The Great American Symphony

[Cato]

That was an interesting article, especially for the struggle expressed therein, not explicitly articulated until the last paragraph.

The thing he posits there, that his "experiences of everyday life—[his] real feeling of a headache, [his] real taste of chocolate—that really is the ultimate nature of reality," is first principle kinda stuff for any student of language or literature. I was thinking as I read it, that his struggle was probably a result of his perspective, his training as a scientist. And that is what he says in the last paragraph. A poet, for example, would never have this particular struggle. In poetry, in the arts generally, probably, the idea is that "reality" is what happens when objects and observers get together. Reality only happens then. Neither observers nor objects really ( ) exist on their own. Real reality is what happens when they meet.

Of course, there's something there in each, separately, in order for the meeting to even be possible, but that something, in either case, is quite remarkably different from what results are when the two meet. That's what Hoffmann suggests in his interview, too. A poet would probably start with the results, the pre-existing somethings being, by definition, out of reach, a matter of speculation only.

My problem with the article is that non-conscious "observers" (cameras, microphones) obviously record reality.  Put a timer on a camera and walk away from the forest, and I am betting that the camera will - without any brain - observe a forest when the shutter clicks.  Light particles are bouncing off the forest and bring that image to anything capable of receiving them, conscious or not.  And if somehow not one particle of light hit the forest, I will also bet that it is still there.   

And he seems to misunderstand quantum physics, i.e. the "blinking" nature of a particle, its tendency to "sort of" exist, to be a packet of potential existence, is fine for individual particles.  But outside of the quantum world we obviously do not see e.g. books and trees disappearing for a micro-second and then reappearing.

Otherwise, I would say he should read Kant and ruminate on phenomenology.   

[Karl Henning]

. . . Put a timer on a camera and walk away from the forest, and I am betting that the camera will - without any brain - observe a forest when the shutter clicks.

You seem to be saying that an apparatus without a brain is not necessarily at any disadvantage compared to a human with (we must suppose) a brain.

Perhaps you're right, at that.

[Karl Henning]

There are many American symphonies that I love (in no particular order):

Barber: Symphonies 1 & 2
Schuman: Symphonies 3, 6, & 10
Copland: Symphony No. 3
Ives: Symphonies 2 & 4, 'Holidays' Symphony
Diamond: Symphonies 3 & 4
Piston: Symphonies 2 & 6
Thompson: Symphony No. 2
Harris: Symphony No. 6 "Gettysburg" (the only Harris symphony I enjoyed otherwise I have always felt he was too preachy and declamatory)

I've just revisited the Diamond Fourth.  Now, I realize you're saying, John, these are symphonies you love, which is already refocusing the question, so my observation here is not necessarily a conflict.

Personally, I could not argue for the Diamond Fourth as The Great American Symphony.  I enjoy it, I am glad to have heard it, and I can entirely see any of us loving the piece.  So perhaps we should not see my comment as any deficit in Diamond's work, but (again) in the notion of The Gr Am Sym.

Separately . . . you find the Harris Third fatally preachy & declamatory?

(* looks for Volume 16 . . . . *)

[Heck148]

You're so very confused. The mere whim of your mood doesn't change musical history or where things came from.

you attempt to posit an absolute that does not exist. "musical history", "where things came from" are subjective, not objective...
How an individual responds to particular music is probably the only real "standard", and that is definitely subjective...

It doesn't lessen, devalue or erase the greatest achievements.

nor does your sounding forth your own individual opinion.

I'm not much of a symphony person myself at the end of the day,

yes, that is quite obvious. 

but at least I have put in the time and have the facts all sorted & straight, leading to a clear perspective.[/size][/font]

no, you have voiced your own individual opinion, which to this point, is completely unsubstantiated or supported...there is nothing factual or clear about anything you've posted...

[Heck148]

In essence, you are right.  When James states his opinion, he seems genuinely to believe that his opinion is Universal Artistic Truth.

right, Karl - there is never a discussion with such people - they simply try to pontificate, and naturally expect everyone to defer in strict obedience to their pronouncements.

[Mirror Image]

I've just revisited the Diamond Fourth.  Now, I realize you're saying, John, these are symphonies you love, which is already refocusing the question, so my observation here is not necessarily a conflict.

Personally, I could not argue for the Diamond Fourth as The Great American Symphony.  I enjoy it, I am glad to have heard it, and I can entirely see any of us loving the piece.  So perhaps we should not see my comment as any deficit in Diamond's work, but (again) in the notion of The Gr Am Sym.

Separately . . . you find the Harris Third fatally preachy & declamatory?

(* looks for Volume 16 . . . . *)

Cheers, Karl!

I could never argue for what the Great American Symphony is or could be. I do, however, feel that these symphonies exhibit musical traits that I admire and each of these symphonies have really meant a lot to me, which I have concluded that they're great IMHO.

As for Harris, I'm wrong about his 3rd, I do like this work, but aside from this symphony and his 6th, I can barely listen to his music without feeling the need to turn it off. It's not bad music of course, it's just not my thing.

[Sergeant Rock]

As for Harris, I'm wrong about his 3rd, I do like this work

Thank you. I can now return my bazooka to the armory

(By the way, and to return to topic, Harris 3 would get my vote as the Great American symphony; that or Ives 2. I'd have to flip a coin.)

Sarge

[Karl Henning]

Cheers, Karl!

I could never argue for what the Great American Symphony is or could be. I do, however, feel that these symphonies exhibit musical traits that I admire and each of these symphonies have really meant a lot to me, which I have concluded that they're great IMHO.

As for Harris, I'm wrong about his 3rd, I do like this work, but aside from this symphony and his 6th, I can barely listen to his music without feeling the need to turn it off. It's not bad music of course, it's just not my thing.

Can't say fairer than that, and you have mollified the Sarge 

[Heck148]

....I do, however, feel that these symphonies exhibit musical traits that I admire and each of these symphonies have really meant a lot to me, which I have concluded that they're great IMHO.

yes, I agree, well said.

As for Harris, I'm wrong about his 3rd, I do like this work, but aside from this symphony and his 6th, I can barely listen to his music without feeling the need to turn it off. It's not bad music of course, it's just not my thing.

I'm with you - I enjoy Harris #3, and #6....have not had much luck with the others...very "academic-sounding"

[Cato]

You seem to be saying that an apparatus without a brain is not necessarily at any disadvantage compared to a human with (we must suppose) a brain.

Perhaps you're right, at that.

Right, given the author's idea that reality depends on a (conscious) observer.  e.g.

Gefter: The world is just other conscious agents?

Hoffman: I call it conscious realism: Objective reality is just conscious agents, just points of view. Interestingly, I can take two conscious agents and have them interact, and the mathematical structure of that interaction also satisfies the definition of a conscious agent. This mathematics is telling me something. I can take two minds, and they can generate a new, unified single mind.

And what about non-conscious agents capable of observations?  Do they create "non-objective reality" ?  0:)

Gefter: If it's conscious agents all the way down, all first-person points of view, what happens to science? Science has always been a third-person description of the world.

Hoffman: The idea that what we're doing is measuring publicly accessible objects, the idea that objectivity results from the fact that you and I can measure the same object in the exact same situation and get the same results — it's very clear from quantum mechanics that that idea has to go. Physics tells us that there are no public physical objects. So what's going on? Here's how I think about it. I can talk to you about my headache and believe that I am communicating effectively with you, because you've had your own headaches. The same thing is true as apples and the moon and the sun and the universe. Just like you have your own headache, you have your own moon. But I assume it's relevantly similar to mine. That's an assumption that could be false, but that's the source of my communication, and that's the best we can do in terms of public physical objects and objective science.

But we do not live inside a quantum mechanical world! The quantum mechanical world resides inside us and the rest of the universe.  And it is not clear to me at all that "Physics tells us that there are no public physical objects." 

And what about that camera and its image of the forest?  Is it not "communicating" to me that the forest does exist, even when I did not consciously observe it?  I would hope that the good man is not insisting on some degree of consciousness for the camera?!

Anyway...

Thank you. I can now return to my bazooka to the armory

(By the way, and to return to topic, Harris 3 would get my vote as the Great American symphony; that or Ives 2. I'd have to flip a coin.)

Sarge

[Mirror Image]

Thanks all and, most of all, thanks to Sarge for sparing me of the bazooka!

[Karl Henning]

I'm with you - I enjoy Harris #3, and #6....have not had much luck with the others...very "academic-sounding"

Without contradicting you . . . I've been lucky in my explorations of that era (I may just have the right, and a long-lived, canary for duty down that shaft). The initial "tastes" with which I tried Schuman and Mennin encouraged me to explore more, and that listening has all been to the good (and we might say that I had to overcome the hurdle of The Lot being dismissed as "academic").  With certain other composers, the one symphony I heard (without its being a genuinely negative experience) left me feeling that, well, I would explore down other avenues.

Antheil (and perhaps Hanson) is a case where I do not feel that the work is on quite the level of Schuman and Mennin, but (1) the work is IMO genuinely good, (2) it strikes me as a personal musical expression, not as dutiful notespinning ("academic"), and thus (3) is music I do revisit at times.

[Heck148]

Antheil (and perhaps Hanson) is a case where I do not feel that the work is on quite the level of Schuman and Mennin, but (1) the work is IMO genuinely good, (2) it strikes me as a personal musical expression, not as dutiful notespinning ("academic"), and thus (3) is music I do revisit at times.

yeh, that works, I think Schuman and Mennin, Diamond too for me, are consistently at least very good, sometimes great...Hanson and Antheil can get there too, maybe not as consistently??
another American symphony I enjoy is Bernstein #1 - "Jeremiah"...the 2nd mvt is a real "rip-snorter"...Bernstein jumps right in with the asymmetric rhythms, mixed meters, very effectively...written in 1942, this is one pissed-off piece...but, considering what was happening to the Jewish population at the time, it certainly stands to reason.

[Karl Henning]

another American symphony I enjoy is Bernstein #1 - "Jeremiah"...the 2nd mvt is a real "rip-snorter"...Bernstein jumps right in with the asymmetric rhythms, mixed meters, very effectively...written in 1942, this is one pissed-off piece...but, considering what was happening to the Jewish population at the time, it certainly stands to reason.

I need to revisit Jeremiah.  I'm a huge yuuuuge fan of The Age of Anxiety.

[Mirror Image]

I need to revisit Jeremiah.  I'm a huge yuuuuge fan of The Age of Anxiety.

+1

I like both of these Bernstein symphonies. I'm not sure how I feel about the Kaddish, though. Any thoughts?

[Cato]

yeh, that works, I think Schuman and Mennin, Diamond too for me, are consistently at least very good, sometimes great...Hanson and Antheil can get there too, maybe not as consistently...

Arnold Schoenberg advised Diamond to stay with a future as "an American Bruckner."

The discussion has jogged a memory of a letter from Schoenberg to Roy Harris.  In the letter Schoenberg states that Harris is the composer whom he considered "characteristic for American music."

Saying that he has not seen the scores, and has heard their compositions on the radio usually only once, Schoenberg lists other American composers whose music showed "talent and originality."

(It is not clear how the list is organized, or whether the names occurred to Schoenberg as he wrote (in English).)

Aaron Copland, Roger Sessions, William Schuman, David Diamond, Louis Gruenberg, Walter Piston, Anis Fuleihan, Henry Cowell, Adolphe Weiss, Gerald Strang.  He then adds as "lesser known" "Lou Harrison and Miss Dika Newlin".

The letter dates from May 1945.

[relm1]

I would suggest Mahler Symphony No. 9 is the great American symphony since Mahler was a New York resident from 1908-11 and this symphony (written 1908-9) sums up music before and transitions to what comes ahead.  Congratulations Mahler.  Honorable mention to Los Angelenos's own Rachmaninoff who live in LA after 1919 and whose Symphony No. 3 from 1934-5 is a fantastic work.

[Karl Henning]

another American symphony I enjoy is Bernstein #1 - "Jeremiah"...the 2nd mvt is a real "rip-snorter"...Bernstein jumps right in with the asymmetric rhythms, mixed meters, very effectively...written in 1942, this is one pissed-off piece...but, considering what was happening to the Jewish population at the time, it certainly stands to reason.

Cross-post:

Lenny
Symphony № 1 « Jeremiah » (1942)
Jennie Tourel, mezzo
NY Phil
The composer conducting

Large stretches of the third movement (Lamentation) are very Billy the Kid-ish, which I find touching rather, for a few reasons.  As a composer no less, Lenny was often inspired by his musical enthusiasms (and as the last chord of the Lamentation fades away, it seems almost to echo the Symphonies of Wind Instruments).  Even where I fancy echoes of the Copland, Lenny does not merely riff on the found material;  there is original material, in the first place, throughout the movement;  and there are also passages of (shall we say) warmly personalized adaptation of the found material.

I find the middle movement (Profanation) exhilarating rather than "angry," for the most part.  Maybe he meant it for angry when he wrote it, and re-thought its emotional content in the almost 20 years which elapsed before this 1961 recording?  Or do I just hear the piece otherwise?

Very strong piece;  I shan't wait anywhere so long before revisiting it again.

[Sergeant Rock]

I would suggest Mahler Symphony No. 9 is the great American symphony since Mahler was a New York resident from 1908-11 and this symphony (written 1908-9) sums up music before and transitions to what comes ahead.  Congratulations Mahler.

And we have a winner! 

Sarge

[some guy]

And what about that camera and its image of the forest?

The "good man," as you call him probably knows quite well that the camera is a mechanical device designed by conscious individuals, and the images it produces are objects that are comprehensible to humans. How else would it be?

What the camera and its image shows is that humans can devise recording devices that can capture things in recognizable ways. A microphone is not as sophisticated as an ear nor is a camera as sophisticated as an eye, but do a fair job. The brains attached to the ears and the eyes are going to interprete the frequencies and the pixels, anyway. Not only that, but with photography the brains, or perhaps it's the minds, have also to interpret two dimensional images of three dimensional objects.

Cameras and microphones can also alter things past all recognition. And what that says about the things, I think, is that "it depends."