# what is classical music?



## solkorset (May 26, 2011)

Does anyone here have a theory? What's the essential difference between classical and other kinds of music? What differences in the real world do the different kinds of music correspond to? Are the differences determined by race, class, nation, ethnic group, economic system, prevailing philosophy and religion, political ideas, way of life or something else? Why have there been different musical epochs, barock -> wiener classicism -> romanticism -> modernism ? Why do changes in music follow the changes in literature, art and philosophy? I mean, in the romantic epoch you have romantic music AND romantic painting for instance. Do we know what we are talking about when we say "classical music"? Given the practical task of classifying 100 randomly chosen pieces of music into classical and not, would we all do it the same way? What do people have in common who love classical music, and what distinguishes them from those who hate it?


----------



## pjang23 (Oct 8, 2009)

From a recent thread:



pjang23 said:


> To put it shortly, classical music is the classic literature of music.
> 
> It's *not a single genre* (sadly it often gets treated as one out of ignorance) but it draws from the best works of many many genres. You wouldn't call Shakespeare, Dickens, and Tolstoy as part of a single genre, but they are all "classic literature". The same reasoning applies to Bach and Rachmaninoff.


----------



## Serge (Mar 25, 2010)

pjang23 said:


> From a recent thread:
> 
> To put it shortly, classical music is the classic literature of music.


pjang23, quoting oneself is rather cute, but since your premise is very wrong I would abstain from doing so, if I were you.

To the OP, why don't you go to the thread with exactly the same title that you might have pushed off the first page of this forum with this post of yours and look for the answer there?


----------



## solkorset (May 26, 2011)

I read it, but it derailed and didn't address the issue like I do.


----------



## Serge (Mar 25, 2010)

Well, this place spots many others, including some very recent ones. Wikipedia has very good articles, probably the best place to start off anyway. If you still have specific questions afterwards somebody will hopefully answer those. Other than that I just don’t see anyone stepping up to the same plate anytime soon. But hey, that’s just me.


----------



## Philip (Mar 22, 2011)

I would just look in a dictionary.


----------



## Tapkaara (Apr 18, 2006)

It's drab, depressing music written in almost exclusively slow tempos by psuedo-intellectuals in powdered wigs or some amount of long, unkempt hair.


----------



## Kopachris (May 31, 2010)

Tapkaara said:


> It's drab, depressing music written in almost exclusively slow tempos by psuedo-intellectuals in powdered wigs or some amount of long, unkempt hair.


Poe's law?

As for the original question, "classical" depends on the form and organization at both microscopic and macroscopic levels. Certain musical figures should be followed by certain others, etc.


----------



## Guest (May 27, 2011)

Pseudo-intellectuals aye? Would that be anything like posting rubbish on an internet forum? I think of anti-intellectualism and ignorance - the former is an active choice whilst the latter is a hapless state of mind.


----------



## regressivetransphobe (May 16, 2011)

Uh-oh, somebody needs their irony detector repaired.


----------



## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

It seems to me that classical music is ultimately a _score_, notes on a sheet of paper, compared to a _recording_, the ultimate product of most other types of music. The classical score may be interpreted by different performers and rarely is the first performance or recording of the score held automatically in higher esteem than subsequent recordings and performances. Popular music may be _covered_ by other artists after the recording by the original artist, but that is all that it is considered to be - merely a cover, and rarely is a cover held in as high of esteem as the original recording.


----------



## Pieck (Jan 12, 2011)

It's music that most people think they hate, yet they love doing the Ta-Ta-Ta-Ta! from Beethoven 5th.


----------



## Guest (Jun 6, 2011)

Uh-oh, I get it now RegressiveTransphobe. A joke laced with irony, right? Wasn't it Woody Allen who said "Americans don't get irony. Well, only about 2% do, but that's still a lot of people"!!! I'm new to this forum and have had the unpleasant experience of an internet Troll on a previous one dedicated to the discussion of serious music, so I'm ultra-cautious. I hope my comment wasn't too, well, uh, "regressive"!!


----------



## Polednice (Sep 13, 2009)

Personally, I think classical music is music what is classical.


----------



## beethovenian (May 2, 2011)

I think the word 'Classical' is just too full of ill prejudices (slow & boring, music for insomniac, gay music, Music for the old folks...etc) formed by the general public. It also confuses the hell out to new comers regarding the various periods (classical being one of them)

I think we should drop the term 'classical' and start using some better word to describe great music. The best alternative i can think of is 'Art' music, but i still think it sounds pretentious and snobbish to the general public, anybody here got any better ideas?


----------



## Serge (Mar 25, 2010)

beethovenian said:


> [...] anybody here got any better ideas?


Sure thing: how about _*fancy*_?

And... Starting now, all you *fancy music lovers* out there!


----------



## dmg (Sep 13, 2009)

I personally define classical music as timeless music. I do not define it as a genre; it does not reflect a style or set of styles. I think for something to be considered classical music, it must stand the test of time - as society moves from one set of cultures to the next, the music still holds relevance and still holds its appeal, regardless of style or complexity or any other structural attributes.

That is why I set the following personal definition: if it is still performed and recorded 100 or more years after its original creation, it is classical music. This personal definition leaves out a lot of music that many consider classical according to their own definitions, and includes a lot of music that many do not consider classical (for example - included: music by Stephen Foster. Excluded: music by Dmitri Shostakovich). That does not mean one cannot listen or enjoy works created in the last 50 years, nor does it mean music created in the last 50 years cannot be great, magnificent works. It just means it hasn't stood the test of time yet. And that's the key: the only real test to see if music is timeless or not is for it to stand the test of time.


----------



## Serge (Mar 25, 2010)

As a personal opinion this is fine I suppose. But will it stand the test of time?


----------

