Is It Music or Gibberish ?

[(poco) Sforzando]

I can hear a clear musical narrative in Carter's works - or, at least, in those works he composed before adopting serialism - and if a rather inexperienced listener as me can, and a prominent critic such as ACDouglas can not, then obviously his musical sensibility deserves to be called into question. (Note that I don't mean to talk ill about serialism here - it is just a major problem area with me).

1) Carter is never serial. He is atonal, but specifically rejects the use of 12-tone rows or other serial procedures.

2) The word "prominent" when applied to ACD has already been questioned.

3) ACD, when backed into a corner, issued an "Important" codicil to his original blog entry where he claimed he wasn't talking about Carter at all! (Look for my post a few days back.)

Well-stirred, though I can hardly fathom your inability to see Sean for the genius he is.

[Sean]

Croche

I can not comment on what music academics are generally like, having never met one myself, but the account given by Luke is more objective and level-headed compared to Sean's.

Luke's problem is he's too level-headed: he needs to blow his sedate mind with some more passion and he'd see the light, and sound a bit less genteel and kind-of bandaged.

[Sean]

Well-stirred, though I can hardly fathom your inability to see Sean for the genius he is.

Mmm.

[lukeottevanger]

Croche

Luke's problem is he's too level-headed: he needs to blow his sedate mind with some more passion and he'd see the light, and sound a bit less genteel and kind-of bandaged.

Sean, if only you knew.....

[Florestan]

I'm a genius.

That's true. It takes genius --- albeit a peculiar one --- to exhibit with such magnificence the deep frustration and the bitter resentment that you are full of.

[DavidRoss]

...a prominent critic such as ACDouglas....

This is the only statement I object to in your fine post, M Croche.  ACD is hardly a prominent critic, but just a garden variety wingnut with a website.  (Or was your tongue in cheek?  )

...the account given by Luke is more objective and level-headed compared to Sean's.

But of course.  Stick around and you'll quickly learn to expect just that.  Luke is consistently thoughtful, articulate, and knows whereof he speaks.

[J.Z. Herrenberg]

Luke is consistently thoughtful, articulate, and knows whereof he speaks.

Agreed. 'Informed passion' - the real thing, in my opinion.

[Cato]

Skimming through here after my absence, I must quote this with certain emphases:

Aesthetics is 'opinion' or rather, absolute conviction in the personal experience one has, and which of course is universalizable.

                                      0:)  

which is the only personal and of course unversalizable reaction possible after such a definition!

[(poco) Sforzando]

This is the only statement I object to in your fine post, M Croche.  ACD is hardly a prominent critic, but just a garden variety wingnut with a website.  (Or was your tongue in cheek?  )

That's what makes this site such fun. When prominent critics and geniuses are involved, it's scarcely possible to tell who's being straight and who's laughing their asses off at the other lunatics.

[Joe Barron]

This entire discussion is moot now, since on April 29, Douglas apologized in his blog to anyone who thought his remarks were directed at Carter:


An Important Clarification
After a number of chiding eMails scolding us for our apparently treating the music of Elliott Carter so rudely in this post of ours, we see that a clarification is urgently required.

In that post we said nothing about Carter's music, with which music we're only glancingly familiar. Justin Davidson did. It seems our breezy (and we now see careless and ill-chosen) "Just so" response to Mr. Davidson's quoted remarks on Carter's music is the culprit here. Our "Just so" was NOT meant as a comment on Carter's music. It was meant to indicate that Mr. Davidson's closing remarks on Carter's music, though expressed differently, expressed exactly what we said in our above linked post's opening graf as it applied to, "much of the atonal music of our experience that we found so, well, unmusical — worse, found to be non-music," NOT to Carter's music specifically with which music, as we've above noted, we're only glancingly familiar and, further, from that glancing exposure concluded that what we heard was indeed genuine music and NOT gibberish.

The fault here is due entirely our careless writing, not our readers' reading, and for that, our shamefaced apologies.


As for justin Davidson, I can't comment, since I did not read his original post and, in any event, I like Carter's music and would likely find unconvincing any attempt to prove, from a priori definitions of narrative, that it is gibberish.

[karlhenning]

It was meant to indicate that Mr. Davidson's closing remarks on Carter's music, though expressed differently, expressed exactly what we said in our above linked post's opening graf as it applied to, "much of the atonal music of our experience that we found so, well, unmusical — worse, found to be non-music," NOT to Carter's music specifically with which music, as we've above noted, we're only glancingly familiar and, further, from that glancing exposure concluded that what we heard was indeed genuine music and NOT gibberish.

To speak of gibbering . . . .

[karlhenning]

That's a "clarification," is it? 

[(poco) Sforzando]

This entire discussion is moot now, since on April 29, Douglas apologized in his blog to anyone who thought his remarks were directed at Carter:


An Important Clarification
After a number of chiding eMails scolding us for our apparently treating the music of Elliott Carter so rudely in this post of ours, we see that a clarification is urgently required.

In that post we said nothing about Carter's music, with which music we're only glancingly familiar. Justin Davidson did. It seems our breezy (and we now see careless and ill-chosen) "Just so" response to Mr. Davidson's quoted remarks on Carter's music is the culprit here. Our "Just so" was NOT meant as a comment on Carter's music. It was meant to indicate that Mr. Davidson's closing remarks on Carter's music, though expressed differently, expressed exactly what we said in our above linked post's opening graf as it applied to, "much of the atonal music of our experience that we found so, well, unmusical — worse, found to be non-music," NOT to Carter's music specifically with which music, as we've above noted, we're only glancingly familiar and, further, from that glancing exposure concluded that what we heard was indeed genuine music and NOT gibberish.

The fault here is due entirely our careless writing, not our readers' reading, and for that, our shamefaced apologies.


As for justin Davidson, I can't comment, since I did not read his original post and, in any event, I like Carter's music and would likely find unconvincing any attempt to prove, from a priori definitions of narrative, that it is gibberish.

This "important" - nay, "urgent" - clarification has already been mentioned by me - twice.

But reading these paragraphs of such earth-shattering importance - 193 words with one sentence of 85 words and about 27 parenthetical phrases, dependent clauses, and other gasbaggy hemming and hawing - I can only recommend to ACD this excellent rule from Strunk and White: "Omit needless words! Omit needless words! Omit needless words!"

[Joe Barron]

This "important" - nay, "urgent" - clarification has already been mentioned by me - twice.

But reading these paragraphs of such earth-shattering importance - 193 words with one sentence of 85 words and about 27 parenthetical phrases, dependent clauses, and other gasbaggy hemming and hawing - I can only recommend to ACD this excellent rule from Strunk and White: "Omit needless words! Omit needless words! Omit needless words!"

Sorry. I scanned the thread lookiong for the apology but missed it. 

[(poco) Sforzando]

Sorry. I scanned the thread lookiong for the apology but missed it. 

No problem! a clarification of such urgency and importance cannot possibly get too much attention.

[karlhenning]

The fault here is due entirely our careless writing . . . .

Oops. = due entirely to our [the Pompous We] careless writing.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Oops. = due entirely to our [the Pompous We] careless writing.

Lest a matter of such grave importance be not correctly understood, the word "to" does not appear in the Original.

[karlhenning]

Lest a matter of such grave importance be not correctly understood, the word "to" does not appear in the Original.

Thanks; I suspected not, but then, the Original is of no importance sufficient for me to have checked against it.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Thanks; I suspected not, but then, the Original is of no importance sufficient for me to have checked against it.

Heretic!

[jochanaan]

Aiyiyiyi!  Amazing how the thread entangles itself when I'm out of town a few days!

And even the relatively meaningless question "Is the written text music or isn't it?" has reared its air-filled head. For the record, my take is that the written text is not in itself music, but rather bears the same relationship to performed music that an architect's blueprint bears to the completed building.  The difference is, of course, that musicians can alter the blueprint without the music falling apart--if they do it well and subtly.  And you don't usually get more than one significant building out of a single blueprint.  (The endless suburbs around our major metropolitan areas hardly count as significant--except in the way they destroy virgin land. )