GMG and classical music collection - the conflict

[Florestan]

Actually, what difference does it make whether the score itself is really music, or it isn´t?

[jochanaan]

And so to the gentleman who insisted: "Not what Jochanaan said at all," I will reply with Jochanaan's confirmation, "exactly what Jochanaan said." And exactly what I disagree with.

But tell me: if Mahler was not "writing music," then just what the hell was he doing?

Writing instructions for making music.

But the music Mahler imagined may be quite different from the music you hear in your mind, when you read the score.

So two - or more - different pieces of music may arise from the same score.

Yes.  Leonard Bernstein's performances of Mahler are very different from Bernard Haitink's (to name two examples at "extreme poles" on a continuum); thus they are, in a sense, two different musics both arising from the same score.  That's why folks who know both Bernstein and Haitink can recognize recordings of music they've made without being told.

So what? That's all very poetic, but can this composer honestly say he learned nothing from studying scores? Can any composer? What say you, Mr. Henning? I remind you of Mozart's excited discovery of the music of Bach from those stange hieroglyphics, or young Elliott Carter's purchase of the sheet music to the Schoenberg Suite op. 25 in Vienna at a time when this music was never performed. Scores are the composer's source material, his archive for learning. Once again, I quote Charles Rosen as pointing to "a difficulty that has irritated philosophers of aesthetics and their readers for a long time. Is the work of music to be identified as the written score or its performance? Is a symphony of Beethoven the printed score or the sound in the concert hall when it is played?"

I say that unless this difficulty is acknowledged, any answer to this question is inadequate.

Of course we musicians learn much from looking at scores.  But what Mozart and Carter in the above examples were doing, like the rest of us, was "hearing the music in their heads;" that is, they were imagining performances that would take place were they ever to have the musicians and sufficient time to rehearse so that they could direct the making of music from the instructions Bach and Schoenberg left.  (And of course Mozart, like all other musicians of his day, would not have hesitated to insert some additions of his own to what Bach wrote.  It wasn't until the 20th century that you had performers playing music exactly as the score directed without adding any notes.)

I was just thinking that this discussion had an element of the chicken and the egg.

In this case, we know pretty much when the "egg" of written music developed, which was long after the "chicken" of musical performance.

[prémont]

Well, that piece poses a unique problem in aesthetics, a piece of music that consists of nothing but timed silence. But that problem applies both to the score and any "realization" or performance.

The score consists of musical symbols, which you can find in most scores, but when realized, no sound is produced, which can be attributed to these symbols. So the problem applies first and foremost to the realization of the score. The score by itself is unremarcable, until you begin to imagine its content in your mind.

[(poco) Sforzando]

You were the first one to mention Mahler (post 119 in this thread).

Please see my modified entry, posted before this response.

[jochanaan]

Actually, what difference does it make whether the score itself is really music, or it isn´t?

In one sense, it's only semantics.  But in another sense, it's like the difference between mere orthodoxy and a personal encounter with God.  Not everyone can read scores, and thus whatever "music" is contained in them is not accessible to everyone; yet everyone who is there can respond to an orchestra playing music based on a printed reproduction of Beethoven's Symphony #5 (to use an example nearly all of us know).

The score consists of musical symbols, which you can find in most scores, but when realized, no sound is produced, which can be attributed to these symbols. So the problem applies first and foremost to the realization of the score. The score by itself is unremarcable, until you begin to imagine its content in your mind.

That's true of any score.

[Ken B]

I recall discussing this with one of my philosophy profs, who was also a classical nut. He made a convincing case that a piece of music, the example we discussed was Beethoven's 5th, is a type. A type is an abstract entity that can have particular instances or instantiations. As such it's the common notion behind the score, the performance, the heard-in-your-head. Each is a different instantiation of the type. We agree I think that the score of La Mer and a performance of La Mer are about the same piece of music but that the score of La Mer and a performance of Bolero are about different pieces. The type is a nice notion for capturing these similarities and differences. It also fits nicely when Karl improvises a bit on the clarinet, and the computer produces a score and an mp3; or when Karl fiddles with notation and the computer produces an mp3 and sounds (plays the notes).

[prémont]

Actually, what difference does it make whether the score itself is really music, or it isn´t?

I just want to stress, that the performers contribution in music is much greater, than people usually realize.

[Florestan]

In one sense, it's only semantics.  But in another sense, it's like the difference between mere orthodoxy and a personal encounter with God.  Not everyone can read scores, and thus whatever "music" is contained in them is not accessible to everyone; yet everyone who is there can respond to an orchestra playing music based on a printed reproduction of Beethoven's Symphony #5 (to use an example nearly all of us know).That's true of any score.

I like this analogy. 

I just want to stress, that the performers contribution in music is much greater, than people usually realize.

Well, since no two performances of a work are the same, not even two by the same performer, I don´t see how it can pass unacknowledged, or be flatly denied.

[Karl Henning]

So what? That's all very poetic, but can this composer honestly say he learned nothing from studying scores? Can any composer? What say you, Mr. Henning? I remind you of Mozart's excited discovery of the music of Bach from those stange hieroglyphics, or young Elliott Carter's purchase of the sheet music to the Schoenberg Suite op. 25 in Vienna at a time when this music was never performed. Scores are the composer's source material, his archive for learning. Once again, I quote Charles Rosen as pointing to “a difficulty that has irritated philosophers of aesthetics and their readers for a long time. Is the work of music to be identified as the written score or its performance? Is a symphony of Beethoven the printed score or the sound in the concert hall when it is played?”

I say that unless this difficulty is acknowledged, any answer to this question is inadequate.

I certainly have learnt a great deal from music which I have read in score, before (if ever) hearing it actually performed.

[North Star]

But would a person who's always been deaf be able to learn to read music? I can get the taste of a food in my mouth if I think of it, but thinking is not eating..

[Florestan]

But would a person who's always been deaf be able to learn to read music?

To read, as in to be able to tell a B flat from a D or to know that allegro is faster than adagio or to point out that in this measure there is a horn solo over a timpani roll, certainly. To hear the music, though, no way. Absolutely impossible. A person born deaf cannot even have the notion of sound.

I can get the taste of a food in my mouth if I think of it, but thinking is not eating..

You can only get the taste of that food which you´ve already tasted. Think of a food you have never tasted before: what taste do you get in your mouth?

[North Star]

To read, as in to be able to tell a B flat from a D or to know that allegro is faster than adagio or to point out that in this measure there is a horn solo over a timpani roll, certainly. To hear the music, though, no way. Absolutely impossible. A person born deaf cannot even have the notion of sound.

You can only get the taste of that food which you´ve already tasted. Think of a food you have never tasted before: what taste do you get in your mouth?

Precisely.

[Moonfish]

Precisely.

I thought everything tasted like chicken?

[North Star]

I thought everything tasted like chicken?

No - everything tastes like fish, especially chicken.  0:)

[Florestan]

I thought everything tasted like chicken?

One more proof you have no taste for diversity. 

[Moonfish]

One more proof you have no taste for diversity. 

[Moonfish]

No - everything tastes like fish, especially chicken.  0:)

[(poco) Sforzando]

Actually, what difference does it make whether the score itself is really music, or it isn´t?

A great deal. I refer you to my previous posts.

[(poco) Sforzando]

But what Mozart and Carter in the above examples were doing, like the rest of us, was "hearing the music in their heads;" that is, they were imagining performances that would take place were they ever to have the musicians and sufficient time to rehearse so that they could direct the making of music from the instructions Bach and Schoenberg left.

I'll let some of your other comments pass, but here I think you're dead wrong. Now it is true, I'm finding on further research, that when Mozart visited the Baron van Swieten, he heard some of Bach performed. But the account continues:

"He was informed that this school, where Sebastian Bach had once been cantor, possessed a complete collection of his motets, which were preserved as if they were a saint's relics. 'That is right, that is fine,' he exclaimed. 'Let me see them' There was, however, no complete score of these songs. He therefore took the separate parts, and then, what a pleasure it was for the quiet observer to see how eagerly Mozart sat down, the parts all around him, held in both hands, on his knees, on the nearest chairs. Forgetting everything else, he did not stand up again until he had looked through all the music of Sebastian Bach. He asked for copies...."

Copies, note. Not rehearsal time for performances. Nothing about instructions. What Mozart wanted to do was to absorb Bach's style as a model for future composition. And there are plenty of examples where Mozart's style was greatly influenced by his discovery of Bach.

[(poco) Sforzando]

In one sense, it's only semantics.  But in another sense, it's like the difference between mere orthodoxy and a personal encounter with God.  Not everyone can read scores, and thus whatever "music" is contained in them is not accessible to everyone; yet everyone who is there can respond to an orchestra playing music based on a printed reproduction of Beethoven's Symphony #5 (to use an example nearly all of us know).That's true of any score.

I don't see what God has to do with it, but once again, those of you on the other side keep thinking of music solely as something to be realized in performance. Of course that is one essential element of music, yet scores have other significances to composers and to music history besides performance.

Not everyone can read scores, of course, and not everyone can read all scores equally well. I am better at reading rhythms in my head than pitches, especially of difficult modern works. I can read the treble, alto, tenor, and bass clefs fluently, but not the soprano clef Bach used in his choral works. I can't easily read plainchant notation, lute tablature, or figured bass. Yet I don't discount any of these notations as music just because I personally can't read them.