Does Star Wars soundtrack count as classical music?

[Florestan]

Oops!  You are actually providing concrete examples and not vague generalities..

It's a bad habit I acquired during my engineering studies.   

[karlhenning]

So it can stand as concert music.  So can suites taken from many film scores.  And whether the Star Wars music, or a suite from it, can do so is more a matter of taste than anything else.

Well, for me one of the core considerations is a question which we can never answer in our lifetime.

Ask the audiences who go to the Boston Pops, &c., who hear and enjoy the Star Wars suite if it stands as concert music, and of course they will say it does.  But are they (or we) competent to answer the question?

I mean, we who have seen the movies, and whose reception of the music is an indelible matter of the experience of the movies which were the occasion of the music's publication — we cannot really say.  The reason the Star Wars music is programmed, is because those arranging the program are counting on the cinematic tie-in to fetch in the audience.  The cynical response must be, that there is no instance of the music being programmed, simply because it's good music.  If it is ; )

So, does the Star Wars music "stand as concert music"?  That question must be answered by a generation which doesn't rely on memories of that wonderful splash of stars on the huge screen and the then-new Dolby sound systems, meseems.  For none of us here (or nearly none of us) actually dances in Viennese cafés to the sound of a small house orchestra, yet we all attest that the waltzes of Joh. Strauss Jr are great stuff.  The first several times I heard Tchaikovsky's Romeo & Juliet Fantasy-Overture, I had never seen the Shakespeare play, and had only a childishly crude notion of the story of the play which was the inspiration for the music (no one at that age understands or cares about the character and role of Friar Lawrence, but that does not interfere with our enjoyment of the wind chorale which opens the piece).  &c., &c., &c.

[karlhenning]

On those lines, obviously I had listened to Shostakovich's music for the Kozintsev Hamlet many times before I actually saw the film.

It's impossible for any of us, I imagine, to approach the Star Wars music like that: as music on its own, before (or even, completely without) any experience of it as part of a film.

[Philoctetes]

Yes, I don't think entertainment (which can be every bit as slippery to define as classical music) will serve at all as any presumed touchstone.  Entertainment of itself is hardly The Great Satan of culture . . . .

Well that's not how I really meant the term, but whatever. I think James understood what I meant.

[Grazioso]

that he wrote, great orchestration and melody, texture, wildly inventive and memorable within that little musical sphere he operated in and focused on.

Funny, but I'd ascribe some of those same qualities to Williams. For instance, I haven't heard the full Star Wars score in a long time, yet I can very easily whistle many of the main themes, with enjoyment. The fact that his writing has stuck in my head that long and still provides entertainment tells me that he's certainly succeeded on some level as a composer. (And I like it as music, not because it reminds me of Stormtroopers and talking robots.)

To address some of your other assertions:

* You speak of pedagogical uses. Film scoring is taught at college. I would be shocked if some of Williams's scores weren't studied, given his place in the pantheon.

* You keep speaking of film music being buried in a mix of dialogue and images, as if it functioned exclusively as muted background noise. If you've seriously watched or studied film, you'd know that music can be foregrounded and play a major role in shaping the identity of the movie and the audience's emotional reactions. Think of Poledouris's score for the Conan the Barbarian, to name a classic example, or the music of 2001, for another. Famously, Star Wars opens with blackness to the music thundering forth. Much of the music in the film works in tandem with the imagery and isn't somehow hidden beneath dense layers of dialogue and foley effects.

* You deride music supposedly intended for passing entertainment value: uh oh, we'd better throw Handel's Water Music overboard, given that it was written to entertain nobles on a pleasure cruise. Farewell to Bach's "frivolous" Coffee Cantata (this performance underwritten with the generous support of Starbucks). Mozart wrote divertimenti? Good Heavens, we'll have no diversions while I'm around! Only serious, deep music is allowed in the hallowed halls of (fanfare, please--but not a cheesy John Williams-style fanfare) Classical Music.

* You speak of film and its music as pop culture ephemera. Film is practiced and studied as a serious art form at the highest academic levels. In the US, there's a television channel, Turner Classic Movies, devoted entirely to presenting classic, historic films going back to the silent era. Remember, too, that's there is much ephemera in the world of "officially sanctioned" classical music: one need only look at the Baroque and Classical eras, with their flood of music for entertainment, performed once or a few times and left behind, perhaps to moulder as a manuscript in a small European library, only to be resurrected by CPO a few centuries later.

[karlhenning]

Funny, but I'd ascribe some of those same qualities to Williams.

Not great orchestration.  Nope.

[Grazioso]

Not great orchestration.  Nope.

I'd have to borrow a copy from someone and listen again to comment there. But melodious and memorable to my ears, certainly. Yet, that's of course subjective and is ultimately neither here nor there when it comes to classifying the music.

[karlhenning]

I'd have to borrow a copy from someone and listen again to comment there. But melodious and memorable to my ears, certainly. Yet, that's of course subjective and is ultimately neither here nor there when it comes to classifying the music.

Well, the orchestration which he cribbed from Stravinsky, Holst, & al. (e.g.) is excellent, of course.  No argument there.  And back when I first heard his music (something like 1978), I should have given him great credit for orchestration (which I should have done in ignorance).

Again, the trouble is these "concert" pieces of his, for whose orchestration he is solely responsible.  Competent at best, and . . . poor in more spot than one.

You're certainly right that he has had a good talent for memorable tunes!  Not all of them, of course;  but the few really great ones, no one can take away from him.

[jochanaan]

Well, for me one of the core considerations is a question which we can never answer in our lifetime...

That was exactly one of my points to James.  As for the rest of your excellent post, thanks again for your always carefully-considered thoughts.  I feel that whether we consider such things as the Star Wars scores to be "classical music" touches on the very definitions we use.

And, having actually played Star Wars suites on several occasions, perhaps I have a greater respect for Mr. Williams' orchestral abilities than some.  At least he knows the ranges and capabilities of all the instruments, and isn't afraid to give them a few challenges.  You can't say that about every film composer whose music is programmed at concerts.

[71 dB]

How do you know it?

You ask me this as if the knowledge was beyond us (or me).

The music is structurally modern and the scale of it indicates romantism, the inevitable* development of classical music after classism. The only thing that isn't that romantic is the orchestration.
_________________________________________________
* classism was about lighter, less complex music to entertain all kind of people in high social status, the birth of "commercial music" partially outside patrons if you will. Since the return to complex baroque was out of the question in the new world, the logical step to restore some sort of depth to music was romantism. Also, the development of piano as an instrument during the 18th century encouraged composers to explore dynamic variation in music stronger than before.

[Florestan]

The music is structurally modern and the scale of it indicates romantism

How do you know the structure of the music and its scale?

[(poco) Sforzando]

You ask me this as if the knowledge was beyond us (or me).

The music is structurally modern and the scale of it indicates romantism, the inevitable* development of classical music after classism. The only thing that isn't that romantic is the orchestration.

This is simply not true. While there are some romantic elements in Beethoven music, the basis of his structures and use of tonality remains firmly grounded in classicism (not classism, a different thing entirely). Moreover, to say that classicism "was about lighter, less complex music to entertain all kind of people in high social status" has no validity either. There's nothing lighter or lacking in complexity about Mozart's mature operas, concertos, or quintets. And expecting Beethoven's orchestra, which is generally handled superbly (except for a few moments that don't balance well, like the recap in the 1st movement of the 8th symphony), to sound like Berlioz's is to expect Beethoven to have an entirely different musical personality.

[71 dB]

How do you know the structure of the music and its scale?

I have heard it. 

[71 dB]

There's nothing lighter or lacking in complexity about Mozart's mature operas, concertos, or quintets.

Bach, Fasch, Mozart. The line of simpler structures. Mozart was able to compose very complex music but he rarely did that because his audience wanted something lighter, the operas being good examples of that. His church and chamber music show greater complexity.

And expecting Beethoven's orchestra, which is generally handled superbly (except for a few moments that don't balance well, like the recap in the 1st movement of the 8th symphony), to sound like Berlioz's is to expect Beethoven to have an entirely different musical personality.

The Sixth Symphony and Missa Solemnis are well-orchestrated works. I especially admire Beethoven's way of using piccolo flute. In other orchestral works Beethoven needed badly ways to soften the sound because the music material is so raging and angular.

[Scarpia]

In other orchestral works Beethoven needed badly ways to soften the sound because the music material is so raging and angular.

You dismiss the possibility that Beethoven wanted it that way? 

[MN Dave]

You dismiss the possibility that Beethoven wanted it that way?

My very thought.

[karlhenning]

This just keeps getting richer and richer.

[MN Dave]

This just keeps getting richer and richer.

Deeper and deeper.

[(poco) Sforzando]

The Sixth Symphony and Missa Solemnis are well-orchestrated works. I especially admire Beethoven's way of using piccolo flute.

Too bad the Missa doesn't use a piccolo flute, and the Sixth uses it in only one of the five movements.

[Scarpia]

Too bad the Missa doesn't use a piccolo flute, and the Sixth uses it in only one of the five movements.

If he had eliminated the piccolo flute from that one movement, that would truly excellent use of piccolo flute!