Gramophone Contemporary Award 2016

[nathanb]

Barbara Hannigan's voice is as fine as any other, but I really dislike what she represents in contemporary music culture. I would really like to think that, unlike the Metropolitan Opera, good contemporary music can get by without making queens and divas the focal point. To me, the phenomenon that is Barbara Hannigan is equivalent to the contemporary music market saying "We need a frontwoman like Callas, because the music doesn't speak for itself."

[SeptimalTritone]

Having a name that someone working for Gramophone will recognize, that is.

Of course, Gramophone hasn't the foggiest idea who's doing stuff that people who listen to contemporary music listen to. Even the older people, like Beatriz Ferrerya or Pierre Henry or Yasunao Tone, are unknown to that crew. The middle ground as well. None of them, I am sure, have ever heard of Lionel Marchetti or eRikm or Andrea Neumann. And the younger crowd? Not a frickin' chance. Sure, they'll have heard of Mason Bates, as over-hyped a person as one could ever imagine. But what about somebody doing something really interesting or new, like Emmanuelle Gibello or Mike Boyd or Sandra Gonzalez? Again, not a chance.

This is simply a massive, and predictable, failure by "mass-market" media to keep up with what's actually been going on.

Hi some guy,

I have some questions. First, what makes Murail and other spectralists not "stuff that people who listen to contemporary music listen to"? Is it that their kind of music too conservative? What makes it so: is it that they are, perhaps, a second pressing and over-simplified version of what Boulez, Messiaen, and Ligeti accomplished?

Second, while I enjoy some of the names you mention above, and indeed, you introduced me to them, I still have a hard time with Yasunao Tone. I have gone back to Palimpest and the MP3 deviations, and works by other Japanese noise artists every now and then, and I simply don't get it. The thinness, heterogeneity, and neutralness of the sounds, as I mentioned in an earlier post, are very difficult for me. I feel like I'm listening to one channel here, a few channels there, and so on. What do you enjoy about them? What makes them good, interesting, and worthwhile?

I listened to Andrea Neumann, since you mentioned her name, for the first time here in a 2014 performance https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNhWA9B96n0 I have a serious question: what makes this not a second pressing of what Lachenmann did in his chamber ensemble or string quartet music? As before, what do you like about Neumann, and what makes her good? To my ears, it sounds simpler and sparser than, say, Lachenmann's quartets https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBAXqy9WJjU I'm also not fond of the held low "engine" sound that persists through a lot of the second half.

Speaking of sparseness, or held sounds: what makes eRikm good? I have his album Stéme. I remember it being quite thin and sparse, and not only that, it having a long 20 minute part near the end with a sound held for a long time, a sound that sounds half like a major chord and half like noise. It's a nice sound, but it goes on for a while...

Given how much you enjoy this music, and given how I don't really like it, even with putting good attentiveness into it, there must be a huge difference in how we listen, perceive, or understand. There is some music you've introduced to me that I really, really like: I like musique concrete and I like the composers for traditional instruments. There's just a lot I don't get about what you hear in some composers you've recommended.

[SimonNZ]

Hey, ST! Good to see you here!

[SeptimalTritone]

Hi Simon! Thanks for the welcome. There's a lot of (at least for me) masterful composers/works some guy has recommended. I love Francis Dhomont and, in particular, his Foret Profonde. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHYg4SZCw_s&list=PLmb8gHpoPVZ8eIWFF03lnHqUllnM410h0 And I enjoy everything I've recently recommended in... other places. But there's still a lot I don't get that some guy has spoken in high esteem of: some explanation would be helpful.

[SimonNZ]

I should have probably clarified at the beginning that my purpose in starting this thread wasn't to treat these nominees as representative of anything, certainly not that they represented the "cutting edge". I was I guess kind of amused in the difference between the "elitist-noise" accusations contemporary classical routinely gets, and just how (it seems to me) approachable and unthreatening all of those albums are. But the conversation may go as it will.

[Monsieur Croche]

Mind you, I don't believe I have heard any of Mason Bates' music, so I do not have an opinion  0:)

You are, imho, fortunate in that regard. Lol.


Best regards.

[Karl Henning]

May my good fortune endure!

[some guy]

Yes, ST, good to see you still around these parts.

And also yes, we do perceive things differently. None of the issues you have seem like issues to me at all. That is, I do not see thinness of texture or lengthy drones as bad things.

I like what I like, because I'm me, because I've had my experiences and my reading and my tastes.

It's not going to be the same for everyone. I have a very dear friend who is a professional musician, whose compositions and improvisations delight me no end. He has guided me many times to things that I enjoy. He has even guided me to things that I was sure I didn't enjoy, but it turns out that I was wrong. He has also recommended to me dozens of things that I don't like and am pretty sure I will never like.

[Monsieur Croche]

I should have probably clarified at the beginning that my purpose in starting this thread wasn't to treat these nominees as representative of anything, certainly not that they represented the "cutting edge". I was I guess kind of amused in the difference between the "elitist-noise" accusations contemporary classical routinely gets, and just how (it seems to me) approachable and unthreatening all of those albums are. But the conversation may go as it will.

Point very well made and taken. Context is important here, i.e. of the entire 3% of the population who do listen to classical, there are but a tiny percent who also routinely and happily seek out, listen to, and purchase recordings of the contemporary repertoire.

Lest We Forget: the Grammy contemporary nominees and award are not about the best and most cutting-edge of new music -- though sometimes there is a coinciding agreement there. They are about newer pieces which are considered pretty strong and that in combination with a superb performance superbly recorded are the criteria.  Too. these are also intra industry awards, meant to have some integrity in their picks while also successfully functioning as a promotion for and about that industry and what it makes.

Within that context, all four nominees are very harmonically gentle; these picks are "safe bets" and more certain to have a more generally wide audience appeal. That said, those four pieces are still the kind of music many an alleged lover of classical avoids, or finds 'not music.' Lol. The relativity of that should, I suppose, have contemporary fans joyous enough that these four were nominated, and yea, even that there is such a category for a Grammy award.

[~]Silvestrov: This particular stamp of East European / former Soviet Union retro-nostalgic sentimentalism is rife and pouring out of those locales at a rather alarming rate.  I personally find it awful, and have no truck with it.  I think it stems from an expression for so long suppressed that a serious sickly sweet gangrenous smell is inherently part and parcel of it, and being a true and deep nostalgia it 'is about' a distant memory which can not be truly recaptured, ergo, something clinically disordered and not genuine about it.  Either that, or it is simply not my cuppa, lol.  One way or t'other I find it unlistenable and am therefore disappointed (not surprised) that it can and has gained a degree of popularity.

[~]Murail: I do like Murail, while even when I first heard his work it seemed a bit old-hat. He has major compositional strength, however, and that makes what might be 'just pretty' soundscape pieces that much stronger coming from his hand -- so I am quite happy he should get even wider 'publicity.'

[~]The late Peter Maxwell Davies: With all due respects, there is almost no 20th century (or later) English composer whose work(s) say much at all too me... all a matter of personal taste, of course.

[~]Abrahamsen: Let Me Tell You. I first heard of this through a forum post from a member who finds contemporary 'difficult' while still working at it and broadening their taste. (Kudos.) That said, they said, "Here is a contemporary piece I can really like."  My reaction when I listened to it, and you will have to imagine a quietly strained voice talking through clenched teeth, "Yes, dear. It is very pretty."  Between the perfect storm of a highly trendy topically chosen text, its glossary of extended instrumental techniques and its predominance of 'sweet' major / minor thirds, it irked the hell out of me. This is not to say I have any objections about contemporary music being a relatively easy listen for those who usually find it 'difficult,' but pretty ain't beautiful, and to me the piece has absolutely no teeth whatsoever.  It is merely pretty, and that ain't no compliment.  Ergo, I am not at all surprised it has caught on with a wider than usual audience nor that it has drawn attention enough to garner a Grammy nomination.


Always best regards.

[Karl Henning]

Lest We Forget: the Grammy contemporary nominees and award are not about the best and most cutting-edge of new music -- though sometimes there is a coinciding agreement there.

Very true, and thanks for the reminder.

Tangentially, if we wondered just how large the field is . . . .

[Monsieur Croche]

Very true, and thanks for the reminder.

Tangentially, if we wondered just how large the field is . . . .

Very true, and thanks for the reminder.

Tangentially, if we wondered just how large the field is . . . .

Lol and indeed that is a list running to serious numbers of composers, and at that those are just the working composers whose names found their way on to that wikipedia list!

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

Lol and indeed that is a list running to serious numbers of composers, and at that those are just the working composers whose names found their way on to that wikipedia list!

And wikipedia lists often miss out on rather many articles that would be appropriate on the list as well. Wikipedia isn't the greatest, but not everyone has access to Grove Online.............................

[Monsieur Croche]

And wikipedia lists often miss out on rather many articles that would be appropriate on the list as well. Wikipedia isn't the greatest, but not everyone has access to Grove Online.............................

I have a hunch that a list from either source is basically 'the tip of the iceberg' as far as how many people are writing or putting together some kind of at least decent music that could be considered, lol, 'legitimate.'

[GioCar]

Well, the Abrahamsen won.



In Gramophone they aren't very brave.

[Karl Henning]

Establishment award-givers aren't where you look for musical bravery.

[GioCar]

So true, but I'd have hoped this time that the Murail, for instance, had gained more visibility than a pretty/nice work which already got awards and recognitions all around the classical music world.
Which will be the final destiny of contemporary (art) music? Is it that only this kind of works pleasing the majority of the audience will always emerge and all the others will always remain confined to the Donauerschinger type of listeners?

[Monsieur Croche]

Well, the Abrahamsen won.



In Gramophone they aren't very brave.

WHAT a shocker! ;-)