Music: National or Cosmopolitan?

[Florestan]

I stumbled upon this:

Art, and especially the art of music, uses knowledge as  a  means  to  the  evocation  of  personal  experience in  terms which  will  be  intelligible  to  and  command  the  sympathy  of others. These others must clearly be primarily those who by race, tradition, and cultural experience are the nearest to him; in fact those  of  his  own  nation,  or  other  kind  of homogeneous community.

My top 3 favorite composers are Mozart, Schubert, Chopin --- none of them is Romanian.

In my top 10 favorite composers there is not one single Romanian composer, yet there are Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff --- both of them Russian, ie belonging to a nation whose infliuence on the history of the Romanian people has been mostly deleterious and nefarious.

Therefore I call RVW's thesis above pure , unadulterated bullshit.

What say you?

[Pat B]

What say you?

My immediate reaction is that there's a kernel of truth in his first sentence, at least for some music. But the second sentence is just off the rails.

[Dima]

Pop music join people, classical music disjoin people.

I can say there are many russian composers whom are not recognized out of Russia.
And there are many composers in Russia that are not recognized in own country, but are well known abroad.

Anton Rubinstein when he was young wrote the 3rd piano concerto (it has an author programm - it concerns classical community that lives in an ivory tower). I agree with him.

P.S. RVW and even Elgar are not well known in Russia - this also confirm the message of RVW.

[JBS]

The EuroAmerican tradition is a homogeneous community of the sort RVW was talking about, and all of us are members of it, and all the composers you mention are members of it.
London and New York City (and probably other great cities) have been said to be collections of neighborhoods, all distinct and with their own character, but all their residents truly citizens of the greater urban whole.

As illustration I am listening to Elgar's Caractacus, written 121 years ago, with a text celebrating a man with no apparent connection to me, a pagan Briton who lived almost 2000 years ago, and a contemporary of his, a Roman emperor, head of a tyrannical regime that, within a decade of his death, would initiate the first of a series of genocides against my people, the evil effects of which still have an impact on my life now in 2019.
But I have no problem connecting with either text or music.

[JBS]

Pop music join people, classical music disjoin people.

I can say there are many russian composers whom are not recognized out of Russia.
And there are many composers in Russia that are not recognized in own country, but are well known abroad.

Anton Rubinstein when he was young wrote the 3rd piano concerto (it has an author programm - it concerns classical community that lives in an ivory tower). I agree with him.

P.S. RVW and even Elgar are not well known in Russia - this also confirm the message of RVW.

I don't think RVW was referring to knowing about music from other countries. I think he was referring to the ability to connect to a piece of music intellectually and emotionally when listening to it.

[Dima]

I don't think RVW was referring to knowing about music from other countries. I think he was referring to the ability to connect to a piece of music intellectually and emotionally when listening to it.

I think each of us talks about his. It's the main rule of every forum:)

[david johnson]

"or other kind of homogeneous community" covers a lot of territory.  Music is clearly involved in both of the options presented in the op title.

[BasilValentine]

Therefore I call RVW's thesis above pure , unadulterated bullshit.

What say you?

I agree. Bullshit it is. If RVW's premise were correct, one would have to conclude after examining the programmed repertoire of major orchestras in the U.S. that the country's citizens are by tradition and cultural experience closest to 19thc and 20thc Russians and 18thc and 19thc Germanic peoples.

[Jo498]

I think it is rather hard for us to feel the national character of music before the early 19th century. Sure, there were the different regional styles in the baroque era but what dominates the baroque repertoire since the mid 20th century is either italian or some mixed tastes (Bach, Handel). And while the second half of the 18th century is mostly dominated by Austrians we do not hear Mozart as "Austrian music". And while some dances might be distinguishably Austrian, Figaro certainly is not, based on a French play, Italian libretto, Spanish setting.

But this changes quite a bit in the 19th century and while there are still grades between cosmopolitanism and regionalism, the latter seems stronger than in the preceding century. This does not necessarily mean that the music does not "travel" well, but sometimes it does. Despite the strong Polish roots Chopin's music is more cosmopolitan than Schubert's - it took until the mid 20th century for a lot of the latter's instrumental music to take hold globally. And there are pieces like Weber's Freischütz that have been huge hits in German speaking countries since almost 200 years but are not so well known elsewhere.
Same with Glinka and maybe to some extent Gounod or later Elgar. More typically, even within the oeuvre of one composer are some works that become popular almost everywhere and others that remain more local. E.g Rimsky's Sheherazade vs. most of his operas.

[Ghost of Baron Scarpia]

The quote by RVW strikes me as vaguely true and pretty uninteresting. Certainly we interpret classical music of various kinds (or other kinds of music) in light of our musical and cultural experiences. He was a lot more skilled at composing music than sentences. (Perhaps some would disagree with that last comment.)

[Ken B]

I am Romanian

Had a 23andMe test? 

Maybe you are actually Austro-Polish and will finally learn you were adopted!

The RVW quote is one of this folk-wisdom things that sounds vaguely like it makes sense but isn't true.  Like red wine is good for building blood cells.

[Mirror Image]

My top 3 favorite composers are Mozart, Schubert, Chopin --- none of them is Romanian.

My 'Top 3' favorite composers are Debussy, Ravel, and Bartók. None of them are Irish/French/German/British/Native American.

[vandermolen]

Vaughan Williams is one of my favourite composers and so are Finzi, Bax and Moeran, who are all British. However so are Shostakovich, Miaskovsky, Copland, Bloch and Novak who are not. I think that VW meant that his music might have a special appeal to his own countrymen and women but also, hopefully, appeal to others. In the past I think that there was limited knowledge of his music outside Britain. I recall going into a record shop, whilst on holiday in Austria probably about fifteen years ago. There was no 'Vaughan Williams' section but a reasonable selection of music by Britten.

[Biffo]

RVW was writing at least 60 years ago, possibly a hundred years ago. There was less globalisation then and, if the latter, the record industry was in its infancy. I think many people in France, Germany and Italy would have agreed with him. There was a great deal of cross-fertilisation between those three but in general the principle held.

[Florestan]

RVW was writing at least 60 years ago, possibly a hundred years ago.

1934 (at least that's the year of publication). RTWT here: http://spinnet.humanities.uva.nl/images/2013-10/vaughanwilliams1934.pdf

There was less globalisation then and, if the latter, the record industry was in its infancy. I think many people in France, Germany and Italy would have agreed with him. There was a great deal of cross-fertilisation between those three but in general the principle held.

You might have a point.

[Biffo]

1934 (at least that's the year of publication). RTWT here: http://spinnet.humanities.uva.nl/images/2013-10/vaughanwilliams1934.pdf

You might have a point.

Thanks for the link - I will have to download it and read it all at my leisure. I started what I thought was just a glance and got drawn into it. J S Bach was RVW's favourite composer so it was interesting what he had to say. Must finish the rest later.

[Jo498]

The situation in Britain in the late 19th century was almost exactly the opposite of the "typical" relation between culture and politics in that time. Britain was a powerful empire but most of its music seemed "imported" or second rate to the generation of Elgar and later. (Even if RWV wrote this particular paragraph at a later time when the Empire was crumbling and British music in better shape than the Empire, I think his generation is still clearly influenced by their apparent lack of local musical tradition that made them turn to Elizabethan composers and folk music.)
Whereas in Germany in the early/mid 19th century as well as in Italy, Poland, Bohemia etc. the regional cultural or especially musical identity preceded the very existence of a coherent national state. Sure, as soon as national states were established, music would usually become integrated into a nationalist stance.

[some guy]

Does the question in the subject heading express a false dichotomy?

(Also relevant: is Ralph Vaughan Williams dead?)

[Biffo]

Does the question in the subject heading express a false dichotomy?

(Also relevant: is Ralph Vaughan Williams dead?)

(1) No idea
(2) RVW 1872 - 1958 is most definitely dead

[some guy]

(1) No idea
(2) RVW 1872 - 1958 is most definitely dead

I would have ventured to guess from you previous remarks that you did indeed have an idea.

Also, yes, Vaughan Williams is most definitely dead, hence can neither defend himself nor alter his views.

(Next week, why is Mussorgsky such a drunk? Can't he control himself?)