# Throwing out the baby with the bathwater...



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

That's basically what people with what I see as not very flexible views do when giving opinions on music. The two extremes are hard core conservatives and hard core progressivists or avant-gardists, whatever we want to call them.

It might surprise some here, but on it's premiere in 1982, John Adams' _Grand Pianola Music_ did not go down well with the academic avant-garde establishment. Nor does minimalism of that kind generally get a good reception with these people.

Here are why these people call pieces like this "bad music," but of course not so directly, more in their convoluted jargonistic language.

- It has melody
- It has repetition
- It has elements of the major/minor system (eg. diatonic and tonally focused)
- It has an optimistic vibe, a "big tune," at the end (so, not only ambiguous or subtle emotions, but strong emotions, even bombast)
- It incorporates elements of popular culture/musics
- The audience, or majority of it, tends to like and simply/naturally enjoy this music (in contrast with who I'm calling the hard core avant-gardists)

Of course we can go on. Some of the composers whose music I like, such as Malcolm ARnold, Qigang Chen, Richard Mills and others have been subjected to this kind of dogmatic criticism over the years. Of course, anything can be used to pull them down, I wouldn't call their music simple-minded or a walk in the park (depending on what piece), it's not for morons.

Basically what I'm saying is that we have some of these avant-gardists pulling people down, even composers as accomplished as this, due to their own restricted ideology. & also pulling listeners down for liking new or newer classical music that in some way values tradition.

*Well what do you think? Let's have a dialogue about -

- Do you like music coming after say 1945 that does have the things the avant-gardists hate?

- Do you like music that looks back a bit to the past, but also tries to renew the past and speak to listeners today? Or incorporates "forbidden" things like folk or popular musics?

- Do you just go by the approach that it's all just music, no matter what techniques are used? (eg. the old tonal versus atonal debate which some people inordinately get focussed on?)

- Do you think, as I do, that dogma of any sort should be thrown into the trash can where it belongs?

Let's have a discussion about this, based on our experiences of music, etc...*


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## Guest (Jan 26, 2012)

Deleted by author - sigh.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

There are dogs regurgitating dogs around here? That must really be something!

1. I don't hate it, I just do my best to avoid it because I find it boring. It's not so much that they use repetition and melody but that they tend to use melody and then repeat the same one over and over. In that style a three minute piece feels like an eternity.

2. a) I think being mindful of the past is important. b) I love folk music and actively encourage combining instruments and styles of all cultures. c) In what way? A 4/4 beat and some synthesisers playing I-vi-IV-V?

3. I believe that tonality, atonality, polytonality, pantonality, microtonality, whatevertonality are all valid means of making music and should be used at will by anyone who wants to make music. Hell, non-tonality (i.e.: audibly pitchless "noises" arranged as music) is just fine by me.

4. I think dogma has the potential to be very dangerous in the case of religion, culture or politics. In this instance I don't think it's dangerous, just stupid in a bad way.


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## HarpsichordConcerto (Jan 1, 2010)

Sid James said:


> - It has melody
> - It has repetition
> - It has elements of the major/minor system (eg. diatonic and tonally focused)
> - It has an optimistic vibe, a "big tune," at the end (so, not only ambiguous or subtle emotions, but strong emotions, even bombast)
> ...


The extreme avant-garde folks are known to push music to the extreme for the sake of it. I recall member _some guy_ here at TC wrote in one of his posts last year that he believes in pushing music to the extreme, in which case almost by implication the list you wrote above will inevitably suffer in their hands. Let me give you a likely example (as well as taking the opportunity to build awareness of the following new piece).

Australian composer and pianist, Ian Munro (born 1963) was last year's _Featured Composer 2011_ by Musica Viva. He finished composing his clarinet quintet, _Songs From The Bush_ (2010). The following is a clip where the composer himself described the work and strikingly, it features every single criteria you listed above, and one or two words are pretty much spot on. I would predict that a piece as such might not go down very well at all amongst the extreme avant-garde folks.

In short, the extreme avant-garde folks would pull down these newly composed works for "not being avant-garde enough"/not "extreme enough". I call foul. I call pretentiousness. And I call decadence.

Ian Munro on his own clarinet quintet (2010, commissioned for Musica Viva). An interesting clip.


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## Vaneyes (May 11, 2010)

No need to worry, Sid, we're in the TC Oasis, where such things are passe. IOW you're preaching to the choir.

Related to this topic, it seems to me that there were more rude squirmishes a year or two ago at TC. I don't see this to be as much of a problem currently, though one can never avoid stupid utterances altogether. I saw one recently on a Schumann thread that seemed more troll-like, rather than being from an esteemed group such as the Avant-Garde.

I don't venture outside. This is all I want.


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## Guest (Jan 26, 2012)

There's always gonna be people pulling people down. I'm happiest when people focus on sharing their enthusiasms and love of good music.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

I could care less what type of label gets attached to a composer's work. The academic establishment means nothing to me. I'm just an individual who loves music. I have no contact with classical musicians, professors, critics, etc. I'm just a guy who listens to all types of music. I follow my muse, and I don't care what anybody else thinks.


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

Every three days there's another one of these posts. I think the argument is more popular than the music.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Vaneyes said:


> No need to worry, Sid, we're in the TC Oasis, where such things are passe. IOW you're preaching to the choir.
> 
> ....


Well this is true. Most people here, the vast majority, as well as those listeners and musicians known to me in real life, are not these extremes. This was just a backlash against a certain member here who pretends everyone who is not like him is inflexible or conservative. I think compared to him we are all conservatives. But I will go no further, it's not good to be negative.

I should not have used academics as a scapegoat, as I'm not against them, only "hard core" dogmatists of either conservative or avant-garde extremes. & of course, this kind of dogma seems to be dead in the water now. The example I gave was from 1982, which was 30 years ago. I have read similar examples in the 1990's, but today this type of thinking seems to be dead and buried.

I am low on time now, but I did get something out of people's responses above, which I will come back to answer properly in the next few days. Thanks for your responses...


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

i don't want to talk about him, but i suppose we're talking of the kind of extremism Boulez was famous for in his youth (or Adorno before him).
I suppose that people like them often presume that musician who don't make "extreme" music are naif, people withouth artistic awareness and sense of history. Instead i have the idea that many of those composers that make music considered pleasant, outdated, conservative, melodic, bourgeois etc have a very deep knowledge and awareness of what art is, while sometimes extremism hides only superficiality. After all the notion of what is reactionary and what is avantgarde is often really superficial.


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## Polednice (Sep 13, 2009)

*Do you like music coming after say 1945 that does have the things the avant-gardists hate?*

Yes, of course. I don't identify with the avant-garde ideology.

*Do you like music that looks back a bit to the past, but also tries to renew the past and speak to listeners today? Or incorporates "forbidden" things like folk or popular musics?*

This seems to me to be one of the best things that music can do. Looking in both directions historically is much more preferable to looking only in one direction, whichever it is.

*Do you just go by the approach that it's all just music, no matter what techniques are used? (eg. the old tonal versus atonal debate which some people inordinately get focussed on?)*

Kind of do, kind of don't. When I listen to a piece of music, I don't take particular account of the techniques used, I just try my best to enter its sound world and see whether I like or dislike the sound on that fundamental level alone. Having said that, certain techniques (such as the old atonal debate) correlate with a large number of dislikes, which in turn makes me less likely to give those kinds of techniques a chance in the future.

*Do you think, as I do, that dogma of any sort should be thrown into the trash can where it belongs?*

Not necessarily; it depends what you mean by 'dogma' here. Particularly for composers, but for listeners too, I think it is important, even essential, for them to have a "restrictive ideology". Having ideas about what music is and what music should be gives a certain framework to artistic creation - if you really didn't care about what music is, I think you'd fall at the first hurdle. The problem is then how this is used to receive other composers' works. Defend and promote your personal ideologies all you like, that's good, but _don't_ assume that your ideology is demonstrably better than another, and don't systematically criticise styles of music that compete with your own.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

bigshot said:


> Every three days there's another one of these posts. I think the argument is more popular than the music.


I'll let HC, St Lukes, and some guy continue with the arguments. I'll just listen to my CDs from Bach to Boulez.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

I'll listen to Bach through Giacinto Scelsi, Tarik O'Regan and Osvaldo Golijov... and I'll listen to Boulez as conductor... but have little use for Boulez the composer. This has nothing to do with Dogma. I like some Modern/Contemporary music more than other Modern/Contemporary music... and I don't like some Modern/Contemporary music at all. Personally, I would assume the same is true of nearly everyone.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Polednice said:


> ...
> 
> *Do you think, as I do, that dogma of any sort should be thrown into the trash can where it belongs?*
> 
> Not necessarily; it depends what you mean by 'dogma' here. Particularly for composers, but for listeners too, I think it is important, even essential, for them to have a "restrictive ideology". Having ideas about what music is and what music should be gives a certain framework to artistic creation - if you really didn't care about what music is, I think you'd fall at the first hurdle. The problem is then how this is used to receive other composers' works. Defend and promote your personal ideologies all you like, that's good, but _don't_ assume that your ideology is demonstrably better than another, and don't systematically criticise styles of music that compete with your own.


I think here you may be confusing ideology with dogma? It's easy to do and I think I do it all the time too.

Ideology is not a dirty word if not taken to an extreme. I'm just against extreme ideologies, which inevitably harden into dogma, which is inflexible to change and to realities or views outside that dogma.

I'm okay with people who value tradition, there is an argument for valuing tradition. But if that kind of ideology, or world view if you like, is used as a battering ram to further certain "hard core" conservative type of dogmas, well it doesn't wash with me. Neither does it the other way round, the other extreme, of "hard core" avant-garde dogmas, either. Both don't do much to promote their respective causes, or the cause of classical music in general. In my experience, they tend to turn people off and ignite turf wars and mudslinging contests.

The fact is that all creators will have some ideology. Eg. Ravel didn't like Beethoven's music, said it was "abonimable." Janacek didn't care much for the three B's. Ives said Chopin's and Mozart's music was for cissies.

However, I'm suspicious when critics do not admit their ideologies or bias. The classic example is the Brahms versus Bruckner camps during late 19th century in Vienna. It was not about the composers, really, it was about the critics. Hanslick on one side and Hugo Wolf (with his critic hat on) on the other. It created animosity and a false dichotomy. There are many listeners today who like both of these composer's music, including myself.

The best critics and writers on music give listeners options, they educate & inform us, they can give their opinion but they have to say that's exactly what it is, their opinion (not necessarily fact). I like writers who mix their own subjective opinions with more objective facts or consensus views. It's interesting to read the contrast between these.

But contrast this with Hanslick's famous quote that Tchaikovsky's violin concerto was music that "stinks in the ear" and Wolf's one that the cymbal clash in Bruckner's 7th symphony was worth more than all of Brahms' symphonies put together - and the serenades as well! - these are not informative, these are not educative and don't reflect any consensus view. So they're basically just the writer's own extreme ideologies - and dogma, or on the way to being dogma, at least...


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

norman bates said:


> ...
> I suppose that people like them often presume that musician who don't make "extreme" music are naif, people withouth artistic awareness and sense of history. Instead i have the idea that many of those composers that make music considered *pleasant, outdated*,* conservative*, melodic, *bourgeois* etc have a very deep knowledge and awareness of what art is, while sometimes extremism hides only* superficiality*...


It's the old Marxist dogma, that the composer has to be untainted from the broader society or any hint of commercialism ("selling out"), they have to be in an ivory tower to be a "real" artist.

It's largely of the past now, as far as I know, esp. with many composers who can both be appealing to the public and be respected by their peers in the music industry.

When I came to this forum 3 years ago, there was this anti-minimalist group of members, now all gone. Their main reason was the old Marxist reasons. Eg. these composers are too successful and for the great unwashed, who have no taste and are morons. Apart from minimalism being an easy target for these kinds of people focusing on ideology rather than the music at hand.

Which reminds me, during the 1990's, I remember reading a review by a music critic here in the paper, after the Australian premiere of Philip Glass' _Violin Concerto_, the first one. This guy said it was like a journey where you never arrive at your destination. I remember he was being critical, but not too nasty. I heard that broadcast on air, and I loved that work, immediately connected with it. Still do, it's withstood the test of time, one of his most popular works still.

But what I'd ask this reviewer, whose name I forget, is what about more experimental kinds of violin concertos? Eg. by Dutilleux, Ligeti, Carter, from the same period as that Glass one, 1980's. Would he call those like being journeys without a destination? I am quite unbiased here because I like all these, esp. the Carter one, which I think is one of his most accessible scores of more recent times which I've heard...


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

HarpsichordConcerto said:


> ...
> 
> Australian composer and pianist, *Ian Munro* (born 1963) was last year's _Featured Composer 2011_ by Musica Viva. He finished composing his clarinet quintet, _Songs From The Bush_ (2010). The following is a clip where the composer himself described the work and strikingly, it features every single criteria you listed above, and one or two words are pretty much spot on. I would predict that a piece as such might not go down very well at all amongst the extreme avant-garde folks.


I do like Ian Munro's work, esp. as a pianist and interpreter of other composer's music. I have heard a piece of his, in that Musica Viva series you mention.

THIS review of a piece by Munro in that series, by music critic Andrew Miller, comes across to me as quite balanced and basically a good read. Below are quotes of his review, I have excerpted it focussing on the piece, not Munro's performance of it which he did in this concert. This is an example of effective critical writing, fairly straightforward and talking of the music, not ideology -



> ...
> ...Ian Munro played piano himself for his new Second Piano Quintet...This new piano quintet has a similar spunky quality as the others and is also inspired by other art, in this case the poems of Judith Wright, but it works just as well, perhaps better to my ears, without the program implied by the poems. Of these pieces, it is Munro's least tonal, least traditional and most shadowy, perhaps the most difficult to interpret because of its ambiguity and disturbing sounds in the first movement, entitled Dreams. But it is a positive kind of disturbing. Quite unpredictable in a way which gives the piece scope, the notes leap quickly from one end of the keyboard to the other, using the extremities of the Yamaha to good effect, and the odd jazz chord sidles in. Likewise the tones of the strings of the quartet change unpredictable, nightmarishly even. A little four note rhythmic motif - à la Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, but here more strongly syncopated and arch - repeats obsessively, reminiscent of Stravinsky, but it is not as drum-like or percussive as Le Sacre du Printemps. It is animal rather than tribal. The tension between the rhythmic repetition and the wild throws of tone, pitch and harmony builds across the movement and though the whole piece is brief (timed at 15 minutes in the program) it seems very much longer. This dilation of time removes the piece even further from the material plane.
> 
> ...
> ...


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