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[Saul]

I see. But while Saul is naturally all too happy to take a bow, I cannot praise this post quite as highly. Saul's main point is to tell Teresa not to bother trying to change people's minds. However, if you look at the metaphor he chooses, it's obvious he considers Schoenberg and Co. the musical equivalent of junk food. And that judgmental attitude is what some of you are standing up and applauding.

It was an example not meant to insinuate, but to suggest, and I didn't take any bow. I stated what I felt to be true, that's all no strings attached and no cynicism.

[Sid]

I wonder how much "atonal" (or pan-tonal) music people like Teresa have actually heard? Not much, judging from comments like this. A 5 minute clip on youtube is not good enough. Go to the nearest library & borrow a Schoenberg disc, or buy one cheaply on Naxos. Listen to it all a few times, let it sink in, then make up your mind. He also made some excellent arrangements of the music of Handel, Brahms and J. Strauss which might be a first step to those who are new to his music. He was a composer of many facets. Often, we focus on his post-1908 "atonal" output, but he had composed in some other more traditional styles about 20 years before that.

[Sid]

Another thing that many people don't realise is that Schoenberg was a huge fan of the three B's (Bach, Beethoven, Brahms) as well as others in the Austro-German tradition like Haydn & Mozart. He actually thought that the chromaticism of people like Wagner & R. Strauss had departed too far from these classical models. With pantonality, he wanted to restore the balance. Often, unlike those composers, Schoenberg develops a single theme (or fragmentary one) right throughout a single work. This is closer to what the traditionalists were doing, rather than the late Romantics.

Schoenberg was not the only one to make these conclusions and depart from tonality. The American Charles Ives and Russians Nikolai Roslavets and Alexander Scriabin were developing similar ideas in their respective spheres. If you rubbish Schoenberg, then you are doing the same to these guys, not to speak of later composers who used pantonality as a springboard, like Carter, Lutoslawski, Frank Martin, Stravinsky, etc. & there were those who equally validly rejected it, like Varese, Feldman, Glass, etc. If you don't understand Schoenberg then you are coming to C20th music with a HUGE handicap...

[Brian]

I see. But while Saul is naturally all too happy to take a bow, I cannot praise this post quite as highly. Saul's main point is to tell Teresa not to bother trying to change people's minds. However, if you look at the metaphor he chooses, it's obvious he considers Schoenberg and Co. the musical equivalent of junk food. And that judgmental attitude is what some of you are standing up and applauding.

I would have done the same thing. I don't know why Saul chose the junk food analogy, but I like it because a rhetorician has to understand his target audience. This is a cynical point of view, yes, but Saul's target audience was Teresa, and the junk food analogy is presumably an effective one for her. He was trying to get his point across to somebody who has a hard time letting points cross into her consciousness, so he chose an analogy that would make her sympathetic to his attempt to persuade her.

[Brian]

I would have done the same thing.

Actually that's not true. I would have said some people eat soup and some people eat stew, and stew is not a defamation of soup.

[karlhenning]

It's WAR between stew & soup!

[(poco) Sforzando]

I would have done the same thing. I don't know why Saul chose the junk food analogy, but I like it because a rhetorician has to understand his target audience. This is a cynical point of view, yes, but Saul's target audience was Teresa, and the junk food analogy is presumably an effective one for her. He was trying to get his point across to somebody who has a hard time letting points cross into her consciousness, so he chose an analogy that would make her sympathetic to his attempt to persuade her.

His target audience, Brian, is not only Teresa but the entire readership of this forum. Or said otherwise, it is not unusual in rhetoric to directly address one individual while indirectly speaking to any number of others who are also listening in. And having made that choice of words (where he could have created a metaphor that was less pejorative), he bears responsibility for them.

And though I grant that at times Saul sounds conciliatory --

No one would suggest to attack their music and call it 'degenerate'.. the hard cold truth is that whatever may be degenerate for you, can be beautiful and worthwhile for others.

- there is still no question that he considers this music, which many here respond to with great enthusiasm, to be inferior stuff:

You and I have every right to dislike certain composers' music, and voice our opinions on other composers who are way more superior.

Junk food, that is.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Actually that's not true. I would have said some people eat soup and some people eat stew, and stew is not a defamation of soup.

Then you see precisely what I was aiming at when I was writing my last message. To use a soup or stew metaphor is to keep the comparison neutral. To use a comparison between gourmet food and potato chips is to make the comparison immediately judgmental.

[Teresa]

I wonder how much "atonal" (or pan-tonal) music people like Teresa have actually heard? Not much, judging from comments like this. A 5 minute clip on youtube is not good enough. 

I have owned over 10 Schoenberg compositions on LP.  And I have owned or borrowed from the library compositions by several dozen atonal composers.  But in the old days (before computers) I bought blindly as Tulsa had no classical music station.  I soon learned to avoid LPs with ugly artwork as it meant the music was ugly as well.     Now I have the internet and streaming audio to help me avoid ugly atonal music.   The internet is a great tool.

The ONLY Mercury Living Presence recording I do not like:



Note it has Berg's Lulu Suite with the awful screams of the high soprano as she is being raped (in the story-line).   

He also made some excellent arrangements of the music of Handel, Brahms and J. Strauss which might be a first step to those who are new to his music.

I have heard Schoenberg's chamber arrangements of Johann Strauss Jr. Waltzes and Polkas and the originals are much, much better! 

He was a composer of many facets. Often, we focus on his post-1908 "atonal" output, but he had composed in some other more traditional styles about 20 years before that.

I know I used to own Verklärte Nacht on LP, I found it incredibly boring.

[Sid]

I just wish, that instead of impotently judging & theorising, people would go out and actually grab a cheap but good quality recording of the music they hate. I know it sounds a bit absurd, but it's a good thing to challenge one's perceptions. That's the way we learn new things that are good, and unlearn old things that are bad. People should get out of the musical ghettos and backwaters that they have created for themselves and get on the high road (eg. those composers Teresa posted youtube clips of are no way near as significant as Schoenberg, Berg, Webern, or other greats like Hindemith, Hartmann, Eisler, Weill - just to mention some other Austro-Germans of the century which she would probably equally despise for being too radical). Go to some concerts of contemporary classical music & see this great stuff done live, that might change your misguided views of what music should (or should not) be. But maybe I'm just throwing pearls to swine? Some people will remain highly inflexible and never learn. Is ignorance bliss?

[Sid]

Well, Teresa, you say you only dislike one of the LP's, what about the others? & do you expect art to only be about the nice things in life? But look at Puccini's operas - they have just as much sordid things going on as say Berg's (& Puccini likes to beef things up, eg. he made the servant girl kill herself in Turandot, when it was not in the original story). What do you say to that?

[Mirror Image]

My god, you are stupid.

Lol...you're starting to sound like James! I love it!

[Teresa]

I just wish, that instead of impotently judging & theorising, people would go out and actually grab a cheap but good quality recording of the music they hate. I know it sounds a bit absurd, but it's a good thing to challenge one's perceptions. That's the way we learn new things that are good, and unlearn old things that are bad. People should get out of the musical ghettos and backwaters that they have created for themselves and get on the high road (eg. those composers Teresa posted youtube clips of are no way near as significant as Schoenberg, Berg, Webern, or other greats like Hindemith, Hartmann, Eisler, Weill - just to mention some other Austro-Germans of the century which she would probably equally despise for being too radical). Go to some concerts of contemporary classical music & see this great stuff done live, that might change your misguided views of what music should (or should not) be. But maybe I'm just throwing pearls to swine? Some people will remain highly inflexible and never learn. Is ignorance bliss?

I absolutely hated not only all of the compositions I've owned by Schoenberg (10 over about 5 or so LPs) but all the other atonal composers as well.  All told it worked out about 50 LPs, since I had to buy Classical music blind back in the day, until I learned the relationship between ugly album covers and ugly music.  After that I avoided ugly album covers.

And after listening 30 or 40 times to each work I've come to agree completely with the anti-Schoenberg crowd that this it was all a scam, and I was one of the ones who was scammed by their non-music.  So yes I am kinda of pissed at the thousands of wasted hours and hundreds of wasted dollars!   

I traded in all those LPs for good ones, and vowed I would help prevent this from happening to innocent music lovers in the future. 

[Mirror Image]

I highly doubt that Teresa has actually listened to any Berg, Schoenberg, or Webern for any extended length or better yet with an open-mind. She called Schoenberg's "Verklarte Nacht" boring, which to me is one of the most moronic statements I've ever read. This work is anything but boring. The story behind the work is quite interesting: a man and woman walk through the woods at night and the woman has a dark secret to share with the man. Schoenberg's Chamber Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2 are also a great places to start exploring Schoenberg. I doubt Teresa has given these works a thorough listen.

There is one fact that remains: the Second Viennese School were all brilliant composers whether you want to acknowledge this or not. They have influenced so many composers and even ones that didn't create atonal music. To simply deny this influence as Teresa has done is not only uneducated, but downright (to use Some Guy's word) absurd.

[Brian]

Then you see precisely what I was aiming at when I was writing my last message. To use a soup or stew metaphor is to keep the comparison neutral. To use a comparison between gourmet food and potato chips is to make the comparison immediately judgmental.

Attribute it to the mentally restorative effects of a quick trip to the bathroom. Such a great place to think, that is. 

[Mirror Image]

I absolutely hated not only all of the compositions I've owned by Schoenberg (10 over about 5 or so LPs) but all the other atonal composers as well.  All told it worked out about 50 LPs, since I had to buy Classical music blind back in the day, until I learned the relationship between ugly album covers and ugly music.  After that I avoided ugly album covers.

And after listening 30 or 40 times to each work I've come to agree completely with the anti-Schoenberg crowd that this it was all a scam, and I was one of the ones who was scammed by their non-music.  So yes I am kinda of pissed at the thousands of wasted hours and hundreds of wasted dollars!   

I traded in all those LPs for good ones, and vowed I would help prevent this from happening to innocent music lovers in the future. 

Your argument is just so juvenile and I love the way you keep going back to the argument of "This music is ugly" or it's all a "scam.............."We get it: you don't like any atonal composers. Everybody I think understands this better than you do. I think it's time to move on and quit making a fool of yourself don't you? Nobody is buying your "opinion."

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[Teresa]

I highly doubt that Teresa has actually listened to any Berg, Schoenberg, or Webern for any extended length or better yet with an open-mind.

Yes I have, I tried very, very hard to like that crap.  It did not work as it is not real music, it is a rip-off pure and simple.

She called Schoenberg's "Verklarte Nacht" boring, which to me is one of the most moronic statements I've ever read.

100% true perhaps the most boring tonal work I have ever heard and I have heard thousands of classical compositions over the last 40 years!  I find it insulting that you are calling someone a moron for telling the truth about such an unworthy composition.

To simply deny this influence as Teresa has done is not only uneducated, but downright (to use Some Guy's word) absurd.

To deny atonal anti-music that almost destroyed classical music is NOT absurd but the most logical thing to do IMHO.

[Mirror Image]

Yes I have, I tried very, very hard to like that crap.  It did not work as it is not real music, it is a rip-off pure and simple.
100% true perhaps the most boring tonal work I have ever heard and I have heard thousands of classical compositions over the last 40 years!  I find it insulting that you are calling someone a moron for telling the truth about such an unworthy composition.
To deny atonal anti-music that almost destroyed classical music is NOT absurd but the most logical thing to do IMHO.

All your own opinion and doesn't represent the larger classical community, which find your rhetoric disgusting.

[greg]

And after listening 30 or 40 times to each work I've come to agree completely with the anti-Schoenberg crowd that this it was all a scam, and I was one of the ones who was scammed by their non-music.  So yes I am kinda of pissed at the thousands of wasted hours and hundreds of wasted dollars!   

In other words, it's a scam because you don't like it.

I traded in all those LPs for good ones, and vowed I would help prevent this from happening to innocent music lovers in the future. 

But what if they end up liking Schoenberg?

(oh, that's right... no one actually enjoys his music. They just wanna be intellectual or something).

[greg]

100% true perhaps the most boring tonal work I have ever heard and I have heard thousands of classical compositions over the last 40 years!  I find it insulting that you are calling someone a moron for telling the truth about such an unworthy composition.

And this is where you just say, "I find it painfully boring," or maybe, "So boring that I felt like smashing my head against the wall."
You don't say a work like that is "unworthy" and that that's the "truth." That's just your opinion.
My opinion is: It's AWESOME!!!