How does one have time to explore?

[Madiel]

She was also approached by Deutsche Grammophon to do a classically-based album. The result, Night of Hunters, is a song cycle where each song is based, to a greater or lesser extent, on an existing work, most often a solo piano piece.

So yeah, Deutsche Grammophon didn't think she was just tinkering with trivial junk. They specifically picked her out as someone they thought had qualities similar to classical music such that that kind of crossover would work.

The whole reason I toy with these examples is it's so amusing to watch people suggesting that some quality or other can only be found in one place, as if it can't possibly cross genres. So yeah, I went and dug up a bit of 5-voice counterpoint, and then I realised it's from a work that in terms of length and emotional arc is pretty similar to something like Winterreise. Incidentally, it makes more use of harpsichord than any other album I know.

I suspect I could find some example somewhere for just about any technique or idea that someone claims is found in their preferred style and absent elsewhere. It's no different, really, to the fact that there are a lot of core concepts and principles that can be found in languages all over the world. This apparent notion that one kind of music has operated in a vacuum from another, such that there are no shared lessons, is just absurd. Good musicians are by their nature curious about what they might find in other forms of music. The Beatles used the same chord progression as Mahler. Modern 'classical' musicians appropriate ideas from popular music and its African roots, just as other composers appropriated ideas from Asian music about 120 years ago.

It's not the actual musicians that insist on being in fortified bunkers, just some of their listeners.

[Florestan]

There are 2 vocally overlaid tracks. I said 5-voice counterpoint, but normally when one is talking about 'voices' in counterpoint one does not mean 'sung'.

(EDIT: It's actually arguably 6-voice, but I was playing it safe.)

Nor, when one is talking about 5-voice counterpoint, is one focused on the technical facility of the performer. One is normally focused on the compositional aspect. I certainly was. Why on earth does it matter that the same singer's voice was used 3 times instead of using 3 different singers to perform live? One of the bits of 5-voice counterpoint I'm familiar with is in Mozart's last symphony - is Mozart somehow a poorer composer because of how many players he requires to generate the 5 voices, rather than fitting it all on an organ or harpsichord? Is a Bach cantata inherently inferior in your eyes to the Well-Tempered Clavier?

You didn't get it at all. A Mozart symphony or a Bach fugue requires the players to perform simultaneously. Tori Amos sung 3 or 5 or what not vocal tracks separately then they were overlapped electronically --- and that makes all the difference in the world.

But nevermind. You have your ideas, I have mine. Debating endlessly and pointlessly about them will not make the Earth revolve faster or slower around the Sun so let's just agree to disagree and leave it at that. Pace e gioia mille ani!  

[amw]

You didn't get it at all. A Mozart symphony or a Bach fugue requires the players to perform simultaneously. Tori Amos sung 3 or 5 or what not vocal tracks separately then they were overlapped electronically --- and that makes all the difference in the world.

I don't see how that makes a difference at all. (remember that the recorded medium is the "canvas" Amos is working with, rather than a score intended for re-interpretation) You may as well argue that Mozart is superior to Schubert on the basis that Mozart wrote his works out directly in full score, whereas Schubert first wrote the melody and bass line and then filled in the inner parts later; but the compositional process does not necessarily have of a perceptible impact on the end result.

[71 dB]

You didn't get it at all. A Mozart symphony or a Bach fugue requires the players to perform simultaneously. Tori Amos sung 3 or 5 or what not vocal tracks separately then they were overlapped electronically --- and that makes all the difference in the world.

Well, Mozart and Bach didn't have electronics* as an option. The musicians of today have. The difference is there is more ways to do things and possibilies to do things impossible before. Tori Amos needed to listen to the already recorded tracks when singing a new one. Artistically that's not very different from performing simultaneously.

--------------------------------
* That term of yours is a bit funny in this context. Pro Tools or some other music software was used to product the song, just as you use an internet browser to post your messages here. Are our messages typed electronically? 

[Madiel]

You didn't get it at all. A Mozart symphony or a Bach fugue requires the players to perform simultaneously. Tori Amos sung 3 or 5 or what not vocal tracks separately then they were overlapped electronically --- and that makes all the difference in the world.

What difference does it make? You're still talking about the performers when I'm talking about the composers. Mozart writing out a symphony doesn't actually require ANY performers. Only you hearing it does.  And it is in fact perfectly possible for someone to reconstruct Mozart's 5-voice counterpoint all by themselves with modern recording technology. I would bet there's a MIDI version of symphony no.41 out there somewhere.

And one can only imagine what you think of composers that have used electronic techniques, like Varese or Stockhausen.

You give the bizarre impression that someone sang a bit and then a computer did something and that song just happened. Um, no, that song was carefully planned out by someone. Someone called Tori Amos, who wrote it, then played it and sang it (with some help from a bass player and a trumpeter). I fail to see how that makes 'all the difference in the world' from, say, Bach writing cantatas to perform in church on Sunday or Mozart writing piano concertos for his concerts, just because the music she conceived was recorded in a studio. It's also played live on a regular basis - although she usually leaves out the third vocal line.

I don't know how you can say I didn't get it at all when I'm the one making the point. The point being that 5-voice counterpoint is perfectly capable of appearing in a modern popular music composition. Your point appears to be something about the benefits of live performance, which (a) has absolutely nothing to do with what I was interested in talking about, otherwise I would have chosen live music rather than a studio recording, and (b) motivates me to invite you to one of Ms Amos' marvellous concerts, hopefully one where she will play a piano with one hand and a hammond organ on the opposite side of her with the other hand at the same time. AND sing.

[Madiel]

And dwelling on personal problems has nothing to do with music. Using emotionalism like that is cheap & tawdry.[/font]

Again, you really should tell that to most of the 19th century composers of Lieder. And opera for that matter. There's a scene in either Die Walkure or Siegfried that gave me the urge to slap a female character and tell her to just get over it.

Romantic Lieder and opera are chock full of people claiming that their life is over because the girl/boy of their dreams has rejected them (usually a bit after claiming that their life is complete because she/he gave them a nice smile). It's even got people literally dying because of failed romances, either pining away or stabbing themselves or throwing themselves in rivers. It's actually quite hilarious to have you saying that pop music is 'cheap & tawdry' for using 'emotionalism' that always strikes me as far more in proportion than the sheer histrionics that pass for high art in the 19th century.

I'd genuinely fascinated to know what you think of Winterreise. It's 71.5 minutes on my recording. The text starts with a man marching off into the night because the girl he loved hasn't worked out. The rest of the text is a mix of reminiscing about the good days, and complaining about how cold and windswept and lonely it all is. It is, in short, one great big narration about personal problems and his complete inability to get over it.

I quite like it, myself. It's usually cited as one of the great masterworks of Lieder. But do you just think it's cheap and tawdry?

[Madiel]

but it was a poor & typical use of the studio by the sounds of it, 70 minutes of annoyingly whiny Tori Amos feat. some multi-tracking, big deal ..  [/font]

Oh the irony. Oh the sheer outrage you expressed when I listened to only the first 10 or 20 minutes of a Stockhausen opera and expressed my disinterest in listening to any more of it.

Please note, I'm not requiring you to listen to the whole 70 minutes. I just find it amusing how ready you are to pronounce such firm judgements. Really, most of my participation in this thread is driven by my amusement at the willingness of people to pronounce firm judgements. Often about things that they are quite incapable of giving any specific information about.

I did end up trying about 3 or 4 different selections of Stockhausen opera, by the way, just to see if I responded more to others. And then I tried other Stockhausen pieces. I liked one of them, sadly can't remember which.

[Madiel]

So you're implying that Tori Amos's work is on that level because she uses studio multi-tracking and goes on and on about her personal life for 70 minutes?

No, I'm implying that the particular criticism you levelled against her could be levelled against a wide range of classical music.

[Madiel]

We're talking music here though. You seem to be implying big things regarding this Tori Amos .. emotionalism notwithstanding.

What do you mean "we're talking music"? YOU'RE the one who made an explicit objection to lyrical content about relationship breakups. You decided the subject matter of the words were an explicit grounds for criticism. So when I suggest that there is classical music that deals with exactly the same subject, and has people saying a hell of a lot about how dreadful their life is after a relationship is over, why are we suddenly "talking music"?

It truly is wonderful to see people like you so keen to dodge their own points. I repeat, this is why the thread is so entertaining. It's not the fact that people want to criticise popular music. It's perfectly possible to criticise popular music. No, it's the fact that any time I suggest the same criticism could be applied to classical music, suddenly there's a problem and the shields go up and the criticism isn't valid any more.

EDIT: It's no different, incidentally, to conversations I end up having with some folk on a Christian message board who are a little too keen to utter generic, stereotypical criticisms of Islam, but then react very adversely to any suggestion that you could swap all their references to 'Islam' and 'Muslims' with references to 'Christianity' and 'Christians' and come up with an equally stereotypical criticism of their own religion. It's not that it's wrong to criticise, it's that sweeping broad-brush statements have a tendency of being far too generic.

[Rinaldo]

Pop has OTHER things (like dwelling on ones personal problems) to offer, things you don't find easily in art music.

Exactly.

I don't see why my thorough enjoyment of this

https://www.youtube.com/v/6As1Pvz-mHs

needs to exclude my thorough enjoyment for.. well, let's go for something that's really trivial, musically:

https://www.youtube.com/v/JtH68PJIQLE

This is both music that moves me & inspires me, through wholly different means and to wholly different ends. To compare its level of 'artistry' is a pointless excersise, like comparing a sparrow and a Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird on the basis of their complexity.

[Ken B]

Exactly.

I don't see why my thorough enjoyment of this

https://www.youtube.com/v/6As1Pvz-mHs

needs to exclude my thorough enjoyment for.. well, let's go for something that's really trivial, musically:

https://www.youtube.com/v/JtH68PJIQLE

This is both music that moves me & inspires me, through wholly different means and to wholly different ends. To compare its level of 'artistry' is a pointless excersise, like comparing a sparrow and a Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird on the basis of their complexity.

Agreed. Different responses to different virtues. Exactly what Florestan, and I said.  Exactly what Orfeo denied.

[Madiel]

Exactly what Orfeo denied.

Where?

[71 dB]

Where did I say I was seeking counterpoint?

You said it nowhere, but I read it between the lines you have been writing. Such interpretation was promted by you overall attitude.

You can always make yourself clear and tell us what you are seeking.

And dwelling on personal problems has nothing to do with music. Using emotionalism like that is cheap & tawdry.[/font]

Really? Why does opera music use those tricks then? Music is a good medium for addressing various themes, personal problems included.

[Madiel]

You're anchoring a lot on a simple point I said in passing, and losing sight of the discussion (actually we've veered off awhile ago). Setting text, words & language to music is a special art, it has been occurring within Art music for centuries .. Dowland, Schubert, Wagner, Bach & others .. did it effectively, backed by solid musicianship, even true genius. And you should check out Stockhausen's forensic work in phonetics for a fresh creative perspective.  But yea .. word content about heartbreak and whatnot in pop music, nothing new, or particularly musical or amazing .. most lyrics in pop music are dumb.

Ah, I see. So it's okay if you SET someone else's words, rather than write your own.

Damn. There's a few classical composers who are in trouble then. And yay for all those people who split their songwriting responsibilities, like Bernie Taupin and Elton John.

You see? Any time you try to say that classical music is so fundamentally different from pop music, it's remarkably easy to find counterexamples that demonstrate that the nice hard and bright line you want to set up with simplistic comparisons isn't quite as hard and bright as you might think. Certainly, there is an overall difference in trend, with there being more cases of setting pre-existing words in classical music and more cases of a songwriter dealing with both words and music in popular music, but every time you try to characterise one genre as having an exclusive claim to a particular quality, it's easy to show that this is stereotyping.

As to the quality of the words... I hate to break it to you, but the notes of my CDs of lieder and art song are full of criticisms of some of the poetry set by composers. Sure, some of it is great, but not all of it. I've seen Schubert disparaged for picking the second-rate poetry of his friends too often. I've seen Schumann criticised for his choices in his 'lesser' songs, Faure for some of his earlier ones, and now Rachmaninov in the set I've just bought.  It's not that I think that all popular music lyrics are genius, it's that I find broad sweeping statements suggesting that there is no genius in popular music and lots and lots of genius in classical music absurd. I suspect there's about the same level of genius in both cases. It's just that classical music has had more time to highlight to later generations of listeners which were the genius bits.

[71 dB]

I made that clear pages ago .. I wanted a deeper and richer musical experience.

Musical experience can be rich in many ways. Listening to different music genres makes the experience ever richer, at least for me: J.S. Bach + Far East Movement is more than only J.S. Bach, no matter how much "better" J. S. Bach is said to be. After listening to some Far East Movement I can really appreciate J.S. Bach's counterpoint and after J.S. Bach Far East Movement's music sounds exteremely cool, fun and laidback. J.S. Bach sucks when it comes to cool, fun and laidback urban music. Far East Movement sucks in melodic invention and fugues. No problem, I have them both to complete each other. 

[Karl Henning]

You see? Any time you try to say that classical music is so fundamentally different from pop music, it's remarkably easy to find counterexamples that demonstrate that the nice hard and bright line you want to set up with simplistic comparisons isn't quite as hard and bright as you might think. Certainly, there is an overall difference in trend, with there being more cases of setting pre-existing words in classical music and more cases of a songwriter dealing with both words and music in popular music, but every time you try to characterise one genre as having an exclusive claim to a particular quality, it's easy to show that this is stereotyping.

Word.

In many cases, I suppose the quarrel with pop songwriters who fancy themselves poets, and then make their poem into a song, is that, basically, they could benefit from an editor.

And, come to think of it, Stockhausen could have stood exactly the same benefit.  Another instance of non-exclusivity.

[71 dB]

Well it is trivial, so you're dead right there. It ain't beautiful, musical, inspiring, moving, nourishing .. it sounds like total crap to my ears, especially in light of your first selection.

Actually it sounds total crap to my ears too, but I don't judge that artist (completely unknown to me) after hearing one song once. It's possible I don't understand the artist at all at this point.

[Karl Henning]

How does James have time to call everything he has no appreciation for "total crap"?

[71 dB]

Please go back and read my first few responses in this thread to see where I am coming from, I already explained myself there.

Your first post was:

Simple. Art music (prefer this term to "classical") offers a lot more in terms of the art-form and it has been around a lot longer & evolved much longer, so more time is necessary.  It's broader & deeper in all aspects of musical art. It offers the best that is available.. and it is so much more engaging (requires more on our part etc.) & nourishing. I haven't ignored entertainment music, or pop music (and all it's stylistic cliches & boxes etc.) either, its fun, easy to digest, and was a bigger part of my youth  .. its just that once your curiosity & hunger take you along, and you make the leap & delve deep into Art music and forge a relationship with it, pop music doesn't really compare, it is so impoverished in comparison. I have a much, much deeper and richer appreciation & experience with music as a whole as a result of spending so much time with "classical music". I have had a better life because of this relationship.

So what did you exactly explain? One day you found "art music" and after that other music sounds unimpressive to you. Why's that? I think you somehow figured out that "art music" is the only possible measure for good music. You try to listen to pop music with "art music" ears. Well, that just won't work. How could it?

[71 dB]

But yea .. spending so much time with Art music will do that to the ears, it changes them, it sharpens them, it stretches them, it better hones & connects them. It is another reason why I spend so much time with it in fact.

Listening to music of a certain genre teaches the brain to recognize musical patterns typical to that genre. That's why it's difficult to like music outside what you listen to yourself. Country music sucks if your head is "tuned" to rock or baroque only. I want to get rid of genres. I want to be tuned to "music". I tend to like artists who's music combines various genres and dislike "puristic" artists.

You don't need to explain why you spend time on music you like. Of course you do. It's your "pop music has little to offer to anyone" generalization that is wrong.