# Rock 'n' roll vs. Serialism



## Czech composer (Feb 20, 2016)

I know, i know... I compare uncomparable and what I will say is maybe going to be a little bit superficial, but personaly I consider this as one of the biggest irony in history of music. 

Because what was the one of main goals of modern classical composers in1950 when both of this genres approximately started? Their effort was to be original and bring something new what have people never heard before. Way of serialism to achieve it was by using complex sounds, mathematical functions, scietific theroies, etc... And result is indeed something new and original.

But what was Rock 'n' roll at the time? It was completely original and new music genre too. It doesn´t resembled almost anything what was written in music before. And how it was achieved? Only by introducing one brand new instrument (electric guitar) and by slightly modified basic harmonic progressions. Triads are the same that was used even by Palestrina, but thanks to the new form and adding interval of seventh meaning is completely different. 

So point is, that you could be original even without trying to turn laws of physics upside down.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

But serialism at least doesn't require a volume that will cause the listener to lose his hearing.


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## Tallisman (May 7, 2017)

To be honest I'd take Exile on Main Street over Schoenberg any day


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Czech composer said:


> But what was Rock 'n' roll at the time? It was completely original and new music genre too. It doesn´t resembled almost anything what was written in music before.


Doesn't it at least resemble the blues? To me, it seems to be less of an original creation and more of an amalgamation of the blues, folk, gospel, and jazz. So like serialism, it came from past innovations and emerged as a logical extension of them.

Of course, serialism preceded rock by a three decades. I think a closer comparison for being groundbreaking was minimalism. In the 1960s, it entered an academic musical world obsessed with complex rows and reintroduced patterns and triads. That innovation got average people interested in listening to classical music again, and it also didn't require turning the laws of physics upside down.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

But what rock n roll musicians/bands? and what serial compositions from which composers?


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

In this sense - and very much in the way galant and classical 'pared it all back' - the way forward after the very complex music of the 19th century probably should have been less complexity, not more complexity.

Since popular music and art music moved (move) on different planes it's probably not a legitimate direct comparison. I would have said it was jazz which started to unravel, or rather infiltrate, the art music world.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

IMO, post-Webernian (who was a god among men) "serialism" didn't get to perfection until the late 50s and Rock didn't reach maturity until the late 60s (where even then it was in a primitive state)


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Primitive in what context?


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> Primitive in what context?


Still very new, unrefined, still largely undeveloped technology-wise (amps, effects, guitars etc), still mostly based on blues and R&B, not generally technically complex either


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Still, it took the mid 70s (with progressive rock, early metal and early punk) for rock to start realizing what it was truly capable of


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

ST4 said:


> Still, it took the mid 70s (with progressive rock, early metal and early punk) for rock to start realizing what it was truly capable of


Did you miss the Beatles then? Not just them but a host of others who were extending rock 'n' roll/rock/pop by the middle '60s. In many ways the music of the art-music world and 'rock' converged somewhat. If anything it was far from primitive even in the 60s.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> Did you miss the Beatles then? Not just them but a host of others who were extending rock 'n' roll/rock/pop by the middle '60s. In many ways the music of the art-music world and 'rock' converged somewhat. If anything it was far from primitive even in the 60s.


No I didn't miss the Beatles, their sound is highly primitive but they're a popular household name so people will consider them "timeless" because their music is so familiar but they do not have a modern sound :lol: They embody the 60s mainstream culture, even at their most innovative. Being an influential and well known band doesn't take away how 'old fashioned' they sound.

There are some exceptions like Zappa (having technically complex compositions) or Captain Beefheart (avant garde dissonant and highly influential in the underground) but they where both still heavily reliant on blues and R&B, even if they where also taking from classical and jazz.


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## Selby (Nov 17, 2012)

Tallisman said:


> To be honest I'd take Exile on Main Street over Schoenberg any day


To be honest, I wouldn't.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

ST4 said:


> No I didn't miss the Beatles, their sound is highly primitive but they're a popular household name so people will consider them "timeless" because their music is so familiar but they do not have a modern sound :lol: They embody the 60s mainstream culture, even at their most innovative. Being an influential and well known band doesn't take away how 'old fashioned' they sound.
> 
> There are some exceptions like Zappa (having technically complex compositions) or Captain Beefheart (avant garde dissonant and highly influential in the underground) but they where both still heavily reliant on blues and R&B, even if they where also taking from classical and jazz.


Christ, I should have known the name 'Zappa' would be dropped eventually. This is the problem with self-appointed art-music arbiters; especially those anointing themselves as members of the tradition initiated by Schoenberg.

The Beatles do not and did not even at the time 'embody the 60s mainstream culture'. It betrays an extremely shallow comprehension of the direction of pop music and the influences it received and transmitted. Not to mention a peculiar failure to see what 'mainstream 1960s culture' actually looked like.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

But eugeneon, it doesn't inherently make it a bad thing. Afterall I'm a huge fan of Medieval music and Doo ***, which both lived quite closely to their times but that doesn't make them irrelevant :tiphat:


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Was there ever anything commercially bigger than The Beatles?


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> This is the problem with self-appointed art-music arbiters; especially those anointing themselves as members of the tradition initiated by Schoenberg.


What is rock music? never heard it, I've only got one rock album in my collection :lol:


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Still what exactly are you trying to say in that paragraph? 

Zappa even barely stepped away from blues or R&B but he started to compose really complex rhythmic music towards the late 60s but like The Beatles, still very much a product of his time.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

ST4 said:


> What is rock music? never heard it, I've only got one rock album in my collection :lol:


Okay. Play the fool if the cap fits. Add another chortling smiley for good measure.


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## Daybloom (Mar 4, 2017)

ST4 said:


> Was there ever anything commercially bigger than The Beatles?


No. Michael Jackson and Elvis are runners up.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> Okay. Play the fool if the cap fits. Add another chortling smiley for good measure.


You seem to be making huge assumptions without even being straight about it and saying what they are, I doubt you even know who Beethoven is.

What does my music collection look like? How many albums do I have? How much experience am I basing my statements on? (that you obviously disagree with), what was I actually stating with my initial post there?


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Daybloom said:


> No. Michael Jackson and Elvis are runners up.


Yes, fair point.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Really, how much further can this go than my statement here:

Rock was:


ST4 said:


> Still very new, unrefined, still largely undeveloped technology-wise (amps, effects, guitars etc), still mostly based on blues and R&B, not generally technically complex either


 in the 50s/60s, compared to how much it developed in the 70s, 80s, 90s and how far it has come to the current day. Rock in 2017 doesn't resemble rock of the 50s and 60s, unless you are looking at cover bands or novelty nostalgia bands that don't make much of an impression in the music world.

vuala

Conclu


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Unless you only listen to rock n roll from the 50s and 60s, you should be able to notice and acknowledge how far rock has come since then, not that difficult


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## Daniel Atkinson (Dec 31, 2016)

Rock nowadays is very different, this is correct. What happened to the Bee Gees? 



Daniel


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Daniel Atkinson said:


> Rock nowadays is very different, this is correct. What happened to the Bee Gees?
> Daniel


The Bee Gees was a pop group. U2 was/is a rock group.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Mind the blood pressure people, for once.


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## Daybloom (Mar 4, 2017)

I've heard some say that serialism is more or less a continuation of what came before it and others that disagree. I don't know either way really. But I wonder if it can at least be said that serialism was intelligently designed (by composers) while rock is more a product of natural selection (of the culture and audience). The evolution comparison is just that, but I wonder if it's a fair one.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Daybloom said:


> I've heard some say that serialism is more or less a continuation of what came before it and others that disagree. I don't know either way really. But I wonder if it can at least be said that serialism was intelligently designed (by composers) while rock is more a product of natural selection (of the culture and audience). The evolution comparison is just that, but I wonder if it's a fair one.


No, rock is a natural development from blues


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## Agamemnon (May 1, 2017)

Obviously, there isn't much similarity between serial music and rock 'n' roll musically, besides rock 'n' roll has - I presume - some chromaticism which it inherited from the blues/jazz, because serial music is art music and rock 'n' roll is entertainment which two traditions have been very seperated in the 20th century. But then again, both have an important similarity anyway because they are both modern and thus 'shocking' to most listeners because of their modern lust to transgress any boundary. Rock 'n' roll transgresses not so much musically as energy-wise: rock 'n' roll is blues but played very fast and wild and excited to create a spirit of 'going crazy' or 'going out of your mind'. In that way the primitivism of rock 'n' roll is typically modernist.


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

Agamemnon said:


> Obviously, there isn't much similarity between serial music and rock 'n' roll musically, besides rock 'n' roll has - I presume - some chromaticism which it inherited from the blues/jazz, because serial music is art music and rock 'n' roll is entertainment which two traditions have been very seperated in the 20th century. But then again, both have an important similarity anyway because they are both modern and thus 'shocking' to most listeners because of their modern lust to transgress any boundary. Rock 'n' roll transgresses not so much musically as energy-wise: rock 'n' roll is blues but played very fast and wild and excited to create a spirit of 'going crazy' or 'going out of your mind'. In that way the primitivism of rock 'n' roll is typically modernist.


yes, that's why a lot of rock critics hated progressive rock, because it actually replaced what made original and exciting the music in the first place with a pale imitation of what classical composers had done, but without the same level of sophistication. I'm generalizing obviously, and I don't necessarily fully agree with this view, but I can see a logic in this argument.


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## Agamemnon (May 1, 2017)

norman bates said:


> yes, that's why a lot of rock critics hated progressive rock, because it actually replaced what made original and exciting the music in the first place with a pale imitation of what classical composers had done, but without the same level of sophistication. I'm generalizing obviously, and I don't necessarily fully agree with this view, but I can see a logic in this argument.


I also think that the efforts to abridge the gap usually aren't very satisfying because rock can't approximate the sophistication of serious music and serious music can't approximate the energy of rock 'n' roll. As an illustration (or as something to discuss), here is a serious composer imitating (?) rock 'n' roll:


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

ST4 said:


> You seem to be making huge assumptions without even being straight about it and saying what they are,* I doubt you even know who Beethoven is.*


The part I bolded: what does that ridiculous statement even mean?


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## Tallisman (May 7, 2017)

ST4 said:


> Still very new, unrefined, still largely undeveloped technology-wise (amps, effects, guitars etc), still mostly based on blues and R&B, not generally technically complex either


That's the essence of rock 'n' roll... primitive and unrefined...


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## Tallisman (May 7, 2017)

ST4 said:


> Still, it took the mid 70s (with progressive rock, early metal and early punk) for rock to start realizing what it was truly capable of


................ That's when it all started going downhill....


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## Tallisman (May 7, 2017)

ST4 said:


> What is rock music? never heard it, I've only got one rock album in my collection :lol:


phew... that explains it


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Tallisman said:


> That's the essence of rock 'n' roll... primitive and unrefined...


Well that is before half a million rock subgenres spawned and technology changed, things changed socially/politically and people realized that synths worked really well with rock, odd-time signatures existed, drums could hit on other notes other than 1&3, before production got really good and everyone realized that they weren't gonna get laid unless they where a pop singer, way before even the glam metal love ballad came along.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> *The part I bolded*: what does that ridiculous statement even mean?


I didn't even know that was possible, are you some kind of psychic magician?


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Tallisman said:


> phew... that explains it


Well, I have 9 days of rock (leaving out the metal) on itunes alone, not taking into consideration the CD and vinyl collection as well......


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

Tallisman said:


> ................ That's when it all started going downhill....


Just like how classical music started going downhill once people realized that they could use instruments to compose instead of just the voice.... :lol:


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## Agamemnon (May 1, 2017)

Agamemnon said:


> But then again, both have an important similarity anyway because they are both modern and thus 'shocking' to most listeners because of their modern lust to transgress any boundary. Rock 'n' roll transgresses not so much musically as energy-wise: rock 'n' roll is blues but played very fast and wild and excited to create a spirit of 'going crazy' or 'going out of your mind'. In that way the primitivism of rock 'n' roll is typically modernist.


To elaborate a little bit on my position that all modern music is crazy music:

Chromaticism and dissonance have always been known and used in music but usually it was used to express irrationality/craziness and therefore as an effect (like contemporary horror films use dissonance/atonal music to give the audience an uneasy feeling). Modernist music used chromaticism/serialism not merely as an effect but as the basis of the new music. So in a sense you could say that modernist (chromaticist/serialist) music is simply 'crazy' music. Now ask a fan of rock 'n' roll to give a definition of rock 'n' roll and he should say (if he is wise ): 'rock 'n' roll is crazy music'! So there you have the resemblance: all modern music - as art or as entertainment - is crazy music.


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## Tallisman (May 7, 2017)

ST4 said:


> Just like how classical music started going downhill once people realized that they could use instruments to compose instead of just the voice.... :lol:


That was Western music entirely... rock is a relatively small 20th century genre. I can't accept that analogy:tiphat:


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## Tallisman (May 7, 2017)

ST4 said:


> people realized that synths worked really well with rock









................


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## mathisdermaler (Mar 29, 2017)

I agree with Tallisman. Yes is gross and are much less interesting artistically than the Rolling Stones. The only avant-garde rock bands who ever really succeeded (because they were doing something that was wholly original in rock and classical) were Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band and the Velvet Underground (who, despite what I saw another person post on here once, were not just copying the Dream Syndicate/Theatre of Eternal Music). Zappa was best in his early years when he was making satirical American music, his greatest records being Freak Out and We're Only in It for the Money. After that he became a second rate jazz/classical composer and what was the point of that? King Kong is pretty good, I guess. Synths are ugly in all music.


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## Czech composer (Feb 20, 2016)

> Synths are ugly in all music.


I disagree with this last sentence. Ok it was maybe true in 80´s but today synth sounds can be realy sophisticated.

Have you heard about Keyscape. They´ve got lot of great artists for their promotional videos.
And for me personally this is type of contemporary art music which I like and which I think is relevant today.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

ST4 said:


> I didn't even know that was possible, are you some kind of psychic magician?


I'm actually rather normal and ordinary I just stumble when confronted with incomprehensible rubbish.


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## Czech composer (Feb 20, 2016)

Rock meet Serialism!

Best youtube comment: "If you want to hear more like this just walk into any random guitar store on a Tuesday.﻿"


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

One of the most misused terms is 'Alternative Rock'. Alternative rock has never been well-defined and seems to include a grab-bag of groups starting in the 90s. The term might fit groups such as Nirvana and Radiohead that were/are uniquely different, but it doesn't apply to groups such as Coldplay (which has flipped between rock and pop) and The Killers which has had a similar style -highly melodic with driving beat-not unlike 80s bands.


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## mathisdermaler (Mar 29, 2017)

Czech composer said:


> I disagree with this last sentence. Ok it was maybe true in 80´s but today synth sounds can be realy sophisticated.
> 
> Have you heard about Keyscape. They´ve got lot of great artists for their promotional videos.
> And for me personally this is type of contemporary art music which I like and which I think is relevant today.


I don't agree that that is contemporary art music.


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> I'm actually rather normal and ordinary I just stumble when confronted with incomprehensible rubbish.


You must have a stroke when you read your own posts


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

mathisdermaler said:


> I agree with Tallisman. Yes is gross and are much less interesting artistically than the Rolling Stones. The only avant-garde rock bands who ever really succeeded (because they were doing something that was wholly original in rock and classical) were Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band and the Velvet Underground (who, despite what I saw another person post on here once, were not just copying the Dream Syndicate/Theatre of Eternal Music). Zappa was best in his early years when he was making satirical American music, his greatest records being Freak Out and We're Only in It for the Money. After that he became a second rate jazz/classical composer and what was the point of that? King Kong is pretty good, I guess. Synths are ugly in all music.


So? ......................


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## ST4 (Oct 27, 2016)

i love you guys, you're all so nice and friendly :kiss:


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## Simon Moon (Oct 10, 2013)

mathisdermaler said:


> I agree with Tallisman. Yes is gross and are much less interesting artistically than the Rolling Stones. The only avant-garde rock bands who ever really succeeded (because they were doing something that was wholly original in rock and classical) were Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band and the Velvet Underground (who, despite what I saw another person post on here once, were not just copying the Dream Syndicate/Theatre of Eternal Music). Zappa was best in his early years when he was making satirical American music, his greatest records being Freak Out and We're Only in It for the Money. After that he became a second rate jazz/classical composer and what was the point of that? King Kong is pretty good, I guess. Synths are ugly in all music.


I disagree on almost every point. Only difference is, I will state my disagreements as opinion, not (what seems like you have done) as objective fact.

YES was once a great band. Their best, in my opinion, was better than the Stones at their best.

Henry Cow, Magma, Univers Zero, Samla Mammas Manna, Art Zoyd, and other avant-garde bands were, in my opinion, more successful (artistically speaking) than Velvet Underground and Beefart (I like both bands).

Zappa was at his best, in my opinion, in his middle period; One Size Fits All, Zoot Allures, Apostrophe, Joe's Garage. Inca Roads? Hardly second rate...

I love synths, in the right context.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

ST4 said:


> You must have a stroke when you read your own posts


No, I don't. On average people don't survive a 3rd stroke and I've posted more times than that. Of course you know I mean the rubbish you are producing here. Which is not to say that I mean all of it, I've read many good posts from you and clicked likes.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Czech composer said:


> I know, i know... I compare uncomparable and what I will say is maybe going to be a little bit superficial, but personaly I consider this as one of the biggest irony in history of music.
> 
> Because what was the one of main goals of modern classical composers in1950 when both of this genres approximately started? Their effort was to be original and bring something new what have people never heard before. Way of serialism to achieve it was by using complex sounds, mathematical functions, scietific theroies, etc... And result is indeed something new and original.
> 
> ...


In my opinion, serialism failed the development of classical music in the 1950s and beyond by no longer relating music to the core value of communication. In that space, Rock 'n' Roll took over to popularize music for all in a fast changing western society. But pockets of good composers like Vaughan Williams still took late Romanticism onward, so it wasn't all about serialism in that time.


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## Czech composer (Feb 20, 2016)

> I don't agree that that is contemporary art music.


Ok, cool.
I agree that that video with Jack Stratton from Vulfpeck isn´t his best and it is quite standard.
But I found out, that this is only contemporary music which I listen regularly and I sincerely enjoy it. And I say it as a Mahler guy or Stravinsky guy. 
I´ve unfortuanetly never heard a 21st century work of so called "contemporary" classical music which I would loved so much, that I would listened it over and over and over again. But this type of music is the case for me. So what is art?


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Rock ‘n’ Roll = 3 chords
Serialism = No chords
:cheers:


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## Guest (Sep 28, 2018)

Larkenfield said:


> Rock 'n' Roll = 3 chords
> Serialism = No chords


Wouldn't serialism be 'all chords' and plainchant or drones be 'no chords.?


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

...............


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

shirime said:


> Wouldn't serialism be 'all chords' and plainchant or drones be 'no chords.?


You could be right! :tiphat:


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

My, this discussion is going so well! I propose another thread. How about Punk Rock vs Gregorian Chant.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Actually, I see parallels between Punk Rock and Gregorian chant. If we acknowledge that The Velvet Underground was the prototype for punk, and John Cale was in La Monte Young's Dream Syndicate, then we have 'the drone" in common. Basically, all tonal music can be reduced to a drone. Schenker would agree.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Not rock and roll serialism, but at least rock and roll pointillism:


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

I knew this was a marvelous discussion! Velvet Underground doesn't sound very punk. I was thinking Sex Pistols or Ramones.


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

Because of this thread I'm wondering if it could be possible to make a rock'n'roll piece enthralling as Chuck Berry's Johnny B. Goode or Little Richard's Lucille but atonal or serialist.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

norman bates said:


> Because of this thread I'm wondering if it could be possible to make a rock'n'roll piece enthralling as Chuck Berry's Johnny B. Goode or Little Richard's Lucille but atonal or serialist.


Without repeating a tone until all in the series have been stated? The opening of Johnny B. Goode is going to collapse at the first hurdle! Which is great.

This is your cousin Marvin Berry, you know that new sound you've been looking for? Well listen to this! :


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

norman bates said:


> Because of this thread I'm wondering if it could be possible to make a rock'n'roll piece enthralling as Chuck Berry's Johnny B. Goode or Little Richard's Lucille but atonal or serialist.


 It might be possible, but probably only after a few sessions of shock therapy or a susceptibility to St. Vitus' dance. The main problem is how to teach an atonalist or serialist Chuck Berry 's famous duck walk where he glides across the stage to impress the girls. As far as I know, no woman has ever thrown her undergarments at an atonalist or serialist, but it could possibly happen during an earthquake or tsunami, something that would be Johnny be good to even the score between the rock 'n' rollers and the boys of the sour chords. :cheers:


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