# Writing music today in an older style



## Guest (May 3, 2016)

This thread is intended to address a couple of points that have been raised on this forum about the "validity" of a composer today writing in a much earlier style (e.g. Alma Deutscher, _et al_).

Have a listen to this piece written by German composer Hans Mollenhauer Millies (1883-1957) who wrote this "Concertino for violin and piano in the style of Mozart". (I haven't been able to pinpoint the date of composition, but very probably in the 20th century unless he too was a prodigy _à la_ Deutscher.)






Now, here are the questions intended to stimulate some (civilized) debate:

1) Putting aside its obvious pedagogical function (use of 1st position for elementary students of the violin), do you find it a "good" piece? What are its strengths (or weaknesses) in your humble opinion?
2) Even knowing that it is written "in the style of Mozart", would it have fooled you into thinking it is Mozart (pure and simple, ahem) if in a "blind test", so to speak?
3) Would you prefer composers today (student and professional) to continue writing in older styles like this example? If so, why?
4) Does the fact that it is a piece used for teaching remove any doubts we might have as to its "aesthetic value"?
5) Trick question: can Alma do it better? Hah!


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

Any competent composer today should be able to write something convincing in the style of Mozart, or at least in the style of the era. 
All music is valid in someone's eyes (ears).

Mozart would not be in G major by bar 82 that's for sure.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

I'm having trouble answering because this example incorporates much of what I dislike about Mozart, but as to the practice itself, there is very good precedent.

For example, Mendelssohn's string symphonies are clearly throwbacks to earlier styles, some even sounding baroque to me, and they are youthful works, but they are among my favorites of Mendelssohn's output. I think if done as a stepping stone these exercises can be a valuable part of the catalog, but I'd be suspicious if one's output is exclusively that.


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

1. It's not really my bag. Pleasant enough teatime music.
2. I could believe it or not.
3. No, not as an ongoing general answer. That is nostalgia, not creativity. Artistically, if everyone did that, always, it would mean the end of time, in effect.
4. Irrelevant (to me, aesthetically).
5. Trick answer: who cares. Hah!


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

4: Great composers have written great music for beginning students, e.g., Bach's Anna Magdalena notebook, Bartok's Mikrokosmos and 44 Duos for two violins. This isn't horrible, but is obviously not on that level for numerous reasons.
3: Composers routinely use older styles to some degree. Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Satie and Poulenc certainly did. And who couldn't love Respighi's Ancient Airs and Dances? Fritz Kreisler even pretended his pieces were written in the baroque era. 
2: No. Listen to Mozart's piano and violin sonatas written when he was no more than 10 years old.
1: Mozart took what seems, to modern ears anyway, a simple and narrow harmonic language and conventional classical structures and created work of immense harmonic sophistication and complexity, with extensive use of modulation (almost absent from this work), and intricate and elaborate internal thematic structures. This work is not remotely in that league.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

_1) Putting aside its obvious pedagogical function (use of 1st position for elementary students of the violin), do you find it a "good" piece? What are its strengths (or weaknesses) in your humble opinion?_
It sounds bland; not offensively so, but bland nonetheless.

_2) Even knowing that it is written "in the style of Mozart", would it have fooled you into thinking it is Mozart (pure and simple, ahem) if in a "blind test", so to speak?_
I doubt it. The 8-year-old Mozart wrote more interesting music.

_3) Would you prefer composers today (student and professional) to continue writing in older styles like this example? If so, why?_
No. I don't see the point in trying to sound like a long-gone composer, seeing as how there's so much music already written in that era that remains for most of us to explore. It's always going to sound old (and not merely "old-fashioned"). But I have no problem with a composer who attempts to "update" an older style by bringing something fresh to the table.

_4) Does the fact that it is a piece used for teaching remove any doubts we might have as to its "aesthetic value"?_
I suppose so.

_5) Trick question: can Alma do it better? Hah!_
Oh well, there goes your "civilized debate".


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

A distinction should be made between "sounding like another composer" and "sounding like it was composed in the classical era". The former will always trouble some listeners, the latter shouldn't (and if it does, shouldn't be considered anyone's problem but the listener's).

I find it funny how someone always says that I should listen to minor classical era composers if I want more music that sounds like classical era music. Hello! I don't want to listen to second-rate music. I want to listen to more works of pure genius that sound like classical era music. Nothing. Wrong. With. That.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

1) I think it can only be evaluated for its pedagogical function. It seems strange to say it's "not good" when it probably serves its purpose.
2) In a blind test I would never guess that the piece was by Mozart, but if you told me it was written by Mozart as a child, I would believe it.
3) No. Talented composers have never been interested in doing that and never will be.
4) I guess, though more interesting pieces for children can be and have been written.
5) Don't know.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

Chordalrock said:


> A distinction should be made between "sounding like another composer" and "sounding like it was composed in the classical era". The former will always trouble some listeners, the latter shouldn't (and if it does, shouldn't be considered anyone's problem but the listener's).
> 
> I find it funny how someone always says that I should listen to minor classical era composers if I want more music that sounds like classical era music. Hello! I don't want to listen to second-rate music.* I want to listen to more works of pure genius that sound like classical era music*. Nothing. Wrong. With. That.


But a 'pure genius' today would not, could not arbitrarily restrict themselves to such a narrow range. How could that person be a genius? A genius is someone who has seen what none else has seen, has imagined what none else has imagined. They are not in the business of mere imitation, how ever good.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

There have been several threads on the subject of "I wish composer X had written X." So apparently there would be demand for that. Except the fact alone that it would not be actually composed by the composer being "copied" would affect the perception of that work, even if the composer clone actually managed to succesfully copy the composer's style, whatever that means.


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## Stavrogin (Apr 20, 2014)

Writing in another composer's style is not a problem, writing bland music is a problem.

Assume Mozart never wrote the Jupiter symphony, and this guy did instead, in early '900. Is it still a masterpiece?


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Petwhac said:


> But a 'pure genius' today would not, could not arbitrarily restrict themselves to such a narrow range.


Doesn't sound like much of a genius if they can't do that.

Also, I take it you don't believe there are geniuses of 12-tone or serialist composition. Now that's "arbitrarily restricting" yourself.



Petwhac said:


> A genius is someone who has seen what none else has seen, has imagined what none else has imagined.


A genius is someone with the highest standards and the ability to perform up to them.



Petwhac said:


> They are not in the business of mere imitation


Choosing to compose within a certain restricted range of means isn't the same as imitation. To imitate, you must choose a specific composer or work as a model. Otherwise, Mozart was nothing but an imitator, since Haydn had already composed a body of work in Classical idiom.


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Also, I take it you don't believe there are geniuses of 12-tone or serialist composition. Now that's "arbitrarily restricting" yourself.


The 12-tone method is no more restricting than the system of tonality.

Sorry TalkingHead, but this thread will burn now. Serialism has been brought up.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Stavrogin said:


> Assume Mozart never wrote the Jupiter symphony, and this guy did instead, in early '900. Is it still a masterpiece?


Yes, but that never happens, so the question is purely hypothetical.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

The "Mozart style" was created by Mozart through acts of individual genius. Its genius and originality are not separable. They never are.

That's why in a thousand years of music there has never been a genius who wrote in someone else's style, and there never will be. It's a contradiction.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

nathanb said:


> The 12-tone method is no more restricting than the system of tonality.
> 
> Sorry TalkingHead, but this thread will burn now. Serialism has been brought up.


The idea of total chromaticism is certainly more restrictive than tonality, since the latter includes diatonicism AND almost total chromaticism.

I'm not sure what the point of your comment was anyway. Was it just to defend the idea of 12-tone music? Because you needn't do that. I like 12-tone music.

Or was your intention to discredit my analogy? Because the analogy is just fine. There is nothing more restricting about composing Classical Era music than there is in composing using total chromaticism. If there was, then Mozart and Beethoven would have to be considered composers of less range than late Schoenberg or Webern - and I'd still be winning the argument.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

Harold in Columbia said:


> Yes, but that never happens, so the question is purely hypothetical.


Obviously the particular hypothetical didn't happen. But is it really impossible to compose a masterpiece in an older style today? I don't think so. I believe it is even likely that a piece you would consider a masterpiece if it had been written by Mozart/Beethoven/Haydn/whoever has been written say, in the 21th or the later half of 20th century. The problem is that it would be difficult for such a work to attract attention.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Dim7 said:


> Obviously the particular hypothetical didn't happen. But is it really impossible to compose a masterpiece in an older style today? I don't think so. I believe it is even likely that a piece you would consider a masterpiece if it had been written by Mozart/Beethoven/Haydn/whoever has been written say, in the 21th or the later half of 20th century. The problem is that it would be difficult for such a work to attract attention.


Once the West sails through Singularity, we'll have super AIs composing music in all the styles of all the classic composers. It may be considered just a circus act by the masses, but the fact is it will happen and it will result in some pretty brilliant music.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> Once the West sails through Singularity, we'll have super AIs composing music in all the styles of all the classic composers. It may be considered just a circus act by the masses, but the fact is it will happen and it will result in some pretty brilliant music.


I would bet a lot of money that nothing like this will ever happen.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

isorhythm said:


> I would bet a lot of money that nothing like this will ever happen.


I'd bet a lot of money that it's already happened, and that we're living in the resulting virtual world simulation and that all the best music by our most esteemed composers has in fact been composed by super AIs. Come on, prove me wrong.


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## Stavrogin (Apr 20, 2014)

isorhythm said:


> I would bet a lot of money that nothing like this will ever happen.


You may lose it.
The evolution of future technological progress is very difficult to predict and probably faster than most people would imagine.


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## Richannes Wrahms (Jan 6, 2014)

Those super AIs must be infused with sadistic programming.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

I'm all for robot rebellion.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Dim7 said:


> But is it really impossible to compose a masterpiece in an older style today?


Yes, because it's impossible to adequately understand art consciously, which is why it isn't science, and the only way to adequately understand a style intuitively is to live in the time and place, in terms of musical culture and otherwise, that produced it.



Dim7 said:


> I believe it is even likely that a piece you would consider a masterpiece if it had been written by Mozart/Beethoven/Haydn/whoever has been written say, in the 21th or the later half of 20th century. The problem is that it would be difficult for such a work to attract attention.


This is of course just the old excuse for undistinguished art, that it would be admired if only it had its chance.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Richannes Wrahms said:


> Those super AIs must be infused with sadistic programming.


They would just be servants. It's the chimp that climbed down from the trees that's always been a rotten apple.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> The idea of total chromaticism is certainly more restrictive than tonality, since the latter includes diatonicism AND almost total chromaticism.


Not by that logic, since it's possible to compose a piece that's technically totally chromatic and sounds diatonic.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Stavrogin said:


> The evolution of future technological progress is very difficult to predict and probably faster than most people would imagine.


That suggests that isorhythm is likely to _win_ their bet.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

Here's a piece I like a lot written in a style that was old at the time (1622):






It's surprising how few examples of that kind of thing you can find in music history, though. Tomkins is the best example I know.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Chordalrock said:


> A distinction should be made between "sounding like another composer" and "sounding like it was composed in the classical era". The former will always trouble some listeners, the latter shouldn't (and if it does, shouldn't be considered anyone's problem but the listener's).
> 
> I find it funny how someone always says that I should listen to minor classical era composers if I want more music that sounds like classical era music. Hello! I don't want to listen to second-rate music. I want to listen to more works of pure genius that sound like classical era music. Nothing. Wrong. With. That.


I am right there with you. You expressed it so perfectly. My only difference is that I want more late romantic masterpieces. Just a guess, but I think we are not alone, there are many who feel as we do.


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## Stavrogin (Apr 20, 2014)

Harold in Columbia said:


> That suggests that isorhythm is likely to _win_ their bet.


That suggests only that no scenario, regardless of how unlikely it seems today, can be excluded.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Truckload said:


> My only difference is that I want more late romantic masterpieces.


And I want a billion dollars. Guess what?


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Stavrogin said:


> Writing in another composer's style is not a problem, writing bland music is a problem.
> 
> Assume Mozart never wrote the Jupiter symphony, and this guy did instead, in early '900. Is it still a masterpiece?


The Jupiter would still be a masterpiece no matter who wrote it, or when it was written. The music speaks for itself.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

Harold in Columbia said:


> This is of course just the old excuse for undistinguished art, that it would be admired if only it had its chance.


Well what if one of Mozart's masterpieces had been lost, then discovered by a composer living in our century and published by him as his own work. Would it be regarded as a masterpiece?


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Harold in Columbia said:


> Not by that logic, since it's possible to compose a piece that's technically totally chromatic and sounds diatonic.


Diatonicism means that no chromaticism is present, so what you are suggesting is nonsensical to me.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Stavrogin said:


> That suggests only that no scenario, regardless of how unlikely it seems today, can be excluded.


Right, so since we're playing make believe, why not imagine something more pleasant than the apotheosis of the code monkeys? (Like, say, _anything_.)


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

isorhythm said:


> The "Mozart style" was created by Mozart through acts of individual genius. Its genius and originality are not separable. They never are.
> 
> That's why in a thousand years of music there has never been a genius who wrote in someone else's style, and there never will be. It's a contradiction.


The piece posted by the OP does not sound anything like Mozart to me. It does sound like something that could have been written in the mid-classical era by someone, but not Mozart. The composer probably knew this. My guess is that it was simply a shorthand way of saying, "in a classical era style". The piece follows all of the typical conventions of the era, with no anachronisms that I hear, so this was a knowledgeable person. If anything, it is more similar to Haydn than Mozart, but merely by a matter of degree. It doesn't really sound like Haydn either.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Chordalrock said:


> Once the West sails through Singularity, we'll have super AIs composing music in all the styles of all the classic composers. It may be considered just a circus act by the masses, but the fact is it will happen and it will result in some pretty brilliant music.


I hope this will never happen. I for one would be really sad if a computer could write music with the same inherent humanity as the great composers.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

Chordalrock said:


> Choosing to compose within a certain restricted range of means isn't the same as imitation. To imitate, you must choose a specific composer or work as a model. Otherwise, Mozart was nothing but an imitator, since Haydn had already composed a body of work in Classical idiom.


But we were talking about composers who are imitating specific other composers or eras. That is not the same as a contemporary composer choosing to apply limitations or boundaries to their own work - which of course they are free to break if they feel the need. 
Mozart was indeed an imitator as all composers start that way though he didn't end that way (the genius bit) But he wasn't imitating Palestrina.
There are plenty of painters who could knock up a Dutch Master of French Impressionist to fool 99% of the population and their works can command a large fee but they would not expect to be hailed and esteemed to the same extent as the originators of style.
There's nothing _wrong_ with someone wanting to write imitation Mozart and nothing wrong with someone wanting to listen to it. It's just unreasonable to expect it to be held up along side Mozart in terms of artistic achievement. It's just a bit of fun.
Enjoy it but don't complain if it's not taken seriously.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Truckload said:


> I am right there with you. You expressed it so perfectly. My only difference is that I want more late romantic masterpieces. Just a guess, but I think we are not alone, there are many who feel as we do.


I was just thinking the same thing and then you went and said it.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Dim7 said:


> Well what if one of Mozart's masterpieces had been lost, then discovered by a composer living in our century and published by him as his own work. Would it be regarded as a masterpiece?


It would be regarded as a masterpiece, and the composer as an obvious fraud, because everybody would quickly figure out that he couldn't have written it.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Truckload said:


> I hope this will never happen. I for one would be really sad if a computer could write music with the same inherent humanity as the great composers.


Knowing humans, I think it'll happen.

I'm not saying this because I think it would necessarily be a good thing - it might be a bad thing, but honestly I'm jaded enough that personally I'd probably just find a way to benefit from it (i.e. find a way to not care that the music is by a machine rather than by a human).


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

Harold in Columbia said:


> Not by that logic, since it's possible to compose a piece that's technically totally chromatic and sounds diatonic.


A whole piece? Let's hear it.


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> The idea of total chromaticism is certainly more restrictive than tonality, since the latter includes diatonicism AND almost total chromaticism.


So having to write in a diatonic way is less limiting than not having to write in a diatonic way?


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

nathanb said:


> So having to write in a diatonic way is less limiting than not having to write in a diatonic way?


I was obviously using the definition of diatonicism that means "no chromaticism". So what I was saying is that tonality includes both "no chromaticism" and "almost total chromaticism", thus being less limiting than something that includes only "total chromaticism".


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Diatonicism means that no chromaticism is present, so what you are suggesting is nonsensical to me.


_Total diatonicism_ would mean no chromaticism is present.

As for 12 tone music sounding diatonic, it has, of course, been _done_:


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Harold in Columbia said:


> _Total diatonicism_ would mean no chromaticism is present.
> 
> As for 12 tone music sounding diatonic, it has, of course, been _done_:


Do you guys have to read my messages like the devil reads the Bible? What I'm saying is not hard to get, you just have to read my messages sympathetically instead of itching to write inapt criticism the first chance you get.

By 12-tone music I meant total chromaticism, as should be obvious from the fact that I started using the latter term.

By diatonicism I meant "total diatonicism", as should have been absolutely clear from the context, and as is usually meant in the context of discussing harmony.


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## Faustian (Feb 8, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> Do you guys have to read my messages like the devil reads the Bible? What I'm saying is not hard to get, you just have to read my messages sympathetically instead of itching to write inapt criticism the first chance you get.


Welcome to talk classical where every conversation is a competition.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

Harold in Columbia said:


> _Total diatonicism_ would mean no chromaticism is present.
> 
> As for 12 tone music sounding diatonic, it has, of course, been _done_:


 That's cheating!


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

For goodness sake pleeeeeese don't turn this thread into another tonal/atonal serial-modernism-conservative gore-fest!!
And NOBODY mention Schoenberg- oops!


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Do you guys have to read my messages like the devil reads the Bible?


Alright, let's go back to the original point. Was 12 tone music an "arbitrary restriction"? _Salome_ to _Erwartung_ to Webern's bagatelles for string quartet to the waltz from Schönberg's Op. 23 is a pretty clear process of gradual evolution. Now, if somebody today tried to write like Schönberg in the '20s, that _would_ be an arbitrary restriction - in the same sense as trying to write like Mozart.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

I really do not know how to answer these questions.

I know many composers who will on occasion compose a work in an older style. I know of many that like to go back to the Renaissance: Ron Nelson; _Courtly Airs and Dances_ or Robert Latham; _Court Festival_ or the many Respighi works.

If my ear likes it, I really do not care.

Note 1: The Second Viennese has been around for a century. Would that now be an older style?

Note 2: It is a matter of time before this thread gets shut down.

Amended Note 1 per suggestion of Mahlerian. It appears he had a point.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> A distinction should be made between "sounding like another composer" and "sounding like it was composed in the classical era". The former will always trouble some listeners, the latter shouldn't (and if it does, shouldn't be considered anyone's problem but the listener's).
> 
> I find it funny how someone always says that I should listen to minor classical era composers if I want more music that sounds like classical era music. Hello! I don't want to listen to second-rate music. I want to listen to more works of pure genius that sound like classical era music. Nothing. Wrong. With. That.


Some of those "minor classical era composers" were as popular and celebrated in their day as Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, if not more so. You'll never know what you're missing if you don't give them a try. So many posters here say, "I'm only interested in the most popular composers" or "I'm only interested in the greatest genius composers". Why worry about labels? Listen for yourself.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

fluteman said:


> Some of those "minor classical era composers" were as popular and celebrated in their day as Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, if not more so. You'll never know what you're missing if you don't give them a try.


Unless you spend any length of time listening to public radio, in which case you know what you're "missing" _all too well_.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Dim7 said:


> There have been several threads on the subject of "I wish composer X had written X." So apparently there would be demand for that. Except the fact alone that it would not be actually composed by the composer being "copied" would affect the perception of that work, even if the composer clone actually managed to succesfully copy the composer's style, whatever that means.


The music business has long been full of people writing music in someone else's style, so you are right on the demand part. But those people, though often highly skilled, tend to remain anonymous (ed. and never as successful as the original) unless and until they start writing their own music.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

arpeggio said:


> I really do not know how to answer these questions.
> 
> I know many composers who will on occasion compose a work in an older style. I know of many that like to go back to the Renaissance: Ron Nelson; _Courtly Airs and Dances_ or Robert Latham; _Court Festival_ or the many Respighi works.
> 
> ...


Note 1, I agree, yes it is.

Note 2, I agree again. It is only a matter of time. Just a question of when.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Harold in Columbia said:


> Unless you spend any length of time listening to public radio, in which case you know what you're "missing" _all too well_.


NYC's last remaining classical radio station, which is public, plays pretty much nothing these days but the most famous warhorses around the clock. I know this because our cockatiel is a devoted listener.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

arpeggio said:


> Note 1: 12 tone has been around for a century. Would that now be an older style?


No, because it was never a style to begin with. It's a way of approaching one's musical material, not a way of arranging it.

It may be compared to the procedure of cantus firmus in that it's associated with a given period and style, but it doesn't have to be used in a way that evokes that time.


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

TalkingHead said:


> 2) Even knowing that it is written "in the style of Mozart", would it have fooled you into thinking it is Mozart (pure and simple, ahem) if in a "blind test", so to speak?


Assuming that we're not actually going to _do_ this experiment, I'll say no of course I'd know the difference.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

fluteman said:


> NYC's last remaining classical radio station, which is public, plays pretty much nothing these days but the most famous warhorses around the clock.


Not sure if that's better or worse than Boston's, which has a great affection for Albinoni and Pleyel.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

Mahlerian said:


> No, because it was never a style to begin with. It's a way of approaching one's musical material, not a way of arranging it.
> 
> It may be compared to the procedure of cantus firmus in that it's associated with a given period and style, but it doesn't have to be used in a way that evokes that time.


OK, I should of called it what?


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

One of my favorite members of the other forum is a gentleman with the handle of "Discophage". He has made some great posts. One of my favorites is:

"But again I don't think the "decline of classical music" has anything to do with not producing new composers who will appeal to the masses. The question is more: why doesn't Beethoven appeal to the masses? And if Beethoven doesn't bring new fans to classical music, what makes you think that Joe Schmurtz, the new Mozart, will?"


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

TalkingHead said:


> 1) Putting aside its obvious pedagogical function (use of 1st position for elementary students of the violin), do you find it a "good" piece? What are its strengths (or weaknesses) in your humble opinion?


Not particularly. It seems too regular and clumsy.



TalkingHead said:


> 2) Even knowing that it is written "in the style of Mozart", would it have fooled you into thinking it is Mozart (pure and simple, ahem) if in a "blind test", so to speak?


Difficult to say. Of course I think no, but that could be confirmation bias at work. I would have to have heard it blind to really answer you.



TalkingHead said:


> 3) Would you prefer composers today (student and professional) to continue writing in older styles like this example? If so, why?


No, I think that they should cultivate their own style, not imitations of someone else's, no matter how good.



TalkingHead said:


> 4) Does the fact that it is a piece used for teaching remove any doubts we might have as to its "aesthetic value"?


Not really a factor. There are a number of pieces of undoubtedly high quality that were written with pedagogical function, not least some of the keyboard works of Bach.



TalkingHead said:


> 5) Trick question: can Alma do it better? Hah!


With a few more years, she might end up being able to do it just as well. I still wouldn't care.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> A genius is someone with the highest standards and the ability to perform up to them.


You can define "genius" that way if you want, but in the arts, people are generally interested in _creative_ genius, not genius in the sense of a high degree of competence.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

arpeggio said:


> OK, I should of called it what?


Well, perhaps the Second Viennese style or something. I'd agree that that is an old style and not contemporary any longer.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Harold in Columbia said:


> Unless you spend any length of time listening to public radio, in which case you know what you're "missing" _all too well_.


Well you seem to be listening to it or you wouldn't know what public radio was playing.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

DaveM said:


> Well you seem to be listening to it or you wouldn't know what public radio was playing.


I change the channel.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

Mahlerian said:


> Well, perhaps the Second Viennese style or something. I'd agree that that is an old style and not contemporary any longer.


Great suggestion.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Kyle Gann, for one, will object. He dislikes the implication that S, W, and B are in the same class as H, M, B, and S - which, come to think of it, may be the only sincerely complimentary thing he's ever said about M.


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

fluteman said:


> You can define "genius" that way if you want, but in the arts, people are generally interested in _creative_ genius, not genius in the sense of a high degree of competence.


And if this were not true, Lang Lang would have no detractors.


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Do you guys have to read my messages like the devil reads the Bible? What I'm saying is not hard to get, you just have to read my messages sympathetically instead of itching to write inapt criticism the first chance you get.
> 
> By 12-tone music I meant total chromaticism, as should be obvious from the fact that I started using the latter term.
> 
> By diatonicism I meant "total diatonicism", as should have been absolutely clear from the context, and as is usually meant in the context of discussing harmony.


I am ok with your criticism, personally, because, to me, it is obviously a criticism easily associated with one who has never attempted to compose 12-tone music. I really am only correcting you for the sake of others.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Dim7 said:


> Well what if one of Mozart's masterpieces had been lost, then discovered by a composer living in our century and published by him as his own work. Would it be regarded as a masterpiece?


Yes, but it's all but impossible to equal, much less beat, Mozart or Beethoven at their own games, especially when at their best. Harder even than perfectly imitating someone else's handwriting. Even the most talented artists have little choice but to invent and play their own games.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

1) Putting aside its obvious pedagogical function (use of 1st position for elementary students of the violin), do you find it a "good" piece? What are its strengths (or weaknesses) in your humble opinion?

*It's pleasant. I enjoy its symmetry, and the violin has a nice tender tone. * 

2) Even knowing that it is written "in the style of Mozart", would it have fooled you into thinking it is Mozart (pure and simple, ahem) if in a "blind test", so to speak?

*Well, it might have, but that's because I'm thick... *

3) Would you prefer composers today (student and professional) to continue writing in older styles like this example? If so, why?

*No, any more than I'd like modern poets to use eighteenth century poetic diction such as 'steed' for horse, 'brand' for sword and 'feathered tribe' for birds.* 

4) Does the fact that it is a piece used for teaching remove any doubts we might have as to its "aesthetic value"?

*As a former teacher, I feel massively insulted by this question!* 

5) Trick question: can Alma do it better? Hah!

*I never listened to any of Alma's stuff, so sorry, I cannot answer. Hah! *


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

fluteman said:


> You can define "genius" that way if you want, but in the arts, people are generally interested in _creative_ genius, not genius in the sense of a high degree of competence.


And why wouldn't high degree of competence include high degree of competence in being creative? Honestly, I think a lot of you guys have a very Romantic view of what being a genius involves. I bet none of you can explain how exactly creative genius is different from my definition. You can make claims and appeal to emotion with high-flown rhetoric, but I have never seen anyone do more than that to support such a point of view.


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

1) Seems pleasant, but I was bored before it finished.
2) I might have believed it was a youthful work by him.
3) No. Or at least, if you going to write in this style, at least add something new and different to it.
4) It could still have aesthetic value despite being a teaching work. 
5) Of course. This is far better than the Millies piece:






EDIT: Oh, I see, she didn't actually write that.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

To Chordalrock:

I don't think it's Romantic to expect more from musical genius than high competence. Genius has acquired several definitions as the concept has evolved. Originally it wasn't something you _were,_ but something you _had,_ a spirit-being ("genie") who watched over you and guided you. Genius defined merely as a high level of intellect or ability misses that spiritual connotation, which is still a part of what people mean when they speak of artistic genius. Bach's genius wasn't just in his mastery of counterpoint and his ability to turn out a cantata every week, but in the depth of his creative imagination and his ability to make those perfectly wrought fugues say something extraordinary. Telemann was also a master and wrote a lot more music than Bach, but no one puts his "genius" on Bach's level.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> And why wouldn't high degree of competence include high degree of competence in being creative? Honestly, I think a lot of you guys have a very Romantic view of what being a genius involves. I bet none of you can explain how exactly creative genius is different from my definition. You can make claims and appeal to emotion with high-flown rhetoric, but I have never seen anyone do more than that to support such a point of view.


Actually, I'm a Modernist myself.  More seriously, my comment, and yours, or so I thought, was more in the context of the question, Why can't a composer today write a Mozart symphony?, that some of the posters here, including the OP, seem to be asking. As someone already said, creativity requires something new, by definition. But more importantly, writing a symphony truly in Mozart's style, and up to Mozart's standards, would be nearly impossible to do. As an artist, you can really only have your own style. Some go so far as to say making highly accurate copies is "mere craftsmanship", not art. But that's getting further into semantics than I care to go.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

fluteman said:


> You can define "genius" that way if you want, but in the arts, people are generally interested in _creative_ genius, not genius in the sense of a high degree of competence.


Anyway, you are either nitpicking.....or you're claiming that a composer can be creative only by creating a new style, e.g. Mozart was creative by creating the "Mozart style".

Back in the real world, a real composer can be creative either in terms of content or style. He doesn't have to invent a new style, he can just invent content that makes the piece of music sound unique.

Plus this doesn't have much to do with my original point anyway, since I wasn't arguing that anyone should imitate other composers, just that it was perfectly legitimate to compose with certain restrictions that would make the music sound like it was composed in the classical period. It would be entirely possible to create A NEW STYLE that sounded like it came from the 18th century, inasmuch as Mozart's style can be considered a new style, or Beethoven's late period style a new style.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Woodduck said:


> To Chordalrock:
> 
> I don't think it's Romantic to expect more from musical genius than high competence. Genius has acquired several definitions as the concept has evolved. Originally it wasn't something you _were,_ but something you _had,_ a spirit-being ("genie") who watched over you and guided you. Genius defined merely as a high level of intellect or ability misses that spiritual connotation, which is still a part of what people mean when they speak of artistic genius. Bach's genius wasn't just in his mastery of counterpoint and his ability to turn out a cantata every week, but in the depth of his creative imagination and his ability to make those perfectly wrought fugues say something extraordinary. Telemann was also a master and wrote a lot more music than Bach, but no one puts his "genius" on Bach's level.


Telemann wasn't composing "to the highest standards" if the content of his compositions was lackluster.

I have no obsession with style. I'm pretty much only interested in content and composers who are strong with content. I don't care at all if someone invents a new style until their content is solid as well.

What's more, inventing a new style used to be pretty easy. Certainly no mark of genius. It used to take a lot more genius to come up with unique, powerful content than it did to come up with a new style.

I could invent a new style right now: I could compose only by using black keys of the piano every fourth bar, white keys similarly, and the rest of the bars would be divided between different combinations of allowed pitches. Wow. A new style. Does that make me a genius? Heck no.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Back in the real world, a real composer can be creative either in terms of content or style.


If a composer isn't creative in terms of both, they won't be creative in terms of either.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

We'd all like to have more work by the composers we love, but we aren't going to get it. The forms of art are art are essentially determined by subconscious processes in the act of creation, and every individual's subconscious is filled with experiences unlike anyone else's. An artist can begin by taking any style or period as a model, but as soon as he stops imitating and listens to his own subconscious he will begin to diverge from the model. And the greater his creative faculties, the more he is likely to diverge and produce something unprecedented.

Yes, we can have imitation 18th-century composers. But they won't be the best composers, the ones whom posterity will call "genius."


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

I haven't bothered to shred through the various posts in this thread...but the example is FAR too bland to have been written by Mozart. If someone blind tested me on this I would have guessed a generic classical composer.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Woodduck said:


> To Chordalrock:
> 
> I don't think it's Romantic to expect more from musical genius than high competence. Genius has acquired several definitions as the concept has evolved. Originally it wasn't something you _were,_ but something you _had,_ a spirit-being ("genie") who watched over you and guided you. Genius defined merely as a high level of intellect or ability misses that spiritual connotation, which is still a part of what people mean when they speak of artistic genius. Bach's genius wasn't just in his mastery of counterpoint and his ability to turn out a cantata every week, but in the depth of his creative imagination and his ability to make those perfectly wrought fugues say something extraordinary. Telemann was also a master and wrote a lot more music than Bach, but no one puts his "genius" on Bach's level.


Interesting, I had completely forgotten about the spirit-being "genie" thing. Glad you brought that up. I agree about the concept of genius. I always thought of it as a work of more than just excellent craftsmanship. I want to say it is an inspired work, but then that just begs the question of what does it mean to be inspired. There is so much in that word genius to me yet I can not define it at all. I was just thinking that it is a work that connects with many people emotionally, but that cant be correct. Lots of pop and country and movie music connects emotionally without being the work of genius. Wow, I am at a complete loss to put my finger on exactly how to describe it.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> Anyway, you are either nitpicking.....or you're claiming that a composer can be creative only by creating a new style, e.g. Mozart was creative by creating the "Mozart style".
> 
> Back in the real world, a real composer can be creative either in terms of content or style. He doesn't have to invent a new style, he can just invent content that makes the piece of music sound unique.
> 
> Plus this doesn't have much to do with my original point anyway, since I wasn't arguing that anyone should imitate other composers, just that it was perfectly legitimate to compose with certain restrictions that would make the music sound like it was composed in the classical period. It would be entirely possible to create A NEW STYLE that sounded like it came from the 18th century, inasmuch as Mozart's style can be considered a new style, or Beethoven's late period style a new style.


I beg to differ. A composer does have to invent a new style. That's why one can tell the difference between Haydn and Mozart. Or Schumann and Brahms. Or Debussy and Ravel. Or Hindemith and Martinu. Or Ibert and Milhaud. Or Copland and Barber. Or Stockhausen and Xenakis. It isn't just that one is better, or has more mastery of the same style.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Chordalrock said:


> What's more, inventing a new style used to be pretty easy. Certainly no mark of genius. It used to take a lot more genius to come up with unique, powerful content than it did to come up with a new style.
> 
> I could invent a new style right now: I could compose only by using black keys of the piano every fourth bar, white keys similarly, and the rest of the bars would be divided between different combinations of allowed pitches. Wow. A new style. Does that make me a genius? Heck no.


A new style won't make you a creative genius, but creative geniuses make new styles. By definition.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

fluteman said:


> I beg to differ. A composer does have to invent a new style. That's why one can tell the difference between Haydn and Mozart. Or Schumann and Brahms. Or Debussy and Ravel. Or Hindemith and Martinu. Or Ibert and Milhaud. Or Copland and Barber. Or Stockhausen and Xenakis. It isn't just that one is better, or has more mastery of the same style.


You are conflating what (you think) exists with what you think ought to be. I don't think that's a very insightful thing to do.

Content is the only thing that matters, as wonderful and unique content is wonderful and unique regardless of the style, while a wonderful and unique style (whatever that might mean) doesn't guarantee wonderful and unique content.

Only content matters, so style is always a prison because it limits what you can do with content. I think many great composers have felt this restraint as unpleasant, and that's why you have composers like Beethoven and Stravinsky moving through different styles and trying out different things.

Soon there won't be new styles left anyway, only new content. Your contemporary bias will be considered at best quaint soon enough.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

fluteman said:


> I beg to differ. A composer does have to invent a new style. That's why one can tell the difference between Haydn and Mozart. Or Schumann and Brahms. Or Debussy and Ravel. Or Hindemith and Martinu. Or Ibert and Milhaud. Or Copland and Barber. Or Stockhausen and Xenakis. It isn't just that one is better, or has more mastery of the same style.


I can usually tell the difference between Mozart and Haydn and early Beethoven even when it is not a work that is a favorite and highly familiar to me. So I suppose my brain is recognizing what you are calling an individual style. But if I try to think of a way to musically define these "styles" I cannot. Harmonically the language was the same for all three. Early Haydn was not so adventuresome harmonically, but the late Haydn became more adventuresome harmonically with age (or perhaps in response to Mozart). They all wrote primarily using motives, and using the same structure for melody; the period, the sentence, binary and ternary melodic structure. All three used the same forms for movements; sonata, theme and variation, large ternary, rounded binary, minuet, rondo, sonata rondo and sonata without development. They used the same instrumentation. So how can an experienced listener recognize one from another? I must think about it.


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

fluteman said:


> I beg to differ. A composer does have to invent a new style. *That's why one can tell the difference between Haydn and Mozart*. [...]


Not always as easy as you think, Fluteman! 
Try this test and see: http://qq.themefinder.org/


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

TalkingHead said:


> Not always as easy as you think, Fluteman!
> Try this test and see: http://qq.themefinder.org/


To make it truly fun, try it with some closely aligned Renaissance composers, preferably ones whose works you aren't already familiar with. I recommend the pair Palestrina and Victoria as a starter pack - both most highly esteemed giants in the canon of Renaissance composers.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Truckload said:


> So I suppose my brain is recognizing what you are calling an individual style. But if I try to think of a way to musically define these "styles" I cannot.


But maybe you could if you put a whole lot of time, effort and study into it. That is one of the main things academics do, at least the good ones, like Charles Rosen. If you read his book, The Romantic Generation, I promise you will learn a lot about how to define in words what made Chopin's or Schumann's styles unique. No easy task, I admit.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Chordalrock said:


> A distinction should be made between "sounding like another composer" and "sounding like it was composed in the classical era". The former will always trouble some listeners, the latter shouldn't (and if it does, shouldn't be considered anyone's problem but the listener's).
> 
> I find it funny how someone always says that I should listen to minor classical era composers if I want more music that sounds like classical era music. Hello! I don't want to listen to second-rate music. I want to listen to more works of pure genius that sound like classical era music. Nothing. Wrong. With. That.


I agree with the first half of your post entirely.

But be cautious about referring to lesser known classical era composers as minor composers. Many of them really are fairly minor and mediocre, but a fair number are not. Some composers may be considered minor only because the following century distorted our perspective, not with enhanced quality, but with a stylistic precedent that took hold in the name of quality. You drop your romantic perspective, or any balancing perspective across the history of classical music and hone in on that 2nd half of the 18th and first part of the 19th, and you'll realize all the riches that were passing before your ears previously.

Also if someone wants to write interesting 18th century sounding music now, it's a huge benefit to have a broader perspective of how the patterns were being used formally, thematically, etc. You just listen to Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven, and you can do some interesting hybridizing and maybe come out with your own thing the longer you write based on your past works, but you are more likely to just sound like a mix of them.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> To make it truly fun, try it with some closely aligned Renaissance composers, preferably ones whose works you aren't already familiar with. I recommend the pair Palestrina and Victoria as a starter pack - both most highly esteemed giants in the canon of Renaissance composers.


I'm pretty good at it with the composer pairs I picked. I didn't pick them randomly. Now, don't you go and try to impose other pairs on me!  Obviously, you have to develop some familiarity with a composer's style before you can distinguish his music from that of his contemporaries.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

isorhythm said:


> Here's a piece I like a lot written in a style that was old at the time (1622):
> 
> It's surprising how few examples of that kind of thing you can find in music history, though. Tomkins is the best example I know.


The English Renaissance was still going on into that period. They have often been a curiously backwards nation, but the music of their High Renaissance almost seemed to be going it's own direction and maximizing while the relative simplicity of the early baroque was beginning in earnest on the continent.

I think the best example might be the viol consort music of Henry Purcell. Even the English had long "gone baroque" since by his time, and yet he wrote the best Viol Consort music yet written, an anachronism.

Compare Purcell:






and Gibbons:






Interesting huh? The Gibbons is brilliant and ultimately ahead of it's time achieving dissonances by way of counterpoint that wouldn't be regularly revisited till the high baroque. Purcell's is even more extreme, moving around in ways romantics wouldn't dare.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

fluteman said:


> But maybe you could if you put a whole lot of time, effort and study into it. That is one of the main things academics do, at least the good ones, like Charles Rosen. If you read his book, The Romantic Generation, I promise you will learn a lot about how to define in words what made Chopin's or Schumann's styles unique. No easy task, I admit.


Good recommendation. I loved his book on the Classical Style, so I should give it a try.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

fluteman said:


> I'm pretty good at it with the composer pairs I picked. I didn't pick them randomly. Now, don't you go and try to impose other pairs on me!  Obviously, you have to develop some familiarity with a composer's style before you can distinguish his music from that of his contemporaries.


Yeah, well, at what point do stylistic differences become trivial in their aesthetic significance? I've heard that Victoria used a little more dissonance than Palestrina, generally speaking, but I doubt the difference is consistent enough across works that you wouldn't mistake one for the other now and then. Isn't it also rather trivial? I don't think using a little more dissonance than the composer you're imitating makes you oh so creative.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

The viewpoint that I maintain: there is no should. If one wants to gain notoriety and have an active dialogue with their art and society at it's current point that others readily might comprehend, modernization is necessary(it's something that will happen when one is striving for this end, not the other way around(striving for modernization just to be up to date).

If one is ultimately geared in that direction, that it doesn't matter if they prefer to start writing pieces with an 18th, 19th, 17th, 16th, or even 20th century vocabulary in mind(which is very common these days among aspirant students). They start doing that but eventually things will happen as their creative thinking evolves and the result might be interesting. Elliot Carter loved English virginal music from a young age, and evidently tried to write a few works informed by that. Look how he ended up.

If they aren't ultimately geared in that direction, then who is to rob them of enjoying what they do or others enjoying that? And who is to tell them they aren't creative either? There is no need to "put somebody in their place" who not only isn't harming anybody, but actually has skill. Copying Mozart or Bach may be more intellectual than creative, but stripping the great names out of it and distilling a harmonic and possibly, a formal essence into their own mold is also more creative than not.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Chordalrock said:


> You are conflating what (you think) exists with what you think ought to be. I don't think that's a very insightful thing to do.
> 
> Content is the only thing that matters, as wonderful and unique content is wonderful and unique regardless of the style, while a wonderful and unique style (whatever that might mean) doesn't guarantee wonderful and unique content.
> 
> ...


No genuine artist views style as a prison. It is a set of parameters - premises, so to speak - more or less specific, on which an artist consciously or unconsciously builds when he imagines a new work - which, he hopes, will exemplify his own style.

You mention Stravinsky, who liked to experiment with style, but he didn't do so because he found particular stylistic boundaries a hindrance to his inspiration. On the contrary, he felt that the acceptance of limits liberated his creative mind by freeing it from the unnecessary distraction of weighing an infinity of possibilities. Style was thus a stimulus to his imagination as well as to the aesthetic specificity which distinguishes creative art from hack work. Different artists will have different perspectives on this, but I think that the greatest composers generally find their own voices by embracing and absorbing - to a great extent unconsciously, but intentionally as well - the styles prevalent in their own cultural milieu, and that they sharpen their faculties and define themselves by breaking through existing limits.

Style is only a prison if reality itself is a prison. Yes, it limits us - but without limits we are, literally, nothing.


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

Woodduck said:


> We'd all like to have more work by the composers we love, but we aren't going to get it.


We're not?!?! I'm very much expecting this.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Woodduck said:


> Style was thus a stimulus to his imagination as well as to the aesthetic specificity which distinguishes creative art from hack work.


Writing to please others is what distinguishes hack work. That is, at least, what the word generally means, and why it has negative connotations: a hack composing in his own style is still a hack (at least inasmuch as a style aligned with the culture around you, a la Mozart, can be considered one's own).

You may be right about Stravinsky - I'm not an expert on him - but you haven't really said anything to make me reconsider my position on the whole. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.


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## Tristan (Jan 5, 2013)

dogen said:


> We're not?!?! I'm very much expecting this.


Me too. I hear Beethoven's 10th is gonna be great


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

It simply doesn't happen often, so I'd like to drop in and say:

I agree with Woodduck.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Let's put it this way: It doesn't take a genius to imitate a style. So even if a certain contemporary composer was a genius, if they stuck to writing "In The Style Of" pieces their whole life, we wouldn't be able to tell.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

violadude said:


> Let's put it this way: It doesn't take a genius to imitate a style. So even if a certain contemporary composer was a genius, if they stuck to writing "In The Style Of" pieces their whole life, we wouldn't be able to tell.


So, if Beethoven had stopped at 8 symphonies, and someone else had composed his 9th, you wouldn't be able to tell that someone else was a genius?

Or the same scenario, but with the Diabelli Variations.

Some have claimed this has never happened, but given enough time and enough universes, something analogous is bound to happen. There is no metaphysics or a principle of the universe or of human psychology that would stop it from happening. Ergo, it's gonna happen.

Now, would you call a guy who composed Beethoven's 9th a creative genius, or not?


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

If you have to introduce the notion of infinite parallel dimensions to make a hypothetical scenario feasible, you should probably find something else to do


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

nathanb said:


> If you have to introduce the notion of infinite parallel dimensions to make a hypothetical scenario feasible, you should probably find something else to do


Well, like I've said, I think our best music has probably been composed by machines, so as far as I'm concerned, the joke's on you.

Here's why I think that way:

1) Statistics says that this pretty much has to be a virtual world (see Nick Bostrom)

2) Much of the paranormal literature can only be explained if you posit that this is a virtual world which is used for toying with the humans who are trapped here.

3) Even great composers like Beethoven typically compose mediocre works. Their actual masterpieces and strokes of genius seem like accidents, like they originate outside the composer and would never have been created without outside help (some artists are familiar with this feeling and call it "inspiration").

So I think it's funny you're very keen to idolise people who are just puppets channeling some sort of super AI. Basically, all of that music is pretty certainly some sort of pastiche, you just don't know it because you're too blind to see the obvious.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Chordalrock said:


> So, if Beethoven had stopped at 8 symphonies, and someone else had composed his 9th, you wouldn't be able to tell that someone else was a genius?
> 
> Or the same scenario, but with the Diabelli Variations.
> 
> ...


No one would have composed Beethoven's 9th, I guarantee. That's why it's *Beethoven's* 9th.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

violadude said:


> I haven't bothered to shred through the various posts in this thread...but the example is FAR too bland to have been written by Mozart. If someone blind tested me on this I would have guessed a generic classical composer.


Presumably until you looked at the score and noticed it ignoring a move to the dominant and instead rather abruptly and without preparation launch into the subdominant which I doubt would have been done by any composer of that period. At least not in a sonata movement.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Some have claimed this has never happened, but given enough time and enough universes, something analogous is bound to happen. There is no metaphysics or a principle of the universe or of human psychology that would stop it from happening. Ergo, it's gonna happen.


"Given enough time and enough universes" is essentially an admission that it's never going to happen.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Chordalrock said:


> So, if Beethoven had stopped at 8 symphonies, and someone else had composed his 9th, you wouldn't be able to tell that someone else was a genius?
> 
> Or the same scenario, but with the Diabelli Variations.
> 
> ...


There have been debates among musicologists about the origins of quite a few pieces of classical music. There are a number of things attributed to both Bach and Mozart that have caused uncertainty. Where is Edward Bast? He would probably know the specific pieces in question.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Tristan said:


> Me too. I hear Beethoven's 10th is gonna be great


I'm happy to tell you that there is a Beethoven 10th. Well, sort of:


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Truckload said:


> There have been debates among musicologists about the origins of quite a few pieces of classical music. There are a number of things attributed to both Bach and Mozart that have caused uncertainty. Where is Edward Bast? He would probably know the specific pieces in question.


I remember reading that many pieces now attributed to Josquin's younger contemporaries could have in fact been Josquin's (as per original attributions) if we assume that Josquin's style had kept evolving into that direction.

People like to imagine that they know a lot of things, but scratch the surface of their beliefs and you'll find nothing much of substance.

Anyway, there's always Bach's most famous piece for some major authenticity-controversy fun:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toccata_and_Fugue_in_D_minor,_BWV_565#Attribution_question

For all we know, it was composed by extra-terrestrials and gifted to Ringk's collection with a purposefully incorrect attribution. Actually, that could be said of a lot of old music...


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## Guest (May 4, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> 1) Statistics says that this pretty much has to be a virtual world (see Nick Bostrom)


Thanks for bringing this to my attention. I enjoyed reading about his theories and arguments. I don't want to continue discussion in this thread (perhaps "Is This Real?" would make a fun community forum thread), but my first impression was that Bostrom only claims that statistics support the simulation idea under one of the three possible lemmas.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

TalkingHead said:


> Not always as easy as you think, Fluteman!
> Try this test and see: http://qq.themefinder.org/


I guess my point here isn't being fully understood. I was trying to say that each artists style is as unique as his handwriting. That doesn't mean that even top professional handwriting experts are never wrong, much less the rest of us. Hey, art forgers have had a long history of success, even though the flaws in their work are usually clear once the forgery is discovered.
Virtuoso violinist Fritz Kreisler may not have been one of the greatest composers in history, or at least composing wasn't his main focus, but he was a brilliant musician who for example could improvise on nearly anything on the piano at parties. He wrote a series of pieces he attributed to more or less well-known Italian and French baroque composers (no doubt that music and those composers weren't as well known then as they are now -- one would be hard pressed to get away with that today no matter how skillful the imitation was).
I think if you placed his work side by side with that of the original composers, and were told that one piece was from the 18th century and the other an imitation by a late 19th-early 20th century composer, you would be able to tell them apart, at least once you became familiar with Kreisler's style. In fact, I don't think Kreisler tried very hard to erase all 19th century influences from this work. He loved this baroque music and was paying tribute to it, while playing a little joke. Yet he fooled many.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

I'm impressed you guys. This thread has remained relatively civil. Maybe we are all tired of it and it was a gently put premise to begin with.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Chordalrock said:


> So, if Beethoven had stopped at 8 symphonies, and someone else had composed his 9th, you wouldn't be able to tell that someone else was a genius?
> 
> Or the same scenario, but with the Diabelli Variations.
> 
> ...


I suspect that in _this_ universe, he or she might not be regarded as a genius.
Whether anything gets called a work of genius depends to some extent on circumstances outside of its actual content. The fact that Beethoven was already an acclaimed composer surely gave the 9th some sort of head-start on the road to genius status; if a hitherto unknown composer had produced it, it's possible that it might not have been so readily performed in the first place, or that its novelties might not have been regarded so positively, and so on.
And once Beethoven's 9th was written and known, it entered our collective musical consciousness to the extent that it's (like all other "genius" works) a little bit a part of our understanding of what classical music is. Without it, what we regard as a work of genius is slightly different - and in the case of Beethoven's 9th perhaps it's had a significant effect on such thoughts.
Compose Beethoven's 9th today and the first thing everyone will notice is that it sounds like it was written a couple of hundred years ago, and it falls between two stools: it's in such an old style that we can't value it in the way we'd value something new, and so we must lump it in with the 19th-century works we know; and because we've already decided on the 19th-century canon (one that doesn't have Beethoven's 9th in it, of course) it's going to have a hard time breaking in.
That's what would likely happen on a collective level, I think. Of course it's possible that any given individual could see it as a work of genius, but I think there are too many factors that mitigate against it being collectively hailed as a work on the same level of the actual Beethoven's 9th.

ETA: And then there's Pierre Menard!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I wonder about this. Beethoven's 9th has quite some considerable force, that wouldn't be missed by the wider range of classical music listeners (regardless of the opinions of "experts".) My guess is that it would make quite a noise. The fact that it sounded as if it were written a couple of hundred years ago might be seen by most as a positive, not a negative. And in the final analysis, vox populi vox dei.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

Beethoven's 9th is a 'work of genius' because of when it was written. Which of its attributes, taken out of context of its time make it a masterpiece? If it is presented as something written in 2016 what are we going to point to?
What does it actually contain that can't be found in Brahms, Mahler, Tchaikovsky, Sibelius or Shostakovich? The voice of Beethoven, that's what!


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## Guest (May 4, 2016)

KenOC said:


> vox populi vox dei.


Being a plebeian I had to look that up and the full quote, in English, is:

"And those people should not be listened to who keep saying the voice of the people is the voice of God, since the riotousness of the crowd is always very close to madness."


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Nereffid said:


> I suspect that in _this_ universe, he or she might not be regarded as a genius.
> Whether anything gets called a work of genius depends to some extent on circumstances outside of its actual content. The fact that Beethoven was already an acclaimed composer surely gave the 9th some sort of head-start on the road to genius status; if a hitherto unknown composer had produced it, it's possible that it might not have been so readily performed in the first place, or that its novelties might not have been regarded so positively, and so on.
> And once Beethoven's 9th was written and known, it entered our collective musical consciousness to the extent that it's (like all other "genius" works) a little bit a part of our understanding of what classical music is. Without it, what we regard as a work of genius is slightly different - and in the case of Beethoven's 9th perhaps it's had a significant effect on such thoughts.
> Compose Beethoven's 9th today and the first thing everyone will notice is that it sounds like it was written a couple of hundred years ago, and it falls between two stools: it's in such an old style that we can't value it in the way we'd value something new, and so we must lump it in with the 19th-century works we know; and because we've already decided on the 19th-century canon (one that doesn't have Beethoven's 9th in it, of course) it's going to have a hard time breaking in.
> ...


Posts like this puzzle me for their lack of coherent logic. We simply don't apply them to other things, like scientific discoveries. Because others have used and built on Newton's or Einstein's laws of physics doesn't make Newton or Einstein any less of a genius. And the fact that we treat these laws as familiar today doesn't detract from their discoverers.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

DavidA said:


> Posts like this puzzle me for their lack of coherent logic. We simply don't apply them to other things, like scientific discoveries. Because others have used and built on Newton's or Einstein's laws of physics doesn't make Newton or Einstein any less of a genius. And the fact that we treat these laws as familiar today doesn't detract from their discoverers.


Beethoven and Newton are geniuses because they did what they did when they did it.
Your analogy breaks down because science deals in facts.
If someone wrote the Principia today, we'd say "we already know all that!"

Nobody is detracting from past masters achievements.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

DavidA said:


> Posts like this puzzle me for their lack of coherent logic. We simply don't apply them to other things, like scientific discoveries. Because others have used and built on Newton's or Einstein's laws of physics doesn't make Newton or Einstein any less of a genius. And the fact that we treat these laws as familiar today doesn't detract from their discoverers.


Music isn't science; Beethoven's 9th wasn't a "discovery" the way Newton's laws were.
I'm not saying Beethoven wasn't a genius, or that his 9th symphony isn't a work of genius. My point was merely that if the exact same notes had been written by somebody who wasn't Beethoven, there's a _possibility_ that the work wouldn't be as highly regarded as it actually is, for reasons that have nothing to do with the music itself. It's speculation, is all it is.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Nereffid said:


> Music isn't science; Beethoven's 9th wasn't a "discovery" the way Newton's laws were.
> I'm not saying Beethoven wasn't a genius, or that his 9th symphony isn't a work of genius. My point was merely that if the exact same notes had been written by somebody who wasn't Beethoven, there's a _possibility_ that the work wouldn't be as highly regarded as it actually is, for reasons that have nothing to do with the music itself. It's speculation, is all it is.


Without going on endlessly about this, I want to mention Somerset Maugham's entertaining novel Cakes and Ale, where he deals with issues like an artist's popularity and acclaim during his career and the ultimate verdict of history on his body of work, which of course are not the same thing. One point he makes is that an artist has to achieve at least a certain degree of popular success in his own era to even be on the list of candidates for greatness and immortality in the future. I think he makes a good point there in general, though there are exceptions.


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

fluteman said:


> Without going on endlessly about this, I want to mention Somerset Maugham's entertaining novel Cakes and Ale, where he deals with issues like an artist's popularity and acclaim during his career and the ultimate verdict of history on his body of work, which of course are not the same thing. One point he makes is that an artist has to achieve at least a certain degree of popular success in his own era to even be on the list of candidates for greatness and immortality in the future. I think he makes a good point there in general, though there are exceptions.


Also worth thinking about is this:
Critically acclaimed works that are judged to be of high quality aren't always popular. But works that are very popular are always of high quality. Of course you have to take into consideration what the works set out to be.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Nereffid said:


> I suspect that in _this_ universe, he or she might not be regarded as a genius.
> Whether anything gets called a work of genius depends to some extent on circumstances outside of its actual content. The fact that Beethoven was already an acclaimed composer surely gave the 9th some sort of head-start on the road to genius status; if a hitherto unknown composer had produced it, it's possible that it might not have been so readily performed in the first place, or that its novelties might not have been regarded so positively, and so on.
> And once Beethoven's 9th was written and known, it entered our collective musical consciousness to the extent that it's (like all other "genius" works) a little bit a part of our understanding of what classical music is. Without it, what we regard as a work of genius is slightly different - and in the case of Beethoven's 9th perhaps it's had a significant effect on such thoughts.
> Compose Beethoven's 9th today and the first thing everyone will notice is that it sounds like it was written a couple of hundred years ago, and it falls between two stools: it's in such an old style that we can't value it in the way we'd value something new, and so we must lump it in with the 19th-century works we know; and because we've already decided on the 19th-century canon (one that doesn't have Beethoven's 9th in it, of course) it's going to have a hard time breaking in.
> ...


LOL, I remember Pierre Menard, the guy who rewrote Don Quixote without changing a word, yet succeeded at making it a far richer, better novel. Personally, I'm not particularly convinced that post-structuralism has much value, but eh, it's a funny short story.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Petwhac said:


> Beethoven's 9th is a 'work of genius' because of when it was written. Which of its attributes, taken out of context of its time make it a masterpiece? If it is presented as something written in 2016 what are we going to point to?
> What does it actually contain that can't be found in Brahms, Mahler, Tchaikovsky, Sibelius or Shostakovich? The voice of Beethoven, that's what!


They all contain melody, harmony, rhythm, and counterpoint, of course.

I believe that in order to properly evaluate a composition, you have to look at how effective, skilful, and unique it is in terms of the total effect of its parts (melody, harmony etc.).

Of course, subjective stuff like personal associations and cultural prejudices affect your evaluation, but (1) their significance can be decreased by being aware of them and (2) they don't affect the real quality and inherent value of the piece of music.

Basically, I think that post-structuralism is like a village idiot who makes a big deal about saying things everyone always knew anyway, while forgetting the important stuff: the quality of the work itself and its primacy in determining value.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

fluteman said:


> One point he makes is that an artist has to achieve at least a certain degree of popular success in his own era to even be on the list of candidates for greatness and immortality in the future.


I would say it's the other way around: If an artist is great, their work will achieve at least a certain degree of popular success in their own era. The fact that maybe the greatest exception to this rule, Emily Dickinson, submitted very nearly none of her poetry for publication, nor otherwise tried to make it available to the the public during her lifetime, would seem to support this.

On the other hand, obviously there have been _potentially_ great artists who never even got started, but would have if not for material and social barriers.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Petwhac said:


> Beethoven and Newton are geniuses because they did what they did when they did it.
> *Your analogy breaks down because science deals in facts.*
> If someone wrote the Principia today, we'd say "we already know all that!"
> 
> Nobody is detracting from past masters achievements.


Actually they are detracting from past masters achievements. Read some of the posts.

The analogy isn't perfect but it will do. I didn't mean people to take it literally.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Nereffid said:


> Music isn't science; Beethoven's 9th wasn't a "discovery" the way Newton's laws were.
> I'm not saying Beethoven wasn't a genius, or that his 9th symphony isn't a work of genius. My point was merely that if the exact same notes had been written by somebody who wasn't Beethoven, there's a _possibility_ that the work wouldn't be as highly regarded as it actually is, for reasons that have nothing to do with the music itself. It's speculation, is all it is.


We all know music isn't science. And as I've said the analogy isn't perfect. You seem to miss the point of what I am saying. And as you say, you are dealing with speculation not fact.


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## Krummhorn (Feb 18, 2007)

Some insulting posts have been deleted.

Members are reminded <sigh> again about the forum rules. Read them ... heed them ... or be banned eventually.

Let's kindly stay on topic ...


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

DavidA said:


> Actually they are detracting from past masters achievements. Read some of the posts.
> 
> The analogy isn't perfect but it will do. I didn't mean people to take it literally.


I think I've read all the posts! I don't remember anyone diss'ing the old guard!
What I've been trying to say is that writing Mozart's 42nd or Haydn's 105th or Beethoven's 10th in 2016 is not going to attract cries of "genius" no matter how great the music is. And a genius in 2016 is unlikely to want to do it.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Petwhac said:


> Also worth thinking about is this:
> Critically acclaimed works that are judged to be of high quality aren't always popular. But works that are very popular are always of high quality. Of course you have to take into consideration what the works set out to be.


Depends which critics you're talking about, right? In this age of online reviews and blogs especially, the critics and the popular audience are often the same people.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Harold in Columbia said:


> I would say it's the other way around: If an artist is great, their work will achieve at least a certain degree of popular success in their own era. The fact that maybe the greatest exception to this rule, Emily Dickinson, submitted very nearly none of her poetry for publication, nor otherwise tried to make it available to the the public during her lifetime, would seem to support this.
> 
> On the other hand, obviously there have been _potentially_ great artists who never even got started, but would have if not for material and social barriers.


Of course there are other famous exceptions, like Van Gogh, and usually for the same reason as Emily Dickinson: little or no effective marketing or promotion, whether by choice or inability. But that's Maugham's point: The effective self-promoters have a big advantage. My rejoinder to him would be, that may be true, but the most active self-promoters often fall from grace very quickly after they die, as nobody else is willing or able to promote their art as ardently and effectively as they did themselves.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

fluteman said:


> But that's Maugham's point: The effective self-promoters have a big advantage.


I don't think that's the case, though. Great art attracts promoters, even if the artist themselves is useless at promoting. (See Schubert.) Van Gogh is admittedly an example of a great artist who tried to attract interest and didn't - but then Van Gogh isn't all _that_ great.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

In the old days, a composer's publisher would act as a promoter to some extent, because he'd be boosting his own sales. Music magazines (mostly) were supported by ads for new sheet music. Not too different from today, except that the ads are now for recordings of old music.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Harold in Columbia said:


> I don't think that's the case, though. Great art attracts promoters, even if the artist themselves is useless at promoting. (See Schubert.) Van Gogh is admittedly an example of a great artist who tried to attract interest and didn't - but then Van Gogh isn't all _that_ great.


OK, you can take that up with Maugham (who, by the way, delightfully described himself as in the second rank's first tier). But remember, Emily Dickinson wouldn't even allow her picture to be taken and became a total recluse in later years, and Van Gogh became progressively mentally ill and committed suicide. And their recognition was delayed. In music, the comparison is often made between the handsome and charismatic Liszt, with his long and wildly successful performing career and even longer life, and Chopin, with his much shorter, and if not less successful at least much less prolific, performing career and life. Today, arkivmusic lists 2,352 Chopin recordings and only 2,159 Liszt recordings. So there is no doubt that Chopin was the greater composer.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

fluteman said:


> OK, you can take that up with Maugham (who, by the way, delightfully described himself as in the second rank's first tier).


In the version I've heard, Richard Strauss said that. I wonder which one of them said it first. (Or about whom it was said first.)



fluteman said:


> Today, arkivmusic lists 2,352 Chopin recordings and only 2,159 Liszt recordings. So there is no doubt that Chopin was the greater composer.


Or he's just currently more fashionable.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

fluteman said:


> Today, arkivmusic lists 2,352 Chopin recordings and only 2,159 Liszt recordings. So there is no doubt that Chopin was the greater composer.


There may well be people here who imagine I would be nodding vigorously in agreement with that sort of statement, but - with the hope that this doesn't move the thread too far off topic - I think the most one could conclude about "greatness" from those figures is that both Chopin and Liszt are probably on the list of great composers for a lot of people.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

We do not know how many people today are writing music in older styles. Of course many composers interested in a more Romantic aesthetic have probably gravitated towards media and film music. One giant problem for composers today is that it is almost impossible to earn money from composing.

Both Dvorak and Tchaikovsky turned to personal appearances to make money, becoming guest conductors for large fees. That is what brought Dvorak to America. Tchaikovsky wrote his Symphony 6 to conduct himself, as a guest conductor for large fees. Rachmaninoff, though immensely popular as a composer, depended on his performance fees for income.

Rachmaninoff wrote his Symphonic Dances in 1940. Hanson wrote his Symphony No 7 in 1977. Both were very clearly writing in what many members of TC would call an older style. Are there living composers with similar talent and skill writing today? Maybe so, and I am constantly hoping to run across him or her. I'll bet there are many people like myself who would love to become a fan of a living composer with talent, skill and depth of artistic expression.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Nereffid said:


> There may well be people here who imagine I would be nodding vigorously in agreement with that sort of statement, but - with the hope that this doesn't move the thread too far off topic - I think the most one could conclude about "greatness" from those figures is that both Chopin and Liszt are probably on the list of great composers for a lot of people.


I assume everyone sees I was being sarcastic with my comment about arkivmusic.com. But with the comment above from another poster "what is popular is always of high quality", which he may have meant seriously, I'm not so sure. I suppose if you draw no distinction between art and entertainment, or high art and popular art, you can say things like that. But that distinction has been a major feature of Western culture for centuries, certainly in the areas of music, literature, poetry, painting and sculpture. Theater had a bit of a lowbrow reputation in olden days (hence no lady actors on Shakespeare's stage) but that very much changed in the 18th and 19th centuries.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Truckload said:


> Rachmaninoff wrote his Symphonic Dances in 1940. Hanson wrote his Symphony No 7 in 1977. Both were very clearly writing in what many members of TC would call an older style. Are there living composers with similar talent and skill writing today? Maybe so, and I am constantly hoping to run across him or her. I'll bet there are many people like myself who would love to become a fan of a living composer with talent, skill and depth of artistic expression.


The obvious rejoinder is that there are _plenty_ of living compsers with "talent, skill and depth of artistic expression", they're just not writing music in a style you want to hear. Or, to put it another way, your definition of how talent, skill and depth of artistic expression manifest themselves musically differs from that of listeners who enjoy contemporary music.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Nereffid said:


> The obvious rejoinder is that there are _plenty_ of living compsers with "talent, skill and depth of artistic expression", they're just not writing music in a style you want to hear. Or, to put it another way, your definition of how talent, skill and depth of artistic expression manifest themselves musically differs from that of listeners who enjoy contemporary music.


I agree with the general thrust of your comment. Of course I would disagree about the music showing talent, skill and depth of artistic expression, but I follow your thinking.

I'm sure you would agree that many other people share a similar "taste" in music to my own. There are many composers trying to address the audiences of which I would be a member. I applaud their contributions, but they usually disappoint me in some way or other. I should probably start a thread on living composers who I believe are on the right track, even if they have not reached the level of a Rachmaninoff or Hanson.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

fluteman said:


> I assume everyone sees I was being sarcastic with my comment about arkivmusic.com.


Oops! I didn't. Sorry!


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Truckload said:


> I agree with the general thrust of your comment. Of course I would disagree about the music showing talent, skill and depth of artistic expression, but I follow your thinking.
> 
> I'm sure you would agree that many other people share a similar "taste" in music to my own. There are many composers trying to address the audiences of which I would be a member. I applaud their contributions, but they usually disappoint me in some way or other. I should probably start a thread on living composers who I believe are on the right track, even if they have not reached the level of a Rachmaninoff or Hanson.


Such a thread would undoubtedly earn a few people some infraction points - put a big TRIGGER WARNING in the title!  - but I'm curious about who those composers might be.

My own introduction to new music was quite a gentle one, because I heard music I liked (Glass, Nyman, Taverner, Pärt) before I heard music I didn't like (the usual suspects ) - so I was primed to believe that new music didn't have to be disappointing, and also that new music didn't sound like (and wasn't supposed to sound like) the older music I liked. That certainly made it easier to expand my tastes later.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

With some individuals exchanges like these are exercises in futility.

Some will remark that no one composes in older styles. Then if one takes to time to provide examples, then the composers are not quite as good as the originals.

I give up. These persons for whatever reasons just hate contemporary music which is OK. And they will produce all sorts of articles from the Wall Street Journal or Manchester Guardian or a doctoral dissertation by Ludwig von Drake to support their positions. And they hate it one someone rains of their parade.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Nereffid said:


> Such a thread would undoubtedly earn a few people some infraction points - put a big TRIGGER WARNING in the title!  - but I'm curious about who those composers might be.
> 
> My own introduction to new music was quite a gentle one, because I heard music I liked (Glass, Nyman, Taverner, Pärt) before I heard music I didn't like (the usual suspects ) - so I was primed to believe that new music didn't have to be disappointing, and also that new music didn't sound like (and wasn't supposed to sound like) the older music I liked. That certainly made it easier to expand my tastes later.


Since I am despised and reviled by a certain group on this forum, any such thread would direct venom upon any living composer I spoke of favorably. And in a very brief time, the thread would be closed. Perhaps that is the new strategy. Take turns drawing infractions to get any thread shut down that includes comments that are opposed by that group. It would be better for others to put forward names.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

arpeggio said:


> With some individuals exchanges like these are exercises in futility.
> 
> Some will remark that no one composes in older styles. Then if one takes to time to provide examples, then the composers are not quite as good as the originals.
> 
> I give up. These persons for whatever reasons just hate contemporary music which is OK. And they will produce all sorts of articles from the Wall Street Journal or Manchester Guardian or a doctoral dissertation by Ludwig von Drake to support their positions. And they hate it one someone rains of their parade.


Sorry to hear you are giving up. At times your posts have been quite helpful. If you have some examples of composers working in older styles you would like to share, please share them. I doubt if you would be likely to draw any "friendly fire" upon yourself. And whether everyone thinks all are of the highest skill, it is always interesting to learn new things, and hear about living composers who are not in the "contemporary" rut.


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## Guest (May 5, 2016)

arpeggio said:


> With some individuals exchanges like these are exercises in futility.
> 
> Some will remark that no one composes in older styles. Then if one takes to time to provide examples, then the composers are not quite as good as the originals.
> 
> I give up. These persons for whatever reasons just hate contemporary music which is OK. And they will produce all sorts of articles from the Wall Street Journal or Manchester Guardian or a doctoral dissertation by Ludwig von Drake to support their positions. And they hate it one someone rains of their parade.


Best to give up, yes. We aren't going to win.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Truckload said:


> Sorry to hear you are giving up. At times your posts have been quite helpful. If you have some examples of composers working in older styles you would like to share, please share them. I doubt if you would be likely to draw any "friendly fire" upon yourself. And whether everyone thinks all are of the highest skill, it is always interesting to learn new things, and hear about living composers who are not in the "contemporary" rut.


The question has to be asked, though: how "old-fashioned" does a work have to be for it not to be dismissed as "contemporary"?

There's an interesting phenomenon that I've found in my polls here: there's a noticeable dip in enthusiasm for music composed in the mid-18th, mid-19th, and mid-20th centuries. There seems to be a transitional period in all 3 centuries where one style's a bit past its sell-by date but the next style hasn't hit its stride yet. But whereas the two earlier dips are temporary (lasting about 10-15 years), the "likes" received by 20th-century music continue to decline. I assume that this is essentially an issue of familiarity, and that the same cycle may well repeat (though few of us will still be around to confirm this!).

Anyway, my point being that if we mark the mid-20th century as the point where (for some) music went into decline by being excessively modern, and we're now in 2016... let's adopt a similar perspective for previous centuries. Would it have been reasonable for someone in 1916 to hope that there remained a decent supply of composers whose music was stylistically close to Chopin and Mendelssohn? Or someone in 1816 to wish that the music of the day sounded like late Baroque?
The answer I imagine would be "no". Schubert's 4th symphony doesn't sound much like Handel's Fireworks music, does it?

Now, I grant that there's such a wide variety of music being composed these days that the Handel-to-Schubert gap is a heck of a lot narrower than for _some_ equivalent chronological gaps today, but surely the leap from Handel's Fireworks to Schubert's 4th is just as great as (if not greater than) the leap from, say, Barber and Korngold's violin concertos to those of Adès and Salonen?

I hate telling others what they should be doing, so I'll just simply note that _perhaps_ what the reluctant listener needs isn't "old-fashioned" music that accords with a set of pre-existing wishes, but simply a greater acceptance of the realities of what's being composed now.


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

Truckload said:


> Sorry to hear you are giving up. At times your posts have been quite helpful. *If you have some examples of composers working in older styles you would like to shar*e, please share them. I doubt if you would be likely to draw any "friendly fire" upon yourself. And whether everyone thinks all are of the highest skill, it is always interesting to learn new things, and hear about living composers who are not in the "contemporary" rut.


I vehemently disagree that contemporary is a "rut." But answering your request...

Have you heard of Martin Ellerby?


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Nereffid said:


> There's an interesting phenomenon that I've found in my polls here: there's a noticeable dip in enthusiasm for music composed in the mid-18th, mid-19th, and mid-20th centuries. There seems to be a transitional period in all 3 centuries where one style's a bit past its sell-by date but the next style hasn't hit its stride yet.


I guess you could say 1841-1850 was transitional - after Schumann's "song year" and before _Rigoletto_ - but that's a pretty short transition (in contrast to the quarter century between Handel's _Jephtha_ in 1751 and Mozart's _Jeunehomme_ concerto in 1777).

I guess maybe you could make a case for a transitional period from 1951 - demarcated not so much by what the young serialists were doing as by the apparent exhaustion of Stravinsky's Neoclassicism after _The Rake's Progress_ - through the consolidation of minimalism and spectralism in about 1976 (_Einstein on the Beach_, Górecki's symphony No. 3, and Murail's "Mémoire/Erosion" premier; _Music for 18 Musicians_ completed - though not released until 1978; Grisey's "Partiels" written in the previous year; Pärt's "Fratres" written in the next year). Minimalism of course _is_ popular, as classical music goes, just not with the blue hairs who prop up what's left of the Belle Époque concert hall culture.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

Truckload said:


> Sorry to hear you are giving up. At times your posts have been quite helpful. If you have some examples of composers working in older styles you would like to share, please share them. I doubt if you would be likely to draw any "friendly fire" upon yourself. And whether everyone thinks all are of the highest skill, it is always interesting to learn new things, and hear about living composers who are not in the "contemporary" rut.


But I have many, many times. For example the thread: http://www.talkclassical.com/41172-12-tone-music-contemporary.html#post984975

Another example is Lowell Liebermann. Check out his _Flute Concerto_. There are many samples on YouTube.

The problem for the purist is that no matter how neo a composer is there will be elements of contemporary music that will creep into their works. (I do not care how much like Mozart Johnson sounds, his music was composed for modern instruments). My ears hear all sorts of contemporary sounds, especially in the area of orchestration, even in the music of Rachmaninoff. There is no way one is going to hear that saxophone solo from the _Symphonic Dances_ in anything by Tchaikovsky.


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## Harold in Columbia (Jan 10, 2016)

Harold in Columbia said:


> I guess maybe you could make a case for a transitional period from 1951 - demarcated not so much by what the young serialists were doing as by the apparent exhaustion of Stravinsky's Neoclassicism after _The Rake's Progress_ - through the consolidation of minimalism and spectralism in about 1976 (_Einstein on the Beach_, Górecki's symphony No. 3, and Murail's "Mémoire/Erosion" premier; _Music for 18 Musicians_ completed - though not released until 1978; Grisey's "Partiels" written in the previous year; Pärt's "Fratres" written in the next year). Minimalism of course _is_ popular, as classical music goes, just not with the blue hairs who prop up what's left of the Belle Époque concert hall culture.


Alternately, you could identify a period between 1920 and 1966 - after Stravinsky's _Symphonies of Wind Instruments_ and before the Beatles' _Revolver_.

Of course, that's a very _long_ transition.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Nereffid said:


> The question has to be asked, though: how "old-fashioned" does a work have to be for it not to be dismissed as "contemporary"?
> 
> There's an interesting phenomenon that I've found in my polls here: there's a noticeable dip in enthusiasm for music composed in the mid-18th, mid-19th, and mid-20th centuries. There seems to be a transitional period in all 3 centuries where one style's a bit past its sell-by date but the next style hasn't hit its stride yet. But whereas the two earlier dips are temporary (lasting about 10-15 years), the "likes" received by 20th-century music continue to decline. I assume that this is essentially an issue of familiarity, and that the same cycle may well repeat (though few of us will still be around to confirm this!).
> 
> ...


I would like to respond to all of the points in your thread, since you were kind enough to write such a detailed reply. I hate it when people cut up someone's post and then insert snippy replies between paragraphs, so I will not do that. If I miss something please forgive me.

I do not dismiss any composer until I have become at least partially familiar with their work. Thanks to all of the internet resources we have today, that is an easy task. I personally do not dismiss any work as "contemporary", the music speaks for itself. I would gladly enjoy an "old fashioned" work no matter when it was composed. The music speaks for itself. I value melody (or motives), harmony, orchestration, development, form and artistic merit. A work that does not display these qualities is a waste of my time.

I have never thought about the significance of the year in relation to the century. What you say about it may have merit, I just don't know. The classical music lover in 1916 had a lot of very fine music to look forward to by composers like Rachmaninoff, Copland, Hindemith, early Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Khachaturian, Holst, Elgar, Sibelius, Britten's Young Persons Guide to the Orchestra, Gershwin, Korngold, Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra, Puccini, Bernstein, Ravel, Hanson, Nielson and many others. I have limited myself to dead composers for obvious reasons. I know I am probably leaving out many who should be included. The 20th century was a great time to like "old fashioned" music.

As for the reluctant advice in your last paragraph, I am confident you mean well. However, I will never take the advice to "just accept" what some call music that I do not call music. My advice, which is not reluctant, is for each listener to set high standards, and do not sit still for it. Get up and walk out.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Truckload said:


> As for the reluctant advice in your last paragraph, I am confident you mean well. However, I will never take the advice to "just accept" what some call music that I do not call music. My advice, which is not reluctant, is for each listener to set high standards, and do not sit still for it. Get up and walk out.


I do set extremely high standards, both for myself, and for others. In my own compositions, I am extremely self-critical and will scrutinize every single part to make sure it's there for a good reason and adds to the aesthetic impact of a piece.

It is because of those standards that I look up to composers like Bach, Brahms, Mahler, Schoenberg, Monteverdi, Debussy, Stravinsky, and Boulez, who showed us what music could be, how beautiful it could be, how expressive and powerful it could be.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

GreenMamba said:


> I vehemently disagree that contemporary is a "rut." But answering your request...
> 
> Have you heard of Martin Ellerby?


Thank you for posting this. Ellerby's "Elgar Variations" is another wonderful work. For some reason many of the living composers I admire primarily compose for wind symphony (concert band) and brass band. Perhaps those musicians are more accepting of the "old fashioned" or perhaps the performers are more discerning. I don't know why.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Truckload said:


> As for the reluctant advice in your last paragraph, I am confident you mean well. However, I will never take the advice to "just accept" what some call music that I do not call music. My advice, which is not reluctant, is for each listener to set high standards, and do not sit still for it. Get up and walk out.


That's fine, and I grant you that there's plenty of stuff being composed today that I wouldn't bother arguing over if you said it's not music. But the point I was getting at with my comparison with previous centuries is that I find it hard to see how something like Salonen's violin concerto (that was just a random example, I'm not trying to advocate specifically for that work) would fall into the category of "not music" because I really don't think there's _that much_ difference between it and violin concertos from 5 or 6 decades earlier. And there's definitely a huge amount of such music, where there can surely be no argument that it possesses "melody (or motives), harmony, orchestration, development, form and artistic merit", being written today. TBH it seems to me that "high standards" is just another term for "personal preference".


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Mahlerian said:


> I do set extremely high standards, both for myself, and for others. In my own compositions, I am extremely self-critical and will scrutinize every single part to make sure it's there for a good reason and adds to the aesthetic impact of a piece.
> 
> It is because of those standards that I look up to composers like Bach, Brahms, Mahler, Schoenberg, Monteverdi, Debussy, Stravinsky, and Boulez, who showed us what music could be, how beautiful it could be, how expressive and powerful it could be.


I don't know if I have ever heard anything of yours. I certainly do not doubt your intelligence or dedication. You have always impressed me as a well educated and well informed advocate. We will have to agree to disagree about what constitutes high standards in classical music.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Truckload said:


> I don't know if I have every heard anything of yours. I certainly do not doubt your intelligence or dedication. You have always impressed me as a well educated and well informed advocate. We will have to agree to disagree about what constitutes high standards in classical music.


I'm only an advocate of excellence and artistry, nothing else. Everything else is secondary.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

arpeggio said:


> But I have many, many times. For example the thread: http://www.talkclassical.com/41172-12-tone-music-contemporary.html#post984975
> 
> Another example is Lowell Liebermann. Check out his _Flute Concerto_. There are many samples on YouTube.
> 
> The problem for the purist is that no matter how neo a composer is there will be elements of contemporary music that will creep into their works. (Out do not care how much like Mozart Johnson sounds, his music was composed for modern instruments). My ears hear all sorts of contemporary sounds, especially in the area of orchestration, even in the music of Rachmaninoff. There is no way one is going to hear that saxophone solo from the _Symphonic Dances_ in anything by Tchaikovsky.


Please forgive me for not reading your previous thread about 12-tone Music and Contemporary Tonal Music, but I will check it out very soon. Thank you for suggesting Lowell Liebermann. I find his harmonic language using an expanded tonal palate (sometimes including bitonality) to be very intriguing. These highly controlled elements often succeed precisely because they are framed within a more traditional tonal context. He reminds me somewhat of Holst. Was the Flute Concerto originally for band and flute solo? I can't remember.

You are mistaken if you think that I expect or want everyone to sound like Tchaikovsky. I do not. I appreciate your willingness to engage the subject at hand. Thank you.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Nereffid said:


> That's fine, and I grant you that there's plenty of stuff being composed today that I wouldn't bother arguing over if you said it's not music. But the point I was getting at with my comparison with previous centuries is that I find it hard to see how something like Salonen's violin concerto (that was just a random example, I'm not trying to advocate specifically for that work) would fall into the category of "not music" because I really don't think there's _that much_ difference between it and violin concertos from 5 or 6 decades earlier. And there's definitely a huge amount of such music, where there can surely be no argument that it possesses "melody (or motives), harmony, orchestration, development, form and artistic merit", being written today. TBH it seems to me that "high standards" is just another term for "personal preference".


I appreciate that you have every right to your own point of view and every right to listen to whatever, and not listen to whatever. I can not agree with you regarding the piece you mentioned. In fact, I find it very typical of the "contemporary rut". I am listening to it now while writing this, and wondering how Salonen could stay awake long enough to write it down. But if it floats your boat, awesome. Good for you. Just please don't force me to listen to it.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Mahlerian said:


> I'm only an advocate of excellence and artistry, nothing else. Everything else is secondary.


OK, sounds good. I believe you. I am curious to hear your compositions, but I can't promise to like what I hear, so maybe it would not be a good idea. I like you, and I wouldn't want to say something that would cause you any discomfort. And there is nothing more personal than an original composition, or any original work of art. We leave a little piece of our soul in everything we compose.

While in college, I had an assignment to write a 12 tone work of at least 5 minutes duration. I wrote a piece for strings plus flute and clarinet. My composition teacher really loved it. He was very into the 12 tone method, and every other method other than tonality. When we had our annual new music festival in the spring, my teacher selected it for live performance. The guest speaker was another composition teacher from another school. He spoke about each of the students compositions and gave us feedback. He very mildly said that my piece was too "constrained" and it sounded as if I was a "prisoner of the methodology". I was so embarrassed and upset that I lost track of time, and was still sitting in my chair when the symposium ended and I was the last person in the room. The funny part is that I kind of hated that piece. I thought it was terrible. But I didn't want anyone else to say anything bad about it. Isn't that funny!

I certainly enjoyed your piano transcription, it was very skillfully accomplished.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

Truckload said:


> While in college, I had an assignment to write a 12 tone work of at least 5 minutes duration. I wrote a piece for strings plus flute and clarinet. My composition teacher really loved it. He was very into the 12 tone method, and every other method other than tonality. When we had our annual new music festival in the spring, my teacher selected it for live performance. The guest speaker was another composition teacher from another school. He spoke about each of the students compositions and gave us feedback. He very mildly said that my piece was too "constrained" and it sounded as if I was a "prisoner of the methodology". I was so embarrassed and upset that I lost track of time, and was still sitting in my chair when the symposium ended and I was the last person in the room. The funny part is that I kind of hated that piece. I thought it was terrible. But I didn't want anyone else to say anything bad about it. Isn't that funny!


So the guy was perceptive! You _did_ feel constrained by the method, and he could tell. I think this shows people who like 12-tone music and other "modern" idioms do have high standards, even if they're different from yours.

Your story reminds me of a story Steve Reich always tells in interviews: his teacher, Luciano Berio, looked at a 12-tone piece he wrote and told him, "If you want to write tonal music, why don't you write tonal music?"


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## Richannes Wrahms (Jan 6, 2014)

Restrictions is the universe.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Mahlerian said:


> I do set extremely high standards, both for myself, and for others. In my own compositions, I am extremely self-critical and will scrutinize every single part to make sure it's there for a good reason and adds to the aesthetic impact of a piece.
> 
> It is because of those standards that I look up to composers like Bach, Brahms, Mahler, Schoenberg, Monteverdi, Debussy, Stravinsky, and Boulez, who showed us what music could be, how beautiful it could be, how expressive and powerful it could be.


The challenge is though, that "high standards" are not necessarily consistent from individual composer to another. While we all in principle agree to the notion of "high standard" it is of course difficult to achieve agreement. I for example, would not put Boulez in the same sentence as Bach when it comes to "high standard".


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

Truckload said:


> Since I am despised and reviled by a certain group on this forum, any such thread would direct venom upon any living composer I spoke of favorably. And in a very brief time, the thread would be closed. Perhaps that is the new strategy. Take turns drawing infractions to get any thread shut down that includes comments that are opposed by that group. It would be better for others to put forward names.


It would be nice to hear you for once speak positively about any specific modern music. You'd only get a hostile reaction if you felt the need to add "this is what real music sounds like and how it should be written", rather than simply stating its what you prefer.

On the other hand: the more frustration you bring out in other members the more likely they are to be banned, and then you're less likely to be contrdicted no matter what you say or how you express it.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

isorhythm said:


> So the guy was perceptive! You _did_ feel constrained by the method, and he could tell. I think this shows people who like 12-tone music and other "modern" idioms do have high standards, even if they're different from yours.
> 
> Your story reminds me of a story Steve Reich always tells in interviews: his teacher, Luciano Berio, looked at a 12-tone piece he wrote and told him, "If you want to write tonal music, why don't you write tonal music?"


Yes, he was a very perceptive person. He was on the faculty at Eastman, had been a student of Hanson, and my teacher was very deferential to him. I can't remember the fellows name. This was in 1976. As it turns out, his comments about my work were the least critical of the day, I was later told, and my fellow student composers were jealous. I didn't hear a word after he called me a "prisoner of the methodology". They heard his positive comments about my orchestration skills and a few other things I can't remember and thought I should be pleased, but all I heard was the critical comments. I guess I was overly sensitive.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

SimonNZ said:


> Wow. Three contributors to this thread banned in 24 hours. Is that some kind of record? No, probably not.
> 
> It would be nice to hear you for once speak positively about any specific modern music. You'd only get a hostile reaction if you felt the need to add "this is what real music sounds like and how it should be written", rather than simply stating its what you prefer.
> 
> On the other hand: the more frustration you bring out in other members the more likely they are to be banned, and then you're less likely to be contrdicted no matter what you say or how you express it.


Sounds like an effective strategy, but I am not interested in trying to get people banned. And I am probably too busy to put the time into it that would be required.

I never saw these posts that got banned. Sorry to say if I was the target, the message was happily not received.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Truckload said:


> I appreciate that you have every right to your own point of view and every right to listen to whatever, and not listen to whatever. I can not agree with you regarding the piece you mentioned. In fact, I find it very typical of the "contemporary rut". I am listening to it now while writing this, and wondering how Salonen could stay awake long enough to write it down. But if it floats your boat, awesome. Good for you. Just please don't force me to listen to it.


Why on earth would I force you to listen to it? Moreover, _how_ could anyone force you?

But anyway, that "contemporary rut" is in fact one of several wide roads. If you don't want to travel on those roads, that's fine with me. When I recommended "greater acceptance of the realities of what's being composed now" above, I didn't mean that people should be obliged to listen; I simply meant that those who reject the majority of what's being written today should at least acknowledge that it _is_ the majority, that their taste in contemporary music is a specialist one, and that what's going on is not that most of today's music is out of step with where it "should" be but that the listener happens to be (with no pejorative connotations intended) out of step with where today's music is.


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## Guest (May 6, 2016)

I'm sick of being the victim. The next time someone from the non older style crowd makes me listen to what they like I'm going to stand up for my rights and walk out.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

SimonNZ said:


> On the other hand: the more frustration you bring out in other members the more likely they are to be banned, and then you're less likely to be contradicted no matter what you say or how you express it.


So the car driver who rear-ends the car in front is not to blame because he/she got frustrated over how slow the driver in front was driving. The poster you are addressing has been respectful and patient.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

SimonNZ said:


> On the other hand: the more frustration you bring out in other members the more likely they are to be banned, and then you're less likely to be contrdicted no matter what you say or how you express it.


No matter the situation, members who get banned only have themselves to blame.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

Bulldog said:


> No matter the situation, members who get banned only have themselves to blame.


That is a very unfair remark. I have found, and this is true the one time I have received an infraction, that frequently a member chastises others for what they enjoy listening too. It could be John Williams or contemporary music or Beethoven's _Ninth_ or whatever. These critiques are essentially bogus and frequently demeaning. Then when one tries to defend his position he gets banned.

A person can be passionate as a proponent of the great masters of the 18th and 19th centuries but if a member tries to defend Carter, watch out. Mahlerian addressed this phenomenon in the thread that was closed down where his OP received over sixty likes.

In ice hockey a player frequently gets sent to the penalty box for reacting to a cheap shot the refs missed.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

^I have to disagree with this. No one's ever been banned for defending Carter. It's never, ever a surprise when people are banned and it's always easy to see how it could have been avoided. I've enjoyed posts from some people who've been banned and I admit I can't understand why they do it.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

isorhythm said:


> ^I have to disagree with this. No one's ever been banned for defending Carter. It's never, ever a surprise when people are banned and it's always easy to see how it could have been avoided. I've enjoyed posts from some people who've been banned and I admit I can't understand why they do it.


OK, maybe not Carter, but how about Cage or Stockhausen or Xanakis or whatever. I have many friends who have been banned and some who have left because of their views. This is one of the issues Mahlerian addressed in the thread he started. Because of the musical bigotry I have had to deal with in the real world and because I was driven out of another forum, I try to be very careful. But I can appreciate the frustrations of others.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

arpeggio said:


> In ice hockey a player frequently gets sent to the penalty box for reacting to a cheap shot the refs missed.


That is a 'the exception proves the rule' argument. I'm a big hockey fan. Have been for decades. Any good hockey fan (and player for that matter) knows that, by far, the penalties are justified and the replays prove it. Over and over again.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

isorhythm said:


> ^I have to disagree with this. No one's ever been banned for defending Carter. It's never, ever a surprise when people are banned and it's always easy to see how it could have been avoided. I've enjoyed posts from some people who've been banned and I admit I can't understand why they do it.


Yeah, who's actually surprised that it's certain people that are banned and not others? The banning has nothing to do with their opinions and everything to do with how they express those opinions.

All posts are voluntary.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

arpeggio said:


> That is a very unfair remark.


No, it's on target. When you screw up, figure out what you did, correct it and move on.

I agree that some folks get banned when reacting to comments they find hard to tolerate. It's all a matter of how one reacts.

As long as members feel that there are enemies on the board, you can expect hostility and banning.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Bulldog said:


> No matter the situation, members who get banned only have themselves to blame.


The rules and reasons for infractions can be pretty amorphous; it's more a culture that's being enforced than any stated set of detailed behaviour guidelines - a sort of Victorian, American hyper-politeness culture that not everyone had the benefit to grow up in - and not always enforced consistently.

Also, blaming people for their behaviour is much like blaming them for their genetics, growing up environment, and the sometimes unexpected situations they find themselves in. Why would anyone want to do that?


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> Also, blaming people for their behaviour is much like blaming them for their genetics, growing up environment, and the sometimes unexpected situations they find themselves in. Why would anyone want to do that?


Assuming it intrudes on the rights of, or hurts, other people, funny how society, in general, does that. It's called 'laws'.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

DaveM said:


> Funny how society, in general, does that. It's called 'laws'.


I'm not an expert on American culture, but we here in Scandinavia no longer think of prisons and laws as being there to make wrong-doers pay for their misdeeds. Instead, they exist purely for practical reasons having to do with rehabilitation and crime-prevention. Of course, crime-prevention of such kind largely fails, but in the context of this discussion it's the idea that counts.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Chordalrock said:


> I'm not an expert on American culture, but we here in Scandinavia no longer think of prisons and laws as being there to make wrong-doers pay for their misdeeds. Instead, they exist purely for practical reasons having to do with rehabilitation and crime-prevention.


Well then, perhaps one could look on banning as rehabilitation and bad behavior prevention.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

The concepts of blame and punishment don't need to enter into it at all. It's a question of allowing the forum to function.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Getting back to the title of the thread. Here is another child prodigy, with some music written in an older style. He has written a number of things of interest.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

Chordalrock said:


> Also, blaming people for their behaviour is much like blaming them for their genetics, growing up environment, and the sometimes unexpected situations they find themselves in. Why would anyone want to do that?





isorhythm said:


> The concepts of blame and punishment don't need to enter into it at all. It's a question of allowing the forum to function.


I agree with these two posts. But I would also suggest that this discussion should either be discontinued or taken up in Area 51 since it is not relevant to the thread and involves issues that only concern registered members of this forum.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

Does the name Kostas Papazafeiropoulos ring a bell? Does it come tripping off the tongue easily? I don't think I could pronounce that last name if someone was holding a gun to my head and my life depended on it, but he has been very dedicated to writing music in a classical era style for quite a while now. Per his website he has written 112 works in what he calls a neoclassical style. Since that name can mean a number of different things, perhaps saying his music is in the high classical style might give a potential listener more of a hint.

His website: http://kostasmusic.blogspot.gr/

Here is one of his pieces being performed on a reproduction of a period instrument.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

Truckload said:


> Getting back to the title of the thread. Here is another child prodigy, with some music written in an older style. He has written a number of things of interest.


If he were an adult, this piece would not be of interest.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

SimonNZ;1064528
It would be nice to hear you for once speak positively about any specific modern music. You'd only get a hostile reaction if you felt the need to add "this is what [U said:


> real[/U] music sounds like and how it should be written", rather than simply stating its what you prefer.
> 
> On the other hand: the more frustration you bring out in other members the more likely they are to be banned, and then you're less likely to be contrdicted no matter what you say or how you express it.


It took me a while but I finally found a piece that embodies what for me "real music sounds like." I think we can all agree that this is how music SHOULD be written and performed.


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## Guest (May 6, 2016)

Truckload said:


> I think we can all agree that this is how music SHOULD be written and performed.


No.

Each of us can only speak for ourselves when it comes to musical preferences. To claim beyond that is presumptious, arrogant and invariably wrong.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Truckload, I find that sonata of Kostas(played by Wim) less interesting and wimpier than the C minor one that was first released on Wim's channel. To me there is nothing wrong with that one and even a voice and original ideas. The F major one fell much shorter in my view. I've corresponded with Kostas some, and he is a very reasonable and sympathetic person who has a passion for doing this and a vision of what he's like to accomplish. Here is the C minor one:


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

clavichorder said:


> Truckload, I find that sonata of Kostas(played by Wim) less interesting and wimpier than the C minor one that was first released on Wim's channel. To me there is nothing wrong with that one and even a voice and original ideas. The F major one fell much shorter in my view. I've corresponded with Kostas some, and he is a very reasonable and sympathetic person who has a passion for doing this and a vision of what he's like to accomplish. Here is the C minor one:


That is a wonderful piece. He seems to be really committed to this path. I admire him for being true to his artistic vision. I don't see that what he is doing is any less viable or meaningful than writing in any other style. And to me it is certainly more intellectually stimulating than being in a band and writing rock or pop or hip hop, etc. I am impressed that you are in communication with a composer you enjoy. I know that being able to talk about the works with the actual composer adds another dimension of enjoyment to the experience.

Do you know of any other specialists in older styles?


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Truckload said:


> Do you know of any other specialists in older styles?


I don't know of any in the youtube community that are as active and skilled as him. I myself write some pieces, but I think you've heard the best of the complete ones, and I don't follow the 18th century discipline so strictly/naturally like Kostas, being more mixed up and also younger.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

isorhythm said:


> If he were an adult, this piece would not be of interest.


I find it interesting. And surprising that it could be written by someone so young. Unlike Alma's music, and I admit I have not listened to all of it, Adam's piece has an emotive arc that impresses me. Assuming he wrote these pieces, and not his parents, I will be very interested to hear how his artistic vision develops as he matures.


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

Truckload said:


> It took me a while but I finally found a piece that embodies what for me "real music sounds like." I think we can all agree that this is how music SHOULD be written and performed.


There's a type of insult that will get you punished and a type that is allowed. And I find where you're going (and have many times now gone) with the above or similar far more insulting than someone just calling me an SOB.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

SimonNZ said:


> There's a type of insult that will get you punished and a type that is allowed. And I find where you're going (and have gone) with the above far more insulting than someone calling me an SOB.


Insulting? Wow, I was just trying to lighten things up with a little humor. OK, no problem, I wont reply to any more of your posts. I don't want you to think I am insulting you.


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## Adam Weber (Apr 9, 2015)

Truckload said:


> Getting back to the title of the thread. Here is another child prodigy, with some music written in an older style. He has written a number of things of interest.


If by "older style" you mean "Hans Zimmer soundtrack," sure.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

dogen said:


> No.
> 
> Each of us can only speak for ourselves when it comes to musical preferences. To claim beyond that is presumptious, arrogant and invariably wrong.


The last time and place I know of where everyone came anywhere near agreeing on how music should be written and performed was the Soviet Union during the Stalin regime, and the reason everyone pretty much agreed is that they didn't want to spend their lives writing and performing that music in remote Siberian villages. (Although, and not surprisingly, the truth seems to be there was a lot more non-musical political wrangling, favoritism, arbitrary punishment and backstabbing than any actual effective program of artistic control.)

Of course there is no such thing as how music should be written and performed, unless the answer is, an infinite number of ways.


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## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

fluteman said:


> Of course there is no such thing as how music should be written and performed, unless the answer is, an infinite number of ways.


If you don't write an infinite number of ways, then you are not writing real music.


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