GMG Classical Music Forum

Questions of getting the music aside . . . .

Karlheinz Stockhausen
John Cage
Pierre Boulez



Aside from the fact I highly dislike their music and their "artistic approach", they all strike me as terrible people, particularly Stockhausen and Boulez.

Quote from: Elnimio on March 30, 2012, 03:42:46 PM
Karlheinz Stockhausen
John Cage
Pierre Boulez



Aside from the fact I highly dislike their music and their "artistic approach", they all strike me as terrible people, particularly Stockhausen and Boulez.

It will be interesting to read some of the responses to your post, especially James about Stockhausen and Boulez. I personally can't stand these three composers' music, but I like Boulez's conducting. That's about it. As far as these composer's opinions and world views, I could careless. I know Boulez has had some nasty views in his younger days especially in regard to one of my favorite 20th Century French composers, Henri Dutilleux who, IMHO, is the finer composer.

Cage seems like a pretty cool guy based on his interview/dialogue manuscripts.

I find it hard to dislike composers personally, as they tend to be intelligent enough to be rational with their opinions, even when I disagree with them, rather than outright moronic. There were a lot of people from the early 20th century who tend to be mentioned as "nasty", but I feel these reflect the wider culture of the time, and are not the dominant factor in the personalities of the composers in question anyway (Orff refusing to write a work to replace Mendelssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream speaks far more clearly to me than his other collaborations). Pfitzner wasn't all bad, he was just a reactionary and perhaps inward and negative person.

The only borderline composer (he arranged editions and maybe other stuff) I can think of as applicable here is Thomas Beecham, whose personality is anathema to me - he seems very much the oily, razzle-dazzle, abusive type.

Carlo Gesualdo, who would like a murderer?
Although it was an act of passion...hmm, I'm torn now.  :-\

Quote from: TheGSMoeller on March 30, 2012, 05:17:05 PM
Carlo Gesualdo, who would like a murderer?
Although it was an act of passion...hmm, I'm torn now.  :-\

Not that Redemption is possible through composing music, but consider...

http://www.youtube.com/v/v/I_MmCv08PVE

Quote from: Cato on March 30, 2012, 05:45:15 PM
Not that Redemption is possible through composing music, but consider...

http://www.youtube.com/v/v/I_MmCv08PVE

Beautiful, thanks for sharing. I love Gesualdo's music, so sublime.
And truthfully, I'm not one to have his opinions skewed by a composer's personal endeavors.

(http://www.willcwhite.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/varese.jpg)

Oh Yeah?!  Well I don't like YOU!

Oh, wait. Saul.

(* chortle *)

If you knew them as neighbors, more than half of the composers whose music you love may be insufferable people in real like you couldn't stand.

Percy Grainger, what a great (though possibly wasted) talent, but one of the few people you can call motherxxxxer and it's not an insult but a mere statement of fact;

Boulez, as mentioned above. But I love Cage, as a person more than as a composer even;

Bruno Walter, such a "nice" person but so terribly conceited;

Maazel may be a living musician/composer who fit the word a..h.... better than anyone I know. What a terrible terrible human being!

Quote from: springrite on March 30, 2012, 07:35:24 PM
Maazel may be a living musician/composer who fit the word a..h.... better than anyone I know. What a terrible terrible human being!

Hmm, this is news to me.

I don't think I could have been friends with Liszt.

Also, from what I've read, Edgar Varese was quite detestable as well.

Brahms was an a------ but it doesn't keep me from enjoying his music of course. I didn't like his attitude at all. Mahler seemed like he would have been one as well.

I frankly can't think of ANY Composers (Liszt?) I'd want to go to a Bible Study with! :-\

Musically, I despise the idiotic pseudo-intellectualism of Stockhausen and Cage and most of their New Age aleatoric bibble babble. Schoenberg and the entire movement he began I also consider to be bad music which I hate, but I have an enormous amount of respect for the man as a musical intellect. I am opposed to all who try to impose some non-musical "system" and ignore beauty in order to use it. Ugliness is what I hate.

Quote from: springrite on March 30, 2012, 07:35:24 PM
If you knew them as neighbors, more than half of the composers whose music you love may be insufferable people in real like you couldn't stand.

And of course we don't know any of the composers we like in real life (or most of us don't), so all we are going by are other people's opinions which have been passed down to us.  They may be biased and are certainly only the personal experience of someone else. 

It's hard to know for absolute certain whether we would have got on well enough personally with a particular composer or not.  And of course it's a two way thing, not just whether you like them but whether they like you.  :D  Would a composer like you idolising them (or just find you another annoying groupie), would you accept some more annoying personal characteristics more easily if you loved their music?  I think the music and person are definitely separate in a way.  Also I think we probably enjoy the position of being able to enjoy the music without having to have the complication of a personal relationship with the composer. 

Of course music would be a common point of discussion.  Though Mozart, I remember reading, got a bit tired of musicians coming to see him.

And of course with composers of the past maybe we need to remember the past is a foreign country.  Music somehow transcends that and probably makes us forget that going back in time will send us to a different culture which may be harder to understand and the people more difficult to get as well.

Just to present an opposite view I've always considered Robert Schumann a very nice man in a world of conceited men with inflated ego's.

Quote from: springrite on March 30, 2012, 07:35:24 PM
What a terrible terrible human being!

Perhaps a more fitting title for this thread.

Quote from: Elnimio on March 30, 2012, 07:50:57 PM
Also, from what I've read, Edgar Varese was quite detestable as well.

Quote from: Cato on March 30, 2012, 06:08:55 PM
(http://www.willcwhite.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/varese.jpg)

Sez you!

Quote from: Mirror Image on March 30, 2012, 07:55:20 PMBrahms was an a------ but it doesn't keep me from enjoying his music of course. I didn't like his attitude at all. Mahler seemed like he would have been one as well.

Not sure what about him you would dislike. From what I've read, he was gruff but avuncular. Shy, like many composers, but jolly pub company. Of course, he was probably frequently hungover.

Quote from: Lethevich on March 30, 2012, 04:25:34 PMThe only borderline composer (he arranged editions and maybe other stuff) I can think of as applicable here is Thomas Beecham, whose personality is anathema to me - he seems very much the oily, razzle-dazzle, abusive type.

Oh, but you can get away with murder if you make 'em laugh. How many other composers or conductors have had books assembled of their witticisms, eh, m'dear gel?

(That's my attempt at an impersonation of Beecham.)

Quote from: The new erato on March 31, 2012, 12:48:19 AM
Just to present an opposite view I've always considered Robert Schumann a very nice man in a world of conceited men with inflated ego's.

That's it, people will think what they want.  Music is a more sure thing that can be assessed.

Quote from: Elnimio on March 30, 2012, 03:42:46 PM
Karlheinz Stockhausen
John Cage
Pierre Boulez



Aside from the fact I highly dislike their music and their "artistic approach", they all strike me as terrible people, particularly Stockhausen and Boulez.

How was Cage a terrible person? From what I can tell, he was very sweet and kind.

Wait - is this supposed to be about composers you don't like AS PEOPLE or don't like AS COMPOSERS?  If the former, I have absolutely no idea, I've never met a composer of any consequence - well, except Stravinsky and Toch, but only incidentally, and only years later did I even know who they were. 

If the latter, how much time do we have?

Someone who probably actually was a bad person: Tikhon Khrennikov — don't feel any need to hear his music.

Chopin and Debussy are others who comes to mind for me, although perhaps not strongly enough to formally declare them for inclusion under this thread's criterion - they come across as rather uptight people, unwilling to treat most of the people they met with much warmth.

Quote from: Coco on April 06, 2012, 06:32:24 PM
Someone who probably actually was a bad person: Tikhon Khrennikov — don't feel any need to hear his music.

Ooh I forgot about that fellow. I also couldn't listen to his music.

Quote from: Coco on April 06, 2012, 06:32:24 PMSomeone who probably actually was a bad person: Tikhon Khrennikov — don't feel any need to hear his music.

Relevant to me, as I've been reading Elizabeth Wilson's Shost book. Sad to read that Kabalevsky was involved in such proceedings, but I think he was more a nitwit than a genuine bad egg. There's a funny anecdote about Kabalevsky's mother pleading with Shost for his secret on how he got so many more performances than her son.

Wagner.  Whatever his innovations in orchestration, his raging anti-Semitism and conceit made him a quite unpleasant little chap.

Britton was a pederast - ugh.

And it might be hard to determine without more information just why Bach's sons treated Johann Sebastian's 2nd wife so coldly after JS's death.  It is seemingly inexcusable, from the outside looking in.

Might it be safe to assume that any individual who achieves the artistic greatness of the composers being mentioned here probably has some personality traits uncommon to us mortals, and a number of these traits are likely to be viewed as objectionable to a greater or lesser degree?

Quote from: Uncle Connie on April 06, 2012, 03:28:23 PM
Wait - is this supposed to be about composers you don't like AS PEOPLE or don't like AS COMPOSERS?  If the former, I have absolutely no idea, I've never met a composer of any consequence - well, except Stravinsky and Toch, but only incidentally, and only years later did I even know who they were. 

If the latter, how much time do we have?

As people!

And tell us more about meeting Stravinsky AND Toch!!!   :o

Okay, here's all about how I once met Ernst Toch and Igor Stravinsky in passing, and prepare to be bored, it's not very exciting....

It was somewhere between 1953 and '57 which is when I lived in Los Angeles (and so did they), most likely '55 or '56.  At the time I had never even heard of Toch, and knew Stravinsky only as the guy who wrote the dinosaur music in "Fantasia."  But I had a schoolmate whose father was of some importance in the Hollywood music industry as player/arranger/accompanist/whatever.  Surname Reisman, I don't know his first name.  (The dad's, that is.) 

So on two occasions when I was visiting my friend's home after school, I happened to meet those composers.  They came to do some work with Dad and his house full of pianos.  Out of courtesy I was introduced.  They said hello.  I said hello.  Toch seemed quite pleasant and smiled; Stravinsky was a monosyllabic grouch, perhaps because - even at age 12 - I was taller than he.  (I eventually made it to 6'8" - 2 m. - but he, of course, didn't....) 

And that was it.  Some while later I learned who Toch was, and of course learned far more about ol' grump Igor, but of course by then it was far too late to ask for autographs. 

I told you it wasn't going to be exciting.     But thanks for asking, Cato.  I like your taste in quotations.   

Actually, I didn't find that at all boring. Which is but a backward way to say, thank you.

Quote from: Scion7 on April 06, 2012, 11:07:58 PM
And it might be hard to determine without more information just why Bach's sons treated Johann Sebastian's 2nd wife so coldly after JS's death.  It is seemingly inexcusable, from the outside looking in.

The fact she's responsible for the loss of a huge chunk of her husband's music is enough for me to detest her. I dare not to think how many masterpieces were included in the estate left to her by Bach, now lost forever. I think Johann Christian (or was it Johann Christoph?) was an accomplice in this, so he collects my ire as well. If memory serves right, according to what Gutman says in his biography at least one fourth of Bach's entire musical output was lost because of their careless squandering of the inheritance he left to his family.

Quote from: Szykneij on April 07, 2012, 04:06:55 AM
Might it be safe to assume that any individual who achieves the artistic greatness of the composers being mentioned here probably has some personality traits uncommon to us mortals, and a number of these traits are likely to be viewed as objectionable to a greater or lesser degree?

The defining personal quality of a genius is supreme totality and wholeness of their individuality, which invariably means they tend to be misanthropic towards the grand majority of people who have less defined individualities and tend to live and act as if they were part of some sort of social herd.

Of course, the realization you have nothing in common with the rest of humanity doesn't mean you have to be an ass about it, but i suppose it takes a rather firm temperament not to be annoyed by the mediocrity of nearly every single human being you meet.

Some artist of course turned this around and decided to look at the average person with compassion rather then scorn. Fellini comes to mind.

For me it would have to be Paganini... and Johann Strauss (just because his waltzes is almost all they play on Montreal's Radio Classique)

Also because he caused Mahler a lot of pain, I will also include Richard Strauss. :P

What did Strauss do to Mahler?

The indifference of real geniuses towards things they deemed unimportant doesn't bother me — in fact, I think it can be admirable. Artists truly worthy of scorn are those who actually were mediocrities but set out to degrade other, superior artists in order to feel better about themselves. Although, when you're deep into a craft, you tend to develop strong feelings about it.

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 07, 2012, 05:29:23 PM
What did Strauss do to Mahler?

They kept up quite a correspondence, all the way down to 1911 when Mahler died.

One reads that Strauss caused unintended slights and was mystified when Mahler went silent.  (Similar things happened between Mahler and Schoenberg.)

See:

http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=E2AXthU7mk8C&oi=fnd&pg=PA11&dq=strauss+and+mahler&ots=oRPahM9bj7&sig=cbb8XNnlYQQy1BIzPY0C5oRzoSU#v=onepage&q=strauss%20and%20mahler&f=false (http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=E2AXthU7mk8C&oi=fnd&pg=PA11&dq=strauss+and+mahler&ots=oRPahM9bj7&sig=cbb8XNnlYQQy1BIzPY0C5oRzoSU#v=onepage&q=strauss%20and%20mahler&f=false)

Quote from: Coco on April 06, 2012, 06:32:24 PM
Someone who probably actually was a bad person: Tikhon Khrennikov — don't feel any need to hear his music.

Have to say,I quite like some of his music. The third & second symphonies,particularly. I just think it's un pc to say anything positive about his music in the West,because of who he was & what he did!
And yes,I know some people just think he's crap!!!! ;D

Quote from: Scion7 on April 06, 2012, 11:07:58 PMBritton was a pederast - ugh.

My understanding (admittedly vague in this case) is that he fancied adolescent boys but didn't do anything with them, which doesn't seem reprehensible to me.

Unless you believe that a thought is no different to an action, in which case we are ALL going to hell.

This one again. Some time ago there was a thread where Britten's proclivities were discussed. A couple of books had come out, one by David Hemmings. All the actual evidence pointed to the composer very much liking the close company of boys. He tended to choose a favourite and become like an uncle, always around and showering little gifts and treats. The instant the youngster's voice broke, they were excluded from all communication.

Hemmings had been one of these chosen ones and the adjustment from close little friend to being a non-person was the real trauma.

All that seems quite bad in itself. But nothing at all surfaced to indicate that Britten had touched any of these boys.

Mike

Quote from: TheGSMoeller on March 30, 2012, 05:17:05 PM
Carlo Gesualdo, who would like a murderer?
Although it was an act of passion...hmm, I'm torn now.  :-\

Well, he did spend the remaining of his life doing penance, praying constantly and even resorting to flogging. The man seemed to be all about extremes, in rage as in guilt, but the fact he did in fact experience guilt does seem to imply he had some redeeming personal qualities.

Quote from: eyeresist on April 07, 2012, 09:52:05 PM
My understanding (admittedly vague in this case) is that he fancied adolescent boys but didn't do anything with them, which doesn't seem reprehensible to me.

Unless you believe that a thought is no different to an action, in which case we are ALL going to hell.

I believe I read in Alex Ross's book, in the chapter dedicated to him, that only once he did  try to make a move on a younger (meaning adolescent) boy that was a singer. He realized his mistake and never attempted anything like that again. You should note that the boys that worked with him were fond of him though; they were very well treated and respected. (I read this a month ago, I think I'm remembering it right)

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 07, 2012, 05:29:23 PM
What did Strauss do to Mahler?

What I understood from Alex Ross's book is that although the two composers did conduct each other's works, they were somewhat rivals. While the premieres of Mahler's symphonies waren't actually failures, Richard Strauss was the one who usually got the spotlight (in Vienna I believe). People were really excited about his music. This had really bothered Mahler, who thought that his recognition couln't come in this lifetime; he had a hard time accepting this.

I remember reading about how the successful premiere of Salome in Vienna puzzled Mahler (not to confuse with the US premiere!); it received very positive reviews and quite a few people enjoyed it. Mahler considered it a great work and didn't understand how could people enjoy a great work! (to him the greatness and popularity of a work were mutually exclusive)

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 07, 2012, 05:18:33 PMThe defining personal quality of a genius is supreme totality and wholeness of their individuality, which invariably means they tend to be misanthropic towards the grand majority of people who have less defined individualities and tend to live and act as if they were part of some sort of social herd.

So does that mean that Sorabji is the greatest composer of all time? :-\

Quote from: Sequentia on April 08, 2012, 11:27:56 AM
So does that mean that Sorabji is the greatest composer of all time? :-\

I'm not sure i follow you.

Quote from: raduneo on April 08, 2012, 06:10:32 AM
What I understood from Alex Ross's book is that although the two composers did conduct each other's works, they were somewhat rivals. While the premieres of Mahler's symphonies waren't actually failures, Richard Strauss was the one who usually got the spotlight (in Vienna I believe). People were really excited about his music. This had really bothered Mahler, who thought that his recognition couln't come in this lifetime; he had a hard time accepting this.

I remember reading about how the successful premiere of Salome in Vienna puzzled Mahler (not to confuse with the US premiere!); it received very positive reviews and quite a few people enjoyed it. Mahler considered it a great work and didn't understand how could people enjoy a great work! (to him the greatness and popularity of a work were mutually exclusive)

Interesting. But from what i understand opera was much more popular in those days then instrumental music. Strange that Mahler couldn't see this as a contributing factor, particularly considering how many operas he conducted himself.

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 08, 2012, 12:48:52 PM
Interesting. But from what i understand opera was much more popular in those days then instrumental music. Strange that Mahler couldn't see this as a contributing factor, particularly considering how many operas he conducted himself.

Hmm that is good to know! I wasn't aware that opera was very popular back then! When did its popularity begin to fall? When were ballets popular? (I assume during the 1st half of the 20th century). What about symphonies?

I ask because I don't have a music backgroud and would welcome some knowledge!

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 08, 2012, 12:32:51 PMI'm not sure i follow you.

If that's the case, then you are not familiar with his biography.

I am not a "modern" composer in the inverted commas sense. I utterly and indignantly repudiate that epithet as being in any way applicable to me. I write very long, very elaborate works that are entirely alien and antipathetic to the fashionable tendencies prompted, publicised and plugged by the various "establishments" revolving around this or that modish composer.

Why do I neither seek nor encourage performance of my works? Because they are neither intended for, nor suitable for it under present, or indeed any foreseeable conditions: no performance at all is vastly preferable to an obscene travesty. [...] Why do I write as I do? Why did (and do) the artists-craftsmen of Iran, India, China. Byzantine-Arabic Sicily (in the first and last of which are my own ancestral roots) produce the sort of elaborate highly wrought work they did? That was their way. It is also mine. If you don't like it, because it isn't the present day done thing, that is just too bad, but not for me, who couldn't care less. In fact, to me your disapproval is an indirect compliment and much less of an insult than your applause, when I consider some of your idols.

"A Personal Statement" (dated 14 October 1959), first published as "Statement by Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji" in Gambit: Edinburgh University Review, Summer 1965: 4.

Taken from http://www.mus.ulaval.ca/roberge/srs/03-quota.htm.

Quote from: raduneo on April 08, 2012, 01:37:21 PMHmm that is good to know! I wasn't aware that opera was very popular back then! When did its popularity begin to fall? When were ballets popular? (I assume during the 1st half of the 20th century). What about symphonies?

I think the decline of interest in opera coincides closely with the rise of cinema, which could do even more spectacular storytelling with (when sound was invented) music. Before this, most composers dreamed of having a hit opera as the surest route to fame and fortune. Even Beethoven attempted one, though it was to be honest a flop. Brahms is regarded as highly unusual for never attempting the genre.

Ballet was regarded as a minor diversion until Tchaikovsky showed it could be a serious musical work (and serious box office). Thanks to the big romantic hits, a few dancers' names entered common knowledge. But that was half a century ago.

The changing public face of the symphony is a bit more complicated and I don't feel up to examining it now, sorry.

Quote from: eyeresist on April 09, 2012, 10:18:07 PM
Brahms is regarded as highly unusual for never attempting the genre.

He was also unusual in stubbornly wanting to write music in a language that was already exhausted, and did it with so much intellectual rigor he even managed to influence the direction of certain "modernistic" tendencies, at least indirectly. When Schoenberg called Brahms "the progress" it was an exaggeration that contained an element of truth.

That said, it is even more unusual that Mahler, who specialized in conducting opera, never tried to write one in his mature years.

Quote from: Sequentia on April 09, 2012, 09:08:48 PM
If that's the case, then you are not familiar with his biography.

I am not a "modern" composer in the inverted commas sense. I utterly and indignantly repudiate that epithet as being in any way applicable to me. I write very long, very elaborate works that are entirely alien and antipathetic to the fashionable tendencies prompted, publicised and plugged by the various "establishments" revolving around this or that modish composer.

Why do I neither seek nor encourage performance of my works? Because they are neither intended for, nor suitable for it under present, or indeed any foreseeable conditions: no performance at all is vastly preferable to an obscene travesty. [...] Why do I write as I do? Why did (and do) the artists-craftsmen of Iran, India, China. Byzantine-Arabic Sicily (in the first and last of which are my own ancestral roots) produce the sort of elaborate highly wrought work they did? That was their way. It is also mine. If you don't like it, because it isn't the present day done thing, that is just too bad, but not for me, who couldn't care less. In fact, to me your disapproval is an indirect compliment and much less of an insult than your applause, when I consider some of your idols.

"A Personal Statement" (dated 14 October 1959), first published as "Statement by Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji" in Gambit: Edinburgh University Review, Summer 1965: 4.

Taken from http://www.mus.ulaval.ca/roberge/srs/03-quota.htm.

I was talking about a more fundamental and natural type of absolute personality. Sorabji's misanthropic excesses seem to be rather artificial to me.

No, it's documented he "did" do things with them. 

I don't care for Britton's music (always found him a snore), but that has nothing to do with his actions as a person.

Before you come down too hard on Brahms ......

Admittedly, he could be a very crotchety person in older age.  But much of that was due to a childhood in which his attitudes toward women (in general) were very warped by the actions of prostitutes, etc., in the brothels that he played in to support his family.  Brahms came from a very poor background in a slum district, and saw the worst of what went on at the docks.

Additionally, he admired Schumann so much that it's probable that his love/desire for Clara after Robert's final bout of insanity worked on his feelings of guilt - in later life, comparing all other women to her yet unable to form a natural, healthy relationship with one.  His total dedication to his art at the expense of wife and children affected him in later years. 

Despite his often gruff behavior, he was just as often very warm to his friends, and his private financial support of many promising students and institutions is very admirable, as was his very simple lifestyle, despite the wealth he acquired.

His attitude towards Liszt was completely without merit, but so it goes.  He hardly damaged either his popular success or his legacy.

So let's not kick the man too hard.  :-)

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 10, 2012, 12:56:56 AM
He was also unusual in stubbornly wanting to write music in a language that was already exhausted

The inherent contradiction here is breathtakingly amusing in its concision!  If Brahms wrote great music (and only an ass would deny so), then the language was by no means exhausted, QED.

Quote from: Scion7 on April 10, 2012, 01:47:21 AM
Admittedly, he could be a very crotchety person in older age.  But much of that was due to a childhood in which his attitudes toward women (in general) were very warped by the actions of prostitutes, etc., in the brothels that he played in to support his family.

Old guys can get (and have gotten) crotchety without any such background. (Just saying.)

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 10, 2012, 12:56:56 AM
He was also unusual in stubbornly wanting to write music in a language that was already exhausted,

Seems to me that the language Brahms chose to compose in was obviously not exhausted since his oeuvre contains great works. 

Quote from: karlhenning on April 10, 2012, 04:12:37 AM
The inherent contradiction here is breathtakingly amusing in its concision!  If Brahms wrote great music (and only an ass would deny so), then the language was by no means exhausted, QED.

I did not see your post before making the same point.


;)

Great minds, &c. : )

Quote from: knight66 on April 07, 2012, 10:56:05 PM
This one again. Some time ago there was a thread where Britten's proclivities were discussed. A couple of books had come out, one by David Hemmings. All the actual evidence pointed to the composer very much liking the close company of boys. He tended to choose a favourite and become like an uncle, always around and showering little gifts and treats. The instant the youngster's voice broke, they were excluded from all communication.

Hemmings had been one of these chosen ones and the adjustment from close little friend to being a non-person was the real trauma.

All that seems quite bad in itself. But nothing at all surfaced to indicate that Britten had touched any of these boys.

Mike

I know we went round n round with this before, but, honestly, in light of recent history, your Post just 'sounds' naive. I'm not criticizing, I'm just shocked that, as I'm reading your Post, my first reaction is, Of course nothing has 'surfaced',...those surrounding Britten have more wherewithal than those in the Catholic church. Hemmings doesn't count as 'surface'?

I mean,... all signs point to something so stereotypically common in the circles of people who would quite naturally be inclined to disregard signs... the 'privileged'? I mean, to me it seems like, Does a bear shit in the woods? Does the pope wear a pagan fish hat? Does a Brit fop bugger little boys?

Why do I feel like Strangelove all of a sudden? ???

I'm sorry, this just sounds like a blind alcoholic who just can't, for the life of them, figure out why their life isn't peaches. This is so 1945 to me. I've 'heard of' AA meetings that still act like the '60s never happened. I've heard of psychia-tropists who administer 1950s styled therapy to problems that any high schooler can see right through. Our whole society seems to be based on, Here, look over here while I deceive you behind your back...

Oh, ok,... doh de doh de doh, I go skipping down the lane...

Seriously, I don't go pedo-hunting, but Britten STINKS like a turd moustache!! :-X


Then there was Elgar in the same Thread. ::) NOW I'm trolling!! ;)


ok, I just get a little emotional over 'those who had no choice'. :'( not meaning to be a prick :-[

Quote from: snyprrr on April 10, 2012, 05:27:10 AM
Why do I feel like Strangelove all of a sudden? ???

Sure I could not even speculate . . . .

Quote from: eyeresist on April 09, 2012, 10:18:07 PM
I think the decline of interest in opera coincides closely with the rise of cinema, which could do even more spectacular storytelling with (when sound was invented) music. Before this, most composers dreamed of having a hit opera as the surest route to fame and fortune. Even Beethoven attempted one, though it was to be honest a flop. Brahms is regarded as highly unusual for never attempting the genre.

Ballet was regarded as a minor diversion until Tchaikovsky showed it could be a serious musical work (and serious box office). Thanks to the big romantic hits, a few dancers' names entered common knowledge. But that was half a century ago.

The changing public face of the symphony is a bit more complicated and I don't feel up to examining it now, sorry.

That makes a lot of sense! Thank you eyeresist! :)

Perhaps Brahms never attempting opera had something to do with Beethoven being his idol. While I did not read a biography of Brahms (and I should, I bought one), he strikes me as someone modest, trying to avoid being flashy - maybe he wasn't obsessed with fame? (you can definitely say that about his music in my opinion - not that it cannot be energetic or very emotional, but it does so in a somewhat restrained manner).

Before Tchaikovsky, ballet, in the form it existed before, was very popular among the French I believe; in fact they had little interest to watch an opera if it did not contain a ballet number somewhere in there: that was the highlight for them. (I read that in Fred Plotkin's book about Opera)

Quote from: raduneo on April 10, 2012, 05:31:48 AM
Before Tchaikovsky, ballet, in the form it existed before, was very popular among the French I believe; in fact they had little interest to watch an opera if it did not contain a ballet number somewhere in there: that was the highlight for them.

Well, and maybe they're right, at that.

Quote from: snyprrr on April 10, 2012, 05:27:10 AM
I know we went round n round with this before, but, honestly, in light of recent history, your Post just 'sounds' naive. I'm not criticizing, I'm just shocked that, as I'm reading your Post, my first reaction is, Of course nothing has 'surfaced',...those surrounding Britten have more wherewithal than those in the Catholic church. Hemmings doesn't count as 'surface'?

I mean,... all signs point to something so stereotypically common in the circles of people who would quite naturally be inclined to disregard signs... the 'privileged'? I mean, to me it seems like, Does a bear shit in the woods? Does the pope wear a pagan fish hat? Does a Brit fop bugger little boys?

Why do I feel like Strangelove all of a sudden? ???

I'm sorry, this just sounds like a blind alcoholic who just can't, for the life of them, figure out why their life isn't peaches. This is so 1945 to me. I've 'heard of' AA meetings that still act like the '60s never happened. I've heard of psychia-tropists who administer 1950s styled therapy to problems that any high schooler can see right through. Our whole society seems to be based on, Here, look over here while I deceive you behind your back...

Oh, ok,... doh de doh de doh, I go skipping down the lane...

Seriously, I don't go pedo-hunting, but Britten STINKS like a turd moustache!! :-X


Then there was Elgar in the same Thread. ::) NOW I'm trolling!! ;)


ok, I just get a little emotional over 'those who had no choice'. :'( not meaning to be a prick :-[

What recent history? I am no apologist for Britten, also, I am not constantly scanning the news to see what may or may not have surfaced. If there are new facts, let me know. But all you have put forward are assumptions. David Hemmings was very much a child of the swinging sixties and he was very direct in the way he conveyed his experiences. He was one of the chosen boys, he was groomed and then dumped the day his voice broke. He said that nothing physical took place. I know perfectly well what Britten's tastes were. I have even read some of his hand written blatherings about some golden haired lad or other.

No one has brought anything forward, though a couple here don't want to accept what I have written. Not that it matters much....his music is his music.

Mike

Groomed and then dumped. Choristerdom is a heartbreak . . . .

I watched a programme over Easter about one of the Cathedral choir schools. They were coming towards the end of an academic year which meant that they automatically lose some singers who move schools. Both boys and girls obviously found it quite traumatic to lose such a focus for their lives, a position in their little society and the sheer loss of the musical experience. It seemed harsh, but no doubt they get over it and I think that for at least a few it reflected some truth in the saying about school days and best days. There must be some kids for whom it is true: though I have never met any.

Mike

Quote from: raduneo on April 10, 2012, 05:31:48 AM
Perhaps Brahms never attempting opera had something to do with Beethoven being his idol.

He greatly admired Wagner - at least what it was he was doing in music in terms of new frontiers and all that - and probably thought why bother?  Or he wasn't inspired along those lines, if his other works are any indication.  Brahms had a very full plate - even though we have a large body of work from him, perhaps twice that amount went into the fireplace as his perfectionism didn't allow anything mediocre to survive - there might have been the sketch of an opera in that ream of paper, which he just never wrote to anyone about, thinking it was crap?

Another thing is, Brahms being more the lone-wolf sort of composer, how to resolve the 'problem' of a librettist?  Unlike his vain contemporary, he knew he was not fit to create a libretto himself . . . but socially, may have been disinclined to collaborate with anyone.

Quote from: karlhenning on April 10, 2012, 08:07:41 AM
Another thing is, Brahms being more the lone-wolf sort of composer, how to resolve the 'problem' of a librettist?  Unlike his vain contemporary, he knew he was not fit to create a libretto himself . . . but socially, may have been disinclined to collaborate with anyone.

I don't there needs to be any explanation as to why Brahms, or any composer, chose to not write an opera.   Handel wrote many; Bach none.  In the wake of Verdi, Donizetti, Bellini and of course Wagner, Brahms may have felt no need to join in a field that was already full in a genre he had no interest.  The other question I think is more telling: why did so many composers (all of the above) seem to focus so much of their energies on opera and write little of anything else?

Good post.

I've been thinking about this question tonight and honestly how do I really know how a composer acted? I never met any of the composers I admire and that inspire me. So I've come to realization that I have no right to judge what a composer does in his/her personal life. We can read all the stories of how they acted all we want to, but the reality is we'll never know unless we actually know the composer personally which I doubt anyone here has ever met Brahms so he's closed case. :P

Quote from: Mirror Image on April 10, 2012, 08:46:14 PM
I've been thinking about this question tonight and honestly how do I really know how a composer acted? I never met any of the composers I admire and that inspire me. So I've come to realization that I have no right to judge what a composer does in his/her personal life. We can read all the stories of how they acted all we want to, but the reality is we'll never know unless we actually know the composer personally which I doubt anyone here has ever met Brahms so he's closed case. :P

Stop being all rational and just go with the spirit of the thing, will you? ::)

:P

Quote from: Mirror Image on April 10, 2012, 08:46:14 PM
I've been thinking about this question tonight and honestly how do I really know how a composer acted? I never met any of the composers I admire and that inspire me. So I've come to realization that I have no right to judge what a composer does in his/her personal life. We can read all the stories of how they acted all we want to, but the reality is we'll never know unless we actually know the composer personally which I doubt anyone here has ever met Brahms so he's closed case. :P

Well that's what I already said, but glad you agree with me.  :D

Quote from: starrynight on April 11, 2012, 12:10:39 AM
Well that's what I already said, but glad you agree with me.  :D

(* chortle *)

Sent from my DROID BIONIC using Tapatalk 2

Quote from: eyeresist on April 09, 2012, 10:18:07 PM
I think the decline of interest in opera coincides closely with the rise of cinema, which could do even more spectacular storytelling with (when sound was invented) music. Before this, most composers dreamed of having a hit opera as the surest route to fame and fortune. Even Beethoven attempted one, though it was to be honest a flop. Brahms is regarded as highly unusual for never attempting the genre.

Ballet was regarded as a minor diversion until Tchaikovsky showed it could be a serious musical work (and serious box office). Thanks to the big romantic hits, a few dancers' names entered common knowledge. But that was half a century ago.

The changing public face of the symphony is a bit more complicated and I don't feel up to examining it now, sorry.

Orson Welles in an interview said the first great stars of the gramophone were opera singers, then they got replaced by movie stars and they in turn got replaced by pop singers.

I tend to think that vocal music has been dominated by popular music over through the modern age, whereas instumental music has been the main bastion of classical/experimental music.

Quote from: knight66 on April 10, 2012, 06:33:15 AM
What recent history? I am no apologist for Britten, also, I am not constantly scanning the news to see what may or may not have surfaced. If there are new facts, let me know. But all you have put forward are assumptions. David Hemmings was very much a child of the swinging sixties and he was very direct in the way he conveyed his experiences. He was one of the chosen boys, he was groomed and then dumped the day his voice broke. He said that nothing physical took place. I know perfectly well what Britten's tastes were. I have even read some of his hand written blatherings about some golden haired lad or other.

No one has brought anything forward, though a couple here don't want to accept what I have written. Not that it matters much....his music is his music.

Mike

By recent history I simply meant that everyone's (that hangs around boys) being outed as a pedo these days.

OK, so Britten just made sweet gentle love to (just liked to 'hang around') young boys, and didn't enjoy 'pushing the dirt uphill',... alright, I'm just aching to see something that just isn't there. I'll seek counseling.

I guess the Classical World really is as boring as it seems. Nothing to see here.

Sigh

"...eschewing even the appearance of evil..."

Quote from: Winky Willy on March 30, 2012, 10:09:24 PM
Musically, I despise the idiotic pseudo-intellectualism of Stockhausen and Cage and most of their New Age aleatoric bibble babble.

I somehow sympathize, because I used to think similarly. Not anymore:

http://home.earthlink.net/~almoritz/changeofopinion.htm

Quote from: Al Moritz on April 11, 2012, 08:57:50 AM
I somehow sympathize, because I used to think similarly. Not anymore:

http://home.earthlink.net/~almoritz/changeofopinion.htm

I rejected Stockhausen too, for a long time (even while you, Al, were promoting him). Now I'm reconsidering him, starting with Gruppen; and my experience is more positive this time.

I think Stimmung is another good gateway. The shock value of the avant-garde is often blunted when writing for choir (or in this case, small vocal ensemble).

Quote from: karlhenning on April 10, 2012, 04:12:37 AMThe inherent contradiction here is breathtakingly amusing in its concision!  If Brahms wrote great music (and only an ass would deny so), then the language was by no means exhausted, QED.

As a great man once said, "There is plenty left to be said in C major."

Quote from: Scion7 on April 10, 2012, 01:29:16 AMNo, it's documented he "did" do things with them. 

Documented where?

Quote from: eyeresist on April 11, 2012, 05:50:41 PM
As a great man once said, "There is plenty left to be said in C major."

And I hope you also know that that great man was Schoenberg.

Quote from: Guido on April 12, 2012, 08:32:06 AM
And I hope you also know that that great man was Schoenberg.

Gimme a C! A bouncy C!

(* chortle *)

No doubt the creator of this thread will ban me forever. And I hesitate to tell the truth. But here it is.

I don't like Sibelius.

I never really cared much for his music, so I started reading his biographies, 15 years ago, to find out why - as all my best friends and all good people that I know to be good people (unlike me) love him and adore him en can explain in perfect terms how great a composer he is.

I even read all 26 volumes by Erik Tawaststjerna.  :o I forgot it all, except my conclusion.  :-X

Quote from: Christo on April 12, 2012, 09:56:31 AM
No doubt the creator of this thread will ban me forever.

Oh, you know me better than that, I hope . . . .

Quote from: karlhenning on April 12, 2012, 09:57:40 AM
Oh, you know me better than that, I hope . . . .

;)

Quote from: Christo on April 12, 2012, 09:56:31 AM
No doubt the creator of this thread will ban me forever. And I hesitate to tell the truth. But here it is.

I don't like Sibelius.

I never really cared much for his music, so I started reading his biographies, 15 years ago, to find out why - as all my best friends and all good people that I know to be good people (unlike me) love him and adore him en can explain in perfect terms how great a composer he is.

I even read all 26 volumes by Erik Tawaststjerna.  :o I forgot it all, except my conclusion.  :-X

You couldn't get the music, so you read the biography to see if it helped. Does not compute.

Sibelius is one of the last tonal masters in classical music. Some people seem to have a really big problem with this, for whatever reason. As if writing in a tonal language makes one automatically unintelligent, or less of a genius.

Speaking of Tawaststjerna, i appreciate his effort in trying to bring Sibelius's piano music to the fore, since it is the most neglected aspect of his output, but i wish he had gotten somebody else to play it. Very unimpressed by his recordings.

To steal a line from Karl:

munches popcorn

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 12, 2012, 10:12:37 AM
Sibelius is one of the last tonal masters in classical music. Some people seem to have a really big problem with this, for whatever reason.

Giosh, and here we thought that that language was exhausted with Brahms . . . .

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 12, 2012, 10:12:37 AM
Sibelius is one of the last tonal masters in classical music. Some people seem to have a really big problem with this, for whatever reason. As if writing in a tonal language makes one automatically unintelligent, or less of a genius.

Some people's point, not mine. I do love most of his 'tonal' contemporaries, in Finland and abroad. I do like composers clearly inspired by him, for example Madetoja, Tubin and Lilburn. And I don't think Sibelius was "one of the last tonal masters" - tonality survived him and is indeed still the dominant current in art music, as it was for the whole length of the past century. Notwithstanding the strong position of modernists and avantgardits in especially the 1950s till 1980s, most composers always remained on the (neo)classical side and tonality continued to be the dominant style.

For me, symphonists like Vaughan Williams, Nielsen and Holmboe fulfill the function that Sibelius obviously does for many of you.  :) (And I like Sibelius' later symphonies, Tapiola and also Kullervo - but little more than that).

Quote from: karlhenning on April 12, 2012, 10:23:36 AM
Giosh, and here we thought that that language was exhausted with Brahms . . . .

My thoughts exactly!

;)

Quote from: Christo on April 12, 2012, 09:56:31 AM
No doubt the creator of this thread will ban me forever. And I hesitate to tell the truth. But here it is.

I don't like Sibelius.

I never really cared much for his music, so I started reading his biographies, 15 years ago, to find out why - as all my best friends and all good people that I know to be good people (unlike me) love him and adore him en can explain in perfect terms how great a composer he is.

I even read all 26 volumes by Erik Tawaststjerna.  :o I forgot it all, except my conclusion.  :-X

Kind of same for me. I used to love his music but have steadily gone off it until I almost never listen nowadays :-X

Quote from: Lethevich on April 12, 2012, 12:56:54 PM
Kind of same for me. I used to love his music but have steadily gone off it until I almost never listen nowadays :-X

That could be said for a lot of us. There are composers that we will always love but don't listen to much anymore. Sibelius is this way for me also.

Oh, it's more of a reversal of opinion. I liked the "grand" sound of his earlier works, and the refinement of his later ones. But I have come to feel that there just isn't as much to Sibelius as I had thought - endless refinement masking a slight lack of content. The music does offer considerable value per weight, but I almost expect flaws in music nowadays, to enable me to have to make judgements on its worth itself. I like the notion of a composer struggling, or aiming high and falling slightly short. Sibelius offers very "easy", perfected music that has increasingly come to bore me a little. I feel this is attested to in his lesser works, with him churning out a lot of solid if unremarkable stuff, then endlessly polishing a few little "gems" for posterity. If I compare this to Nielsen, whose genius shon in most works, or even to Shostakovich who I only like with reservations, who wrote loads of lesser music, and yet it feels as though his heart was usually in the music he wrote, and the distinction between his daily bread and major works is far more blurred - it feels as though there is much more there. He didn't "give up", so to say.

Quote from: Lethevich on April 12, 2012, 01:12:21 PM
Oh, it's more of a reversal of opinion. I liked the "grand" sound of his earlier works, and the refinement of his later ones. But I have come to feel that there just isn't as much to Sibelius as I had thought - endless refinement masking a slight lack of content. The music does offer considerable value per weight, but I almost expect flaws in music nowadays, to enable me to have to make judgements on its worth itself. I like the notion of a composer struggling, or aiming high and falling slightly short. Sibelius offers very "easy", perfected music that has increasingly come to bore me a little. I feel this is attested to in his lesser works, with him churning out a lot of solid if unremarkable stuff, then endlessly polishing a few little "gems" for posterity. If I compare this to Nielsen, whose genius shon in most works, or even to Shostakovich who I only like with reservations, who wrote loads of lesser music, and yet it feels as though his heart was usually in the music he wrote, and the distinction between his daily bread and major works is far more blurred - it feels as though there is much more there. He didn't "give up", so to say.

I don't listen to Nielsen or Sibelius much anymore, but then again I don't listen to hardly any Scandanavian composer anyway. I do like Lindberg and Salonen though. I just don't connect with the frame of mind many of these Scandanavian composers had. Much of the music I've heard, and not just Sibelius, seems devoid of any kind of warmth or humanity. This is just my personal assessment. There are a few gems in the Nordic repertoire, but those were never enough to keep me interested in their music. In the end, I connect with what I connect with and I don't make any excuses for it.

Quote from: karlhenning on April 12, 2012, 10:23:36 AM
Giosh, and here we thought that that language was exhausted with Brahms . . . .

I wasn't talking about tonality when i said that regarding Brahms. I was speaking about romantic classicism. For instance, in an age that gave us Bruckner and Mahler, it seems strange to wanting to write a symphony not even in the style of Beethoven, but of Schumann. Its not even a question of using old forms or techniques, he literally and arbitrarily wished to protract that particular style, for no particular reason, since he didn't specifically have to wrap himself in a time capsule centered around the first decades of the 19th century just to reject the radical developments introduced by Wagner and his camp.

His music is certainly magnificent but i think he would have been just as great a composer had he chosen to diversify his style. The limitation of his chosen idiom is apparent when his music is at its most complex. You can sense he could go even further, but he just couldn't transcend the formula, even when the strain was at a braking point.

Surely at one point he could have said "enough of this, let's try something else". Instead he just kept going on and on, until the day he died.

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 12, 2012, 03:03:32 PM
His [Brahms's] music is certainly magnificent but i think he would have been just as great a composer had he chosen to diversify his style. The limitation of his chosen idiom is apparent when his music is at its most complex. You can sense he could go even further, but he just couldn't transcend the formula, even when the strain was at a braking point.

Surely at one point he could have said "enough of this, let's try something else". Instead he just kept going on and on, until the day he died.

There's a lot here with which I agree just fine.

One thing I take issue with is the suggestion (which perhaps you did not intend) that Brahms was somehow "trapped" in "formula."  The later works are not the music of someone who is in a cage, and just wheels around in the same path, but an exquisite refinement.  In principle, I agree that Brahms could have diversified, and would have done so artistically and brilliantly;  judging simply by the music which he left, it was no "defect" in the least that instead he continued to hone his native craft.

His deep study of early music, too, was in effect a kind of diversification, even as it served also as a driver to a greater degree of focus.  The First Symphony, and even the Second, lovely and unassailable as they are, feel a bit rambling compared to the luminous economy of the Third, for instance.

And just to-day, in fact, I was on the phone with an organist who mentioned to me that he has the Opus 122 on his desk, and how continually astonished he is by their quiet magnificence.

Quote from: Guido on April 12, 2012, 08:32:06 AMAnd I hope you also know that that great man was Schoenberg.

Oh God, I hope this is some obscure sort of joke :(



It was Wagner, of course.

Quote from: Lethevich on April 12, 2012, 01:12:21 PMI like the notion of a composer struggling, or aiming high and falling slightly short. Sibelius offers very "easy", perfected music that has increasingly come to bore me a little.

Great thing about this forum - people can listen to the same music and draw opposite conclusions.

The thing that frustrates and intrigues and fascinates me about Sibelius, and the thing that attracts me to him and repels me from him in equal measure, is the imperfection I hear in his music, the way that he always seems to fall short. Sibelius' music always comes just - this - close to satisfying me, but with some grit, with some tarnish, that leaves me yearning for it to have gone some other way. It's like falling in love with someone for their imperfections and being continually tormented by them, but never wanting to give them up.

The foremost examples to me are the Fifth and Sixth symphonies - I'm always engrossed by the journey of the Fifth, through such strange landscapes at the beginning, echoey and even ugly at times, to that transcendent ending - but then he cuts the ending off. That intrusive final silence always makes me feel like something has been brutally taken away from me, like I'm reaching out and grasping at thin air trying to grab hold of something which was just in my hands. The only music that produces a similar effect in me is 'that tune' from the Schubert string quintet: they always break my heart, those moments, because they conjure up for me those moments in life which are simply perfect in their beauty and joyfulness and completeness, those moments of euphoria you want to never end - and then the way that each composer unsentimentally moves on crushes me because that conjures up for me the realization that those moments of euphoria always, always end. And when they end they leave but a trace of memory as residue, to be yearned for until the next time.

Anyway. That's why Sibelius fills me with joy and sadness at exactly the same time. Some triumphant moments in music (Beethoven's Ninth, Braga Santos' Fourth, Atterberg's Third) make me think they'll last forever, because they leave me to bask in an afterglow for a long time afterwards. But Sibelius' Fifth (and the first movement of the Schubert quintet) are rare works which - in my ears - achieve that summit of perfection, blaze out word of triumph for all to hear, and then turn right back and march away again. They show me the perfection and then they hide it again.

In light of what Brian said, I do like some of Sibelius' music particularly the 4th, 6th, and 7th symphonies. For me, these are masterworks of the symphonic genre. No other Sibelius symphony can touch these IMHO. I do like some of Sibelius' other works like Kullervo, Pohjola's Daughter, and Lemminkäinen Suite. I never have liked his Violin Concerto and frankly never understood it's popularity. Most of Sibelius' music just sounds empty to me and like Lethe mentioned, it just seems to be devoid of content and musical ideas. I suppose it's all a matter of how we're attuned to the music and what our musical tastes are but Sibelius is a composer I strongly favored when I first got into classical music but he's just not one of favorites anymore.

Quote from: Brian on April 12, 2012, 06:16:41 PM
Great thing about this forum - people can listen to the same music and draw opposite conclusions.

The thing that frustrates and intrigues and fascinates me about Sibelius, and the thing that attracts me to him and repels me from him in equal measure, is the imperfection I hear in his music, the way that he always seems to fall short. Sibelius' music always comes just - this - close to satisfying me, but with some grit, with some tarnish, that leaves me yearning for it to have gone some other way. It's like falling in love with someone for their imperfections and being continually tormented by them, but never wanting to give them up.

The foremost examples to me are the Fifth and Sixth symphonies - I'm always engrossed by the journey of the Fifth, through such strange landscapes at the beginning, echoey and even ugly at times, to that transcendent ending - but then he cuts the ending off. That intrusive final silence always makes me feel like something has been brutally taken away from me, like I'm reaching out and grasping at thin air trying to grab hold of something which was just in my hands. The only music that produces a similar effect in me is 'that tune' from the Schubert string quintet: they always break my heart, those moments, because they conjure up for me those moments in life which are simply perfect in their beauty and joyfulness and completeness, those moments of euphoria you want to never end - and then the way that each composer unsentimentally moves on crushes me because that conjures up for me the realization that those moments of euphoria always, always end. And when they end they leave but a trace of memory as residue, to be yearned for until the next time.

Anyway. That's why Sibelius fills me with joy and sadness at exactly the same time. Some triumphant moments in music (Beethoven's Ninth, Braga Santos' Fourth, Atterberg's Third) make me think they'll last forever, because they leave me to bask in an afterglow for a long time afterwards. But Sibelius' Fifth (and the first movement of the Schubert quintet) are rare works which - in my ears - achieve that summit of perfection, blaze out word of triumph for all to hear, and then turn right back and march away again. They show me the perfection and then they hide it again.

A super post, danke. I think that this evasiveness might be part of it for me too, although not to the same end. Rather than just falling short of perfection, it sometimes feels as though a work is never aiming for an "answer". He utilises sublime sounds and a masterful sense of delicate ambiguity that imply a sense of purpose, but the composer seems to realise that it cannot be reached so instead focuses on craft aspects, instead melding allegros with scherzos to the delight of the musicologists.

The "answers to questions not even asked" element of art seems not to be fulfilled with a work like the 6th symphony (which I admire), if the obfuscation has reached such a point that the question is unintelligible. It does feel slightly like being robbed after it ends, because that almost naïve level of commitment and confidence to write with purpose is not here. It sounds distinctly post-modern in its timidity - really beautiful moments, but the composer is too knowing to do anything with them.

Quote from: Mirror Image on April 12, 2012, 06:48:30 PMMost of Sibelius' music just sounds empty to me and like Lethe mentioned, it just seems to be devoid of content and musical ideas.

I don't think that's what she was saying. 

I think the Sibelius problem (and "problem" might be overstating it) is that his music answers all its questions; it doesn't have the intriguing sense of something left unsaid, a mystery, a tantalising connection to something else, outside itself.  This is one of the qualities that draw us back to music, I think, but with some music, once you know it, there's not much need to actually hear it again. (I dare not name some of the other composers I feel this way about, for fear of a lynching!)

Quote from: eyeresist on April 12, 2012, 07:01:45 PM
I don't think that's what she was saying. 

I think the Sibelius problem (and "problem" might be overstating it) is that his music answers all its questions; it doesn't have the intriguing sense of something left unsaid, a mystery, a tantalising connection to something else, outside itself.  This is one of the qualities that draw us back to music, I think, but with some music, once you know it, there's not much need to actually hear it again. (I dare not name some of the other composers I feel this way about, for fear of a lynching!)

I disagree. I think Sibelius' music leaves many questions unanswered, like, for example, what is he being so quiet about? The question that I continue to struggle with is "what is it about his music that I'm not responding to?" This is really the question that has plagued with several composers. There are so many people who do enjoy Sibelius that it makes me wonder sometimes why can't I get into it too? But I'm slowly coming to the realization that not everybody will enjoy what I enjoy and vice versa. I mean how people here actually like Bernstein's Kaddish or Tippett's Symphony No. 3? ;) :D

Quote from: eyeresist on April 12, 2012, 07:01:45 PM
I think the Sibelius problem (and "problem" might be overstating it) is that his music answers all its questions; it doesn't have the intriguing sense of something left unsaid, a mystery, a tantalising connection to something else, outside itself.  This is one of the qualities that draw us back to music, I think, but with some music, once you know it, there's not much need to actually hear it again. (I dare not name some of the other composers I feel this way about, for fear of a lynching!)

Tbh I don't entirely have a grand unified point on the subject, I am only groping towards one. The strong internal balance, almost self-referencing qualities of certain works of the composer can be certainly somewhat frustrating in how easily they pass, as you describe. The "universalism" of the music is of an elemental and unrelatable quality, almost written as though to deflect any angle of criticism, like a suit of armour.

Quote from: Lethevich on April 12, 2012, 07:21:30 PMThe "universalism" of the music is of an elemental and unrelatable quality, almost written as though to deflect any angle of criticism, like a suit of armour.

Yea! What good is a work if we can't criticize it? :D But seriously, are you implying that Sibelius was consciously composing music that's safe and that uses a musical language that kept him out of trouble instead of possibly composing music that came from his heart?

Sibelius, you don't like Sibelius? Let's list some composers you really shouldn't like:

Telemann, Handel, D Scarlatti, Berlioz, Chopin, Brahms, Verdi, Liszt, Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, Bizet, Faure, Grieg, Scriabin, Elgar, R Strauss, Puccini, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Ravel &c &c 

Quote from: Lethevich on April 12, 2012, 07:21:30 PMThe "universalism" of the music is of an elemental and unrelatable quality, almost written as though to deflect any angle of criticism, like a suit of armour.

I don't quite understand what you mean by "universalism". Do you mean Sibelius's music isn't "personal" enough?

Quote from: calyptorhynchus on April 12, 2012, 07:39:22 PM
Let's list some composers you really shouldn't like:

Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Ravel

I could never dislike these composers. They speak directly to me with their music.

Quote from: Mirror Image on April 12, 2012, 07:38:25 PMBut seriously, are you implying that Sibelius was consciously composing music that's safe and that uses a musical language that kept him out of trouble instead of possibly composing music that came from his heart?

But what if Sibelius was composing music that's safe, self-contained, and reflective of a strange mixed breed of traditional consolation and existential despair, because that was the music that came from his heart? What if he wasn't being safe for other people - what if he was being safe to protect himself?

Quote from: Brian on April 12, 2012, 08:10:07 PMBut what if Sibelius was composing music that's safe, self-contained, and reflective of a strange mixed breed of traditional consolation and existential despair, because that was the music that came from his heart? What if he wasn't being safe for other people - what if he was being safe to protect himself?

Yes, how ever you may personally react to the music, I don't think there can be any question of Sibelius composing in bad faith.

Quote from: Mirror Image on April 12, 2012, 07:38:25 PM
But seriously, are you implying that Sibelius was consciously composing music that's safe and that uses a musical language that kept him out of trouble instead of possibly composing music that came from his heart?

That was specifically how I feel about his mature compositions, although the trait is apparent in his earlier works to a lesser degree. Even the uber-Romantic 2nd symphony has a considerable chastity to it, although it's an admirable and original take on an existing formula. The safeness isn't... easy to describe because Sibelius was nothing like a typical conservative of the early 20th century, writing navel-gazing music which seeks not to offend. Nor is it the composer writing in a modern language so that posterity and academia look upon them favourably.

His musical language is distinctive and seemingly strongly linked to his personality, so there is no falseness to it. I think it's in his committing to the aesthetic, the goals that I find enjoyable in music became able to be sacrificed to further underline the unique qualities of the style. It allows for an extraordinary purity, but at the same time, I do not necessary feel a duty to care about one man's nth degree of stylistic refinement when it grates against some of my more cherished feelings in music, which include a progression throughout a piece, a release of tension towards the end that even if not "Romantic", is at least psychologically appealing. The gentle shifts and releases in Sibelius's late works are perhaps all too artful. For such an inoffensive style, I should not care at all, but something about the composer's approach from the structure up wilfully evades qualities that I consider desirable in music - I am having trouble pinning down exactly with, for A/B comparisons, but these are half-thoughts and I'm fairly okay if I turn out to be wrong and reconsider them.

Quote from: eyeresist on April 12, 2012, 07:54:01 PM
I don't quite understand what you mean by "universalism". Do you mean Sibelius's music isn't "personal" enough?

That certain composers are often put forward as 'perfect' examples of the human spirit/condition (as perceived in the western tradition) represented in art - Beethoven, Bach, Chopin, Mahler, etc. Mature Sibelius is also a popular choice. The characteristic of these composers is that their music is at once perfectly original and 'personal', but also achieves a highly debatable/hard to isolate characteristic which allows their output to be considered as a touchstone in relevence and sublimity. I suppose I am disputing Sibelius's ability to represent anything other than himself, which is not the fault of the composer, more of those who might elevate him so highly. Beethoven's warts and all "go do it" approach does ring more truly to me as an ambassador for this human condition.

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 12, 2012, 03:03:32 PM
I wasn't talking about tonality when i said that regarding Brahms. I was speaking about romantic classicism. For instance, in an age that gave us Bruckner and Mahler, it seems strange to wanting to write a symphony not even in the style of Beethoven, but of Schumann. Its not even a question of using old forms or techniques, he literally and arbitrarily wished to protract that particular style, for no particular reason, since he didn't specifically have to wrap himself in a time capsule centered around the first decades of the 19th century just to reject the radical developments introduced by Wagner and his camp.

His music is certainly magnificent but i think he would have been just as great a composer had he chosen to diversify his style. The limitation of his chosen idiom is apparent when his music is at its most complex. You can sense he could go even further, but he just couldn't transcend the formula, even when the strain was at a braking point.

Surely at one point he could have said "enough of this, let's try something else". Instead he just kept going on and on, until the day he died.

It could be argued that quite a few of the most acclaimed composers limited their chosen idiom, but that is exactly what made them great as they were able to explore a style in a more full and ultimately personal way.  It's also true that they often didn't just shift to the latest changes in fashion, JS Bach is often cited as an example of that in his later years.  Brahms probably did reach his full potential in some areas such as the symphony, some chamber music genres and piano music.  In others he may not have but he still did very well even there within the context of his own time.


As for Sibelius I don't think you should expect a Viennese warmth to his music as he never wrote music there.  There is probably a warmer element in his music that links to the folk style ideas he uses, but that would probably have more of an open air sound to it.  So it will have a different sound to some of his contemporaries, and he also saw himself it seems as more akin to the classicists so there will be a directness to his style as well.  And as was said in judging these styles it's really whatever someone's preference is, and preference is guided by what people are used to listening to. 

Quote from: Lethevich on April 12, 2012, 08:16:13 PMThat certain composers are often put forward as 'perfect' examples of the human spirit/condition (as perceived in the western tradition) represented in art - Beethoven, Bach, Chopin, Mahler, etc. Mature Sibelius is also a popular choice. The characteristic of these composers is that their music is at once perfectly original and 'personal', but also achieves a highly debatable/hard to isolate characteristic which allows their output to be considered as a touchstone in relevence and sublimity. I suppose I am disputing Sibelius's ability to represent anything other than himself, which is not the fault of the composer, more of those who might elevate him so highly. Beethoven's warts and all "go do it" approach does ring more truly to me as an ambassador for this human condition.

So the problem with the universalism of Sibelius is that it's not universal enough? :)

I suppose some people hold up certain composers or works as representatives of the godhead on earth, but I think that's mystical bollocks. And I don't believe Beethoven represent Humanity better than Sibelius. He represents himself, an overtly passionate self who is perhaps easier for listeners to identify with than a cool, self-isolating personality like Sibelius.

Quote from: Lethevich on April 12, 2012, 08:16:13 PM
That certain composers are often put forward as 'perfect' examples of the human spirit/condition (as perceived in the western tradition) represented in art [....]

You're right, there are people who do this (put certain composers forward as Poster Children).  But I always wonder why they feel the compulsion to do any such thing.

And, John: "devoid of content and musical ideas"? Sibelius?  That suggestion, from a chap who has been known to obsess over Koechlin, and now is on a Bernstein tear?  Who claims that the only way to enjoy Schnittke is to be steeped in vodka?

Not far from someone who says, There's no content or ideas in Huckleberry Finn.  Give me Interview with the Vampire!

Quote from: karlhenning on April 13, 2012, 03:34:22 AM
And, John: "devoid of content and musical ideas"? Sibelius?  That suggestion, from a chap who has been known to obsess over Koechlin, and now is on a Bernstein tear?  Who claims that the only way to enjoy Schnittke is to be steeped in vodka?

What can I say? I'm a strange brew. :)

Fair enough!

All right!  Cato's here!  :o   "Put your hands on your heads, get off the bar, and get on the wall!"   $:)

You trying to put a shiv in my man Sibelius ???!!!   0:)

Did I see something about Sibelius being somehow emotionally stunted?!

Having listened to Sibelius since 1962   :o  , I will tell you that a mysterious psychomachia of some sort occurs in every symphony, not to mention in smaller things e.g. his music for  Pelleas and Melisande.

I'll let you off with a warning this time!  Now behave!   :D

The music of Sibelius answers all the questions i'd care to know about.

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 13, 2012, 11:14:43 AM
The music of Sibelius answers all the questions I'd care to know about.

There you have it!

We will not, however, ask you what those questions might be!   0:)

Wisdom!

Quote from: eyeresist on April 11, 2012, 05:50:41 PM
As a great man once said, "There is plenty left to be said in C major."

B Major is a completely different story, though.

Quote from: Mirror Image on April 12, 2012, 07:15:39 PM
I mean how people here actually like Bernstein's Kaddish or Tippett's Symphony No. 3? ;) :D

Here's one at least.  8)

Personally, the most perplexing aspect of the dislike some people display towards Sibelius is in their excessive level of irrational hatred they direct towards the composer, which seems disproportionate based on whatever faults they perceive in his music. Its not just a question of not liking the music, or the style, there's something about Sibelius that just offends those people. A good example is Theodore Adorno.

Luckily for me, those are people whom i despise in the first place, so i have no reason to give the slightest amount of weight or credibility to their opinion.

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 14, 2012, 12:41:17 PM
Personally, the most perplexing aspect of the dislike some people display towards Sibelius is in their excessive level of irrational hatred they direct towards the composer, which seems disproportionate based on whatever faults they perceive in his music. Its not just a question of not liking the music, or the style, there's something about Sibelius that just offends those people. A good example is Theodore Adorno.

Luckily for me, those are people whom i despise in the first place, so i have no reason to give the slightest amount of weight or credibility to their opinion.

That hasn't applied for decades, though. It used to be the "cool" position to trash anything that had tonal melodies, but Sibelius has found himself a cushy middle ground where nowadays pretty much everybody likes him. He has the tunes for the dinosaurs, and the "sublimity" and craft for the aesthetically obsessed.

Quote from: eyeresist on April 12, 2012, 08:54:58 PMAnd I don't believe Beethoven represent Humanity better than Sibelius. He represents himself, an overtly passionate self who is perhaps easier for listeners to identify with than a cool, self-isolating personality like Sibelius.

Another example of different listeners hearing different things. I tend to agree with you, but I don't know that Beethoven is often "overly passionate" - he can sometimes be fairly cagey. My mother, on the other hand, does not hear "Beethoven being Beethoven" in (m)any of his works - she hears a composer consistently trying to represent Humanity and write universal music, and masking his own identity in the process.

Just throwing that out there.

I never really got on with Richard Strauss - especially works like Ein Heldenleben.  Gottschalk is another one I never really appreciated, also Nicholas Maw.  I'm sure that this is my loss but there it is. I much prefer the composers who were apparently influenced by Richard Strauss (Novak, Bantock for example) than by Richard Strauss's own music. I do quite like Till Eulenspiegel however.

I couldn't get Strauss either. Then i listened to the Metamorphosen by Klemperer, and it somehow begun to grow on me. Strauss is like a Wagnerian classicist. The harmony, form and orchestration is the very definition of charm and Viennese refinement. He doesn't shatter your soul with every gesture, like a Mahler, he's just a very consummate craftsman.

Quote from: Brian on April 14, 2012, 06:09:06 PM
Another example of different listeners hearing different things. I tend to agree with you, but I don't know that Beethoven is often "overly passionate" - he can sometimes be fairly cagey. My mother, on the other hand, does not hear "Beethoven being Beethoven" in (m)any of his works - she hears a composer consistently trying to represent Humanity and write universal music, and masking his own identity in the process.

Not sure if Beethoven is actually trying to represent humanity in a general sense normally, but that might be how some people want to interpret his work (based on the 9th symphony I suppose).  His music can have a heroic sound to it with grand gestures but that is a feature of that period I think and perhaps something that grew out of the classical period.

Quote from: Brian on April 14, 2012, 06:09:06 PM
Another example of different listeners hearing different things. I tend to agree with you, but I don't know that Beethoven is often "overly passionate" - he can sometimes be fairly cagey. My mother, on the other hand, does not hear "Beethoven being Beethoven" in (m)any of his works - she hears a composer consistently trying to represent Humanity and write universal music, and masking his own identity in the process.

Just throwing that out there.

I'm sorry, but she's completely mistaken. Beethoven is the very definition of a composer who put himself and nothing but himself in the music.

Quote from: Mirror Image on April 12, 2012, 07:15:39 PM
I disagree. I think Sibelius' music leaves many questions unanswered, like, for example, what is he being so quiet about? The question that I continue to struggle with is "what is it about his music that I'm not responding to?" This is really the question that has plagued with several composers. There are so many people who do enjoy Sibelius that it makes me wonder sometimes why can't I get into it too?

Hmm. Hang on, am I right in remembering that you also couldn't get into Holmboe either?

Because to me they are quite similar composers, and I think I like them for much the same reasons. So whatever it is I do respond to might be the very thing that you're not responding to!

More people like Sibelius than like Holmboe, including me.

Quote from: Josquin des Prez on April 15, 2012, 12:38:25 AM
I couldn't get Strauss either. Then i listened to the Metamorphosen by Klemperer, and it somehow begun to grow on me. Strauss is like a Wagnerian classicist. The harmony, form and orchestration is the very definition of charm and Viennese refinement. He doesn't shatter your soul with every gesture, like a Mahler, he's just a very consummate craftsman.

Thanks - I must listen to  Metamorphosen.

Quote from: vandermolen on April 15, 2012, 01:27:29 PM
Thanks - I must listen to  Metamorphosen.

I'm in the same boat as Josquin: I am not a keen Strauss listener, but Metamorphosen is a piece I do cherish, along with the Four Last Songs. I just looked through my listening logs for 2010, 2011, and 2012: only 18 listens in those years, and 9 of them were either Metamorphosen or the Four Last Songs.

R Strauss usually bores me stupid (though some might opine that's a short distance to cover). I lasted about 2 minutes into Salome.

Quote from: eyeresist on April 15, 2012, 07:01:22 PM
R Strauss usually bores me stupid (though some might opine that's a short distance to cover). I lasted about 2 minutes into Salome.

This is my usual reaction but I know that my brother likes 'Four Last Songs' and I shall listen to Metamorphosen.

Quote from: vandermolen on April 14, 2012, 11:45:46 PM
I never really got on with Richard Strauss - especially works like Ein Heldenleben.  ... I much prefer the composers who were apparently influenced by Richard Strauss (Novak, Bantock for example) than by Richard Strauss's own music. I do quite like Till Eulenspiegel however.

Exactly my position too, including the only piece by him that I happen to like. But you know that.  ;)

Worst composer who is also fat?

Looking back at my comments, how could I say some of the things that I did about Sibelius?!?!? I mean really WTF?!?!? Anyway, let me say that I suppose during that time I was suffering quite a Sibelius drought and then I put on Symphony No. 6 all of these sudden doubts I had completely washed away. The man was an outstanding composer.

Quote from: Mirror Image on September 25, 2012, 01:19:57 PM
Looking back at my comments, how could I say some of the things that I did about Sibelius?!?!? I mean really WTF?!?!? Anyway, let me say that I suppose during that time I was suffering quite a Sibelius drought and then I put on Symphony No. 6 all of these sudden doubts I had completely washed away. The man was an outstanding composer.

Excellent, John - I was slightly amazed by your opinion on him before. He's like no-one else, but fits right in with your other favourites.

Perhaps Mahler has helped, too. (although they're completely different composers)
Coincidentally, that's the one symphony I haven't 'got' yet. Must try again soon.

Here's what Menuhin said about his visit to Ainola in 1955. (sorry about the poor translation by yours truely)

"I was in luck, as he wasn't drunk. Apparently, he drank a lot, but he was sober when we met, and very friendly and hospitable.It was a beautiful fall day and we sat on the porch. He was a relaxed old-timer, at peace with himself.
I was startled when he asked me "who is the greatest composer of the century". He himself was a candidate, and it would have been impolite to name someone else. Luckily, he got me out of trouble by saying that he thought it was Bartók. This pleased me, for I had known Bartók and value him greatly."
http://www.sibelius.fi/suomi/ainola/muistoja_muusikoita.html

Quote from: North Star on September 25, 2012, 01:37:38 PM
Excellent, John - I was slightly amazed by your opinion on him before. He's like no-one else, but fits right in with your other favourites.

Perhaps Mahler has helped, too. (although they're completely different composers)
Coincidentally, that's the one symphony I haven't 'got' yet. Must try again soon.

Here's what Menuhin said about his visit to Ainola in 1955. (sorry about the poor translation by yours truely)

"I was in luck, as he wasn't drunk. Apparently, he drank a lot, but he was sober when we met, and very friendly and hospitable.It was a beautiful fall day and we sat on the porch. He was a relaxed old-timer, at peace with himself.
I was startled when he asked me "who is the greatest composer of the century". He himself was a candidate, and it would have been impolite to name someone else. Luckily, he got me out of trouble by saying that he thought it was Bartók. This pleased me, for I had known Bartók and value him greatly."
http://www.sibelius.fi/suomi/ainola/muistoja_muusikoita.html

I really don't know why I said those things about Sibelius which obviously weren't true, but I think I made these comments because I was starting to feel that maybe Sibelius wasn't that important to me anymore. Thankfully, I was wrong of course. :) He really has always been a favorite of mine. The first symphony that I heard of Sibelius' was his 2nd and when the last movement was over, I just sat back in my chair, smiled, and nodded. I just heard a sliver of genius and some of the greatest music this planet has ever produced. When I listen to Sibelius, everything makes much more sense to me.

The 6th was a symphony that gave me some problems for quite some time until I read what Sibelius wrote about it:

"The sixth symphony always reminds me of the scent of the first snow. Rage and passion...are utterly essential in it, but it is supported by undercurrents deep under the surface of the music."

Quote from: North Star on September 25, 2012, 01:37:38 PM
"...Luckily, he got me out of trouble by saying that he thought it was Bartók. This pleased me, for I had known Bartók and value him greatly."
http://www.sibelius.fi/suomi/ainola/muistoja_muusikoita.html
http://www.amazon.es/Gustav-Mahler-Michael-Tilson-Thomas/dp/B004WSX6DO/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1348607907&sr=1-1

Wow.  How interesting!  I had no idea.   :o  Good old Sibelius!

Quote from: Mirror Image on September 25, 2012, 01:19:57 PM
Looking back at my comments, how could I say some of the things that I did about Sibelius?!?!? I mean really WTF?!?!? Anyway, let me say that I suppose during that time I was suffering quite a Sibelius drought and then I put on Symphony No. 6 all of these sudden doubts I had completely washed away. The man was an outstanding composer.

People change and grow quite a lot as listeners. We're always happy to see it happen, and I'm always happy when it happens to me. :)

Quote from: Brian on September 25, 2012, 05:19:14 PM
People change and grow quite a lot as listeners. We're always happy to see it happen, and I'm always happy when it happens to me. :)

I was reading my comments again and it just surprises me that I wrote that at all. Sibelius was a personal hero of mine and he helped me get a grasp of classical music. In fact, I got into Nielsen, the same time I got into Sibelius as someone recommended both of these composers to me and said they were two of leading Nordic composers of their time.

I'm listening to Sibelius as I type and after this recording, I'm going to listen to some Nielsen. To paraphrase Rachmaninov: "So much music, so little. time."

Quote from: Brian on September 25, 2012, 05:19:14 PM
People change and grow quite a lot as listeners. We're always happy to see it happen, and I'm always happy when it happens to me. :)

That's why I listen. Or else I would still listen to children songs. More seriously though; that feeling of achievement when you "align" with a composer you earlier on didn' quite get along with (or understand) is a pretty good feeling.

Prompted by recent posts elsewhere - Scriabin is another composer who bores me. Is this partly Muti's fault? I probably need to hear Golovanov or Svetlanov before making a final verdict.

Quote from: CriticalI on September 26, 2012, 06:45:45 PM
Prompted by recent posts elsewhere - Scriabin is another composer who bores me. Is this partly Muti's fault? I probably need to hear Golovanov or Svetlanov before making a final verdict.

What composers do you actually like, eyeresist? List your top 10 favorite composers that you couldn't live without.

Quote from: The new erato on September 26, 2012, 04:31:13 AM
that feeling of achievement when you "align" with a composer you earlier on didn' quite get along with (or understand) is a pretty good feeling.

yup  :D

after many years of trying i finaly got into schumann, probably because i grew up/learned more history and decided to stop blaming him for the kinds of things i hated in most romantic music

i still can't listen to him if i wanna have a good time tho.  gotta be in a darker mood 

Quote from: Mirror Image on September 26, 2012, 06:48:37 PMWhat composers do you actually like, eyeresist? List your top 10 favorite composers that you couldn't live without.

:D

I realise that there are a number of prominent composers who I am not ashamed to say I don't care for (can't the same be said for you?).
Some of the composers who clog up my playlists (special faves are bolded):
Amirov
Barber
Bax
Bruckner
Chausson
Copland
Dvorak
Elgar
Godar
Hanson
Haydn
Herrmann
Hindemith
Holst
Honegger
Kalinnikov
Khachaturian
Liszt
Mahler
Mozart
Penderecki
Prokofiev
Rachmaninov
Saint Saens
Schnittke
Schubert
Schuman
Shostakovich
Sibelius
Tchaikovsky
Terterian
Vaughan Williams
Vivaldi
Wagner

Is that enough? Is that enough for you to accept that I care about music, even though I don't like some of the things you like?

Quote from: CriticalI on September 26, 2012, 07:06:37 PM
Is that enough? Is that enough for you to accept that I care about music, even though I don't like some of the things you like?

The reason I asked you is to get to know you better and know your tastes. That's all. A simple question which evidently caused you to react irrationally. Anyway, nice list. And remember I just asked you to list your top 10.

My top 10 would look something like this:

1. Shostakovich
2. Ravel
3. Bartok
4. Vaughan Williams
5. Villa-Lobos
6. Stravinsky
7. Prokofiev
8. Debussy
9. Sibelius
10. Tippett

The names in bold are the ones that never change order.

Oh, okay. Anyway, I couldn't list a top 10 because as you see there are only 6 ultra-top favourites - and even then there are certain works by other "minor" composers which I love vehemently, perhaps as much as the entire opuses of my bolded faves, e.g. Kalinnikov 1, Khachaturian 2, Terterian 3 & 4, Liszt's Heroide Funebre, which makes weighing everything to determine a set order-of-liking impossible.

Looking at what I've listed, I'd say I like stuff that is thematically striking (we're not allowed to say "good tunes" ;) ), rich and full in sound (but with variety, of course), and with a strong overall structure.

Quote from: CriticalI on September 26, 2012, 08:06:20 PM
Oh, okay. Anyway, I couldn't list a top 10 because as you see there are only 6 ultra-top favourites - and even then there are certain works by other "minor" composers which I love vehemently, perhaps as much as the entire opuses of my bolded faves, e.g. Kalinnikov 1, Khachaturian 2, Terterian 3 & 4, Liszt's Heroide Funebre, which makes weighing everything to determine a set order-of-liking impossible.

Looking at what I've listed, I'd say I like stuff that is thematically striking (we're not allowed to say "good tunes" ;) ), rich and full in sound (but with variety, of course), and with a strong overall structure.

I see. Well it's good to see what you enjoy and it gives me a better idea of where you stand in terms of musical taste. I like all kinds of moods and I don't consider structure in music to be a make or break thing as I like a lot of music that just kind of floats by and is atmospheric. The reason I enjoy composers like Debussy, Ravel, and Delius so much because of the fact that structure wasn't everything to them. Not that they couldn't compose a work that was concise and direct. Ravel wrote many works where there's not a note out-of-place and that relies on structure. But with Debussy and Delius, I don't worry so much with their music, because for me it's an aural experience. Not everything has to be so cut and dry with me. I like a variety of styles, which is one reason why I take to the 20th Century more than any other period of music. It's simply the most musically diverse century of any period in classical music. All, of course, IMHO.

We need a new thread "What are you NOT listening to" in the General Classical Music Discussion section.

I can fill that with a zillion posts in a zilch.

Quote from: Mirror Image on September 26, 2012, 08:13:34 PMI like all kinds of moods and I don't consider structure in music to be a make or break thing as I like a lot of music that just kind of floats by and is atmospheric. The reason I enjoy composers like Debussy, Ravel, and Delius so much because of the fact that structure wasn't everything to them. Not that they couldn't compose a work that was concise and direct. Ravel wrote many works where there's not a note out-of-place and that relies on structure. But with Debussy and Delius, I don't worry so much with their music, because for me it's an aural experience. Not everything has to be so cut and dry with me.

Maybe one reason I need structure is that I have a short attention span :D

I note that neither of us cares much for opera. For me I think the main reason is that they are (usually) structured to fit the libretto, rather than to stand on their own as music.

But, oddly in contrast to that, I have a problem with atonal music that tries to use old structural methods - new wine in old skins and all that. I don't know if sonata form and variation technique can really be effective if you've ruled out "common practice" tonality as a basic reference point. I think atonal music is a case in which dramatic or program work is preferable, in order to be coherent over large structures.

Quote from: CriticalI on September 27, 2012, 12:40:09 AM
I don't know if sonata form and variation technique can really be effective if you've ruled out "common practice" tonality as a basic reference point.

I can certainly see it being a problem with sonata form, given the number of references I've seen recently to its basic rationale involving heading from a 'home' to a 'far out point' somewhere in the development and back again.  It's fairly hard to have a 'home' to head out from if you don't have tonality and the sense of heirarchy within the scale that comes with it.

   According to stories Saint-Saens  actually was a pederast, and when he visited  Algeria and other North African countires, he took advantage of  the availability of  young boys who were being prostituted . Yuck !  But I still like his music  . 

Quote from: CriticalI on September 27, 2012, 12:40:09 AM
Maybe one reason I need structure is that I have a short attention span :D

I note that neither of us cares much for opera. For me I think the main reason is that they are (usually) structured to fit the libretto, rather than to stand on their own as music.

But, oddly in contrast to that, I have a problem with atonal music that tries to use old structural methods - new wine in old skins and all that. I don't know if sonata form and variation technique can really be effective if you've ruled out "common practice" tonality as a basic reference point. I think atonal music is a case in which dramatic or program work is preferable, in order to be coherent over large structures.

Different composers require different kinds of listening. You can't listen to Debussy the same way you listen to say Villa-Lobos. That just wouldn't work, but if you listen to each composer differently and put away your personal biases, then the end result could be quite satisfactory. I don't mind atonal music, but I'm not going to seek it out, because, like any music, there's some junk out there that needs to be filtered out. I can stand The Second Viennese School of Music, but I can't stand composers like Stockhausen or Boulez who just took this stuff too far out.

Opera is a medium I could live without and have lived without for quite some time. I do like some operas, but it's not a favorite genre and I doubt it ever will be. But there are some operas that exceded my expectations like those of Wagner, Janacek, Shostakovich, Mussorgsky, Delius, Bartok's only opera, Tippett's The Midsummer Marriage, and a few of Martinu's.

Quote from: Mirror Image on September 26, 2012, 07:14:34 PM
The reason I asked you is to get to know you better and know your tastes. That's all. A simple question which evidently caused you to react irrationally. Anyway, nice list. And remember I just asked you to list your top 10.

My top 10 would look something like this:

1. Shostakovich
2. Ravel
3. Bartok
4. Vaughan Williams
5. Villa-Lobos
6. Stravinsky
7. Prokofiev
8. Debussy
9. Sibelius
10. Tippett

The names in bold are the ones that never change order.

That's a funny list but not as amusing as my current one:

1.   Bach
2.   Shostakovich
3.   Schumann
4.   Scriabin
5.   Weinberg
6.   Mahler
7.   Dvorak
8.   Beethoven
9.   Mozart
10. Myaskovsky

The only name that never changes position is Bach.  If I ever do change it, you'll know it's time to put me down.

Quote from: Sammy on September 27, 2012, 02:08:15 PM
That's a funny list but not as amusing as my current one:

1.   Bach
2.   Shostakovich
3.   Schumann
4.   Scriabin
5.   Weinberg
6.   Mahler
7.   Dvorak
8.   Beethoven
9.   Mozart
10. Myaskovsky

The only name that never changes position is Bach.  If I ever do change it, you'll know it's time to put me down.

Didn't know you ranked Mysakovsky so highly. He's a great composer. Thank goodness for Svetlanov and his dedication to this composer. Also nice to see Shostakovich, Scriabin, and Weinberg on your list. I'm still getting into Weinberg.

Quote from: Mirror Image on September 27, 2012, 08:19:37 AM
Opera is a medium I could live without and have lived without for quite some time. I do like some operas, but it's not a favorite genre and I doubt it ever will be. But there are some operas that exceded my expectations like those of Wagner, Janacek, Shostakovich, Mussorgsky, Delius, Bartok's only opera, Tippett's The Midsummer Marriage, and a few of Martinu's.

i dont generally like opera unless it's by Britten

Quote from: xochitl on September 27, 2012, 06:52:05 PM
i dont generally like opera unless it's by Britten

Just gave you a standing ovation in my living room.

Quote from: xochitl on September 27, 2012, 06:52:05 PM
i dont generally like opera unless it's by Britten

I can't say I'm a fan of Britten's operas. I listened to Peter Grimes a week or so ago and it didn't do much for me. Britten is a fine composer and one of my favorites, but I tend to look towards the other end of his output. My favorite Britten works are what I would call his 'war trilogy': Ballad of Heroes, Sinfonia da Requiem, and the War Requiem. These are some of the finest British works I've ever heard.

Quote from: Mirror Image on September 27, 2012, 07:00:08 PMI can't say I'm a fan of Britten's operas. I listened to Peter Grimes a week or so ago and it didn't do much for me.

Are you familiar with Gloriana? Grimes didn't do much for me when I sampled it but Gloriana knocked my socks off - although that was a live (and very finely staged) performance. Since then, I return to the Chandos recording of the symphonic suite regularly.

Quote from: Rinaldo on September 27, 2012, 07:36:43 PM
Are you familiar with Gloriana? Grimes didn't do much for me when I sampled it but Gloriana knocked my socks off - although that was a live (and very finely staged) performance. Since then, I return to the Chandos recording of the symphonic suite regularly.

Nope, haven't heard it yet. I have the two Britten Conducts Britten opera boxes and I really need to give the others a listen. I've just so much music I want to listen to instead of opera right now. If you're referring to that Gardner Britten recording on Chandos, then, yes, that's a good recording that I need to revisit at some point.