The exotica thread

[kyjo]

This thread is meant for discussion of all music composed in an exotic vein. Apart from the usual suspects (Rimsky, Borodin, Khachaturian etc.), here are some lovely slices of exotica I have discovered:

Karayev: Seven Beauties and In the Path of Thunder (ballet suites)
Szymanowski: Symphony no. 3 Song of the Night; Harnasie; Love Songs of Hafiz
Amirov's "symphonic mughams" and PC
Ranjbaran: Persian Trilogy
Villa-Lobos' symphonic poems
Griffes: The Pleasure-Dome of Kubla Khan; Five Poems of Ancient China and Japan
Holst: Beni Mora; Japanese Suite
Schierbeck: The Chinese Flute (song cycle)
Ludolf Nielsen: Lackschmi
Monasypov: Violin Sonata (on YT)
Kuzhamyarov: Symphony no. 3 (on YT)
Schmitt: La tragedie de Salome
Lehmann: Violin Concerto
Lyapunov: Hashish (symphonic poem)
Ippolitov-Ivanov: Caucasian Sketches: Suites 1 and 2; Turkish Fragments
Bantock: Omar Khayyam
Liadov's short orchestral works
N. Tcherepnin: Le Royaume enchantee; La Princesse lointaine
A. Tcherepnin: Symphony no. 3 Chinese
Aho: Chinese Songs
Fernstrom: Ro-Nai-Nai's Songs
Chisholm: Piano Concerto no. 2 Hindustani
Ireland: The Forgotten Rite; Mai-Dun
Most of Kamran Ince's music
Rabuad: Marouf (opera)
And, of course, the Butterfly Lovers' Violin Concerto and The Yellow River Piano Concerto

[some guy]

And to all the Chinese and Japanese and Iranians on the board, it's Haydn's London symphonies that are exotic.

And Copland's Appalachian Spring.

And Gerhard's New York symphony.

And Mendelssohn's Scottish symphony.

Perhaps only Vaughan-Williams' seventh will seem exotic to everyone....

[Sergeant Rock]

Perhaps only Vaughan-Williams' seventh will seem exotic to everyone....

  ....unless we have a few music loving penguins among us.

Sarge

[Octave]

But the term "exotica" (cf. David Toop's book) does kind of account for a Western (dis)(ad)vantage point and gross (i.e. fascinating) "misreading", doesn't it?  I think Kyjo knows that.  The wrongness or strangeness or inaccuracy of these works as anthropology is part of what makes them fascinating as music, right?  When it's "concert" music written from the vantage point of someone from the ethnic/regional group that produced the "exotic" (sic) content, then it's the presentation as ~Western concert music that is exotic, unless you are not from that ~ethnic group, in which case it's the ~exotic content that is ~exotic.  Duck-rabbit!
I think it's kind of useful to have a thread that takes stock of some of these inspirations and oddities.  I was thinking of Rimsky-Korsakov just yesterday in this vein, so fresh input is welcome.

A couple 'gimmes':
Lou Harrison (a bunch...the gamelan pieces in terms of instrumentation)
Christopher Adler (all I know are the pieces on the album EPILOGUE FOR A DARK DAY [Tzadik, 2004])

[North Star]

Jenny Lin's Chinoiserie is an entire disc devoted to 'Chinese' music written by people from the west - the Tcherepnin etudes were written in China, and are quite 'Chinese', though, most of them being influenced by different Chinese instruments.

Here are a few others that ought to qualify:

Britten: The Prince of the Pagodas
Ravel: Chansons madécasses
Mozart: Rondo all Turca

[Dax]

But the term "exotica" (cf. David Toop's book) does kind of account for a Western (dis)vantage point and gross (i.e. fascinating) "misreading", doesn't it?

Quite so. Given the pejorative use of the word in some quarters, some kind of definition would be useful here.

[kyjo]

By "exotica" I am referring to music of, pertaining to, or influenced by the modes and harmonic patterns of music from Eastern (non-Western) countries.

[jochanaan]

By all rights, one should include Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde and Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker in the "usual suspects."

[kyjo]

I shouldn't have forgotten Respighi's Belkis, Queen of Sheba, with its thrilling War Dance!

[Mirror Image]

I shouldn't have forgotten Respighi's Belkis, Queen of Sheba, with its thrilling War Dance!

Hell yes! That War Dance movement is outstanding. The Geoffrey Simon performance is the one to hear, although Eiji Oue's is a sonic blockbuster too!

[listener]

3 operas:
MOZART``The Abduction from the Seraglio
GLUCK`Le Cinesi
CORNELIUS: The Barber of Bagdad

[some guy]

By "exotica" I am referring to music of, pertaining to, or influenced by the modes and harmonic patterns of music from Eastern (non-Western) countries.

Yes, we know.

[Octave]

Yes, we know.

How obnoxious.

By "misreading" above, btw, I meant (in conjunction with the nod the more negative connotations of the term "excotica") something like iirc Harold Bloom might have meant, also something like cross-pollination and mutation the way jazz has always done since before it was 'jazz'.  [EDIT: I'm just trying to re-emphasize the felicity of ~Western appropriations and narcissism...exciting distortions and accidents etc.  Otherwise the requisite hesitations just sound like the policing anthropology beached itself on for quite a while; still, perhaps.]
Anyway, I hope Kyjo and others will keep this thread going. 

OT, several years ago I read a book that didn't focus on music (literature is his real subject though the scope of the book is rather wider than that), but seems relevant.  For whatever it's worth; I'm sure there are wheelbarrow fulls of stuff on this subject even just in musicology.  The Kontje book was my glancing blow, and it was interesting.  (EDIT: In addition to the famous Edward Said books, which I'm pretty sure almost everybody gets to first of all.)


Todd Kontje: GERMAN ORIENTALISMS (Univ Michigan, 2004)

Any genealogy of how any idea or place or tradition becomes the "middle/center" of anything is probably relevant to my own anxieties about what survives and what I spend time with.

[some guy]

How obnoxious.

Yes, that was my point.

Any genealogy of how any idea or place or tradition becomes the "middle/center" of anything is probably relevant to my own anxieties about what survives and what I spend time with.

But this is what I'm really interested in. If you can get past your perception of me, could you explain why you have anxieties about what survives and how that relates to what you spend time with. (I took this as meaning something beyond the bluntly practical--if something has not indeed survived, then it's not available to spend time with.)

Not necessarily this thread, of course. A new thread? A PM?

[Lisztianwagner]

Johann Strauss II: Persischer-Marsch, Egyptischer-Marsch and Tausend und eine Nach-Walzer.
Respighi: Brazilian Impressions.

[kyjo]

Yes, we know.

Obviously you didn't, as you were the one who first questioned the definition of the word.

[Octave]

Some Guy, yes, I overreacted.  I need to take a weekend away from the web and de-crank.  We'll talk, though.

[some guy]

OK, cool.

[Superhorn]

    Albert Roussel : Evocations .  Opera/Ballet Padmavati . 

[kyjo]

    Albert Roussel : Evocations .  Opera/Ballet Padmavati .

Indeed! Love those works by the way! Which brings to mind.....Ibert's Escales.