Progressive Rock as "serious" music?

[BasilValentine]

Preach it, brother.

I'm a big fan of Christgau, even though I disagree with some of his takes / takedowns vehemently. That said, his 'problem' with prog rock stems from the simple fact that a lot of it Doesn't. Rock. At. All. From his review of Lizard: "To call this progressive rock is only to prove the term an oxymoron."

Right on.

For me, 'serious music' is music that tackles serious themes, issues, emotions. Which you can do with 'three chords and the truth'. Or an 808 beat. Or a trivial singalong.

So he decided to call it progressive rock (those who composed and performed it certainly didn't), then got peeved because it didn't rock. This is ... uh ... intensely stupid.

As for serious themes, issues, emotions and three chords, I'm presuming all the "tackling" takes place in the lyrics?

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

Has anyone noticed that a number of King Crimson's best improvised works (Starless and Bible Black, Providence, We'll Let you Know) are structured like works of Indian Classical music? They begin with an exploratory section in free meter and rhythm establishing a mode and mood, move on to a section in a steady meter with firmer, more integrated melodic content, and peak in a third section, with a full rhythm section, pushing the earlier ideas to their limits. One might argue that this tripartite structure is just like the alap, johr, gat pattern in Indian Classical music.

Interesting, thanks for pointing it out. I'll have to listen with this in mind.

I'm a big fan of Christgau, even though I disagree with some of his takes / takedowns vehemently. That said, his 'problem' with prog rock stems from the simple fact that a lot of it Doesn't. Rock. At. All. From his review of Lizard: "To call this progressive rock is only to prove the term an oxymoron."

So would he be OK with it, if it were called something other than "rock?" It's fine to dislike music, but it seems kind of pointless to get hung up on terminology.

[Rinaldo]

As for serious themes, issues, emotions and three chords, I'm presuming all the "tackling" takes place in the lyrics?

Usually, although not necessarily. I just don't subscribe to the notion that musical complexity automatically imbues a piece of music with some extra layer of 'seriousness' or 'art', unattainable to other forms of music (e.g. pop).

So would he be OK with it, if it were called something other than "rock?" It's fine to dislike music, but it seems kind of pointless to get hung up on terminology.

He's not talking about terminology. Another quote of his, from the review of KC's Islands), might (?) illuminate his point: "When I feel the need for contemporary chamber music or sexist japes, jazz libre or vers ordinaire, I'll go to the source(s)."

[Alek Hidell]

Sorry, but to bring racism into it is ridiculous. Clearly the status of "modern" (i.e. post WW II) and progressive Jazz with plenty of highly influential black musicians and later Fusion is higher than the status of "prog rock". And there is probably enough taste snobbery around Jazz that has nothing to with skin color (maybe with class, though).

I don't think it's ridiculous at all. Jazz has a different audience, and a different cultural status, than rock. And while jazz may enjoy a relatively exalted cultural position now, it hasn't always been thus. Certainly in its early years there was very definitely a racial animus at work against what was called "jungle music." When did it start to gain wider acceptance? In the 1930s, when the Big Band era began and you started to see a lot more white participation in the music. Then the (mostly African-American) bebop generation came along, and there was a reaction to it too in the form of the (mostly white) "West Coast" jazz of the 1950s. Not that these latter musicians themselves were racist - most of them were probably well ahead of the curve for their time - but I strongly suspect that the audience they gained was at least in part due to their race.

All of that said, however, I may not have stressed class enough. As I said, prog-rock was, and is, a chiefly British phenomenon - and England doesn't have the same fraught racial history that the U.S. does. If there's a near-equivalent in England, it's class. So while the Beatles may have helped rock/pop music attain a somewhat more "respectable" status (a term loaded in itself), I think the British rock musicians of the mid- to late-1960s got the idea that if they brought in orchestras, more sophisticated arrangements, "deeper" thematic material, etc., it would then be acceptable as Art - not just ephemeral fun for the youngsters, but "serious" stuff worthy of "serious" attention (which means attention by the upper-class arbiters of taste).

Now, I don't know who the fans of this music are today. Jo498, you mentioned "50-60 year-old nerds," but I suspect the audience may be slightly older than that (or closer to 60, anyway - and overwhelmingly male). I'm 53, and a lot of prog-rock is "before my time." I don't know if these fans are largely British or American. For the American ones, I suspect there's some of the common American assumption that anything British is "classy." Like those stickers that used to be placed on some classical LPs in the U.S.: "Imported from England." Ooo, imported! from England! It must be high-class stuff!

[BasilValentine]

All of that said, however, I may not have stressed class enough. As I said, prog-rock was, and is, a chiefly British phenomenon - and England doesn't have the same fraught racial history that the U.S. does. If there's a near-equivalent in England, it's class. So while the Beatles may have helped rock/pop music attain a somewhat more "respectable" status (a term loaded in itself), I think the British rock musicians of the mid- to late-1960s got the idea that if they brought in orchestras, more sophisticated arrangements, "deeper" thematic material, etc., it would then be acceptable as Art - not just ephemeral fun for the youngsters, but "serious" stuff worthy of "serious" attention (which means attention by the upper-class arbiters of taste).

Now, I don't know who the fans of this music are today. Jo498, you mentioned "50-60 year-old nerds," but I suspect the audience may be slightly older than that (or closer to 60, anyway - and overwhelmingly male). I'm 53, and a lot of prog-rock is "before my time." I don't know if these fans are largely British or American. For the American ones, I suspect there's some of the common American assumption that anything British is "classy." Like those stickers that used to be placed on some classical LPs in the U.S.: "Imported from England." Ooo, imported! from England! It must be high-class stuff!

The audience for prog rock has been global for decades — every continent but Antarctica. At its inception the main audience was middle and working class US, so I'm not sure where you got that idea about "upper-class arbiters of taste." The only data I have on current demographics comes from attending King Crimson concerts in the last few years. Those audiences looked to be about 80% male and middle aged, although there were fairly large contingents of younger folk — maybe there were people dragging their grand children out for some culture?    

[Jo498]

All music of the 20th century that started as popular/lower class/minority/marginalized people's music, be it Blues, Jazz, Rock whatever achieved its eventual status against upper/upper middle class arbiters of taste. This shows the waning influence of the latter. And from the 60s on the students etc. who would become the established upper middle class 20 years later were already steeped mostly in the popular music of their time, so some of it became the dominant music also for the upper middle class.
I don't claim that we have achieved classnessness of taste. But taste has become more independent of class than ever before. There are still differences but usually the middle classes listen "inclusively", i.e. they do listen to some music (like Jazz, Classical, maybe even Prog Rock ) others appreciate far less but they also include "lower class" music like Rock, Pop, Musical etc.

Surely, it also still differs between countries or even regions. But even in Germany I would hesitate to use my appreciation of and considerable knowledge of classical music as a "class/status marker". Unless one is pretty sure of one's enviroment already one could more likely appear a pretentious nerd and not gain any status.

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

For the American ones, I suspect there's some of the common American assumption that anything British is "classy." Like those stickers that used to be placed on some classical LPs in the U.S.: "Imported from England." Ooo, imported! from England! It must be high-class stuff!

I also bought LPs with stickers that said "Imported from Germany," "Imported from the Netherlands" and so on. I don't think it had anything to do with class snobbery.

In the case of "Imported from England" - if it was an EMI recording, this was important to some collectors, because of the (generally true) belief that British EMI pressings were superior to American Angel ones.

[Jo498]

@Archaic Torso. Don't even start with imported LPs. Your very nickname in this forum shows you're prone to snobbery 

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

@Archaic Torso. Don't even start with imported LPs. Your very nickname in this forum shows you're prone to snobbery 

Not only that, I always left the "imported from" sticker on the record jacket. That way, people would see it and realize how classy and superior I was.

[Cato]

All music of the 20th century that started as popular/lower class/minority/marginalized people's music, be it Blues, Jazz, Rock whatever achieved its eventual status against upper/upper middle class arbiters of taste. This shows the waning influence of the latter. And from the 60s on the students etc. who would become the established upper middle class 20 years later were already steeped mostly in the popular music of their time, so some of it became the dominant music also for the upper middle class.
I don't claim that we have achieved classlessness of taste. But taste has become more independent of class than ever before. There are still differences but usually the middle classes listen "inclusively", i.e. they do listen to some music (like Jazz, Classical, maybe even Prog Rock ) others appreciate far less but they also include "lower class" music like Rock, Pop, Musical etc.

Surely, it also still differs between countries or even regions. But even in Germany I would hesitate to use my appreciation of and considerable knowledge of classical music as a "class/status marker". Unless one is pretty sure of one's environment already one could more likely appear a pretentious nerd and not gain any status.

My lower-middle-class childhood was no barrier to finding Classical Music, which I always preferred from a very young age.  "Popular music" I always found - even at age 6 or 7 - as something you might tap your toe with, but the "real" music was to be found via Beethoven, Wagner, etc.  My mother had records going back to the 1920's, and they struck me as "funny," e.g. Phil Harris singing That's What I Like About the South.  I was aware of Elvis and The Beach Boys and their race-car songs, but found them not be even close to the same satisfaction as e.g. a late Mozart symphony.  My very low opinion of the Beatles was the same as my grandmother's, a night-club pianist, who could ad lib variations on the major popular tunes from 1900-1940's.  While watching the famous Ed Sullivan Show performance, she shrugged: "They're flat!  They can't sing one note right.  What's all the fuss about?"  I had to agree.

Improbable Nobel Prize Winner Bob Dylan was even worse, given his drug-bewitched brain.

Of more interest was my discovery at our public library of a new, American Schuman and his work Credendum, on the same record as Leon Kirchner's Piano Concerto.  For prime-time television discoveries there was Copland's Piano Concerto.  (Full disclosure: I was enthusiastic, but Grandma did not like it.)   

(YES!!!  Aaron Copland performed this work on prime-time television!)

https://www.youtube.com/v/vC3qQpyp4rI

Often when I hear how "original" some rock group sounds because of Technique X, I can say e,g, "Penderecki did that back in the 1950's."

In high school I found a good number of fellow Classical Music mavens, and economic background was irrelevant.  Several came from neighborhoods just as economically below-average as mine, but our Catholic grade schools had given us a great intellectual advantage.

[steve ridgway]

I don't claim that we have achieved classnessness of taste. But taste has become more independent of class than ever before. There are still differences but usually the middle classes listen "inclusively", i.e. they do listen to some music (like Jazz, Classical, maybe even Prog Rock ) others appreciate far less but they also include "lower class" music like Rock, Pop, Musical etc.

Yeah that's me, a mixture of Krautrock, Prog Rock, Psychedelic, Industrial, Ambient, Electronic, Metal, Punk, New Wave, Musique Concrete and now Classical. Not being upper class it's all been found in a random and unstructured way but I have had a lot of surprises .

[jwinter]

Interesting topic. I agree with this statement:

The fact is, certain rock albums released 50 or even more years ago are now regarded as classics and still have a lot of listeners. Ultimately this is the only real test of classic status.

1969 - 50 years = 1919. Was there still a lot of interest in pop music of the 1910s-20s as late as the 1960s? My impression is that there wasn't, and this older pop music had already become obscure - the sort of thing you hear in a movie to evoke a certain period, but otherwise without a lot of active listeners. But there are still a lot of people who like the Beatles, Stones and so on; they haven't become a historical curio.

If I can drift back in this topic a bit...  I think the question of whether Prog Rock or any other kind of popular music will be considered in the same category as Beethoven is complicated by the fact that Pink Floyd (or the Beatles, or Miles Davis, or Johnny Cash, or...) are experienced as recordings, not as notes on a page or sheet music that needs to be interpreted by a performer in order to be heard.  Dark Side of the Moon is an artifact -- if you want to hear it, there's only one source.   Discussions of Good Vibrations or Penny Lane don't often get into cover versions, and with good reason -- no one disputes that there is one, definitive version that supersedes all others.  In fact, it's hard to even differentiate the musical notes from the performance -- it's all intertwined, it's all of a piece.

Mozart is another matter, because unless you can read music, you can only access his music indirectly, i.e. through a performance, played by musicians who are by necessity adding their own artistic and technical decisions to the score.  I strongly suspect that if Mozart had been able to release a digital quality recording of himself performing his own works in his own time, there would be a lot less discussion of Murray Perahia vs Andras Schiff today, good as they both are -- in fact many of those modern recordings would likely never have been made.  And I think that would not be a good thing in relation to Mozart's place in the "canon" of serious music -- because the act of performative reinterpretation itself has played an integral part in cementing Mozart's cultural influence over the intervening centuries. 


So I think to a large extent the idea of "serious" music is tied up in music that can be easily disassociated from an individual performance -- i.e. that is interpreted by multiple performers over time either through a score or in imitation or emulation of previous performances (such as blues standards or traditional ballads).  Occasionally you get a pop song that becomes a "standard" like Yesterday, but that's a different sort of thing.


All of which leads me to answer the original question, will prog rock ever be considered as serious music, with a qualified No.  Prog rock, even more so than some other kinds of pop, exists as a studio artifact (i.e. album), so by it's very nature it's not going to have the same manner of cultural existence and influence as Chopin or Brahms.


That said, is the heart of the question really, is prog rock as "good" as some "serious music?"  Does the music of Peter Gabriel, say, have artistic and aesthetic qualities that can be profitably discussed alongside the music of Debussy?  Well that's another question entirely.  I would say that it does -- good music is good music after all.  But I would maintain that the existence of definitive recordings by the composer/artist changes the basic equation of how we experience music, and how that music interacts with and influences the culture moving forward. 


I think it also provides an interesting perspective on "serious" music by living composers, it's reception and recordings thereof, but that's probably a different thread...   

[Rinaldo]

Very good points!

[steve ridgway]

Yes, the worship of the original studio version is a big shortcoming. What do you think though of this reinterpretation of ELP's Tarkus on solo piano? Could it be considered a classical piece or are there glaring compositional mistakes? Or could it be reworked into something acceptable?

http://youtube.com/watch?v=0bg47eIXwk8

[steve ridgway]

I find bits of it quite appealing but in other places it's rather repetitive and I don't know enough to say for example if any of it might be derivative. A few people on the prog rock forum are very keen on it.

[Alek Hidell]

I've been away for a while, doing other things, vacationing, etc. Almost forgot about this thread. It's a fine discussion, too.

At its inception the main audience was middle and working class US, so I'm not sure where you got that idea about "upper-class arbiters of taste."

I'm talking more about perception than reality, really. There has long been in the pop/rock audience (in isolated pockets, mind) an element of defensiveness about the music they love. It comes from all those who in the early years of rock said that it was junk, noise, simplistic, low art, etc. (Cato, above, speaks a little to this view). So the audience is being told, essentially, that what they like is junk, which implies they have no taste, no depth. So there grew a desire, born of this defensiveness, and especially after the Beatles started getting attention from music critics who noticed the advanced techniques in some of their writing, to make the music more "sophisticated" for those who had been saying the music was junk - those whose opinions helped determine what is acceptable in the broader culture as "art": rich donors who attend symphony concerts, magazine/newspaper critics, philanthropists who underwrite new concert halls and museums, and so on. Those are the "arbiters" to whom I refer.

Yes, those arbiters have much less of a voice now, but I'm talking about fifty or more years ago. At the time we were only a decade or so removed from the time when "pop music" meant Frank Sinatra, Patti Page, Bing Crosby, etc. What was popular was determined by adult record-buyers (very few of whom, relatively speaking, were interested in what "the kids" were listening to). The burgeoning postwar teen audience whose favored music would soon sweep away those singers was only just getting underway.

And again, I'm talking about perception. There's always a notion, and not just in music but in just about any art form, that the artistic product hasn't really "arrived" or "matured" until it has been accepted by those "arbiters" I described above. That notion still exists to a degree even though now the philanthropist who wants to underwrite an artistic venture may be a guy who wears nothing but T-shirts, goes unshaven, and loves punk rock.

I also bought LPs with stickers that said "Imported from Germany," "Imported from the Netherlands" and so on. I don't think it had anything to do with class snobbery.

Well, maybe not for you. But I think those at the record companies who wanted the stickers put on the LPs had that idea, that it would be perceived as more "high-class" if it came from Europe (the fact that that might have been actually true in some cases is beside the point). There are a lot of Americans who, when they hear someone speak with a British accent, automatically assume he/she is intelligent and sophisticated.

[j winter]

... Well, maybe not for you. But I think those at the record companies who wanted the stickers put on the LPs had that idea, that it would be perceived as more "high-class" if it came from Europe (the fact that that might have been actually true in some cases is beside the point). There are a lot of Americans who, when they hear someone speak with a British accent, automatically assume he/she is intelligent and sophisticated.

Yeah, that's a pretty deep cultural thing, you see it all the time in movies -- the most famous examples probably being Kubrick's Spartacus and the original Star Wars trilogy, where the "rebels" are mostly all played by Americans, while the evil empire is full of out-of-work Shakespearean actors.  That British accent, particularly if used in this way, can be convenient short-hand for a great many things.

But coming back to recordings, there's definitely a cultural bias there -- as an American listener wading into the classical music marketplace years ago, there was certainly a common perception that if you wanted to hear how Beethoven or Wagner "ought" to be played, then you listened to a German or an Austrian orchestra, preferably Vienna or Berlin; if you wanted to "really get" Rachmaninov or Shostakovich, you had to hear it played by Russians, nobody else really "understood" the music.  This can become rather silly after awhile, but like many cultural stereotypes, there is often a kernal of truth underneath -- there is undeniably in some cases a long historical tradition and association, an affinity if you will, between certain orchestras and certain works or composers, and there are such things as folk idioms which local musicians may well understand and convey more naturally. 


All of which is my long-winded way of agreeing... if I'm a newbie US classical buyer back in the day, and I'm confronted with two Beethoven 9's, one labelled "Imported from Germany" and the other labeled "Made in Cleveland," I'm probably going for the import -- even though Szell's recording is very likely better.  A bit of experience circumvents all that -- but then a lot of folks bought the occasional classical LP as a status thing (I'm cultured, so nyah) without a lot of prior exposure... 

 

[71 dB]

There are a lot of Americans who, when they hear someone speak with a British accent, automatically assume he/she is intelligent and sophisticated.

Stuart Varney? 

[Jo498]

This was before my time (I knew LPs as a child but not about niceties like pressing quality) but wasn't pressing/manufacturing quality also really an issue and sometimes a pretty good reason for preferring certain labels or imports in LP times?

[BasilValentine]

I also bought LPs with stickers that said "Imported from Germany," "Imported from the Netherlands" and so on. I don't think it had anything to do with class snobbery.

In the case of "Imported from England" - if it was an EMI recording, this was important to some collectors, because of the (generally true) belief that British EMI pressings were superior to American Angel ones.

The imported label told one several things: In my hometown, imported meant music the major labels in the U.S. weren't touching, bands that probably wouldn't be touring the U.S. to promote it, and recordings you weren't going to get at the chains like National Record Mart. All of this implied that it was likely to be more interesting. The major audience for prog, middle and working class teens in the U.S., didn't give a rat's arse about class and snob value. It was the underground versus the corporate machine.