Would anyone here like to participate in this?

[coffee]

Cultural capital isn't about knowing facts. It's about savoir vivre - knowing how to interact and being able to gain access to influencers. You can be an expert in Beethoven or whatever and all that knowledge has very little capital value because you are too gauche to interact in the right way with the people who hold the cultural power - the impresarios, curators, publishing house owners, concert hall owners etc. To turn culture into capital, you need to be the right sort of person.

I'd say that background knowledge can make some difference rather than it makes no difference at all.

It might be like the difference between learning the vocabulary of a language and learning to speak the language. The former is not equivalent to the latter but it sure is useful to speed the latter along.

Recently I was having a conversation with the director of a something related to classical music in Leipzig, a very nice guy. He asked me who my favorite composer was. Of course part of having an acceptable answer to that question is knowing how to answer it in terms of tone, gestures, and so on; but part of it is also knowing what a composer is and knowing a few works by a composer or two. My answer was of course that my favorite composer usually depends on what concert I last attended, but if he squeezed me really hard I would give an answer like I gave Florian.

I was once helping a student prepare for an application interview to a prestigious American boarding school. A common question (in practice at least, if not in reality) is what their favorite music is. He tried to impress me by saying classical, and I was like, great, me too, who's your favorite composer. He looked worried and answered Beethoven, and I asked which works he liked best, and he said all of them, and I was like well but which do you really like most, and he said, "Um, the fifth one?"

Of course I advised him to tell the truth instead of that because it wouldn't matter which kind of music he likes best -- what matters is that he is able to speak intelligently about something.

I mention all this to attempt to persuade you that I am not the ignoramus you generally assume I am.

And yet you do know that there was something behind the kid's intuition. There are reasons that the school he wanted to go to has an orchestra and a theater and a few art history classes -- and they're related to the reasons that many people who have the power to do so wish to deny even basic art and music classes to public school kids.

[Florestan]

I don't know about Beethoven, but I think Bruckner had trouble because of his gaucheness.

Well, let's see...

To turn culture into capital, you need to be the right sort of person, brought up in the right way, with the right manners and the right contacts.

Mozart and Mendelssohn.

Otomh I can think of no other famous composer who fits in the bill.

[coffee]

Well, let's see...

Mozart and Mendelssohn.

Otomh I can think of no other famous composer who fits in the bill.

M's description put me in mind of Oswald von Wolkenstein. 

Maybe it's not fair to consider any medieval or Renaissance composer famous, but he's no Johann Schobert either.

[Mandryka]

Well, let's see...

Mozart and Mendelssohn.

Otomh I can think of no other famous composer who fits in the bill.

Well Haydn had enough savoir vivre to interact with royalty, as did Lully and Marais. Bach could hobnob with kings well enough to produce opfer. Where things get complicated is in the 19th century, where there's educated lower middle classes who form their own alternative to the academic establishment - Baudelaire, Manet . . . there must be examples in music, but I know so little about 19th century composers I can't comment. (I mean, I've heard the music obviously, but I'm not interested enough in it to research their background.)

[coffee]

I myself am careless enough about money as to be an aristocrat and mindful enough about morality as to be a bourgeois.

Oh, no, you're doing that exactly backwards! Aristocratic amorality is the most fun by far.

[coffee]

Anyway, it's clear that the people willing to address the question in the OP overwhelmingly wish to keep this project away from GMG.

That was essentially the situation in 2012 and 2016 as well. I hope I'm around in a few years to try again....

[DavidW]

Anyway, it's clear that the people willing to address the question in the OP overwhelmingly wish to keep this project away from GMG.

That was essentially the situation in 2012 and 2016 as well. I hope I'm around in a few years to try again....

4 year interval followed by 6 interval... hmm... well see you again in 2030!

Or you could stick around and talk about music in the other threads.  Just a thought.

[foxandpeng]

4 year interval followed by 6 interval... hmm... well see you again in 2030!

Or you could stick around and talk about music in the other threads.  Just a thought.

I agree with David. Stay around and contribute to some of the other threads.

[Jo498]

Well Haydn had enough savoir vivre to interact with royalty, as did Lully and Marais. Bach could hobnob with kings well enough to produce opfer. Where things get complicated is in the 19th century, where there's educated lower middle classes who form their own alternative to the academic establishment - Baudelaire, Manet . . . there must be examples in music, but I know so little about 19th century composers I can't comment. (I mean, I've heard the music obviously, but I'm not interested enough in it to research their background.)

Beethoven got along quite well with nobility. I think his clumsiness has been exaggerated and later in life he didn't care because he could afford it (like unkempt elderly Einstein; Einstein looks quite normal and well groomed in pictures from ~1910-20, i.e. in his 30s, of course paintings are different, but just look at the smart short-haired young Beethoven from paintings around 1800 compared to the wild or very serious grey-haired one around 1820) 
Most composers were from the lower middle/middle class of their times but until the 19th century almost everyone would have been (or become during youth and education) sufficiently well dressed and behaved to get along well at the courts or similar institutions they worked for, or the students they taught. They could afford some extravaganza but only when they were reasonably established in their careers.

As you say, the 19th century is a bit more complicated with some artists cultivating the air of a bohemien or others really struggling economically (like Schubert). Nevertheless, the majority was still doing quite well in upper class company. There might be more examples of "misfit" artists as we progress through the 19th and early 20th century but I think it is overall an exaggerated cliché and one that might have been less true in music, partly because of the obvious social dimension, you don't want a stinking, dirty drunk guy giving the councilor's daughter piano lessons or play in your salon for the weekly jour fixe.

[coffee]

4 year interval followed by 6 interval... hmm... well see you again in 2030!

Or you could stick around and talk about music in the other threads.  Just a thought.

I agree with David. Stay around and contribute to some of the other threads.

Thank you guys for the invitation! You may be in the minority, but it is very kind.

I don't find participating in the normal discussions (on any forum) very time-efficient, so I don't do so very often anymore, but I still occasionally do and will continue to.   

[Florestan]

Actually, what is the purpose of your project? Look, you already have a list. What use, if any, does it have for you? I don't quite get the idea.

[coffee]

Actually, what is the purpose of your project? Look, you already have a list. What use, if any, does it have for you? I don't quite get the idea.

If I don't know a work on the 60th tier, I consider that probably a bigger gap in my knowledge than if I don't know a work on the 90th tier, and so a higher priority to address.

A work on the 120th tier is probably one I don't need to know much about, but one on the 30th tier is probably one I should know very well.

[Florestan]

If I don't know a work on the 60th tier, I consider that probably a bigger gap in my knowledge than if I don't know a work on the 90th tier, and so a higher priority to address.

A work on the 120th tier is probably one I don't need to know much about, but one on the 30th tier is probably one I should know very well.

All right. How many works from the tiers 1 to 10 have you already listened to?

[coffee]

All right. How many works from the tiers 1 to 10 have you already listened to?

I've already listened to most of the works on the top 100 tiers. I don't claim to know them all very well.

I've listened to multiple recordings of all the works on the top ten tiers and I know basic information about the composers, the circumstances of the composition, the history of reception, stuff like that. I have a music-theory level analysis of very few works, but that does not seem to be very rewarding compared to a more basic "listening guide" kind of knowledge.

[Florestan]

I've already listened to most of the works on the top 100 tiers.

Very good. Did you ever feel that a work in a tier actually belonged to another, either higher or lower?

[coffee]

Very good. Did you ever feel that a work in a tier actually belonged to another, either higher or lower?

Sure. I vote too.

[Florestan]

Sure. I vote too.

Okay. Then by now you should already have (1) some favorite composers, (2) some composers you'd like to explore more before deciding, and (3) some composers you definitely dislike. Things are so simple then: stick to (1) and (2) and ignore (3). I don't understand why you need another list.

[coffee]

Okay. Then by now you should already have (1) some favorite composers, (2) some composers you'd like to explore more before deciding, and (3) some composers you definitely dislike. Things are so simple then: stick to (1) and (2) and ignore (3). I don't understand why you need another list.

Well, if we're going to get into this, the first thing I'd note is that I don't frame things by composers so rigidly. I prefer to think in terms of specific works. After all, Beethoven is more famous than Sculthorpe, but the latter's Kakadu is probably more likely to come up in conversation than the former's piano quartets, WoO 36.

Also, I don't know that there are any composers that I "definitely dislike." But that gets to the question of why I would take my own preferences so seriously anyway.

Were you referring to another list previously? I might have misunderstood that.

[Florestan]

Well, if we're going to get into this, the first thing I'd note is that I don't frame things by composers so rigidly. I prefer to think in terms of specific works. After all, Beethoven is more famous than Sculthorpe, but the latter's Kakadu is probably more likely to come up in conversation than the former's piano quartets, WoO 36.

And yet Beethoven will have far more specific works likely to come up in conversation than Sculthorpe. Comparing an obscure work of a genius to an obscure work of an obscure composer is a moot point.

why I would take my own preferences so seriously anyway.

No, the question is rather why you take your own preferences so lightly.

I have the impression that you need these lists precisely because you are so insecure about your own preferences that you need to be told that what you listen to is indeed great and worthwhile. A question, if I may: did you listen to music and have your own oreferences before that list was compiled?

[coffee]

And yet Beethoven will have far more specific works likely to come up in conversation than Sculthorpe. Comparing an obscure work of a genius to an obscure work of an obscure composer is a moot point.

No, the question is rather why you take your own preferences so lightly.

Who am I that I would do otherwise? I'm at most just one person, and not a musically-gifted or musically-trained one.

I have the impression that you need these lists precisely because you are so insecure about your own preferences that you need to be told that what you listen to is indeed great and worthwhile. A question, if I may: did you listen to music and have your own oreferences before that list was compiled?

I knew very little about classical music when I started working on that list.

At this point I mostly listen to music that is unlikely to be regarded as "great and worthwhile."

Maybe putting it this way will help: I gain more pleasure in learning about music that is new to me than I gain from listening to something I already know. In fact, I ordinarily gain very little pleasure from listening to something I already know except insofar as I am getting to know it better.

So the question is what I will learn about next.

My goal is to maximize the odds that I will know about a work of music that comes up in conversation. Maximizing those odds brings me more pleasure than whatever the hedonic difference is between listening to my favorite works and something that I barely enjoy at all.