Is the composer obsolete?

[karlhenning]

Those are not contemporary composers 

Andrei did not claim so;  the question is how "Josquin" explains his assignment of musical "superiority."

[(poco) Sforzando]

After hearing Beethoven's op. 131, Schubert is reported to have said: "What  is left for us to compose after that?"  

To counterbalance this, there is also the fact that the late Beethoven quartets took many decades after his death to establish themselves as the extraordinary works a great many musicians and listeners perceive them as today. I'll have to dig up the source, but it appears that performances were few and far between, with op. 135 (as the most Haydnesque of the lost) the most popular until well into the 1870s. The late quartets and sonatas were often regarded as the regrettable effluvia of a deaf near-madman, and it wasn't until the 20th century that they became as prestigious as they are today, to the point where every other piano or quartet recital you see includes at least one of them. (Conversely, I have yet to see the so-called "overplayed" Moonlight programmed outside of complete cycles.) But as far as 131 goes, Schubert, Berlioz, and Wagner were way ahead of their times in appreciating this difficult and complex work.

[Florestan]

Andrei did not claim so;  the question is how "Josquin" explains his assignment of musical "superiority."

Precisely.

[greg]

There is an interesting and generally useful point behind this, though, to be frank, it doesn't have much to do with any supposed quarrel to what I've been saying.

Not only is there a difference between experience and understanding (not that I see that problem in evidence in this discussion), but distinct from either of those is observation/reflection.  A lot of the kneejerk reaction to the mere name of Schoenberg (in recent evidence yet again when Levine did his Beethoven-&-Schoenberg programming here in Boston) betrayed a gulf between observation, and experience.

Another valuable distinction to observe (especially in this thread) is the difference between deciding one dislikes something, and understanding (or even experiencing) it.  Many people decide they don't like some kinds of music in advance of any actual experience of the music, and putter with ideas as to why they are sure they will dislike the as-yet-unheard music, and, lo and behold, practice follows theory!

One sees this in various guises.  Most obviously (considering the topic under advisement) there are those who, without having heard any (say) Schoenberg, already spook at the rumor of Schoenberg, and then spook at the abstract discussion of his music;  haven't heard a note of the music yet, but already there is the expectation, or even in many cases the 'certainty', that they Aren't Going To Like THIS.  But what the heck, hardly anyone wants to seem prejudicial and bigoted, so they'll try some Schoenberg;  in a surprisingly high percentage, when they do actually hear the music, they were right all along, they don't like it!

Or, wait; were they were right all along, or did the already-formed prejudice drive the belated experience?

In other cases, one sees this with classical music in general.  I.e., there is some portion of the general public (in the USA) who have not yet actually experienced classical music, but they "know" that they "don't like" it.  Same error, different application.

I tend to start with the opposite prejudice. 
I remember reading from a page or two of the score that was reprinted in a book of the Penderecki Threnody and was awed at learning new techniques that I could never have dreamed of....... could NOT wait to listen, and when i did, I had to play it again 2 or 3 times because I was simply amazed! 

BUT...... i've also had experience with reading a few scores that were hypercomplex and interesting- for example, Ferneyhough and the piano pieces of Stockhausen and Boulez, and just ending up hating it all- i'd almost say, with a passion (though, still, if i can learn to wrap my head around those rhythms I've learned quite a bit, and that'll be a goal of mine).

Not just me....... i've tried something like this with letting my parents listen to my music. For example- saying how much i liked Schoenberg's Book of Hanging Gardens and how it actually mixes very well with the lyrics in a strange, yet convincing way. She listened through and thought it was "a joke, and i tried flipping through the tracks but each song sounded the same". 
Yet, i mentioned how Berg was atonal, but when she listened she said he "wasn't bad" or something like that.

So I don't think this:

or did the already-formed prejudice drive the belated experience?

is true at all for most people, at least not when it comes to music.

[karlhenning]

Incidentally, I don't think that it is true at all for most people, either, of course.

[greg]

Incidentally, I don't think that it is true at all for most people, either, of course.

You know, I think something like that may make people think of their "ideals" about music, which may just be an approximation of their actual tastes......

[karlhenning]

You know, I think something like that may make people think of their "ideals" about music, which may just be an approximation of their actual tastes......

Axiom No. 1: Words about music are more slippery than they appear.

[Lethevich]

To counterbalance this, there is also the fact that the late Beethoven quartets took many decades after his death to establish themselves as the extraordinary works a great many musicians and listeners perceive them as today. I'll have to dig up the source, but it appears that performances were few and far between, with op. 135 (as the most Haydnesque of the lost) the most popular until well into the 1870s. The late quartets and sonatas were often regarded as the regrettable effluvia of a deaf near-madman, and it wasn't until the 20th century that they became as prestigious as they are today, to the point where every other piano or quartet recital you see includes at least one of them.

Indeedie, I read that Verdi having the scores to all of Beethoven's late quartets on his bookshelf was considered quite "esoteric" at the time - and this was Falstaff era...

[greg]

Axiom No. 1: Words about music are more slippery than they appear.

I like how you stated that. There's always a negative or positive way of saying the same thing, too, after all.......

[rappy]

Andrei did not claim so;  the question is how "Josquin" explains his assignment of musical "superiority."

But Josquin claimed that the contemporary composers were inferior to the classics. And I think he counts Prokofiev, Bartok and co. to the classics.

[jochanaan]

Yes, but you seem to want to ignore the power of the human mind to think in abstractions and reach conclusions which are beyond what can be readily understood or explained. I cannot say, in simple terms, what makes Bach a genius, but i can understand it, using ontological and intuitive means. I cannot say or prove that i'm right in my judgment, but that isn't the same as saying my understanding of the music of Bach isn't based on concrete realities which one day we may even come to discover. In the end, who was that said that "the reason we have so few geniuses is that people do not have faith in what they know to be true"? 

To be frank, part of the reason why people seem to have such a conflicting perception of art is that there is a difference between experiencing something and truly understanding it, in the sense implied above. Experiencing something gives you a taste of the object in question, but you may not develop a proper consciouses of it, so that the object may appear vague and shrouded in feeling rather then understanding. I believe most people are prone to cast judgment over something while they are still in this pre-conscious phase, so that their understanding is still in the form of feeling. Ask anybody what they think of classical music and most we'll just say that it's nice, or that it is relaxing, that is, their understanding of it is still not properly formed so they can only rely on their emotional perception of it. Hence, why the adamant attitude displayed by people here on how individual perception rules everything is so infuriating in that it's based on the sheer emotional gratification of stating that we are all individuals with different tastes and such and such rather then reason or any real evidence.

Aren't you forgetting that most people have to be guided to this understanding?  I don't know about you, but without the presence of classical LPs in my home and the persistence of a mother who really loved them, I may never have come to know and love them myself.

And it seems to me that what you call "understanding" is almost as feeling-based as any drug addict's response to The Grateful Dead.  Both are based on "insight" which their adherents falsely claim is universal and unavoidable.

Soightly off-topic question: Is our response to Bach or Mahler or Carter any more valid because we've been guided to understand this music, or because it's obviously more complex than that sung by Ms. Spears or even Lennon and McCartney?  One can say that "our" music is more "intellectual," and it is, but I've never yet found music that doesn't produce some bodily response--not even serial or atonal music.  Seems to me the categories are never as clear-cut as a lot of people would like to make them.

But Josquin claimed that the contemporary composers were inferior to the classics. And I think he counts Prokofiev, Bartok and co. to the classics.

Do you, Josquin?  Because Schoenberg and company considered Bartok just as radical as themselves in their day.

[karlhenning]

But Josquin claimed that the contemporary composers were inferior to the classics. And I think he counts Prokofiev, Bartok and co. to the classics.

Not sure why you think so;  the impression I get is that "Josquin" a priori considers Prokofiev (e.g.) ineligible for the stature of The Hoary Classics.

(My impression could be mistaken, of course.)

[lukeottevanger]

Axiom No. 1: Words about music are more slippery than they appear.

Isn't that a Meatloaf song?

[Florestan]

Not sure why you think so;  the impression I get is that "Josquin" a priori considers Prokofiev (e.g.) ineligible for the stature of The Hoary Classics.

(My impression could be mistaken, of course.)

This is my impression, too. It would be interesting then to know where does Josquin draw the line between good music and bad music, IOW, when and with whom did music start going downwards.

[karlhenning]

Isn't that a Meatloaf song?

What a happy country, where even the meatloaf sings!

[eyeresist]

I think Wuorinen's proclamation on entertainment is idiotic, because by his logic Mozart (entertainment, for the most part) is inferior to Schonberg (art theory for art theory's sake and damn the audience). As Raymond Chandler said, there is no good art and bad art, there is only art, and precious little of it. It's not for the composer to claim superiority on grounds of obscurantism and unpopularity, nor for the listener to condemn when what he hears isn't immediately familiar and appealing. The thing has to stand for itself.

Ultimately it's a problem of exposure. The 19th century saw a huge amount of music thrown into a Darwinian scuffle for immortality - audiences (and musicians) knew their stuff, and the desire for new music was matched by a willingness to praise or excoriate without favour. Now, new music occasionally surfaces and must be treasured like oil, because it seems so rare and ephemeral to us. This, combined with the academicisation of music has led to an audience (small but enthusiastic) afraid to call shenanigans on pretentious junk, for fear of dooming the whole enterprise.

I'd like to see a New Music Proms, and I think such an endeavour could really work, because the Proms show that a large, broad-minded audience is actually there, ready and waiting (providing they can stand in the hall for free).

[MahlerSnob]

Forgive me but I am lazy and very tired, so I will skip over most of what is in this thread and go straight to what I think is the most interesting question and challenge so far.

Once you guys have finished feeling good and fuzzy about yourselves (take your time, by all means), i'd like to present a proposition: name one single contemporary composer that is as great as Beethoven, or Bach. No second runners allowed.

As Webern famously said to Gershwin, "Music is Music." Similarly, a masterpiece is a masterpiece and a genius is a genius. If you don't mind extending "contemporary" to include the last 50 years, I would say that Stravinsky was a musical genius on par with Bach and I would say that Barber's works for chorus are equal to the collected masterpieces that are the Brahms choral works. Debussy's orchestral music may well have found its match in the vast works of Messiaen.
Even if you don't except my broad definition of contemporary, I would also argue that the Berio Sequenzas are masterpieces to rival the Bach Cello Suites and that the Ligeti piano etudes are as great as Beethoven's sonatas or Chopins polonaises. Although both Berio and Ligeti are, sadly, no longer with us, they were both alive recently enough to be considered contemporary.
Living composers? Harbison and Adams are as great as any other composers in American history. Carter, as we have recently seen at Tanglewood, may also be destined for a place in the pantheon of Beethoven, Wagner, and Schoenberg.
Want more? I can keep going if you wish.

[Mark G. Simon]

As Webern famously said to Gershwin, "Music is Music."

A quick nit-pick. It was Berg, not Webern.

Gershwin was visiting Berg. Having just heard Berg play some of the Lyric Suite, and being asked to play some of his music, Gershwin was embarrassed to follow that with his show tunes. Berg reassured him, saying "Music is music".

[Dancing Divertimentian]

Music is not only about understanding. I can fully understand a Classical symphony and it's still crap. There are certain things which make music worth listening to. With some effort I could list them all (or almost all), considering a certain masterpiece. If you want to know why I like the Don Juan, I will mention the powerful main theme with its forward-pressing rhythm, the lyrical Oboe theme being an excellent contrast, in general: the motivic and thematic ideas, the orchestration (I can go further in detail: for example while the Oboe plays its theme, the basses are devided into 4 voices while the celli play a counterpart etc.), the harmonic progressions, the chronology of the different sections etc.
While I love every second of the masterwork, I think the greatest awards are those passages who send shivers down your spine and/or give you thrills of joy. Without them, I wouldn't listen to music that much, for sure.

Now let's take a work from Xenakis and you, as you think you "understand" it, tell me reasons for why you like it (which I can follow) in the same way.

Within the framework of your post it's difficult to take your request seriously. I looks too much like a set-up. I sense you're trying to teach me a lesson rather than genuinely engage me.

Oh, well...

First off I will say it's wrong to align composers in opposing camps like you do. R. Strauss vs. Xenakis. Beethoven vs. Lutoslawski. Etc...

It really isn't necessary.

I have no problems accepting Josquin's proposition that the human mind intuitively finds solace in the artistic concoctions of other humans. Though I admit his intent in saying this isn't tied in with what I'm proposing. I simply stole his idea and ran with it...

What this has to do with your question is this: I get just as many "shivers" (as you put it) from a Lutoslawski piece as a Beethoven piece. Or a Richard Strauss piece. I simply make a connection with certain music (I'm working on Xenakis).

My "understanding" of a piece is tied in with what it means TO ME. And that's all you're saying, correct? I mean, with your Don Juan analogy.

But what if I enjoy something that's completely foreign to you? Does it NECESSARILY then become bad music? If yes, why would that be so? You've just outlined what good music means to you. Must my likes to the letter conform to yours? Again, if so, why?

We can crisscross ideas ad infinitum on what it means to 'understand' certain music but until something clicks inside someone nothing will ever be resolved. But the trick is not to hold the 'other guy' in contempt for seeing it differently. And that's really all I'm fighting for, here.

I believe in the possibility of growth when it comes to aesthetics. That's what I meant by 'maturing'. It was probably all pretty vague in that last post of mine but it was late and I was itching to get to bed.

But in a nutshell I've seen my musical tastes change over time to include music I once deemed contemptible. And I recognize the benefits of such a change. It's called growth.

I don't think anyone should deny themselves this.

(But make the distinction: this is NOT the same thing as "relativism").



   

[karlhenning]

I think Wuorinen's proclamation on entertainment is idiotic, because by his logic Mozart (entertainment, for the most part) . . . .

No, Mozart's 'entertainment' was at a number of levels raised from far more prosperous 'entertainers' of his day.

I think that trying to dismiss what Wuorinen has to say as "idiotic," is self-serving and ridiculous. Tchah!