Definition of early music
William Chesters
(Sonny Hsu) writes:
# I am a little uncertain about the exact definition of the term early
# music. I believe most people use the term classical music when they
# refer to music written in the baroque, classical and romantic periods.
# Thus Bach is a classical music composer. However, does that mean
# early music only includes Renaissance music, or is baroque music also
# part of early music?
*Early music* is a concept of almost Wittgenstinian elusiveness.
"Mainstream" musicians tend to approach music from within an
organically grown, un-selfconscious modern performance
tradition. But if someone is thinking of a piece as `early
music', then she has in mind its historical background: where
the composer was coming from (musical and other influences),
contemporary performance practice etc.
Bach is a particularly interesting case: you can `just play
it', in which case it ends up sounding rather Brahmsified, not
least because Brahms was influenced by (his interpretation of)
Bach. Then it's classical music.
Or you can learn about pre-JS Bachs, French stuff, Biber,
Lutheranism and Pietism in early 18th century Leipzig, old
instruments and so on. And you're looking at the music in
different way. In fact, there's a sense in which you're
playing different music: it's rather like those paper drawings
which can represent convex or concave objects, depending on a
conscious decision by the viewer.
For example, I have two ways of thinking of the slow
movement from the G minor sonata for viola da gamba and
harpsichord: I get rather different feelings out of it when I
hear God the Father (Wieland Kuijken!) play it from when I hear
it on the soundtrack of Truly Madly Deeply. The incredible
thing about early musicians is that they have developed a whole
new performing tradition: one which is vigorous, diverse and
generally wonderful, and opens up really new possibilities in
the music. It's an amazing collective effort of imagination.
So you can see that Bach can be classical or early. Most
stuff before Bach is simply early, because it was never part of
the classical tradition; while anything up to and including
Brahms is now considered fair game for earlyfication.
Disclaimer: the above is superficial and overgeneral.
--
William Chesters (will...@aifh.ed.ac.uk)
Computer vision? I'll believe that when it sees me.
Marcia Grumme
Early music is a how, not a when. Not early music but earlier music -
i.e. earlier than now (as opposed to earlier than thou) I think the
"how" of making "earlier" music is to 1) exclude the notes, sounds and
concepts that would have been foreign to the composer and 2) include
the notes, sounds, and concepts that s/he and the listeners would have found
familiar, and 3) do this in an innovative, creative, and unselfconscious way
that would have been recognized by them, as well as us, as high art .
and fine musicianship. Hence, the frequent comparison to painting restoration:
of stripping away the dark gunk that has accumulated through the years,
restoring the damaged parts with techniques and aesthetics used by the painter,
thus revealing the original shapes and colors. Voila! Simple ;-)
It is even less time-bound than you might think. There are still plenty
of voice teachers coaching their students to sing Dowland lute songs with
big dark voice to big, dense piano accompaniments. Thus Dowland becomes
"classical". And steel strings did not supplant gut on the fiddles until
the first part of the twentieth century. So, I suppose, Mahler could
be given an "early" treatment.
A very late "early" music example: A friend of a friend in the recording biz
was involved in a project to re-record the fanfare theme for MGM that comes
on at the beginning of their films (or is it Paramount or Columbia?). Seems
the master had been lost. They got an orchestra together and recorded it,
but just couldn't make it sound right. The reason: the original was
recorded in the '30's when tympanii still had skin heads. They have since
been supplanted by plastic/acrylic or whatever. They had to obtain "original"
instruments to get the same sound that had been recorded in the '30's.
Marcia Grumme mgsec@ucsfvm
================================================================
"When they hit Mahler, I'm bailing out". -- a former early musician (who
actually went over to jazz even before they got to Beethoven.)
----------------------------Original message----------------------------
In article <2j7b9l$5...@netnews.upenn.edu>, sonn...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu
(Sonny Hsu) writes:
# I am a little uncertain about the exact definition of the term early
# music. I believe most people use the term classical music when they
# refer to music written in the baroque, classical and romantic periods.
# Thus Bach is a classical music composer. However, does that mean
# early music only includes Renaissance music, or is baroque music also
# part of early music?
*Early music* is a concept of almost Wittgenstinian elusiveness.
"Mainstream" musicians tend to approach music from within an
organically grown, un-selfconscious modern performance
tradition. But if someone is thinking of a piece as `early
music', then she has in mind its historical background: where
the composer was coming from (musical and other influences),
contemporary performance practice etc.
Stephen Wilcox, Mathematical Institute, Oxford, (2)73571
> In article <2j7b9l$5...@netnews.upenn.edu>, sonn...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu
> (Sonny Hsu) writes:
> # I am a little uncertain about the exact definition of the term early
> # music. I believe most people use the term classical music when they
> # refer to music written in the baroque, classical and romantic periods.
> # Thus Bach is a classical music composer. However, does that mean
> # early music only includes Renaissance music, or is baroque music also
> # part of early music?
>
> *Early music* is a concept of almost Wittgenstinian elusiveness.
Precisely. `Early Music' means what it is used to mean....if I remember my
Wittgenstein correctly.
> Bach is a particularly interesting case: you can `just play
> it', in which case it ends up sounding rather Brahmsified, not
> least because Brahms was influenced by (his interpretation of)
> Bach. Then it's classical music.
On the other hand if you play Brahms in a self-conscious, let's look at
the instruments Brahms would have heard, ignore the way we're used to hearing
Brahms sort of way, then Brahms is Early Music.
If it's worth anything at all, the `general' meaning of `Early Music' seems to
be Early Baroque and before. The sort of thing that almost no-one played until
the 1950s and has only really taken off in popularity since 1980. But when
Early Music fans talk about Early Music, it can either mean music before 10 am
or else `what I like'. On that basis, Britten is Early Music.
And if you understand that, you're a better philosopher than I ever was.
--
Stephen Wilcox | Research is 5% inspiration
wil...@vax.oxford.ac.uk | and 95% desparation.
Francois Velde
|will...@aifh.ed.ac.uk (William Chesters) writes:
|> *Early music* is a concept of almost Wittgenstinian elusiveness.
|
|Precisely. `Early Music' means what it is used to mean....if I remember my
|Wittgenstein correctly.
I thought that was Humpty-Dumpty. I must have been asleep during that
lecture.
--
Francois Velde
Stephen Wilcox, Mathematical Institute, Oxford, (2)73571
Humpty-Dumpty, Wittgenstein. Shtick, Shtuck. One was an egg heading off
the wall, one was an off-the-wall egg-head. One baffled King's men, one baffled
Trinity's men.
--
Stephen Wilcox | Normally resident at wil...@maths.ox.ac.uk
wil...@vax.oxford.ac.uk | but that network's out of action :-(