Deep thought in Classical Era Music?

[Karl Henning]

I think it did, in religious music. The relationship one had with Christ was presumed to be personal and deep. And it was expressed, among other forms, in music. The Enlightenment composers wrote deep, meditative religious music just as Bach did, if quite less frequently. Whether or not they were personally dedicated Christians is beside the point as to what they were feeling as they composed. In fact, in the 18th century, a good dose of deism or agnosticism was not necessarily incompatible with Christianity, as Jefferson demonstrates.

This is still a retro-fit. When Ockeghem wrote a polyphonic Mass, he was not expressing Personal Feelings. Period.  If they had thought in such terms (which I doubt they did), they would thought it unseemly and forward to "express personal feelings" in music to be employed in the Liturgy.

[Chaszz]

This is still a retro-fit. When Ockeghem wrote a polyphonic Mass, he was not expressing Personal Feelings. Period.  If they had thought in such terms (which I doubt they did), they would thought it unseemly and forward to "express personal feelings" in music to be employed in the Liturgy.

I was writing about the 18th century, not the 15th. I also said "especially after Luther." If you'd like to remove most or all music before Lutheranism from the point I'm trying to make, I have no great issue.

[Cato]

This is still a retro-fit. When Ockeghem wrote a polyphonic Mass, he was not expressing Personal Feelings. Period.  If they had thought in such terms (which I doubt they did), they would thought it unseemly and forward to "express personal feelings" in music to be employed in the Liturgy.

Medieval people in general seemed to have been marked by an amazing lack of ego: this was the opinion of several Medieval History professors of mine from the good ol' days.  Their joke was that the claim is proven via the main artist of that era being named Anonymous.   0:)

We are lucky that we even know the names Ockehegm or Perotin: and Art was still subordinated to religious expression.  The idea of e.g. painting portraits or producing a concerto to display one's talents on an instrument would not be known until the more ego-centered art of the early modern period is born.

[Chaszz]

Just a word on the piano reductions of scores with which this thread began. Imagine a rising middle class with no radio, movies, TV and internet, the luck of the draw in traveling theatrical troupes, and no orchestral concerts outside of major cities. There was music in church, of course. But apart from that and especially in the evenings, reading aloud to each other and piano and chamber music in their homes and those of their friends was almost the only culture and entertainment they were likely to get for weeks or months at a time. Every bourgeois family had a daughter who could read music well enough and play. Piano reductions filled a great need, and made a good profit for composers and publishers.   

[kishnevi]

Do we know whether Mozart was aware of any of these problem plays? Is there a tradition of morally "problematic" drama in Italian or German literature?

I'm not sure if Mozart was very familiar with Shakespeare, much less the other English playwrights.  And being rather unfamiliar with Italian/German literature of the era (beyond Goethe, and not much of him other than Faust, which is too late for Mozart anyway), I haven't the vaguest idea what the answer to your second question might be.

I've never read Webster or Tourneur, but I remember reading the Duchess of Malfi at school -- I loved it , but I don't remember it as containing unresolved moral questions. I'll look at it again sometime (it was on in London recently but I didn't go.)

Thinking it over,  perhaps Probelm Play is not the term I should have used.  But I think Webster and Tourneur were the fathers of the "antihero", as we know the concept: the heroic villain or villainous hero, or at least the resolutely morally ambigous central character whose very actions are never quite resolved into something moral or immoral.  Webster in particular strikes me writing plays which suggest there simply isn't a moral universe, in the way his contemporaries at least would have understood it.  (Remember---our modern view of morality is a good deal more complex and vague than the people of Shakespeare's time or Mozart's time.  What strikes us as morally neutral or morally obvious might have been appalling, or at least very perplexing, to them; and vice versa.  We've resolved, or at least learned to live with, questions Webster raised, and which his audience would have found at least a little disturbing.)  Tourneur directly questions the idea that morality is anything beyond human convention,  and in rather subversive way--especially at the end of the Atheist's Tragedy, in which the title villain is killed off rather suddenly, in an obviously artificial manner, as if the playwright was saying, "Oh, it's the end of Act V; I'd better punish the wicked and reward the good people as quick as possible,  and the more obvious and less motivated my manipulation is, the better!"  (The villain, having managed to get his latest victim sentence to death by a court, impulsively decides he wants to be the executioner himself, but in hefting the ax, with a suddenness and clumsiness that verges on farce,  manages to cave in his own skull.)

Actually I may have looked at the Tourneur years and years ago when I was very interested in Hamlet -- but I can't remember much about it now. I used to be interested in the idea that Hamlet was a Problem Play, not really a tragedy (the problem being about whether to be "God's scourge and minister")

I've always thought of Hamlet as being one play in which Shakespeare failed rather badly.  I think he wanted to do several things with the play (your idea being one of the things he attempts),  and couldn't get them to cohere very well, with the result that Hamlet is a character much more problematic than Shakespeare actually intended.

Again, as I wrote before, his approach to religion and his relationship to Christ were personal, and this is reflected in his music. The texts of his cantatas are full of references to the personal relationship between him and his Savior, which are often tenderly reflected in the music and instrumentation. Although he didn't write the words, he selected and often commissioned them.   

I would suggest (and this goes for almost all the composers in the 17th and 18th century) the text that Bach set to music probably indicate his religious and personal feelings more than the music itself does.
Although I'm not clear on exactly how much leeway he had in selecting the cantata texts--how often were they handed to him by others,  how much input did he have in the selection, how often did he have the freedom to set whatever text he wanted to use for that week's canata?

In fact, setting aside settings of the Mass and liturgical settings made on commission (in which the patron or performing church would probably select whatever text was used, insofar as liturgical texts can be selected), this would probably apply to Renaissance composers as much as Baroque ones.

[Chaszz]

...I would suggest (and this goes for almost all the composers in the 17th and 18th century) the text that Bach set to music probably indicate his religious and personal feelings more than the music itself does.
Although I'm not clear on exactly how much leeway he had in selecting the cantata texts--how often were they handed to him by others,  how much input did he have in the selection, how often did he have the freedom to set whatever text he wanted to use for that week's canata?...

Numerous music critics and Bach biographers have remarked, some with extended examples of score and text, on how sensitively Bach set the varied personal emotions evoked by the individual's relationship with the Savior, both melodically and in orchestration. This is so for the Passions as well as the cantatas.

Though a cantata grew from a Biblical quote related to the date on the liturgical calendar, in portions of it there was freedom to elaborate on the theme. Bach collaborated with several poets of his time, such as the Leipzig poet Picander, in creating the texts of the parts of the cantatas, mostly the solo arias, that were not specifically prescribed by tradition. All reported indications are that he had input into the thoughts and feelings expressed, if not the words themselves. 

[Mandryka]

Florestan asked "The better question would be: during that time, did the concept of (musical) personal, deep utterances exist? "

(Sorry I can't seem to get it to quote)

As a preliminary to answering this question, I wonder whether you will accept that Mozart and his contemporaries thought of the concerto as a metaphor for the relation of an individual to a group.

[Florestan]

(Florestan asked "The better question would be: during that time, did the concept of (musical) personal, deep utterances exist? ")

I think it did, in religious music. The relationship one had with Christ was presumed to be personal and deep. Especially after Luther, and even in Counter-Reformation art, where I think of all the piercings of the heart that Christ supposedly caused. And this intimate relationship was expressed, among other forms, in music.

Well, this is (partially, see below) true in the Reformation world. But religious music is by its nature unambiguously programmatic. Even before the music begins we know with certainty what it will be about: God, Christ, Virgin Mary, Christmas, Easter, sin, redemption etc. There is nothing open to interpretation and speculation.

But my question was formulated in quite another context, immediately following comments related to Mozart, Haydn, the symphony and style galant. It obviously referred not to Bach's religious music but to the Classical instrumental music.

The Enlightenment composers wrote deep, meditative great religious music just as Bach did, if quite less frequently.

Well, not even Bach was that personal. After all he was a Lutheran, writing (mostly on commission) for a Lutheran community. Most, if not all, his personal ideas about all things religious were (a) derived from, or previously expressed in, Luther's writings and (b) shared by the whole community. The idea of Bach being a lonely genius creating deeply personal music out of nowhere, as if dictated by the Holy Ghost (which would anyway be in stark contradiction with "deeply personal"), while surrounded by a misapprehending, indifferent or even hostile environment is entirely a Romantic fabrication.

And if a composer could knowingly use deep, personal feelings in religious music, would he necessarily have carefully walled himself off from them, and the idea of them, when writing other kinds of music? Of course, the Romantic concept of extreme self-expression did not exist, but to deny composers all intentions toward depth and philosophic meaning is a bit extreme in the other direction, I think. These guys had brains, after all.

I don't deny no such thing. I just ask to be shown "depth and philosophical meaning" in the non-vocal music of Haydn, Mozart or any of their contemporaries --- with only one common-sense precondition: based solely on their own words and writings, on what we know for certain to have been the contemporary philosophy of music and using no concept or idea which did not exist in their times.

[Florestan]

Florestan asked "The better question would be: during that time, did the concept of (musical) personal, deep utterances exist? "

(Sorry I can't seem to get it to quote)

As a preliminary to answering this question, I wonder whether you will accept that Mozart and his contemporaries thought of the concerto as a metaphor for the relation of an individual to a group.

If you mean a musical individual to a musical group, there is no metaphor: it is obvious. If you mean a social individual to a social group, I will accept it as soon as you present evidence for this assertion, respecting the precondition in the last paragraph of my post just above this one.

[Purusha]

Well, not even Bach was that personal. After all he was a Lutheran, writing (mostly on commission) for a Lutheran community. Most, if not all, his personal ideas about all things religious were (a) derived from, or previously expressed in, Luther's writings and (b) shared by the whole community. The idea of Bach being a lonely genius creating deeply personal music out of nowhere, as if dictated by the Holy Ghost (which would anyway be in stark contradiction with "deeply personal"), while surrounded by a misapprehending, indifferent or even hostile environment is entirely a Romantic fabrication.

I think i may have to take objection to this. The reality of genius is something that is inherent in human nature itself, and it has a tendency to manifest itself whether it is consciously recognized or not, and if you know anything about the biographical details of Bach you should also know that he did in fact work in an environment which was misapprehending, indifferent and even hostile.

This "human" aspect existed in the middle ages also, but was essentially ignored because the focus of that civilization was centered around that which was above the human dimension. This does not mean of course that it was a society without hierarchies, which is what i suspect a lot of people here actually believe when they speak of the peculiar "anonymity" of medieval artists. This anonymity existed precisely because medieval man had a much deeper understanding of what "superior" and "inferior" meant in a transcendental sense, enough to know that the human ego did not belong in that particular equation. In this sense, the "humanism" of the Renaissance can be seen as a real degeneration, the end result being that the human ego was put on a pedestal. In this atmosphere, those who still had an innate sense of the transcendent, that is, those who placed the human self well below the higher "Self", had to "manifest" themselves in an individual manner also, which in a way lessened the spiritual value of their work. Even then, this created a paradox in that we are now speaking of artists with a marked lack of individual ego being singled out in an egotistic majority which by inverse proportion is now woven in a new "anonymity" which in itself has nothing whatsoever to do with the hierarchical anonymity of the middle ages. What happened in the Romantic era is that human genius, hitherto being the province of an isolated few, ended up becoming public domain, which had the effect of extinguishing any transcendent or "suprahuman" quality it may have retained up to that point. Nowadays it is egotism that reigns supreme, but by some strange twist many think we have "outgrown" concepts such as genius by returning to an earlier, more "democratic" understand of human life, while in reality it is precisely the other way around.

In short, all this can be summed up by simply saying that human genius, far from being the "summit" of a humanistic artistic ideal, was actually for the most part nothing other then an exception to the rule (thus, the "tortured" nature of genius who felt alienated from a society he did not understand, and for good reason). With the advent of humanism, western civilization placed the human ego above anything of a transcendent order. But a feeling for that which is beyond the human is inherent in human nature itself, so not everybody conformed to this ideal, and a few of those individuals happened to be artists. Hence, what we mistakenly refer to as "genius". What happened then is that, while medieval man suppressed any "humanistic" tendency because he focused entirely on that which was above man, modern man, by inverse proportion, suppresses everything that is above man by exalting all that which is purely "human", or below the human ever since psychoanalysis was developed. Basically, by moving towards the extreme opposite direction, modern man seems to have gone full circle by creating a "parody" of medieval "anonymity" based on a complete reversal of the principles that governed medieval life. Basically, when everybody is seen as "special", no one is.

BTW, when speaking of Renaissance "polyphony", it is my opinion that this was an art which still had a predominately "medieval" character to it, and even though chronologically it falls well within the sphere of influence of humanistic art. In that sense, it was actually more of an anachronism, the fulfillment of a musical possibility which begun in the late middle ages and had to continue even in the midst of a counter artistic current. This explains some of the discrepancies between this genuinely spiritual art as opposed to the titanesque paganism of Renaissance "religious" art.

[Florestan]

I think i may have to take objection to this. The reality of genius is something that is inherent in human nature itself, and it has a tendency to manifest itself whether it is consciously recognized or not,

I didn't mean that Bach was no genius, or that genius in general does not exist.

and if you know anything about the biographical details of Bach you should also know that he did in fact work in an environment which was misapprehending, indifferent and even hostile.

He worked in many different environments, which one would you describe as "misapprehending", which one as "indifferent" and which one as "hostile"?

With the rest of your post I generally tend to agree.

[Karl Henning]

... The idea of Bach being a lonely genius creating deeply personal music out of nowhere, as if dictated by the Holy Ghost (which would anyway be in stark contradiction with "deeply personal"), while surrounded by a misapprehending, indifferent or even hostile environment is entirely a Romantic fabrication.

Post of the Month

[Purusha]

I didn't mean that Bach was no genius, or that genius in general does not exist.

He worked in many different environments, which one would you describe as "misapprehending", which one as "indifferent" and which one as "hostile"?

With the rest of your post I generally tend to agree.

Well, misapprehending, indifferent and hostile in the sense of what made Bach different or "greater" than the average musician of his day. I remember reading many anecdotes in this regard when i went through Christoph Wolff's biography, which alas i cannot recall in any specific detail at present. Even so, the general anonymity his music enjoyed after his death is a mute testament to a certain degree of disinterest in his "genius", a disinterest which is partly due to the aforementioned misapprehension and indifference, but also due to a complete reticence from the part of Bach to achieve any form of "notoriety".

That said, i don't disagree that the Romantics spoiled the entire concept of genius (again i must stress how inappropriate this word is in describing the true nature of the object in question, which i personally believe is beyond the human sphere entirely) by adding a "personal" and "individual" character to something which by its very nature would escape anything of a truly personal or individual order. In this respect, i am in perfect agreement that dragging the concept of the "holy spirit" into a purely humanistic equation is a perfect contradiction of terms, if there ever was one. And the irony is all the more obvious when one looks at the artistic development of Beethoven, who we reckon is the archetype of the "genius" as understood by the Romantics, because the quality that makes Beethoven a genius is not the degree of "individualization" of his music, from a purely humanistic point of view, but his attempt to use this "exalted" individualization in an effort to escape the human point of view entirely, and reach that which is beyond the individual, a genuine "liberation" in a Buddhist sense from the perspective of what is known as "self power". Basically, where Beethoven used this exalted "individualism" as a mean to escape from the human state entirely, the Romantics mistook the mean for the end itself. Needles to say, if Beethoven had been born in the middle ages, he would have been absorbed into the spiritual environment of that age (which was "other power", to stretch the Buddhist analogy) without any need to carve his own way towards the transcendent using only his own relative individual powers.

BTW, for those who may find it strange for me to equate western genius to anything pertaining to the eastern traditions, this article regarding the late works of Dostoevsky (who knew nothing about Buddhism and was quite hostile to what little he thought he knew about it) may demonstrate how such a comparison is not as strange as it may first appear:

http://www.utoronto.ca/tsq/DS/02/155.shtml

Needless to say of course that the only reason so many westerners had to rely on such "individual" means is that western culture in general has been suffering from a spiritual crisis for a long time now, a crisis which was not as acutely felt in Germany when Bach was alive as opposed to the environment Beethoven grew up in.

[Karl Henning]

. . . Even so, the general anonymity his music enjoyed after his death is a mute testament to a certain degree of disinterest in his "genius" . . . .

No, I do not think that his anonymity then is any "referendum" on his "genius," at all.

[Florestan]

Well, misapprehending, indifferent and hostile in the sense of what made Bach different or "greater" than the average musician of his day. I remember reading many anecdotes in this regard when i went through Christoph Wolff's biography, which alas i cannot recall in any specific detail at present.

AFAIK most quarrels he had with his employers were in his early days in Arnstadt and were over such technicalities as the quality of the choir singers, or his absence from his duties during his pilgrimage to Buxtehude --- but the quality of his music or his proficiency as a musician were never an issue, on the contrary, his expertise was greatly and widely acknowledged, especially as time went by.

Even so, the general anonymity his music enjoyed after his death is a mute testament to a certain degree of disinterest in his "genius", a disinterest which is partly due to the aforementioned misapprehension and indifference,

Active interest in "geniuses of the past" is another Romantic thing (a good one this time).  I don't think the Baroque composers, and least of all Bach, expected or sought any celebrity among their contemporaries, let alone entertain any notion of their work enduring for centuries; they'd have been puzzled to learn that 2 or 3 hundred years after their death they'd be not merely remembered, but downright revered. 

[Karl Henning]

AFAIK most quarrels he had with his employers were in his early days in Arnstadt and were over such technicalities as the quality of the choir singers, or his absence from his duties during his pilgrimage to Buxtehude --- but the quality of his music or his proficiency as a musician were never an issue, on the contrary, his expertise was greatly and widely acknowledged, especially as time went by.

Aye; it is another Romanticist retro-fit, to suppose that on the basis of satisfaction with his music, his employers would have made supreme efforts to satisfy his wishes in details of the job(s).

[Florestan]

Aye; it is another Romanticist retro-fit, to suppose that on the basis of satisfaction with his music, his employers would have made supreme efforts to satisfy his wishes in details of the job(s).

Or to acomodate to his whims and moods in regards to social life and social codes. Prince-bishop Colloredo would have looked at Ludwig of Bayern exactly as at a madman, for dedicating his life (and money) to make Wagner's easier.

[Florestan]

That said, i don't disagree that the Romantics spoiled the entire concept of genius (again i must stress how inappropriate this word is in describing the true nature of the object in question, which i personally believe is beyond the human sphere entirely) by adding a "personal" and "individual" character to something which by its very nature would escape anything of a truly personal or individual order. In this respect, i am in perfect agreement that dragging the concept of the "holy spirit" into a purely humanistic equation is a perfect contradiction of terms, if there ever was one. And the irony is all the more obvious when one looks at the artistic development of Beethoven, who we reckon is the archetype of the "genius" as understood by the Romantics, because the quality that makes Beethoven a genius is not the degree of "individualization" of his music, from a purely humanistic point of view, but his attempt to use this "exalted" individualization in an effort to escape the human point of view entirely, and reach that which is beyond the individual, a genuine "liberation" in a Buddhist sense from the perspective of what is known as "self power". Basically, where Beethoven used this exalted "individualism" as a mean to escape from the human state entirely, the Romantics mistook the mean for the end itself. .

Interesting idea.

[Purusha]

Active interest in "geniuses of the past" is another Romantic thing (a good one this time).  I don't think the Baroque composers, and least of all Bach, expected or sought any celebrity among their contemporaries, let alone entertain any notion of their work enduring for centuries; they'd have been puzzled to learn that 2 or 3 hundred years after their death they'd be not merely remembered, but downright revered. 

If that was entirely the case though, we would have no information whatsoever regarding historical personages of any kind, whether scientific, artistic or religious. But this is not the case and human "individualities" have been known and "revered" for most of what we consider to be "known" history. When Dante chose a guide for his esoteric journey in the Divine Comedy, he picked Virgil, not "anonymous". Today, it is Dante that is revered in his turn. Even if we argue that this is a condition resulting from the general "degeneration" of humanity owning to the fact we currently live in the last cycle of our existence, that which is referred as the "Kali Yuga" in Hindu cosmology, it is still a fact of human existence that has nothing to do with what the Romantics may have thought they were "inventing".

As such, the concept of "genius" as intended by those Romantics cannot be considered an "arbitrary" invention but more of a distortion and degeneration of something that in its natural state has enjoyed quite a natural and healthy existence as far back as we can remember. And surely, as "anonymous" many of those medieval artists may have been, their work is certainly known and was meant to be known, all the more so because traditional societies had no conception of l'art pour l'art and neither did they consider art to be distinct from what nowadays we refer to as mere "craft". This essay by Ananda Coomaraswamy may elucidate a few aspects of how art was understood in ancient times:

http://www.studiesincomparativereligion.com/public/articles/Why_Exhibit_Works_of_Art-by_Ananda_Coomaraswamy.aspx

Personally, what i see here is still a tendency towards a "democratic" perspective, a tendency to "lower" the artistry of a Bach to a degree more in tune with the commonality of his age, which is something that relates exactly to what i was saying regarding the absolute egotism of modern civilization "masquerading" as something akin to the absolute lack of egotism which characterized most traditional societies. The truth is that the medieval artist or craftsman didn't feel any need to impose his own individuality into his work because he had in mind something that pertained to that which was immutable and eternal, his work being a mere manifestation of some eternal principle into an "outward" form which in itself was of no particular value. Thus, when the medieval artist painted his icon, it was the object of the icon he had in mind, not the end result of his work, which was only a distant reflection of said object, almost like a dead relic, something that could at best serve as a mere "reminder" of the object in question, and that was for the most part its very function.

The Renaissance changed all this in that most artists lost sight of the principles contemplated by traditional artists, so that "art" itself became a vehicle for the expression of purely individual talent because there was nothing else to it. Thus, the work of art becomes a reflection of the artist rather then anything pertaining to a "superior" order, and human nature being fundamentally undemocratic, only those works produced by an individuality imbued with some "transcendent" element can be considered to have any value whatsoever. Basically, what we consider to be a "genius" is nothing but a pneumatic individuality in a stoic sense that just happens to be endowed with the type of "profane" talent that can be objectively appreciated by a "commonality" (thus, to answer your first question, it is only in this sense that Bach was "known" in his days), while most art nowadays is made by psychic or even hylic individuals, as the gross excesses of contemporary "popular" art surely must attest. To argue that human genius cannot be individual in any sense is tantamount to saying the human state cannot in itself achieve any degree of transcendence, for then, how are we to be "made in the image of God"? But ultimately, human genius is only "individual" in so far as the human state can participate in supra-individual realities. Thus, Bach was human except when it came to his genius, which was not human and thus not "of" Bach. But his genius still pertains to the possibilities we human beings have as creatures made in the image of God, except not everybody can be chosen to be used as a vehicle for a such a "divine" inspiration. For that, to imply there is nothing of value in the fruits of such a divinely inspired individual is a bit extreme, don't you think? We don't know why God chose Mohammed to send his message to the Arab peoples, but the fact he chose a human individual doesn't mean one can just dismiss the "Koran" has having no more value then any other type of literature produced in that environment, however "unlikely" Mohammed himself would have considered the idea that one day his name would have been revered by an entire civilization. I wouldn't place Bach anywhere near that level of divine intercession but the analogy is quite pertinent i think. As such, the error of the Romantics is that they mistook entirely where the inspiration of genius actually came from, and created a delusion in which it is now the "individual" who becomes like a god himself, rather then being a mere vessel for something coming from high above. Yet, they were not mistaken in attaching a superior "qualitative" dimension to the works of such inspired individuals, because this qualitative difference is actually real and not a "phantom" of anyone's imagination.

[Purusha]

And now i can't believe i just wrote all that. I think i need to cut on coffee for a while.