# The Problem of Mozart



## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

From *Mozart* by Maynard Solomon:

_"Relatively little attention has been has been paid to the individuality of Mozart's style. Perhaps this is due to the inherent difficulties of defining any musical style, let alone the idiosyncratic style, of a composer whose greatness consists, at least in part, in his seeming purging of subjectivity in the service of a perfected, classical objectivity. For many, indeed, Mozart has exemplified the supreme artist whose works transcend issues of personality, of self-revelation, of originality."

_Paraphrasing further: _"Figures like T.S. Eliot and Goethe agree; Mozart's works were hard to think of as products of subjectivity; they seemed to have been always in existence, to have issued from an ideal sphere. Mozart's music did not show the labor that went into its creation. Mozart's creativity came to be considered as the product of forces external to him; he was regarded as a receptive, neutral instrument or vessel of a vital, perhaps divine, force; he was thought to have written music automatically, because that was his instinctive nature, to make music as a silkworm spins silk. In the early 1830's Goethe even intimated that Mozart's creativity might be due to an otherworldly, perhaps even demonic, element."

_*Reactions?*


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Good post, millions!

There's two things here: the effect of the music, and where we think the music comes from. So, the music has the effect is that we think the music is transcendental, it "purges subjectivity", it sounds like it arrived as an "objective, classical ideal."

I'd have a lot of sympathy with that.

But the second issue is the one the Romantics came to define, until recently: that Mozart was a "_ receptive, neutral instrument or vessel of a vital, perhaps divine, force; he was thought to have written music automatically, because that was his instinctive nature, to make music as a silkworm spins silk_." The Goethe quote sums up a lot of this feeling, that Mozart's music came from some demonic prompt (Goethe said this of _Don Giovanni_).

I think that actually the music is the product of a hard-working, practical but inspired mind. I don't think of Wolfie as being an ignorant conduit to another sphere, but instead, he was just a brilliant craftsman who left no traces of his labour. The 19th century stereotypists have had a field day with Mozart, making him out to be part-angel, part-hooligan, a receptor of divine inspiration and so on, but really, he was an inspired genius who laboured hard, had great taste and the ability to turn his hand at everything with proficiency...


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Kieran said:


> ...I don't think of Wolfie as being an ignorant conduit to another sphere, but instead, he was just a brilliant craftsman _who left no traces of *his *labour. _ The 19th century stereotypists have had a field day with Mozart, making him out to be part-angel, part-hooligan, a receptor of divine inspiration and so on, but really, he was an inspired genius who laboured hard, had great taste and the ability to turn his hand at everything with proficiency...


Don't you see, though, that you have defined the "problem" for us _again,_ Kieran; that by "leaving no trace of *HIS* labor," that Mozart has, in effect, left no trace of his personality.

In this sense, he has "transcended his own ego" and has become the ultimate model of modernist objectivity, which places process above personality. Not unlike John Cage and Pierre Boulez, ironically.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

millionrainbows said:


> Don't you see, though, that you have defined the "problem" for us _again,_ Kieran; that by "leaving no trace of *HIS* labor," that Mozart has, in effect, left no trace of his personality.
> 
> In this sense, he has "transcended his own ego" and has become the ultimate model of modernist objectivity, which places process above personality. Not unlike John Cage and Pierre Boulez, ironically.


I think there's a lot of definitions in there!

His music is ego-less in the sense that it isn't written in the first-person, like a lot of Romantic composers. His music isn't autobiographical. This isn't to say that he isn't in the music ambiently. He can only compose based upon his own knowledge. So his personality can still be in the music, in his choices etc, but who can tell what part of the music best reflects his personality? He wrote great tragic music alongside other pieces that were light and whimsical. This is because he was a working musician. Did he "check his ego at the door" when he composed? It's not impossible. We don't read the plays of Shakespeare and conclude he was like Hamlet - or Orphelia. These were types he knew of and could write.

In Alex Ross excellent article, The Storm of Style, he writes that "I got the feeling that Mozart's brain contained an array of musical archetypes that were connected to particular dramatic situations or emotional states-figures connoting vengeance, reconciliation, longing, and so on." And so if this is the case, the content wouldn't necessarily be always the Composer - which is more a 19th century trick...


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## Kevin Pearson (Aug 14, 2009)

From what I know of Mozart, which is mostly limited to his music and liner notes, he seemed to be able to create music rather spontaneously and with little effort. Music flowed from him unlike Beethoven who had to work harder at creating his masterpieces. It does not make one better than the other. It just shows that the creative process can be easier for some than it is for others. And that's not to say that Mozart didn't work at his music but it did seem to come more naturally. I don't understand anyone who claims to like or love classical music that cannot see the genius of Mozart. You don't have to like his music to acknowledge what has been so obvious to much of the classical music world for over 200 years.

Kevin


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Kieran said:


> *"His music is ego-less* in the sense that it isn't written in the first-person, like a lot of Romantic composers. *His music isn't autobiographical*. This isn't to say that he isn't in the music ambiently. *He can only compose based upon his own knowledge. * So *his personality can still be in the music, in his choices etc,* *but who can tell what part of the music best reflects his personality?* He wrote great tragic music alongside other pieces that were light and whimsical. This is because he was a working musician. *Did he "check his ego at the door" when he composed? It's not impossible.* We don't read the plays of Shakespeare and conclude he was like Hamlet - or Orphelia. These were *types* he knew of and could write."


Wow! You could just as easily be talking about Pierre Boulez, or any number of serialists, even (shudder) Milton Babbitt!


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

millionrainbows said:


> Wow! You could just as easily be talking about Pierre Boulez, or any number of serialists, even (shudder) Milton Babbitt!


Do I get paid more if I am? 

I don't really know their music, but this is a contentious issue: are *all *the works of a composer autobiographical? Or is it possible for them to compose music in the 3rd person?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Kevin Pearson said:


> I don't understand anyone who claims to like or love classical music that cannot see the genius of Mozart. You don't have to like his music to acknowledge what has been so obvious to much of the classical music world for over 200 years.


Yes, I can see the "genius" of Mozart, as if it were some celestial force of perfection, curiously detached from individuality and Humanity, as if it were the product of otherworldly, perhaps even demonic, forces.* Ahhhh, the darkness!!!*


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

millionrainbows said:


> Yes, I can see the "genius" of Mozart, as if it were some celestial force of perfection, curiously detached from individuality and Humanity, as if it were the product of otherworldly, perhaps even demonic, forces.* Ahhhh, the darkness!!!*


It's _as if_ it's detached, etc, but not actually. But I like how you see the darkness there. A lot of people only hear whimsy and see sheen...


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## MagneticGhost (Apr 7, 2013)

Kieran said:


> Do I get paid more if I am?
> 
> I don't really know their music, but this is a contentious issue: are *all *the works of a composer autobiographical? Or is it possible for them to compose music in the 3rd person?


I think people are far too quick to attribute autobiographical detail to music.
Like Millions says - You wouldn't necessarily attribute the same to a play. 
Or to a novel.


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## Geo Dude (May 22, 2013)

samm said:


> Mozart is just awful.


No.

This whole 'fifteen characters' thing really is an unnecessary burden at times.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Kieran said:


> Do I get paid more if I am?
> 
> I don't really know their music, but this is a contentious issue: are *all *the works of a composer autobiographical? Or is it possible for them to compose music in the 3rd person?


Well, Kieran, I think this underscores a rather unpleasant reality for Mozart fans...this music is, indeed, part of the Quadrivium, along with Astronomy, Geometry, and Arithmetic. Music's primary purpose is not "emotional."


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## Kevin Pearson (Aug 14, 2009)

millionrainbows said:


> Yes, I can see the "genius" of Mozart, as if it were some celestial force of perfection, curiously detached from individuality and Humanity, as if it were the product of otherworldly, perhaps even demonic, forces.* Ahhhh, the darkness!!!*


If demonic be acknowledge would that not preclude the thought of a divine being? and how would we know if the music was from God or demonic? And if demonically motivated to what purpose would the demon/s have in mind? Honestly I have never thought of Mozart's music as being demonic, but from a Christian perspective I suppose the immorality promoted in some of his operas could qualify.

Kevin


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Geo Dude said:


> This whole 'fifteen characters' thing really is an unnecessary burden at times.


True; it shouldn't be a burden, but an easily-usable template for 'instant humanity.'


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Kevin Pearson said:


> If demonic be acknowledge would that not preclude the thought of a divine being? and how would we know if the music was from God or demonic? And if demonically motivated to what purpose would the demon/s have in mind? Honestly I have never thought of Mozart's music as being demonic, but from a Christian perspective I suppose the immorality promoted in some of his operas could qualify.
> 
> Kevin


Well, I'm basically parroting what Goethe said in the 1830s, about Don Giovanni. See Kieran's post #3. And let's not forget, Man is imperfect. Is this "Lucifer, bearer of light" raising his ugly head again? That art is artifice, a lie, a distortion, and therefore dangerous, in that it "projects illusions" like some demonic movie theatre?


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## Geo Dude (May 22, 2013)

MagneticGhost said:


> I think people are far too quick to attribute autobiographical detail to music.
> Like Millions says - You wouldn't necessarily attribute the same to a play.
> Or to a novel.


I have to wonder if this desire to attribute autobiographical details to music but not to plays or novels or other works of art results from music being abstract, more difficult to connect with--at times--than the latter two examples.


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## Geo Dude (May 22, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> True; it shouldn't be a burden, but an easily-usable template for 'instant humanity.'


If brevity can be said to be the soul of wit, then I am typically as witless as they come. This being the case, I do prefer to enjoy those rare moments when succinct statements reflect all that I need to say about a matter.


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## deggial (Jan 20, 2013)

it sounds to me like he was a very versatile musician with an excellent knowledge of the musical trends of his time and a keen interest in making his music accessible (ie, ensuring he got paid as much as he could).


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## Geo Dude (May 22, 2013)

deggial said:


> it sounds to me like he was a very versatile musician with an excellent knowledge of the musical trends of his time and a keen interest in making his music accessible (ie, ensuring he got paid as much as he could).


I would agree with all of that except 'making his music accessible', and the latter is provisional; accounts of performances of chamber music often discuss the ridiculously large difference in quality when his music is played by professionals, as opposed to the amateurs that chamber music was often written for, because of the technical difficulties his work presented. He was aware of the relative technical inaccessibility of some of his music and continued doing what he pleased in spite of it. Good for him...and us!


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## deggial (Jan 20, 2013)

I meant accessible to his audience, but fair enough, I'm not fussy.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Kevin Pearson said:


> From what I know of Mozart, which is mostly limited to his music and liner notes, he seemed to be able to create music rather spontaneously and with little effort. Music flowed from him unlike Beethoven who had to work harder at creating his masterpieces.


Mozart was certainly fluent, but like many other artists and mathematicians his fluency began to desert him in his last years. He began to work from extensive sketches, at least for some works, and things no longer came quite so easily. That doesn't seem to have hurt their quality though -- probably the opposite!

I think of Mozart as a professional musician, a very focused and hard-working guy, who was blessed by a probably unparalleled musical talent. Above all, as Haydn told his papa, he had taste. (except in certain canons...)


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## Ondine (Aug 24, 2012)

I have ever said -when somebody asks me why I love so much Mozart's music- that there is no _'Mozart'_ in Mozart's music.

Mozart was music and in music he became.


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

The idea that Mozart hasn't left a trace of his personality in his music is absurd. If you create art, something of you is in it. Objectivity in art is an oxymoron. There is no such thing.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

BurningDesire said:


> The idea that Mozart hasn't left a trace of his personality in his music is absurd. If you create art, something of you is in it. Objectivity in art is an oxymoron. There is no such thing.


I think you're taking this too literally. Most people would agree that the composer's personality inhabits a space somewhere in the work, but not necessarily as the subject of the work. In fact, sometimes it's impossible to detect the composer's own personality at all...


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## niv (Apr 9, 2013)

I'm not sure what do we understand as "personality" here. behaviour/emotional patterns? something similar to temperament?


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

niv said:


> I'm not sure what do we understand as "personality" here. behaviour/emotional patterns? something similar to temperament?


That's a good question, niv. What I'm thinking is, that _the personality is exposed_ when the work is _about the composer_. The composer's objective is to reveal themselves autobiographically in their work. I think this was common in the 19th century, and later. Not so common before this.

Also, the composer's personality is revealed maybe _in the choices they make_, and _why_, during the work. Describing these, or understanding them, would be problematical, since we'd need to analyse the sketches and see what was rejected, and again, why. Not every idea that comes to an artist is based upon their own personal story.

Plus, dramatically, a composer might make choices which are good for the work, and only for this reason. They reflect good taste here, but not necessarily something of their own personality. It can't get even more difficult to fathom than this, I'm sure...


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## niv (Apr 9, 2013)

But you have completely avoided what I asked. What do you understand by "personality"?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Hmmm... Do we hear Bach's "personality" when we listen to the WTC? Just asking...


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## Ondine (Aug 24, 2012)

Kieran said:


> I think you're taking this too literally.[...]


Yes. What I used is something called 'metaphorical language'.


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## niv (Apr 9, 2013)

KenOC said:


> Hmmm... Do we hear Bach's "personality" when we listen to the WTC? Just asking...


And if we enjoy listening to the WTC, what does that say about our "personality"? Is our "personality" revealed in what we listen to?


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## Ondine (Aug 24, 2012)

Kieran said:


> That's a good question, niv. What I'm thinking is, that _the personality is exposed_ when the work is _about the composer_. The composer's objective is to reveal themselves autobiographically in their work. I think this was common in the 19th century, and later. Not so common before this.


In sharp contrast with Beethoven -just as an example- there is too much _'Beehoven'_ in Beethoven's music as saying with insistence: Hey, put attention, I am here!

But anyway this is a very personal appreciation; not an absolute statement.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

niv said:


> But you have completely avoided what I asked.


I didn't avoid it, I added to it...


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## niv (Apr 9, 2013)

Ondine said:


> In sharp contrast with Beethoven -just as an example- there is too much _'Beehoven'_ in Beethoven's music as saying with insistence: Hey, put attention, I am here!
> 
> But anyway this is a very personal appreciation; not an absolute statement.


Ondine, do you have a particular example of a beethoven piece where you feel that?


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## Ondine (Aug 24, 2012)

niv said:


> Ondine, do you have a particular example of a beethoven piece where you feel that?


His entire oeuvre... but come to mind, the fifth symphony but it can be felt from his very first one up to his ninth. It is the way I feel Beethoven.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

Some thoughts........

Every composer of note has his/her 'voice'. It has nothing to do with autobiography. You may call it musical 'personality' if you like.
Mozart certainly had his own unmistakeable voice and so did Bach. It is something you have in spite of yourself although a certain maturity is required for you to progress past the merely imitative stage. I think most composers will begin by imitating that which inspires them and gradually their own style will emerge from finding what 'works' for them.

Where does Mozart's genius lie? He was certainly a prodigy and a highly trained one. He seems to have been able to produce not just good, but sublime music at times without breaking sweat, straight onto the page, no sketches. Actually though, I think the 16 year old Mendelssohn with his Octet is as precocious a genius as the young Mozart.

We must remember also, that Mozart was composing at a time in the development of music when composition was less polyphonic than in the previous era. It was the era of melody and accompaniment, of the 'Alberti bass', of simple sonata structures and homophonic textures. Later on when he began to explore the music of Bach and introduce more elaborate counterpoint I would think he would have to stop and think a bit more.

I'm not belittling his achievement, far from it. Sublime is sublime and all the more remarkable to be able to fashion it from modest resources.

He was not a revolutionary, a visionary or a groundbreaker. He did not slam his fist down on the musical world and usher in the era of 'artist as hero' as did Beethoven. He did not forever change music and the relationship between composer and listener as did Beethoven.
In the field of Opera though, he was a game changer. And like Shakespeare, he is renowned for his perception of humanity. For his ability to understand his characters' pain, desires, foibles and passions and to articulate then with the simplest and most elegant of means.

Now stop all this nonsense talk of divinity or possession!!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Petwhac said:


> Now stop all this nonsense talk of divinity or possession!!


Certainly. That kind of talk is all the devil's work, I tell you!


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## niv (Apr 9, 2013)

Ondine said:


> His entire oeuvre... but come to mind, the fifth symphony but it can be felt from his very first one up to his ninth. It is the way I feel Beethoven.


Interesting. I personally feel in this regard Beethoven vs Mozart are equals if we count Mozart late symphs.

(IMHO to the question of whether there is more/less personality in mozart vs beethoven, I think petwhac nailed it)


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## Op.123 (Mar 25, 2013)

The problem with Mozart is that he died too young.


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## neoshredder (Nov 7, 2011)

Burroughs said:


> The problem with Mozart is that he died too young.


Glad he made the most of his life then.


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## BurningDesire (Jul 15, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Mozart was certainly fluent, but like many other artists and mathematicians his fluency began to desert him in his last years. He began to work from extensive sketches, at least for some works, and things no longer came quite so easily. That doesn't seem to have hurt their quality though -- probably the opposite!
> 
> I think of Mozart as a professional musician, a very focused and hard-working guy, who was blessed by a probably unparalleled musical talent. Above all, as Haydn told his papa, he had taste. (except in certain canons...)


How is Mozart unparalleled in musical talent?


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

millionrainbows said:


> From *Mozart* by Maynard Solomon:
> 
> _"Relatively little attention has been has been paid to the individuality of Mozart's style. Perhaps this is due to the inherent difficulties of defining any musical style, let alone the idiosyncratic style, of a composer whose greatness consists, at least in part, in his seeming purging of subjectivity in the service of a perfected, classical objectivity. For many, indeed, Mozart has exemplified the supreme artist whose works transcend issues of personality, of self-revelation, of originality."
> 
> ...


_

I think this comes down to a question of aesthetics more than anything else. Some composers lean towards a more 'classicist' or objective aesthetic, others towards a more romantic or subjective one. I did a discussion/poll on this a while back:
http://www.talkclassical.com/21402-swinging-pendulum-your-musical.html

There's many composers who lean more towards the objective, two I label as basically that are Stravinsky and Richard Strauss. They largely avoided putting themselves too much into their music. Other composers like Shostakovich, Berg, Janacek produced many works which are hard to separate from their own lives and personal stories, their music often speaks strongly to the historical contexts in which they where written.

If I can put it another way, do you see a composer as a reptile (cold blooded) or a mammal (warm blooded)? This is quite facetious, but I think its easy to know what I mean.

Mozart, and the Classical and Baroque eras where seen by the likes of Stravinsky in the early 20th century as wholly objective. This was of course part of their reaction against and swing away from Romanticism. Hence Igor's famous quote about music being about nothing but itself.

Having said that I don't see Mozart as being more objective than some others. I think he's kind of in between. He definitely displayed his sense of humour in many pieces. He could also plumb the depths when given half a chance.

The other thing is we might think of his composition process as being miraculous and no sweat easy, but he didn't always see it that way. In one of his letters to his father, he said he knew people thought he could dash off a symphony in a coach journey or something, but he still found it very hard. Think of this guys, the man had no childhood to speak of. From the time he could pick up an instrument he was on the road with his family being paraded as the wunderkind all over Europe. That's not much of a life is it? Might seem easy but it isn't. I think he was like many of the stars today. He just wished he'd had a 'normal' or 'average' life sometimes. Probably he wished for that many times. Its like that speech in Henry V where the king wishes he was a servant without all those burdens and responsibilities. At the end of every day, he could simply rest and look forward to virtually the same day the next day.

In any case, it was said that Schubert could dash off a song to a poem given to him in a cafe by the poet himself. Yet his music doesn't lack emotion or have a mechanical quality, far from it. Andrew Lloyd Webber also penned Don't Cry for Me Argentina (from Evita) in a flash in the same sort of way. Yet its an emotional song, one of his finest. Does compositional process have to do with the product? If its fast is it going to be better, or less better, than something done painstakingly and slowly? I think it just depends on the composer, and you've got to look at the result of their labour, the piece of music itself.

[Another thing is that music made to order sits uncomfortably with Romantic notions of an artist suffering for his art: http://www.talkclassical.com/19502-music-made-order.html (another ancient thread of mine...but it was a short discussion)]_


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## Kevin Pearson (Aug 14, 2009)

I'm really unsure how a composer cannot put himself in his music. It may not be biographical, but personality comes out regardless. Every composer has a voice that is discernible, especially by those who listen to much of their music. There have been times when I heard pieces I did not know by composers I was familiar with and was able to correctly identify who the composer was because their voice, signature, style or whatever you want to call it, because they are evident in the music. You cannot separate the composer from the music they wrote. They are one and the same.

Kevin


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

Kieran said:


> In Alex Ross excellent article, The Storm of Style, he writes that "I got the feeling that Mozart's brain contained an array of musical archetypes that were connected to particular dramatic situations or emotional states-figures connoting vengeance, reconciliation, longing, and so on." And so if this is the case, the content wouldn't necessarily be always the Composer - which is more a 19th century trick...


Thanks for posting this article! There are a couple very interesting hypotheses about Mozart's creativity in there (one of which you quote). It almost makes me want to listen through every Mozartian work chronologically over the course of months the way Ross did! In any case, I know what I'll be doing for the next couple hours.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Kevin Pearson said:


> There have been times when I heard pieces I did not know by composers I was familiar with and was able to correctly identify who the composer was because their voice, signature, style or whatever you want to call it, because they are evident in the music.


I agree, though with me it's usually a process of elimination. Mozart is a special case because his music often doesn't have a "style" or a "signature" a lot different from his contemporaries. As often as not, his music can be identified simply because it's so good that nobody else of that time could have written it. Speaking for myself of course!


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

KenOC said:


> I agree, though with me it's usually a process of elimination. Mozart is a special case because his music often doesn't have a "style" or a "signature" a lot different from his contemporaries. As often as not, his music can be identified simply because it's so good that nobody else of that time could have written it. Speaking for myself of course!


I think this gets close to the heart of the "problem". Mozart's music isn't much different from that of his contemporaries: it's just "better". All this talk of personality and objectivity makes me ask of those making "divine conduit" claims for Mozart, well, give us some examples of how Mozart's contemporaries (to turn the Maynard Solomon quote around) _failed_ to purge subjectivity in the service of a perfected, classical objectivity and _failed_ to transcend issues of personality, of self-revelation, of originality. And, given the nature of your claim, such examples would need to be pretty extensive in order to back you up and, what's more, you'll need to provide very clear contrasts between these examples and examples from Mozart's music. Otherwise I'll continue to believe that, for whatever reason, you're just incapable of dealing with the fact that Mozart was simply way better at his job than anyone else and you have to go looking for fairies at the bottom of the garden to explain it.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Nereffid said:


> Otherwise I'll continue to believe that, for whatever reason, you're just incapable of dealing with the fact that Mozart was simply way better at his job than anyone else and you have to go looking for fairies at the bottom of the garden to explain it.


That's it. He just had incredible depth and breadth, an inexhaustible wealth of ideas, and the capability to pronounce on any musical subject with authority and brilliance. But he wasn't some Romantic-period dreamy absinthe-soaked seer, nor was he an artist set apart from society: he was a regular, hardworking clock-puncher, horrible as that is for some to accept.

Here's another article I'm fond of sharing, controversial and subversive in its thinking, it seems: Mozart as a working stiff!


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Nereffid said:


> I think this gets close to the heart of the "problem". Mozart's music isn't much different from that of his contemporaries: it's just "better"


People say this, but isn't his style say very different overall from Haydn? Others may have more of the elegant smooth style Mozart has, but do they have this combined with the same wealth of ideas which are mixed together often with a bittersweet mix of moods while at the same time enabling them to flow together in such a convincing way? Obviously there was one dominant style in this period, just like there was in the baroque and earlier. So it isn't very useful to compare it to later periods, but individual style can surely be more subtle anyway. Also it is conceivable that some of his contemporaries might actually have been influenced by Mozart and tried to be like him, while likely being more inconsistent in their work.


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## Dongiovanni (Jul 30, 2012)

Kieran said:


> That's it. He just had incredible depth and breadth, an inexhaustible wealth of ideas, and the capability to pronounce on any musical subject with authority and brilliance. But he wasn't some Romantic-period dreamy absinthe-soaked seer, nor was he an artist set apart from society: he was a regular, hardworking clock-puncher, horrible as that is for some to accept.
> 
> Here's another article I'm fond of sharing, controversial and subversive in its thinking, it seems: Mozart as a working stiff!


I agree with you.

Thank you for sharing this article. Very interesting to read. It addresses some questions that I keep asking myself. The biggest question is what would he have composed had he lived longer. And also, would he keep composing at this insane rate if he had gotten rich, or would he stop, just like Rossini did.

Appearing in the documentary "In search of Mozart" Roger Norrington said something like: "No matter what he composed, utter brilliance just kept on pouring out through the cracks", referring to The Magic Flute, that doesn't not have a very brilliant libretto and is based on "popular" themes back then, but the music is still of incredible brilliance and beauty.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

starry said:


> Obviously there was one dominant style in this period, just like there was in the baroque and earlier.


Well, that's really all I meant by saying "Mozart's music isn't much different from that of his contemporaries". He used the same tools and techniques.



starry said:


> People say this, but isn't his style say very different overall from Haydn?


Yes. For a given value of "very".


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

starry said:


> People say this, but isn't his style say very different overall from Haydn?


When I originally raised the point, I wasn't thinking of Haydn, who is a pretty special case himself and (I think) more easily identified by style. I was thinking of people like Baguer, Cannabich, Gossec, Gyrowetz, Kozeluch, Pichl, and so forth. There was a whole crew of busy composers floating around Vienna and elsewhere in Mozart's heyday, all seemingly sharing a "style" with Mozart but all almost forgotten today. Mozart was just "better."

As Kozeluch said on Mozart's passing: "Of course it's too bad about such a great genius, but it's good for us that he's dead. Because if he had lived longer, really the world would not have given a single piece of bread for our compositions."


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## nightscape (Jun 22, 2013)

starry said:


> ...individual style can surely be more subtle anyway.


Which makes it even more amazing that any specific composer could achieve such separation from his/her contemporaries during those musical periods (Classical/Baroque); to have your voice shine through that clearly in what was a relatively traditional and "fixed" style, is pretty incredible.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Some may have had a superficial similarity to Mozart but whether they had the same development as him is another matter. Mozart obviously had influences, the early music of any composer in particular is always likely to be wearing it's influences clearly. Though at his best even in his early works there can be that roccoco lightness but combined with a fecundity and fluency of ideas. Then later he was able to incorporate other styles like Stamitz and Haydn into his work seemingly quite quickly and effortlessly. Still seeming like that quicksilver but elegant mind but adding more strings to his bow as well. Just like people say JS Bach was able to assimilate influences from his concertos to his cantatas and so helped sum up a period maybe you could say they same with Mozart. You can pick apart some aspects of Mozart's work and say this or that is like Haydn or someone else like Gyrowetz but the overall language that can incorporate all these aspects together might be what is more unique. The strength and power of his work probably relates more to Haydn than anyone else, but it is distinct from him in his equal mastery of vocal music and how he seemed to incorporate that with strength into his instrumental work. There was an ambition to him which reached beyond merely being comfortable just stuck in a more one dimensional style. And perhaps the more styles incorporated within the music the more potentially individual the style.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Kieran said:


> Here's another article I'm fond of sharing, controversial and subversive in its thinking, it seems: Mozart as a working stiff!


What a great article! Many thanks for sharing this!


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

Kieran said:


> Here's another article I'm fond of sharing, controversial and subversive in its thinking, it seems: Mozart as a working stiff!


I like the article as well, though I must confess that this doesn't seem like the hardest thesis in the world to prove: "Mozart did not compose because he was inspired, although inspiration may be why he composed so well." I'd have thought that nobody believed the kinds of Romantic things Einstein (the musicologist--and the physicist, at his most romantic, for that matter!) said by the time the author of this piece got around to attacking him.

A thought about the effect of the marketplace on Mozart's music. The essay has a lot to say about the late symphonies (which would have been a challenge for contemporary orchestras), but little to say about all the music he pitched to amateurs. I'd as soon listen to K.540 as anything else from the classical period, but I wonder if a bit more state support might have allowed him to indulge himself a bit more!

Of course, thinking on what Mozart might have done if given more time is not a pleasant thing to do!


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## hreichgott (Dec 31, 2012)

Even the demigods of music had to earn a living!


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

I don't know where the concept that artists should create for free came from. I think it's a recent thing.


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## Forte (Jul 26, 2013)

Wait, so what is the problem exactly? 



millionrainbows said:


> _"Relatively little attention has been has been paid to the individuality of Mozart's style. Perhaps this is due to the inherent difficulties of defining any musical style, let alone the idiosyncratic style, of a composer whose greatness consists, at least in part, in his seeming purging of subjectivity in the service of a perfected, classical objectivity. For many, indeed, Mozart has exemplified the supreme artist whose works transcend issues of personality, of self-revelation, of originality."
> 
> _Paraphrasing further: _"Figures like T.S. Eliot and Goethe agree; Mozart's works were hard to think of as products of subjectivity; they seemed to have been always in existence, to have issued from an ideal sphere. Mozart's music did not show the labor that went into its creation. Mozart's creativity came to be considered as the product of forces external to him; he was regarded as a receptive, neutral instrument or vessel of a vital, perhaps divine, force; he was thought to have written music automatically, because that was his instinctive nature, to make music as a silkworm spins silk. In the early 1830's Goethe even intimated that Mozart's creativity might be due to an otherworldly, perhaps even demonic, element."_


_
Very nice, very poetic, but sounds like an overly detailed way of saying that Mozart made making music look easy and completely natural, which he did no doubt. I also think that it might be interesting to consider for a moment the difficulty in defining what feels like natural and effortlessly created music, and what is not. It is true that Mozart wrote music very quickly, resulting in him being very prolific, and that adds to the notion that he produced music without using too much energy. However, what if Schoenberg also happened to write atonal music that quickly? Hardly anyone I think would pick up that the piece of music was conceived of without a sweat.

So I'd suggest that there is some level of subjectivity here. Our ears hear the style of Mozart and think that it is elegant. That has something to do with our aesthetics, it has something to do with finding loveliness in this appoggiatura rather than that chain of tritones. And maybe then we will find that there is something inherently special about Mozart's music. But we kind of have to define what we mean.

Also, I'd argue that it isn't true that Mozart's works transcend issues of personality, of self-revelation, of originality. There are many works by Mozart that reflect a great deal of his own struggle in his world, like his darker compositions - the Piano Concertos K. 466 and K. 491, the Symphony No. 40, Don Giovanni, and the unfinished Requiem Mass, to name a few. His bright, sprightly moments in music (i.e. most of his entire output) reflect much of his personality from what we know of it. And none of those things make his music less perfect. In fact, I think it shows a lot about how dedicated the man was to his art, in using classicism to express those more somber feelings and stifled despair, as well as the more beautiful moments in life and the prospects of how joyful things could be.

That's what Mozart means to me, anyway._


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

Difficulty isn't quality either.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

millionrainbows said:


> Wow! You could just as easily be talking about Pierre Boulez, or any number of serialists, even (shudder) Milton Babbitt!


Boy, you are so pushing it to make a point you would like to make, and not about Mozart, while plugging both eyes and ears to what has already been so well said. Patently disingenuous, methinks.

Sometimes, if you realize you have such a major talent, are still as slave to the non-endowed non-trustafarian sort of life styes, I would take a guess that the idea of the piece, and making it good, simply took over, i.e. no attempt was made to be objective, but the project in front of the composer, and at the front of his brain, simply 'took over,' and he tended the clearly obvious and bigger fish to fry - the piece, not his ego.

Next to the least or most of Mozart's music, the contemporary process composers sound horribly self-conscious -- or the process itself is a sign of overt intellectual interference, rather than intellect applied but not structurally showing.

The later romantic notion of Beethoven, struggling with his materials like Michelangelo hacking chips of marble off of a block, Beethoven's struggle with the materials almost always audible, and long before he went deaf, seems to have effected how all later composers present themselves, how the press presents them. Latter day fad, detachment, you get people posing as detached, talking about how their art is also detached, etc. Trendy lies or half-truths at best.

So we have this guy, who without trying, managed to cover most any and all of his struggles in coming up with great pieces -- built in his head and held in memory, that is where all and most sketches are, so we will never know what his struggles were, if any, or just few.

That we don't hear them in the briefest of pieces or the more extensive symphonically structured operas is brilliant, but bad news for the current trends, post-romantic, ala the old Oprah Show, of having evidence of the artist crying blood to produce their works.

Without that evidence, some get mightily suspect about folks like Mozart (if the plural is even necessary.)

If you would take one instant to realize all your post modernist interests and concerns did not exist, in anyone's mind, in the late 18th, early 19 century, well then.... no Babbitt in the classical era, no Babbittian process detachment in the classical era.

Mozart composed some of the most intensely 'expressive' music there has yet been -- including the Emo bloom from the later romantic era... His DNA and personality are stamped all over his works -- as is the case with another supposedly 'detached' composer, Stravinsky.


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Forte said:


> Also, I'd argue that it isn't true that Mozart's works transcend issues of personality, of self-revelation, of originality. There are many works by Mozart that reflect a great deal of his own struggle in his world, like his darker compositions - the Piano Concertos K. 466 and K. 491, the Symphony No. 40, _Don Giovanni_, and the unfinished _Requiem Mass_, to name a few.


It's a great post, Forte, and welcome to the boards!

I slightly disagree with your conclusions here. Only slightly, because obviously a composer writes from a position they know, or feel, and so they're _in there_, somewhere. But the Requiem was a commission. Had he been asked instead to compose a brisk and breezy d-major wedding serenade for the same 200 ducats, then that's what we'd hear now. It's problematical assigning works to his timeline because he often composed dark alongside light works, and neither of them can be said to express how he was feeling. He was good at making music out of _types_...


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Kieran said:


> It's a great post, Forte, and welcome to the boards!
> 
> I slightly disagree with your conclusions here. Only slightly, because obviously a composer writes from a position they know, or feel, and so they're _in there_, somewhere.


Amen to that! You've taken all the wind out of my vanity sails to have said it so directly and economically (hats off, ladies and gentlemen!).

And, there is the rub; that "They're _in there_, somewhere." 
~ Because, pushing apart all the psycho pop adventurous or informed guesses, current trends of schools of thought applied to past eras devoid of the tiniest atom of the current ideas
~ because, too, after using all the technical tools to verify the composer's musical DNA in their works...

"...they're _in there_, somewhere." is really as far as anyone can ever fully and rightly say.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

Kieran said:


> It's a great post, Forte, and welcome to the boards!
> 
> I slightly disagree with your conclusions here. Only slightly, because obviously a composer writes from a position they know, or feel, and so they're _in there_, somewhere. But the Requiem was a commission. Had he been asked instead to compose a brisk and breezy d-major wedding serenade for the same 200 ducats, then that's what we'd hear now. It's problematical assigning works to his timeline because he often composed dark alongside light works, and neither of them can be said to express how he was feeling. He was good at making music out of _types_...


_Forte_ was obliged to state 'generalities', and those things come with built-in exceptions. I can even take an exception to your not-so-general penultimate sentence. There is a certain string quintet... .


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Hilltroll72 said:


> _Forte_ was obliged to state 'generalities', and those things come with built-in exceptions. I can even take an exception to your not-so-general penultimate sentence. There is a certain string quintet... .


The g-minor? is that the one? What about it?

And by the way, I enjoyed Forte's post and agree that they were posting generalities, which is no prob for me...


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Forte said:


> Very nice, very poetic, but sounds like an overly detailed way of saying that Mozart made making music look easy and completely natural, which he did no doubt. I also think that it might be interesting to consider for a moment the difficulty in defining what feels like natural and effortlessly created music, and what is not. It is true that Mozart wrote music very quickly, resulting in him being very prolific, and that adds to the notion that he produced music without using too much energy. However, what _if_ Schoenberg also happened to write atonal music that quickly? Hardly anyone I think would pick up that the piece of music was conceived of without a sweat.
> 
> So I'd suggest that there is some level of subjectivity here. Our ears hear the style of Mozart and think that it is elegant. That has something to do with our aesthetics, it has something to do with finding loveliness in _this_ appoggiatura rather than _that_ chain of tritones. And maybe then we will find that there is something inherently special about Mozart's music. But we kind of have to define what we mean.


Yes, and I think your word "natural" is important here. I have no idea how one goes about identifying the composer's effort or work rate from listening to the music, but some compositions can feel more "natural" or "right-sounding", or "perfect" if you will, than others, regardless of the number of hours put into their creation. All entirely subjective of course but let's allow that Mozart's music feels "natural" to a lot of people, which I suppose ultimately means he achieves the highest, I don't know what you'd call it, "neurocognitive hit rate". 
Then, if you call the music "natural" there's the temptation to see it as somehow separate from the human world, which can allow you to see Mozart as being the sole owner of some sort of transcendent oil well, with divine music gushing through him. Or as a glorified secretary, writing down what God tells him.

(As usual, though, God shows a lack of imagination and, just as he placed no rabbit fossils in Precambrian rocks, he never threw Mozart a serialist curveball... )


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## Forte (Jul 26, 2013)

Kieran said:


> But the Requiem was a commission. Had he been asked instead to compose a brisk and breezy d-major wedding serenade for the same 200 ducats, then that's what we'd hear now. It's problematical assigning works to his timeline because he often composed dark alongside light works, and neither of them can be said to express how he was feeling. He was good at making music out of _types_...


Sure, but the vast majority of the music Mozart composed was from commissions, and that also applies to virtually every classical composer at that time (if that wanted to make a living, that is!) and to _composers_ in general up until the Romantic era, and even then there was much music that was written off commissions. Consider: Beethoven's 9th Symphony was initiated as a result of a commission. So were the late string quartets. That didn't limit how much Beethoven put himself and his thoughts into it, or his breadth of artistic vision. I think with Mozart, it is less personal, but I hear a more personal connection between him and his music than with his contemporaries.

I believe, given the right opportunity to express himself, Mozart always was able to do it. He was able to write music about virtually anything, from trivial things like a servant losing a hairpin, to love, to existentially deep music, like the _Requiem Mass_. A composer at that time really couldn't write anything only for themselves, and had to complete commissions to gain money. But when you are asked to write a requiem mass, how deep and emotionally stirring you go is not provided in the request. That's up to you.

The greatest achievement of Mozart is probably that he was able to so completely perfect the classical form that it seems to unveil like nature itself, like one giant well-rounded improvisation, and that he was able to begin to use that form to show the contents of his mind. He may be the most expressive _classical_ era composer, and in that sense the first romantic in music.

Oh yeah, and btw thanks for all the warm welcomes


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## Kieran (Aug 24, 2010)

Great stuff! :tiphat:

I think he was expressive of humanity, of human types and mores, but not necessarily of himself, directly. No more than Shakespeare was expressing himself through Hamlet or Julius Caesar. It's like, sometimes we mistake a great actor for the roles they play, when in reality, they maybe totally different.

By the way, I don't think that makes him any less expressive than Romantic composers. If anything, to my ears, it's the opposite...


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## Guest (Jul 26, 2013)

Forte said:


> Wait, so what is the problem exactly?
> 
> Very nice, very poetic, but sounds like an overly detailed way of saying that Mozart made making music look easy and completely natural, which he did no doubt. I also think that it might be interesting to consider for a moment the difficulty in defining what feels like natural and effortlessly created music, and what is not. It is true that Mozart wrote music very quickly, resulting in him being very prolific, and that adds to the notion that he produced music without using too much energy. However, what _if_ Schoenberg also happened to write atonal music that quickly? Hardly anyone I think would pick up that the piece of music was conceived of without a sweat.
> 
> ...


Nice post. I'm sure others have commented in similar vein, but may I use the bit that I've emboldened to provide a platform for my soapbox?

It seems quite common to argue that Mozart is a genius because his work was produced so effortlessly. Whether he did or not is beside the point, if the point is to make a judgement about the music (rather than the method (or effort) of production). It's no more relevant than the counter often posited that Beethoven wasn't as good as Mozart because he laboured to produce his work.

However, what this, and your point about 'elegance' illustrates is that our response to any piece of music usually makes reference to what we, the listener, attach value to. If someone wishes to value effort, who am I to disagree? I wouldn't use the term 'elegant' either, but that doesn't mean that I disagree with what Forte is saying.

As is so often said, but regularly ignored here, whilst you might be able to demonstrate a _consensus _about the values that many listeners attach to Mozart's music, it cannot be asserted that the music is, definitively, 'elegant', or 'nimble' or any other adjective you'd care to offer.


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## Forte (Jul 26, 2013)

Definitely. And all of that childhood experience traveling around Europe, being around royalty, studying great composers, losing parents, losing children, can't have been a detriment to his imagination.

@MacLeod: Exactly. I was just trying to use words that lots of people tend to use to describe Mozart. But the real difficulty is defining our aesthetics to begin with. And that's what you might have realized, had you focused on the rest of the paragraph


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

Difficulty isn't quality either.

I think there are still a great many... seduced by Romantic ideals... that believe that the artist must suffer... or at least struggle. I know that within the realm of the visual arts there are a great many who equate a surplus of facility with shallowness... who argue that such skills are actually detrimental to one's art. The very concept strikes me as absurd. It seems obvious that the more ability one has, the more possibilities are open to one. Still, just as we have those who dismiss Mozart because his music doesn't reveal just how difficult the creative process can be, so we have those who equally assume that there can not be much depth in the masterful work of such brilliant technicians as Rubens, Van Dyck, or John Singer Sargent.

...all of that childhood experience traveling around Europe, being around royalty, studying great composers, losing parents, losing children, can't have been a detriment to his imagination.

Indeed... but I would add that inspiration is not to be found solely in the exotic or the tragic. The painters Bonnard, Monet, Renoir, and Matisse found more than enough inspiration in the rather mundane realities of their lives. Of course we should remember that even the most mundane... or apparently joyful of lives... also involves sadness and tragedy. Not all art need to dwell upon the darker side of life... nor do so in an openly autobiographical manner.


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## Celloman (Sep 30, 2006)

I think that the paradox of Mozart lies in the apparent simplicity of his music versus the challenge of performing it. Having played a number of Mozart symphonies, I've come to realize that it's this very "simplicity" that makes Mozart performance so difficult. It's like a quartz clock, where every element has to be perfectly in place or it just doesn't work. Phrasing, dynamics, articulation, and rhythm have to be so precise that the listener is unaware of the hard work that's actually being put into it. How can it be that such perfectly simple music can be so difficult to pull off? Mozart is like a magic trick. If you give away the secret, there's no more illusion and the trick is spoiled. Audiences love Mozart because, well, it's enchanting. But oh, if they only knew how difficult it is to achieve this!


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## Forte (Jul 26, 2013)

StlukesguildOhio said:


> The painters Bonnard, Monet, Renoir, and Matisse found more than enough inspiration in the rather mundane realities of their lives. Of course we should remember that even the most mundane... or apparently joyful of lives... also involves sadness and tragedy. Not all art need to dwell upon the darker side of life... nor do so in an openly autobiographical manner.


Art is an expression of the mind, whatever it is capable of expressing. Experiencing things merely helps your mind create. And no, I didn't mean to say that the only thing that inspires composers is happiness or tragedy. Whatever your mind can think up is yours, wherever it comes from.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

PetrB said:


> Next to the least or most of Mozart's music, the contemporary process composers sound horribly self-conscious -- or the process itself is a sign of overt intellectual interference, rather than intellect applied but not structurally showing.


Most composers probably are more self-conscious and more about the structural process showing than having the details express a more personal voice. I'm sure you could say that about most composers in Mozart's time as well.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Nereffid said:


> Then, if you call the music "natural" there's the temptation to see it as somehow separate from the human world, which can allow you to see Mozart as being the sole owner of some sort of transcendent oil well, with divine music gushing through him. Or as a glorified secretary, writing down what God tells him.


But natural surely means more human rather than less. Those composers who show the structure and the work more clearly are perhaps even more abstract, more writing music about music.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

starry said:


> But natural surely means more human rather than less. Those composers who show the structure and the work more clearly are perhaps even more abstract, more writing music about music.


I agree that natural means more human. But one could also argue (or, as I saying in the sentence quoted, be tempted to believe) that "natural" is distinct from "artificial", ie "manmade". Therefore "natural"-sounding music is not manmade, would go the argument.
(I would have thought that my subsequent remarks demonstrated pretty clearly that I thought such an argument was bogus)


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Music it could be argued is meant to be a kind of illusion though, in which the work is meant to be less evident that the ultimate purpose which is to communicate the feeling/ideas in an apparently direct way.


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## SottoVoce (Jul 29, 2011)

I was unaware there was a "problem with Mozart"... The works are there, and they are great, whether they're expressing himself (which I'm highly unsure that you could do), or just making great music. Is there anyone since Stravinsky who thinks good music can stand on itself anymore, that music expresses "nothing", and that the beauty it provides and the emotion it arouses and the pleasure it brings is more than good enough? There's no need for expression. Only a critic poisoned by pseudo-Romanticism and its moralistic offsprings would say otherwise. The "prob;em" of Mozart could be also applied to Shakespeare, as Kieran said; but no one would claim that Shakepseare was deficient in being human just because he didn't express himself. I still don't see a problem.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

You could really rename some threads here..

'the problem with some listeners of Mozart/Beethoven/Bach' etc. 

Because that is really the angle that these threads come from, the music itself does exactly what was intended most of the time, so there are far less problems there. It's the listeners that create the problems more than the composers most of the time.


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## Kevin Pearson (Aug 14, 2009)

I really don't care that the original poster and other members here hate Mozart/Beethoven/Bach etc. etc. etc. any more that I care some folks just love Justin Bieber. That's their problem not mine. I can't say I understand it nor their hatred but it's not going to hinder my enjoyment of them. Life's too short to worry about why some people cannot find value in some of the greatest music ever created. That's an area best left to psychiatrists. :devil:

Kevin


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

KenOC said:


> Mozart was certainly fluent, but like many other artists and mathematicians his fluency began to desert him in his last years. He began to work from extensive sketches, at least for some works, and things no longer came quite so easily.


But was that because he was pushing himself more with different kinds of music, studying counterpoint for example.


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## trazom (Apr 13, 2009)

starry said:


> But was that because he was pushing himself more with different kinds of music, studying counterpoint for example.


Mozart studied counterpoint his whole life and began serious studies in counterpoint at 14, IIRC. He just hadn't studied Handel and Bach's counterpoint closely until he was about 22.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

trazom said:


> Mozart studied counterpoint his whole life and began serious studies in counterpoint at 14, IIRC. He just hadn't studied Handel and Bach's counterpoint closely until he was about 22.


Yeh of course, but he was trying even more to develop his skills and incorporate some of it into major works at the end of his life as well. Anyway my main point is that he wasn't keeping still and was clearly trying some ambitious things which did require much work.


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## Guest (Aug 5, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> Music's primary purpose is not "emotional."


Yes, it is...but perhaps you'd expect me to disagree with your point!

[edit] Search for 'the purpose of music' on t'internet and you get some interesting results...

http://www.purposeofmusic.com/



> A tool as powerful as music should come with instructions.


http://www.slideshare.net/johnnegri/15-purposes-of-music-3552126 (slide 2)



> Today, we will learn about the 15 purposes of music


Yahoo Answers tells us that "What is the purpose of music?" is a resolved question (!) and the most popular answer, chosen by voters, is,



> it is an art form. It is a form of expression that can transform peoples lives or alter moods. It can mark a point in history or create it. It is a reason to live for some and a soundtrack to dying for others. Music is deeply intertwined with the human experience and to me it is life.


http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071016182230AAgiiQu

Lastly, for now, Wiki Answers says...



> The purpose of music is to communicate certain messages, tell a story, illustrate drama, express great power and religion, and preserve cultural traditions. Other specific examples of musical purpose is to heal, enlist or petition spirits for positive outcomes, worship, maintain life-cycle rituals, educate, motivate, work, pass time, feel particular emotions, entertain, express one's identity, protest, control, and unite.


http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_the_purposes_of_music


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

MacLeod said:


> http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_the_purposes_of_music


So it's about a lot more than just emotions.


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## Guest (Aug 5, 2013)

starry said:


> So it's about a lot more than just emotions.


Yes, it's 'about' a lot more than emotions, but I would still generalise that the main appeal from music to man is via an emotional response.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

But it's difficult to separate emotion and intellect and that's what you are doing.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

MacLeod said:


> Yes, it's 'about' a lot more than emotions, but I would still generalise that the *main appeal from music to man is via an emotional response*.


It would be difficult to argue otherwise.
Emotion is a very broad term but I can't see that every human society from the year dot, as far as we know, has developed some sort of music and that music is with us other than because it makes us _feel _something.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Petwhac said:


> It would be difficult to argue otherwise.


The brain doesn't process the musical elements and interpret them? Ok feel that if you want.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

starry said:


> The brain doesn't process the musical elements and interpret them? Ok feel that if you want.


The brain also processes and interprets a smack on the noggin in order that we _feel_ that.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

That's not exactly the same as music though is it? Obviously there could be some relatively immediate physical reaction to sound waves, but with music (and maybe even more so with much classical) it is more complex and you go on a journey with music which to make a big impression you follow with your mind and have to interpret. It's that interpretation _in relation to your own self_ that provokes a bigger emotional reaction I think. If it's just a superficial reaction to something I don't see how that would leave a lasting big impression.


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## Guest (Aug 5, 2013)

starry said:


> The brain doesn't process the musical elements and interpret them? Ok feel that if you want.


Are we getting into territory that (I anticipate) you and are not fit to argue: where 'emotion' is seated in the body?



starry said:


> But it's difficult to separate emotion and intellect and that's what you are doing.


No, I'm not. I'm making a distinction between specific music that is written to appeal to a specific emotion - something that is blatantly militaristic, perhaps; a more general observation that music first triggers a 'felt' response - stimulating a hormonal response before a 'thought' response - and the thought response, a conscious process that can lead to further emotional reactions. They can be separately analysed, but that does not mean that they are totally separate things. I'm rejecting the implication that "classical is cerebral, intellectual and good classical doesn't appeal to mere base emotion, whereas pop is just for feeling and not for the intellect".


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

starry said:


> That's not exactly the same as music though is it? Obviously there could be some relatively immediate physical reaction to sound waves, but with music (and maybe even more so with much classical) it is more complex and you go on a journey with music which to make a big impression you follow with your mind and have to interpret. It's that interpretation _in relation to your own self_ that provokes a bigger emotional reaction I think. If it's just a superficial reaction to something I don't see how that would leave a lasting big impression.


Well I think that the feeling comes first and may be followed by the intellectual engagement. Obviously certain patterns of sound cause a response and to that extent you're right that the brain must recognise and process the pattern before we respond. But it is intuitive and non intellectual at first. Very young children respond _emotionally_ to all sorts of music.

Maybe we are at cross purposes here?


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

MacLeod said:


> Are we getting into territory that (I anticipate) you and are not fit to argue: where 'emotion' is seated in the body?
> 
> No, I'm not. I'm making a distinction between specific music that is written to appeal to a specific emotion - something that is blatantly militaristic, perhaps; a more general observation that music first triggers a 'felt' response - stimulating a hormonal response before a 'thought' response - and the thought response, a conscious process that can lead to further emotional reactions. They can be separately analysed, but that does not mean that they are totally separate things. I'm rejecting the implication that "classical is cerebral, intellectual and good classical doesn't appeal to mere base emotion, whereas pop is just for feeling and not for the intellect".


Ah, but if you get too specific about the emotions then you are in to the territory of _associations_ and cultural conditioning. For instance, in the west, militaristic music will be based around marching tempos and time sig.
But I completely agree that all great music appeals to emotions, base or otherwise! that doesn't mean it can't _also_ appeal to intellect.


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## Rapide (Oct 11, 2011)

millionrainbows said:


> ...
> 
> ... Mozart's creativity came to be considered as the product of forces external to him; he was regarded as a receptive, neutral instrument or vessel of a vital, perhaps divine, force; he was thought to have written music automatically, because that was his instinctive nature, to make music as a silkworm spins silk. In the early 1830's Goethe even intimated that Mozart's creativity might be due to an otherworldly, perhaps even demonic, element."
> 
> [/I]*Reactions?*


There must have been a lot of stupid historians out there in the past more interested in fantasy, conjecture and writing bombast.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Rapide said:


> There must have been a lot of stupid historians out there in the past more interested in fantasy, conjecture and writing bombast.


Maybe not just in the past... :lol:


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## Guest (Aug 6, 2013)

Petwhac said:


> Ah, but if you get too specific about the emotions then you are in to the territory of _associations_ and cultural conditioning. For instance, in the west, militaristic music will be based around marching tempos and time sig.
> But I completely agree that all great music appeals to emotions, base or otherwise! that doesn't mean it can't _also_ appeal to intellect.


I think the Romans knew the value of trumpets and drums to stir the blood long before anyone composed formal music with a martial theme.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

MacLeod said:


> I think the Romans knew the value of trumpets and drums to stir the blood long before anyone composed formal music with a martial theme.


That's probably because they are loud. 
The Greeks believed each different mode had an effect on the listeners and some modes were banned in public in case they corrupted people. 
Unfortunately we don't know what Greek or Roman music sounded like.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

The source of music is of course the person who wrote it, and if that was done purely through emotion it would be a mess. Similarly if a performer performed something just with their emotion and without control and direction it would be a mess. Cultural conditioning and tradition is inherent in both composing performance and listening as well. Thus music is used for functional purposes, as has already been said for military use but also conversely for religious functions as well, as well as for others obviously. I don't see that it's that helpful separating emotion like those who come here often start doing. _Yes emotion is provoked by music, but solely concentrating on that I find very narrow indeed and not very productive._ Anyway my continued discussion of this seems to give more credence to it so maybe I should just stop here. It's better if I keep out of the hundreds of emotion threads in the future, like I do with most poll threads.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

starry said:


> The source of music is of course the person who wrote it, and if that was done purely through emotion it would be a mess. Similarly if a performer performed something just with their emotion and without control and direction it would be a mess.


I doubt if you'd get any argument from anyone on that.



starry said:


> I don't see that it's that helpful separating emotion like those who come here often start doing.


They do?


starry said:


> Yes emotion is provoked by music, but solely concentrating on that I find very narrow indeed and not very productive.


What is it you're wanting to produce? An understanding I would guess. In which case solely concentrating on the emotion that music can and does provoke wouldn't get us very far. But again, who's been doing that?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Okay...maybe it should be called "The Enigma of Mozart" or similar...I'm just trying to penetrate the nature of Mozart, and I think this objectivity or detachment which his music evokes in me is key to this. It also is in perfect synch with my modernist leanings. As usual, I'm having my cake and eating it, too, while modernist critics and anti-quadrivium pundits seem to always be choking on their own bile...ahh, the darkness! 
And the pure logic of it all...Emotion? Who can prove that emotion exists in music? I think it's a sympathetic reaction, personally. Music evokes emotion in us, sure, but I don't think that's a very useful or logical way of penetrating the more profound aspects of music, especially Mozart. 
Talk about your "bombast, conjecture, etc.". Isn't the point of Mozart the symmetry, the grace, the balance? This is not Tchaikovsky, gentlemen...this is cooler, less obviously dramatic, refined, and perfect. Isn't it?


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

MacLeod said:


> I think the Romans knew the value of trumpets and drums to stir the blood long before anyone composed formal music with a martial theme.


There may have been military music before that, but it's interesting that now in the military music is twisted into an instrument of torture rather than something actually relating more to its original purpose.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

starry said:


> There may have been military music before that, but it's interesting that now in the military music is twisted into an instrument of torture rather than something actually relating more to its original purpose.


There was plenty of "battle music" in the times of Mozart and Beethoven, and Beethoven wrote several military marches. Most of the battle music was of the "everybody had a jolly good time and marched home afterward" type. The first more impassioned battle music I know of is in Beethoven's Missa Solemnis.

Not sure what you mean by "instrument of torture." Many of the world's military organizations have fine concert bands and their music is hardly tortuous.


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

KenOC said:


> There was plenty of "battle music" in the times of Mozart and Beethoven, and Beethoven wrote several military marches. Most of the battle music was of the "everybody had a jolly good time and marched home afterward" type. The first more impassioned battle music I know of is in Beethoven's Missa Solemnis.
> 
> Not sure what you mean by "instrument of torture." Many of the world's military organizations have fine concert bands and their music is hardly tortuous.


Haydn's Nelson Mass and Paukenmesse already had the more serious aspects of battle music in them, I think.


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## Guest (Sep 18, 2013)

* The Problem of Mozart.*
He or they wrote too much music..........


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

KenOC said:


> Not sure what you mean by "instrument of torture."


You haven't heard that some kinds of music is used as a means of torture by military organisations now by blaring it into people's ears?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

"Emotion in music" is the same sort of metaphysical response we get when The Star-Spangled Banner" is played.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> "Emotion in music" is the same sort of metaphysical response we get when The Star-Spangled Banner" is played.


Ah, look who's back! We missed you, especially of course your insights on Brahms. :angel:


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

millionrainbows said:


> Okay...maybe it should be called "The Enigma of Mozart" or similar...I'm just trying to penetrate the nature of Mozart, and I think this objectivity or detachment which his music evokes in me is key to this. It also is in perfect synch with my modernist leanings. As usual, I'm having my cake and eating it, too, while modernist critics and anti-quadrivium pundits seem to always be choking on their own bile...ahh, the darkness!
> And the pure logic of it all...Emotion? Who can prove that emotion exists in music? I think it's a sympathetic reaction, personally. Music evokes emotion in us, sure, but I don't think that's a very useful or logical way of penetrating the more profound aspects of music, especially Mozart.
> Talk about your "bombast, conjecture, etc.". Isn't the point of Mozart the symmetry, the grace, the balance? This is not Tchaikovsky, gentlemen...this is cooler, less obviously dramatic, refined, and perfect. Isn't it?


Yet Tchaikovsky liked Mozart...

The problem for classical music is that some of those relatively new to it, who come at it from the perspective of some popular music now, seem to see it as something to purely feed their emotions. It's like they want it to fill them up with some kind of emotional energy like they had a void that needed filling. But I don't really see how anyone approaches art like they are empty and are just receiving something, like it's just some food off a supermarket shelf. And classical music, unlike _some_ popular music which can be largely visceral, actually has a strong intellectual aspect and is not simply an outpouring of emotion.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

starry said:


> Yet Tchaikovsky liked Mozart...
> 
> The problem for classical music is that some of those relatively new to it, who come at it from the perspective of some popular music now, seem to see it as something to purely feed their emotions. It's like they want it to fill them up with some kind of emotional energy like they had a void that needed filling. But I don't really see how anyone approaches art like they are empty and are just receiving something, like it's just some food off a supermarket shelf. And classical music, unlike _some_ popular music which can be largely visceral, actually has a strong intellectual aspect and is not simply an outpouring of emotion.


I like that, except for the part about "some popular music which can be largely visceral." I think that all music is largely visceral, and what sets Mozart apart from, say, Britney Spears' first album is largely the sense of form the visceral (of the senses) content takes. This perception of form must take place over a span of time for it to manifest itself as "sublime form," which is a cerebral process which takes place in time & involves memory, pattern recognition, and comparison of relations; and some popular music (such as repetitive dance grooves) are not really designed to be apprehended or contemplated within this cerebral, contemplative state, but are for physical involvement in social ritual serttings (ahh, to be young). Minimalism, for all its repetitive (openly acknowledged in Britain) similarities to pop, is a significantly different case; it is neither emotional nor cerebral, but is music about "being," which its avoidance of stylistic trappings demands a more "conscious" presence of mind to appreciate.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

brianvds said:


> Ah, look who's back! We missed you, especially of course your insights on Brahms. :angel:


I sincerely hope that's not subtle sarcasm, which has a way of slipping-by on-line. True, some would say I have trashed Brahms in this forum, but I was making a sincere effort: I like the songs, I like the chamber works, and the string quartets; but the case of Brahms always reminds me of that saying, "There's nothing worse than having great potential." In regard to Brahms, I think he could have been much more harmonically adventurous.


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## Guest (Sep 20, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> I like the chamber works, and the string quartets; but the case of Brahms always reminds me of that saying, "There's nothing worse than having great potential." In regard to Brahms, I think he could have been much more harmonically adventurous.


I also like his chamber works but I tend to agree with past poster, a conductor, he said Brahms was not a good orchestrator


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

Andante said:


> I also like his chamber works but I tend to agree with past poster, a conductor, he said Brahms was not a good orchestrator


Well let that conductor see if he'd like to re-orchestrate the 4th symphony! I'm sure Brahms wouldn't mind. I wonder what he might do differently.
As for being harmonically unadventurous. Why ever would that be important? So he could be as famous as Wagner? Oh wait, he is. 
And it is for being Brahms.


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## Guest (Sep 20, 2013)

I wish I could remember his name it was 6 years ago But I will try.

I have remembered who it was a Mr Kurikohtaus


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

If by "personality", you mean a kind of individuality, I think the first composer to have it in a large quantity was Beethoven. It's not difficult to be individualistic but not that simple to be good at the same time. In fact, this is the central aspect of being a good composer. Being individual inside the boundaries of the conventional and popular. I could go right now and write a "shoe concerto" for shoe and orchestra but it would hardly lend me any sort of credibility as a composer of serious music (the fact that in the modern world a lot of such goofy things are passed off as important art is a different thing).

So, what I mean is, personality is important, and Beethoven had tons of it, Mozart somewhat less. There is nothing like "transcending your ego". How is that possible? If Mozart had no ego, why would he compose? In fact, he wouldn't want to walk out of his door if he didn't want to express something.

Let me ask you, what is the scientist doing when he is trying to understand the world? Would you say Nikola Tesla had a personality? He was an inventor, and a pretty perfect one at that. Somebody who made such innovative machines that we can't even dream about - it's not because he had a God-given gift - of course he did - but that's just a name - A Gift. It's not to be taken seriously.

Anyway, saying that Mozart's music seems to transcend the very process of making it - that's both praise and condemnation. The important question is - did Mozart compose enough number of remarkable works which are worthy of a music lover's time 200 years after his death?

The answer is the affirmation in the opening theme of the 40th Symphony.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

I'm not sure about this speculation that Mozart didn't put himself in his music, how can you possibly prove that? I would say that if anything any composer who dedicates his whole life to music must put something of himself into it, while at the same time absorbing himself into the classical music tradition (which they all do). If you hold Beethoven up as an unusually forceful and rumbustious composer how can you ignore Haydn who came before him?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

I think the reason Beethoven is more accessible is due to the emergence of a middle class, and the emerging notion that all men are valuable. Composers write their music with an imagined audience in mind, in most cases. The everyday man's struggles and sufferings suddenly became relevant. While the earlier Mozart and Haydn were entertaining a more elite audience, gathered around royalty and the rich, Beethoven wrote necessarily more raw emotive music, which reflected his new audience. The composer now felt a closer kinship with this new middle class, instead of a detached demeanor. Beethoven wanted to communicate, moreso than "entertain" a group of royalty and affluent listeners who had fewer problems than the man on the street.


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## BillT (Nov 3, 2013)

Some of the comments in this thread might help me to like Mozart. He has always seemed so .... unemotional. Like he was trying to entertain that elite audience. I'll try to look for that transcendence next time. 

Thanks for the discussion. 

- Bill


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## trazom (Apr 13, 2009)

BillT said:


> Some of the comments in this thread might help me to like Mozart. He has always seemed so .... unemotional. Like he was trying to entertain that elite audience. I'll try to look for that transcendence next time.
> 
> Thanks for the discussion.
> 
> - Bill


I'm pretty sure the elite had emotions, too.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

trazom said:


> I'm pretty sure the elite had emotions, too.


That reminds me of that Martin Mull blues song: "I woke up this mornin', and I saw that both cars were gone...I got so durn digusted, that I threw my martini across the lawn..."


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## Copperears (Nov 10, 2013)

Great thread! Particularly liked the 2006 New Yorker article read, and Mozart as Working Stiff.

Romanticism as an art movement was the precipitation, from Napoleon onwards, of the idea of single individuals transforming history. It could be said that the very concept of "the individual" originated during this period, and the marketing of it has been sustained up to this very moment.

The ongoing sports game whereby "greatness" is defined as the fundamental thing to think about suffuses all musical commentary; it was a necessity for survival in Mozart's time, especially as the patronage system for the arts started to break down, and Advertisements for Myself became as important as scribbling away on paper purchased on credit with small loans from friends.

The terrifying counterpoint to this mystifying worship of the Inspired Genius Who Channels God (another function of Romanticism; both to compete with and perpetuate monotheism, taking it out of institutional contexts and mythologizing it as inherently present in Nature) is the possibility that there is no such thing as greatness; that such an assessment is simply the result of sustained, successful advertising.

Postulate: do we think of Mozart's work as superior to that of his contemporaries because it is objectively the case (do we have computer data to prove that)? Or is it simply a consequence of a long line of promotion and mythologizing that has simply locked on this one writer in an effort to simplify and mass-distribute the Mozart Industry?

The farcical tail end of this biz has been the marketing of Mozart Tapes for Babies, etc. A body of music reception work, both in compositional response and critical response, has shored up the sustained perception.

But it might be a productive moment of revelation to open one's ears to the compositions of others in Mozart's time, with a receptiveness to the possibility that Wolfgang is in a continuum of composers from around his time many of whom also have perfectly excellent qualities. Their disappearance from the repertoire and the recording and critical canon is a result of their having been buried under the dysfunctional Romantic worship of greatness, a principle underlying the capitalist belief in competition for limited resources with necessary winners and losers, defined by their access to and control over capital (Mozart and Beethoven didn't have much, putting the lie to such silliness), and perhaps now it is time to dispense with that kind of cultural disease and widen one's perspective to a larger one.

So I like the idea of Mozart as particularly hard-driven craftsman, whose results reflect great fluidity as a result of extensive immersion in musical/cultural practice, combined with the necessity of having had to compose a lot in a desperate effort to survive. 

Much more likely than the propaganda of effortless genius, a propaganda particularly appealing to the lazy and well-situated, who think they can simply substitute some sort of mystical inspiration in moments of silent freedom from necessity for the hard work behind making something that is a satisfying experience for those receiving it.

So, to summarize: when the tourist upon arriving in New York City to attend a concert asked the cabbie, "how do you get to Symphony Hall?" and got the reply, "Practice!" -- the cabbie was right!


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

Copperears said:


> Great thread! Particularly liked the 2006 New Yorker article read, and Mozart as Working Stiff.
> 
> Romanticism as an art movement was the precipitation, from Napoleon onwards, of the idea of single individuals transforming history. It could be said that the very concept of "the individual" originated during this period, and the marketing of it has been sustained up to this very moment.
> 
> ...


Yes! I would like to explore these contemporaries of Mozart. I know none of them because you are right, their work seems to have been turned a blind eye in our times. I think listening to them will also help in understanding Mozart's music better and put it in perspective, and also judging anew its aesthetic qualities.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Copperears said:


> Postulate: do we think of Mozart's work as superior to that of his contemporaries because it is objectively the case (do we have computer data to prove that)? Or is it simply a consequence of a long line of promotion and mythologizing that has simply locked on this one writer in an effort to simplify and mass-distribute the Mozart Industry?


Mozart's contemporary Kozeluch gives us a hint. After Mozart's funeral, he said to a friend "Of course it's too bad about such a great genius, but it's good for us that he's dead. Because if he had lived longer, really the world would not have given a single piece of bread for our compositions."


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

There was obviously some other good music around in Mozart's time, but you could say the same for when Beethoven was composing too. They were both just very productive and across nearly every genre as well and that helped them stand out in their time. They also tended to be particularly ambitious as well.


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## Copperears (Nov 10, 2013)

KenOC said:


> Mozart's contemporary Kozeluch gives us a hint. After Mozart's funeral, he said to a friend "Of course it's too bad about such a great genius, but it's good for us that he's dead. Because if he had lived longer, really the world would not have given a single piece of bread for our compositions."


And hence the marketing began! 

There are times when an artist garners appeal or acclaim in their own time; there are times when they do not. Some are forgotten, only to be resurrected a century later. Others we grow weary of, and begin to take for granted.

Hawthorne thought Melville's Moby Dick was a work of pure genius. It took Charles Olson almost a century later to convince people other than Melville's friends that this might be true. And then Moby Dick went on to elicit tears and boredom among the vast audiences exposed to it subsequently, with the exception of a few twisted souls (like myself).

J.S. Bach almost fell out of sight completely at one point; it took someone a long while later to stand up and shout hey, wait a minute.

This kind of fluidity of reputation, interest and evaluation is always ongoing, and quite volatile. Nothing stems its ceaseless tide, nor is there anything permanent about it, except for the fact of mutability itself.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Copperears said:


> This kind of fluidity of reputation, interest and evaluation is always ongoing, and quite volatile. Nothing stems its ceaseless tide, nor is there anything permanent about it, except for the fact of mutability itself.


I think that history, regardless of changing circumstances, becomes "codified" and becomes mythology, after a certain time has passed. Since history is not a science, it never was "permanent," nor should it be expected to be. Five witnesses to a car wreck will give five different versions; that's "history." 
But in the end, it's only the mytholigized gestalt that will matter; the collective memory of *H*istory, as it becomes part of the larger, more consensus view, having passed the test, and becoming transformed into our collective mythology. This is mythology, like religion; metaphysical in nature, not scientific data.


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