What's the point of Beethoven's piano sonatas?

[ChopinBroccoli]

Well, I think you're wrong. Classic FM manages to make money through advertising sales. Each city has its symphony hall. Beethoven and Mozart big boxes are released ad nauseam. Everyone can recognise The Four Seasons.

And all of this combined attracts fewer people than one Taylor Swift ... that's reality

[Florestan]

You've never annoyed me, on the contrary, when I saw that resolution I was disappointed by the thought that I'd lose a good sparring partner. Delete the resolution, I say. Let's continue to cross swords in 2020.

Don't tempt me! 

[Iota]

I'm looking for an explanation of why instrumental art music is valued by human beings.

I guess sung or drummed music/noise may have always been something that urged people to greater intensity, before a hunt/battle etc, or indeed something that soothed tension, as with dancing or helping youngsters sleep. All of which might be considered as having an evolutionary purpose, with instrumental music being a natural evolution of such stimuli.
The human brain generally wishes to make sense of things, see patterns etc, and being social animals, humans would perhaps naturally share those patterns for communal approval/validation or rejection. Paintings of animals on cave walls for example might have started almost as an identification tool - you point at the animal that will be hunted that day e.g - and it's perhaps not too big a leap to imagine that people finding such images useful/clarifying might go on to finding them intriguing in their own right, and exploring them aesthetically in the form of psychological/emotional stimulants and symbols of communal identity.

Music's route may have been a similar one, function leading to psychological need and aestheticization. Which if at all accurate, wears an evolutionary explanation reasonably well I'd have thought.

[steve ridgway]

The entire universe has evolved from a cloud of simple gas to produce an incredible amount of beauty, variety and complexity, and continues to do so. It's just what it does, maybe even what it's for.

I was including non-living forms here - all the planets and moons explored in the Solar System have against all expectations turned out to be very varied and individual, not mere lumps of near identical rock, with their own particular expressions of beauty - with no biological natural selection involved at all.

[Florestan]

I was including non-living forms here - all the planets and moons explored in the Solar System have against all expectations turned out to be very varied and individual, not mere lumps of near identical rock, with their own particular expressions of beauty - with no biological natural selection involved at all.

That's a very interesting point.

[steve ridgway]

I'm also very impressed by how much information the universe provides. For example the light of the stars tells all sorts about composition, temperature, distance, motion and moon rocks hold the history of impacts, volcanism, solar activity, cosmic ray activity. It's even possible to work out which bodies meteorites come from - pieces of the Moon and Mars have actually been picked up here on Earth.

[Florestan]

I'm also very impressed by how much information the universe provides. For example the light of the stars tells all sorts about composition, temperature, distance, motion and moon rocks hold the history of impacts, volcanism, solar activity, cosmic ray activity. It's even possible to work out which bodies meteorites come from - pieces of the Moon and Mars have actually been picked up here on Earth.

IMNSHO there is one, and only one, rational and reasonable explanation which accounts both for that and for your previous post --- and for a score of other phenomena as well, for all of them actually, but I'm not going there. 

[prémont]

But by all means, if I am annoying just let me know, you or anyone else, and I'll stop posting.

I have never found you annoying, not even in the most heated HIP controversy.

[Florestan]

I have never found you annoying, not even in the most heated HIP controversy.

Thanks and likewise.

[Cato]

I guess sung or drummed music/noise may have always been something that urged people to greater intensity, before a hunt/battle etc, or indeed something that soothed tension, as with dancing or helping youngsters sleep. All of which might be considered as having an evolutionary purpose, with instrumental music being a natural evolution of such stimuli.
The human brain generally wishes to make sense of things, see patterns etc, and being social animals, humans would perhaps naturally share those patterns for communal approval/validation or rejection. Paintings of animals on cave walls for example might have started almost as an identification tool - you point at the animal that will be hunted that day e.g - and it's perhaps not too big a leap to imagine that people finding such images useful/clarifying might go on to finding them intriguing in their own right, and exploring them aesthetically in the form of psychological/emotional stimulants and symbols of communal identity.

Music's route may have been a similar one, function leading to psychological need and aestheticization. Which if at all accurate, wears an evolutionary explanation reasonably well I'd have thought.

Purists would say that "purpose" and "evolutionary" cannot be combined!     But that is another issue!   

A professor of mine in Classics/Latin/Ancient Greek - we were translating one of Plato's Dialogues - once commented: "From a Darwinian point of view, nothing is more worthless than Music.  What kind of survival value could it have?"   0:)   A German lady in my class instantly countered with: "Oh, but it makes surviving Life so much more pleasant!"   

I have read the books of psychologists, musicologists, mathematicians, and physicists on this and similar problems: how is an ability in e.g. mathematics or an ability in drawing in a near photographic manner or in composing music connected to survival?  What would be the "purpose" of selecting such skills, which seem devoid of value for basic or even not so basic survival?

One theory simply shrugs and says: They are not essential.  The skills came about by accident, tangential to survival skills of seeing in three dimensions, imagining solutions to survival problems in three dimensions, imagining natural sounds and trying to reproduce them to e.g. attract prey or distract attackers, imagining the trajectory of a spear, or following sequences efficiently to arrive at a solution for any kind of problem.  Mathematics, Science, Art, etc. blossom when daily survival is no longer an issue, i.e. (probably) when permanent settlements arrive with agriculture, and people have time to use their visual and auditory and thinking skills for creativity. 

The next point, of course: so, what is the purpose of music beyond a simple bird-like call?  What is the purpose of musical complexity, polyphony, diatonic or chromatic harmony, etc.?

One could ask a Roman aristocrat: what is the purpose of decorating your dining room with murals of birds and gods and goddesses?  I suspect he or she would laugh and perhaps say something about wanting to be pleased, wanting to see beauty, wanting to feel a sense of order in a Universe seemingly capricious and even malicious.  At least in this dining room, order  and beauty reign, in contrast to the chaos often awaiting us in the world.

[Gurn Blanston]

I have never found you annoying, not even in the most heated HIP controversy.

Surely that's an exaggeration...

I just wanted to point out, since I see where this is all trending, that what I said was CULTURAL evolution. That's not the same thing as growing an extra appendage out of your forehead. It isn't physical at all. So, just sayin'.... 

[Florestan]

Surely that's an exaggeration...

Well, so was my reply...

(I love you both.)

I just wanted to point out, since I see where this is all trending, that what I said was CULTURAL evolution. That's not the same thing as growing an extra appendage out of your forehead. It isn't physical at all.

I got it all right, Gurn, fear not. I certainly don't need an extra appendage to feel and know that Tchaikovsky's music is much more authentic than Haydn's* ; all I need is intellectual refinement, which you were gracious enough to concede.

 

* (in the sense that Si vis me flere, dolendum est primum ipsi tibi)

[Iota]

Purists would say that "purpose" and "evolutionary" cannot be combined!

Oh yeah, that's just me being clumsy (I blame evolution!) .. I meant it in the sense of it fitting an evolutionary explanation of music.

I was trying to say that humans communicating information between and about themselves, seems almost a sine qua non of their evolutionary success, and music may just be catering to that imperative. (Although evolution doesn't seem to have equipped me well to make the point ..)

[steve ridgway]

IMNSHO there is one, and only one, rational and reasonable explanation which accounts both for that and for your previous post --- and for a score of other phenomena as well, for all of them actually, but I'm not going there. 

Yes, please ignore that this has come from looking back over the ten days I've so far completed of a twelve day Tarot draw .

"Try to feel the energy of the universe flowing through all things, manifesting in different forms, expressing in different ways".

And apart from material forms this includes ideas, dreams, inspirations, musical compositions. They're all part of the universe, where else would they have come from?

[aukhawk]

Shrug. We like sounds. ...

I think most of all we like patterns.  Relatively recent research has shown how fundamental a process pattern-matching is in our brains and in our minute-to-minute existence.  Patterns are also what distinguishes music from mere noise.  So on that basis it's not surprising if we find music stimulating.
(Personally I reject concepts like 'joy' or 'sadness' as part of my musical experience - for me it's more a process of massage or stimulation.)

The choice of Beethoven as an example is an interesting one, because, as a music-lover, I can say that I find most of his music and certainly all of it written after 1808, quite repellent.  The massage is clumsy, the stimulation mis-applied.  Parts of his earlier symphonies/concertos up to the Pastoral, and some of his earlier/middle sonatas up to the Appassionata - OK.  They are about my limit.

[San Antone]

I think most of all we like patterns.  Relatively recent research has shown how fundamental a process pattern-matching is in our brains and in our minute-to-minute existence.  Patterns are also what distinguishes music from mere noise.  So on that basis it's not surprising if we find music stimulating.
(Personally I reject concepts like 'joy' or 'sadness' as part of my musical experience - for me it's more a process of massage or stimulation.)

The choice of Beethoven as an example is an interesting one, because, as a music-lover, I can say that I find most of his music and certainly all of it written after 1808, quite repellent.  The massage is clumsy, the stimulation mis-applied.  Parts of his earlier symphonies/concertos up to the Pastoral, and some of his earlier/middle sonatas up to the Appassionata - OK. They are about my limit.

While I have written elsewhere that Beethoven is my favorite composer, there are limits.  His late sonatas, especially, are difficult going for me; his string quartets go down a bit easier except for the extremely rigorous contrapuntal movements. I hardly ever listen to the symphonies, but they don't bother me as much, although, the 9th is my least favorite. 

I am surprised you lump the 7th in with the works that don't appeal to you.

[some guy]

It's funny; I was just thinking about Beethoven. I used to like him a lot, but I tend nowadays to listen only to the late works. The sonatas in particular seem to me to be the very best things he ever wrote. They are certainly the pieces that I like listening to the most frequently.

Seems to me that these differences in perception among aukhawk, San Antone, and myself are pertinent to the original question posed and to the premise about evolutionary explanations.

We don't all like the same things, and we don't like them in the same way.

[Mandryka]

While I have written elsewhere that Beethoven is my favorite composer, there are limits.  His late sonatas, especially, are difficult going for me; his string quartets go down a bit easier except for the extremely rigorous contrapuntal movements. I hardly ever listen to the symphonies, but they don't bother me as much, although, the 9th is my least favorite. 

I wonder how much of this is because you don't listen attentively, that pretty well all of the music you listen to is in the background.

[San Antone]

I wonder how much of this is because you don't listen attentively, that pretty well all of the music you listen to is in the background.

While it is true that I will have music playing in the background most of the time, I will go in and out of listening attentively to a piece of music that captures my attention.  So, no, I don't think that is an issue regarding my reaction to late Beethoven.  I actively dislike movements such as Grosse Fugue and the 4th movement of the Hammerklavier sonata (once the counterpoint takes over).

[Mandryka]

While it is true that I will have music playing in the background most of the time, I will go in and out of listening attentively to a piece of music that captures my attention.  So, no, I don't think that is an issue regarding my reaction to late Beethoven.  I actively dislike movements such as Grosse Fugue and the 4th movement of the Hammerklavier sonata (once the counterpoint takes over).

Yes, well I too have a problem with op 106!

I do think that it's probably the sign of a good bit of art that it captures your attention. I mean, if I were painting a picture or writing a piece of music, I think I'd want to capture the audience's attention.

For me "capture attention" is pretty well the same as "capture imagination", so it's more grist for the mill for the theory I've been sketching in this thread.