performers aside, a painter can produce
simplistic and pretentious works of "art" and fool a great many people
for a long time. Unless it is truly repellent it can hang in the Museum
of Modern Art as an example of 20th Century genius for decades. But for
a musical composition to gain acceptance it must "please" the "senses"
of a great many people or it will get no audience. That's harder to do.
Nevertheless, I suspect some do ("and with no more brains than you
have, scarecrow.")
MIFrost
mif...@my-deja.com
CosyFunnyTutu <cosyfu...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> It's like this (In My Grumbled Opinion): People who know and
> appreciate classical music, are generally able to link their personal
> taste to a rationalized view on quality. Those views are poured into
> standardized formulas that are understandable to most other music
> lovers. Thus a communis opinio is formed about what is good and what
> is not, even though this is still all about taste. The snag is, that
> the compositions that are considered tasteful, cannot be seen as
> something other than 'good'. We all do it.
>
the "communis opinio" (Is that a real term? It sounds good.) and then
became embraced by it. But I don't think it's all about "taste" really.
Any more than gourmet cooking is all about "taste" either. An
incompetent cook can whip up a tasty dish and please his friends but he
won't beat the Iron Chef. The skill required to produce a truly
outstanding classical composition is, I suspect, more difficult to fake
than the skill required to produce a "modern" work of art. I'm probably
wrong but that's my position until I'm laughed off this thread.
But my point in posing the question in the first place is that there
are probably some pretentious "fakers" out there who some here regard
as one step away from John Tesh and Yanni. Yes?
mif...@my-deja.com
"Raymond Hall" <hallr...@bigpond.com> wrote:
> Now Andrew Lloyd Webber is TOTALLY over-rated. Musical rubbish. And
Glass
> is, contrary to some opinions, not a fraud imho. He found a formula
that
> nobody else discovered. I don't find that fraudulent at all. But ALW
> borrowed half of his music from others, and frankly it is just
abominable
> stuff imho.
>
> Regards,
>
>
>
Pardon, but is ALW considered a "classical" composer? I just assumed he
wrote very boring and mawkish Broadway shows.
David M. Cook
wrote:
>find Leonard Bernstein's compositions, er, overrated?
I think some of his work is underrated and often dismissed out of hand.
Dave Cook
Alain Dagher
mif...@my-deja.com wrote:
> I agree with that. Leaving performers aside, a painter can produce
> simplistic and pretentious works of "art" and fool a great many people
> for a long time. Unless it is truly repellent it can hang in the Museum
> of Modern Art
The Whitney maybe. Or the Venice Biennale.
Alain
flor...@my-deja.com
John Thomas <jwt...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> In article <90oubk$2ml$1...@nnrp1.deja.com>, mif...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> Bruckner. Anyone disagree...;-)?
>
Yup, me.
mif...@my-deja.com
david...@aol.com (David7Gable) wrote:
> > a painter can produce
> >simplistic and pretentious works of "art" and fool a great many
people
> >for a long time.
>
rare, and
> even more rarely does it fool people "for a long time." Fads are
short lived
> phenomena unless there is some substance to what has attracted
(temporarily and
> for the seaon) attention.
>
> At this late date, there is nothing remotely chic about claiming to
admire,
> say, Kandinsky or the classic "poured" Pollocks. They have endured
because
> there is a small public passionately interested in them. (I am a
part of it.)
>
> Furthermore, your claim is fairly meaningless in the abstract. You
must name
> names. (Or are you the one who mentioned Lichtenstein, Pollock, and
Warhol in
> one breath? Warhol was a nihilistic ***&*&*%&^*$& who never
pretended to be a
> great artist in the traditional sense. The whole point was his lack
of gifts.)
>
> -david gable
>
I recall reading, a while back, in New York Magazine I believe, about a
trendy artist whose works were very popular and expensive and it turned
out that they were actually painted by art students hired at minimum
wage to do the actual painting under his "direction." I don't know
whatever happened to him or his reputation. And, as should be obvious,
I'm truly a dilettante in both art and music so please excuse me for
having things ass-backwards.
MIFrost
CosyFunnyTutu
Tepper) wrote:
>mif...@my-deja.com wrote in <90pigo$j63$1...@nnrp1.deja.com>:
>>
>>Pardon, but is ALW considered a "classical" composer? I just assumed he
>>wrote very boring and mawkish Broadway shows.
>
>He is considered a "classical" composer by the same kind of idiots who put
>Mantovani records into the classical bins at used record stores (or, these
>days, do much the same thing at eBay).
Well, you cannot put a fence around classical music unless all people
agree on what classical music is. Is Gershwin a classical composer? He
wrote jazz songs, but regardless of liking his Rhapsody, that IS a
piece of classical music (in form and intent). Andrew Lloyd Webber,
judging from his success (can't stand them myself) is a gifted
composer of musicals, who occasionally writes a work with a classical
form and intent, like his Requiem. Sure, that's an 'english choral
tradition meets Fauré halfway and then changed its mind' piece of
kitsch, but nevertheless, it's not fraudulent in any way. Two
centuries ago, we'd frowned at Cherubini.
Same goes, mutatis mutandis, for Mantovani and I don't doubt he's in
for a big revival that would curl my toes. But I don't see any reason
why he isn't on 'our' side of the fence, except for aesthetical
reasons, and those are off-topic here.
Composing classical music requires a mixture of art and craft. People
who don't like avant-garde classical music generally stress the
absence of craft and of course that's so untrue. People who dislike
pop-ish string orchestra and musical theatre composers stress the
absence of art, and of course that's so untrue too.
Did anyone hear Andrew Lloyd Webber's miniature pastiche conversation
operetta 'Never on a Sunday'? Charming piece.
CosyFunnyTutu
>>The late romantics like Rachmaninoff and, especially, Wagner shattered
>>the "communis opinio"
>
>
>Wagner, maybe . . . but Rachmaninoff? R U kidding?
>
>-david gable
I'm sorry I ever wrote 'communis opinio' -- I really thought it was an
expression used in English.
Nevertheless, Rachmaninov indeed gently broke some conventions, in the
same way Wagner and Liszt did, but the other way around: In an age of
avant-garde, Rachmaninov reverted to aesthetics that were believed to
be extinct in 'serious music' -- his pianist skills were much admired
by the 'truely modern'-ists, but as a composer he was attacked for his
romanticism. I recently read an article about that
CosyFunnyTutu
>Warhol was a nihilistic ***&*&*%&^*$& who never pretended to be a
>great artist in the traditional sense
The irony is: he was, but the art historians just didn't notice it at
the time.
CosyFunnyTutu
We're all grown-up post-modernists now, so Rachmaninov's music doesn't
strike us as reactionary populistic trite anymore, but in its time it
was kind of revolutionary.
CosyFunnyTutu
>I recall reading, a while back, in New York Magazine I believe, about a
>trendy artist whose works were very popular and expensive and it turned
>out that they were actually painted by art students hired at minimum
>wage to do the actual painting under his "direction." I don't know
>whatever happened to him or his reputation. And, as should be obvious,
>I'm truly a dilettante in both art and music so please excuse me for
>having things ass-backwards.
>
>MIFrost
Rembrandt? Raphael? They are quite respectable now.
Alain Dagher
"David7Gable" <david...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20001208020922...@ng-fl1.aol.com...
>
> >This reminds me of that nice review by Robert Hughes of the film
"Basquiat"
> >by Julian Schnabel: "a film about the world's worst dead artist by the
> >world's worst living artist."
> >
>
skewering
> Warhol. (Both are anthologized in "Nothing if not critical.") But Mr.
Hughes
> is going to provide MIFrost with little comfort, appreciating as he does
such
> "frauds" as Pollock, Frank Stella, etc. (I don't think they're frauds. I
> think Stella is God.)
Does Hughes really like Stella all that much? By the way, have you read
Hughes' latest art book, "American Visions"? It is quite marvellous. The man
knows how to look at art and he knows how to write. (And he knows how to
tear someone to shreds too when necessary - a dying art unfortunately.)
cheers,
Alain
Rodger Whitlock
> I suppose "fraud" is the wrong word. I guess I mean composers whose
> music does not merit a place alongside the great and near-great
> composers of the past, yet are given equally serious attention by many
> music scholars and critics today.
Delius.
Beecham's enthusiastic advocacy is still effective.
--
Rodger Whitlock
Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
Jeff Gower
toto...@mail.pacificcoast.net (Rodger Whitlock) wrote:
> On Thu, 07 Dec 2000 21:10:17 GMT, mif...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> > I suppose "fraud" is the wrong word. I guess I mean composers whose
> > music does not merit a place alongside the great and near-great
> > composers of the past, yet are given equally serious attention by many
> > music scholars and critics today.
>
> Delius.
Grrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!! ;-)
Jeff
--
www.jeffgower.com
mif...@my-deja.com
MTaboada
If you consider Delius a fraud (in the peculiar sense of this thread),
what would you say about Elgar?
Regards,
MrT
MTaboada
romanticism.>>
If I recall my history, he was attacked mainly because his music was
weak, not because he had an unacceptable aesthetic attitude. Karol
Szymanowski was just as "romantic", yet he was highly appreciated by all
sorts of people. Actually, lots of composers were writing romantic music
at the same time as Rachmaninov (Schoenberg, Prokofiev, Magnard,
Sibelius, the English guys, etc.).
You may be thinking of Igor's criticisms -- but then, he didn't like
anybody, so his acidity has to be taken in perspective.
Regards,
MrT
CosyFunnyTutu
>What? They didn't do their own paintings?
>
>MIFrost
Some did. But succesful painters usually had a workshop full of
apprentices who did most of the work on most of the paintings.
Raymond Hall
jmcl...@gte.net
Donning my asbestos suit
cheers
Jack
Durham, NC
"Chance favors the prepared mind"
Rodger Whitlock
wrote:
> <<Delius.>>
>
> If you consider Delius a fraud (in the peculiar sense of this thread),
> what would you say about Elgar?
A mere near-great.
CosyFunnyTutu
(Rodger Whitlock) wrote:
>On Fri, 08 Dec 2000 16:59:35 GMT, MTaboada <matr...@yahoo.com>
>wrote:
>
>> <<Delius.>>
>>
>> If you consider Delius a fraud (in the peculiar sense of this thread),
>> what would you say about Elgar?
>
>A mere near-great.
All English composers between Purcell and Britten are near-great at
most. Delius comes very close to being someone I _want_ to call a
fraud. But he isn't, of course.
Dan Koren
mif...@my-deja.com wrote:
> Certain "artists" in the world of art have long been considered frauds
> by a sizable portion of the art community. While many admire, even
> revere, the works of Warhol, Leichtenstein, Pollock, and others, many
> believe these artists were laughing all the way to the bank. (I
> personally take no side in this issue.) A gullible and uneducated
public
> can often be fooled into believing a scribble is the work of genius
> under the right circumstances. Is there a parallel in the world of
> classical music? Does anyone here believe that certain respected
> composers (or performers), while deserving of a short-lived
> "fad-appeal," should not even be taken as seriously as they are today?
> (Please out the Vanessa Maes and Linda Bravas among performers. I'm
> talking about composers and performers who have a "respected"
following
> along the lines of the artists I named above.)
>
Certainly the list should have been obvious all along:
Cage
Glass
Reich
Boulez
Stockhausen
etc...
dk
CosyFunnyTutu
wrote:
>Certainly the list should have been obvious all along:
A moderator would have warned you by now. Didn't I hear you
complaining just now about
>the steady decline in quality and
>substance over the past year or so in this ng
?
So _that's_ what you mean by quality and substance. Could have fooled
me.
David Grayshan
mif...@my-deja.com wrote:
> (Snip)
> I suppose "fraud" is the wrong word. I guess I mean composers whose
> music does not merit a place alongside the great and near-great
> composers of the past, yet are given equally serious attention by many
> music scholars and critics today. Would anyone like to point to a
> particular composer and say "This emporer has no clothes"? It's more
> than being "not-as-good",say, as Mozart. It's being downright awful and,
> in your opinion, meritless as music. Yet it is critiqued seriously in
> books and magazines. Maybe I'm just being pointlessly provocative.
> Hmmm. It wouldn't be the first time.
>
(Snip)
I would myself point to a large number of contemporary composers and say
"this emperor has no clothes", indeed I have done so in general terms right
here in this NG - and been roundly condemned by the Ayatollahs of the
Avant-Garde for doing so.
Most contemporary music I hear is rubbish, especially most of the serial
stuff - though not all of it.
I was impressed by what I heard the other day of music by Killmayer (must
investigate this further). Also there is a Dutch composer whose name I still
have not traced who writes in a Berg style of atonality/tonality that
impressed me when I heard it. But honestly, there is nothing written after
about the late 1950's that I hear that carries me away on first or third
hearing - my benchmark test - as did say Bartok or Stravinsky or Honegger.
Nothing at all.
Of course I exclude composers who were already established by then - such as
Britten - and who were not products of the time when serialism had a
death-grip on the groves of academe.
I now expect the usual flame-throwers to go into action.....
:-))
David.
Dan Koren
CosyFunnyTutu <cosyfu...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, 10 Dec 2000 01:35:32 GMT, Dan Koren <DanK...@Yahoo.com>
> wrote:
>
> >Certainly the list should have been obvious all along:
>
> A moderator would have warned you by now. Didn't I hear you
> complaining just now about
>
No, you are completely wrong. The role of the moderator(s)
on moderated newsgroups is definitely not to exercise
censorship of contents -- that is clearly forbidden
by the bylaws. Their role is simply to keep out
spam or messages that are clearly and obviously
outside of the newsgroup's topic of interest.
*You* really need a lesson in basic netiquette,
Mr. CosyPostAnonymouslyWithGreatHypocrisy.
James
Charl...@econophone.ch wrote:
But honestly, there is nothing written after
> about the late 1950's that I hear that carries me away on first or
third
> hearing - my benchmark test - as did say Bartok or Stravinsky or
Honegger.
> Nothing at all.
>
> Of course I exclude composers who were already established by then -
such as
> Britten - and who were not products of the time when serialism had a
> death-grip on the groves of academe.
>
> I now expect the usual flame-throwers to go into action.....
>
> :-))
>
> David.
>
(that's in Belgium b.t.w.) you've got Kurt Bickembergs. Last month he
premiered an oratorio called 'Apocalypse' based on the vulgate text of
the book of Revelation--not the whole book, but the libretto
w/translation was about 20 pages long. Very very good! And who's ever
had the balls to narrate this book musically? I couldn't believe he
pulled it off, but it really was a fantastic interpretation of this
text. Zeger Vandersteene did most of the recitatives, singing John's
stuff. It really begins like, 'Hi, I'm John, imprisoned on the island
of Patmos' (but then the vulgate Latin) and goes right through the
woman clothed with the sun, the beast, the seven bowls with seven
plagues, seven horsemen... up to the uniting of the Church with God.
Scored for a huge choir, a smaller choir (the 24), a divine voice
consisting of baritone and contralto singing in octaves, a basso
continuo for them of harp and celeste, a recorder quartet and two
trumpets, orchestra, seven sopranos who wander around and up and down
as angels, and another soloist.
If you don't keep up with the text, the two hours could get
tedious...but I found it marvellous.
-James
Raymond Hall
news:3A33589A...@tschan-partner.com...
Before you get thoroughly flamed David, try Lilburn, Sculthorpe, Vine,
Arnold (wasn't just a composer of light works)and Englund just for starters.
There is still plenty of extremely good (fairly to easily) accessible music
being written. And you forgot Shosty's later efforts. And Hovhaness. But
then he always was mud to most of this lot ;-)
A lot of Scandinavian music is well worthy of research also, and will repay
the effort.
Matthew B. Tepper
>In article <3A33589A...@tschan-partner.com>,
> Charl...@econophone.ch wrote:
>But honestly, there is nothing written after
>> about the late 1950's that I hear that carries me away on first or
>third
>> hearing - my benchmark test - as did say Bartok or Stravinsky or
>Honegger.
>> Nothing at all.
>>
>> Of course I exclude composers who were already established by then -
>such as
>> Britten - and who were not products of the time when serialism had a
>> death-grip on the groves of academe.
>>
>> I now expect the usual flame-throwers to go into action.....
>>
>> :-))
>>
>> David.
>>
>This'll probably be unknown to every user of this ng--but in Flanders
>(that's in Belgium b.t.w.) you've got Kurt Bickembergs. Last month he
>premiered an oratorio called 'Apocalypse' based on the vulgate text of
>the book of Revelation--not the whole book, but the libretto
>w/translation was about 20 pages long. Very very good! And who's ever
>had the balls to narrate this book musically?
Well, there *is* Franz Schmidt's "Das Buch mit Sieben Siegeln"....
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/index.html
My main music page --- http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/berlioz.html
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
"Compassionate Conservatism?" * "Tight Slacks?" * "Jumbo Shrimp?"
Matthew B. Tepper
>
>*You* really need a lesson in basic netiquette,
>Mr. CosyPostAnonymouslyWithGreatHypocrisy.
Well, that has been obvious all along.
David7Gable
>avant-garde, Rachmaninov reverted to aesthetics that were believed to
>be extinct in 'serious music' -- his pianist skills were much admired
>by the 'truely modern'-ists, but as a composer he was attacked for his
>romanticism.
You speak as if the advanced modernist music of the period was standard
repertory while Rachmaninov was composing while composers like Rachmaninov
could not get a hearing. This is simply not true. There was nothing either
courageous or shameful in writing as Rachmaninov wrote during the period when
he wrote it. For the record, I know what "communis opinio" means.
-david gable
David7Gable
>anybody, so his acidity has to be taken in perspective.
>
If you mean Stravinsky, this is balderdash. It is true that between the wars
he held a decidedly anti-Romantic stance, but the range of Western music from
the Middle Ages to the present that Stravinsky was familiar with is nothing
short of staggering. The composers he admired include Josquin, Monteverdi,
Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Donizetti, Debussy, Webern, and Carter to name
only a tiny handful of the extraordinarily diverse list of composers he knew
well and loved. Moreover, between the wars, he was a passionate advocate of
Tchaikovsky.
-david gable
David7Gable
>>
>
>What? They didn't do their own paintings?
>
He means that it was common in the Renaissance for many background details in a
painting already well mapped out by the master to be executed by his students,
while the central figures were realized by the master.
-david gable
samir golescu
I love that scene--forgot where I read it--w/ Stravinsky meeting
Rachmaninov in US, drinking themselves out, in Russian tradition, while
Stravinsky was teasing Rachmaninov: "Ha, the Soviets stole your royalties
on the C# Minor Prelude, didn't they?" or something similar...
regards,
SG
P.S. Another great Slavic Drinking Scene is the one in which Rubinstein
outdrank a drunk-to-the-comma-level Richter (which wasn't an easy thing to
do, I bet, even compared to playing Gaspard de la nuit).
David7Gable
See the marvelous Hughes essay on Stella's Swan Engravings in the catalogue
accompanying an exhibition of the engravings in Houston (I think). By the way,
the Stella that I like is the Stella of the "second career," that is the Stella
from the late 70's on. I fell in love with this Stella from the catalogue of
the second big Moma retrospective, and when I finall saw one of those later
Stella's in person (in Washington D.C.) I nearly swooned.
-david gable
David Grayshan
Nice to hear from you again. :-))
I include all the names you mention as being in the "highly enjoyable" category.
They are all "traditionalists" in the best sense of the word. As to Lilburn, I
have an idea that he is (was?) an underrated master. There is a set of his 3
symphonies but I have not yet managed to lay my hands on it.
May I also recommend Dan, Ikuma (proper word order, I believe) to your
attention?
I like the Japanese aesthetic generally so I keep trying with other contemporary
Japanese composers (e.g. Takemitsu). I hear incidental beautiful sounds and
sometimes whole passages: but not a coherent work in the sense of what I
understand by "Western Classical Music". (I miss melody, development and
"purposefulness" if you understand what I mean by that, like Bartok going from
Alpha to Omega in the First Piano Concerto). Maybe there are attempts being made
to creat a new aesthetic: fair enough, but it mostly repells me and I have
always *believed* myself to be prepared to be open-minded.....
Raymond Hall wrote:
> (Snip)
>
> Before you get thoroughly flamed David, try Lilburn, Sculthorpe, Vine,
> Arnold (wasn't just a composer of light works)and Englund just for starters.
> There is still plenty of extremely good (fairly to easily) accessible music
> being written. And you forgot Shosty's later efforts. And Hovhaness. But
> then he always was mud to most of this lot ;-)
> A lot of Scandinavian music is well worthy of research also, and will repay
> the effort.
>
> Regards,(Snip)
I love the Scandinavians, but Pettersen I find boring.....
Regards,
David.
David7Gable
>I now expect the usual flame-throwers to go into action.....
You've thrown enough flames for one day.
-david gable
Simon Roberts
: >Does Hughes really like Stella all that much?
So you literally swooned, then?
Simon
David7Gable
Andrew Lloyd Webber is not a composer I follow, so I can't speak with authority
on the subject, but the prelude to Jesus Christ Superstar was written by
Mussorgsky, which is not acknowledged by the plagiarist himself.
-david gable
REG
artist? It hardly seems consistent with the otherwise rigorous nature of
your other posts here.
Dan Koren <DanK...@Yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:90uml4$djg$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...
samir golescu
On 10 Dec 2000, David7Gable wrote:
>
> Andrew Lloyd Webber is not a composer I follow, so I can't speak with authority
> on the subject, but the prelude to Jesus Christ Superstar was written by
> Mussorgsky,
Um, never knew Mussorgsky had avant-garde views to *such* a degree...
> which is not acknowledged by the plagiarist himself.
Had he acknowledged, could you call him now a plagiarist? .... (-:
regards,
SG
David Grayshan
Apropos of this:
David7Gable wrote:
> (Snip) Moreover, between the wars, he was a passionate advocate of Tchaikovsky.
>
> -david gable
I seem to remember a comment of his on Sibelius' Suite Chempetre (is my memory
deceiving me, was it in fact another Sibelius work?), which ran along the lines
of, "I really like that kind of Northern Italianite lyricism" or somesuch. It
surprised me when I first read it, but when you think about it, it's quite
consistent with his own aesthetic.
I was surprised to hear how the "Symphonies d'Instruments du Vent" sounded in
Boulez' DGG performance, quite magnificent and of an extraordinary lyricism not
brought out by most performances. Deeply impressive.....
Regards,
David.
David7Gable
>
>
At last! A genuine fraud. Although, oddly enough, during the period when he
was "preparing" pianos he was not a fraud but a rather original if very minor
master. He prepared pianos for the performance of certain of his own keyboard
works by inserting rubber erasers, screws, bolts, etc between the piano
strings. These objects were not inserted at random and were inserted in order
to change the timbre of the piano. When you play the piano so prepared, it
sounds rather like a Balinese or Javanese gamelan, and Cage's modest works for
the prepared piano from the 1940's are quite charming pieces. He only
discovered chance operations in the early 1950's.
-david gable
Matthew B. Tepper
<20001210142524...@ng-fc1.aol.com>:
And the "main theme" is swiped from "How to Succeed in Business Without
Really Trying."
David7Gable
>Cage
>Glass
>Reich
>Boulez
>Stockhausen
>etc...
I can't stand their simplistic music, but not even Glass and Reich are frauds.
Glass in particular has the most miniscule talent imaginable, but he's not a
fraud. Not even Cage and Stockhausen were/are invariably frauds, and Cage in
the 40's (before he discovered chance) was a more gifted composer than Glass
will ever be.
When you include Boulez on the list of frauds it only proves that you are still
at the stage of total incomprehension in listening to his music. Nobody who
has not listened enough to assimilate the idiom is a qualified judge of any
music. The wall of noise you hear when a Boulez piece is performed is not
music only in the sense that the gibberish I hear when the Chinese speak is not
language. Boulez becomes music for those who learn the language, a process
that involves listening, as with any other music, including Chopin's. Schumann
thought the last movement of Chopin's B flat minor sonata was not music: he
literally couldn't grasp the melody and harmony through Chopin's revolutionary
texture. Berlioz read through the prelude to Tristan and failed to grasp it
because of its hyper-chromatic idiom in which the diminished seventh chord is
far more prevalent than major and minor triads. Rimsky advised the young
Stravinsky not to listen to Debussy because he might learn to like it.
Nor is it merely a matter of opinion that Boulez's music is music. We who have
come to love Boulez's music know that it is music and not an
uninterpreted/uninterpretable wall of noise, because the process of
assimilating artworks is indistinguishable from the process of assimilating
their language. We couldn't have assimilated his "language" if it really
wasn't one.
In order for Mr. Koren and Mr. Grayshan to hold their totally dismissive
opinions of Boulez's music as fraudulent non-music, they must necessarily also
believe that I am lying or shamming. If the sounds produced when a Boulez
score is performed are not music, then it must necessarily be the case that I
am only pretending to enjoy it, pretending to have assimilated its language.
And the same goes for the dozen other Boulez fanatics who contribute regularly
to this newsgroup. In the end, that's what's too preposterous to believe.
Boulez's music has attracted thousands of listeners and performers over the
past century who are passionately committed to it. We may constitute a
miniscule percentage of the human race, but art is not a popularity contest.
On the other hand, among the devotees of every style, there is generally a
consensus as to who the central figures are. Students of impressionism tend to
prefer Monet to Sisley, Caillebotte, or Mary Cassatt. Similarly, among those
of us interested in the composers of the Darmstadt school, as Berio, Boulez, et
al are sometimes called, there is a consensus that Boulez is one of the central
figures.
Boulez's music may never gain a wide popularity (neither has Emily Dickinson's
poetry), but you never know. After more than half a century Mahler's music
moved to the center of the standard orchestral repertory. Berg is only now
beginning to win a measure of true popularity. Nothing Boulez has composed
since 1970 approaches the first movement of the Eroica or the Grosse Fugue in
complexity. It's not hard for me to imagine a coloristic masterpiece like
Repons becoming genuinely popular. But even if it never does, it is likely
that there will always be a tiny core of fanatics passionately attached to
Boulez's music. Stendhal wrote "for the happy few,"and Boulez will always have
at least his happy few.
-david gable
David7Gable
>Mr. CosyPostAnonymouslyWithGreatHypocrisy.
>
>
Where's the hypocrisy? Being mistaken about the role of the moderator on
moderated newsgroups doesn't constitute hypocrisy. Not even posting
anonymously does.
-david gable
David7Gable
>Boulez' DGG performance, quite magnificent and of an extraordinary lyricism
>not
>brought out by most performances. Deeply impressive.....
>
Why don't you buy a recording of Boulez's Repons where you may discover the
continuation of the Franco-Russian coloristic tradition that you seem to admire
so much?
-david gable
David7Gable
>So you literally swooned, then?
No, I literally nearly swooned. There literally was a momentary loss of breath
accompanied by tingling in what I take to have been my stomach.
-david gable
mif...@my-deja.com
Very well put. Music is a language. Some music sounds like gibberish to
those who chose not to learn it. A great deal of music however, Western
music, falls "naturally" upon the ear. Mozart and Bach found audiences
among the great masses who found it easily enjoyable with little or no
effort at all. Cross-cultural music appreciation is more difficult.
Westerners confused by Asian music. Ravi Shankar tunes up before a
performance and the audience applauds thinking he's just played his
first piece. But within the Western sphere, some composers chart new
paths and the audience now must "learn" to like what they hear. Just, I
assume, as Beethoven's audiences had to "learn" to like the Grosse
Fugue. Just as Van Gogh's paintings were never accepted outside his
small circle of fellow artists until after he had died.
I must admit I'm a lazy listener. If it doesn't fall naturally and
gracefully upon my ear I move on rather quickly. I suppose I envy those
who are more disciplined and better educated in this field than I.
Happy listening to all.
MIFrost
David7Gable
>music, falls "naturally" upon the ear. Mozart and Bach found audiences
>among the great masses who found it easily enjoyable with little or no
>effort at all.
The quotation remarks around "naturally," though, are crucial. We didn't
spring from the womb speakers of English or understanders of Bach. When we are
very small, we are taught tunes that do nothing but arpeggiate a major chord.
Through experiences such as this we internalize the grammar of tonality. Also,
while it is undeniably true that Mozart more quickly found a bigger audience
than Schoenberg's most complex works ever will, it is not true that they met
with no resistance or that everybody who listens to Mozart hears everything
going on in his music. Bach's music remained an esoteric music for
professionals (that is, other composers) and a few sophisticated performers and
amateurs with absolutely no public in the modern sense until the later
nineteenth century.
-david gable
MTaboada
other well-known composers are or were "frauds". Even if you consider
that their music is bad, there have beeen no false pretences and no
other fraudulent actions (such as stealing from other composers, or
having someone else write their music).
Regards,
mrt
Simon Roberts
: I continue to be astounded by the allegations that Glass, Cage, and
I completely agree.
Simon
mif...@my-deja.com
david...@aol.com (David7Gable) wrote:
When we are
> very small, we are taught tunes that do nothing but arpeggiate a
major chord.
> Through experiences such as this we internalize the grammar of
tonality. Also,
> while it is undeniably true that Mozart more quickly found a bigger
audience
> than Schoenberg's most complex works ever will, it is not true that
they met
> with no resistance or that everybody who listens to Mozart hears
everything
> going on in his music. >
>
Very true. Peter Schickele on his radio program provides excellent
insight into the internal goings-on in a great deal of the music I take
for granted. There's just so much more happening in Mozart, Beethoven,
Haydn, Brahms and the rest that goes right over my head while I'm
quietly enjoying the *apparent* "simplicity" of the music. Inverting a
melody to counterpoint itself and the like. (Does that make sense?)
David Grayshan
You have obviously missed some of my postings.
David7Gable wrote:
> (Snip)
> In order for Mr. Koren and Mr. Grayshan to hold their totally dismissive
> opinions of Boulez's music as fraudulent non-music, (Snip)
I have not stated that PB's music was a fraud. I have stated (1). I do not like it
and do not detect anything in it that moves me in any way whatsoever like that of,
say, Bartok or Stravinsky do: and (2). I think PB says some very silly things
sometimes.
The trouble with you, old boy, is that you are what I recently called an Ayatollah
of the Avant-Garde, in this case of Boulez. You are quite besotted with his music
and cannot stand it when anyone critices him or dismisses it..... you immediately
feel the need to attack the person, not address yourself to the possibility that
there might, *just*, be other opinions than yours.
Only time will tell what people the future will think of PB's music, but plenty of
people in the present think that it is a non-musical desert. Accept this or not, it
is all the same to me.
Regards,
David.
lord_e...@my-deja.com
:):)
To be sure of being literally correct, perhaps one should say:
"tingling in what was my stomach at the time". Just to keep all
options open...
Anyway, what claims it's my stomach is semi-literally convulsed from
laughter from this exchange...
Lena
Alain Dagher
Simon Roberts wrote:
This again?
The word "fraud" when used in this context does not mean stealing or
plagiarizing. It is used as hyperbole. In fact, that is the only possibly
way it could be used when describing an artist.
So for example, when someone says that George Steiner is "that very rare
thing, a complete charlattan" one is not saying that he hires people to
write his essays. (I just LOVE that line!)
Alain
John Grabowski
>
> On Thu, 07 Dec 2000 20:29:02 GMT, MTaboada <matr...@yahoo.com>
> wrote:
>
> >The late Giacinto Scelsi was accused of being a fraud (specifically, the
> >accusation was that someone else wrote his music). I don't know what
> >truth there is to this. I do know that his music is terrible. Besides
> >Scelsi, I don't know of any other classical composer who was fraudulent
> >or was accused of fraud. This topic has been discussed before, and I'll
> >repeat what I said then: fraud is very unlikely in a classical composer
> >or performer. What about engineering fraud, where engineers fix a
> >recording so that it misrepresents the actual talent of the artist? This
> >would indeed be fraud, though I don't know of any specific instances --
> >Pinchas Zukerman claims that this kind of fraud is rampant (he was
> >referring, in particular, to some HIP recordings).
> >
> >Regards,
> >
> >MrT
>
> Well, Zukerman would, wouldn't he? -- the authenticists were breaking
> his rice bowl.
Huh? How his more than anyone elses? Also why specifically the
HIPsters?
> That was the thing about Zukerman's claims -- he
> wouldn't name names. He also claimed at least one major "period music"
> conductor couldn't read music. Without naming any names, of course.
Why's that "the thing" in his case? In all cases like this people don't
name names. There are these pesky things called lawsuits. Mind you, I
have no idea if he's speaking truth, but the fact that he's afraid to
name names...hardly unusual.
John
> John Harkness
--
John Grabowski
>
> It is perhaps easier to be a fraud in the visual arts. It is probably very
> hard to be a total fraud in music. There is Helfgot for example
I'm no Helfgott defender by any means, but how is he a "fraud"? Not
very good, but that's different from a fraud.
John
--
Spammers: I don't need a work-at-home business, a ground-floor
investment opportunity or Viagra, thank you.
Simon Roberts
: The word "fraud" when used in this context does not mean stealing or
: plagiarizing. It is used as hyperbole. In fact, that is the only possibly
: way it could be used when describing an artist.
Yes, but then what does it refer to? If it's just another way of
exaggerating, of saying "I really don't like x", or "A's music literally
makes my head spin", well, I'm not sure any response is warranted
other than "me too" or "who cares?" The "hook", surely, is the possibility
that "fraud" is meant literally, no?
Simon
John Grabowski
> The late romantics like Rachmaninoff and, especially, Wagner shattered
> the "communis opinio" (Is that a real term? It sounds good.) and then
> became embraced by it. But I don't think it's all about "taste" really.
> Any more than gourmet cooking is all about "taste" either. An
> incompetent cook can whip up a tasty dish and please his friends but he
> won't beat the Iron Chef. The skill required to produce a truly
> outstanding classical composition is, I suspect, more difficult to fake
> than the skill required to produce a "modern" work of art. I'm probably
> wrong but that's my position until I'm laughed off this thread.
I'm not going to get into whether it's "fraud" either in the visual arts
or music, but how about comparing the scribblings of modern art with the
"ploink ploink ploink" of atonal classical music? I hear a lot of
compositions that sound like my cat walking across the piano keys.
Supposedly there's more to it than that, some sort of profoundly subtle
organization of tone clusters (the jury's still out), but to the
uninitiated that's what it sounds like. Similarly there's modern
painting that looks to the uninitiated like someone threw globs of paint
at a wall.
John
John Grabowski
>
> Certain "artists" in the world of art have long been considered frauds
> by a sizable portion of the art community. While many admire, even
> revere, the works of Warhol, Leichtenstein, Pollock, and others, many
> believe these artists were laughing all the way to the bank. (I
> personally take no side in this issue.) A gullible and uneducated public
> can often be fooled into believing a scribble is the work of genius
> under the right circumstances. Is there a parallel in the world of
> classical music? Does anyone here believe that certain respected
> composers (or performers), while deserving of a short-lived
> "fad-appeal," should not even be taken as seriously as they are today?
> (Please out the Vanessa Maes and Linda Bravas among performers. I'm
> talking about composers and performers who have a "respected" following
> along the lines of the artists I named above.)
I'm surprised no one's mentioned the several books written by Henry
Pleasants in the 1950s and early 60s on this subject--The Agony of
Modern Music, Serious Music And All That Jazz! and the like. Whether
you agree with him or not (and I won't say either way...flame wars are
all too easy to start on this) he targeted dozens of modern "classical"
composers, most of the atonal kind, who he felt were no longer
communicating with anyone other than themselves and perhaps a narrow few
like-minded academics, and who were glad to be doing that. He argued
that the jazz musicians of the last twenty years--the Ella Fitzgeralds
and Charlie Parkers and Duke Ellingtons and Louis Armstrongs--were
reaching their audiences directly and emotionally, the way Mozart and
Haydn and others did in their time. Little did Henry know that just a
few years after writing these books jazz musicians would turn "modern"
with a vengeance (late Coltrane, Rasheed Ali, Steve Lacy, Cecil Taylor,
etc.)
John
Charles Milton Ling
few days ago - but I simply *have* to:
John Grabowski wrote:
> mif...@my-deja.com wrote:
>
> > The late romantics like Rachmaninoff and, especially, Wagner shattered
> > the "communis opinio" (Is that a real term? It sounds good.) and then
> > became embraced by it. But I don't think it's all about "taste" really.
> > Any more than gourmet cooking is all about "taste" either.
Not all about taste. But primarily about taste. It also includes
presentation and a certain dramaturgy during a multi-course meal. However,
these are servants to taste.
> An
> > incompetent cook can whip up a tasty dish and please his friends but he
> > won't beat the Iron Chef.
A cook who can whip up a tasty dish is not incompetent. The Iron Chef, I
believe, is some television entertainment. Perhaps it puts a premium on
resistance to stress or something like that. (My information is sketchy.)
This is a quality much in demand in the profession. It has nothing to do
with taste.
> The skill required to produce a truly
> > outstanding classical composition is, I suspect, more difficult to fake
> > than the skill required to produce a "modern" work of art. I'm probably
> > wrong but that's my position until I'm laughed off this thread.
>
> I'm not going to get into whether it's "fraud" either in the visual arts
> or music, but how about comparing the scribblings of modern art with the
> "ploink ploink ploink" of atonal classical music? I hear a lot of
> compositions that sound like my cat walking across the piano keys.
> Supposedly there's more to it than that, some sort of profoundly subtle
> organization of tone clusters (the jury's still out), but to the
> uninitiated that's what it sounds like. Similarly there's modern
> painting that looks to the uninitiated like someone threw globs of paint
> at a wall.
>
It should astonish me greatly if that has never been done in the name of art.
>
> John
Charley
Charles Ling
Vienna, Austria
John Grabowski
> Nor is it merely a matter of opinion that Boulez's music is music. We who have
> come to love Boulez's music know that it is music and not an
> uninterpreted/uninterpretable wall of noise, because the process of
> assimilating artworks is indistinguishable from the process of assimilating
> their language. We couldn't have assimilated his "language" if it really
> wasn't one.
I'm not taking sides about Boulez (the jury's still out for me), *but*
if the above simplistic statement were true, then *by definition* no
music (or art) could be fraud if only one person said they liked it.
Think about it.
> In order for Mr. Koren and Mr. Grayshan to hold their totally dismissive
> opinions of Boulez's music as fraudulent non-music, they must necessarily also
> believe that I am lying or shamming. If the sounds produced when a Boulez
> score is performed are not music, then it must necessarily be the case that I
> am only pretending to enjoy it, pretending to have assimilated its language.
> And the same goes for the dozen other Boulez fanatics who contribute regularly
> to this newsgroup. In the end, that's what's too preposterous to believe.
If the teachings of Jim Jones were not valid, then it must necessarily
be the case that people were only pretending to understand it,
pretending to see what they say are its message. And the same goes for
the dozens of other zealots who have large followings--L. Ron Hubbard,
David Koresh, etc. We all know if hundreds or thousands of people are
in agreement about something, it *must* always be valid, right?
John
David7Gable
>> painting that looks to the uninitiated like someone threw globs of paint
>> at a wall.
>>
>
>It should astonish me greatly if that has never been done in the name of art.
This tedious accusation was already hurled at Whistler by John Ruskin, who
wrote in response to Whistler's Nocturne in Black and Gold: The Falling
Rocket, a painting of exploding fireworks, "I have seen and heard much of
Cockney impudence before now; but never expected to hear a coxcomb ask two
hundred guineas for flinging a pot of paint in the public's face."
-david gable
David7Gable
>This again?
>
>The word "fraud" when used in this context does not mean stealing or
>plagiarizing. It is used as hyperbole.
>In fact, that is the only possibly
>way it could be used when describing an artist.
No, I think that many people quite honestly believe that most atonal music is a
fraud: that it is not music in the normal sense of the word, that no one could
possibly appreciate the patterns of which it consists, and that there is the
grossest charlatanry involved in "composing" it. (My italics are intended to
convey their and not my suspicion that this music is not really composed in the
traditional sense but a fraud.)
I don't think much of Respighi, but I can't imagine expressing this by saying
he's a fraud.
-david gable
David7Gable
>that "fraud" is meant literally, no?
Surely. For once I am firmly on the side of the literalists. A fraud isn't
something or someone you don't think is very good. It's a form of dishonesty
that purports to be what it is not. When Ruskin accused Whistler of flinging a
pot of paint in the public's face he meant that Whistler was a fraud, that what
he had done was not really painting at all. When Dan Koren accuses Boulez of
being a fraud, it doesn't mean he thinks Boulez is a poor composer. It means
he thinks that what Boulez does isn't really music at all. The rage against
modernism is due to the perception that a fraud is being perpetrated.
-david gable
David7Gable
>Ayatollah
>of the Avant-Garde
When you call somebody an Ayatollah for being passionate about somebody's
music, you shouldn't be surprised that he takes offense. No one has ever
accused me of being an Ayatollah for defending Johann Strauss, fils, not even
those who think that Strauss is the lowest form of trash. It's only when you
make the mistake of insisting that some modernist art really is richly
rewarding art that you are accused using such language.
>Only time will tell what people the future will think of PB's music, but
>plenty of
>people in the present think that it is a non-musical desert. Accept this or
>not, it
>is all the same to me.
I am well aware of the absolute truth of these claims of yours, but they prove
nothing. It is a myth that we must wait for the future to decide for once and
for all the value of a composer's music. Every music that has ever been
written has established itself with at least a small coterie of fanatics from
the very beginning. If it can't do that, it won't survive. The myth of the
misunderstood genius is just that, a myth. The conservative American composer
Virgil Thomson and very many others including Milhaud and Messiaen were
convinced of Boulez's phenomenal gifts before he was 25. Those people who
think that Boulez's music is NOT MUSIC, that it is, as you put it, "a
non-musical desert," could not possibly believe that if they had come to
understand its language. Now it is possible that once they had come to
understand the language of Boulez's music, they would find it to be poor music,
but they are not yet in a position to make that finding. And either this is a
FACT or I am lying when I claim to have assimilated Boulez's language. There
are no alternatives. Either the performers and listeners who feel passionately
about Boulez's music are liars or dupes, or Boulez's music is music in the
traditional sense of the word with a language that can be assimilated and
appreciated. If that is the case, then those who feel in good or bad faith
that Boulez's music is not music are simply mistaken, and they are mistaken
whether or not they are in the majority. It wouldn't be the first time that a
majority was mistaken about something it couldn't understand.
Nor does the survival of music depend on wide popular acceptance. It depends
on the acceptance of performers passionately committted to performing it. That
Boulez's music has most emphatically won. If music engages enough performers,
it will also engage some semblance of an audience. Maybe not an audience the
size of Ricky Martin's or even Bruckner's, but that is simply no evidence one
way or the other about the quality of the art in question. There is plenty of
esoteric art with a miniscule audience out there, but it survives because of
the small number of people passionately devoted to it. Nobody else matters.
In the end, your argument is a purely statistical argument. To quote you,
"plenty of people in the present think that [Boulez's music] is a non-musical
desert." Plenty of people think Bach is a bore and Ricky Martin a god.
Apparently only something like 6% of CD sales are sales of classical music.
What do these statistics prove? They prove that Ricky Martin is more popular
than Bach. Beethoven's symphonies are more popular than his late quartets and
always will be. Traviata is more popular than Falstaff and always will be. It
doesn't follow that the audiences for the late Beethoven quartets and Falstaff
are made up of liars or dupes. It proves that the greater complexity and
concentration of some artistic languages limits the size of their audiences.
-david gable
Alain Dagher
Simon Roberts wrote:
> Alain Dagher (al...@bic.mni.mcgill.ca) wrote:
>
> : The word "fraud" when used in this context does not mean stealing or
> : plagiarizing. It is used as hyperbole. In fact, that is the only possibly
> : way it could be used when describing an artist.
>
> Yes, but then what does it refer to? If it's just another way of
> exaggerating, of saying "I really don't like x",
No, it means something else. It implies that someone is trying to put one over
on the public. I can't come up with a musical example, but in painting I could
say that I don't like Renoir (because he commits the sin of sentimentality),
whereas Keith Harring is a fraud. Those are very different statements.
Alain
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
: Where are your manners, Mr. Koren?
I was given to understand (perhaps incorrectly -- although it seems reasonable
given his name) that Mr. Koren is originally from Israel. If that is the
case, expecting manners from him is a contradiction in terms.
-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"You go on playing Bach your way, and I'll go on playing him *his* way."
-- Wanda Landowska
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
: "A's music literally makes my head spin"
Ouch.
-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
"That's *genius*!"
"Really? I thought it was Rachmaninov."
sch...@gefen.cc.biu.ac.il
: Bach's music remained an esoteric music for professionals (that is, other
: no public in the modern sense until the later nineteenth century.
the same reason that it is much more popular today -- it makes far fewer
demands on the listener. And if anyone doubts that Telemann is more
popular than Bach, I suggest that you compare how much of each of the two
is played on your local classical music station.
-----
Richard Schultz sch...@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
It's a bird, it's a plane -- no, it's Mozart. . .
David7Gable
>I'm not taking sides about Boulez (the jury's still out for me), *but*
>if the above simplistic statement were true, then *by definition* no
>music (or art) could be fraud if only one person said they liked it.
>Think about it.
I've already expressed my skepticism about the existence of artistic frauds.
Actually, I do believe they exist, or something very like frauds, and I believe
there have been more of them in the last century than in previous centuries.
But frauds of this kind (and fads is a better word) do not survive for the
simple fact that there is not enough nourishment on their bones. A piece for
several metronomes, metronomes that you wind up and allow to run down, may be
cute once, but how many times is anybody going to want to listen to it? As
Stravinsky once said, 99% of all avant garde products are transparent
puerilities.
Moreover, there never has been any art that only one person has claimed to
like. It's hard to see how there could be such a thing. For even one person
to grasp an artistic "language," the language has to be something within the
capacity of human beings to grasp. So if one person can grasp it, others will
prove capable of grasping it. Not everybody is interested in any one of the
arts, there are only so many hours in the day, and there is an inexhaustible
supply of things to absorb us within the universe, but among those interested
in Western music and painting, there have always been numbers of people
interested in any given modernist art. (It is also not necessary for everybody
to grasp a language with ease for it to be a language that people can grasp.
Some people are brilliant mathematicians. Others are terrible at arithmetic.
But there are still plenty of mathematicians, although they constitute only a
tiny minority of human beings.)
Jim Jones and David Koresh also do not provide a precise parallel. Charlatans
in the realm of religion are never obliged to prove their claims. The dupe of
a religious charlatan is never going to obtain evidence of the charlatan's
claims except perhaps in the afterlife. Faith is an indispensable component of
religions. An artist must "prove" his "claims," that is, his art work must
engage its audience in the here and now. All human beings are grammar
processors and all of the arts depend on something analogous to the processing
of grammars, above all music. Those who become devoted to, say, Kandinsky or
Boulez are not taking anything on faith. They are responding to a language
they have assimilated with their visual or auditory capacities, their
consciousness, and their grammar-processing capacity. This is implicit in the
claim to have liked the artwork in question. You cannot like Boulez without
first having assimilated his language. There has to be something there.
It is of course true that I might be lying when I claim to have assimilated
Boulez's language, to love his music. Or that I have fooled myself into
believing that Boulez's music is music and that I have come to like it. Even
more incredibly, the performers who have learned to play Boulez's music,
devoting hours of their lives to learning it so they can perform it, also have
to be lying or fooling themselves. That's the only possibility if Boulez's
music is not music but a fraud that Boulez and his admirers are perpetrating on
the public. Either we are liars or dupes and Boulez's music is not music, or
Boulez's music is music and those who claim that it is not music are mistaken
for whatever reason.
Believe it or not, I do understand why people of good faith are capable of
suspecting that the emperor has no clothes, but after a century of modernist
art, those of us who can see the clothes are getting mighty tired of having to
make the argument at the basic level of whether or not there are any clothes in
the first place. We are tired of it because we have long since gotten beyond
that question ourselves, just as in this very same lifetime we have gotten
beyond it with Mozart and Rembrandt.
How do I know anybody likes Mozart? How do I know he isn't lying? I don't.
But I do know that people are born incapable of speaking a language, that at
birth they are incapable of distinguishing shapes with the precision necessary
to make out a Rembrandt. Yet I also know that we are capable of developing our
capacities to distinguish shapes and speak a language. I know that at least one
person has developed the capacity to appreciate Boulez's music, because that
person is me, and I don't consider myself to be a musical superman like Mozart
or Boulez, of whom an awed member of the New York Philharmonic once said if you
dropped a pin he could tell you what key it was in. So if I with my average
routine auditory equipment, consciousness, and grammar-processing capacity have
managed to assimilate Boulez's idiom, I know that others must also be capable
of this same feat. Either that, or I'm lying. And I'm not lying.
-david gable
David7Gable
>dominant languages of tradition, or from the many cultural contexts
>in which they exist?
In my opinion, absolutely not. I think this is the hard lesson Boulez learned
in 1951 and 1952 with total serialism. There is no music without tradition.
Or as Boulez would say to day, "Tradition is like a forest. The most you do is
chop down a little of the dead wood."
Of course, people know Boulez wrote a totally serial piece. They don't know
how quickly he repudiated total serialism way back in the early 50's.
-david gable
David7Gable
>over
>on the public.
Alain, now you are agreeing with Simon and me! (However, I don't agree that
Renoir's greatest pictures commit the sin of sentimentality either, although
there was a horrible falling off in the later work.)
-david gable
James
> >>
> >This'll probably be unknown to every user of this ng--but in Flanders
> >(that's in Belgium b.t.w.) you've got Kurt Bickembergs. Last month
he
> >premiered an oratorio called 'Apocalypse' based on the vulgate text
of
> >the book of Revelation--not the whole book, but the libretto
> >w/translation was about 20 pages long. Very very good! And who's
ever
> >had the balls to narrate this book musically?
>
> Well, there *is* Franz Schmidt's "Das Buch mit Sieben Siegeln"....
>
Hmmm--can you tell me more about this work, please...?
mif...@my-deja.com
I started this thread using the word "fraud" because I still have it in
my pea-brain head that "real" classical music, by its very nature, is
more than likable melodies or complicated dissonances strung together.
(I know. No one is saying it is.) But, when an orchestra plays Beatles
tunes in a classical arrangement we can like what we hear but it isn't
classical music. A history and tradition has developed in this music
that separates it (not necessarily "elevates" it) from other kinds of
music, even when other music uses classical forms (Mantovani, 100
Strings, et. al.). As stupid as I am I am always seeking that elusive
Rosetta Stone of CM. I like *this* piece and it belongs in the
classical section of my record store. I also like *that* but it's
pseudo-classical and belongs elsewhere. I don't need
anyone's "permission" or "validation" for my listening habits (which
include Jazz and folk). I suppose this is just an academic exercise.
Perhaps others find my comments interesting as a jumping-off point for
further discussion.
MIFrost
CosyFunnyTutu
<dgra...@tschan-partner.com> wrote:
>The point below is a very good though no doubt controversial one:
>
>
>(Snip)
>
>I would myself point to a large number of contemporary composers and say
>"this emperor has no clothes", indeed I have done so in general terms right
>here in this NG - and been roundly condemned by the Ayatollahs of the
>Avant-Garde for doing so.
>
You might point to lots of contemporary composers, but 'Avant-Garde'
won't be found amongst them, since that's not a contemporary 'ism'.
You might argue that all contemporary compositions you don't like are
avant-garde, but they are not Avant-Garde -- like a contemporary novel
can be gothic, but not Gothic.
>
>Most contemporary music I hear is rubbish, especially most of the serial
>stuff - though not all of it.
>
Since Serialism isn't a contemporary 'ism' , you've probably heard
contemporary compositions that are more or less influenced by
serialism, over even neo-serialist.
It seems you think 'contemporary' is used to denominate music that
isn't contemporary. Confusing at most. But maybe you just tried to
convey an extremely witty viewpoint on Post-Modernism. In that case,
my command of this language is not strong enough to get the point.
>I was impressed by what I heard the other day of music by Killmayer (must
>investigate this further). Also there is a Dutch composer whose name I still
>have not traced who writes in a Berg style of atonality/tonality that
>impressed me when I heard it. But honestly, there is nothing written after
>about the late 1950's that I hear that carries me away on first or third
>hearing - my benchmark test - as did say Bartok or Stravinsky or Honegger.
>Nothing at all.
>
>Of course I exclude composers who were already established by then - such as
>Britten - and who were not products of the time when serialism had a
>death-grip on the groves of academe.
>
>I now expect the usual flame-throwers to go into action.....
>
I hope they do, because I don't know any Ayatollahs of Serialism yet.
They must be really old, I'd say. I look forward to it.
Terry Cross
What we know is that, from Mozart to hip-hop, the sole judge of
validity in music is the appreciation of the listener. There is no
other standard or test tool. In that respect, music is like a moose
call, but different from carburetors.
Religion, on the other hand is more in the category of the moose call:
If the moose answers, you know the call is good, regardless of how
silly it may sound to a human being or a polecat.
TCross
--
Logic is Truth, and Truth, Logic.
This is all we know in Life, and all we need to know.
CosyFunnyTutu
>You speak as if the advanced modernist music of the period was standard
>repertory while Rachmaninov was composing while composers like Rachmaninov
>could not get a hearing. This is simply not true. There was nothing either
>courageous or shameful in writing as Rachmaninov wrote during the period when
>he wrote it. For the record, I know what "communis opinio" means.
>
>-david gable
You're right. I meant to say (and I still think I did, but English is
not my native tongue) that Rachmaninov was 'revolutionary'
(revolutionary 'reactionary', actually) in the eyes of the people who
regarded themselves as monopolists of Good Taste. I'm aware that the
standard repertoire of most orchestras wasn't brimming with Serialism
c.s., and -that- is precisely the reason that young composers at that
time took a dictatorial stand against music that more or less
resembled HaydnMozartBeethoven.
The only courage Rachmaninoc needed in writing those 'traditional'
compositions of his, was to brace himself against the (in retrospect
not very) influential High Priests of Modernism. But I don't think he
cared.
CosyFunnyTutu
<dgra...@tschan-partner.com> wrote:
>Chempetre
Champetre (give or take on of those silly french diacritical
thingies)?
Terry Cross
Nor is the sceptic ever able to prove his doubts. Your allegations
of charlatanism are as hollow as the faith of the dupe in your example.
> Faith is an indispensable component of religions.
And all communications.
> An artist must "prove" his "claims," that is, his art work must
> engage its audience in the here and now. All human beings are
> grammar processors and all of the arts depend on something analogous
> to the processing of grammars, above all music. Those who become
> devoted to, say, Kandinsky or Boulez are not taking anything on
> faith. They are responding to a language they have assimilated with
> their visual or auditory capacities, their consciousness, and their
> grammar-processing capacity. This is implicit in the claim to have
> liked the artwork in question. You cannot like Boulez without first
> having assimilated his language. There has to be something there.
You have forgotten the painters of the '50s who used ridiculous
techniques to produce their work. They sold paint rags, random
splatters, and other frauds, and the critics raved about the "inner
meanings" of the results. Check out the sax music of Sun Ra, still
selling after 30 years.
Art takes viewer faith that the artist has a message, and sometimes
the viewer sees what he wants to see, rather than what is there.
Sometimes the viewer believes there is a message because the people
around him apparently hear or see the message. In this respect, it is
not unlike a whole room of believers moaning "A-men, brother!"
> It is of course true that I might be lying when I claim to have
> assimilated Boulez's language, to love his music. Or that I have
> fooled myself into believing that Boulez's music is music and that I
> have come to like it. Even more incredibly, the performers who have
> learned to play Boulez's music, devoting hours of their lives to
> learning it so they can perform it, also have to be lying or fooling
> themselves.
Neither the believer nor the skeptic can prove his case. That is why
the argument sometimes breaks down to swords and cannons.
Let the skeptic natter in his sterile world where Boulez does not
sparkle and Sun Ra is only squeeks and groans. Who is the richer by
his perception?
CosyFunnyTutu
>He means that it was common in the Renaissance for many background details in a
>painting already well mapped out by the master to be executed by his students,
>while the central figures were realized by the master.
Or just the faces. Or sometimes just the signature. I actually own a
(very very small) Rembrandt sketch that has been debunked because the
signature ("Rembrandt f(ecit)") isn't in Rembrandt's handwriting.
Matthew B. Tepper
<91326e$ih1$1...@nnrp1.deja.com>:
>
>What we know is that, from Mozart to hip-hop, the sole judge of
>validity in music is the appreciation of the listener. There is no
>other standard or test tool. In that respect, music is like a moose
>call, but different from carburetors.
But what if there is a major effort to prevent the population at large from
learning the capacity to judge? One example would be attempts, by various
governments, to suppress the teaching and use of minority languages. And
then what if an entire industry tries to "starve out" a musical genre
because it doesn't make money for them quickly enough?
>Religion, on the other hand is more in the category of the moose call:
>If the moose answers, you know the call is good, regardless of how
>silly it may sound to a human being or a polecat.
Aw, Bullwinkle, that trick NEVER works!
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://www.deltanet.com/~ducky/index.htm
My main music page --- http://www.deltanet.com/~ducky/berlioz.htm
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
"Compassionate Conservatism?" * "Tight Slacks?" * "Jumbo Shrimp?"
David Grayshan
David7Gable wrote:
> >The trouble with you, old boy, is that you are what I recently called an
> Ayatollah
> >of the Avant-Garde
>
> When you call somebody an Ayatollah for being passionate about somebody's
> music, you shouldn't be surprised that he takes offense. (Snip) It's only when
> you
> make the mistake of insisting that some modernist art really is richly
> rewarding art that you are accused using such language.
But that is not the reason why I used this admittedly journalistic-style epithet. I
do not, never have and never shall condemn or villify passionate conviction, at
least if it is rational (let us not forget that Margaret Thatcher was someone of
passionate convictions, though! - not that I am comparing you to her, by the
way!).
No, the barb was aimed at the way you - and you are not alone in this - can
sometimes evince what I at least experience as a total intolerance of dissent of
any kind whatsoever when it comes to your gods. (Or, in this case, the singular
god). Others may not experience your reactions in this way, but I do and make a
comment accordingly. I am afraid that I am also human and react when provoked as I
have been in the past by the attitudes displayed by the Avant-Gardistas.
Not by what they believe in mind you, that is their right, but by the frenzy into
which they are aroused when someone like me comes along and says something
down-to-earth like, "What a load of old cobblers I think this serial music mostly
is".
I have the right to hold this opinion just as you have the right to hold an
opposite opinion.
> >Only time will tell what people the future will think of PB's music, but plenty
> of
> >people in the present think that it is a non-musical desert. Accept this or not,
> it
> >is all the same to me.
>
> I am well aware of the absolute truth of these claims of yours, but they prove
> nothing. It is a myth that we must wait for the future to decide for once and
> for all the value of a composer's music. Every music that has ever been
> written has established itself with at least a small coterie of fanatics from
> the very beginning. If it can't do that, it won't survive. The myth of the
> misunderstood genius is just that, a myth. The conservative American composer
> Virgil Thomson and very many others including Milhaud and Messiaen were
> convinced of Boulez's phenomenal gifts before he was 25.
Gifts he has, certainly: it is what he does with them that bothers me. :-))
> Those people who think that Boulez's music is NOT MUSIC, that it is, as you put
> it, "a
> non-musical desert," could not possibly believe that if they had come to
> understand its language. Now it is possible that once they had come to
> understand the language of Boulez's music, they would find it to be poor music,
> but they are not yet in a position to make that finding.
Fallacious reasoning, methinks. "Understanding" is never necessary to appreciate
art. A painting either dazzles your eyes or it does not. You do not need to
"understand" it to love it. People tell me that I have to "understand" Jasper Johns
art before I can "appreciate" it. Nonsense! There's nothing to understand. You
either like it or you don't (I don't, finding it neither beautiful nor
well-constructed).
Similarly a piece of music either pleases you or it doesn't. I deeply love
Sibelius' music, but would never claim to "understand its language" as you put it.
What's to understand for heavens' sake? I certainly took the trouble to analyse
Sibelius' style and characteristics, prompted by the experience of enjoying some
performances more than others. But I only did this after the music had appealed to
me so much that I became interested in its technical aspects, NOT BEFORE.
If you are telling me that I need to go to a Trappist monastery and immerse myself
in PB's "musical language" (whatever *that* might mean) for 3 months or somesuch
BEFORE I am worthy and qualified to pass judgement on his music then I would ask
you just what you think music is for? In fact I would say, "Pshaw, sir!". Music is
an aural art and a piece of music should be judged only on its aural merits.
> And either this is a FACT or I am lying when I claim to have assimilated Boulez's
> language. There are no alternatives.
If you are convinced that you have assimilated his "musical language" (as above:
whatever *that* might mean), then I am happy for you. So here is today's challenge:
"Explain the "musical language" of Pierre Boulez objectively and in such a way that
any classical music lover of average intelligence can understand what it is and
from that moment on listen to PB's music with this "understanding" and so
immediately appreciate it ".
> Either the performers and listeners who feel passionately about Boulez's music
> are liars or dupes, or Boulez's music is music in the traditional sense of the
> word with a language that can be assimilated and appreciated.
There you go again. Translation follows: "If you do not agree with us, the High
Priesthood, then you are calling us liars or dupes". See what I mean about how you
react to dissent? You condemn yourself out of your own text. You simply cannot
tolerate dissent.
> If that is the case, then those who feel in good or bad faith that Boulez's music
> is not music are simply mistaken, and they are mistaken whether or not they are
> in the majority. It wouldn't be the first time that a majority was mistaken
> about something it couldn't understand.
Ah, all the world's against you..... I see..... and you all belong to The Select
Few who have Seen The Light..... sorry but the passage above really does merit that
sneer. David, do you realise how it reads? Elitist, to say the very least, and not
worthy of you.
Please understand: I do not give the proverbial monkey's WHO bloody well says that
Boulez' music is that of a genius. I do not hear it as such. I hear it as a load of
disjointed sounds with no purpose, no emotion and no beauty. What's more it has no
tunes either. :-))
By saying this do I deny you the right to hear in it whatever you hear in it? No I
do not. So kindly do not attack me for making statements that I did not make! Just
because I write those words I am not attacking your personal integrity. The fact
that you seem to feel the need to react as if that is what I am doing might be
worth thinking about, though.
> Nor does the survival of music depend on wide popular acceptance. It depends
> on the acceptance of performers passionately committted to performing it. That
> Boulez's music has most emphatically won. If music engages enough performers,
> it will also engage some semblance of an audience. Maybe not an audience the
> size of Ricky Martin's or even Bruckner's, but that is simply no evidence one
> way or the other about the quality of the art in question. There is plenty of
> esoteric art with a miniscule audience out there, but it survives because of
> the small number of people passionately devoted to it. Nobody else matters.
I presume that you mean, "Nobody else matters *to the survival of that art*" but
that is not how that last sentence reads at first glance. :-))
The point I was trying to make was NOT that musical merit is proportional to the
audience attracted but that a lot of people do not feel the way you do about this
music. Just to remind you, as it were, that classical music lovers are in a
minority of the class of music-lovers as a whole, and that really passionate lovers
of avant-garde music, such as yourself, are a minority of *that* minority. Just to
keep a sense of proprtion.....
> (Snip) It doesn't follow that the audiences for the late Beethoven quartets and
> Falstaff
> are made up of liars or dupes.
There you go again. I never said any such thing, nor, I hope, accidentally implied
it, OK?
> It proves that the greater complexity and concentration of some artistic
> languages limits the size of their audiences.
>
> -david gable
Yes, well, IMO complexity and concentration are not in themselves musical merits at
all. A piece may well be complex and/or concentrated, but that is not why you love
it for heavens' sake (or is it in your case?). No, you love it because it resonates
with you, or whatever you want to call that reaction of excitement and astonishment
that you get. There is no *inherent* merit in a piece's appealing to a minority of
listeners,
just as there is no merit in *being* one of that minority,
which is what you are perilously close to implying at numerous points in your
posting, as I have taken the trouble to try and point out.
Cheers.
David.
BTW I listened to some parts of Réponse for 1/2-hour today, admittedly in
suboptimal conditions.
What can I say? If you enjoy that cacophony, it is your good right to do so. For me
you might as well enjoy the noise of downtown London during the rush-hour on The
Strand or Piccadilly. It makes about the same kind of musical sense.....
No way can I find any musical content at all in these sounds, none whatsoever. I do
not even classify it as music, it is simply, in Varèse' phrase, "Organised sound".
Sorry, there it is.
Regards (honest!),
David.