Composers you don't get

[Sergeant Rock]

Easier to summarise Proust, I think.

I seem to recall...

Sarge

[Sergeant Rock]

Don't hog all the puns; it's shellfish.

This thread is mistitled. Should be: the Joke Thread.

Sarge

[Mirror Image]

I wouldn't be surprised if Tippett and Koechlin were added to someone's "composers you don't get" list. I've read several people have difficulty with both of these musical lone wolves. For my own list, I still struggle with Holmboe but I'm not giving up! I think there's something there, I just haven't found it yet. The same with Messiaen, though I do like some of his music.

[eyeresist]

I wouldn't be surprised if Tippett and Koechlin were added to someone's "composers you don't get" list.

Tippett's on this list. Koechlin is on the "If only I had the money and the time!" list, which is quite separate.

[Mirror Image]

Tippett's on this list. Koechlin is on the "If only I had the money and the time!" list, which is quite separate.

Koechlin's recordings on Hanssler can be purchased for decent prices through Amazon MP. I usually recommend people The Jungle Book, but this recording is OOP, but can be found used on Amazon MP for a good price. As far as the time to put in and understand Koechlin, well that's really hard to say because I didn't like his music at all when I first heard it. There was something though I found appealing in the music or I wouldn't have revisited it. One of the most important things in Koechlin is much of his music is devoid of drama or at least drama in the Romantic sense. A lot of his music builds from texture and the melodies aren't exactly memorable per se, but the overall lushness of the music pulled me right in and I soon discovered that there was a whole exotic world under the surface of this music.

Tippett is another composer who I didn't initially like when I first heard him, but, like with Koechlin, there was something in the music that I connected with. Works like Ritual Dances, Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli, Piano Concerto, and Concerto for Double String Orchestra were approachable for me, but when I got to the symphonies, Concerto for Orchestra, and Triple Concerto I was almost immediately turned off. I guess because the style was so different from his first period works. Anyway, I'm proud to say that most of his music doesn't give me any kind of problems these days, but there are still a few later works that I just have say "WTF? "

[eyeresist]

All the samples I've heard of Koechlin sound very appealing. Tippett, OTOH.... I have that Australian Eloquence CD that everyone said was a great introduction and didn't like it. As a lover of symphonies, it's possible I may prefer that part of his opus.

[Mirror Image]

All the samples I've heard of Koechlin sound very appealing. Tippett, OTOH.... I have that Australian Eloquence CD that everyone said was a great introduction and didn't like it. As a lover of symphonies, it's possible I may prefer that part of his opus.

Tippett's symphonies are all outstanding IMHO, but my opinion may be a little biased. The symphonies that get the most criticism are the 3rd and 4th. These are, for newcomers to his music, tough nuts to crack. The 4th symphony, if you read about the symphony and it's program (and it does have a program, don't let anyone tell you it doesn't), is supposed to be about the circle of life: from life to death. The last movement, or section, depending on how it's divided up on a recording, actually features human breathing. This breathing signifies death, but if this breathing isn't done correctly, and what I mean by this is ethereally, then it come off sounding cliche or just plain trite. Thankfully, Hickox's performance on Chandos does full justice to this work. Stay away from Solti's performance! It's really just awful.

[Philoctetes]

What we have here is a tendency to believe that what one greatly enjoys must be a masterpiece.  This attitude is displayed daily on the board and has always puzzled me.

I can only hope to be this wise. Another composer that I have a hard time with is Wagner.

[not edward]

Tippett's symphonies are all outstanding IMHO, but my opinion may be a little biased. The symphonies that get the most criticism are the 3rd and 4th. These are, for newcomers to his music, tough nuts to crack. The 4th symphony, if you read about the symphony and it's program (and it does have a program, don't let anyone tell you it doesn't), is supposed to be about the circle of life: from life to death. The last movement, or section, depending on how it's divided up on a recording, actually features human breathing. This breathing signifies death, but if this breathing isn't done correctly, and what I mean by this is ethereally, then it come off sounding cliche or just plain trite. Thankfully, Hickox's performance on Chandos does full justice to this work. Stay away from Solti's performance! It's really just awful.

The problems with badly-executed breathing in the symphony may be solved by the solution that Tippett used in his own recording of the work; samples played on a MIDI keyboard replacing any live "performance." (Not that I think that would have rescued Solti's recording; the treatment of the work as a concerto for the CSO brass is a bigger offender in my ears than the sounds of an asthmatic Darth Vader.)

The composer's recordings of the 2nd and 4th symphonies probably make a good cheap dip into his symphonic world; there's probably still quite a few copies of the original issue (as a cover disc for BBC Music Magazine) around at very low prices, and the performances are more than satisfactory.

[Karl Henning]

All the samples I've heard of Koechlin sound very appealing. Tippett, OTOH.... I have that Australian Eloquence CD that everyone said was a great introduction and didn't like it. As a lover of symphonies, it's possible I may prefer that part of his opus.

What's on it? If I had to choose a single work which might be apt to appeal to the most listeners, cold, it would likely be the Corelli Fantasia. Now, watch that be one of the pieces you particularly cannot bear . . . .

[snyprrr]

Isn't 'Genius' an ever concentrating circle? Follow me:


Let's start with British Composers. You get ONE. Then, that Composer gets put into the next Category, say 20th Century European Composers. You get THREE (or what have you). Then, you put those Composers into the next Category, and so on and so on, until, literally, the cream rises to the top. Genius should be an ever DWINDLING number, not an ever increasing number.

No?

That's the only thing that hits me about 'Genius': we should always be willing to CUT instead of ADD. There must still be some exclusivity in this feel good, diversity world gone mad.

[Karl Henning]

Not sure how to describe that post, but it isn't genius.

[chasmaniac]

Venn diagrams? I think Snypps is onto Venn diagrams. 

[Christo]

BTT. For me, some composers I don't "get" are: Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, Robert Schumann, Hector Berlioz, Richard Strauss, Anton Webern, John Rutter (oops), Pierre Boulez.

[Mirror Image]

The problems with badly-executed breathing in the symphony may be solved by the solution that Tippett used in his own recording of the work; samples played on a MIDI keyboard replacing any live "performance." (Not that I think that would have rescued Solti's recording; the treatment of the work as a concerto for the CSO brass is a bigger offender in my ears than the sounds of an asthmatic Darth Vader.)

The composer's recordings of the 2nd and 4th symphonies probably make a good cheap dip into his symphonic world; there's probably still quite a few copies of the original issue (as a cover disc for BBC Music Magazine) around at very low prices, and the performances are more than satisfactory.

Actually, NMC has reiussed the Tippett conducted performance of the 2nd and 4th. I bought it a couple of days ago. I believe you made a comment on it when I bought it. I'm really looking forward to hearing it. No, Solti's slam bam approach doesn't work with Tippett's 4th at all and it's pretty offensive that he would treat the work that way, but, as I said on the Tippett thread, he wasn't good at conducting British music anyway.

[jlaurson]

I do have some problems with Berlioz. Somebody said that his music consisted of attempts to go mad without ever quite succeeding. There's something to that.

Another one I don't get - Debussy. Yeah, I know he's supposed to be great and modern and all that. But his work just sounds like mush to me.

Come to think of it, I have a general problem with the French musical aesthetic. Too much atmosphere and perfume and effects; not enough structural rigour.

I hear you, re: Berlioz: http://ionarts.blogspot.de/2012/03/ionarts-at-large-berlioz-damnation.html

La Damnation de Faust should not feel as long as Les Troyens. Now, Stéphane Denève knows more about conducting Berlioz than I know listening to the composer, and therefore I should seek faults on my part first. I'm a troubled Berlioz-listener. In abstract I admire his phenomenal skill in orchestration, or the innovative use of instrumentation. But when I listen to the undisputable master of episodic phantasmorgasm, I often feel like I have ADD. Appropriate for the Will-o-the-Wisp Minuet, granted. But I look with some desperation to a conductor to take me by the ear and pull me from beginning to end, without the mind beginning to wander...

Debussy's Pelleas was a break-through work for me. Like a different composer, from that darn post meridiem demi-goat.

I had to work hard to 'get' most composers. Only select Bach and especially Haydn came really naturally. Haydn I have loved equally at age 5 and 35.

[eyeresist]

Bartok. Was reminded of this this morning when I heard the finale of his 3rd string quartet. His material doesn't interest me, and what he does with it doesn't interest me. I've given him plenty of chances.

[Mirror Image]

Schnittke is another composer I just don't get and I don't think I'll ever get. Bare in mind, that it's not the composer's fault that I dislike his music. I simply just don't like the way he composes music. His style seems so cold and distant.

[Madiel]

For my own list, I still struggle with Holmboe but I'm not giving up! I think there's something there

*The forum's brand new wild Holmboe enthusiast bounces in*

Absolutely there is!  And I personally adore the process of finding it.

But I tend to subscribe to similar views to mc urkneal a few pages back.  One person's ranking of pieces and composers will be different to another because we all value different things in music.  My priorities are not anyone else's priorities.  The best anyone can do is TRY to articulate why they like the things they like, and don't like the things they don't - which requires a fair bit of self-awareness - so that others can assess the similarities and differences with their own 'priorities' or push-button issues.

For example, the whole reason I got on the Holmboe train myself was not just the positive reviews (mostly in the Penguin Guide), but the kind of positive reviews and what they said - remarks about form and development and structure, and comparisons with other composers that I already responded to. When someone gets compared to Sibelius and Shostakovich it sparks my interest.  For someone else, a comparison to Sibelius and Shostakovich might not be a recommendation at all.  I already suspected I would like Holmboe before I heard a note.  Happily, the suspicion turned out to be correct.

It's no different for any other subject.  For example, hotel reviews in TripAdvisor.  When someone complains/gives a low score because of some issue I don't care about much, I don't rule out the hotel.  When some gives a high score because of issues I do care about, the hotel goes towards the top of the list.

Also... I do tend to think that artists improve with age, but it's not always true.  In the field of painting, later de Chirico is widely panned as vastly inferior to his early work.

[Mirror Image]

*The forum's brand new wild Holmboe enthusiast bounces in*

Absolutely there is!  And I personally adore the process of finding it.

But I tend to subscribe to similar views to mc urkneal a few pages back.  One person's ranking of pieces and composers will be different to another because we all value different things in music.  My priorities are not anyone else's priorities.  The best anyone can do is TRY to articulate why they like the things they like, and don't like the things they don't - which requires a fair bit of self-awareness - so that others can assess the similarities and differences with their own 'priorities' or push-button issues.

For example, the whole reason I got on the Holmboe train myself was not just the positive reviews (mostly in the Penguin Guide), but the kind of positive reviews and what they said - remarks about form and development and structure, and comparisons with other composers that I already responded to. When someone gets compared to Sibelius and Shostakovich it sparks my interest.  For someone else, a comparison to Sibelius and Shostakovich might not be a recommendation at all.  I already suspected I would like Holmboe before I heard a note.  Happily, the suspicion turned out to be correct.

It's no different for any other subject.  For example, hotel reviews in TripAdvisor.  When someone complains/gives a low score because of some issue I don't care about much, I don't rule out the hotel.  When some gives a high score because of issues I do care about, the hotel goes towards the top of the list.

Also... I do tend to think that artists improve with age, but it's not always true.  In the field of painting, later de Chirico is widely panned as vastly inferior to his early work.

Well I'm glad you like Holmboe's music. I simply do not and can't find anything redeeming about it other than to say it's pretty lifeless sounding to me, but a lot of it could be attributed to the BIS set I own which isn't all that impressive performance-wise either. I guess, at the end of the day, I just don't connect with the music because, to me, it lacks substance. Structure alone doesn't sell a composer for me. I respond emotionally to a piece of music whether it be a harmonic voicing that I find appealing or a rhythm that just hits me in the gut. With Holmboe, I get nothing, but, again, I'm glad you enjoy the music.