Classical music or art music?

[The Six]

Perhaps any kind of music can be called "art," since it is created, played on instruments, etc.   

This is it. Rock music can be art music. Anything can be art music. That term doesn't really describe anything.

[DavidRoss]

what on earth are you babbling on about... this is ALL in your head i'm afraid. art music even allows room for the rare but highly sophisticated compositions found in other areas of music into the mix, thus aligning it all more closely together, tearing down barriers, pooling the best of the best together, regardless of background...as opposed to the distant museum-like academic connotations & additional baggage a term like "classical music" has built into it, which is rather inaccurate & damaging, especially when trying to describe recent music & musicians (something I think Alex Ross & others have alluded to as well, rightfully so), it's even off with music of 'other periods' that aren't of the classical era.  in fact, the stuffy old term "classical music" is more likely to illicit the sort-of response-ideas you're talking about out of people, and in fact has & does.

I do recall that you were right about something once.  This isn't it.

[Bulldog]

I'm very comfortable with the term "classical music".  Once I'm dead, feel free to use another term.

[Guido]

But David, what about "art music" suggests pretense? It's not as if we're making some grandiose claims for this music that it can't live up to or that can't be supported. I'm sure we can agree on that.

The problem I have with 'art music' as a term, is that no one will know what the hell you're talking about. For me, in every day usage words are meaningful because we know what they are referring to, not because they capture something's essence... Despite all of the flaws of the word 'classical music' - everyone knows what you mean by it, even if they dont know much or anything about classical music.

[ChamberNut]

I think "classical music" is the best term to use, in my opinion.  It covers a broad base (as it should).  Just like when someone says they listen to "Rock Music", that could mean pop, mainstream, hard rock or heavy metal.

[ChamberNut]

I don't think either terms "classical or art music" suggests pretension.  Most people generally know (even if they don't like the music and won't listen to it) that classical music is music that is of a higher scale and complexity than the "popular music" genres.

[karlhenning]

Your words are meaningless to me, just to let you know.

Yes.

No fault of the words, of course.

[karlhenning]

The problem I have with 'art music' as a term, is that no one will know what the hell you're talking about. For me, in every day usage words are meaningful because we know what they are referring to, not because they capture something's essence... Despite all of the flaws of the word 'classical music' - everyone knows what you mean by it, even if they dont know much or anything about classical music.

Yes, there is this practical aspect of the matter.

[karlhenning]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art_music

One of the problems with that last paragraph is, there has to be some more specific way to refer to her than the musician Catherine Schmidt-Jones.  (Although perhaps the writer felt this conveyed more gravitas than "the part-time ocarinist Catherine Schmidt-Jones.")

[Josquin des Prez]

This is it. Rock music can be art music. Anything can be art music. That term doesn't really describe anything.

Anything can be classical music as well, vis, classic rock. See?

I do agree in a certain sense though. When we say art (in the higher sense of the word) what we really mean is genius, but genius is everywhere, and at the same time, not everything in the western canon is genius. So as a broad term it may not be very useful. Yet, the term art music isn't entirely useless as a way to convey a preference. If asked upon my musical taste, it would be inappropriate for me to say i listen to classical music when i consider a lot of it to be dross, the style in itself being of no particular relevance to my enjoyment of the music of a Beethoven ect.. In this context, art music is probably more accurate, for i can then say i enjoy a wide range of musical styles, as long as the appropriate artistic standard is met.

[Josquin des Prez]

It's not the word "art" but the pretentiousness of the term "art music" that would keep most folks with common sense as far away as they can get.

It is those type of sentiments that fuel the rabid wave of anti-intellectualism infecting our culture. If upholding a certain intellectual or artistic standard is sufficient to alienate the general population then "common sense" would be to teach the general population to respect and appreciate higher standards, not to abide their resentment for things they cannot understand. It's like trying to discipline a child while at the same time trying not to impute that the child is doing anything wrong for fear he may resent your words and fail to pay heed to your advice. How many times have you seen that work?

I remember when i first became exposed to classical music in my early teens. I didn't really liked it, didn't really understood it, but i felt ashamed you see. Here is something that is considered to be of great value by society at large, and i was too stupid and ignorant to grasp it. It stuck with me for a long time, until i was old enough to have the self confidence necessary to tackle the problem once and for all. I'm willing to believe my case was not uncommon in the past, but today it is a rarity. Kids are taught that there are no standards, and their obstinacy in refusing to accept views and ideas that don't conform with their limited understanding of the world is infuriating. Are we really asking our adults to humble themselves against such arrogance and lack of respect?

[karlhenning]

I don't find David "anti-intellectual" in the least, BTW.

[DavidRoss]

I don't find David "anti-intellectual" in the least, BTW.

Of course not.  I have empathy for the handicapped.

[Bulldog]

It is those type of sentiments that fuel the rabid wave of anti-intellectualism infecting our culture.

I'm anti-intellectual.  Almost done infecting Albuquerque; your town could be next.

I do get a big kick out of some your words like "rabid" and "infecting".  Sounds like we're in panic mode.

[Josquin des Prez]

I do get a big kick out of some your words like "rabid" and "infecting".  Sounds like we're in panic mode.

Well, you know, civilization as we know it coming down, our culture-organism having been terminally hill for a while now, it's hard to feel the same type of safe complacence displayed by clueless rationalists.   

[greg]

the term "classical" has a lot of excess baggage...whenever i use it in the real world with people not too versed in it (most folks), they automatically think it's just old music etc. even worse - visions of powdered wigs, opera or even something light, relaxing, effeminate & sisy may be even conjured. not good. trying to describe 20th or 21st century music using the term gets dumbfounded looks. they aren't aware that it encompasses an ongoing tradition. i prefer using the term "art music" myself because it ditches all of that & works.

I agree 500%. When people ask me what I listen to, I just get annoyed, because all I can say is "classical," knowing that they'll get the wrong ideas right away unless I explain "20th century composers" or something, so they won't say, "oh, that light stuff..." Society needs to be educated.

Yeah, Shostakovich, Xenakis, Mahler, Schoenberg, that's really easy listening... we used to listen to them during preschool coloring hour.

[karlhenning]

The dentist-office-soundtrack question is a separate quarrel, really.

[karlhenning]

Of course not.  I have empathy for the handicapped.

I'm anti-intellectual.  Almost done infecting Albuquerque; your town could be next.

I do get a big kick out of some your words like "rabid" and "infecting".  Sounds like we're in panic mode.

Judith Shatin once replied (during the course of an 'in-house' interview, IIRC) that "intellectual is not a dirty word."

OTOH, you see the behavior of some neighbors, and there is undeniably palpable gravitation to the hand-sanitizer.

[Szykneij]

I hear you ... most think it's music for old bags and totally unhip. This is especially true I have found amoungst younger generations, and it turns them off.

That hasn't been my experience. I find the young people I work with every day to be far more inquisitive and accepting of music (as well as other things) they're unfamiliar with than in the past. But we are all scattered about the globe and I'm aware that what is true here in New England is not necessarily how things are elsewhere. I know Greg lives in Florida. James, I'm curious as to what part of the world you are from? We are similar in age, but our experiences seem to be quite divergent.

[Brian]

(Xenakis? Penderecki? Stockhausen? Varese? Bartok? Stravinsky? Ligeti? etc),

Actually, I am a student at a university with a very well-respected music school - one of the five or so best in the United States - and I have a very great number of friends in the conservatory's orchestra and in theory and musicology departments. I have found that, although music theory and music history majors tend to enjoy works by Stravinsky and Bartok a great deal, they are not at all fans of the other composers you mentioned, and, even more interesting to me, the performers themselves, based on conversations I have had with several violinists and pianists and a bassoon player, almost universally loathe music from post-1950 or so. The other day I was sitting in the music building's main lounge, people-watching, and I heard a group of students saying that they were quite surprised to enjoy Ligeti, because from what they heard of him in lectures they expected him to be another "avant garde bullshitter," but they were very pleasantly surprised. (I forget which piece they had heard.) Several performance students have told me that their theory professors are all agog over the composers you listed, particularly Varese, but that the professors' passionate lectures were greeted by blank stares from the kids. Berg's Wozzeck has been described to me as "messed up" (which it is even objectively; as one critic noted, blood drips from every note!), and a violin-playing friend of mine whose professor was about to perform the Berg violin concerto consoled me when I expressed my dismay at having to sit through said concerto; she told me, "Yeah, I don't know why they'd choose that piece." (This was Alumni Weekend and all our donors were in town, so I really don't get the choice of such a non-crowd-pleaser.) I know a (quite attractive) young lady who composes music in 12-tone and actually went to the Berg concert and left before the half so as not to sit through Beethoven's Third, but this seems to be a reversal of the usual pattern. Some students who are required to attend symposia of living composers' works tell me that they do so dreading what they might hear.

Sometimes I kid with my music-major friends along these lines:

FRIEND: I'm off to practice piano, I guess.
ME: John Cage?
FRIEND: Hah!

Or:

FRIEND: Pachelbel's Canon is boring.
ME: Ever heard of Milton Babbitt?
FRIEND: Oh, gawd. Don't remind me.

A violinist friend of mine recently was tasked with finding a piece dating from after 1950 for her recital but told me she had never heard one she liked (she cited Tower in particular for not being to her taste). We went looking, and she seriously considered the idea of programming either Salonen or Henning (  ) before settling on a piece by our conservatory's composer-in-residence.

I'm afraid I've given Stravinsky short shrift in this post - but he really does not belong in the same category as many of the others. For what it's worth, most of my performer friends' favorite works come from the mid-to-late romantic era (with some Vivaldi for the wind players who love his concertos for their instruments), stretching up to Ravel, who seems to be loved by just about everybody.

-----------

My point is twofold:

1. Young people, or people of my generation (there are more than a few of us: I'm 19, Greg is 21, Corey is 22 - if my memory is right, that is; you guys can correct me if I'm wrong) can and do enjoy exploring lots of different realms of music, and we are most certainly apt to give serious consideration to classical music! Several of my friends have been converted to classical music largely due to the influence of our university, its music school, its knowledgeable students, and its capacious library of CDs.
2. Young people do not necessarily like young music the most. In fact, quite the contrary; while our generation is more willing to explore and be adventuresome than, say, our parents (my mom still can't believe I listen to Sibelius; my dad keeps asking me who these composers are I've put on his iPod) - it is wrong to say that we are most attracted to music of recent decades. In the experience of my friends here, as well as some random black guys I once met, the greatest force for the spreading of the Word of Classical to emerge in the last seventy or so years is Shostakovich.

NOTE: James, I do agree with you that classical music's image is way too close to the "easy breezy" public radio persona you described. What really draws people to classical for good - for LIFE, is music that takes you somewhere emotionally that regular old pop music could never go.