A different cut on beginners' classical music

[bigshot]

Looking at this now, it's a nicely eclectic selection of light classical music.

Offhand, the only light classical music I see on there is Robert Farnon.

[eyeresist]

Speaking of light music, I saw a documentary about the Wallfisch family last night, "Saved by music". It included an interesting little section in which two young brothers, singer and pianist/composer, were discovering and playing a bit of an opera by Albert Coates (who it turned out was actually a relative).

[Daverz]

Offhand, the only light classical music I see on there is Robert Farnon.

And Gottschalk, Gould and Grofe.  OK, much of it is "serious", e.g. Bartok, but much of it is stuff that used to be staples of "pops" concerts before actual pop music took over.  A lot more of that than I would include in a "beginners" list.

[bigshot]

The overtures, tone poems and vivid programmatic works are EXACTLY what got me interested in classical music initially. The blogger who compiled the list overstates her case a bit, but the basic idea is sound. Symphonies with large form architecture are important and wonderful, but they can be off-putting to beginners who aren't able to grasp the structural elements of classical music yet. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the music on her list. It's as rich and diverse as any other field of classical music. It's just more immediate. You have to walk before you can run.

[Fëanor]

The overtures, tone poems and vivid programmatic works are EXACTLY what got me interested in classical music initially.
...

Me too, but it's chamber music that sustained my interest in classical. As we see, Teresa is dismissive of chamber music.

...
The blogger who compiled the list overstates her case a bit, but the basic idea is sound. Symphonies with large form architecture are important and wonderful, but they can be off-putting to beginners who aren't able to grasp the structural elements of classical music yet. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the music on her list. It's as rich and diverse as any other field of classical music. It's just more immediate. You have to walk before you can run.

This is all completely true.  I envy Teresa her musical training and broad listening experience which, at this stage of my life, I'm certain I will never to equal.  However Teresa will likely never truly be a classical music lover.

[bigshot]

Another board I frequent is filled with Mahlerites, and whenever a newbie comes along looking for an entry point, they list off their favorite Mahler symphonies with a half dozen different conductors. Now don't get me wrong, I love Mahler. But I can't think of a more off-putting introduction to classical music... Except perhaps suggesting just chamber music. People seem to suggest things without considering the person receiving the advice. Instead of trying to set a spark that might grow to a roaring fire, they take the opportunity to parade their own tastes and look down upon certain other types of music and the people who listen to it.

Perhaps the blogger is right. Maybe a lot of classical music fans *are* snobs.

[westknife]

Mahler was one of the first composers I got into

[eyeresist]

Ditto. Cheap cutouts of 4 and 5 with the RPO conducted by Inoue. Admittedly, I didn't know what the hell I was hearing.

[Daverz]

Another board I frequent is filled with Mahlerites, and whenever a newbie comes along looking for an entry point, they list off their favorite Mahler symphonies with a half dozen different conductors. Now don't get me wrong, I love Mahler. But I can't think of a more off-putting introduction to classical music...

For you perhaps, but a lot of people first got turned on by Mahler.  He's popular for a reason.

Perhaps the blogger is right. Maybe a lot of classical music fans *are* snobs.

Theresa has her own rather large blind spots.

[Mn Dave]

For you perhaps, but a lot of people first got turned on by Mahler.  He's popular for a reason.

I see Mahler 1 recommended to newbies pretty often.

[jochanaan]

Whatever else Mahler's music does, it does grab one's ears.

[bigshot]

Listening to Mahler without understanding its architecture is like looking at the ocean one wave at a time. I can't imagine newbies listening to the peaks and valleys over and over for that long without understanding their context. It would be like listening to a film score without the film.

[Florestan]

I can't imagine newbies listening to the peaks and valleys over and over for that long without understanding their context. It would be like listening to a film score without the film.

Maybe, but they are most likely to be very impressed by the giant orchestra and acquire the wrong notion that music played with less than 150 instruments is not worth their time. 

[Daverz]

Listening to Mahler without understanding its architecture is like looking at the ocean one wave at a time. I can't imagine newbies listening to the peaks and valleys over and over for that long without understanding their context. It would be like listening to a film score without the film.

What context?  This is absolute music for the most part.

[bigshot]

What context?

The context of the overall architectural structure. Popular music has nothing like that.

[Fëanor]

The context of the overall architectural structure. Popular music has nothing like that.

I know dick about musical architecture but have still come to enjoy listening to (some) Mahler.

[Daverz]

The context of the overall architectural structure.

And one can pick that up by...listening!  Unless you're saying that one needs to be able to read scores to appreciate Mahler.  Fortunately, Mahler was very good at making his structures easy to follow.

[bigshot]

When I first listened to Mahler, it was when I was first getting into Romantic symphonies... way back in college. I listened to Beethoven and Schubert and Brahms and Buckner and Mahler and a lot of the other core symphonic repertoire. Bruckner and Mahler stood out to me as just being an overlong string of alternating loud and quiet parts. I liked the huge orchestras, but couldn't get any hold on the music itself. Bruckner and Mahler seemed like the same thing to me. I used them as soundtracks dubbed onto silent films like Metropolis because they sounded like they needed some sort of program to go with them.

Now I totally see the difference between the structure of Bruckner and Mahler. But back then, I didn't have the experience to look at things that way. I could totally grasp the Russians and Schubert and I could begin to understand Beethoven's symphonies, but Mahler was of a scale that I couldn't get far enough back from to discern the overall shape of the thing.

It seems to me that newbies would be better introduced to classical music by pieces that they have a possibility of understanding. Maybe I was just dense as a kid and other people can grasp Mahler from a cold start. But for me, starting with Mahler would be like starting a seven course meal with the roast beef. It took a little warming up before I could appreciate it.

[eyeresist]

Ditto. Cheap cutouts of 4 and 5 with the RPO conducted by Inoue. Admittedly, I didn't know what the hell I was hearing.

I must admit that one reason I found this music accessible was that the opening bars of the 5th had been used for the Australian edition of In Search Of, broadcast here as Great Mysteries of the World. Just that element of familiarity made the symphony as a whole easier to get into.

[Florestan]

When I first listened to Mahler, it was when I was first getting into Romantic symphonies... way back in college. I listened to Beethoven and Schubert and Brahms and Buckner and Mahler and a lot of the other core symphonic repertoire. Bruckner and Mahler stood out to me as just being an overlong string of alternating loud and quiet parts. I liked the huge orchestras, but couldn't get any hold on the music itself. Bruckner and Mahler seemed like the same thing to me. I used them as soundtracks dubbed onto silent films like Metropolis because they sounded like they needed some sort of program to go with them.

Now I totally see the difference between the structure of Bruckner and Mahler. But back then, I didn't have the experience to look at things that way. I could totally grasp the Russians and Schubert and I could begin to understand Beethoven's symphonies, but Mahler was of a scale that I couldn't get far enough back from to discern the overall shape of the thing.

It seems to me that newbies would be better introduced to classical music by pieces that they have a possibility of understanding. Maybe I was just dense as a kid and other people can grasp Mahler from a cold start. But for me, starting with Mahler would be like starting a seven course meal with the roast beef. It took a little warming up before I could appreciate it.

Interesting post.

My first Mahler was the Third and I was so enthralled that I thought him to be far superior to any other composer I previously heard, my beloved favorite Beethoven included --- and for quite some time I listened to nothing BUT Mahler. Now, of course that was a teen-ager reaction (I must have been around 14 back then) and today, 35 years later, Beethoven is still my beloved favorite to whose music I listen at least weekly, while I can live for months without hearing any Mahler. Tempora mutantur, nos et mutamur in illis...

Still, I personally know quite a few people who, having heard Mahler in their teens, some even beginning their classical music journey WITH Mahler, never again escaped this "Mahler magic" and for whom Late Romanticism, particularly the "holy trinity" Mahler / Bruckner / Wagner, is the nec plus ultra of music, everything else, and especially chamber music, being just triffles they won't waste their time with.

Therefore, I would never recommend a newby to start with Mahler --- not because he might not grasp it, but precisely because he might be so spellbound as to subsequently reject anything that does not resemble Mahler.