# A hundred years hence...



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

...what "classical music" will people be listening to? What will they consider "classical music"? Will Bach still be enjoyed by many? Beethoven? Shostakovich? Cage?

What will be remembered and what will be forgotten? What do you think?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

I doubt that anyone will listen to classical music. What do you mean when you say many? Many people know Bach's name, but how many actively seek out his music? A small and dwindling number, and that goes for all the great figures.

Classical music, at least in the public view, drew its last breath with World War I. It is a closed repertoire. New works are performed but they have absolutely no chance to ingrain themselves firmly into history in the way that 18th and 19th century artists have.

The dustbin of history is waiting for 21st century art. We don't live in a time of art. This is a time of calculation and derivatives, steel and microchips. A utilitarian age.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

As regards contemporary classical music, various Asian and other globalized influences will be much stronger. Privileged and dedicated listeners will probably have access to some sort of intelligence-enhancing devices that can develop the listening experience with supplementary analytical material and inputs etc. during the listening, or re-create the music and performances in new ways and designs. An enormous amount of music will be accessible through public archives, though not necessarily free.

I doubt that more than say 3-5 pieces by Cage will enter the general canon. Sorabji, Carter and Boulez will be included in it as representatives of the music developments of our time, whereas a lot of the cinematically popular, neo-romantic and neo-classical 20th-century stuff and kitschy pieces of the 19th century will be largely forgotten. 

I don´t think that active, live operatic and orchestral performances will have the same frequency as nowadays, unless progress will also mean that "everybody" has been able to become a decent musician too ...

Just sketchy thoughts ...


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

I just hope humanity is still thriving a hundred years hence. If we are, there will be good music. 

I'd like to tell all the dudes with the nuclear weapons and the folks engineering super viruses and also the people or robots who are going to enslave us: I just need 50 more years. Maybe even only 40. OK? Let me get my traveling and reading done, and then you can... whatever. 

But in those 50 years I expect to hear a lot of great new music composed by youngsters from all over the world, even perhaps Australia and wherever violadude lives.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

It's impossible to know. Ergo, I don't care.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

All I know is that the music, that is considered classical will be very different from today..............


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Pop music will destroy itself within a decade because it sounds more and more similar as the years go by and people's short attention spans will get so bored they have to listen to classical music as a remedy. Jazz will develop further, avant-garde improvisations of the future just end up becoming neo-aleatoric classical music, the composers go back to Cage and other great 20th century aleatoricists for inspiration. Classical music will continue to evolve, new styles and genres and innovations branching out, gathering inspiration from across the universe and new classical music will dominate concert programs, audiences are finally accustomed to good modern stuff.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Pop music will destroy itself within a decade because it sounds more and more similar as the years go by and people's short attention spans will get so bored they have to listen to classical music as a remedy. Jazz will develop further, avant-garde improvisations of the future just end up becoming neo-aleatoric classical music, the composers go back to Cage and other great 20th century aleatoricists for inspiration. Classical music will continue to evolve, new styles and genres and innovations branching out, gathering inspiration from across the universe and new classical music will dominate concert programs, audiences are finally accustomed to good modern stuff.


- could you do us a favour & remember to check which one of us was right ;-) ? 
You are one of those here who will actually be able to get a fair impression of the likely situation then ...


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## GraemeG (Jun 30, 2009)

Oh, jeez, you people who think you're living at the end of time itself. Get a grip.
The Concertgebouw Orkest, which is 125 years old this year, will be 225. Everyone from Monteverdi to Rachmaninov will be played just as they have been for the last 50 years. The 'museum culture' I read about here from time to time will carry on just the same as it is now. Some more works from the 1950s 60s 70s 80s 90s, 2000s, 2010s will have entered the standard repertoire, probably not that many.

Even nowadays, almost no-one seems to write for an enlightened mainstream (maybe because there isn't one?); there are either esoteric academics experimenting with their theories, playing ever more cerebral and less interesting works to each other, and at the other extreme the cohort of Shore and Zimmer writing derivative stuff for lowbrow/popular culture. Not sure this will change a lot.

Maybe someone who's writing for film will write something memorable and permanent. Maybe future generations will dredge through stuff we've written off: Korngold, Hermann, Rosza etc. and find things in it that we've not responded too, in the same way that Vivaldi resided in semi-obsurity for 200 years after his death.

But all the big names who fill concert halls nowadays: Beethoven, Mahler, the usual suspects; no change. Those guys wrote, intentionally or otherwise, for eternity.

No-one will remember Justin Bieber, or David Cassidy, or.... all their predecessors who are forgotten already.
cheers,
Graeme


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Good god- I hope they don't remember Bieber, don't tempt fate thou.......... 

and David who, please don't tell me as I had forgotten until you mentioned his name!


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## Guest (Apr 1, 2013)

...none of us will be alive.

None of our children will, either.

Some grandchildren, maybe.

But we are all alive today and can listen to music today.

It is enough.

When the term "classical music" was coined (in 1810, just by the way), it was immediately applied to music of the past. It immediately set up the whole notion of "greatness." It also immediately set up the notion of posterity. The great works of the past have survived to the present; what are the great works of today that will survive into the future?

But it's all an illusion. The "great" works of the past in 1810 had been written before the notion of greatness was considered all that important for music. They were not so much great when they were made as they had greatness conferred upon them by later listeners for whom "greatness" had become a big deal. And posterity? Well, since none of us will be around to see, we are free to speculate wildly and irrationally to our hearts' content. And for what?

Well, one use of "posterity" is to degrade the value of the present. It was like that in 1810. It was like that in 1910. It is like that today. And really, what's the point? We are alive today. Today is all we've got. Today is enough. 

(Oh, right. And yesterday. We've got yesterday, too. All our troubles seemed so far away.)


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

GraemeG said:


> Oh, jeez, you people who think you're living at the end of time itself. Get a grip.
> The Concertgebouw Orkest, which is 125 years old this year, will be 225. Everyone from Monteverdi to Rachmaninov will be played just as they have been for the last 50 years. The 'museum culture' I read about here from time to time will carry on just the same as it is now. Some more works from the 1950s 60s 70s 80s 90s, 2000s, 2010s will have entered the standard repertoire, probably not that many.


More works from those decades? How about a single work from those decades? To be part of the standard repertoire surely entails more than being played a few times before an extremely isolated group of cigarette smoking, deconstructed, post-postmodern, avant the avant-garde, decadent children of Marxists crawled out of the armpit of Europe.

Beethoven, at his death, even if he was not fully understood, was known to practically every German who could read the alphabet. His works had entered deeply and widely into the life of every German of even the slightest culture.

Has any 20th or 21st century composer (or any recent artist for that matter) achieved this in his nation? No. Is it likely one ever will? No.


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## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)

KenOC said:


> ...what "classical music" will people be listening to? What will they consider "classical music"? Will Bach still be enjoyed by many? Beethoven? Shostakovich? Cage?
> 
> What will be remembered and what will be forgotten? What do you think?


Contemporary classical music will all be Chinese by then. Expect epic symphonies and Ring-like operas based on Chinese history and mythology. But they'll still hold the Old Masters in high regard.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

some guy said:


> But it's all an illusion. The "great" works of the past in 1810 had been written before the notion of greatness was considered all that important for music. They were not so much great when they were made as they had greatness conferred upon them by later listeners for whom "greatness" had become a big deal. And posterity? Well, since none of us will be around to see, we are free to speculate wildly and irrationally to our hearts' content. And for what?


If no one considered greatness a "big deal" it was because very few people before the 19th century had access to great music except in church. Till then, great musicians served aristocracy, isolated from each other and from the lower classes, and only in the early 19th century were those aristocratic structures loosened, making musicians free professionals; now they could survey in a more complete fashion the history of music and compare the relative greatness of composers beyond their own cities and nations, and those of the past. When one is more or less a paid craftsman serving a grand duke, certainly the notion of comparative greatness over vast stretches of time was of little concern and too difficult to evaluate--all the same I hardly find this parochial ignorance something to celebrate.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Pop music will destroy itself within a decade because it sounds more and more similar as the years go by and people's short attention spans will get so bored they have to listen to classical music as a remedy.


That assumes that the success of pop music has anything to do with how it sounds in the first place. The success of pop music is the success of mass marketing--music as such has no connection with it, nor has it ever since the days of Al Jolson.


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## HarpsichordConcerto (Jan 1, 2010)

some guy said:


> ...none of us will be alive.
> 
> None of our children will, either.
> 
> ...


Interesting reading this post, which I do recall with some familiarity. You did write the same elsewhere again and agian here at TC I recall. (Like the safety measures when one gets on a plane and hears but most don't bother with beyond paying attention to it once).

It's alright to have no notion of greatness. It's easier to wallow in shallow pools. And worse, donate money to support it.


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## HarpsichordConcerto (Jan 1, 2010)

KenOC said:


> ...what "classical music" will people be listening to? What will they consider "classical music"? Will Bach still be enjoyed by many? Beethoven? Shostakovich? Cage?
> 
> What will be remembered and what will be forgotten? What do you think?


Well, look at the last ten years. Baroque and early music have enjoyed such re-discovered unparalled ever since Classicism took it over. Early attempts even fifty years ago at performing music of JS Bach for example compared to practices today are worlds apart. I think older music is more alive and increasingly so. Perhaps this might plateau. I don't know. But if the recent years were anything to base one's speculation on, I doubt the party is over anytime soon.

I'm going to buy a new release on the _Heinrich Schütz Edition _(Brilliant Classics). We are so fortunate to that we have older music at our fingertips.


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## ptr (Jan 22, 2013)

I don't think it will be much different then it is now; there will be a bunch of powdered wigs arguing that the old established music is much prettier and nicer to listen to and a seemingly minority avant-gardists who constantly tell the world around them that it is at failure not to embrace contemporary music; but in all, most of the world will still look at the both of these, shake their heads thinking, *oh no*, those extremists are still at it, enough with this time consuming war that leads nowhere!

...kinda dejavuich like most of musical history has been!

/ptr


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

I disagree that we shouldn't care about what happens after we die. At the very least we can hope!


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

joen_cph said:


> - could you do us a favour & remember to check which one of us was right ;-) ?
> You are one of those here who will actually be able to get a fair impression of the likely situation then ...


Mine has more likes so... :tiphat:


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

I can't be relied on to make informed predictions, but I really like ComposerOfAvantgarde's idea about pop music destroying itself and people coming back to classical, because it will be the only music that will still sound like music, and not like computer-generated mechanical noise. Maybe then our descendants will bring forth another Beethoven or Wagner or Mozart.


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## rrudolph (Sep 15, 2011)

One hundred years from now the only music on this planet will be Satie's Vexations and an automated performance of Cage's ASLSP. Didn't you read my prediction in the Apocalypse thread over in the Community Forum?

Sometimes I think this gift of prophesy is more curse than gift.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

SiegendesLicht said:


> I can't be relied on to make informed predictions, but I really like ComposerOfAvantgarde's idea about pop music destroying itself and people coming back to classical, because it will be the only music that will still sound like music, and not like computer-generated mechanical noise. Maybe then our descendants will bring forth another Beethoven or Wagner or Mozart.


Aldous Huxley believed that people and humanity will be destroyed by the things they like, and it's coming true. Greed for money, commercialism etc. is doing bad things for everyone. The rich become richer, the poor become poorer, enhanced greenhouse gas effect becomes...more enhanced. Most people like pop music, that's a fact, songwriters write music that people like and the different sounds, melodies and chord pregressions are becoming so similar because of the narrow minded general public that it will reach a dead end and have nowhere to go. It will, in a sense, destroy itself, but not before it corrupts the minds of pop music listeners into believing it has any "value" at all. Pop music is on a crash course that can only be saved with innovative new compositional ideas, and songwriters would be too scared to write something that won't become a hit because it's so different wouldn't they?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Aldous Huxley believed that people and humanity will be destroyed by the things they like, and it's coming true. Greed for money, commercialism etc. is doing bad things for everyone. The rich become richer, the poor become poorer, enhanced greenhouse gas effect becomes...more enhanced.


The divide between the rich and poor, taken as a whole, is less wide than at any other time in history. Besides, the middle class as we know it has only existed since the 19th century. The poor in today's western countries would have been considered quite well off by the standards of past times.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Logos said:


> The divide between the rich and poor, taken as a whole, is less wide than at any other time in history. Besides, the middle class as we know it has only existed since the 19th century. The poor in today's western countries would have been considered quite well off by the standards of past times.


Yeah I know, I'm just trying to exaggerate that notion and link it to a bunch of other stuff making it seem as if pop music etc. is extremely problematic. I'm kinda half-joking about it if you can't tell...


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## Guest (Apr 1, 2013)

some guy said:


> ...none of us will be alive.
> 
> None of our children will, either.
> 
> ...


I absolutely disagree that using the word "posterity" degrades the value of the present. And it's not all an "illusion". An illusion is something which exists in the figment of somebody's imagination: say, for argument's sake, somebody continues to believe that talking to people endlessly about contemporary music will ensure they 'obey' and start listening to it. That's an illusion.

And today is all we've got? Yeah, that's if you've got Alzheimer's Disease.

And I didn't know that the term "classical music" was coined in 1810. You don't know the exact date by any chance, and by whom?

I submit that we are all the 'product' of our past experiences and our in-built abilities to process the present and future are based upon that. There's a famous quote about those who fail to learn the lessons of the past..... but I've forgotten what it is (because I'm trapped in the present).


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

The key difference, as I see it, will be the further proliferation of the DIY movement, the latest stage of development of independent art, and, perhaps, its apotheosis. It is already a widespread cultural phenomenon that accounts for a good number of works produced in music, literature, film and the visual arts, and these works are spread freely via the internet, reaching people all over the world. It is largely a movement comprised of youth at this time, which suggests that towards the middle of the 21st century today's young upstarts will become its old masters, their mature works becoming cornerstones of a free (libre) music. I think this will ultimately result in a redefinition of ethnic or folk music, the current phenomenon of the house show (in which a band or artist plays at a fan's house) will expand and evolve, eventually taking us to a new form of the traditional community dance party.

My fellow whippersnapper CoAG has suggested that pop music will destroy itself, I think this is a possibility, but it will never have much of anything to do with the music itself. Frank Zappa once said that Varèse would be popular if you had a guy with a tambourine at the front of the stage bopping along to it, and, while perhaps not so ridiculous, or at least not in the same manner of ridiculousness, it is essentially true that any music can be packaged and sold to any demographic with clever enough marketing, because it is the surface that people pay attention to and not the content (the reasons for this are multifarious and constitute a topic of such proportions that several threads would be need simply to assess it in brief, so I'll leave that alone). We might be living in a utilitarian state, but we are far from being a utilitarian society, by and large our consumerist instincts are visual, so, if a bland and uninteresting piece of music is associated with a particular appealing image, whether it be semi-nude women shaking their stuff, people driving fancy cars, people wearing fancy clothes, people in exotic locales, all of the above or any other ugly kind of thing you could imagine, a particular demographic will flock to it. What will destroy pop music is the industry itself; as the aforementioned DIY movement continues to grow, more and more people will be making their own choices regarding the kinds of entertainment they want to consume rather than allowing an executive elite to dictate their tastes to them. When this happens, that elite will lose touch with the majority of consumers and the industry will either collapse in on itself or become severely marginalised.

I have notably ignored the question of who will be listened to by whom, and what stylistic developments will take place. These are of little importance, I feel, the former because we are today able to listen to music that is well over 2000 years old (e.g.: the oldest piece of music I have a recording of is a fragment of Hurrian music from c. 1950 BCE) and I do not see any reason, barring a worldwide cataclysm, why the same will not be true in centuries to come; the latter because I do not see any reason, barring a worldwide cataclysm, why the current trend of polystylism and electronic/technological augmentation will not continue.

In a word: Liberation.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> I submit that we are all the 'product' of our past experiences and our in-built abilities to process the present and future are based upon that. There's a famous quote about those who fail to learn the lessons of the past..... but I've forgotten what it is (because I'm trapped in the present).


Imagine if someguy's artistic criteria were applied to other aspects of life--every generation would have to reinvent the wheel, walking around naked, unwilling to learn anything from their ancestors for fear of being old fashioned or outmoded. But what would be more outmoded than for posterity continually to return to square one due to an aversion to building organically on the accomplishments of the past?


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## deggial (Jan 20, 2013)

Logos said:


> The poor in today's western countries would have been considered quite well off by the standards of past times.


true, but they don't live in past times.


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## Guest (Apr 1, 2013)

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> I absolutely disagree that using the word "posterity" degrades the value of the present [...]


I think the point here is when did the notion of posterity enter the equation? Or to put it another way: when did 'historical awareness' enter the fray? Please do correct me, but it strikes me that composers such as Beethoven were aware that their music would exist beyond their time. I have no documentary evidence to the contrary, but I wonder to what extent Bach imagined that?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

deggial said:


> true, but they don't live in past times.


But does that mean they should form a clamorous mob and greedily demand even more or that they should gain a bit of historical knowledge, and realize that they are, materially speaking, infinitely better off than most of their ancestors and be thankful for the comparative bounty that they have?


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

TalkingHead said:


> I think the point here is when did the notion of posterity enter the equation? Or to put it another way: when did 'historical awareness' enter the fray? Please do correct me, but it strikes me that composers such as Beethoven were aware that their music would exist beyond their time. I have no documentary evidence to the contrary, but I wonder to what extent Bach imagined that?


That began in the revolutionary/Napoleonic age when composers began to break free of the aristocracy and church. Before that composers were just another group of craftsmen and entertainers--cobblers made shoes, musicians made music. They weren't the "artistes" or divas that they later became.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

TalkingHead said:


> ...but I wonder to what extent Bach imagined that?


A good question. But Bach did write his own name into at least two works...


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## Guest (Apr 1, 2013)

TalkingHead said:


> I think the point here is when did the notion of posterity enter the equation? Or to put it another way: when did 'historical awareness' enter the fray? Please do correct me, but it strikes me that composers such as Beethoven were aware that their music would exist beyond their time. I have no documentary evidence to the contrary, but I wonder to what extent Bach imagined that?


Yes, it's an interesting question isn't it!! Posterity entered the 'equation' the minute people realized there were consequences for their actions. This word is not the prerogative of art and culture.

However, I think you mean composers who wrote with an eye to the future. Beethoven is on the record as saying he was writing his final works "for later ages". As to Bach, we can only speculate. Personally, it's a question of genius. If a person is composing partly because he is a pedagogue then he will expect that what he has contributed will last and have meaning. I'm thinking here of "The Art of Fugue" and Bach's "48" which, even though an academic exercise to prove that all keys were 'accessible', were nothing less than profoundly musical. If you know you're a genius I suspect you'd realize there were consequences for posterity. The fact that we know so very little about Bach paradoxically suggests that he wasn't into self-promotion and this is where the issue becomes very complicated. Trouble is, we in the 21st century are so accustomed to the idea of instant fame and the cult of 'celebrity'.

Great discussion to have!!


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## Guest (Apr 1, 2013)

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> Yes, it's an interesting question isn't it!! Posterity entered the 'equation' the minute people realized there were consequences for their actions. This word is not the prerogative of art and culture.
> 
> However, I think you mean composers who wrote with an eye to the future. Beethoven is on the record as saying he was writing his final works "for later ages". As to Bach, we can only speculate. Personally, it's a question of genius. If a person is composing partly because he is a pedagogue then he will expect that what he has contributed will last and have meaning. I'm thinking here of "The Art of Fugue" and Bach's "48" which, even though an academic exercise to prove that all keys were 'accessible', were nothing less than profoundly musical. If you know you're a genius I suspect you'd realize there were consequences for posterity. The fact that we know so very little about Bach paradoxically suggests that he wasn't into self-promotion and this is where the issue becomes very complicated. Trouble is, we in the 21st century are so accustomed to the idea of instant fame and the cult of 'celebrity'.
> Great discussion to have!!


Thank you, I do try! But seriously, when did the 'historical awareness' kick in? The advent of printing (Gutenberg and all that)? I know that Beethoven (and other composers after him) have mentioned the words 'This music is for later times', but did Bach have that assurance? And Mozart? And Haydn?


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## Guest (Apr 2, 2013)

The idea of writing for the future was one consequence of the idea of greatness. Instead of "music," you now have "_classical_ music," which is much cooler and snootier. Great art is superior and the people who get it are consequently superior themselves. The people who don't get it right away clamor for program notes and lectures so that they can join the cool club. (There's a wee history of ideas of the 19th century right there, in a nutshell.*)

In any case, assurance is assuredly the wrong concept to apply to composers pre-Beethoven. Assurance is for when you have an idea of what you want but aren't sure if you're gonna get it. Bach and Mozart and Haydn didn't have the idea of writing for the future. They were writing for now. (Their now, not ours.)

By the way, speaking of history, a lot of the remarks about music being wholly the province of the elite, the nobility, or of the church, is all my grandmother's eye. If you look at the programs for public concerts in the 18th century, you will see that the idea is to include something for everyone: pop tunes, opera arias, symphony movements, sacred songs, and so forth.

The idea of an elite developed with the rise of the middle class, actually. And the snootiness associated with "classical music" as well.

*Actually this is that history in a nutshell: Instead of "music," you now have "_classical_ music," which is much cooler and snootier. Great art is superior and the people who get it are consequently superior themselves. The people who don't get it right away clamor for program notes and lectures so that they can join the cool club.


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## Guest (Apr 2, 2013)

some guy said:


> The idea of writing for the future was one consequence of the idea of greatness. Instead of "music," you now have "_classical_ music," which is much cooler and snootier. Great art is superior and the people who get it are consequently superior themselves. The people who don't get it right away clamor for program notes and lectures so that they can join the cool club. (There's a wee history of ideas of the 19th century right there, in a nutshell.*)
> 
> In any case, assurance is assuredly the wrong concept to apply to composers pre-Beethoven. Assurance is for when you have an idea of what you want but aren't sure if you're gonna get it. Bach and Mozart and Haydn didn't have the idea of writing for the future. They were writing for now. (Their now, not ours.)
> 
> ...


Oh I see - so aristocrats like the French kings and the Gonzaga family of Mantua didn't use cool operas and concerts to impress other aristocrats and to stitch up foreign trade deals. Why do you think "L'Orfeo" has a fanfare to begin the opera - so that the aristocrats could find their seats before the proceedings began. The minute music was separated by da chiesa and de camera it became the prerogative of the elite. In the first place it took an EDUCATION in order to be able to read music. The folk music outside the church was carried in an oral tradition but once notated music was printed and disseminated there needed to be 'specialists' to communicate it to an audience. That did then and does now require skill. And, of course, Mozart's operas like Magic Flute were performed for wider audiences but the majority of his music was written to order for a specific, educated group.

You can imagine a kind of "Shakespearean" audience for music - you know, with folk standing up and hurling stuff if they didn't like it. Perhaps a close study of early public concerts in London might provide some clarity. And kunstmusik was not written for people who have and had the attention span of gnats!


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## HarpsichordConcerto (Jan 1, 2010)

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> Oh I see - so aristocrats like the French kings and the Gonzaga family of Mantua didn't use cool operas and concerts to impress other aristocrats and to stitch up foreign trade deals. Why do you think "L'Orfeo" has a fanfare to begin the opera - so that the aristocrats could find their seats before the proceedings began. The minute music was separated by da chiesa and de camera it became the prerogative of the elite. In the first place it took an EDUCATION in order to be able to read music. The folk music outside the church was carried in an oral tradition but once notated music was printed and disseminated there needed to be 'specialists' to communicate it to an audience. That did then and does now require skill. And, of course, Mozart's operas like Magic Flute were performed for wider audiences but the majority of his music was written to order for a specific, educated group.
> 
> You can imagine a kind of "Shakespearean" audience for music - you know, with folk standing up and hurling stuff if they didn't like it. Perhaps a close study of early public concerts in London might provide some clarity. And kunstmusik was not written for people who have and had the attention span of gnats!


Indeed, I concur. It seems the preceding post to yours displayed an astounding amount of historical confusion (see quoted below mine). The opera was an elite endeavour. When George Frideric Handel, the first continental composer "imported" the Italian opera into England for the first time, it was part of an edeavour to "fashionalise" the prevailing Italianess that was perceived to be the frontier of all matters artistic. Italy was the artistic capital of the world at the time, and it was part of the gentleman's education that a "grand tour" of continental Europe was essential to "seeing the world". It was of no middle-class interest. It had no middle-class support. It was an elite sport - they wanted the best singers in England, they wanted the most extravagant staging and they wanted to beat the Italians at their own game; they imported literally the best singers and composers of the world into England (this sowed the seeds for financial ruin, eventually). The point being that it is sheer nonsense, as the preceding post suggested, that "the idea of an elite developed with the rise of the middle class, actually. And the snootiness associated with "classical music" as well". Absurd.



some guy said:


> The idea of writing for the future was one consequence of the idea of greatness. Instead of "music," you now have "_classical_ music," which is much cooler and snootier. Great art is superior and the people who get it are consequently superior themselves. The people who don't get it right away clamor for program notes and lectures so that they can join the cool club. (There's a wee history of ideas of the 19th century right there, in a nutshell.*)
> 
> In any case, assurance is assuredly the wrong concept to apply to composers pre-Beethoven. Assurance is for when you have an idea of what you want but aren't sure if you're gonna get it. Bach and Mozart and Haydn didn't have the idea of writing for the future. They were writing for now. (Their now, not ours.)
> 
> ...


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## sharik (Jan 23, 2013)

KenOC said:


> A hundred years hence...what "classical music" will people be listening to?


the same old *****, from Monteverdi through Shosty.


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## Bone (Jan 19, 2013)

Goldie89 on youtube gives us an object lesson: today's mediocre music will be forgotten and the truly great music will continue to attract an audience. Elitism may play a part in some people's listening choices, but I honestly believe that 2-5% of the world population will support European art music because it speaks deeply to them. Beethoven, Bach, Haydn, and Brahms will be around for a while....


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## Guest (Apr 2, 2013)

The situation with respect to the middle class is particularly interesting and I have examined the situation in Vienna after the Congress of Vienna.

It's interesting that the rise of the bourgeoise class in Vienna (Biedermier period) saw people acquire pianos and the training for music. This is where Schubert started his career - playing in the salons of patrons and friends who loved reading, socializing, talking and listening to music. He went to the Staatskonvikt where he had a comprehensive musical education to either teach or play an instrument (he did both, of course). According to research I did last year (specifically an essay by Otto Biba) musical evenings in these salons also catered to people who were *not very discerning at al*l and the standard of playing and the expectation of the kind of music to be heard not very demanding. It was the era of the Schubertiade and for every connoisseur there were many who knew little. This was transposed to the concert hall and opera theatre where the demand for lighter music after the dark years of the Napoleonic wars threatened to overwhelm serious composers like Beethoven. He had harsh things to say about Viennese audiences towards the end of his life. But I think he grew exponentially more difficult and 'incomprehensible' in direct proportion to the Viennese tendency towards less demanding music. Nevertheless, the Viennese saw themselves as an 'exclusive' audience in a very discerning city.

It's a fascinating topic. There are some good books on the topic, particularly "Musical Life in Biedermier Vienna" - Alice M. Hanson.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

When I look at the technological advances and the improving quality of life in our civilization, I am very optimistic about its future. But when I look at factors like the majority's musical tastes, I become very pessimistic. The truth, I guess, should be somewhere in the middle.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

The emergence of the music business in the early 19th century meant that for the first time both popular and classical music were sold as competing wares to the middle class and therefore the division between them was more carefully delineated. It's only natural that the term classical music would emerge during this time, not that the division had not existed all along.

Before that time, there was so little contact between the music of the peasant and that of the court and church that there was no need to separate them further with terminology.


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> This was transposed to the concert hall and opera theatre where the demand for lighter music after the dark years of the Napoleonic wars threatened to overwhelm serious composers like Beethoven. He had harsh things to say about Viennese audiences towards the end of his life. But I think he grew exponentially more difficult and 'incomprehensible' in direct proportion to the Viennese tendency towards less demanding music.


I remember Wagner saying something to the effect that Beethoven hurled his works onto an unsuspecting and uncomprehending public. Important to remember when so many would have us believe that classical music was simply the popular music of a past time, whereas in fact it descended from a separate scholarly and ecclesiastical tradition of service to the courts and church.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Logos said:


> I remember Wagner saying something to the effect that Beethoven hurled his works onto an unsuspecting and uncomprehending public. Important to remember when so many would have us believe that classical music was simply the popular music of a past time, whereas in fact it descended from a separate scholarly and ecclesiastical tradition of service to the courts and church.


Indeed, in his lifetime Beethoven was always considered a "serious" and "learned" composer, in distinction to some others like Rossini. Although they were in competition to some extent, my impression is that Beethoven sold to the sheet music and non-vocal amateur audience for the most part, with only occasional concerts, while Rossini was mainly after the opera concert audience. Maybe somebody can clarify or correct this...


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

HarpsichordConcerto said:


> The opera was an elite endeavour. When George Frideric Handel, the first continental composer "imported" the Italian opera into England for the first time, it was part of an edeavour to "fashionalise" the prevailing Italianess that was perceived to be the frontier of all matters artistic. Italy was the artistic capital of the world at the time, and it was part of the gentleman's education that a "grand tour" of continental Europe was essential to "seeing the world". It was of no middle-class interest.


I think some of the confusion results from the fact that many operas (not the best ones) catered to an elite that did not necessarily have a deep understanding of music or drama, and so many composers resorted to flashy tricks which come across as vulgar when compared to the works of later composers who composed for themselves or those composing for the church.


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## Guest (Apr 2, 2013)

Logos said:


> I remember Wagner saying something to the effect that Beethoven hurled his works onto an unsuspecting and uncomprehending public. Important to remember when so many would have us believe that classical music was simply the popular music of a past time, whereas in fact it descended from a separate scholarly and ecclesiastical tradition of service to the courts and church.


You are so right about the tradition of kunstmusik. I'm not sure about Richard Wagner's "authority" when it came to Beethoven, though. (He had his own agenda.)


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## Logos (Nov 3, 2012)

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> You are so right about the tradition of kunstmusik. I'm not sure about Richard Wagner's "authority" when it came to Beethoven, though. (He had his own agenda.)


Whether true or not, Wagner, like Brahms, saw himself as the direct descendant of Beethoven, and he was in his day considered a leading interpreter and elucidator of Beethoven. He viewed his music dramas as the transformation of Beethoven's symphonic language into dramatic form. Again, whether this be true I leave it to more competent authorities to judge.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Logos said:


> Whether true or not, Wagner, like Brahms, saw himself as the direct descendant of Beethoven, and he was in his day considered a leading interpreter and elucidator of Beethoven. He viewed his music dramas as the transformation of Beethoven's symphonic language into dramatic form. Again, whether this be true I leave it to more competent authorities to judge.


There is of course truth in it, but Berlioz, Schumann, and Brahms also claimed the mantle of Beethoven's successor, and they all had different perspectives about what Beethoven represented.


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## Guest (Apr 3, 2013)

Logos said:


> ...the early 19th century....
> 
> Before that time, there was so little contact between the music of the peasant and that of the court and church that there was no need to separate them further with terminology.


That dates are a bit off. By about a hundred years.

The most of the 18th century was full of public concerts attended by a wide range of classes--certainly containing a wide range of musical styles.

Concerts were called miscellanies for a reason. And the principle they followed was collegiality. People went to concerts expecting a wide range of styles and genres. Only in the 19th century, do you start to see concerts devoted to a single genre, the string quartet, say. And the whole century was a struggle between the traditional idea--that you programmed for a wide range of tastes and that you featured mainly living composers--and the new idea--that you programmed for an increasingly narrower range of taste and that you featured mainly dead composers.

It took all century to affect this change, and there were still pockets of resistance well into the twentieth century. Recordings would, of course, cement the change. It's permanent now, I fear, along with the attitude (pretty much dating from Beethoven's time) of distrust of living composers, which also grew throughout the 19th century, until by 1900, it was pretty well set.

Note that 1900 is still more than a decade before the pieces by Schoenberg and Stravinsky that supposedly alienated concert goers by the droves. More than two decades before the "avant garde" could have had enough exposure to be said to have had any effect on concert attendance. The record shows that the alienation started, grew, and culminated before any of the pieces now referred to as "atonal" or "avant garde" or "experimental" or even "modern" in its 20th century sense of "modernistic."

("Modern" was a term used in the 19th century, but there it was a moving target, still, identifying the most recent, most current practices. Only in the early decades of the 20th century did the word get attached to a particular style (or group of styles), so that Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Ravel, and Bartok, for instance, can still be referred to as "modern.")


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Well, you know that saying about the two things which float to the top? One of the two is 'la creme,' .... the other 

That is pretty much what you will have.


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## julianoq (Jan 29, 2013)

Mahlerian said:


> There is of course truth in it, but Berlioz, Schumann, and Brahms also claimed the mantle of Beethoven's successor, and they all had different perspectives about what Beethoven represented.


I read that Brahms suffered a lot of pressure (from the others and from himself) to continue the work of Beethoven, and this was one of the reasons for him taking at least 14 years to compose the No. 1. Not a light burden to carry I suppose!


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

julianoq said:


> I read that Brahms suffered a lot of pressure (from the others and from himself) to continue the work of Beethoven, and this was one of the reasons for him taking at least 14 years to compose it. Not a light burden to carry I suppose!


That sort of pressure would really slow down the development of music.............


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