# What is classical music for you?



## nikolas (Mar 23, 2012)

There's two ways to think of this, I think...

One is to assume that Classical music is the music that was composed in the Classical era (Haydn, Mozart, quite a bit of Beethoven, etc). The other is to be talking about any music that shares the same... whatever. Music by Haydn, Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy, Ligeti, Bach, etc... 

So what is it for you? 

What draws the line? Is John Cage's works for prepared piano classical music? Is film music classical perhaps? What is it?

Just wondering on the general public's opinion here!


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

nikolas said:


> [...]
> Just wondering on the general public's opinion here!


The general public has no idea. The TC membership probably has a bunch of them, none definitive. The medieval and Renaissance equivalents of Pop music are generally considered to be classical music, for no useful reason except that most of its modern hearers are the same folks that listen to classical. In fact, that criterion - who listens to it - may be the best we can do for categorizing it.

[If that doesn't stir the pot for you,_ nikolas_, it may not be stirable.]


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

The general public subscribes to Zappa's opinion. Classical music belongs in a museum and was written by a bunch of irrelevant dead white people. Bunch of guys in wigs writing dull music for the elite. That's the stereotype.

Nothing we can do to change this ridiculous stereotype. If they were exposed to it the way we are and realized it's all about feelings that music can express more than any other art, they would change their minds, but we all know that's not going to happen.

They would be astonished to know that long after those guys wearing wigs, classical music is still alive and well and is currently being written as we speak.

Wonder what Zappa and his ilk would make out of some mid 20th century classical music such as Vincent Persichetti's 12 piano sonatas? Those wig days are long gone!


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Classical music now is what is considered to be 'art' and therefore potentially durable. 
Early & renaissance music was often 'popular' in its day, but now it no longer is, it is 'classical'. 
Pop music genres are considered to be fast food, or junk food, as against haute cuisine.
But if in two hundred years time, pop songs of today are still played in a serious context - maybe becoming part of a respected opera or arranged by a future art-music composer, they will be 'classical music'.

'There's nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so.' - Hamlet.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Classical music is a tradition. A way of thinking about music, also. A tradition is composed by many things: i) the actual pieces of music through history; ii) concepts about art and music, also through history (includes also responses to those concepts). 
Every piece composed in that framework can be considered classical music, I think.
One of the main concepts of classical music is the piece of music as a sublime piece of art, i.e., an accomplished thing in which the composer invested a lot of effort and which is supposed to be only a pure artistic object; the piece is expected to have a great intellectual, conceptual, and emotional deepness. In fact, this is one of the major trademarks of classical music. 

Cage's works for prepared piano certainly fulfill these criteria. Film music, I don't think so because of its functional element and its artistic superficiality.


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## TechWriter (Feb 12, 2014)

I think of it as Western+composed+Haydn through Beethoven. But I let the term be used loosely in conversation. With the general public, it is a distinction that comes off as pedantic and prickly ... with no lasting effects.


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## FleshRobot (Jan 27, 2014)

nikolas said:


> Is John Cage's works for prepared piano classical music? Is film music classical perhaps? What is it


"Film music" is not a genre of music, it's just music of any kind used in films. It can be minimalistic, neo-baroque, neo-romantic, hard rock, electronic or anything else. Asking if film music can be classical is like asking if LP record music can.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

hpowders said:


> The general public subscribes to Zappa's opinion. Classical music belongs in a museum and was written by a bunch of irrelevant dead white people.
> 
> . . .
> 
> Wonder what Zappa and his ilk would make out of some mid 20th century classical music such as Vincent Persichetti's 12 piano sonatas? Those wig days are long gone!


If he said that I'm thinking the latter is exactly what he meant. He was a huge Varese fan of course.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

For me, classical music is a convenient term for the western academic musical tradition as opposed to a more grass roots tradition. However they cross pollinate. All terms are just conveniences. It bothers me a bit that ragtime and jazz are starting to infiltrate my beloved classical in the same way that vampires and zombies are infiltrating my science fiction. Put that stuff back on the other shelf where it belongs!


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

*Most people find out early on the Classical with an upper case C denotes art music of the Classical era, and that classical with a small case c denotes all of art music from the medieval through John Cage and to the present day.* For me, the more catholic usage of classical is my global definition of "what classical music is."

Since I am now a senior citizen (lol) and have been listening to contemporary classical from earliest childhood through all my life, I am not shocked there is a huge variety of classical music post 1890 to present 

_Movie scores and video game scores:_
1.) Most fans and academics who are devoted to classical think almost all film and video scores are 'something else' (they are, written strictly to function -- argument against are maybe five cited bits of classical incidental music from theater -- a nano-scrap of the entire body of classical music) -- while some are brilliantly done, so many are derivative of an olio of various styles one could not dare to call them fully original, and their "short hit" brevity and lack of any development or extended length of play argue against them as being 'classical / art music.' [[ I am of this general opinion about film and video game scores. -- big business which almost never generates or results in "art." ]]

2.) There is another camp who are more ready to evaluate film scores and video game musics as havng the same or equal value as classical, but I think one reason they do so is they really can not hear much difference in either quality or degree of originality between Beethoven and the Star Wars Concert Suite -- or if they do hear a difference they really do not care to make a distinction between one and the other (and that horrifies some in the first camp.)


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## Mister Man (Feb 3, 2014)

I take issue with the first camp's way of thinking. 

Why should an over-engineered automobile be considered "better" if it's performance isn't superior to that of an automobile of lesser engineering?


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Mister Man said:


> I take issue with the first camp's way of thinking.
> 
> Why should an over-engineered automobile be considered "better" if it's performance isn't superior to that of an automobile of lesser engineering?


Your automobile analogy is meaningless to me, so I have no idea, really, what your point is.


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## Mister Man (Feb 3, 2014)

PetrB said:


> Your automobile analogy is meaningless to me, so I have no idea, really, what your point is.


You arbitrarily decide it's meaningless. Therefore you don't understand the point? Such nonsense.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

TechWriter said:


> I think of it as Western+composed+Haydn through Beethoven. But I let the term be used loosely in conversation. With the general public, it is a distinction that comes off as pedantic and prickly ... with no lasting effects.


Haydn through Beethoven? So when I listen to Berlioz, Schumann, Chopin, Britten, Stravinsky and Persichetti, what the heck am I listening to if it's not classical music?

I'm getting confused because they play the above composers on classical music stations.
Perhaps they didn't get your memo?


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

hpowders said:


> Haydn through Beethoven? So when I listen to Berlioz, Schumann, Chopin, Britten, Stravinsky and Persichetti, what the heck am I listening to if it's not classical music?
> 
> I'm getting confused because they play the above composers on classical music stations.
> Perhaps they didn't get your memo?


_TW_ confuses classical with Classical, and then the period with the practice.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

The term "Classical Music" seems as confusing as the term "Art". I'll ignore the notion of "Classical Music" as being limited to the music of the so-called "Classical Era" (Mozart, Haydn, Boccherini, early Beethoven, etc...). As has been mentioned over time in any number of posts on TC, the term "Classical Music" dates from around the time of the rise of "popular" music and a desire to differentiate "high serious" music of the upper classes from the "crap" being churned out by the "unwashed masses".

The problem is that "Classical Music" is not really a musical style or form. Among that which we assigned the term Classical Music we find Byzantine Chant, Gregorian Chant, dances and other folk-music of the middle ages...






... motets, madrigals, Opera, Baroque instrumental works based upon dances (dance music)...






... symphonies, chamber works, lieder, mélodie...






.....


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

... operettas, the Jazz-infused works of Kurt Weil, Gershwin, Ravel, Nikolai Kasputin...






... Musique concrète, the experimental works of John Cage, Xenakis, Stockhausen, etc...

The problem that I see with using the term "Classical Music" to denote a specific style or tradition lies with the lack of logic involved in what is excluded. If 17th and 18th dance music is included... why exclude modern or contemporary dance music? If Schubert's lieder and the 19th century French mélodie are "classical music", why exclude this...






... and if this is "classical music"...


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

... why not this?






... or this?






In literature we have the term "The Classics". In the visual arts we have "The Old Masters" and "Masters" and "Masterpieces". In all honesty, it seems to me that the term "Classical Music" has been employed far too long as something akin to the term "Fine Art" within the realm of the visual arts. This term, "Fine Art" has been under attack... or challenged for at least 100+ years as it has become increasingly obvious that it was employed as a term of value judgment... suggesting that only certain art forms... those largely reserved for the upper classes... were to be taken seriously... as "fine art".

The Novel and the Play were once considered unworthy of being considered "Literature"... yet now we have no problem recognizing that Shakespeare and Lawrence Sterne rank among the classics. It is quite likely that the same will eventually be recognized as true of some comic books and web logs. We find the same "blurring" of the "Hi" and "Low" in the visual arts. The prints of Daumier and Beardsley, the posters of Mucha and Toulouse Latrec, the illustrations of Rackham, Edmund Dulac, Eric Gil, William Morris, etc... are now recognized by a great majority of the "art world" as "fine art"... and the same is becoming increasingly true of the finest works of comic book art, contemporary illustration, etc...

If the terms "Fine Art"... or simply "Art" and "Classic Literature"... or simply "Literature" can embrace such a wide spectrum of achievements... "Hi" and "Low"... I seriously question the use of the term "Classical Music" to exclude the finest achievements of music in Jazz and other "popular" forms. I suspect that it is quite possible that Miles Davis and Duke Ellington may just outlast Cage, Xenakis, and Stockhausen... but that's just me.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

Since I am now a senior citizen (lol) and have been listening to contemporary classical from earliest childhood through all my life, I am not shocked there is a huge variety of classical music post 1890 to present 

Movie scores and video game scores:
1.) Most fans and academics who are devoted to classical think almost all film and video scores are 'something else' (they are, written strictly to function -- argument against are maybe five cited bits of classical incidental music from theater -- a nano-scrap of the entire body of classical music) -- while some are brilliantly done, so many are derivative of an olio of various styles one could not dare to call them fully original, and their "short hit" brevity and lack of any development or extended length of play argue against them as being 'classical / art music.' [[ I am of this general opinion about film and video game scores. -- big business which almost never generates or results in "art." ]]

Of course, Petr, is it not equally true that among the music that we accept as falling under the rubric, "Classical Music"... let us say anything composed by any of the thousands of peers of Haydn, Beethoven, and Wagner... there is a great deal that is every bit as derivative and lacking in any artistic merit as any number of film scores?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

StlukesguildOhio said:


> I suspect that it is quite possible that Miles Davis and Duke Ellington may just outlast Cage, Xenakis, and Stockhausen... but that's just me.


I think it's a certainty.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

Hey _StLukes_, that compound post constitutes a sort of Super Sid Plus. Congratulations.


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## Guest (Feb 13, 2014)

To have a good sense of how the term "classical music" is commonly used, it helps to have a vague and uninformed understanding of classical music. Classical period music, as opposed to Romantic music or Baroque music - these are all terms of art which are not widely understood by the general public.

Classical music in the mind of the general public sounds like an orchestra playing typical orchestral music (think Beethoven or Dvorak), or sounds like a string quartet, or possibly even solo piano music, so long as it is in a classical style.

I think the further away a particular piece of music is from that mushy central expectation, the less comfortable people would feel describing it as classical music. Renaissance chant, for example, would not be considered classical music by most people. Ditto more experimental modern music. On the other hand, the general public would probably accept music like "Schindler's List" as classical music. 

Of course there are a lot of gray areas and judgement calls concerning the boundaries of classical music. Is the theme to Star Wars inside or outside? Hard to say. The general public doesn't waste time splitting those particular hairs.


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## Guest (Feb 13, 2014)

I'm getting tired of saying this, but I guess one more time won't kill me.

The term "classical music"--not the musics covered by the term, but the term itself--has a very precise history. It was coined in Germany in 1810. This is, you may notice, after most if not all of the so-called "classical era" was over. It made it's way into English in the mid-1820's.

This is a simple matter of historical record.

As for what was covered, well that was a matter of some debate, a debate that took most of the century to settle on what from the past would be included, a debate that has never been settled on what new things to let in.

Songs and opera, at the beginning, were not included, for instance. Schubert's symphonies, yeah. His songs, no.

As for it's utility now, well, it has almost no utility any more for me, anyway. Time to move on. If all of Mozart and Haydn and Gluck and Corelli and Telemann and Bach and Handel and Vivaldi and Monteverdi and Dowland could have been written without the benefit of the term, then probably Bokanowski and Marchetti and Noetinger and Salazar and Meirino and Lopez can get along without it, too. And, as a matter of fact, they already do.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Ingélou said:


> But if in two hundred years time, pop songs of today are still played in a serious context - maybe becoming part of a respected opera or arranged by a future art-music composer, they will be 'classical music'.


The problem I see is that most pop songs are too strongly associated with the singer who made them popular and if you listen to a cover of your favorite pop song you are usually disappointed because the voice is not right and often the music is not done exactly the same. For the really good bands where the singer is also the main songwriter, it is inseparable from the person, and the cover is at best a novelty. Pop songs often are about a performer making a big show or exhibition of themself, whereas classical is all about exhibition of the music--the performers remain in the background, except for opera of course. So while pop music of today likely will be around in 200 years, it will mainly be around as recordings. I don't see it being performed extensively. Sure, there will be a few covers, but for the most part, the typical pop singer will be doing their own material or fresh material because for them, it is all about them as the pop singer. The music is often simply a way to "glorify" the pop artist in the eyes of their public.


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## nikolas (Mar 23, 2012)

I got to sleep and now this... (I'm in Greece! )

So, I kinda opened a can of warms then? 

First of all I am aware of the distinction with the capitalized "C" and not. It kinda makes a difference. However I'm also aware about the term "concert hall music" which seems to fit the bill a bit better. I mean almost all Classical music is being designed to be perform-able in a live setting. Even with electronics and so on, you still get live electronics, or Reaktor treatment, etc. 

Think of it this way: If a recording of any music contains "just" the recorded version of what one performed live (on a piano for example), and normally it's attempting to be as transparent as possible with the changes and tweekings made, then we're talking about Classical music. If a recording, on the other hand, contains so much production, post production, etc, and the result is something that cannot really be reproduced (or it can, but with heavy means of sampling and re-recording) live, then we're talking about... something else.

No?


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Calssical music is compsoed music that has strong artistic qualities that have or are likely to remain timeless - this is what "classical" (not referring to the Classical period of Mozart and Haydn). You have heard of terms like a "modern classic" when it comes to other forms of art, clothing, cars etc. deemed to be likely to reach classic status in times to come. Just because something is composed today doesn't mean it is classical music; it may well be thoroughly composed art music, but classical it may not be.


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## nikolas (Mar 23, 2012)

You mean like "That's a classic" sort of way?

So what about this, for example, then?






Or something much more recently composed?


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Mister Man said:


> You arbitrarily decide it's meaningless. Therefore you don't understand the point? Such nonsense.


I genuinely don't get your analogy and to what it was meant to be analogous -- music, of course, but the point, I really do not understand. All I do get from it is an idea of something overwrought, or unnecessary overkill in the making of something.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

StlukesguildOhio said:


> Since I am now a senior citizen (lol) and have been listening to contemporary classical from earliest childhood through all my life, I am not shocked there is a huge variety of classical music post 1890 to present
> 
> Movie scores and video game scores:
> 1.) Most fans and academics who are devoted to classical think almost all film and video scores are 'something else' (they are, written strictly to function -- argument against are maybe five cited bits of classical incidental music from theater -- a nano-scrap of the entire body of classical music) -- while some are brilliantly done, so many are derivative of an olio of various styles one could not dare to call them fully original, and their "short hit" brevity and lack of any development or extended length of play argue against them as being 'classical / art music.' [[ I am of this general opinion about film and video game scores. -- big business which almost never generates or results in "art." ]]
> ...


Sure, and where is all that more banal and less interesting music now, viz in current use and circulation? Same place later generations will have plucked from the whole of our contemporary heap what still interests them or to them has 'value.' That is the dilemma of those who want certificates of approval on contemporary art -- generations of critics and audiences have not been at the work of filtering out 'the best,' LOL. So in our own times, we're more on our own, our current artists not dripping with the ribbons and wax seals of generations of previous approval.


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## nikolas (Mar 23, 2012)

Can I, please, offer an example of computer game music & Classical music?

http://www.nikolas-sideris.com/Stuff/ThaleCres1.mp3 composed in 2006

and






EDIT: both are composed by me. Both feature the same main theme. I do feel that the one is for computer game music (as it stands) whereas the 2nd link is definitely "Classical music".


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## Mister Man (Feb 3, 2014)

PetrB said:


> I genuinely don't get your analogy and to what it was meant to be analogous -- music, of course, but the point, I really do not understand. All I do get from it is an idea of something overwrought, or unnecessary overkill in the making of something.


Excuse me, my apologies.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

nikolas said:


> There's two ways to think of this, I think...
> 
> One is to assume that Classical music is the music that was composed in the Classical era (Haydn, Mozart, quite a bit of Beethoven, etc). The other is to be talking about any music that shares the same... whatever. Music by Haydn, Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy, Ligeti, Bach, etc...
> 
> ...


I think notation is a big aspect, classical tends to have more notation than other genres of music. Improvisation in classical music was killed off in the 19th century, for example cadenzas where written down and in effect carved in stone. No wonder jazz musicians have constantly gone back to the Baroque for inspiration - its got more in common with thier music than the classical stuff since. In any case, you wouldn't find a classical musician going on stage and just saying to the band let's play a certain tune in a certain key, like Duke Ellington did, classical musos have to play from some score. This is why Miles Davis made that famous put down about classical music being s--- music or some such.

Improvisation is of course based on hard work, on tight ensemble work, on this ability musicians develop to read eachother's minds, anticipate eachother's actions. Its something often talked about but impossible to pin down exactly. No doubt classical musos develop this skill too, but in different ways. In Bali, there are ceremonies that go on all night, the gamelan playing. If it is considered good, the audience stay all night into the morning, if its not working and flowing well, they leave early in the piece. There is this flow to indigenous musics, like jazz its got more freedom than classical. No wonder classical composers have taken from non-classical and what we in the West call 'world music' - in the 21st century things are blending a lot, but they have been for ages.

John Cage is classical, even though his methods of notation where different to that of what went before, he still fits into a tradition of sorts. Satie and Percy Grainger where doing similar things way before Cage, so too Charles Ives.

Film music I see as classical, by classically trained composers, so too musicals. In terms of film music its the same as incidental music - in fact, composers like Korngold and Walton did both. In terms of musicals, you've got influences from classical music entering there, everything from Wagner's lietmotif system in Lloyd Webber to the cabaret-inspired worlds of Kurt Weill, who went from composing canonical 'classical' pieces in Europe to conquering Broadway once he got to the USA.

It can be argued that everything at some point stops being new and becomes a tradition. But the question is, is it living or fossilised? Ancient Greek music is no longer living. Classical is, jazz is, country music is, rap, hip hop, West African music, or Aboriginal music, or Indian sitar music, or Japanese Gagaku, or any type of music, they're still living traditions with certain conventions. If they evolve they will continue to live, if they become static, they become artefacts in a museum. Sometimes I despair over the future of classical music and jazz in particular, but that's not strictly the topic here.

Seriously, I've got the 1500 page tome on classical that is very comprehensive (the _All Music Guide_) and its got an entry on Zappa. I know he did an album with the Ensemble Intercontemporain. So many musicians in rock nowadays are classically trained, and that's another thing that's not exactly new, and in a way all the genres are blending like never before.

Ultimately as a listener I don't worry too much about boundaries of genre or music 'type.' I just go with what I enjoy.


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## Guest (Feb 13, 2014)

I would say that it's nigh on impossible to arrive at a meaningful, widely accepted definition of classical music based on necessary technical attributes that the music must possess. 

It is simpler to regard classical music as the residual after allowing for more easily identifiable genres like material like pop, rock, jazz, folk, metal etc. 

The "gross" residual that's left will have lots of fuzzy edges, so the solution is to take your own carving knife and slice off the bits that you don't like or consider not appropriate, in order to finish up with a "net" definition of classical music that one finds acceptable.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Just if I can be all idiosyncratic, to me there are two kinds of music: performer-centric, and composer-centric. Of course these are more like poles on a spectrum, but most kinds of music seem to cluster around one end or the other. "Classical" music is composer-centric, and so is film music and musical theater.... Folk and pop and and blues and so on are obviously performer-centric. I wish to emphasize that to me these are more like poles on a spectrum rather than absolute categories.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

aleazk said:


> <snip>
> Cage's works for prepared piano certainly fulfill these criteria. Film music, I don't think so because of its functional element and its artistic superficiality.





PetrB said:


> *<snip>
> 
> Movie scores and video game scores:
> 1.) Most fans and academics who are devoted to classical think almost all film and video scores are 'something else' (they are, written strictly to function -- argument against are maybe five cited bits of classical incidental music from theater -- a nano-scrap of the entire body of classical music) -- while some are brilliantly done, so many are derivative of an olio of various styles one could not dare to call them fully original, and their "short hit" brevity and lack of any development or extended length of play argue against them as being 'classical / art music.' [[ I am of this general opinion about film and video game scores. -- big business which almost never generates or results in "art." ]]
> ...


*

I find the concept of function and the idea of derivative or pastiche to be a romantic notion of pure art that simply does not hold water.

If one accepts that music written for a function, that is not original or derivative is not "classical music" then out goes all those Bach cantatas written for church performance, any mass written specifically for liturgical use, large chunks of Handel and so on an so forth. There is nothing wrong with having a specific purpose. The romantic notion of an artist pursuing his or her own vision is pretty but meaningless.

I couldn't care less whether a piece is a sublime work of art, pure and unsullied by any crass commercialism. What I want to know is does it sound good, does it meet what I expect from a piece of classical music in terms of musical structure (defined by period) and do I like it. if it meets the first two then it's classical, if it meets the third then it's good classical.*


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Taggart said:


> I find the concept of function and the idea of derivative or pastiche to be a romantic notion of pure art that simply does not hold water.
> 
> If one accepts that music written for a function, that is not original or derivative is *not* "classical music" then out goes all those Bach cantatas written for church performance, any mass written specifically for liturgical use, large chunks of Handel and so on an so forth. There is nothing wrong with having a specific purpose. The romantic notion of an artist pursuing his or her own vision is pretty but meaningless.
> 
> I couldn't care less whether a piece is a sublime work of art, pure and unsullied by any crass commercialism. What I want to know is does it sound good, does it meet what I expect from a piece of classical music in terms of musical structure (defined by period) and do I like it. if it meets the first two then it's classical, if it meets the third then it's good classical.


We are speaking of functionality as a primary goal here. When every aspect of the piece is subjected to the functionality, even if this lessens its quality from certain viewpoints. Most film music tend to be a structureless succession of moments and without development, and without any musical, conceptual or spiritual depth as a whole. That's because it's designed to be in that way, since its primary function is to accompany what is going on in the screen. Any other thing is outside its scope.
The Bach pieces transcend their original functional intentions because the composer produced them with artistic intentions. They are not good examples of functional in the pure sense of the word.

The notion of "self-expression", "the composer's feelings in the music", that's romantic... to ask the composer to produce something, an idea, by his own has nothing to do with that... happens in science too.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

aleazk said:


> The Bach pieces transcend their original functional intentions because the* composer produced them with artistic intentions*. They are not good examples of functional in the pure sense of the word.
> 
> The notion of "self-expression", "the composer's feelings in the music", that's romantic... to ask the composer to produce something, an idea, by his own has nothing to do with that... happens in science too.


I've emphasised something in your post. The idea that Bach's church compositions were anything more than something to fill a sabbath to the glory of God or a way of making him money is precisely the romantic fallacy you describe in the subsequent paragraph.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Taggart said:


> I've emphasised something in your post. The idea that Bach's church compositions were anything more than something to fill a sabbath to the glory of God or a way of making him money is precisely the romantic fallacy you describe in the subsequent paragraph.


So, every piece, painting, etc., produced before the invention of the concept of art was not art?. I don't share that kind of points of view. Concepts like art are not invented out of the blue, instead, they are invented in order to give a name to a concept or phenomenon already in existence.
The fact that those Bach pieces can be enjoyed as pure aesthetic products, without any hint of their background (i.e., they have a life by their own), means that they were made with that intention too (consciously or unconsciously; in Bach's case, considering he also composed absolute music, I would say pretty consciously), as simple as that. And that I would call artistic intention.


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## FleshRobot (Jan 27, 2014)

aleazk said:


> So, every piece, painting, etc., produced before the invention of the concept of art was not art?. I don't share that kind of points of view. Concepts like art are not invented out of the blue, instead, they are invented in order to give a name to a concept or phenomenon already in existence.


You're very good at creating straw men



aleazk said:


> The fact that those Bach pieces can be enjoyed as pure aesthetic products, without any hint of their background (i.e., they have a life by their own), means that they were made with that intention too (consciously or unconsciously; in Bach's case, considering he also composed absolute music, I would say pretty consciously), as simple as that. And that I would call artistic intention.


Most of the greatest composers for film composed "absolute music" as well, and many soundtracks are enjoyed by people who have never even seen the movies where they come from, and some of them are considered great works of art.


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## Guest (Feb 13, 2014)

What is classical for me? Most of the time, it's an irrelevant question. It only matters if I'm going to have a meaningful conversation with someone else where musical definitions are helpful to the discussion.

Otherwise, I just listen to music...


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

FleshRobot said:


> You're very good at creating straw men


I'm just trying to understand why somebody would deny such an obvious (to me at least, evidently!) quality in Bach's music, which is its artistic intentionality.
Since no argumentation for the point is being provided, I'm supposing it's the same kind of argumentation I encountered before, which is the one I alluded in my comment.



FleshRobot said:


> Most of the greatest composers for film composed "absolute music" as well, and many soundtracks are enjoyed by people who have never even seen the movies where they come from, and some of them are considered great works of art.


Well, tastes are tastes... I prefer Bach, if you ask me.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

How about John Corigliano's score for The Red Violin? Terrific. Semi-classical.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Taggart said:


> I find the concept of function and the idea of derivative or pastiche to be a romantic notion of pure art that simply does not hold water.
> 
> If one accepts that music written for a function, that is not original or derivative is *not* "classical music" then out goes all those Bach cantatas written for church performance, any mass written specifically for liturgical use, large chunks of Handel and so on an so forth. There is nothing wrong with having a specific purpose. The romantic notion of an artist pursuing his or her own vision is pretty but meaningless.
> 
> I couldn't care less whether a piece is a sublime work of art, pure and unsullied by any crass commercialism. What I want to know is does it sound good, does it meet what I expect from a piece of classical music in terms of musical structure (defined by period) and do I like it. if it meets the first two then it's classical, if it meets the third then it's good classical.


There are enough who feel this way I think there ought to be a TC category: 
Bach Cantata or Star Wars, its all the same to me.


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## FleshRobot (Jan 27, 2014)

aleazk said:


> Well, tastes are tastes... I prefer Bach, if you ask me.


So do I, but that doesn't mean I cannot like the films scores of Hans Werner Henze, Philip Glass, Shostakovitch, Prokofiev, Bernard Herrmann, Morricone, Rózsa or any other great soundtrack composer, or think they are can also be "enjoyed as pure aesthetic products".


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

hpowders said:


> How about John Corigliano's score for The Red Violin? Terrific. Semi-classical.


Is that "semi" there because, as "well-written" as it is, it holds up under one hearing but not many more?

"


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

PetrB said:


> Is that "semi" there because, as "well-written" as it is, it holds up under one hearing but not many more?
> 
> "


The music is very effective in its role, especially if one 'lets himself go' into the melodrama. I haven't tried it, but suspect it doesn't stand alone very well.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Taggart said:


> I've emphasised something in your post. The idea that Bach's church compositions were anything more than something to fill a sabbath to the glory of God or a way of making him money is precisely the romantic fallacy you describe in the subsequent paragraph.


It is known Bach was not thrilled with having to compose a cantata a week, if nothing else because it left him little or no time for composing what most interested him. Between his reported devoutness, and being a master craftsman, he turned in very fine work(s)... part of the job. What is not always part of the job is the degree of craft and integrity he did put into those cantatas.

My general evaluation of 'work to order' and its quality was specifically aimed at film scores: there are but a handful of film scores and suites or symphonies therefrom by classical composers who took a film score job, the vast majority of their output 'less functional.'


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Ukko said:


> The music is very effective in its role, especially if one 'lets himself go' into the melodrama. I haven't tried it, but suspect it doesn't stand alone very well.


There is a "Red Violin Concerto" -- the material put into suite, perhaps more formal a format. My taste has it a oner for listening pleasure, but that is my taste alone for which I can speak.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

*Here we go again.*

I have not read every post in this thread so I am probably sticking my foot in my mouth because of my lack of patience.

I have just completed reading _The Agony of Modern Music_ by Henry Pleasants. It was published in 1955. The OP is raising issues the people have been squabbling about, without resolution, for over fifty years.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

PetrB said:


> Is that "semi" there because, as "well-written" as it is, it holds up under one hearing but not many more?
> 
> "


No, because it's written in a pseudo-classical style that the masses will not reject.

When I want to listen to seriously classical John Corigliano, I will listen to his clarinet concerto.

Meanwhile, I must admit, I will listen to the "Red Violin" from time to time. It is one of the better film scores.


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

aleazk said:


> The fact that those Bach pieces can be enjoyed as pure aesthetic products, without any hint of their background (i.e., they have a life by their own), means that they were made with that intention too (consciously or unconsciously; in Bach's case, considering he also composed absolute music, I would say pretty consciously), as simple as that. And that I would call artistic intention.


Other people call it the "intentional fallacy," because the ability of a _listener_ to experience music in a certain way is simply not evidence of anything on the _composer's_ part. (And thank God for that, since lots of composers have had pretty silly notions of their own music that lots of listeners would sooner do without.) The "consciously or unconsciously" bit only serves to turn the whole thing into a tautology. If we're allowed to cite a composer's unconscious intentions, then just about any way we experience music can be superimposed on the composer.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Eschbeg said:


> Other people call it the "intentional fallacy," because the ability of a _listener_ to experience music in a certain way is simply not evidence of anything on the _composer's_ part. (And thank God for that, since lots of composers have had pretty silly notions of their own music that lots of listeners would sooner do without.) The "consciously or unconsciously" bit only serves to turn the whole thing into a tautology. If we're allowed to cite a composer's unconscious intentions, then just about any way we experience music can be superimposed on the composer.


Your call for relativism really kills any possibility of discussion about art... that argument can be equally used to refute Taggart's point for that matter...

Well, I guess I'm the only one here thinking that Bach's music is art then... LOL.

I can live with that.


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

Heh... that's close to the opposite of what I said. Lots of people think of Bach's music as art. I certainly do. That's exactly the point: it's _us_ who have made it so. Whether we have Bach's permission is unlikely and ultimately unimportant.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Eschbeg said:


> Heh... that's close to the opposite of what I said. Lots of people think of Bach's music as art. I certainly do. That's exactly the point: it's _us_ who have made it so. Whether we have Bach's permission is unlikely and ultimately unimportant.


Yes, it's a valid point of view. But why we do that?. That's the question. I'm saying because Bach actually wanted to produce something with that quality. It's not a naive process. It's not that I just wanted to create an utilitarian thing and magic, a work of art.


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## Guest (Feb 14, 2014)

Well, one thing is for sure. Bach had no idea he was writing classical music.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

some guy said:


> Well, one thing is for sure. Bach had no idea he was writing classical music.


Not entirely true. When Bach was at Kothen, he penned a note to Prince Leopold which included the passage: "The music I'm writing now is quite good and elevated. In fact, I would call it 'classy' music." Subsequent translators erroneously rendered the word as "classical." And thus a genre was born.

It's in all the better music histories! :lol:


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## Guest (Feb 14, 2014)

aleazk said:


> Yes, it's a valid point of view. But why we do that?. That's the question.


Why? Perhaps some do it to signify that they have refined sensibilities and so can join the club. If one thinks film music is classical, one can't join.

"Art", of course, is not the sole descriptor of worth, but hundreds of years of posing about it has made it more or less the only one that those with soul aspire to recognising and understanding.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

It's probably best just to look at classical music as music. If you bring lots of other baggage with it then it probably helps set up barriers within classical music and with other kinds of music outside of it. And music is a constantly changing and creative thing with barriers only of temporary use.


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## maestro267 (Jul 25, 2009)

I sometimes feel weird calling the whole "classical music" spectrum by that name. But then, what are the alternatives? "Art music" doesn't work, because you can have art rock music. What do we call it to distinguish it from rock/pop music?


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## Guest (Feb 14, 2014)

maestro267 said:


> What do we call it to distinguish it from rock/pop music?


When do you need to do such things?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

My rule is if 97% of the population is repelled by it, that's proof enough that it should be labeled "classical" music.


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## Berlioznestpasmort (Jan 24, 2014)

maestro267 said:


> I sometimes feel weird calling the whole "classical music" spectrum by that name. But then, what are the alternatives? "Art music" doesn't work, because you can have art rock music. What do we call it to distinguish it from rock/pop music?


"Serious Music" was used for a while, though I haven't heard it in a long time. Even saw it in a record store. I liked it for resolving the Classical/classical music confusion, but the term is too negative toward other forms of music, the "non-serious genres," to be seriously considered.

Off on a tangent: there is an interesting genre called "difficult music" - which _seems_ to be an evolution of (among others) some of the work Nico did in the 60s. The Youtube example attached may be of interest not only in and of itself, but for one listener's deeply felt response at the upper right of the screen.


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## Fortinbras Armstrong (Dec 29, 2013)

Some previous posters likened classical music to the pop music of its day. I would like to remind you of Sturgeon's Law. The science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon responded to the charge that 90% of science fiction was crud by observing that 90% of _everything_ is crud. Pop music, of any day, is one of the best examples.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

hpowders said:


> The general public subscribes to Zappa's opinion. Classical music belongs in a museum and was written by a bunch of irrelevant dead white people. Bunch of guys in wigs writing dull music for the elite. That's the stereotype.
> 
> Nothing we can do to change this ridiculous stereotype. If they were exposed to it the way we are and realized it's all about feelings that music can express more than any other art, they would change their minds, but we all know that's not going to happen.
> 
> ...


In defense of* Frank Zappa*, it is well known that he championed *Edgar Varese's *music. The article *Edgar Varese: Idol of my youth *appeared in a 1970s issue of *Stereo Review*. He also dug-up the music of (wig-wearing)* Francesco Zappa,* and recorded it with his Synclavier. Zappa liked *Webern, Stravinsky *(hear *Brown Shoes Don't Make It *for an excerpt),* Conlon Nancarrow *(for his rhythmic innovations, as did* Elliott Carter*), and knew *Pierre Boulez *personally.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

For me, classical music will always function to represent the forefront of musical thought. The growing influence of popular music and media is making all music into a commodity. "Art" will need to be seen as transcending these influences and ways of conveyance, and stand on its own merits. Consumers need to be flexible, inquisitive, and demanding. Human values are going to need to be important again, instead of everything being profit-based, in order for art to flourish.


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## Guest (Feb 14, 2014)

A few comments on various posts I have spotted above:

Most people I have ever encountered, regardless of their knowledge and interest in music, have a good idea what is meant by "classical music". I therefore see no need to seek out any different definition that might somehow be more appropriate. Terms like "art music" and "serious music" as possible substitutes have sometimes been used but they are not going to catch on in general as a substitute. 

There are very few people whose understanding of classical music is based solely on the narrow period known as the "classical style" or "classical era" (c 1750-1820). It is not a source of misunderstanding among people who know little about classical music, and it shouldn't be a problem for people who do have the knowledge. I therefore cannot fathom why this aspect regularly tends to be thrown in these discussions.

I gave up long ago even hinting to other people that I consider classical music to be superior to other kinds of music, as it tends to irritate them very badly. In my experience most people are not interested in talking about music of any description except maybe for a short chat but then only out of courtesy if I happen to raise the subject. Only very rarely has anyone ever raised with me the subject of music from a cold start position. I was once in this position many years ago because I had moved to a job where there happened to be some classical music buffs, but that was highly exceptional and nothing like it has ever happened since.

In fact, I do not think that classical music is superior to other forms of music. It is by far my favourite type of music, almost to the total exclusion of everything else that I once liked, but that does not make it superior. Just as there is no satisfactory way of ranking objectively the various composers, or pieces of music, there is no way of proving that any one major style of music (like classical) is superior to another. Classical may often be more complex, or more enduring, but none of this necessarily makes it superior in any objective way. It is purely our set of preferences that lead us to think this way. Just think about all the pop, jazz, rock, metal fans out there who far outnumber us. By comparison, classical music fans are a very tiny minority, and if it came to a general vote on which style is the best we would be out on our ears.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Taggart said:


> I've emphasised something in your post. The idea that Bach's church compositions were anything more than something to fill a sabbath to the glory of God or a way of making him money is precisely the romantic fallacy you describe in the subsequent paragraph.


To think he was devout and _happily_ writing them for "the glory of God" is another extreme romanticization of what was an assignment of _grunt work_ which the composer was far less delighted about than the music of those cantatas would tell you of through their sound... the composer was brilliant, and a complete professional who produced music like a machine spewing out 'product' when necessary.


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> Human values are going to need to be important again, instead of everything being profit-based, in order for art to flourish.


In order for _anything_ of value to flourish again, I think


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Taggart said:


> I find the concept of function and the idea of derivative or pastiche to be a romantic notion of pure art that simply does not hold water.
> 
> If one accepts that music written for a function, that is not original or derivative is *not* "classical music" then out goes all those Bach cantatas written for church performance, any mass written specifically for liturgical use, large chunks of Handel and so on an so forth. There is nothing wrong with having a specific purpose. The romantic notion of an artist pursuing his or her own vision is pretty but meaningless.
> 
> I couldn't care less whether a piece is a sublime work of art, pure and unsullied by any crass commercialism. What I want to know is does it sound good, does it meet what I expect from a piece of classical music in terms of musical structure (defined by period) and do I like it. if it meets the first two then it's classical, if it meets the third then it's good classical.


Yes and with Handel especially he tended to rehash (or cannibalise?) his own tunes, he did it a lot. Many of them did. Then there's the issue of how they plagiarised others' tunes (but before the concept of copyright, it was considered to be like a homage, and in terms of what we call 'world music' the situation remains, authorship is not a big deal, whilst tradition is).



science said:


> Just if I can be all idiosyncratic, to me there are two kinds of music: performer-centric, and composer-centric. Of course these are more like poles on a spectrum, but most kinds of music seem to cluster around one end or the other. "Classical" music is composer-centric, and so is film music and musical theater.... Folk and pop and and blues and so on are obviously performer-centric. I wish to emphasize that to me these are more like poles on a spectrum rather than absolute categories.


The spectrum idea is how I see it too.

In terms of film music, its highly controlled, even jazz scores are more notated than 'straight' jazz that's not done for film. Composing for film is a special skill basically because of the time factor. The finest composers know what to put at what point in time for the desired effect.

Another parallel is with the suites drawn from film scores, now it can't be denied they are classical (just like ballet suites, or suites from operas or incidental music). Maybe 'real' film scores - I mean straight from the film, not arranged into suites - can be disputed to be 'borderline' classical, but suites I think are by default classical. Or just by purpose - written for the concert hall, without the time limitations of the film soundtrack (look at reviews on amazon, people often complain that "this isn't the music I heard in the film" - well, it's not!).



FleshRobot said:


> Most of the greatest composers for film composed "absolute music" as well, and many soundtracks are enjoyed by people who have never even seen the movies where they come from, and some of them are considered great works of art.


That's right, some did it as a supplement to their main interest of 'straight' classical - for example Shostakovich, Walton, Bernstein, Copland, Korngold. Others specialised in it, eg. Herrmann, John Williams, Rota, Rozsa. The other thing is that some today are doing both film and incidental music, eg. Philip Glass, his String Quartet #2 was drawn from music composed for a Beckett play, 'Company.'

The big problem is that there has been a prejudice against film composers. Korngold effectively ruined his 'serious' classical career once he became a composer for Hollywood. Stravinsky didn't write a film score, probably for this reason, despite the studios wanting him to. Ironically Schoenberg begged them to be able to write a score, but they rejected him.

The other side to the coin is that some composers simply couldn't work for Hollywood, or do film music in general. The studio execs and bean counters would often have concerns at odds with the composer's vision, more about artistic expression than ticket sales. Bernstein didn't enjoy working in Hollywood so much that he never returned, but thank goodness he gave us _On The Waterfront _- one of his finest works. Even Walton, despite his successful partnership with Olivier in his Shakespeare films, was bitter in how his score for _The Battle of Britain _was replaced (or largely replaced) by that of another composer at the last minute, it had been recorded and was ready to go - but the studios pulled it for some reason.

Working in the film music industry could be brutal - Bernard Herrmann's falling out with Hitchcock is an example of this, Hitch couldn't get the budget that Herrmann wanted for a huge orchestra, so they split (ironically amongst Herrmann's final scores was the pared down jazzy one he did for _Taxi Driver_).

There is also this element of sour grapes, in that film music remained largely tonal, despite an atonal trend emerging the the 1960's in the genre. Eg. Herrmann's _Psycho_ and Goldsmith's _Planet of the Apes_. Some pundits said that atonal would be the main thing, but then you had younger composers emerging who just went on with tonal, like John Williams. Ultimately these things can and do coexist, film is just as a diverse artform as the other creative arts.



MacLeod said:


> What is classical for me? Most of the time, it's an irrelevant question. It only matters if I'm going to have a meaningful conversation with someone else where musical definitions are helpful to the discussion.
> 
> Otherwise, I just listen to music...


Yes, I tend not to think about this sort of 'fence building,' more about the connections. In any case its better to be more inclusive than less so - if you build fences between things they tend to multiply, and it can become a theoretical nightmare.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Fortinbras Armstrong said:


> Some previous posters likened classical music to the pop music of its day. I would like to remind you of Sturgeon's Law. The science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon responded to the charge that 90% of science fiction was crud by observing that 90% of _everything_ is crud. Pop music, of any day, is one of the best examples.


That's a great point.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

millionrainbows said:


> Human values are going to need to be important again, instead of everything being profit-based, in order for art to flourish.





TurnaboutVox said:


> In order for _anything_ of value to flourish again, I think


There has never in human history been more flourishing than there is right now!

We need to stop romanticizing the past. I don't know in which era we are supposed to think "human values" were more important than they are now, or in which era we are supposed to think art flourished more than it does now, but - unless "human values" means aristocratic privilege, serfdom, living in mortal fear of comets because we don't know what causes epidemics of disease or how to combat them except through fervent piety, having some people starve to death every time the weather doesn't go just right for us, or something like that - it doesn't matter which era is meant because in every past era almost everything was worse in almost every way than it is now.

So yeah, the abundance of museums, orchestras, jazz venues, folk music festivals, recorded music, informative lectures by world-class experts freely available on iTunes U or podcasts or youtube or whatever, art galleries in every city, generally increasing leisure time for most of us which we can choose to spend with our book discussion clubs and generally increasing wealth for most of us which we can choose to spend on tickets to the ballet, globalization bringing the musical traditions of Japan and India and Indonesia and Brazil and Nigeria and Turkey and Bulgaria and Ethiopia and Portugal and Argentina and Cuba and Kenya to a city near you - all of this is probably a horrible decline from an era... say... in which most people would only ever hear the music they made themselves, and only a small minority of people could afford to enjoy ("consume" even!) music performed by professional musicians with any frequency. This is true especially when we reflect that a lot of people put pink plastic flamingos in their front yards and put Thomas Kinkade calendars on their cubicle walls and wear baseball hats and listen to music in 4/4 time with almost uniformly predictable chord progressions and drink mediocre beer or even some corn syrupy carbonated concoction. In a world like this it is impossible for me to enjoy a cigar brought fresh to me from five thousand miles away or Pollini's Schubert or my corned beef and hash or Byzantine icons. This and early warning systems taking the fun out of tsunamis and hurricanes. Plus, we might eradicate polio soon and women around the world are increasingly able to pursue careers and leave abusive husbands. Capitalism ruins everything. Really, there's nothing for it but I have to jump off a building in order for human values to be important again.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
(just posting for the sake of it - sorry!  )


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

science said:


> ...globalization bringing the musical traditions of Japan and India and Indonesia and Brazil and Nigeria and Turkey and Bulgaria and Ethiopia and Portugal and Argentina and Cuba and Kenya to a city near you - all of this is probably a horrible decline from an era... say... in which most people would only ever hear the music they made themselves, and only a small minority of people could afford to enjoy ("consume" even!) music performed by professional musicians with any frequency. ....


That's a stimulating post, science. I'd like to respond in particular to this quote, because it ties in with my recent listening and reading.

I've just re-read Peter Sculthorpe's autobiography Sun Music (publ. 1999). In that, he reflects a lot on countries to Australia's north that have acted as stimuli and inspiration on many levels to his own music, as well as of Australian and international composers in general.

He made many attempts to go to Bali, but only got there to make a documentary for television in the early 1970's. By that time, he'd thought that the art of gamelan would be museum piece, that what was there would be watered down version of it for the tourists flooding in to the Indonesian province. But the reality was totally the opposite, income from tourism had made gamelan to flourish there. In the 1930's it had looked like the tradition would wind up, its practitioners ageing. But in the 1970's Sculthorpe was able to connect with, interview, hear and live with some of the finest composers for gamelan in Bali.

He took one of them, called Lotring, one of his own Sun Music pieces that had incorporated elements of gamelan in terms of sonority, rhythm and melody. He played it on tape to this master of gamelan. Sculthorpe said he was more nervous then than he had been before on the work's premiere. But Lotring was flattered that Sculthorpe had been influenced by his music in particular and gamelan in general. Feeding into the above debate about originality in Western classical music, Lotring said it was okay for Sculthorpe to take ideas from him because (this is the English translation in the book) "The more people copy from his ideas, the more happy he is. It means a lot of the people like his ideas."

I've just been listening to Japanese court music, Gagaku, and Sculthorpe also went to hear that and talk to its practitioners when he visited Japan. Its music that is ancient but sounds like many types of post-war musics. Sculthorpe incorporates his influences in a way that it sounds like Sculthorpe, so funnily enough I'd say Gagaku sounds more like (say) the Italian minimalist type composer Scelsi, although it is played on many instruments (I've only got his solo cello and double bass pieces, but that static feel is there).

What I'm saying is that Modernism appears to be too wound up on definitons and fences. This is all couched in ideology, you raise one Messiah or totem, that's "the future," then when that's done, you topple him and then comes another so-called "future." On it goes, one fad, technique, philosophy, aesthetic, all claiming to be "new" and "progress" and "the future."

Listening to gagaku, and also over the years my accumulating experiences with music, and also reading things like Sculthorpe's book bought a bit of an epiphany moment for me in recent weeks. I don't know if I can describe it well but the crux of it is this - Western classical music keeps reinventing the wheel, whilst other musics just try to balance tradition with progress or more accurately the living art of music. Its not about sudden leaps but gradual change.

Moreover, it isn't static. Gamelan is still a living art (there are composers of it still today, and Sculthorpe was the first Western composer invited by Balinese musicians to write music for traditional gamelan ensemble). So that's another layer to that tradition. Similar things can be said about other 'world musics' from African, to those of the Americas, to other parts of Asia, the wider Pacific region including Australia and so on. These are rich cultures, not concerned with trendy ideologies from ivory towers but about actual traditions, concerning their own world views, rituals and stories. Mind you, white colonialism didn't help this, and many times tried to wipe it out, but I won't go into detail on that here.

Bottom line is that the more I read about stuff like this its clear to me Modernism, its various kinds, don't answer questions, don't solve problems. They cause more problems and more divisions, in my opinion (and that of others more experted than me in music). They've led us up a blind alley. They are a dead end. Its not just the 20th century that this happened, but then it became more marked and more devastating. Just when so many classical composers reached out beyond the Western 'canon,' you had theorists and ideologes attempt to clamp down on what was permissible and what wasn't. All they do is support ideology, yet classical music itself risks haemmoraging and dying. The issue is that if it doesn't continue to be a living art, no amount of conceptual argument can revive it!

I'll finish this with a great quote in the book. It speaks to your opinions on the decay of feudal Europe, vestiages which lasted into the early 20th century, and I agree on the gist of your scathing comments about it. Anyway, the quote is by Gertrude Stein, whose opinion was that "the 20th century to be no longer European, perhaps because Europe is finished?" The way I read that, maybe European civilisation (as it was, or as some wish to see it preserved?) and classical music along with it is a museum. A splendid and enriching one no doubt, but I also wonder whether it is alive, or like some magnificent dead tomb?

Food for thought as regards to these unending Sisyphean and sometimes ugly debates on this forum - I've seen them for years! Only now can I see the light - and maybe if people still believe in some ideology good for them. Because for a while now I don't know what to believe. I don't believe in anything, I just have my interests, preferences, biases, tastes, etc. That's it.


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## LovroVonMatacic (Feb 16, 2014)

Classical music is spiritual bread to me. 
It can calm a person down when he's frustrated with the daily pains of life.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Doesn't have to be spiritual for me. Love Persichetti's piano sonatas. They simply put a smile on my face.
Sometimes, that's good enough!


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