# Cool, cooler, coolest?



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I just read a delightful post that pointed out that *'being cool'* is not really the object of listening to classical music or belonging to Talk Classical.

Who do you think are the *coolest* composers? The *coolest *pieces? The *coolest* instruments?

You can answer this best if you're young. But if you're older, you can say what *was* cool. And hopefully, *why*.

For example, it strikes me that in 1966 the film *2001 - A Space Odyssey* made certain pieces *cool*: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2001:_A_Space_Odyssey_(soundtrack) It was exciting - remote - modern.

:tiphat: Nice to have your views, serious or witty.


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## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

The viola is the coolest instrument. Hands down. Only the sexiest studs like me with their colossal 16.5 inch... violas get the bit*hes all day, every day.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

Non, vous avez besoin de voir M. Lully avec son énorme bâton en _Le Roi Danse_ de comprendre le "cool". Il est magnifique et M. Lully l'utilise si bien quand il évite son pied.

The dignified elegance of the French hides a joke about an excellent film with music by Musica Antiqua Koln. Lully was certainly one cool cat!


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## DiesIraeCX (Jul 21, 2014)

Hmm, interesting! I think Berlioz's _Symphonie Fantastique_ is "cool" for a variety of reasons. Firstly, it's off-the-walls strange, it's revolutionary and influential. I mean, it's about "an artist gifted with a lively imagination" who has poisoned himself with opium in the "depths of despair because of hopeless love. If that ain't cool, I don't know what is. 

Plus, you can't tell me this guy wasn't the life of those 19th century Parisian parties!!










And clearly the Bassoon is the coolest instrument.


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## ribonucleic (Aug 20, 2014)

Coolest composer: Harry Partch
Why: Didn't just write his own music, didn't just create own his scales, built his own goddamned instruments.

Next coolest composer: Kaikhosru Sorabji
Why: Changed name from "Leon" to "Kaikhosru". Born with F-U money, spent a very long creative life writing pieces so long and difficult that they dared you to try playing them. Actually spent decades forbidding people from even trying.

Coolest instrument: Theremin
Why: If you have to ask...

Next coolest instrument: Oboe
Why: Because it can't be played


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

I'll comment only upon who is the _coolest_ poster on this Forum:










Meanwhile, I'm back to comparing George Lloyd's Fourth Symphony "Arctic" with Ralph Vaughan Williams's Seventh. A fit endeavor on a warm summer afternoon.


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## Jobis (Jun 13, 2013)

Vivaldi was pretty cool, for the first time in my life I found myself head-banging to his concertos the other day.


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## satoru (May 29, 2014)

SeptimalTritone said:


> The viola is the coolest instrument. Hands down. Only the sexiest studs like me with their colossal 16.5 inch... violas get the bit*hes all day, every day.


I thought the above description puts viola into "hot" category 

According to OED, the word "cool" means "of a person, an action, or a person's behaviour: assured and unabashed where diffidence and hesitation would be expected; composedly and deliberately audacious or impudent in making a proposal, demand, or assumption," or "of a thing or action: characterized by or exhibiting calmness, composure, or a lack of passionate emotion."

Doesn't JS Bach meets this criteria? He coldly crashed several of his contestants in organ performance match. Of many of his compositions, isn't the Art of Fugue the most calculating, logical and build-for-math type of work? As for instrument, wouldn't pipe organ, Bach's instrument, most chilling of all?

Wait a moment... Did I pull out the wrong definition for "cool"? Oh no, why I'm getting emotionally shaken with goose bumps all over me while listening to the Art of Fugue??


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

I thought for a while that the young George Antheil was the coolest composer around - creating the appropriate amount of outrage with hip-titled works such as 'Ballet Mechanique', 'Airplane Sonata' and 'Death of Machines' while hanging about in Paris schmoozing effortlessly with the likes of Man Ray, Ezra Pound and Jean Cocteau.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

satoru said:


> Wait a moment... Did I pull out the wrong definition for "cool"? Oh no, why I'm getting emotionally shaken with goose bumps all over me while listening to the Art of Fugue??


Quivers down the backbone 
I got the chills down the thigh bone 
Yeah, the tremors in the back bone 
Shakin' all over

One knows the feeling. The fact that the symptoms reached number 1 in the UK suggests that it my still be "cool".


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Musica Ficta -- in the totally modern 12 and 13 hundreds, you were just a hopeless loser square if you were not one of the hep cat musicians dropping or raising those pitches a half step, bending those notes, rebelling against the Musica Recta 

They destroyed modality, and paved the way for the nihilist and ugly "tonality."

_Punks_, that's what they must of been, _Punks_.


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## thetrout (Jan 28, 2012)

Beethoven? All that - well, perceived - revolutionary fervour; the story of him striking out Bonaparte’s name?


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## Giordano (Aug 10, 2014)

Purcell's Cold Song is cool:






Mozart is cool in his red coat:









This dude thinks he's cool:


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## Guest (Aug 28, 2014)

I would submit this picture for the cool category:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

You are right Ingélou, that "being cool" is not _my_ object in listening to classical music. I listen because I like music that has permanence. It is antithetical to my understanding that music can be good for only a limited period of time, after which it becomes no longer good and uninteresting.

However, when I was younger, I did begin listening to classical with a decided emphasis on finding the coolest music. Stockhausen was really cool in the '60s and '70s. Everyone who was hip knew of Stockhausen and countless cool bands claimed him as an influence, from Zappa to Krautrockers to punks, etc. The Beatles, even. Stockhausen was cool. Noise was cool. He was cool because he was brash. Now, I'm not claiming that all of those people who thought Stockhausen was so cool even liked his music or had even heard it, but he was Ⅎ⊍©⋌ing cool, man.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

I've always found the finale to Ives Second Symphony as being very cool.
Also, the third movement of Prokofiev's Third Piano Concerto is very cool.
I find the peasant dance in Beethoven's Sixth Symphony to be really cool.
Mozart's Horn Concertos, also quite cool.

I define cool as delightfully ingenious, by the way.


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Taggart said:


> Quivers down the backbone
> I got the chills down the thigh bone
> Yeah, the tremors in the back bone
> Shakin' all over


This is actually my favourite song to perform in karaoke. :cheers::devil:


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

There is no cooler instrument than the violin when in the hands of a master.
Jascha Heifetz performing the final movement of the Beethoven Violin Concerto in D is very cool.
Also Nathan Milstein performing the great Fuga movement from Bach's Unaccompanied Violin Sonata #3 in C is as cool as it gets.
Delightfully cool is the first movement of the Fourth Violin Concerto in D and the third movement of the Third Violin Concerto in G, both by Mozart. Many fine performances.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

hpowders said:


> There is no cooler instrument than the violin when in the hands of a master.
> Jascha Heifetz performing the final movement of the Beethoven Violin Concerto in D is very cool.
> Also Nathan Milstein performing the great Fuga movement from Bach's Unaccompanied Violin Sonata #3 in C is as cool as it gets.
> Delightfully cool is the first movement of the Fourth Violin Concerto in D and the third movement of the Third Violin Concerto in G, both by Mozart. Many fine performances.


I so agree. In the hands of a master - or in the hands of a handsome young man or a lovely woman. The devil didn't choose it as his instrument for nothing!


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

ribonucleic said:


> Coolest composer: Harry Partch
> Why: Didn't just write his own music, didn't just create own his scales, built his own goddamned instruments.
> 
> Next coolest composer: Kaikhosru Sorabji
> ...


Cool instruments...

http://listverse.com/2007/09/11/top-10-bizarre-musical-instruments/


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Ingélou said:


> I so agree. In the hands of a master - or in the hands of a handsome young man or a lovely woman. The devil didn't choose it as his instrument for nothing!











If you haven't already done so, I hope you get to listen to Midori Seiler on baroque violin playing the 3 Bach Unaccompanied Partitas. Astonishing and very cool! :tiphat:


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## stevens (Jun 23, 2014)

When I was 12 years old I invited my pop/rock classmates to my home. I had told them that Beethovens 7:e symphonie (movement 3 and 4) was the coolest piece of music one could imagine. MUCH cooler and MUCH louder than their dorky, goofy pop crap.
Well how did it go? They came, I turned the volume up, the house was shaking ...my classmates stared disdainfully at me, and looking at each other. I hadnt exactly convinced them. This was another defeat in my life..


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## Vesteralen (Jul 14, 2011)

Can't get much cooler than this guy from Iceland.


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)




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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

stevens said:


> When I was 12 years old I invited my pop/rock classmates to my home. I had told them that Beethovens 7:e symphonie (movement 3 and 4) was the coolest piece of music one could imagine. MUCH cooler and MUCH louder than their dorky, goofy pop crap.
> Well how did it go? They came, I turned the volume up, the house was shaking ...my classmates stared disdainfully at me, and looking at each other. I hadnt exactly convinced them. This was another defeat in my life..


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View attachment 49901


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

stevens said:


> When I was 12 years old I invited my pop/rock classmates to my home. I had told them that Beethovens 7:e symphonie (movement 3 and 4) was the coolest piece of music one could imagine. MUCH cooler and MUCH louder than their dorky, goofy pop crap.
> Well how did it go? They came, I turned the volume up, the house was shaking ...my classmates stared disdainfully at me, and looking at each other. I hadnt exactly convinced them. This was another defeat in my life..


Don't be depressed over it. The results were entirely predictable.


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## Posie (Aug 18, 2013)

Monteverdi was radically cool in 1604.


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

Paganini
Coooooooooooool


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

Talking about "the greatest, the most influential" is very cool for sure. It is an exercise which immediately makes clear to everybody around you that you are a serious and important listener.

Talking about comparing 20 different performances of the same piece is cool - saying that Sokolov's Bach is better than Argerich's Rachmaninoff.


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## Antiquarian (Apr 29, 2014)

I'll tell you which Classical music piece was 'cool' in the 90's and early 2000's. Back in the day it was Samuel Barber's 'Adagio for Strings'. You would hear it (usually the William Ørbit version) mostly in the 'Chillout' rooms at Dance clubs. Ferry Corsten even did a remix of it.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

In 1967 'A Whiter Shade of Pale' made Bach-ish keyboard music seem cool!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Whiter_Shade_of_Pale
&




Oh, this video does make me laugh - bringing back 1967 and the 'rebellious youth/surreal wordplay/floral shirts' culture. Our generation hated pretentiousness, and we were the most pretentious of the lot.


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## LarryShone (Aug 29, 2014)

SeptimalTritone said:


> The viola is the coolest instrument. Hands down. Only the sexiest studs like me with their colossal 16.5 inch... violas get the bit*hes all day, every day.


I'm sorry but the Saxophone is the coolest instrument. Not only does it suit jazz to a tee but it can cause uproar in a classical orchestra!


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Ingélou said:


> In 1967 'A Whiter Shade of Pale' made Bach-ish keyboard music seem cool!
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Whiter_Shade_of_Pale
> &
> 
> ...


Yes. A Whiter Shade of Pale will always remind me of summer on the beach, me in my dashing 20's, with my portable radio playing this. I loved this! What memories!


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## JACE (Jul 18, 2014)

stevens said:


> When I was 12 years old I invited my pop/rock classmates to my home. I had told them that Beethovens 7:e symphonie (movement 3 and 4) was the coolest piece of music one could imagine. MUCH cooler and MUCH louder than their dorky, goofy pop crap.
> Well how did it go? They came, I turned the volume up, the house was shaking ...my classmates stared disdainfully at me, and looking at each other. I hadnt exactly convinced them. This was another defeat in my life..


It was cool that you did that. Even if they didn't get it.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

JACE said:


> It was cool that you did that. Even if they didn't get it.


Yeah. At least he tried.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

When I was a newbie and first getting into collecting classical, anything that I came across that was in some way different was cool. Well, for me it was.

The main one I can think of is Saint-Saens' Symphony #3, "Organ." The novelty wore off, it became an annoying earworm, but in recent years I came back round to loving it. Same with things like Gershwin's music, mixing classical with jazz (very different to things I started off with, such as the three B's) and later on, Berg (the first atonal composer I got to). Eventually I kind of went in other directions to classical, but in recent years got drawn back to it.

In terms of looks and also his music that is a unique mixture of suaveness and passion, it's 
Ravel who gets the title of being the most coolest composer on the planet.


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## Guest (Aug 30, 2014)

Current cool:

The People United, by Rzewski. 

Right on, bro.


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## ptr (Jan 22, 2013)

Me thinks the fact that one listens to classical music makes one cool, most peeps just choose the easy way out because they don't have the inclination to do anything remotely challenging!
The coolest of the cool are those who listen to music that gets bashed all the time like that "attonnallity" stuff that seem so unpopular! 

/ptr


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## LarryShone (Aug 29, 2014)

JACE said:


> It was cool that you did that. Even if they didn't get it.


Yes bravo that man!


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

One for Itullian:






Mr Anderson on flute playing a Bach Bouree in an attempt to be one sort of "hip". 

Sorry to hear the news about Glenn Cornick.


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

Taggart said:


> One for Itullian:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


THEEEEE COOOOLEST


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

I am the most uncool person who ever lived. I therefore judge that anything that leaves me utterly cold must be really, really cool.

Tonight I'll pick the orchestral music of Satie. Brrrrrr!


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Woodduck said:


> I am the most uncool person who ever lived. I therefore judge that anything that leaves me utterly cold must be really, really cool.
> 
> Tonight I'll pick the orchestral music of Satie. Brrrrrr!


Just learn to do the opposite of everything you would normally think and do. Like George Costanza.


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## Marschallin Blair (Jan 23, 2014)

Itullian said:


> THEEEEE COOOOLEST







'Liquid nitrogen' when done on a Strat with added harmonics.


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## Richannes Wrahms (Jan 6, 2014)

Oboists make the coolest faces. Then there's the whole phenomenon of flutists, with their piercing eyes while their lips...


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## Xiansheng (Feb 20, 2013)

> I am the most uncool person who ever lived. I therefore judge that anything that leaves me utterly cold must be really, really cool.
> 
> Tonight I'll pick the orchestral music of Satie. Brrrrrr!


Pieces Froides? Bring a coat, and give it a good look.


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## Itullian (Aug 27, 2011)

Marschallin Blair said:


> 'Liquid nitrogen' when done on a Strat with added harmonics.


no one tops IA.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

For today, I think Jean-Féry Rebel's 'Chaos & the Elements' is the coolest baroque piece , with its amazing kick-off chord.




He even has a cool surname, a la James Dean!


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

The two coolest women I know personally or semi-personally both love Verdi and Bizet. That has to mean something.


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## Varick (Apr 30, 2014)

satoru said:


> *According to OED, the word "cool" means "*of a person, an action, or a person's behaviour: assured and unabashed where diffidence and hesitation would be expected; composedly and deliberately audacious or impudent in making a proposal, demand, or assumption," or "of a thing or action: characterized by or exhibiting calmness, composure, or a lack of passionate emotion


One thing is for sure, you ain't "cool" if you have to look the definition of "cool" up in the dictionary. 



LarryShone said:


> I'm sorry but the Saxophone is the coolest instrument. Not only does it suit jazz to a tee but it can cause uproar in a classical orchestra!


I might have to go with you on the Sax on being the "coolest" instrument. Perhaps the "sexiest" instrument as well.

For Composers, the coolest has to be Liszt. This guy was the ultimate stud, had women galore swooning over him, and sugar on top: He turned the piano sideways so the chicks could see his hands, hence creating the modern day piano recital. Now THAT'S cool man!

V


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## meredull (Aug 8, 2014)

I think the coolest female composer is Grace Williams, having composed a piece like Penillion for orchestra


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

Let's see what it sounds like:


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Chordalrock said:


> The two coolest women I know personally or semi-personally both love Verdi and Bizet. That has to mean something.


It probably means, unfortunately, that cool women don't love you since you are no Verdi or Bizet.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

The coolest classical I have heard lately are the horn concertos by Mozart played in historically informed performances by Anthony Halstead on natural horn with Christopher Hogwood leading the Academy of Ancient Music.

Practically jazzy! Infectious and irresistible. Very, very cool!!


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## TitanisWalleri (Dec 30, 2012)

Cool composer: Mason Bates 
Coolest instrument: Macbook


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## LarryShone (Aug 29, 2014)

No no no macbooks, uncool


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## echmain (Jan 18, 2013)

Coolest instrument, the triangle.


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

That's right, they also have to follow Haydn's instructions.


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## TitanisWalleri (Dec 30, 2012)

Any pieces with a theremin?


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

SONNET CLV said:


> It probably means, unfortunately, that cool women don't love you since you are no Verdi or Bizet.


It does, doesn't it?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Mozart's keyboard concertos played by Malcolm Bilson on fortepiano with John Eliot Gardiner conducting the English Concert is as cool as it gets. Crisp, historically informed performances.

They bring the best out of Mozart. Very, very cool!!


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## DeepR (Apr 13, 2012)

The kings of cool? Kraftwerk of course.


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## Vaneyes (May 11, 2010)

*Who do you think are the coolest composers? The coolest pieces? The coolest instruments?*

Grieg. In The Hall Of The Mountain King. Bassoon.:tiphat:


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## LarryShone (Aug 29, 2014)

Mussorgsky, Night on a Bare Mountain.


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