# Is Beethoven's music "emotional"?



## KenOC

This might be a strange question, but for the most part I don't find it so. I'm not sure how to explain that further, but would be interested in hearing other opinions.


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## clavichorder

I find some of it emotional, some of it more mentally interesting. For example, his 1st piano sonata I find to be very emotional, but his 2nd more the latter category, with a sort of "tricky" feeling.


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## Evoken

Well, what do you mean by "emotional"?

If you mean whether his music elicits emotions in the listener, then that is a highly subjective question as it will vary from individual to individual. It may not do so for you but it definitely does for others. Some may be left flat by his music, feeling nothing, but others may be taken to very emotional heights by it.

Speaking on more objective terms, I think music itself is inherently "emotional" in so far as it has among it's goals to elicit emotions in the audience, be it joy, sadness, fear, etc. The subjective element enters of course, when we examine the question of wether said music manages to do this or not in one individual or the other.


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## Turangalîla

I don't think that the music is inherently emotional (at least in the Romantic sense of the word), although I'm sure Beethoven often felt great emotion while he was penning his works. His music can be ferocious, charming, supernatural even—and I suppose these could be types of emotions—but "emotional" is not a descriptor that comes to mind for me.

Interesting question.


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## Guest

I find it so, and given that his music is used in film soundtracks to underscore emotional moments, others do too. Whether Beethoven would be satisfied at the sight of grown men crying during the second movement of the 7th Symphony is another matter. Of course, since he said the 6th Symphony "more the expression of feeling than painting", I'd say he'd be pleased to know that his music moves people.


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## KenOC

Evoken said:


> Well, what do you mean by "emotional"?


We never define our terms around here. House rule! :tiphat:


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## starthrower

Gets me going more than the sewing machine stuff. But there's a fine line. I'm not fond of the over the top aspect of symphony no. 7, or the 9th finale.


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## Itullian

I'm not an expert, I just know it moves me.
So I would say yes.


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## DavidA

KenOC said:


> This might be a strange question, but for the most part I don't find it so. I'm not sure how to explain that further, but would be interested in hearing other opinions.


I'd just listen to Richter playing the AppSsionata or the last movement of the Pastoral. Or the scene in Fidelio where Leonore removes Florestan's chains - 'O God, what a moment!'
Beethoven is full of things like this. His music seethes with emotion.


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## Ingélou

If 'emotional' means 'moving' or 'full of feeling', then yes, I find Beethoven's music emotional.
*And what is wrong with that?* 
(My second will be calling on you tomorrow, sir, and you should know that I am the finest pistol shot in all Europe.)

When I came back to the violin, I was playing pieces out of a well-known 'tutor', mostly baroque, and then there was Beethoven's *Sonatina*. My teacher, who was supposed at that point to be teaching me only baroque, kept humming it sotto voce every week, and finally weakened and set it for homework. I found it hard, but lovely, and finally conquered it after I made up an emotional story of awakening love which I could 'live through' as I plied my bow.

Yes, sir - *emotional*!


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## tdc

A lot of it sounds to me like a kind of eccentric, forceful joy. I'll take the "sewing machine" stuff myself.


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## chrisco97

Is the Pope Catholic? :lol:


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## tdc

tdc said:


> A lot of it sounds to me like a kind of eccentric, forceful joy.


Like "I WILL be happy dammit!!"

Then I picture that soldier marching on "A Clockwork Orange" with the really high leg kicks.


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## starry

Classical music is a combination of intellect and emotion, but beginners often just don't accept that as has been clear on this forum.


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## Guest

chrisco97 said:


> Is the Pope Catholic? :lol:


Hah! And do bears poop in the woods?


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## HaydnBearstheClock

I think it depends on the genre - in his piano concertos, I find Beethoven gets very emotional. Somehow I find the symphonies less emotional - of course there are very emotional moments (slow movements - symphony No. 2, 3, 4, 7, 9 for example) but the Eroica, for example, in the 1st movement, is more 'imperial' than emotional, it probably has to do with Beethoven's orchestration. His style is sometimes very focused on rhythm, maybe that's a part of it too.


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## Guest

If we persist in looking in the wrong places for things, we will continue to not find those things.

The answer to "Is Beethoven's music 'emotional'?" is that no music is emotional. Music doesn't have emotions. People do.

Music has notes. Music has rhythms and pitches and durations and volume and timbre. Stuff like that. Those sounds and combinations of sounds, occurring in time, have the capability of eliciting emotional responses in different people. But then so do puppies and sunsets and thunderstorms. That's because people are emotional.

The real question here is "Are people emotional?" And the answer to that we already know. It is "yes." No matter how many times we ask it, the answer will always be "yes."

And no matter how often we ask "Is the music of X emotional," those answers, the good ones and the bad ones alike, will always be the same. Some will say "yes." Some will say "no." Some will ask what the asker means by "emotional." Some will point out that different people will respond differently.

We know this. We all know all of this going into it.

Is Bach's music emotional? Is Chopin's? Is Tchaikovsky's Is Babbitt's? The answers, we know this, will all be the same: "Yes." "No." "What do you mean by 'emotional'?" "Different people will have different responses."

If we persist in asking questions to which we already know the answers, we will continue to get answers we already know.

Is structure important? "Yes." "No." "What do you mean by 'structure'?" "What do you mean by 'important'?" "Structure is more or less important to different listeners."

I don't understand. (And these are the threads that get the most mileage, too. Go figure.)


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## quack

^ That post made me cry.


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## Evoken

chrisco97 said:


> Is the Pope Catholic? :lol:


Well, if you ask among some traditional Catholic circles, they may answer in the negative


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## StlukesguildOhio

Ackk!! The government is about to default and I find myself agreeing with Someguy. It's the end of the world!!!


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## Guest

starry said:


> Classical music is a combination of intellect and emotion, but beginners often just don't accept that as has been clear on this forum.


I'm not sure of the significance or relevance of 'beginners' in this discussion. And I'm sure Ken was not asking if we think that Beethoven is _exclusively _emotional. To describe his music as 'emotional' does not preclude it from also being 'intellectual'.

As for someguy's post, I agree, up to a point. Nevertheless, whetherhe likes the use of general consensus as a justification or not, it would be a fairly routine argument that by general consensus, some pieces of music tend to elicit emotion more than others in a large number of people, and some composers deliberately set out to elicit such emotions, knowing that certain tropes are particularly successful in doing this.


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## starry

I just brought another factor into the discussion that relates to the forum, if not up to that point to this thread. The fact is some will talk about it as being purely emotional.

Anyway I'll bring in the role of performers again, most don't here I feel. They are surely the ones who bring the score alive and communicate the music to the audience. Of course there can be markings on the score that indicate some kind of emotional content though this isn't brought alive until it's performed. And exactly how that music is communicated will vary according to the performer, even if it's the same composer/piece.


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## Blancrocher

some guy said:


> If we persist in looking in the wrong places for things, we will continue to not find those things.
> 
> The answer to "Is Beethoven's music 'emotional'?" is that no music is emotional. Music doesn't have emotions. People do.


That's one way of looking at it, that's for sure. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has a fairly whinging discussion of "Music and the Emotions," which covers perspectives on ideas about emotions in music and/or audiences.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/music/#3

Your view is basically what the author calls "the error theory":



> This suggestion raises the specter of an 'error theory' of music's expressivity, that is, a theory that all claims of emotional expressivity in music are strictly false. A major burden of such a theory is to explain away the widespread tendency to describe music in emotional terms. This has been attempted by arguing that such descriptions are shorthand or metaphor for purely sonic features (Urmson 1973), basic dynamic features (Hanslick 1986), purely musical features (Sharpe 1982), or aesthetic properties (Zangwill 2007). There are many problems with such views. For one thing, they are committed to some sort of scheme for reduction of expressive predicates to other terms, such as sonic or musical ones, and such a scheme is difficult to imagine (Budd 1985a, 31-6). For another, anyone not drawn to this theory is likely to reject the claim that the paraphrase captures all that is of interest and value about the passage described, precisely since it omits the expressive predicates (Davies 1994, 153-4). However, the possibility that a musical culture might fall into the grip of anti-expressivist formalism raises questions about contextualism. Perhaps Levinson, Davies, et al., are right that most people hear most music as emotionally expressive. It is a nice question, however, whether, if our musical culture fell into the grip of anti-expressivist formalism - in the future or the past - it would be appropriate to exclude ourselves from the reference class of listeners appealed to by such theories as those of Davies and Levinson. If so, this would point to a kind of high-level contextualism, or cultural relativity about the expressivity of music, making it a more contingent matter than most theorists imply. On the other hand, such an occurrence may be unlikely if our tendency to 'animate' non-sentient objects is deeply rooted in our biology.


This doesn't refute your point, which is hard to do.

I will say this, though: _of course_ Beethoven's music is emotional!


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## deggial

CarterJohnsonPiano said:


> His music can be ferocious, charming, supernatural even-and I suppose these could be types of emotions


what else could they be?

if Beethoven's music is not emotional I don't know what is.


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## DavidA

Some guy is right. We are the ones who experience emotions. The more pertinent question is 'Does Beethoven's music arouse emotions in you?' Then of course it is, What emotions?


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## Couac Addict

If "no", does this mean that the Apassionata may be breaching the Trades Description Act?


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## Blancrocher

DavidA said:


> Some guy is right. We are the ones who experience emotions.


Even if the two of you are right in general, I would still maintain that the 31st Piano Sonata would continue to be emotional even if the world were entirely populated by androids.


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## Guest

Well, the 31st piano sonata (which is one of my favorite pieces), absolutely requires a particular kind of ears to be anything at all besides marks on some pieces of paper. Ears attached to a particular kind of brain.

And, of course, very specialized and highly trained fingers to make it sound for those ears and brains.

If the world were entirely populated by androids, and those androids had no appreciation for Beethoven, then the 31st piano sonata would, for all practical reasons, simply not exist.

The marks would still be on the paper, of course, but without the fingers or the ears or the brains, those marks would have no effect on anyone. And in that case, some android somewhere would inevitably realize that that paper could be used for some other purpose. Perhaps starting a nice fire in the winter time. (I am not suggesting that Mrs. Haydn was an android.)


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## Blancrocher

some guy said:


> The marks would still be on the paper, of course, but without the fingers or the ears or the brains, those marks would have no effect on anyone. And in that case, some android somewhere would inevitably realize that that paper could be used for some other purpose. Perhaps starting a nice fire in the winter time. (I am not suggesting that Mrs. Haydn was an android.)


Well, if Beethoven's music wasn't emotional before, I bet it's quite annoyed--and maybe somewhat alarmed--right now!

:lol:


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## Guest

It's probably really pissed off. And will probably want to smash my ears.

That's the problem with these emotional pieces. They get so angry so easily.:scold:


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## starthrower

some guy said:


> I don't understand. (And these are the threads that get the most mileage, too. Go figure.)


Oh, the irony! Warm blooded emotional humans have an insatiable appetite for triviality and small talk.


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## trazom

No, but much of it could be called emotive.


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## jani

Well at least my brain has a emotional response for it, also knowing the story of his life adds up to the experience.
With out knowing his story i would still have an emotional response for it but not as big as i have when i know it.


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## DavidA

Blancrocher said:


> Even if the two of you are right in general, I would still maintain that the 31st Piano Sonata would continue to be emotional even if the world were entirely populated by androids.


Sorry, not a logical statement. It is us who are emotional - the music plays on our emotions.


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## Blancrocher

DavidA said:


> Sorry, not a logical statement. It is us who are emotional - the music plays on our emotions.


On the contrary, I think that Beethoven's Opus 129 has a good sense of humor. And his little laugh is so infectious.


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## jani

Blancrocher said:


> On the contrary, I think that Beethoven's Rondo a Capriccio in G op. 19 has a good sense of humor. And his little laugh is so infectious.


How dare you Blancrocher, its not some childish presentation of silliness, its a piece of true highly emotional art. Which brings even god in tears!


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## shangoyal

The Cavatina from Op. 130. I think that is tear-jerker, yes.


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## trazom

Maybe it's just another example of people needing to anthropomorphize everything. This music is emotional and funny, the brook is babbling, the crocodile is smiling, etc.


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## Blancrocher

trazom said:


> Maybe it's just another example of people needing to anthropomorphize everything.


I think that's unlikely--at least in my case.


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## bigshot

If you don't hear emotion in Beethoven, you're listening to the wrong conductors.


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## deggial

trazom said:


> Maybe it's just another example of people needing to anthropomorphize everything. This music is emotional and funny, the brook is babbling, the crocodile is smiling, etc.


I know, it's more fun being literal about everything.


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## ccravens

TalkingHead said:


> Hah! And do bears poop in the woods?


Not polar bears.....


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## julianoq

bigshot said:


> If you don't hear emotion in Beethoven, you're listening to the wrong conductors.


Or with the wrong ears (if you haven't missed their function like poor Ludwig).


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## trazom

deggial said:


> I know, it's more fun being literal about everything.


Because it's really only an 'either/or' situation. D'oh!


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## moody

I am surprised by the thought that Beethoven's music was not emotional or emotion making (for heaven's sake).
I always have thought it more emotional than most compositions from other composers. Just listen to the Appassionata sonata, monstrously emotional !


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## Guest

Not emotional. (People are emotional.)

Emotion making, sure. Unless you happen to find Beethoven dull or boring. (Some people do, you know. For heaven's sake, you do know that, don't you?)

Just listening to the Appassionata won't do anything for you unless you're receptive. Just try this: Get someone who's never heard any Beethoven, someone really passionate )) about oh, Afrobeat, say. Play the Appassionata for them. Monstrously boring is the reaction I'd expect from that person.

I'm surprised you don't know that.

For emotions to be made (or better, elicited) you have to have a creature capable of having emotions. And not everyone will react the same way. (Haven't we gone over this same ground already? Haven't we gone over this same ground already? Haven't we experienced this feeling of deja vu already?)


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## mstar

Ah, Beethoven! If not emotional, then what would you call his Emperor! 
I think Beethoven is wonderfully emotional, though in a good way. He's able to combine that with technique to output some of the greatest music of all time.


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## ShropshireMoose

shangoyal said:


> The Cavatina from Op. 130. I think that is tear-jerker, yes.


Indeed, if you are not emotionally moved by the Cavatina, then you are dead.................or not worth knowing.


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## Guest

Wow.

No, really. Wow.

And here I always thought.... 

No.

Just "wow."


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## ShropshireMoose

And don't even get me started on the question of Moose.


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## ShropshireMoose

Incidentally, the question of the emotions it arouses is, of course a thorny one. I remember Spike Milligan recounting the tale of the time he took Ronnie Scott to a performance of the "Eroica" at the Albert Hall. Towards the end of the Funeral March, he turned to Milligan and said, "This bloke must have lived a ******* long way from the cemetery!"


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## ShropshireMoose

How sad that in the 21st century it feels the need to get rid of a good old Anglo-Saxon word! Rhymes with clucking, in case you were in doubt!


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## Blancrocher

mstar said:


> Ah, Beethoven! If not emotional, then what would you call his Emperor!
> I think Beethoven is wonderfully emotional, though in a good way. He's able to combine that with technique to output some of the greatest music of all time.


I'm sorry, mstar--you can use exclamation marks and emoticons all you like, but your post still won't be intrinsically emotional--just marks on a screen that may _elicit_ emotion (especially after I've had a little wine this evening).

Keep in mind that even Beethoven's setting of the "Ode to Joy" may fill one with anxious, suicidal despair if played too loudly or too often.


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## KenOC

Blancrocher said:


> Keep in mind that even Beethoven's setting of the "Ode to Joy" may fill one with anxious, suicidal despair if played too loudly or too often.


Or if, like Spohr, you simply hate it. "The fourth movement is, in my opinion, so monstrous and tasteless and, in its grasp of Schiller's Ode, so trivial that I cannot understand how a genius like Beethoven could have written it."


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## moody

some guy said:


> Not emotional. (People are emotional.)
> 
> Emotion making, sure. Unless you happen to find Beethoven dull or boring. (Some people do, you know. For heaven's sake, you do know that, don't you?)
> 
> Just listening to the Appassionata won't do anything for you unless you're receptive. Just try this: Get someone who's never heard any Beethoven, someone really passionate )) about oh, Afrobeat, say. Play the Appassionata for them. Monstrously boring is the reaction I'd expect from that person.
> 
> I'm surprised you don't know that.
> 
> For emotions to be made (or better, elicited) you have to have a creature capable of having emotions. And not everyone will react the same way. (Haven't we gone over this same ground already? Haven't we gone over this same ground already? Haven't we experienced this feeling of deja vu already?)


Well of course you spend most of your time pounding well beaten paths and I'm certainly not particularly interested in your quaint theories.


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## StlukesguildOhio

Not emotional. (People are emotional.)

Emotion making, sure. Unless you happen to find Beethoven dull or boring. (Some people do, you know. For heaven's sake, you do know that, don't you?)

Just listening to the Appassionata won't do anything for you unless you're receptive. Just try this: Get someone who's never heard any Beethoven, someone really passionate () about oh, Afrobeat, say. Play the Appassionata for them. Monstrously boring is the reaction I'd expect from that person.

Again... I have to agree with someguy. We know that those who love classical music make up a small percentage of the populace as a whole. A good many who love Bluegrass or Blues or Rap or Pop music would probably not find Beethoven's music emotional at all. I have long been fond of the aesthetic views of _Art pour l'Art_ and feel Oscar Wilde was right on the mark when he suggested: _"It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors." _

What we get from a work of art comes from us and what we bring to the work. How many of our Beethoven "fan boys" fail to appreciate (let alone feel a deep emotional response) to Mozart... because they come to him with a biased notion that a minor key and grand crescendos or other elements of Romanticism are essential to the expression of profound emotions?

Yes... I personally have deep emotional responses to Beethoven... but are these truly within the organization of sounds... or are they a result of my experience, education, expectations with regard to music? I suspect the latter.


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## Blancrocher

*edit* Instead of wrangling over details until coming to some obvious common ground, I'll just post a lovely old (and crackly) recording of Beethoven's "Kakadu" Variations:


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## bigshot

I like most forms of music, and the thing I like about them is their emotions. That goes as much for Bluegrass as it does for classical.

The inability of the listener to perceive emotion in music probably isn't the fault of the music or any indication that there is no emotion to be found in it. It's more a reflection of the autistic age we live in. Expression of emotion is suppressed in many people. It only makes sense that they wouldn't feel emotions that are presented to them in music.


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## mstar

KenOC said:


> Or if, like Spohr, you simply hate it. "The fourth movement is, in my opinion, so monstrous and tasteless and, in its grasp of Schiller's Ode, so trivial that I cannot understand how a genius like Beethoven could have written it."


I tend to enjoy the first movement much more, and the fourth seems to lack as much enjoyment, if you will.


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## ArtMusic

KenOC said:


> This might be a strange question, but for the most part I don't find it so. I'm not sure how to explain that further, but would be interested in hearing other opinions.


Emotionally forceful might be it. The symphonies for example. _Symphony #6_ in particular where Beethoven even wrote himself that the music was meant to invoke the feelings of the countryside, the brook etc.


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## julianoq

If music is created to generate emotions in human beings, why can't we discuss these emotions? Of course that music itself is not inherently emotional, it is just symbols in a piece of paper, but it has the power and was created for emotions, so I think it makes a lot of sense to discuss it. But I think that a better question would be "what emotions Beethoven's music generate on you", since all music, even 4'33, generate emotions in everybody (even if the emotion is not good).


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## moody

StlukesguildOhio said:


> Not emotional. (People are emotional.)
> 
> Emotion making, sure. Unless you happen to find Beethoven dull or boring. (Some people do, you know. For heaven's sake, you do know that, don't you?)
> 
> Just listening to the Appassionata won't do anything for you unless you're receptive. Just try this: Get someone who's never heard any Beethoven, someone really passionate () about oh, Afrobeat, say. Play the Appassionata for them. Monstrously boring is the reaction I'd expect from that person.
> 
> Again... I have to agree with someguy. We know that those who love classical music make up a small percentage of the populace as a whole. A good many who love Bluegrass or Blues or Rap or Pop music would probably not find Beethoven's music emotional at all. I have long been fond of the aesthetic views of _Art pour l'Art_ and feel Oscar Wilde was right on the mark when he suggested: _"It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors." _
> 
> What we get from a work of art comes from us and what we bring to the work. How many of our Beethoven "fan boys" fail to appreciate (let alone feel a deep emotional response) to Mozart... because they come to him with a biased notion that a minor key and grand crescendos or other elements of Romanticism are essential to the expression of profound emotions?
> 
> Yes... I personally have deep emotional responses to Beethoven... but are these truly within the organization of sounds... or are they a result of my experience, education, expectations with regard to music? I suspect the latter.


No,this really doesn't explain how a complete tyro first hearing a particular piece of music is bowled over by it.Also it must be that on many occasions the composer is writing an emotional piece,so it's uo to us as to whether we read that emotion or not.


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## Guest

Who is this person? What piece did they hear? Was this person indeed a complete tyro?

Without any corroborative details, this just looks like a made up scenario. Made up simply to "prove" a point. But the threads of TC are jam-packed with actual evidence that listeners who do not have the "experience, education, expectations" to understand or appreciate certain pieces or certain genres will tune out (at best) or hurl invectives at the music. (Makes sense, I guess. If you locate inappropriate things as being *in* the music, then if you don't like something, it's the music's fault.)

As for the rest of it, perhaps thinking about other things than music may help. (I said "may." I've still not recovered from the total inability (or at least refusal) to address any of the issues.)

Take a thunder storm. Humans can make emotional responses to thunder storms. Are the storms themselves emotional, though? Is the storm angry at us or something? What about landscapes? I make emotional responses to landscapes all the time. That's because the _landscapes_ are emotional?

Mountains? Flowers? Stars? Puppies? Sculptures? Cityscapes?

Oh, OK. I'll give you the puppies.


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## moody

some guy said:


> Who is this person? What piece did they hear? Was this person indeed a complete tyro?
> 
> Without any corroborative details, this just looks like a made up scenario. Made up simply to "prove" a point. But the threads of TC are jam-packed with actual evidence that listeners who do not have the "experience, education, expectations" to understand or appreciate certain pieces or certain genres will tune out (at best) or hurl invectives at the music. (Makes sense, I guess. If you locate inappropriate things as being *in* the music, then if you don't like something, it's the music's fault.)
> 
> As for the rest of it, perhaps thinking about other things than music may help. (I said "may." I've still not recovered from the total inability (or at least refusal) to address any of the issues.)
> 
> Take a thunder storm. Humans can make emotional responses to thunder storms. Are the storms themselves emotional, though? Is the storm angry at us or something? What about landscapes? I make emotional responses to landscapes all the time. That's because the _landscapes_ are emotional?
> 
> Mountains? Flowers? Stars? Puppies? Sculptures? Cityscapes?
> 
> Oh, OK. I'll give you the puppies.


It doesn't really matter and I certainly can't be bothered.


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## Jobis

Music has its origins in speech and communication between humans. I remember an article posted her recently that said the minor third interval often occurs in speech as a kind of vocalisation of sadness, upset etc. so its not strange at all to see music as emotional. It speaks to our shared consciousness in a sense.

Music obviously can't convey specific emotions, which is why some of the more romantic composers like to marry it with text or some background story. Berlioz for example, whose vast majority of work is dramatically driven. He cannot escape tone painting, but then you have Beethoven, whose music is no less emotional, its just that the response it elicits is more subjective, he doesn't tell you how to feel, or whether you ought to be feeling something and thus it is what you make of it.


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## moody

Blancrocher said:


> *edit* Instead of wrangling over details until coming to some obvious common ground, I'll just post a lovely old (and crackly) recording of Beethoven's "Kakadu" Variations:


Why's it crackly---aren't you looking after your records properly ?


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## ArtMusic

Listeners can respond to a thunderstorm - as do we when we listen to Beethoven's musical portrait of one in his sixth symphony but we marvel at it, because we know it is a musical portrait of a thuderstorm (that section in the _Pastoral_).

People responding to a real thunderstorm as if it was music, well that's a deifferent matter dealing with sanity altogether.


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## quack

Telephone wires don't contain conversations but they transfer them, genes aren't cancer but they can cause cancers, notes on a page aren't music but they represent music.

People keep saying Beethoven's music is just notes on the page; have you "read" all the music you've listened to? Music is much more than that reductionist approach. The notes might be all we have of Beethoven now but his music isn't trapped within those representations, we don't listen to the paper. If we listen to Uchida play Beethoven we hear a musician liberating Beethoven's music from it's transmission medium, she might be making Uchida's music partly but she is also revealing Beethoven for the non-specialist.

The anthropomorphism argument may work when it comes to thunderstorms. Are they trying to frighten us? Not if they are simply weather conditions, to say they have some motive suggests some higher power or creator god imbuing them with that will. But Beethoven's scores do have that creator. If Beethoven is grumpy and wants people to be as grumpy as him he can create a score that transmits music that attempts to elicit the same kind of emotional response in the listener. There's no grumpy notes, not even the crotchet, but thinking there isn't emotion woven between them is to apply to be one of those androids already mentioned.

I expect people will cite the imperfections of the transmission medium and the inconsistencies of the audience to prove that Beethoven wasn't filling his score with emotion. The fact that our emotional responses aren't simple and we all react differently doesn't mean an attempt at communication hasn't been made. What is supposed to be dramatic can often seem melodramatic, what is supposed to be profound might seem laughable, what is supposed to be exciting might seem boring. A telephone conversation in Russian doesn't stop being an attempt at conversation because you only speak English.

Discussions on internet forums so often devolve into logic-infested, black and white thinking. When that is about politics it is usually unhelpful, when it is about emotions it is just absurd. Since when have emotions been a part of logic.


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## starry

julianoq said:


> If music is created to generate emotions in human beings, why can't we discuss these emotions? Of course that music itself is not inherently emotional, it is just symbols in a piece of paper, but it has the power and was created for emotions, so I think it makes a lot of sense to discuss it. But I think that a better question would be "what emotions Beethoven's music generate on you", since all music, even 4'33, generate emotions in everybody (even if the emotion is not good).


Ugh. Beethoven's music generates every flippin emotion, just like just about every other composer. This is the trouble with these simplificiations, but this is what we'll get in this forum, as many come straight here after just starting on classical and coming from some one dimensional style of popular music. Not saying that's the case with you, but I expect it is of some. Classical music (and some other types of music) is COMPLEX. Threads asking for happy music, relaxing music, angry music....all is very reductive and more people imposing some limited pretty shallow need on something which is isn't meant to be there to fill a basic consumer's need like basic food but is meant to be artistic and so complex.


----------



## julianoq

starry said:


> Ugh. Beethoven's music generates every flippin emotion, just like just about every other composer. This is the trouble with these simplificiations, but this is what we'll get in this forum, as many come straight here after just starting on classical and coming from some one dimensional style of popular music. Not saying that's the case with you, but I expect it is of some. Classical music (and some other types of music) is COMPLEX. Threads asking for happy music, relaxing music, angry music....all is very reductive and more people imposing some limited pretty shallow need on something which is isn't meant to be there to fill a basic consumer's need like basic food but is meant to be artistic and so complex.


I already heard many great musicians and conductors talking about the emotions present in Beethoven works, are they also beginners simplifying music? I never said anything about reducing, for example, a whole symphony like the No.5 in a word like "anger". But certainly certain passages tend to pass this emotion to most listeners. As other passages tend to pass tenderness, and so on.


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## starry

Well you asked what emotions does Beethoven's music generate in me?

My answer - every emotion. Same with most other composers. And just taking one passage or series of notes out of the whole doesn't tell you that much about a whole piece. And even just saying something sounds 'angry' doesn't really epitomise fully what a piece is about. It's a journey, a complex intellectual idea of thoughts and feelings. It's not just feeding an emotion otherwise it would simply be throwaway stuff.


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## julianoq

starry said:


> Well you asked what emotions does Beethoven's music generate in me?
> 
> My answer - every emotion. Same with most other composers. And just taking one passage or series of notes out of the whole doesn't tell you that much about a whole piece. And even just saying something sounds 'angry' doesn't really epitomise fully what a piece is about. It's a journey, a complex intellectual idea of thoughts and feelings. It's not just feeding an emotion otherwise it would simply be throwaway stuff.


I agree, it doesn't fully epitomize any piece. But it helps to explain. And great musicians and artists do that all the time to explain music. Jonathan Biss, one of the very best Beethoven Piano Sonatas experts of the new generation talk about the emotions in the music all the time. Is he a 'beginner coming from one dimensional style of popular music', as you judged me? I don't think so.


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## Guest

quack said:


> logic-infested


Hahahaha, where?

No, really. Internet forums?


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## starry

julianoq said:


> as you judged me?


You seem to have a problem with reading what I said. "Not saying that's the case with you". Anyway take it personally if you want, but I'm just pointing this out in case someone else didn't read. I'm sure a pianist in Beethoven would think about all kinds of factors including emotions to convey. I said earlier performers are to communicate emotions to the audience. Such things have to arise from the piece and the complex journey it goes through, and often of course these can be ambiguous and not simply a black and white simplicity. There can be gradations, transitions and moments of change. These require an intellectual act of interpretation from both performer and listener and not simply a fury of emotion.


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## Eschbeg

julianoq said:


> If *music is created to generate emotions* in human beings, why can't we discuss these emotions?
> 
> ...*all music, even 4'33, generate emotions* in everybody (even if the emotion is not good).


Even if it is true that all music does generate emotions, it is definitely not true that all music is created for that purpose. Some composers explicitly state that they are not trying to generate emotions. That doesn't stop anyone from having an emotional response anyway, but you shouldn't conflate the two statements above.


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## julianoq

starry said:


> You seem to have a problem with reading what I said. "Not saying that's the case with you". Anyway take it personally if you want, but I'm just pointing this out in case someone else didn't read.


Sorry - I interpreted it wrong.



starry said:


> I'm sure a pianist in Beethoven would think about all kinds of factors including emotions to convey. I said earlier performers are to communicate emotions to the audience. Such things have to arise from the piece and the complex journey it goes through, and often of course these can be ambiguous and not simply a black and white simplicity. There can be gradations, transitions and moments of change. These require an intellectual act of interpretation from both performer and listener and not simply a fury of emotion.


I agree, and I never said that it must me simple. I am certain that it is complex. But as you and I agree the emotions are there. They can be ambiguous and complex, but they are there. Why can't we discuss them? Should we abstain from discussing it at all only to "avoid simplification"?


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## Guest

Julian,

What I suggested several pages ago was that the emotions are _not_ there. Not _in_ the music.

My point was simple. The word "emotions" identifies things that sentient beings have, not rocks, not clouds, not buildings, not music. Sentient beings. That was all I said. I wasn't saying that music could not evoke emotions. Of course it can. So can flowers and puppies. As to what we can or cannot discuss, there has been no attempt by anyone at any time to forbid certain topics. And no one has the power to enforce that, anyway. So that one's a nonstarter, for sure.

No one's actually contested that point. Which has baffled me. No one's really disagreed with what I said. They've just repeated, over and over again, that music _is_ emotional.

Not even, which would be daft but at least comprehensible, that the word emotional refers to the capacity to evoke emotions. (Shall we repeat this again, just for giggles: since humans are emotional, they are capable of making emotional responses to practically anything. Or, to put it another way, practically anything can evoke emotions from humans.)

Looking for emotions _in_ music--even if a composer has explicitly stated that they're there, even if a performer, in order to get a point across to an uneducated audience, talks as if they are there--is to look in the wrong place.

"So what?" Moody might say. Because what people hear in music differs from person to person. You will never get every listener to agree that the opening to Beethoven's fifth expresses anger, for instance, even though I know a couple of people who hear it that way. And that, simply enough, is because the emotion is what happens when the listener and the sounds of a particular piece establish a relationship. You listen to a piece and hear X, Y, and Z. I listen to the same piece and hear A, B, and Q. ArtMusic listens to the same piece and hears M, T, and D.

Which is right? you might ask. And that would be the wrong question. The situation has nothing of rightness or wrongness in it. It just is what it is. Of course, that won't stop dozens of posters to online forums writing as if X, Y, and Z were clearly what are INSIDE the piece and if you don't hear that, you must be a loony. Or at least a horrible person whom no one wants to be with.

But that's another story.


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## Blancrocher

In my view, your post starts off with an obviously correct point: nobody would maintain that a Beethoven sonata gets snippy and cantankerous when it's played too loudly or the performer misses a few notes. By the end, though, you seem to be suggesting that there is no way to determine the emotions that a piece of music is designed to evoke--that we can never know the right answer, that it's all relative. That could be argued, of course, but it's not obviously true.


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## Guest

ArtMusic said:


> Listeners can respond to a thunderstorm - as do we when we listen to Beethoven's musical portrait of one in his sixth symphony but we marvel at it, because we know it is a musical portrait of a thuderstorm (that section in the _Pastoral_).
> 
> *People responding to a real thunderstorm as if it was music, well that's a deifferent matter dealing with sanity altogether*.


Hah! Still, you must admit that certain sonic phenomena might well be music to someone's ears, no? Personally, I quite enjoy thunderstorms (I find them exciting) - from within the privacy of my own home, of course. Do I consider them to be 'music'? Well yes, at times, especially when I have in mind the opening of *John Tavener's* _Total Eclipse_.
Here's a link where you can hear an extract (try it at a decent level of volume!):
http://www.newcollegechoir.com/tavener-total-eclipse-recordings.html


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## Guest

Actually, the link I gave above gives only a very short extract (not from the beginning of the piece) and does not convey the full power (The horror! The terror!) of the percussionist(s) going haywire on the timps. Please do try and see if you cannot find a better extract on YouTube or wherever. All I can say is that when I first heard this piece (full volume, late at night, sitting in the dark) I nearly 'wet my frock', so to speak.


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## tdc

quack said:


> Telephone wires don't contain conversations but they transfer them, genes aren't cancer but they can cause cancers, notes on a page aren't music but they represent music.
> 
> People keep saying Beethoven's music is just notes on the page; have you "read" all the music you've listened to? Music is much more than that reductionist approach. The notes might be all we have of Beethoven now but his music isn't trapped within those representations, we don't listen to the paper. If we listen to Uchida play Beethoven we hear a musician liberating Beethoven's music from it's transmission medium, she might be making Uchida's music partly but she is also revealing Beethoven for the non-specialist.
> 
> The anthropomorphism argument may work when it comes to thunderstorms. Are they trying to frighten us? Not if they are simply weather conditions, to say they have some motive suggests some higher power or creator god imbuing them with that will. But Beethoven's scores do have that creator. If Beethoven is grumpy and wants people to be as grumpy as him he can create a score that transmits music that attempts to elicit the same kind of emotional response in the listener. There's no grumpy notes, not even the crotchet, but thinking there isn't emotion woven between them is to apply to be one of those androids already mentioned.
> 
> I expect people will cite the imperfections of the transmission medium and the inconsistencies of the audience to prove that Beethoven wasn't filling his score with emotion. The fact that our emotional responses aren't simple and we all react differently doesn't mean an attempt at communication hasn't been made. What is supposed to be dramatic can often seem melodramatic, what is supposed to be profound might seem laughable, what is supposed to be exciting might seem boring. A telephone conversation in Russian doesn't stop being an attempt at conversation because you only speak English.
> 
> Discussions on internet forums so often devolve into logic-infested, black and white thinking. When that is about politics it is usually unhelpful, when it is about emotions it is just absurd. Since when have emotions been a part of logic.


^^^Very well said, I agree.



julianoq said:


> I agree, and I never said that it must me simple. I am certain that it is complex. But as you and I agree the emotions are there. They can be ambiguous and complex, but they are there. Why can't we discuss them? Should we abstain from discussing it at all only to "avoid simplification"?


Yes, I have to agree with this too. I don't understand why it should be problematic to discuss these things, though I do understand the importance of avoiding over-simplifications or as quack put it "black and white thinking".


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## tdc

Whether one agrees about Beethoven's music being emotional or not, I think the question has certainly elicited a lot of interesting discussion.


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## KenOC

Beethoven himself was quoted as saying that even thinking about the Cavatina from the Op. 130 quartet always moved him to tears. But of course he was a well-known softie!


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## starry

The exact precise emotion (or more precisely journey of emotions) isn't necessarily obvious always and that's part of the interpretation of performer and the interpretation of the listener who hears it. It's rarely a monolithic block of emotion, it's a play of different ideas which can be interpreted differently. But as we know the threads are simplistic on this which is why it's normally better just to keep out of them. I prefer thinking of music not as something just to wallow in for an expected emotion but something to actually make me engage with it, and that itself makes it not just emotional but intellectual as well.


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## Guest

some guy said:


> Julian,
> 
> What I suggested several pages ago was that the emotions are _not_ there. Not _in_ the music.
> 
> My point was simple. The word "emotions" identifies things that sentient beings have, not rocks, not clouds, not buildings, not music. Sentient beings. That was all I said. I wasn't saying that music could not evoke emotions.
> 
> Of course it can. So can flowers and puppies. As to what we can or cannot discuss, there has been no attempt by anyone at any time to forbid certain topics. And no one has the power to enforce that, anyway. So that one's a nonstarter, for sure.
> 
> No one's actually contested that point. Which has baffled me. No one's really disagreed with what I said. They've just repeated, over and over again, that music _is_ emotional.


No-one's disagreed because no one disagrees, so far as I can see. You make a point that is not worth disagreeing with. What most want to discuss, in their irritating, human shorthand is whether the music of Beethoven has the power to evoke emotions, but by saying that such 'music _is _emotional'.

You may say (in fact, I think you did say) that that is of interest no longer, since comparing whether piece x evokes emotion z in listener t has been done to death; you may say too that Ken just started off another thread along the same lines to provoke; but, there we are. That's what (some) TC members want to discuss.


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## shangoyal

It would be good to compare Beethoven with some other composer whose music is less emotional. Because all music is emotional, right?


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## Turangalîla

While of course I agree that music itself does not possess emotions, I am convinced that in many cases it has an inherent ability to transmit a certain emotion. Take the example of a simple major and minor chord—the vast majority of listeners would sort categorize them as "happy" and "sad" chords, respectively. There is more to the equation than just "the emotions we attribute to the sounds".


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## Ingélou

MacLeod said:


> No-one's disagreed because no one disagrees, so far as I can see. You make a point that is not worth disagreeing with. What most want to discuss, in their irritating, human shorthand is whether the music of Beethoven has the power to evoke emotions, but by saying that such 'music _is _emotional'.
> 
> You may say (in fact, I think you did say) that that is of interest no longer, since comparing whether piece x evokes emotion z in listener t has been done to death; you may say too that Ken just started off another thread along the same lines to provoke; but, there we are. That's what (some) TC members want to discuss.


:tiphat: Absolutely - why are we spending so long quibbling over a simple case of 'transferred epithet'? 



CarterJohnsonPiano said:


> While of course I agree that music itself does not possess emotions, I am convinced that in many cases it has an inherent ability to transmit a certain emotion. Take the example of a simple major and minor chord-the vast majority of listeners would sort categorize them as "happy" and "sad" chords, respectively. There is more to the equation than just "the emotions we attribute to the sounds".


This is a very good point. I would love to know more of the history of such attributions, about modes that were happy or sad etc. There's also the dynamics & the way the performer chooses to convey emotions. PetrB will probably not be pleased, but I'd like to point up the analogy with language. A certain word order will indicate a question:

'Are you expecting me to go to your school concert tonight?'

Emphasise different words and you get a whole set of different meanings and emotions. The words are the same - it's not they who possess the emotions - but we all speak the language & sign up to a system & set of conventions.

*'Are* you...' ---- Is that what you're holding me to?
'Are *you*...' - Auntie Jane doesn't, but do you?
'Are you *expecting* me...' - I might drop in, but you know it's not a firm thing...
'Are you expecting *me* to...' - You must be out of your tiny mind...
'Are you expecting me *to*..' - I'm a foreigner & don't understand word emphasis! 
'Are you expecting me to *go*..' When you know I live a hundred miles away!
'Are you expecting me to go *to*..' - I was expecting just to give you a lift back from it...
'Are you expecting me to go to *your* ...' You know Freddy has his concert on tonight too...
'Are you expecting me to go to your *school* concert..? - I'm way too highbrow for schoolkids' music!
'Are you expecting me to go to your school *concert* ...' - When there's a sixth form parents' evening on as well?
'Are you expecting me to go to your school concert *tonight*?' - I'm too busy - thought it was next Wednesday!


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## Guest

Ingenue said:


> why are we spending so long quibbling over a simple case of 'transferred epithet'?


Seriously?

I answered this in the first sentence of my first post about this.

Because I do not think that we're dealing with hypallage here but with a perception of reality.

Like the attributions of other responses--beautiful and ugly and the like--to the music itself.

Like the insistence that contemporary composers are purposely setting out to **** people off.

It's all part of the urge to transfer one's own, individual responses to the world outside, turning the responses into description.

This can work wonderfully well in poetry. But as a strategy (conscious or unconscious) for avoiding responsibility for one's responses, well, not so good.

THAT'S why.


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## Ingélou

Fine - you have your own view of reality then, but it's not mine. I think it's natural to interpret the world with integrated emotion-and-intellect, so we'll agree to differ.

I don't think that 'contemporary composers are purposely setting out to **** people off' & I don't believe that the opinion necessarily 'goes' with the idea that music can convey emotions. It seems a bit of a non-sequitur.

Live long & prosper, and have a nice unemotional day!


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

I find it difficult to hear "emotion" in any music. In a lot of music I can slightly feel different emotions but this is just me, it has nothing to do with the music itself.


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## Guest

Ingenue said:


> :tiphat: Absolutely - why are we spending so long quibbling over a simple case of 'transferred epithet'?


Thanks - I knew there was a term for it, but couldn't effectively dredge my mind for the errant memory of the teacher who taught me all I know about zeugma, aposiopesis, metonmy and...



some guy said:


> hypallage


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## Guest

some guy said:


> Seriously?
> 
> I answered this in the first sentence of my first post about this.
> 
> Because I do not think that we're dealing with hypallage here but with a perception of reality.
> 
> Like the attributions of other responses--beautiful and ugly and the like--to the music itself.
> 
> Like the insistence that contemporary composers are purposely setting out to **** people off.
> 
> It's all part of the urge to transfer one's own, individual responses to the world outside, turning the responses into description.
> 
> This can work wonderfully well in poetry. But as a strategy (conscious or unconscious) for avoiding responsibility for one's responses, well, not so good.
> 
> THAT'S why.


I guess you'd have to ask each and every one of the respondents if they were aware that they were engaging in 'hypallage' or that they want to assert that they really have a different perception of reality from you.

You might help your case if you acknowledged that you can see other's point of view, or at least part of it, rather than continue to assert (in effect, if not explicitly) that the rest of us are all flawed in our perceptions because we don't see things your way.

However, I do understand a compulsion to oppose a misconception at every opportunity. I have a personal mission to oppose the misguided views of readers of The Daily Telegraph on a more or less daily basis! Perhaps I need to get a life, since it's a Sisyphean task!


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## Guest

Ingenue said:


> Fine - you have your own view of reality then, but it's not mine.


This may not be the vicious putdown you might have thought it was.

Partly because this:


Ingenue said:


> I think it's natural to interpret the world with integrated emotion-and-intellect


is exactly how I feel--as you should know if you've read any of my other posts on other threads. So it's kinda hard for me to agree that we differ, on this point anyway, since we do not differ.

And partly because this:


Ingenue said:


> have a nice unemotional day


completely ignores my continued insistence that all humans are emotional, that they are able to and indeed do make emotional responses to just about anything. Or do you just not read anything I say before responding to... to... to what? Certainly you're not responding to what I said.

Otherwise, I am glad you do not think that contemporary composers purposely set out to **** people off. But that's as may be. Several of our colleagues on this board have explicitly stated this as a quality of contemporaneous music that they dislike. I know that you have read these claims, too. And as part of the process of attempting to turn subjective responses into descriptions, the two things ("composers set out to **** people off" and "music is emotional") are certainly related. They are both examples of the same impulse, to turn my own personal responses and opinions into actual descriptions of the world. Not responses to (no longer responses to) but descriptions of reality.

And that is a bad thing, I think, because it makes true collegiality difficult if not impossible. It makes everyone who disagrees with you wrong or crazy or undesirable. Or all three.


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## Blancrocher

I like to think of a piece of music as having a particular "emotion" in many cases, though I'd prefer not to get into a philosophical wrangle about it. Inferring any kind of intention in music that could be put into words is beset with difficulties. But even professional musicologists debate the peculiar "tone" of a piece of music--whether it's mocking, ironic, playful, despairing, etc. The fact that they often disagree doesn't vitiate the enterprise. It just means we get to argue about works of art that we love--hopefully with greater calm and decorousness than they manage in musicology journals!

In Mozart's "Musical Joke," it's not just the way the notes are put together that makes it funny--it's also its relation to other music and its subversion contemporary musical ideals. If I don't want to get into all that, though, I'll just say it's humorous--especially when it's had a couple beers in it.


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## Mahlerian

Blancrocher said:


> I like to think of a piece of music as having a particular "emotion" in many cases, though I'd prefer not to get into a philosophical wrangle about it. Inferring any kind of intention in music that could be put into words is beset with difficulties. But even professional musicologists debate the peculiar "tone" of a piece of music--whether it's mocking, ironic, playful, despairing, etc. The fact that they often disagree doesn't vitiate the enterprise. It just means we get to argue about works of art that we love--hopefully with greater calm and decorousness than they manage in musicology journals!


I prefer the term character in this instance. Emotions are a personal, subjective thing, and I understand where Some Guy and others here are coming from, but I think there is such a thing as the character of a piece. How that manifests is different in different eras and styles. For example, in Baroque music, a constant running sixteenth note gesture was a common signifier of agitation, but that's not the same thing as saying that the music _is_ emotionally agitated or that it causes emotional agitation in the listener. It's a cultural point of reference.


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## Guest

Blancrocher said:


> The fact that they often disagree doesn't vitiate the enterprise. It just means we get to argue about works of art that we love


Indeed. And what I have been trying to say is simply that this is just exactly what we are *not* getting, arguments about works of art that we love. What we *are* getting is endless wrangles about ourselves, about the validity of our perceptions, all of it masquerading as being about the works.

An argument about works of art that we love, yeah, I'd like to see that. You know, just once.



Blancrocher said:


> I'll just say it's humorous--especially when it's had a couple beers in it.


Just so long as you keep Nielsen's sixth off the sauce. In and out of rehab all the time.


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## Blancrocher

Give me--or at least Mahlerian--a "like," some guy. You know you really want to, deep down. 

:lol:


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## Ingélou

some guy said:


> This may not be the vicious putdown you might have thought it was.
> 
> ... Or do you just not read anything I say before responding to... to... to what? Certainly you're not responding to what I said.
> 
> Otherwise, I am glad you do not think that contemporary composers purposely set out to **** people off. But that's as may be. Several of our colleagues on this board have explicitly stated this as a quality of contemporaneous music that they dislike. I know that you have read these claims, too. And as part of the process of attempting to turn subjective responses into descriptions, the two things ("composers set out to **** people off" and "music is emotional") are certainly related. They are both examples of the same impulse, to turn my own personal responses and opinions into actual descriptions of the world. Not responses to (no longer responses to) but descriptions of reality.


a) I did not even 'imagine' it was a _putdown_, let alone a 'vicious' putdown. Your statement is strange from one who thinks it wrong to make emotional attributions to neutral phenomena. I was saying, we seem to have a different view of reality. That would only be a putdown if I held a grudge against people who disagree with me. I don't.

b) My original post wasn't responding to you at all; it was simply agreeing with MacLeod. To do that, I didn't think it necessary to scroll back to see what you'd written in the first sentence of your first post - yes, I confess it. Do most people read every post of a long thread before posting in the later stages? Well, if they do, I'm a slacker.

c) The idea that contemporary composers set out to **** us off may be 'related' (i.e. belongs in the same box) to 'the process of attempting to turn subjective responses into descriptions', but it is not *logically* related; to me it remains a non-sequitur.

*Are* we aiming for 'collegiality', btw? It sounds a bit too formal, like an official process. I thought we were just airing and discussing our opinions - and for that, it's quite important that people's opinions differ.

I am glad we agree on the importance of integrating emotion and intellect. As I said, I wasn't setting out to engage with you at all, I meant just to follow on from MacLeod and lead in to CJPiano's point about specific musical phrases/chords being linked historically with particular emotions.

I posted basically because I was hoping to learn something about that.


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## moody

Now I perceive why for years I thought that Tchaikovsky's "Romeo and Juliet" was a lament for a dead mother and "Babi Yar"was a follow up to "Casse Noisette." It was my errant emotions that saw them that way.


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## Guest

some guy said:


> what we are *not* getting [is] arguments about works of art that we love. What we *are* getting is endless wrangles about ourselves, about the validity of our perceptions, all of it masquerading as being about the works.
> 
> An argument about works of art that we love, yeah, I'd like to see that. You know, just once.


Go on then. You start. This thread is about Beethoven. Tell us what you love about, say, the second movement of the 7th Symphony. Does it elicit emotion, even though the notes cannot themselves contain emotion? And if not, how does it appeal? And if you don't love that movement and that symphony, offer something else.

What you overlook is that in amongst the wrangles about 'us', some people have posted exactly what you ask for, but you seem, somehow to have overlooked it. Look again at posts such as #2, #5, #7, #9, #10....

And if you're not satisfied with the quality of those contributions, why not ask the posters to elaborate a little more on what it is, exactly, that makes them love the pieces they cite?


----------



## Guest

MacLeod said:


> Tell us what you love about, say, the second movement of the 7th Symphony.


Tell you what I love. Hmmm. Sounds like I'd be talking about myself, there. And maybe that is truly all we can do. I dunno. Ever since reading Richard Lanham's _Analyzing Prose,_ I have wondered if what he says there could be applied to music. In it, he talks about language like "turgid" or "hard-hitting" as being responses to something, not descriptions of the something itself. And about the difference between that and the descriptive language of rhetoric--anadiplosis, chiasmus, ploce, and the like. (He goes on to say, anticipating an objection to abstruse technical jargon that no one understands, that it's not just that ploce is technical and turgid is not. It's that we prefer talking about ourselves.) He then goes on to talk about literature itself, about rhetorical strategies and various ways of balancing the elements of a sentence or a paragraph or a chapter, about words and phrases, about parallelism and asymmetrical patterns.

All of which leads, surprisingly enough, to conversation about how one responds (emotionally, of course) to literature. With this one difference, that that conversation is now grounded in actual descriptions, not made up solely of vague generalizations pretending to be descriptions _of_ but which are in reality simply responses _to._



MacLeod said:


> ome people have posted exactly what you ask for, but you seem, somehow to have overlooked it. Look again at posts such as #2, #5, #7, #9, #10....


I have overlooked nothing. The posts you mention do not contain any information or description about any piece of music.

This particular thread does not encourage anyone to post even close to what I am asking for, but there have been a few posts that point in the general direction, at least, and some that are even quite close: #3, #22, #56, #69, #71, #78, even #87 (which I disagree with in every way). Also #88 and #96.

Not that anything in this thread would elicit that kind of discussion. I was just daydreaming about the possibility. Not here. Some other thread.


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## Guest

some guy said:


> Tell you what I love. Hmmm. Sounds like I'd be talking about myself, there.


You're very picky. Let me rephrase. You stated that



> _what we are _*not getting [is] arguments about works of art that we love*


I assume that that is what you want. So, why not give us an argument about works of art that you love, and if not LvB, then who? What? We'll allow a little thread drift, surely?

(You'll have to give me a while to look up Lanham before I can join in with you on that...six months might do for a slow reader such as I am.)


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## KenOC

some guy said:


> If we persist in asking questions to which we already know the answers, we will continue to get answers we already know... I don't understand. (And these are the threads that get the most mileage, too. Go figure.)


I tactfully refrain from mentioning the author's many fine contributions to this thread since that point.


----------



## Ukko

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> I find it difficult to hear "emotion" in any music. In a lot of music I can slightly feel different emotions but this is just me, it has nothing to do with the music itself.


Ahem. The emotion isn't _in_ the music. Music may _stimulate_ emotion, but even so, it won't be the _same_ emotion in every listener. If a composer insists on specific emotions, he better add lyrics. Even the Lees symphony which he identifies as Holocaust related, and in which he leans on it very hard, can evoke only emotions within a rather wide range.


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## trazom

Hilltroll72 said:


> Ahem. The emotion isn't _in_ the music. Music may _stimulate_ emotion, but even so, it won't be the _same_ emotion in every listener. .


WHAT? From the posts here, I thought emotion was something a composer could simply add to the score while composing a piece, like the missing ingredient in an aural soup. In fact, that may explain Beethoven's multiple revisions to his pieces: He felt he needed to add more emotion in measures that were lacking.


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## Ukko

trazom said:


> WHAT? From the posts here, I thought emotion was something a composer could simply add to the score while composing a piece, like the missing ingredient in an aural soup. In fact, that may explain Beethoven's multiple revisions to his pieces: He felt he needed to add more emotion in measures that were lacking.


Oregano. It's the oregano...well certainly not the paprika.


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## moody

Hilltroll72 said:


> Ahem. The emotion isn't _in_ the music. Music may _stimulate_ emotion, but even so, it won't be the _same_ emotion in every listener. If a composer insists on specific emotions, he better add lyrics. Even the Lees symphony which he identifies as Holocaust related, and in which he leans on it very hard, can evoke only emotions within a rather wide range.


So a huge seller like Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto of which there have been millions of recordings distributed across the world, must be listened to differently by all of those owners ?Not acceptable,how would you discuss it,or anything else, if everyone heard it in a different way ?
If I go to a concert I hear the music that I know in my mind before I go , and that's why I go. When discussing the composition afterwards you would have no common ground. One might say that a piece almost makes you cry ,only to be given a rejoinder that the other person doesn't understand because it always makes them scream with mirth. I've never come across a completely diametrically opposed situation like this.It is possible that the other person dislikes the music because of the reasons that you like it,but they are the same feelings that have caused this opposite opinion. In the case of the Rachmaninoff the overtly romantic and lush make -up of the piece is too much for some types frightened of their emotions, so it proves too much for them.
There are many,many people who don't enjoy emotion,but it certainly does not mean that their emotions feel it differently.They just can't take their emotions being tweeked and in fact do not approve of shows of emotion.


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## KenOC

trazom said:


> WHAT? From the posts here, I thought emotion was something a composer could simply add to the score while composing a piece, like the missing ingredient in an aural soup. In fact, that may explain Beethoven's multiple revisions to his pieces: He felt he needed to add more emotion in measures that were lacking.


I guess it's like they say about building airplanes. As the last step, add lightness.


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## mstar

KenOC said:


> I guess it's like they say about building airplanes. As the last step, add lightness.


Nah, Tchaikovsky didn't do that as much.... Nevertheless, about Beethoven, I wouldn't consider his Moonlight Sonata to be emotional - at all! In fact, I feel that Beethoven did perfectly well with his "less-calm" works!


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## Blancrocher

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_and_emotion

Wikipedia has a lot to say about music and emotion, it turns out. Still, at the end of it I'm still wondering if Beethoven's 16th piano sonata is the kind of guy who cries in his beer or tells funny stories.


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## Ukko

moody said:


> So a huge seller like Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto of which there have been millions of recordings distributed across the world, must be listened to differently by all of those owners ?Not acceptable,how would you discuss it,or anything else, if everyone heard it in a different way ?
> If I go to a concert I hear the music that I know in my mind before I go , and that's why I go. When discussing the composition afterwards you would have no common ground. One might say that a piece almost makes you cry ,only to be given a rejoinder that the other person doesn't understand because it always makes them scream with mirth. I've never come across a completely diametrically opposed situation like this.It is possible that the other person dislikes the music because of the reasons that you like it,but they are the same feelings that have caused this opposite opinion. In the case of the Rachmaninoff the overtly romantic and lush make -up of the piece is too much for some types frightened of their emotions, so it proves too much for them.
> There are many,many people who don't enjoy emotion,but it certainly does not mean that their emotions feel it differently.They just can't take their emotions being tweeked and in fact do not approve of shows of emotion.


Why do you assume that those differing emotions must be 'diametrically opposed'? Of course they will not be. But only the strongest emotions, those that cause physical reactions like grief or joy do, can we be reasonably sure are closely shared. Without those _indicators_, we are at a loss to make close comparisons. _Language is inadequate for elucidating the gentler emotions._ Works that affect listeners in moderately different ways are everywhere in classical music - probably in the majority of works in any genre that don't have familiar lyrics associated with them.


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## maestro57

Beethoven's piano sonatas are all masterpieces to me. I can get so wrapped up in them, jamming out and dripping sweat while listening to them. So, I suppose it's "emotional" for me, but that word is very subjective itself. I'm taking your question to mean "Do you feel ANYTHING at all" (whatever "anything" may be).... and the answer is YES.


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## moody

Hilltroll72 said:


> Why do you assume that those differing emotions must be 'diametrically opposed'? Of course they will not be. But only the strongest emotions, those that cause physical reactions like grief or joy do, can we be reasonably sure are closely shared. Without those _indicators_, we are at a loss to make close comparisons. _Language is inadequate for elucidating the gentler emotions._ Works that affect listeners in moderately different ways are everywhere in classical music - probably in the majority of works in any genre that don't have familiar lyrics associated with them.


 I didn't assume any such thing,in fact I said that I've never come across such a situation. But I was extrapolating what could be a scenario if nobody's emotions were on the same path, but I believe that they usually are whatever the actual outcome may be.Your point about only the strongest emotions being capable of being shared is surely the very point around which this discussion revolves. Is there such thing as a weak emotion,maybe technically but to me emotions are disturbing at some level or they are not really "emotions".
Discussion on a particular composition will surely not arise unless emotions are stirred up by that piece in a serious and even bewildering manner. I have recordings that I cannot play to visitors because of the effect they have on me and I don't really want to uncover myself completely and burden them with overemotional behaviour from an old wreck.
As for language being inadequate to elucidate the gentler emotions I beg to differ,there are many,many songs,poems and pieces of music dealing with the less than lurid and gentler approach to emotional subjects.
Works that affect us only moderately are not really in contention here are they ?I cannot imagine someone saying: "Well that symphony certainly affected me in a moderate way---was it like that for you?"
I am getting the emotion that I wish that I'd not got into this debate.


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## Guest

As far as I'm concerned, I was taking the term to refer to all shades of emotion, not the easily described or extreme ones.

Still, like the term 'learning curve' (ugh!) or 'to an extent', a qualifying adjective is required to make proper sense.


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## Ingélou

An emotion is a feeling that moves you, at whatever level. 
Still, Moody is right; there'd be no point in saying, 'Did you listen to that? It made me feel _mildly embarrassed_.'

And I do think that if a piece is stirring, it will stir listeners in roughly the same direction, and that could lead to a discussion on why it works in that way - orchestration, particular intervals or keys, haunting phrases et al.

I particularly agree with Moody's last sentence, however, so now - I'm *out* of here!


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## ArtMusic

All that really matters is great, powerful music evokes emotions in almost all its listeners. That's why say Beethoven's music sits at the very, very top.


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## starry

Except of course that other composers have wrote music which inspires _performers _ to communicate the music in such a way as to invoke powerful emotions in listeners as well.


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## ArtMusic

starry said:


> Except of course that other composers have wrote music which inspires _performers _ to communicate the music in such a way as to invoke powerful emotions in listeners as well.


That's a performance question, yes.


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## moody

MacLeod said:


> As far as I'm concerned, I was taking the term to refer to all shades of emotion, not the easily described or extreme ones.
> 
> Still, like the term 'learning curve' (ugh!) or 'to an extent', a qualifying adjective is required to make proper sense.


Apparently "emotion" was adapted from the French word "emouvoir" which means "stir up".
That's how I've always thought of an emotion---something that stirs you deeply.


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## starry

ArtMusic said:


> That's a performance question, yes.


Which is unavoidable as music is a performance art.


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## Guest

The spoon that stirs the soup is not the feeling of satisfaction that one gets from eating the soup.

Neither is the soup the feeling of satisfaction that one gets from eating the soup.

I'm getting a strong suspicion that what a lot of people have been saying in this discussion is that a spoon is a feeling.

Oh well, so long as you don't try to eat the spoon....


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## Guest

Well, all I can say now is sod all the semantics...I'm definitely being stirred by Shostakovich's Symphony No. 11: it's gorgeous, exciting, tense, even tedious in places (yes, an emotion in my book) and makes me come over all militaristic at the grand climaxes.

Beethoven and some guy: eat your heart out!


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## DavidA

moody said:


> So a huge seller like Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto of which there have been millions of recordings distributed across the world, must be listened to differently by all of those owners ?Not acceptable,how would you discuss it,or anything else, if everyone heard it in a different way ?
> If I go to a concert I hear the music that I know in my mind before I go , and that's why I go. When discussing the composition afterwards you would have no common ground. One might say that a piece almost makes you cry ,only to be given a rejoinder that the other person doesn't understand because it always makes them scream with mirth. I've never come across a completely diametrically opposed situation like this.It is possible that the other person dislikes the music because of the reasons that you like it,but they are the same feelings that have caused this opposite opinion. In the case of the Rachmaninoff the overtly romantic and lush make -up of the piece is too much for some types frightened of their emotions, so it proves too much for them.
> There are many,many people who don't enjoy emotion,but it certainly does not mean that their emotions feel it differently.They just can't take their emotions being tweeked and in fact do not approve of shows of emotion.


It really depends on the emotional make up of the person concerned. Four example my wife is not at all stirred by Rachmaninov. She appreciates the virtuosity but the music doesn't do anything for her. However it is not because she is afraid of her emotions as if you play her the St Matthew passion then she will be stirred deeply in her emotions. I remember listening to a performance of Schubert's Schone Mullerin. One of the company was a lady who I know is that was not too keen on romantic music like the Rach 2. However when the jolly Miller went and drowned himself in the mill pond this lady was weeping buckets! 
The fact is emotions are personal to us all and what stirs one person will not stir another necessarily.


----------



## Guest

DavidA said:


> The fact is emotions are personal to us all and what stirs one person will not stir another necessarily.


It really is this simple.

It does seem very, very difficult to have a conversation here, but that's not because our responses to things are different. We have enough in common to have conversations about music, even if our responses differ. I think Moody's take on things is exaggerated beyond what is real or practical.

"I've never come across a completely diametrically opposed situation like this." I doubt anyone else has, either. But that does not mean that this is true, either: "It is possible that the other person dislikes the music because of the reasons that you like it,but they are the same feelings that have caused this opposite opinion."

Music is something to which I make an emotional response. If you make an emotional response to it, then that is our common ground. If your emotion differs from mine, that is an opportunity to discover something new, for both of us. If we squander that opportunity in order to squabble, that is a great pity. Because something stirs me, I can understand if something else, even something that leaves me cold, can stir someone else.

It's easy. And it only becomes difficult, I believe, if one or the other person believes that something that stirs them is intrinsically stirring. Or, as we see more often here, if one or the other person believes that something that stirs them negatively is intrinsically crappy. In either case, a particular response has been privileged over all other responses, which are then judged as wanting in some way. There is another way. And that is to accept that your response is your response. Period. And that mine is mine. And that if they never match, so what? We are different. How boring if we were all the same. How about enjoying the differences?

Haha, now _there's_ a radical idea!!


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## moody

DavidA said:


> It really depends on the emotional make up of the person concerned. Four example my wife is not at all stirred by Rachmaninov. She appreciates the virtuosity but the music doesn't do anything for her. However it is not because she is afraid of her emotions as if you play her the St Matthew passion then she will be stirred deeply in her emotions. I remember listening to a performance of Schubert's Schone Mullerin. One of the company was a lady who I know is that was not too keen on romantic music like the Rach 2. However when the jolly Miller went and drowned himself in the mill pond this lady was weeping buckets!
> The fact is emotions are personal to us all and what stirs one person will not stir another necessarily.


But that's what I said ,the piece of music's effect is recognised by each person but the result of that effect can have different results.
The lady you mention doesn't like Rachmaninoff for the same reason that another lady WILL like him.


----------



## Blancrocher

Hilltroll72 said:


> Oregano. It's the oregano...well certainly not the paprika.


Most people I know put the accent on the second syllable of "oregano," but I've got an Italian friend who puts it on the third. I've always understood her fine, though--and it actually sounds better, in my opinion. I hope nobody gives her a hard time about it.


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## moody

Blancrocher said:


> Most people I know put the accent on the second syllable of "oregano," but I've got an Italian friend who puts it on the third. I've always understood her fine, though--and it actually sounds better, in my opinion. I hope nobody gives her a hard time about it.


I hope not,because she's right and the people you know are Americanising it---there's a word !

it's from the Latin Origanum after all.


----------



## Ukko

Blancrocher said:


> Most people I know put the accent on the second syllable of "oregano," but I've got an Italian friend who puts it on the third. I've always understood her fine, though--and it actually sounds better, in my opinion. I hope nobody gives her a hard time about it.




I know even less about Italian than about Spanish. In Spanish, in general, the penultimate syllable is accented unless there is an accent mark somewhere else. The way most English speaking Americans pronounce it would be represented by orégano. Maybe we are well enough conditioned by Óregon/orégano to accept oregáno easily. What many of us are unprepared for is hot paprika.


----------



## moody

Hilltroll72 said:


> I know even less about Italian than about Spanish. In Spanish, in general, the penultimate syllable is accented unless there is an accent mark somewhere else. The way most English speaking Americans pronounce it would be represented by orégano. Maybe we are well enough conditioned by Óregon/orégano to accept oregáno easily. What many of us are unprepared for is hot paprika.


Now there's another story altogether--I'm prepared.


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## Ukko

moody said:


> But that's what I said ,the piece of music's effect is recognised by each person but the result of that effect can have different results.
> The lady you mention doesn't like Rachmaninoff for the same reason that another lady WILL like him.


Several of us are talking past each other. Face-to-face we might get our signals uncrossed (or come to blows), but I don't see it happening here.


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## Blancrocher

Hilltroll72 said:


> What many of us are unprepared for is hot paprika.


Yes, it's too emotional, in my view.



> Several of us are talking past each other. Face-to-face we might get our signals uncrossed (or come to blows), but I don't see it happening here.


There's been a little tension, but there were some good points from everyone along the way. I'm sure there are no lingering hard feelings.


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## moody

Hilltroll72 said:


> Several of us are talking past each other. Face-to-face we might get our signals uncrossed (or come to blows), but I don't see it happening here.


It's not unusual as Tom Jones would say.


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## quack

some guy said:


> The spoon that stirs the soup is not the feeling of satisfaction that one gets from eating the soup.
> 
> Neither is the soup the feeling of satisfaction that one gets from eating the soup.
> 
> I'm getting a strong suspicion that what a lot of people have been saying in this discussion is that a spoon is a feeling.
> 
> Oh well, so long as you don't try to eat the spoon....


A much more direct analogy would be the recipe.

Is Gordon Ramsey's soup f------ satisfying? Is the recipe for it printed in a book satisfying, is the soup you make yourself from that recipe satisfying and is it still Ramsey's soup?

The spoon would be better compared with the conductor's baton. Spoons are specifically designed, usually in metal, to impart no taint to the flavour of soup. So just as a spoon doesn't make a soup more delicious the human aspect of the stirrer or conductor infuses a human quality that other may or may not be able to perceive. If you didn't stir the soup it would most likely be disgusting. If Ramsey or Beethoven wrote bad recipes the likely emotional response would be yuck or just meh.

The shared emotional response to music is one of it's most powerful aspects. You can make music yourself, as an amateur, and even if it is badly played it will likely give you satisfaction. Part of Beethoven's greatness is that he give satisfaction to a larger group of people that just one. The fact that a Cavatina might envoke the same strong emotion in lots of people allows you to say it is a sad piece of music, even though some might find it makes them happy, some might find nothing in it and it is spurious to suggest that any of the individual notes are sad.

This has drifted so far away from what I believe is the OP question, soon there will be soup recipes with plenty of herbs. Dragging it back to the question: are the emotional responses envoked in some people by Beethoven's music more or less frequent than for other composers? Not in my perception at least.


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## julianoq

For the record, I am reading Beethoven - His Spiritual Development and the first three entire chapters are reasoning about the effects that music have or have not on people and the nature of music. I will not try to argue about it here right now since I am at this moment reviewing my own opinions, but I suggest the reading.


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## PetrB

KenOC said:


> We never define our terms around here. House rule! :tiphat:


Well, for men, then, I guess the question is when you listen to Beethoven do you:
1.) have tears quietly rolling down your cheeks
or
2.) have "just a little sniffle."

I find his compositional process so deliberate -- and that highly audible in the finished product being performed -- the drama so calculated, that I think it far more "intellectual" than "emotional."

The collective audience reaction to Beethoven, generally, seems to stir tremendous emotions within the listeners.


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## KenOC

julianoq said:


> For the record, I am reading Beethoven - His Spiritual Development and the first three entire chapters are reasoning about the effects that music have or have not on people and the nature of music. I will not try to argue about it here right now since I am at this moment reviewing my own opinions, but I suggest the reading.


The author of that book (J. W. N. Sullivan) was an Irish journalist and popularizer who wrote some of the earliest popular accounts of the theory of relativity. He was not a musician. Nonetheless his book remains central to the Beethoven literature and is well worth reading any time. The cover of the ancient Mentor paperback I have always makes me think of Donovan's Brain...


----------



## Guest

some guy said:


> Indeed. And what I have been trying to say is simply that this is just exactly what we are *not* getting, arguments about works of art that we love. What we *are* getting is endless wrangles about ourselves, about the validity of our perceptions, all of it masquerading as being about the works.


Just wanted to go back and affirm elements of some guy's point here.

Of course, what we have on an internet forum is a place to project ourselves, sometimes along with well-argued thoughts about music. But a number of posters here, some guy included, have such distinct posting styles that it's sometimes difficult to see the music for the projection.

I hasten to add that I'm not complaining. (Doubtless, others might argue that I too have a distinct style, and 'project' myself more than the music!) Just saying that this is an example of "bears/woods", "Pope/Catholic" or, my preferred version, "Is a frog's a$$ watertight?"


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## ArtMusic

some guy said:


> It really is this simple.
> 
> It does seem very, very difficult to have a conversation here, but that's not because our responses to things are different. We have enough in common to have conversations about music, even if our responses differ. I think Moody's take on things is exaggerated beyond what is real or practical.
> 
> "I've never come across a completely diametrically opposed situation like this." I doubt anyone else has, either. But that does not mean that this is true, either: "It is possible that the other person dislikes the music because of the reasons that you like it,but they are the same feelings that have caused this opposite opinion."
> 
> Music is something to which I make an emotional response. If you make an emotional response to it, then that is our common ground. If your emotion differs from mine, that is an opportunity to discover something new, for both of us. If we squander that opportunity in order to squabble, that is a great pity. Because something stirs me, I can understand if something else, even something that leaves me cold, can stir someone else.
> 
> It's easy. And it only becomes difficult, I believe, if one or the other person believes that something that stirs them is intrinsically stirring. Or, as we see more often here, if one or the other person believes that something that stirs them negatively is intrinsically crappy. In either case, a particular response has been privileged over all other responses, which are then judged as wanting in some way. There is another way. And that is to accept that your response is your response. Period. And that mine is mine. And that if they never match, so what? We are different. How boring if we were all the same. How about enjoying the differences?
> 
> Haha, now _there's_ a radical idea!!


You seem to spend a lot of effort responding to what YOU PERCEIVE AS OTHER LISTENERS' response to music.


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## ArtMusic

Maybe it's a generation gap thing. One of my threads asked that very question about TC. Interesting.


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## Piwikiwi

Of course it is emotional, it's just quite restrained compared to more romantic composers.


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## Ukko

Piwikiwi said:


> Of course it is emotional, it's just quite restrained compared to more romantic composers.


_Restrained?_ Whachu been listening to, _P_? As per some guy and I and other picky people, music ain't emotional anyway, but some of Beethoven's music is highly _evocative_. It's just that he wasn't a nutcase like Scriabin, or a birdsong soundsmith like Messiaen.


----------



## Piwikiwi

Hilltroll72 said:


> _Restrained?_ Whachu been listening to, _P_? As per some guy and I and other picky people, music ain't emotional anyway, but some of Beethoven's music is highly _evocative_. It's just that he wasn't a nutcase like Scriabin, or a birdsong soundsmith like Messiaen.


Compared to chopin but that is a good point.


----------



## moody

Piwikiwi said:


> Of course it is emotional, it's just quite restrained compared to more romantic composers.


Boy,you must have listened to some lousy interpretations,he can be a wild man !!!


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## ArtMusic

Piwikiwi said:


> Of course it is emotional, it's just quite restrained compared to more romantic composers.


Not that restrained. If Beethoven lcomposed during the second half of the 19th century instead, then his pieces probably would blow our ear drums apart!


----------



## PetrB

StlukesguildOhio said:


> Ackk!! The government is about to default and I find myself agreeing with Someguy. It's the end of the world!!!


The government did default, just as it did in '95 when another bunch of grown men and the occasional women we call our leaders had a collective hissy fit and threatened and followed through on collecting all their toys and walking away while refusing to play further.

The government is once again open, You've agreed with some guy because his post was so very sensible, and the sun will still rise, the stars dance


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## PetrB

Blancrocher said:


> That's one way of looking at it, that's for sure. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has a fairly whinging discussion of "Music and the Emotions," which covers perspectives on ideas about emotions in music and/or audiences.
> 
> This doesn't refute your point, which is hard to do.


The article gets near the way I experienced music being discussed in theory and composition class. I would say some emotive quality, at least, and how many would perceive that quality, was covered but per se not in vocabulary of emotions but of similar words used for both the drama and the weather:

Calm / agitation / drama / suspense / ambiguity, etc.

Because theory really doesn't tell you everything of all the elements of music.

This allowed for a lot of clear looking at who did what in their scores, without getting to the drippy Oprah - fest of people parading their highly charged emotive responses to any given piece. If those sheer emotional reactions / confessions / heart spills are all there is in a discussion thread, it is a string of complete non-sequiturs, and I think a very sloppy way to find out others might feel / think the same about a particular composer or work. Who, pray tell, is the poor slob to mop up such a runny mess after a thread like that  ?

Now, unstated, but very much a part of this question I think, is that often asked "what was the composer feeling" when they wrote the piece, or "what were they trying to express." There, I default to my favorite "I don't care if s/he had a toothache when when s/he wrote it." Because, unless there is something from the horses mouths in writing about their intent, the rest is sporty, lively perhaps, wild or semi-educated guesswork.

Was the man himself an "emotional" creature? By all accounts. A composer / performer who said "it is unforgivable to play without passion." is not a composer who has _fallen into the grip of anti-expressivist formalism_ (the in italics I get, but this is why it is soooo difficult for me to take this academic formalism at all in earnest -- the phrase has meaning, but sounds ridiculous.)

Do we know once in a blue moon what Beethoven _intended_ of the emotional content in any particular piece. I suppose there are a few, but only a few. Many comments he made about a work were reactionary, i.e. a retort after some other comment upon it which he took as provocative.

Emotional or other, it is certainly often some of the stagiest most highly dramatic music we have -- and Beethoven is known as one of the most brilliant of musical strategists in planning in a work just what to do, what turn to take, what pause and what you next hear, to startle, surprise in a way that takes your breath away or "knocks your socks off."

He was, as came up in another question, "vulgar," -- perhaps the most vulgar composer of the classical era, and I think those who love the music also love that fact of one of the most brilliant of composers basically putting his thumb on his nose, waggling his other fingers, crossing his eyes, sticking out his tongue while also giving you the raspberry... so there!

And to make it plain, in what may be considered the deep and serious works, this same prankster, the same deployments from the same strategist, are also at work.


----------



## willimek

*Music and Emotions*

The most difficult problem in answering the question of how music creates emotions is likely to be the fact that assignments of musical elements and emotions can never be defined clearly. The solution of this problem is the Theory of Musical Equilibration. It says that music can't convey any emotion at all, but merely volitional processes, with which the music listener identifies. Then in the process of identifying the volitional processes are colored with emotions. The same happens when we watch an exciting film and identify with the volitional processes of our favorite figures. Here, too, just the process of identification generates emotions.

Because this detour of emotions via volitional processes was not detected, also all music psychological and neurological experiments, to answer the question of the origin of the emotions in the music, failed.

But how music can convey volitional processes? These volitional processes have something to do with the phenomena which early music theorists called "lead", "leading tone" or "striving effects". If we reverse this musical phenomena in imagination into its opposite (not the sound wants to change - but the listener identifies with a will not to change the sound) we have found the contents of will, the music listener identifies with. In practice, everything becomes a bit more complicated, so that even more sophisticated volitional processes can be represented musically.

Further information is available via the free download of the e-book "Music and Emotion - Research on the Theory of Musical Equilibration:

www.willimekmusic.de/music-and-emotions.pdf

Enjoy reading

Bernd Willimek


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## Crassus

I really dislike when i see people who appreciate classical music pushing absolute relativism to subjective tastes here.

We must draw a line somewhere, otherwise we end listening to rhythmed speech with a 4 bar progression repeating for 4 minutes and thinking that criticizing such insult to music is something unacceptable because "everything is subjective".

The line suggest that two moods synthesized in a new ambiguous mood are more expressive and emotional than a single mood alone.

Thinking of Beethoven's music as something "not emotional" is nonsensical.


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## KenOC

Just ran across this quote from the man himself: "Emotion suits women only; music ought to strike fire from the soul of a man." (August 15, 1810, to Bettina von Arnim.)


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## PetrB

KenOC said:


> Just ran across this quote from the man himself: "Emotion suits women only; music ought to strike fire from the soul of a man." (August 15, 1810, to Bettina von Arnim.)


"Come on baby, light my fire
Come on baby, light my fire
Try to set the night on fire "


----------



## Blake

KenOC said:


> Just ran across this quote from the man himself: "Emotion suits women only; music ought to strike fire from the soul of a man." (August 15, 1810, to Bettina von Arnim.)


Haha, that's a very old-world way of saying "Yes, my music is very passionate and emotional... I just can't say that because I must be manly."

Beethoven's the man regardless.


----------



## KenOC

Vesuvius said:


> Haha, that's a very old-world way of saying "Yes, my music is very passionate and emotional... I just can't say that because I must be manly."


Well, yes. Of course there's always the possibility that Beethoven meant exactly what he said. That was often the case.


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## Blake

I'm sure he meant it. That doesn't mean it's correct. Of course he was passionate and emotional; it wasn't a robot producing those amazing compositions. How can that be done without feeling or emotion?


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## KenOC

Vesuvius said:


> I'm sure he meant it. That doesn't mean it's correct.


Well, if it disagrees with your inclinations, then obviously it's incorrect. To quote Brahms, "Any jackass can see that."


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## Blake

Hey man, I'm just sharing some ideas. No need to get in a tiffy.


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## KenOC

Vesuvius said:


> Hey man, I'm just sharing some ideas. No need to get in a tiffy.


Well, you got my knickers in a knot. Shame on you! :lol:


----------



## PetrB

KenOC said:


> Well, you got my knickers in a knot. Shame on you! :lol:


They wouldn't knot so if you didn't have them so heavily starched.


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## kv466

If interpreted correctly, yes, very much so.


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## moody

KenOC said:


> Well, if it disagrees with your inclinations, then obviously it's incorrect. To quote Brahms, "Any jackass can see that."


And you certainly ought to know !


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## PetrB

DavidA said:


> Some guy is right. We are the ones who experience emotions. The more pertinent question is 'Does Beethoven's music arouse emotions in you?' Then of course it is, What emotions?


"Mahler makes me feel all weepy."

"Rachmaninov makes me think psycho / physical romantic thoughts and gives me pangs of longing."

Fine. I'm even cutting slack for the writer for whom this is a new and revelatory experience, and that there are several such neophytes coming along every hour, like regularly running buses.

But, other than TELLING THE READER ABOUT YOURSELF, what real interest is there in such fare? Our reactions to composer "X" or composition "Y" are all about ourselves, not the piece, not the composer, and those reactions may or may not have anything to do with either what the composer was feeling when they wrote the piece or what they intended their audience to "feel."

I've said it before: everyone talking about what is essentially their personal reaction(s) to an aural Rorschach blot is not exactly discussing music -- no where near, actually.


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## Guest

PetrB said:


> I've said it before: everyone talking about what is essentially their personal reaction(s) to an aural Rorschach blot is not exactly discussing music -- no where near, actually.


You cannot say this too often, so far as I'm concerned.:tiphat:


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## moody

PetrB said:


> "Mahler makes me feel all weepy."
> 
> "Rachmaninov makes me think psycho / physical romantic thoughts and gives me pangs of longing."
> 
> Fine. I'm even cutting slack for the writer for whom this is a new and revelatory experience, and that there are several such neophytes coming along every hour, like regularly running buses.
> 
> But, other than TELLING THE READER ABOUT YOURSELF, what real interest is there in such fare? Our reactions to composer "X" or composition "Y" are all about ourselves, not the piece, not the composer, and those reactions may or may not have anything to do with either what the composer was feeling when they wrote the piece or what they intended their audience to "feel."
> 
> I've said it before: everyone talking about what is essentially their personal reaction(s) to an aural Rorschach blot is not exactly discussing music -- no where near, actually.


I'm glad that you are cutting slack for neophytes,but if you carry on this way there may be no neophytes.
This is not a classroom and members' personal reactions are what the OP was looking for--but perhaps he will pipe up on that point.
If I'm asked how I feel about Beethoven's Seventh I certainly would not chunter on about the composer,what he was feeling or anything else. However I have read a lot about Beethoven but that is not the point of this thread.Buit if someone does want to go into the depths of course they can.


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## Blake

KenOC said:


> Well, you got my knickers in a knot. Shame on you! :lol:


It happens... I'll still love you tomorrow.


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## Blancrocher

PetrB said:


> I've said it before: everyone talking about what is essentially their personal reaction(s) to an aural Rorschach blot is not exactly discussing music -- no where near, actually.


I understand this argument, but I think it can be taken too far--not just for the purposes of chat forums, but even for the purposes of criticism. Many of my favorite essays about music have some combination of formal analysis, historical contextualization, and personal reflections on how the music makes the author feel (whether the author admits it or not!). If writers didn't take all these things into account, it would be hard to discuss such issues as when a composer is being ironic.


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## Vesteralen

KenOC said:


> Just ran across this quote from the man himself: "Emotion suits women only; music ought to strike fire from the soul of a man." (August 15, 1810, to Bettina von Arnim.)


Something must be lost in the translation. I wonder how a phrase like "strike fire from the soul" could not be a description of an emotional response?

It sounds like he's really trying to contrast emotion with EMOTION


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## jamallax89

Music is a strong emotion.


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## shangoyal

Vesteralen said:


> Something must be lost in the translation. I wonder how a phrase like "strike fire from the soul" could not be a description of an emotional response?
> 
> It sounds like he's really trying to contrast emotion with EMOTION


That's interesting. Nothing can escape the fact that men and women are different. It would be interesting to see how many men like Beethoven's music and how many women do. I have a feeling the answer is quite obvious.


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## moody

shangoyal said:


> That's interesting. Nothing can escape the fact that men and women are different. It would be interesting to see how many men like Beethoven's music and how many women do. I have a feeling the answer is quite obvious.


And your point is ?


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## shangoyal

moody said:


> And your point is ?


My point is that among Beethoven fans you will find way more men than women. That could be because his music speaks to a more "manly" (for want of a better word) vision of reality. Most of his music, anyway.

I could be wrong, this is just a blind guess.


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## Blancrocher

Incidentally, they used to call Beethoven's 4th Piano Concerto "The Ladies' Concerto." Times change, and so do gender stereotypes.


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## trazom

shangoyal said:


> That's interesting. Nothing can escape the fact that men and women are different. It would be interesting to see how many men like Beethoven's music and how many women do. I have a feeling the answer is quite obvious.


Do you think Beethoven's music speaks to everyone 'personal fable'?


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## shangoyal

Blancrocher said:


> Incidentally, they used to call Beethoven's G Major Concerto "The Ladies' Concerto." Times change, and so do stereotypes.


Yes, I have heard that concerto and I can see where that is going. I don't think stereotypes simply "change". Stereotypes are only stereotypes because they have some truth behind them. Stereotypes evolve only because our willingness to see the truth behind them wavers.


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## shangoyal

trazom said:


> Do you think Beethoven's music speaks to everyone 'personal fable'?


Sorry, but I couldn't get what you meant there.


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## Vesteralen

Well, regardless of what Beethoven thought about it, I think gender stereotyping is ridiculous. But, I think it's time to get back to the main point of this thread - "Is Beethoven's music "emotional"?" - although I think the question has already been answered.

Maybe we're done here.....................


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## PetrB

Blancrocher said:


> Incidentally, they used to call Beethoven's 4th Piano Concerto "The Ladies' Concerto." Times change, and so do gender stereotypes.


Well, then -- he gave his best piano concerto to the ladies, I guess


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## shangoyal

Vesteralen said:


> Well, regardless of what Beethoven thought about it, I think gender stereotyping is ridiculous. But, I think it's time to get back to the main point of this thread - "Is Beethoven's music "emotional"?" - although I think the question has already been answered.
> 
> Maybe we're done here.....................


Fine, I shall follow the rules of taboo henceforth...


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## moody

shangoyal said:


> Yes, I have heard that concerto and I can see where that is going. I don't think stereotypes simply "change". Stereotypes are only stereotypes because they have some truth behind them. Stereotypes evolve only because our willingness to see the truth behind them wavers.


I don't see that at all, also when you hear someone like Gina Bachauer play it it's no ladies concerto. Also in all these many years I've not heard this nonsense.


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## Vesteralen

shangoyal said:


> Fine, I shall follow the rules of taboo henceforth...


No need for that. Say what you feel. Everyone else does. Not everyone will agree with you, but so what?

I just thought that we were all in danger of going off on a tangent as far as this thread was concerned.


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## moody

shangoyal said:


> My point is that among Beethoven fans you will find way more men than women. That could be because his music speaks to a more "manly" (for want of a better word) vision of reality. Most of his music, anyway.
> 
> I could be wrong, this is just a blind guess.


I suppose they all like Chopin then !! The women that is.


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## shangoyal

moody said:


> I suppose they all like Chopin then !! The women that is.


How did you arrive at that?


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## PetrB

moody said:


> I suppose they all like Chopin then !! The women that is.


Whether music is (or can even be considered) "masculine or feminine," is always going to be subject to the gender-typing of the era and writer who names it as such.... and I think every time someone does name it either is yet another attempt to make some verbal analogy about the qualities of one of the more abstract non-verbal, non-literal things on earth -- music.


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## Ingélou

I like Chopin - and I like Beethoven.


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## shangoyal

PetrB said:


> Whether music is (or can even be considered) "masculine or feminine," is always going to be subject to the gender-typing of the era and writer who names it as such.... and I think every time someone does name it either is yet another attempt to make some verbal analogy about the qualities of one of the more abstract non-verbal, non-literal things on earth -- music.


What you are saying is true, but it's a meta analysis. I believe nothing escapes the masculine and feminine duality. It's a rather natural fact, don't you think? We, in our intellectual fervour, sometimes deny it, dodge it, ignore it, but it's there in real life all the same...


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## Blake

shangoyal said:


> What you are saying is true, but it's a meta analysis. I believe nothing escapes the masculine and feminine duality. It's a rather natural fact, don't you think? We, in our intellectual fervour, sometimes deny it, dodge it, ignore it, but it's there in real life all the same...


Maybe. It's the duality of the relative world, which implies a level of separation... But there seems to be something more universal that music can tap into beyond duality... if just a glimpse. No religious beliefs needed. Your own existence in this phenomena is enough.


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## PetrB

shangoyal said:


> What you are saying is true, but it's a meta analysis. I believe nothing escapes the masculine and feminine duality. It's a rather natural fact, don't you think? We, in our intellectual fervour, sometimes deny it, dodge it, ignore it, but it's there in real life all the same...


So the multi-tasking of women translates to what, polyphony, polyrhythm, poly-temporal music, and the masculine tendency to focus on one thing at a time is what, Bruckner and that obsessively repeated motif?

You've got to accept some now nearly controverted notions to stick with that masculine / feminine duality.

It is not like we're asking if any of these composers or pieces could bench press 240 lbs.

Yet, as analogy, freed from the inconsistency of the actual traits of men and women, and the track record of who / what they are _(since looking into all that usually blows the tidy male/female duality thingy right out the window)_ -- I sort of get it -- though I'm one to think a lot of talk about music is not worth much, including deciding the "duality" of the masculine-feminine in a Beethoven Sonata, for example... I actually thought that late romantic schtick and approach was over -- and do think it laughable.


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## Blancrocher

Vesteralen said:


> Well, regardless of what Beethoven thought about it, I think gender stereotyping is ridiculous. But, I think it's time to get back to the main point of this thread - "Is Beethoven's music "emotional"?"


Mind you, this is a very politically charged question, and I worry that the discussion was becoming rather heated. Perhaps a digression will help to restore harmony to the forum.


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## shangoyal

Vesuvius said:


> Maybe. It's the duality of the relative world, which implies a level of separation... But there seems to be something more universal that music can tap into beyond duality... if just a glimpse. No religious beliefs needed. Your own existence in this phenomena is enough.


Sir, absolutely beautifully put. 

This is where the hard realist in me goes out and the idealistic Super-Ego wakes up...


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## Ingélou

There used to be a division, based on social inhibitions I presume, between male and female tastes. If one was teaching a class & had to choose a non-exam set book, one chose the most traditionally 'masculine' one, about war, sport, science fiction, mining disasters etc, on the grounds that the girls would put up with this; whereas, if one chose a traditionally 'girly' one, like 'Little Women', the lads would never put up with it.

On that analogy, the females would like Beethoven, but the males would scorn to admire ... ?Chopin??? (I don't know who's supposed to have written 'feminine' music.) So *men* would be *men* in their tastes, and *women* would be *people*! 

But these days, men are not ashamed to be 'in touch with their feminine side'; or not as much. I doubt if the traditional divisions are all that relevant, these days.


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## shangoyal

PetrB said:


> So the multi-tasking of women translates to what, polyphony, polyrhythm, poly-temporal music, and the masculine tendency to focus on one thing at a time is what, Bruckner and that obsessively repeated motif?
> 
> You've got to accept some now nearly controverted notions to stick with that masculine / feminine duality.
> 
> It is not like we're asking if any of these composers or pieces could bench press 240 lbs.
> 
> Yet, as analogy, freed from the inconsistency of the actual traits of men and women, and the track record of who / what they are _(since looking into all that usually blows the tidy male/female duality thingy right out the window)_ -- I sort of get it -- though I'm one to think a lot of talk about music is not worth much, including deciding the "duality" of the masculine-feminine in a Beethoven Sonata, for example... I actually thought that late romantic schtick and approach was over -- and do think it laughable.


Excellent points.

Yes, I think that Bruckner part has a ring of truth to it... but we might want to ignore that. That's convenient, and needed of course, to maintain a more wholesome experience of the music itself. It's just that the music itself can remind you of the duality again, once you had forgotten it, and it comes as a real breath of fresh air...

In the end, my points were just _observations_. I absolutely do not intend any kind of rigorous musicological analysis of any piece based on gender, that sounds boring as hell.


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## KenOC

Re Beethoven's supposed "special appeal" for men: LvB wrote a relatively few works that can be described as "heroic" -- really, count 'em up! -- and these seem to have that masculine appeal, possibly because males are more prey to heroic fantasy. But most of his output is otherwise, though of the same (or better) quality. In my experience, there is no difference in its appeal between the sexes.


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## PetrB

Ingélou said:


> There used to be a division, based on social inhibitions I presume, between male and female tastes. If one was teaching a class & had to choose a non-exam set book, one chose the most traditionally 'masculine' one, about war, sport, science fiction, mining disasters etc, on the grounds that the girls would put up with this; whereas, if one chose a traditionally 'girly' one, like 'Little Women', the lads would never put up with it.
> 
> On that analogy, the females would like Beethoven, but the males would scorn to admire ... ?Chopin??? (I don't know who's supposed to have written 'feminine' music.) So *men* would be *men* in their tastes, and *women* would be *people*!
> 
> But these days, men are not ashamed to be 'in touch with their feminine side'; or not as much. I doubt if the traditional divisions are all that relevant, these days.


I dunno... mankind has been capable of sustaining some entirely artificial constructs about itself for millennia - careful you not be rockin' dat boat!

I do know it was a man who invented the sewing machine, though


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## shangoyal

Meanwhile, Brahms 3rd symphony has flown by me, and I seemed to hardly have registered the gender-centrality of it! I shall have to replay it...


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## PetrB

shangoyal said:


> Meanwhile, Brahms 3rd symphony has flown by me, and I seemed to hardly have registered the gender-centrality of it! I shall have to replay it...


zOMG! Sexless / genderless music? How on earth is that possible?


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## Guest

Depending on how the word "emotional" is defined, I don't find Beethoven's music to be any more "emotional" than that of his main Classical bed-fellows, Joseph Haydn and W A Mozart. 

Each of the latter wrote lots of emotional music in terms of expressing sentiments like sadness, happiness, humour, surprise, etc. Think of Mozart's several operas. How much more emotional can classical music get? Haydn wrote some beautifully expressive symphonies, chamber works, concertos, and several grand choral works including some marvelous sacred music. 

Indeed some of Beethoven's music is probably rather less "emotional" in these terms. Agreed however that some of Beethoven's music is probably more fiery, dynamic and exuberant than that of Haydn and Mozart. Perhaps Beethoven's generally more strident style may appeal to some more so than the gentler and more subtle musical expression of Haydn and Mozart, and vice versa, but overall I don't think there's much in it taking all the factors into account. 

In general I find Schubert's music to be a good deal more emotional than that of Haydn, Mozart or Beethoven. With Schubert it was the first time that a truly emotional content, in terms of making a personal statement about one's own feelings of joy, sadness etc, was deliberately incorporated into classical music by a really great composer. 

This tradition was continued by Schumann and Chopin, who also incorporated a new, more poetic element in furtherance of the Romantic style. With Brahms the emotional content dropped somewhat to be replaced by a more analytical, quasi-Beethovian style, but was picked up by Tchaikovsky and later by Dvorak. In the case of Tchaikovsky, it's all a matter of taste but for me I now find the emotional content of some his music a little OTT on occasion, but I still like it generally.


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## moody

shangoyal said:


> How did you arrive at that?


Well you know Beethoven is more manly so I suppose Chopin simply MUST be more womanly,don't pou think ?


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## moody

PetrB said:


> zOMG! Sexless / genderless music? How on earth is that possible?


Gendercentrality--did you see--is that a real word ?


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## Ingélou

-----------------It is now...


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## moody

PetrB said:


> I dunno... mankind has been capable of sustaining some entirely artificial constructs about itself for millennia - careful you not be rockin' dat boat!
> 
> I do know it was a man who invented the sewing machine, though


Yes that's right his name was Scarlatti wasn't it ?


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## moody

Ingélou said:


> I like Chopin - and I like Beethoven.


Well you know what that means then.


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## Ingélou

--------------------------------------------------------

(second thoughts)


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## Ingélou

More seriously, it is impossible to eradicate what you know of a composer & not 'inject' an appropriate emotion into one's listening. I know Beethoven was a dark, stormy man, so I may unjustly perceive his music as dark and stormy.
What do I know about Paganini? That people thought he was in league with the devil, and that he achieved some of his effects on the violin by what was judged as 'trickery'. So when I listened to his music just now, I didn't perceive emotions at all - I perceived 'cleverness'. 

 I am one of those who thinks that music does stir emotions - but this experience gives me pause for thought...


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## Blake

That's interesting. So, Paganini was a soulless demon?


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## Mahlerian

Ingélou said:


> I am one of those who thinks that music does stir emotions - but this experience gives me pause for thought...


Well, our reactions are always conditioned by our expectations. Beethoven's music certainly isn't _always_ dark and stormy. That's only one of the five movements of the _Pastoral_!


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## Blake

Mahlerian said:


> Well, our reactions are always conditioned by our expectations. Beethoven's music certainly isn't _always_ dark and stormy. That's only one of the five movements of the _Pastoral_!


That's why the saying goes, "There's one Earth, but billions of worlds." No two people perceive the exact same way.


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## Ingélou

Vesuvius said:


> That's interesting. So, Paganini was a soulless demon?


Certainly not; but he does seem a bit of a showman. For the first time in my life I have the perfect excuse to use the word 'meretricious'!


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## shangoyal

If there's room for understanding, there's also room for confusion... and sometimes I think it is in the latter that all the enjoyment lies.



Ingélou said:


> More seriously, it is impossible to eradicate what you know of a composer & not 'inject' an appropriate emotion into one's listening. I know Beethoven was a dark, stormy man, so I may unjustly perceive his music as dark and stormy.
> What do I know about Paganini? That people thought he was in league with the devil, and that he achieved some of his effects on the violin by what was judged as 'trickery'. So when I listened to his music just now, I didn't perceive emotions at all - I perceived 'cleverness'.
> 
> I am one of those who thinks that music does stir emotions - but this experience gives me pause for thought...


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## PetrB

Ingélou said:


> There used to be a division, based on social inhibitions I presume, between male and female tastes. If one was teaching a class & had to choose a non-exam set book, one chose the most traditionally 'masculine' one, about war, sport, science fiction, mining disasters etc, on the grounds that the girls would put up with this; whereas, if one chose a traditionally 'girly' one, like 'Little Women', the lads would never put up with it.
> 
> On that analogy, the females would like Beethoven, but the males would scorn to admire ... ?Chopin??? (I don't know who's supposed to have written 'feminine' music.) So *men* would be *men* in their tastes, and *women* would be *people*!
> 
> But these days, men are not ashamed to be 'in touch with their feminine side'; or not as much. I doubt if the traditional divisions are all that relevant, these days.


Men "being in touch with their feminine side" is not so much "feminine" as it is not that cartoon-like one dimensional notion of "being a man" which was predominant at least through the 1960's... and it is still floating about in western and other cultures, quite doggedly hanging on.


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## KenOC

PetrB said:


> I dunno... mankind has been capable of sustaining some entirely artificial constructs about itself for millennia - careful you not be rockin' dat boat!


I suggest that we are sustaining more "artificial constructs" today than has been true for some centuries. All societies are based on myths, of course, but we're pretty far out on the limb.


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## Blake

Thankfully the boundaries are only ideas held together by beliefs. The more people wake up, the more the boundaries will fall.


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## PetrB

moody said:


> Yes that's right his name was Scarlatti wasn't it ?


I think you meant J.S. Bach, maybe Vivaldi....


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## PetrB

moody said:


> Well you know Beethoven is more manly so I suppose Chopin simply MUST be more womanly,don't pou think ?


Chopin had women throwing themselves at him, at least one or more affairs, and lived with at least one women.

Beethoven couldn't even get a date, and remained a bachelor his entire life. What a wuss.


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## PetrB

Ingélou said:


> I am one of those who thinks that music does stir emotions...


.....Music stirring emotions


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## KenOC

PetrB said:


> Beethoven couldn't even get a date, and remained a bachelor his entire life. What a wuss.


One of the women he wanted to marry said to her family, "He's ugly and half crazy."

Beethoven himself had high standards: "Now you can help me to find a wife. If you find a beautiful woman in F. who, mayhap, endows my music with a sigh... But she must be beautiful, for I can love only the beautiful." (1809, to Baron von Gleichenstein)


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## moody

PetrB said:


> I think you meant J.S. Bach, maybe Vivaldi....


My post was a joke and I'll bet yours was as well---I hope.
But if we are to be serious it looks as if the basic thing was invented in 1397 by Hermann Poll.

I knew yours was a joke really.


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## Blake

KenOC said:


> One of the women he wanted to marry said to her family, "He's ugly and half crazy."
> 
> Beethoven himself had high standards: "Now you can help me to find a wife. If you find a beautiful woman in F. who, mayhap, endows my music with a sigh... But she must be beautiful, for I can love only the beautiful." (1809, to Baron von Gleichenstein)


Where do people get these quotes? How do we know they're not just entertaining nonsense? Haha

Just a thought: So there was someone in this woman's house recording what she said... or are we relying on some poor bloke's memory and integrity?


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## KenOC

Vesuvius said:


> Where do people get these quotes? How do we know they're not just entertaining nonsense?


The first quote is from Cooper's "Beethoven." The second is from a letter, #199 here:

http://pianosociety.com/cms/index.php?section=731

Hope this helps!


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## Ingélou

PetrB said:


> .....Music stirring emotions
> View attachment 28003


I was right. I always knew it: Music *is* a woman!


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## PetrB

KenOC said:


> One of the women he wanted to marry said to her family, "He's ugly and half crazy."
> 
> Beethoven himself had high standards: "Now you can help me to find a wife. If you find a beautiful woman in F. who, mayhap, endows my music with a sigh... But she must be beautiful, for I can love only the beautiful." (1809, to Baron von Gleichenstein)


My God, was he really like that, i.e. emotionally more, like, ten years old?

That is what that quote sounds like, at least to contemporary ears. It reads like one of those rather pathetic on-line ads of a search for a spouse as written by a 30+ year old guy living in his parents basement, jobless, laying about all day in sweatpants and shirt and playing video games.

Was Beethoven that socially inept when it came to the opposite sex? It would not surprise me.


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## PetrB

Ingélou said:


> I was right. I always knew it: Music *is* a woman!


.. and she is _*a 20th century woman*_ at that


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## Blake

PetrB said:


> My God, was he really like that, i.e. emotionally more, like, ten years old?
> 
> That is what that quote sounds like, at least to contemporary ears. It reads like one of those rather pathetic on-line ads of a search for a spouse as written by a 30+ year old guy living in his parents basement, jobless, laying about all day in sweatpants and shirt and playing video games.
> 
> Was Beethoven that socially inept when it came to the opposite sex? It would not surprise me.


I'm sure his level of genius greatly affected his social skills. Rightly so, when one aspect of a human expression is magnified to an immense level, such as Beethoven's musical incredibilities, other aspects of the person might consequently be diminished.


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## Cheyenne

Maybe if he composed more music like his violin romances..


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## trazom

Vesuvius said:


> I'm sure his level of genius greatly affected his social skills. Rightly so, when one aspect of a human expression is magnified to an immense level, such as Beethoven's musical incredibilities, other aspects of the person might consequently be diminished.


That seems to be the case in most Hollywood depictions of geniuses.


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## Blake

trazom said:


> That seems to be the case in most Hollywood depictions of geniuses.


Science also considers similar explanations... It's no objective truth, but certainly a possibility for Beethoven.


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## Vesteralen

What I've learned from this thread:

1. When asked to define "emotional" music, most of us are apt to describe how we respond emotionally to something. This may or may not have anything to do with the emotions of the composer when writing it.

2. Many people claim that emotion is not intrinsic to the music itself - basically music is just marks on a piece of paper. (One does wonder, though, how could someone compose a "Triumphal" March or a Valse "Triste". It kind of boggles the mind of us lesser mortals)

3. The English word "emotional" may mean different things to different people, and as a translation of a word in another language may be totally inadequate. For example, whatever the word was in German that was translated "emotions", it seemed to signify wilted lilies to Beethoven. There must have been another German word to describe the kind of emotions we might call "soul-stirring".

4. Finally, I have just as much trouble caring about the answer to this question now as when I started reading this thread.


----------

