# Has the thread run out?



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant. Sure, we have diverting composers like John Adams, who has done interesting things but generally not of great substance. And a lot of composers who seem more interested in the sounds of music than anything significant to communicate. And other composers whose efforts seem more related to the literary than the truly musical.

Please, tell me I‘m wrong and point out the exceptions that are keeping the music in this genre alive!


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

KenOC said:


> ...composers who seem more interested in the sounds of music...


Could you clarify?


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

"New music has degenerated to mere noise, bludgeoning our ears rather than caressing them."*

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

*Frederick the Great in 1777, quoted in James Gaines "Evening in the Palace of Reason"


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

Music from the classical tradition is not a part of mainstream culture anymore and probably never will be again. Nothing lasts forever. If that's what you mean by "says anything significant" then I guess you're right.

If we're actually talking about music, then the problem is you've lost the thread.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

isorhythm said:


> Music from the classical tradition is not a part of mainstream culture anymore and probably never will be again....


Was it ever? Classical music has always been appreciated by a small part of the population, although it is clearly getting smaller and that's been the trend for decades. When I was a kid classical was certainly more part of the culture, from movies, cartoons, and even church. Any art form requires new and fresh ideas to thrive; without it they become museum pieces and that's exactly what's going on in the classical arena. Of course this has been a debate for at least 100 years, and many performers, composers, and writers have been wringing their hands over it. As a listener I really have no desire to go hear the local orchestra play any symphony by Beethoven, Brahms, Tchaikovsky or others anymore. I've heard it all many times, thank you. But when they play some new, modern symphony I may marvel at the orchestral wizardry and the sounds they produce, but like KenOC I remain unmoved and uninvolved. You can't tap your toe to the tune (if there are any), and nothing sticks in the head. As a performer those older composers knew how to write idiomatically for instruments and playing them is fun and exciting. Playing some modern music is extremely difficult - composers ask for things that your instrument was never designed or intended for. It's ungratifying and you become apathetic. And you remain unmoved and the lack of emotional involvement is numbing.

This is not just a classical problem we must realize. Can anyone really believe that pop music today is better than the work of yesterday? Is there any songwriter who can come close the quality of Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Jerome Kern? Go back to the 60s and listen to the amazing work of Jimmy Webb or Bob Crewe. Today's pop music is horribly impoverished by comparison. The Beatles and even the Beach Boys had musical value that no Hip Hop artist can match. Even in Country/Western things have gone badly. The Golden Era of C/W is long gone replaced with mostly wannabe rock musicians who think putting on a cowboy hat and boots makes it country.

The last, best hope for classical or something close to it is in movie soundtracks - those composers, and there are some good ones, still create music that is exciting, emotional and orchestral based. But modern music for the concert is dead - no one cares.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Damn it, is any author going to write novels remotely like those of Fielding again? I'm sick of waiting.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Can't comment on the OP - but there are lots of good novelists working today, so cheer up, eugene. :cheers:


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Personally, I'm waiting for Alma Deutscher's atonal phase.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Manxfeeder said:


> Personally, I'm waiting for Alma Deutscher's atonal phase.


That would be excellent. And because they all despise her so much the avant-garde will turn to highly-tonal music.

Someone needs to have a word.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

*No it has not*

No it has not. I have been reading your complaints about this for years and no matter how many times we have provided to you examples that your observations are inaccurate you ignore them and a year later start up another thread with the same accusations. You want to go hide under rock because you believe no one composes the type on music you are familiar with, except Alma Deutscher, go right ahead. Most of us enjoy contemporary music, whether it is composed in a traditional or modern style.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

arpeggio said:


> ...Frankly I no longer give a damn what you think.


Seems to me, from your response, that you care quite a bit.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

So, I was re-reading _Tom Jones_ while listening to Shostakovich's Ninth Symphony when I was struck by the urge to check the Talk Classical Forum and found this thread.

I remain one who cherishes music that suggests something significant (though that "something" may be a purely subjective assumption) while realizing that much good, enjoyable music leaves profound philosophical probings far behind it. After all, if I want philosophy I can read Plato, or Kant, or Sartre. Or listen to Bach's B Minor Mass, or Beethoven's Ninth, or Tchaikovsky's Sixth. Yet, I would content that all the music I enjoy by Bach, Beethoven, and Tchaikovsky … and others, does not necessarily plumb the depths and scale the heights of human understanding, thought, wisdom, speculation, awareness. Some of it just sound darn good to me, and that's enough.

I can say that about Miles Davis, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, and Pierre Boulez, John Cage, and Iannis Xenakis. Still, I've been _moved_ by music by Miles Davis, the Beatles and the Stone, Boulez, Cage and Xenakis. Again, not all of it, but some.

Good composers are out there, and time will sort them out for lasting qualities. I'm not certain Bach and Beethoven were always appreciated in their times, or looked upon then with the reverence we hold them today.

I'm not certain every novel by Fielding inspires me. _The Female Husband_, which I re-read recently, first published anonymously, proved interesting but not mind-shattering. Nor have I ever been greatly bowled over by Shosty's Symphony No. 2, though I revisit it every now and then, usually through new recordings.

I don't yet contend that classical music is dead, any more than I would contend that the Baroque fugue died with the emergence of J.C. Bach and Joseph Haydn's classical era. After all, I have on my record shelves several volumes of Baroque fugues ready for listening enjoyment.

The important thing is that composers keep working, keep experimenting, keep moving forward. Or, that they keep looking backwards and building upon what is there, gazing into recessed corners to find shards of sound that haven't been yet fully exposed or explored. Wasn't it Schoenberg who insisted that there was still a great deal of good music to be written in the key of C Major? I, for one, am open to hearing it. And to hearing whatever else is out there to hear.

And, I think a lot of others are, too. After all, I see newbies appearing on this Forum all the time, folks eager to know more about what we term "classical music". Let us not disappoint them by suggesting that they have entered the "dead zone". Rather, let us present a living, breathing, still fresh and growing art form which, it seems, we all love deeply enough to spend time with. And, as I always remind myself, time is the necessary investment in the appreciation of music -- time which is taken from one's very life clock and can never be replaced. It _must _be an important thing if one will spend one's time on it. Not worth doing for "dead zone" stuff!

Ah … now I can get back to Jones and Shosty. Or, perhaps I'll take on Andrew Sean Greer's novel _Less_ while I listen to some John Luther Adams, Henry Threadgill, or maybe even Kendrick Lamar!


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

arpeggio said:


> No it has not. I have been reading your complaints about this for years and no matter how many times we have provided to you examples that your observations are inaccurate you ignore them and a year later start up another thread with the same accusations. You want to go hide under rock because you believe no one composes the type on music you are familiar with, except Alma Deutscher, go right ahead. Most of us enjoy contemporary music, whether it composed in a traditional or modern style.


Apparently you do. And the 'most of us enjoy contemporary music' is meaningless without a definition of contemporary music that everyone accepts. If it means what many people here have defined it as, then there is absolutely no proof re: the 'most of us'.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant. ..........................................
> 
> Please, tell me I'm wrong and point out the exceptions that are keeping the music in this genre alive!


You are wrong. Very wrong. There are a great many people who feel that a lot of music post-Shostakovich is as great or greater. I can provide a list and you will then say "no, that's just noise" and you will then point out that they don't enjoy mass audiences (yet) as Shostakovich does these days: among music I was listening to recently (and without thinking for a minute) I would count Kurtag, Benjamin and Birtwistle as being of the stature you refer to. I believe your position may be a Stalinist one!


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Those who think that classical music is vibrant and full of promise are living in a bubble. As many have said, CM has always been a minority genre, but, at least, when I was growing up, classical music had a presence in the general public in the form of movies where it was a subject and TV shows where classical artists performed. That’s all gone. 

The music programs seem to be turning out composers who aren’t interested in composing music that is accessible to those beyond the small circle that appears to like the output. And then, it seems that anything that doesn’t fit under popular music or jazz is being called classical music including anything that is sound for sound’s sake. Orchestras such as the Los Angeles Phil commission works that are played once to great fanfare and then never heard of again.

The fact is that very little classical music is being created that will grow classical music. On the contrary, the only thing keeping it alive in the community is pre-1950 music. Luckily, there is some new quality music that has value in keeping CM alive among the relatively few believers in CM that has substance, but it’s not enough to engender great excitement.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Enthusiast said:


> ... I believe your position may be a Stalinist one!


I see Ken more as a Churchill.


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## Room2201974 (Jan 23, 2018)

KenOC said:


> And a lot of composers who seem more interested in the sounds of music


Apparently you haven't heard that the hills are full it.

And...

Has someone been reading too much Charles Murray again?????


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> Apparently you do. And the 'most of us enjoy contemporary music' is meaningless without a definition of contemporary music that everyone accepts. If it means what many people here have defined it as, then there is absolutely no proof re: the 'most of us'.


Still banging the same drum.:lol:


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## Colin M (May 31, 2018)

Ingélou said:


> Can't comment on the OP - but there are lots of good novelists working today, so cheer up, eugene. :cheers:


 If one can't see the greatness and individual uniqueness of Ishiguro and McEwan there is a problem in perception in the modern novel... dead pool guess that McEwan snags the Nobel prize next...


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

In Shosty's Russia we have the genius of Schnittke, and Gubaidulina. Hardly insignificant music makers. And several major Polish composers in Lutoslawski, Panufnik, Bacewicz, and Penderecki. And so many others that probably don't appeal to your conservative tastes. I don't see Shostakovich as being the end of the line by a long shot. It's like saying there's no great jazz after Basie and Ellington.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Enthusiast said:


> ...I would count Kurtag, Benjamin and Birtwistle as being of the stature you refer to. I believe your position may be a Stalinist one!


Nonsense! However, I do believe that we should round up a good portion of our so-called composers, send them to the camps to be softened up a bit, and then ship them out to the Urals to assist in radiation experiments. :cheers:

_Pour encourager les autres_, of course!


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## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

Schnittke is almost as good as Shosti. 20th century modern music (whatever that means) happened, it is a reality and we should be glad for the variability. Classical music is not dead, it just evolved into new directions. Try to open your mind and embrace it


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> Still banging the same drum.:lol:


And you're still being provoked by it...


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

KenOC said:


> Nonsense! However, I do believe that we should round up a good portion of our so-called composers, send them to the camps to be softened up a bit, and then ship them out to the Urals to assist in radiation experiments. :cheers:


Along with being put in solitary confinement and forced to listen to their own stuff 24/7.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> And you're still being provoked by it...


Hardly. It's entertainment.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

The problem that a lot of commentators are missing is that there is no longer a public clamor for new classical music. Zero. No one waits champing at the bit to hear a new anything by any living composer. There was a time when people were fighting over who gets the first shot at the Shostakovich 7th. In old Vienna, news about who's conducting the opera or what a new symphony is like made front page news. Look at how many newspapers have divested themselves of music critics, classical reviews or anything. You can point out all you want how "great" some work by Schnittke is or how ground-breaking something by Babbitt or Carter is, but the truth remains: audiences don't want to hear it, they don't care about; orchestras don't want to play it and the conductors who want to are far and few between. Too many modern composers are so engrained in the academy that they don't care if there's an audience. The great composers of yesterday sometimes were subsidized, but many of them lived comfortably because people wanted their music, orchestras enjoyed playing it and it was new then.


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## Guest (Nov 1, 2018)

I listen mainly to contemporary music and I find almost everything I hear highly enjoyable. Perhaps KenOC could browse around the ongoing Exploring Contemporary Composers thread.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

shirime said:


> I listen mainly to contemporary music and I find almost everything I hear highly enjoyable. Perhaps KenOC could browse around the ongoing Exploring Contemporary Composers thread.


People often read what they want to read rather than what is written. For instance I never said I didn't enjoy contemporary (or any other) music. What I wrote was, "Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant."​


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## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

mbhaub said:


> The problem that a lot of commentators are missing is that there is no longer a public clamor for new classical music. Zero. No one waits champing at the bit to hear a new anything by any living composer. There was a time when people were fighting over who gets the first shot at the Shostakovich 7th. In old Vienna, news about who's conducting the opera or what a new symphony is like made front page news. Look at how many newspapers have divested themselves of music critics, classical reviews or anything. You can point out all you want how "great" some work by Schnittke is or how ground-breaking something by Babbitt or Carter is, but the truth remains: audiences don't want to hear it, they don't care about; orchestras don't want to play it and the conductors who want to are far and few between. Too many modern composers are so engrained in the academy that they don't care if there's an audience. The great composers of yesterday sometimes were subsidized, but many of them lived comfortably because people wanted their music, orchestras enjoyed playing it and it was new then.


this is a consequence of TV, radio, movies, internet, videogames etc. The classical music has to compete against all of it. Classical music will never be mainstream entertainment again, simply because there are so many other options. In the 19th century, the only options were to go to see the music live or to see opera or to see theather. So it will stay a niche market. People who are interested in it will find their way to it. The masses can consume their hip hop or whatever


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

KenOC said:


> What I wrote was, "Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant."​


Even Shostakovich wasn't thought all that significant at the time, not in the west at any rate since barely anyone knew about him or his music. When he did become known the opinions were, and remain, split (with jackasses like Boulez dismissing him).

Most listeners focus on well-entrenched works and Shostakovich has had time enough to become well-entrenched. Widespread classical listening is largely about listening to a well-known canon (as is jazz and pop actually) so it's hard for newer things to get a foothold.

The quote Taggart gave at the start sums it up; there's forever complaints that there's nothing new worth listening to and then music 20,30, 50 years after the complaints is in the concert programmes.


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## Resurrexit (Apr 1, 2014)

KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant. Sure, we have diverting composers like John Adams, who has done interesting things but generally not of great substance. And a lot of composers who seem more interested in the sounds of music than anything significant to communicate. And other composers whose efforts seem more related to the literary than the truly musical.


A valid question, and one tackled by Webster Young in his essay Can There be Great Composers Anymore?

"There are a number of reasons given to support this contention, the chief of which is that the styles of modern music have become so individual and idiosyncratic that there can no longer be general movements in music, and therefore no "influence" of one composer on another: there can only be iconoclasts....

In the end, the notion that "there simply cannot be great composers any more" would prove to be an illusion created by modernism, both directly and indirectly. Modernism and iconoclasm in music have by now shown themselves barren. The methods and ideals of the avant-garde have produced very little of lasting value in music in the last fifty years. The now century-old, superannuated avant-garde (a contradiction in terms) has, in the process, alienated audiences and ruined the economics for new music. As the modernist fog clears, a common practice in music-like that of the New Tonality now developing-will be reborn and recognized. If a neoclassical criticism can now also emerge, composers will once again build upon the past and upon each other's work, creating beautiful new melodies and nobly redefined forms. Eventually, a genius will appear who, like Mozart, will owe almost everything to those who went before him."


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

If the messages of contemporary composers seem insignificant compared to Shosty's, I'll confess that I think the same of most previous composers' as well. It's hard to think of anyone else who made composing seem so urgent and important.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Generally agree with the OP. Contemporary music feels like watching a movie with dazzling special effects, but you don't care to remember what the story was about. It can be as technically accomplished as hell, but feels sort of hollow for those familiar with the Classics.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

eugeneonagain said:


> The quote Taggart gave at the start sums it up; there's forever complaints that there's nothing new worth listening to and then music 20,30, 50 years after the complaints is in the concert programmes.


Well, 50 years ago was 1968. How much music written since then, and I ask seriously, is now "in the concert programs"? Have we ever had such a drought?


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant. ...


I'm not sure what you mean by "means anything significant." I'm one who believes that music does not convey meaning. Works I love, such as Beethoven 9, Mozart 41, and Brahms Violin Concerto, have no meaning whatsoever for me. I recognize technical musical aspects, and I find the music beautiful, captivating, powerful, etc.. But there's no meaning in the music. Did you have a special meaning for that phrase or did you simply mean that it's hard to find music that is beautiful, captivating, powerful, etc.?

I agree that fewer classical music listeners seem to like modern/contemporary music than earlier music. I would also agree that the percentage of such listeners who would look forward to hearing modern/contemporary works in concerts is significantly smaller than the percentage who look forward to earlier works.

I think there are many reasons for that change including that the music itself is likely more difficult to enjoy for those raised on tonal music. But I would like to ask KenOC and DaveM (and others who tend to view contemporary music less favorably), what do you personally wish contemporary composers would write? Do you wish they would write more Romantic works, Classical works, Baroque works? Do you wish they would write music similar to Romantic but with some slight changes such that the music is different but also remarkable?

I believe that composers felt they "had to" move away from Romantic music so the new music sounds distinctly different (e.g. lack of tonality, more dissonance, focus on timbre, etc.). Those who wish to enjoy the new music either simply do or else listen to become familiar with the new "languages." Those who do not wish to learn (i.e. put in the time and effort necessary) to enjoy the new music obviously do not have to do so. I'd be a bit shocked to learn that today's composers are not as good, in general, or better on average than composers of the past. They simply produce music different from the past and largely different from each other (as Resurrexit quoted Webster Young).


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

eugeneonagain said:


> Even Shostakovich wasn't thought all that significant at the time, not in the west at any rate since barely anyone knew about him or his music...


Shostakovich was _very _highly regarded in his country, the USSR, and famous/notorious in the West. He was on the cover of Time Magazine and his new works were eagerly anticipated. All that ended about 1948 with the start of the Cold War, the American purges, and a propaganda-driven campaign against anything and everything Communist. Those who were alive in the early 1950s will remember it well.

I'm wondering if there isn't a wider cultural change that militates against "significant" music. In particular, the values of the West have conquered most of the world now. But I remember a quote from a Soviet artist, while that entity still existed: "Here, nothing is possible but everything matters. In the West, everything is possible but nothing matters."


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## Rangstrom (Sep 24, 2010)

If you haven't found any post-Shostakovich music worth listening to, then you aren't trying very hard. Off the top of my head---Rzewski, Maw, W. Schuman, Holmboe, Simpson, Zwilich, Weinberg, Part, Penderecki, Gorecki...


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Rangstrom said:


> If you haven't found any post-Shostakovich music worth listening to, then you aren't trying very hard. Off the top of my head---Rzewski, Maw, W. Schuman, Holmboe, Simpson, Zwilich, Weinberg, Part, Penderecki, Gorecki...


Again, please read what I wrote, not what you evidently think I wrote.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

mmsbls said:


> ...But there's no meaning in the music. Did you have a special meaning for that phrase or did you simply mean that it's hard to find music that is beautiful, captivating, powerful, etc.?


The music has had special meaning for me (as opposed to the music having some kind of intrinsic meaning). The Brahms Violin Concerto was my primary introduction to CM as a young kid.



> But I would like to ask KenOC and DaveM (and others who tend to view contemporary music less favorably), what do you personally wish contemporary composers would write? Do you wish they would write more Romantic works, Classical works, Baroque works? Do you wish they would write music similar to Romantic but with some slight changes such that the music is different but also remarkable?


Something like the latter would have been a darn sight better than music without melody or music that just throws a lot of sounds at you (as much experimental stuff does) as if that is what practically anyone wants to hear. Not to mention that you could schedule music like it on programs with a straight face.



> I believe that composers felt they "had to" move away from Romantic music so the new music sounds distinctly different (e.g. lack of tonality, more dissonance, focus on timbre, etc.). Those who wish to enjoy the new music either simply do or else listen to become familiar with the new "languages." Those who do not wish to learn (i.e. put in the time and effort necessary) to enjoy the new music obviously do not have to do so. I'd be a bit shocked to learn that today's composers are not as good, in general, or better on average than composers of the past. They simply produce music different from the past and largely different from each other...


When it comes to contemporary/experimental music that has no melody and limited or no orchestration then these composers haven't proven any skill remotely comparable to composers of the past. It takes particular skill to come up with a melody and develop it, not mention orchestrating for all the instruments of the orchestra.


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

Phil loves classical said:


> Generally agree with the OP. Contemporary music feels like watching a movie with dazzling special effects, but you don't care to remember what the story was about. It can be as technically accomplished as hell, but feels sort of hollow for those familiar with the Classics.


The cream of the classics have risen to the top; not so with contemporary music as we are still in the process of sifting. You could probably say the same thing about any era, where a lot of composers are "technically accomplished as hell, but feels sort of hollow for those familiar with the Classics."

Anyway, while I completely disagree with the idea that music has to mean something to be important (Stravinsky is one of my very favourite composers, for example), one contemporary composer who does get inspiration from external ideas and events is Brett Dean. Some of my favourite works by him are the piece for 12 cellos *12 Angry Men*; the violin concerto *The Lost Art of Letter Writing*, which is based on letters written by Brahms, Hugo Wolf and Ned Kelly (and won the Grawemeyer Award for Music); *Koramov's Fall*, based on Vladimir Komarov's death; and one of my favourite operas, *Bliss,* based on the Peter Carey novel.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

*classical music is alive*

mmsbls,

Over the years many of us have provided examples of performances where avant-garde type works have been well received by the audience. Like the time I attended a performance of a Cage work that received a standing ovation.

We have also provided examples of many contemporary composers like Mark Camphouse who composes in a very tonal style. Music like his _Watchman Tell Us of the Night_ does everything these naysayers claim contemporary music does not do.

Yet no matter what proof we may provide, every six months or so KenOC starts one of his classical music is dead threads.

This is the only classical music forum that I participate where these types of discussions occur. This is also the only classical music forum that I participate in that I am compelled to maintain an "ignore" list.

Even if it violates the TOS I think we have a right to tell the classical music is dead crowd that their observations are inaccurate, redundant and boring


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

DaveM said:


> Something like the latter would have been a darn sight better than music without melody or music that just throws a lot of sounds at you (as much experimental stuff does) as if that is what practically anyone wants to hear. Not to mention that you could schedule music like it on programs with a straight face.


I guess the question is whether a particular style can sustain itself for 100 or 200 years or more. I suppose it could, but most people I know like the fact that classical moved on from Renaissance, Baroque, and Classical. I'm wondering if the experts (i.e. classical composers) believe continuing the Romantic style (even with modifications) would have been tenable. In other words, composers desire to create something new and wonderful. Do contemporary composers feel that they can actually create something new without deviating much from the Romantic style? I'd be rather interested in a discussion by the experts on that topic.



DaveM said:


> When it comes to contemporary/experimental music that has no melody and limited or no orchestration then these composers haven't proven any skill remotely comparable to composers of the past. It takes particular skill to come up with a melody and develop it, not mention orchestrating for all the instruments of the orchestra.


I won't include experimental since many who love contemporary music aren't enamored with much of that music. I'm not a musician and don't have a feel for the difficulty in composing various styles. Melody is one aspect of music that presumably takes talent to create. There are presumably many other aspects that take great talent as well. I mentioned that I'd be very surprised if today's composers are not essentially as good as those from the past (maybe better given the increased numbers, better training, and access to enormous databases of music). I think the composers simply desire to create something different than you prefer. Ten years ago I would have had very similar thoughts as you do now although I always assumed today's composers are as good as those from the past.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

arpeggio said:


> This is the only classical music forum that I participate where these types of discussions occur. This is also the only classical music forum that I participate in that I am compelled to maintain an "ignore" list.
> 
> Even if it violates the TOS I think we have a right to tell the classical music is dead crowd that their observations are inaccurate, redundant and boring


Is some unseen force causing you to read these threads? It's usually possible to figure out the subject matter from the title alone. Why would anyone bother with a subject they consider to be boring?


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

arpeggio said:


> mmsbls,
> 
> Over the years many of us have provided examples of performances where avant-garde type works have been well received by the audience. Like the time I attended a performance of a Cage work that received a standing ovation.
> 
> ...


I very rarely view other forums, but my understanding is that there certainly were forums where modern/contemporary music was routinely criticized. Still you know I generally agree with your sentiments. I do disagree with the last paragraph and not because of the ToS. One can easily attempt to refute any claims while being polite.

Since I used to strongly dislike modern music, I understand many of the comments and feelings expressed by those who find such music horrible, useless, or worse. What _are_ those composers thinking in creating such awful sounds? Why would anyone wish to write music that almost everyone hates?

Having made the transition from disliking almost all modern music to liking/loving much of it, I think it's useful to try to convey that it's possible to enjoy and even love modern music, that the music itself is different but not so different as to be a different type of music, and that composers are doing much of what they did in the past with obviously different results. I think it's useful to discuss with those posting negatively about the music but also to post so that those who might feel that way but do not post might read my and others' views.

Old classical music is wonderful. Middle classical music is wonderful. New classical music is wonderful. I'm so glad I learned to enjoy the new so I can have so much more, and different, music to hear. I think if even a few people can read what I and others say about the new music and maybe be more open to leaning the new language, that would be a good thing.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

mmsbls said:


> I guess the question is whether a particular style can sustain itself for 100 or 200 years or more. I suppose it could, but most people I know like the fact that classical moved on from Renaissance, Baroque, and Classical. I'm wondering if the experts (i.e. classical composers) believe continuing the Romantic style (even with modifications) would have been tenable. In other words, composers desire to create something new and wonderful. Do contemporary composers feel that they can actually create something new without deviating much from the Romantic style? I'd be rather interested in a discussion by the experts on that topic.
> 
> I won't include experimental since many who love contemporary music aren't enamored with much of that music. I'm not a musician and don't have a feel for the difficulty in composing various styles. Melody is one aspect of music that presumably takes talent to create. There are presumably many other aspects that take great talent as well. I mentioned that I'd be very surprised if today's composers are not essentially as good as those from the past (maybe better given the increased numbers, better training, and access to enormous databases of music). I think the composers simply desire to create something different than you prefer. Ten years ago I would have had very similar thoughts as you do now although I always assumed today's composers are as good as those from the past.


You may be right that it was inevitable that continuing the Romantic period indefinitely may have been untenable. And I also accept the premise that composers wanted to branch out into something new. But I stand by my perspective that the end result -which at its worst requires some sort of educational effort on a level never before required in order to enjoy it- of dwindling audiences and almost total dependence on the older music to sustain any interest in the CM genre by general audiences.

Of course, there is an audience for contemporary music and all the more power to people who like it. I'm just addressing the broader question of the future of classical music that the OP raises.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

KenOC said:


> I'm wondering if there isn't a wider cultural change that militates against "significant" music.


Do you consider Bach's keyboard suites significant, in the way you mean here?

Also, is religious music significant in this way, or is that something else?

I'm not sure I understood what you were getting at.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Rangstrom said:


> If you haven't found any post-Shostakovich music worth listening to, then you aren't trying very hard. Off the top of my head---Rzewski, Maw, W. Schuman, Holmboe, Simpson, Zwilich, Weinberg, Part, Penderecki, Gorecki...


Just for kicks, I looked up how often each composer you listed was programmed by the 40 or so major US orchestra in 2016-2017. The database has 4,096 entries, each representing one concert or series of concerts; the concert may be repeated two or three times, but those repeats are not counted here. Anyway, composer and times programmed:

Rzewski, 0 times programmed
Maw, 0
W. Schuman, 1
Holmboe, 0
Simpson, 0
Zwilich, 0
Weinberg, 2
Part, 6
Penderecki, 1
Gorecki, 0

Obviously, the US orchestra world is not falling all over itself in anxiety to hear the music of these composers! I am a bit familiar with the music of most of them and offer:

Rzewski, mostly piano music, and I enjoy what I've heard.
Maw, no clue, a name new to me.
W. Schuman, too dry for me and sounds a bit academic for my taste.
Holmboe, neither his symphonies nor his string quartets interest me much.
Simpson, I really hoped to like him and collected all his symphonies and quartets. Didn't work.
Zwilich, I haven't heard.
Weinberg, I have quite a collection but generally find him to be low-grade ore.
Part, leads in performances and rightly so. We need more like him, but that seems unlikely.
Penderecki, very good, but too much of an effort for the reward (for my ears).
Gorecki, aside from his 3rd Symphony, which palled rather quickly, not too much of interest for me.

Of all these, I think Part and possibly Gorecki may be the ones who are remembered for "significant" works. Of course, they have some things in common, which is interesting.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

*Excersize in Futility*



mmsbls said:


> I very rarely view other forums, but my understanding is that there certainly were forums where modern/contemporary music was routinely criticized. Still you know I generally agree with your sentiments. I do disagree with the last paragraph and not because of the ToS. One can easily attempt to refute any claims while being polite.
> 
> Since I used to strongly dislike modern music, I understand many of the comments and feelings expressed by those who find such music horrible, useless, or worse. What _are_ those composers thinking in creating such awful sounds? Why would anyone wish to write music that almost everyone hates?
> 
> ...


It is true that the late Amazon forum had its problems.

Although classical music may be in decline in parts of the United States, it seems to be doing well in Europe and Asia. From the sources I am familiar with it appears that the causes are more related to economics rather than the aesthetics of Cage.

I remember reading an article in the Washington Post that the National Symphony hired a marketing firm to determine what they could do to increase attendance. They determined two factors that adversely effected the National Symphony. One is that the Kennedy Center has a lousy location and, second, it is very expensive to attend. I have mentioned this before in other threads.

It seems that there is a faction here that believes that classical music is dying and that the main culprits are contemporary composers and the people who follow contemporary music. So far they have denied any documentation that we have provided to prove otherwise. Even your enlightened explanations.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

KenOC said:


> Just for kicks, I looked up how often each composer you listed was programmed by the 40 or so major US orchestra in 2016-2017.


I am glad to report that there is a very active classical music world outside of the US and it's 40 or so major orchestras.

"Just for kicks", here is an additional list of composers who have been successfully active since Shostakovich, perhaps you are familiar with some of them...

Michael Tippett
George Lloyd
James MacMillan
Jennifer Higdon
Hans Abrahamsen
Peter Maxwell Davies
Thomas Ades
William Bolcom
Lennox Berkeley
Alberto Ginastera
William Mathias
Ned Rorem
Joly Braga Santos
Graham Waterhouse


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

isorhythm said:


> Do you consider Bach's keyboard suites significant, in the way you mean here?


An interesting question! I guess we have to depend on "significance by acclamation" which certainly argues for their significance. But in the 19th century, they would have been dismissed by most as mechanical exercises and not significant at all. Were People wrong then? Have we gotten smarter? Or is it all a matter of fashion, like hemlines?



isorhythm said:


> Also, is religious music significant in this way, or is that something else?


Not sure about this, but I notice that both recent composers I cited in my previous post as likely to be "significant" are deeply religious, as are many of their works. Most of us today are as Dvorak described Brahms: We believe nothing.



isorhythm said:


> I'm not sure I understood what you were getting at.


I think my idea was that "great" works may be best created in adversity. But there are so many exceptions!


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## Guest (Nov 2, 2018)

KenOC said:


> People often read what they want to read rather than what is written. For instance I never said I didn't enjoy contemporary (or any other) music. What I wrote was, "Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant."​


What does the sound that music has actually mean? What makes that meaning significant or insignificant? I don't really understand the criteria. Personally, aside from a small handful of works, there's not much Shostakovich I enjoy as much as other composers. I've never really thought about anything 'meaning something significant.'


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

For Górecki alone, post-Shostakovich, there have been close to 400 performances of his works since April of 2001, including by major orchestras such as the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra of London in 2018. I would hardly consider 400 a poor representation. One has to search in the right places for performances around the world or the information can be misleading:

http://www.musicsalesclassical.com/composer/performances/Henryk-Mikolaj-Górecki/100/1


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Becca said:


> I am glad to report that there is a very active classical music world outside of the US and it's 40 or so major orchestras.
> 
> "Just for kicks", here is an additional list of composers who have been successfully active since Shostakovich, perhaps you are familiar with some of them...


Unfortunately, I have no information on (for instance) how many times the composers you list were performed, Some are performed reasonably often in the US -- especially Higdon, Tippett (not a modern composer really), and Bolcom (I hope, anyway). But I could supply a list of a hundred composers performed in the US in the last couple of years, mostly "premieres," whose pieces will never be heard again. That's more often the case than not. It seems quite a meaningless exercise.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Classical Music isn't what it used to be. Jazz isn't what it used to be. Nor Country and Western. Or Pop, or Rock. Art. A vastly increased global population, linked instantaneously via electronics, capable of being exposed to both everything and to myriad short-lived micro-trends that come and go with the speed of cosmic rays. A time where, in the arts, everything is possible, probable, certain, happening somewhere. The pie now is enormous, and it is sliced into a near-infinite number of slices. People used to larger slices are disappointed. Brownian motion. The New Stasis. It will remain this way for the foreseeable future, until/unless some enormously powerful entity--cultural, religious, ideological--imposes a new paradigm upon a great part of the world. We may not like that new paradigm. Find what you like amid the white noise of The New Stasis and enjoy it, as it will likely be preferable to the possible alternatives.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

KenOC said:


> But I could supply a list of a hundred composers performed in the US in the last couple of years, mostly "premieres," whose pieces will never be heard again. That's more often the case than not. It seems quite a meaningless exercise.


What about the hundreds, even thousands of pieces composed from (e.g) 1800 to 1900 which have long since slipped into oblivion?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Becca said:


> What about the hundreds, even thousands of pieces composed from (e.g) 1800 to 1900 which have long since slipped into oblivion?


That's certainly the case. But I can think of no prior 50-year period that had so few additions to the performing repertoire within its confines as the most recent half-century. We are getting, effectively, almost no "new music" with an appeal beyond just a few people.


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## Rangstrom (Sep 24, 2010)

Kenoc--I doubt that you want to change your mind, but it seems sad that you find so much glorious music uninspiring. Your loss. I do know that if I had to listen solely to works heavily programmed by American symphony orchestras, I would be extremely bored. Beethoven's 7th may be my favorite symphony but I probably don't give it a spin more than 2 or 3 times a year.

Maw wrote an amazing symphony and a lovely opera. Rzewski's The People United is one of the finest set of variations for piano that I've ever had the pleasure to hear (both live and on 5 recordings). I listen to the Simpson symphonies every year (thank you Hyperion) with growing appreciation each time. Actually just listen to the Rzewski, it couldn't hurt.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Rangstrom said:


> Maw wrote an amazing symphony and a lovely opera. Rzewski's The People United is one of the finest set of variations for piano that I've ever had the pleasure to hear (both live and on 5 recordings). I listen to the Simpson symphonies every year (thank you Hyperion) with growing appreciation each time. Actually just listen to the Rzewski, it couldn't hurt.


As I wrote (clearly I thought) I enjoy Rzewski's music. The People United is among his music that I enjoy. Simpson, however, is a vast disappointment. His music seems, ultimately, cold and without human meaning.


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## Guest (Nov 2, 2018)

Unfortunately I am still unclear what is meant by 'meaning' and what makes some music have more 'significance' than others in that regard.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Becca said:


> What about the hundreds, even thousands of pieces composed from (e.g) 1800 to 1900 which have long since slipped into oblivion?


I believe that had more to do with the fact that the number of composers and new works being composed did not have an effective outlet for exposure, there being only so many orchestras and concerts and no recordings. The vibrant on-going recording of previously relatively unknown music from composers of the 19th century is testimony to the quality of all those 'pieces'.

One of many possible examples:


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## Rangstrom (Sep 24, 2010)

Ok Ken, help me understand--why doesn't The People United meet your criterion of "significant"?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Larkenfield said:


> Górecki listed at zero performance? For Górecki alone, post-Shostakovich, there have been close to 400 performances of his works since April of 2001, including by major orchestras such as the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra of London in 2018...


Yes, I was kind of surprised at the Górecki numbers, but I only have a US database -- I don't know of an international one. From your link, I see quite a few performances internationally -- mostly his _3rd Symphony_ and his _Pieces in the Old Style_. His US performances appear limited to some decidedly minor orchestras (Fargo???) but that's probably a coincidence. I think he (or his 3rd Symphony) is more popular here than his numbers indicate.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Rangstrom said:


> Ok Ken, help me understand--why doesn't The People United meet your criterion of "significant"?


Here we go again. Where did I say that anything Rzewski wrote isn't "significant"? I certainly didn't affirm that it _is _significant, but you can do that if you like. You have my blessing!​


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

This is a fun thread! So many opinions; some valid, some not so much. If you haven't, get a copy of Henry Pleasant's 60-year old book, "The Agony of Modern Music". It will shed a great deal of light on many comments above. When I first read it 40 years ago I thought he was dead wrong. Now, given much more experience and listening, I think he was mostly right.


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## Andolink (Oct 29, 2012)

I could list here 10 or 15 living composers who I view as "vital and important"; composers everyone interested in the future of classical music should pay attention to, but what would be the point. KenOC and his acolytes on this site would just say "Nope. You're wrong".

So I just stay out of these pointless debates.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Resurrexit said:


> ..."There are a number of reasons given to support this contention, the chief of which is that the styles of modern music have become so individual and idiosyncratic that there can no longer be general movements in music, and therefore no "influence" of one composer on another: there can only be iconoclasts....


Perhaps this is the crux of the matter. The power of classical music lies in the conventions that have been developed and agreed in times before. The composer has an idea of these conventions, as do the listeners. So his works call forth a multitude of extra-musical ideas, thoughts of pastoral life, of struggle, of praise of God or royalty, whatever. In a sense, music is a common language within a culture.

The fragmentation of musical language, the invention of new styles and fashions, destroys the bond between the composer and the listener, since there are no conventions that they share. The composer speaks in one language, the audience listens in another. Listeners may say, "But if I try very hard I can figure this out." All very fine, but the joy of music seems far removed from that sort of tedious slog.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Andolink said:


> I could list here 10 or 15 living composers who I view as "vital and important"; composers everyone interested in the future of classical music should pay attention to, but what would be the point. KenOC and his acolytes on this site would just say "Nope. You're wrong".
> 
> So I just stay out of these pointless debates.


Well of course, what you or I think is irrelevant. Ultimately the music will survive or, like most music, will sink into unremembered oblivion. What we _want _to happen really doesn't matter a whit. So who are you placing your bets with?


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

I have been thinking about this and it seems that I should have never gotten involved with this thread.

Even if we think KenOC and his acolytes are wrong, they should be allowed to have their contemporary music stinks thread.

I have gotten irritated when people try to derail contemporary music threads. It appears I am doing the same thing here. Sorry about that.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I think a living composer should compose a piece setting some of the most apoplectic rants against the music of today. It could make a fine piece. I don't know if the singer would spit out works like "it's all just meaningless noise" or "they just spit out ugly sounds at you" (not intended as actual quotes from a thread but I may have accidentally stumbled on someone's words) in a ranting way or sing them in a deeply melodious one with nursery rhyme harmonies. Both could work.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I remember from back in my twenties a discussion with a new friend (well, he turned out not to be a friend at all) who hated classical music and wanted to ridicule me for listening to some of it. Because he hated it he didn't really listen to it so all he had heard was little snippets (which he would caricature) or, if he did happen to listen to a good part of a piece, he would declare it to be like cheap film music or would yawn ostentatiously or would do a skit of a waltzing fop. There was no answer to him. He thought his hard rock was more gritty and real and profound (and didn't even acknowledge that I had tastes in both camps) and I just had to leave him to his very limited tastes. As listening to music was an important part of his life, I feel he missed a lot. 

I often think about the conversations I had with him when I see threads like this. The views being expressed here against our living music see analogous to his views about classical music of the past. And both also come with some passion to deny the value of something that has not appealed to them.


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## Marinera (May 13, 2016)

For me the thread haven't run out: Arvo Part, Philip Glass, Dalbavie, Morton Feldman and when in the right mood slightly abrasive textured music from Gerard Grisey, but without vocals only, like Les Espaces Acoustiques and not his other album Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil. I don't like when music is eerily unsettling, and Grisey's vocal works run towards that end of the spectrum. 

Depends on what thread you are looking for, I suppose.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

KenOC said:


> Shostakovich was _very _highly regarded in his country, the USSR, and famous/notorious in the West. He was on the cover of Time Magazine and his new works were eagerly anticipated. All that ended about 1948 with the start of the Cold War, the American purges, and a propaganda-driven campaign against anything and everything Communist. Those who were alive in the early 1950s will remember it well.


Quite a few of the composers you deride have also been held up in mainstream media as notable or great. The latest example was a long documentary about British composer, George Benjamin, on the BBC - making very strong claims about his importance and popularity. The cold war actually also gave Shostakovich added profile in the West with many believing him to be a Soviet dissident so that when he visited the States people campaigned to encourage him to make a break for freedom. That sort of thing gets you in the news! He was an icon from "freedom" who also composed music that "people could understand" - and strangely few explored the link between the oppression he was seen to suffer from with the resulting forced easy accessibility of his music.

My mother who was an amateur cellist with fairly normal tastes for her time (but fairly open ears - she loved the Bartok quartets) was appalled and fascinated by the apparent banality of the 1st Cello Concerto, although she like the 5th symphony. But, no, I think back in the 60s there were many who thought Shostakovich was going nowhere. Some were avant gardists (many attacked Shostakovich - not just Boulez, Bartok had in his day, too) but others were people who felt that the tradition had died with him.



KenOC said:


> I'm wondering if there isn't a wider cultural change that militates against "significant" music. In particular, the values of the West have conquered most of the world now. But I remember a quote from a Soviet artist, while that entity still existed: "Here, nothing is possible but everything matters. In the West, everything is possible but nothing matters."


I am shocked at this passage! There may indeed be a wider cultural change that militates against significant music! Your posts on this subject and those of you acolytes are surely prime examples of this! Can you really not see that?


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## eljr (Aug 8, 2015)

mbhaub said:


> This is a fun thread! So many opinions .


But people often don't realize that it is their opinion.... they post as if their perspective is fact.

We humans are a very arrogant bunch.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Again, please read what I wrote, not what you evidently think I wrote.


Well I am remain unclear as to what your OP is actually saying.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

KenOC said:


> Well of course, what you or I think is irrelevant. Ultimately the music will survive or, like most music, will sink into unremembered oblivion. What we _want _to happen really doesn't matter a whit. So who are you placing your bets with?


That's true although I think many composers compose for (or, rather, _in response to_) *now *even if they have dreams of posterity. But I wanted to ask you a question prompted by your naming Shostakovitch as the end of the line.

Shostakovich was of course a composer who held an important place among the creators of new music for most of his long life. But he was not alone. There were several others although many didn't live as long as he did. He went his own way (or Stalin's way, if you will) and it is harder than it is for many other composers to relate his music to other music being written at the same time. So my question is: what other music of the period, say, between the 1930s and the 1960s do you also revere? Do you see Shostakovich standing out in an already declining musical universe? Or do you see him as one of many greats (Bartok, Stravinsky, Berg, Prokofiev, Britten, Schoenberg, Strauss etc) who somehow failed to give rise to a following generation?

I think your answer to this might help us to come up with more helpful or understanding responses to your OP.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

KenOC said:


> Unfortunately, I have no information on (for instance) how many times the composers you list were performed, Some are performed reasonably often in the US -- especially Higdon, Tippett (not a modern composer really), and Bolcom (I hope, anyway). But I could supply a list of a hundred composers performed in the US in the last couple of years, mostly "premieres," whose pieces will never be heard again. That's more often the case than not. It seems quite a meaningless exercise.


Well it was you who initiated the exercise, presumably to prove some point. Plus you ignored the fact, and Becca's point, that much music is programmed outside the US, which is not really a Mecca of contemporary listening anyway, or the yardstick for measuring worldwide musical tastes.

Your dismissal of Weinberg as 'low-grade ore' tells me that your claim to be actually listening to such composers and their music is either false, superficial or simply reveals your actual tastes to be just pre-modern. Otherwise I can't fathom any other reason for starting so many threads with the same, tired premise.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

shirime said:


> Unfortunately I am still unclear what is meant by 'meaning' and what makes some music have more 'significance' than others in that regard.


I think you hit the crux of where the argument lies. A lot of contemporary music is robbed of musical context in my opinion. It was meant to be more open to interpretation, but most listeners want to be shown what the composer is saying, rather than it saying whatever the listener is feeling like ink blots. How can an ink blot compare with a Monet, etc.


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## Rangstrom (Sep 24, 2010)

Classical music is--and probably always was--a niche market. It may even be shrinking in the face of untold riches--concerts, radio broadcasts, audio recordings, video recordings, streaming, you-tube, but it will survive and a select few new compositions will be deemed significant and will be studied and enjoyed by those that follow. It is hard to see while it is happening. When I first started following classical music seriously (the late 60s), Mahler was considered an esoteric outlier. No one would have predicted the crazy number of conductors recording all of his symphonies that we have today. 

Kudos to anyone willing to put the time and effort into exploring the output of living composers (a niche within a niche). I find the effort is rewarded by discovering compositions that will be considered significant and maybe mainstream programmable down the road. But it takes time. It took Bach 100 years, Vivaldi even longer and even Mahler needed 50+ years.

Unfortunately I don't see how to profitably continue with this discussion until the OP graces us with what he means by significant.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Phil loves classical said:


> A lot of contemporary music is robbed of musical context in my opinion. It was meant to be more open to interpretation, but most listeners want to be shown what the composer is saying, rather than it saying whatever the listener is feeling like ink blots. How can an ink blot compare with a Monet, etc.


Interesting ... but I am not sure what you mean. I am not sure what Mozart was trying to say in his time and am only aware of Beethoven's and Schubert's "messages" to the extent that we know what they thought about some of the events and institutions of their time. Very possibly, we are imposing our (probably anachronistic) ideas about these onto their music - which is, of course, easier with Beethoven (some of whose music can sound angry) than Schubert (who actually risked imprisonment for "political crimes").

With Shostakovich there is a never ending debate about the extent to which he was a secret dissident, about how political and how patriotic he was. Some use one position or other to lead them into the music and feel they understand better because of the context that they imagine or believe is the true one. There were a few composers who were openly Marxist during the 1920s and 30s and, again, in the 60s and 70s.

We see some other composers are painting pictures of nature (Sibelius?) or architecture (Bruckner) but were they? Throughout history I think it has been far more common for composers to claim that the "meaning" of their music, if it exists at all, cannot be expressed in words and that if it could then they would not have written the music.

Even the blot vs Monet example that you give is really just about figurative vs. abstract art - not really meaning of context and not really about what an artist is trying to say. Indeed Benton - who "taught" Jackson Pollock would - start his (figurative) works with abstract patterns that for him captured rhythms and would go on to develop these as elaborate scenes involving people and places. Pollock took an opposite approach for quite a while, starting with a figurative scene and then making it abstract.

Anyway, I often feel a closer understanding of context and message in music written in my time than I do of older music. This is probably an illusion!

Sorry, I didn't mean to go on so long - I just wonder what you meant?


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

Could you say explicitly what you think the relationship is between number of performances and significance?


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> ... Otherwise I can't fathom any other reason for starting so many threads with the same, tired premise.


I thought it was entertainment. I read these complaints about these threads by the same few and yet they keep showing up in them and, in spite of them, the threads themselves are some of the most popular in the forum. Which probably has to do somewhat with the fact that people get fired up about their position and, in the end, that's why many take part in forums to begin with.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Phil loves classical said:


> I think you hit the crux of where the argument lies. A lot of contemporary music is robbed of musical context in my opinion. It was meant to be more open to interpretation, but most listeners want to be shown what the composer is saying, rather than it saying whatever the listener is feeling like ink blots. How can an ink blot compare with a Monet, etc.


Another interpretation of what Phil is saying here is that the hierarchical structure of most music, with its balancing of fulfilling and thwarting expectations of what is to come (see Leonard Meyer's several books on this) leads people (most people) to being shown what the composer is saying, musically. When music abandoned or abandons this hierarchical structure and turns away from tonality and towards serialism, aleatory, other avant-garde techniques that minimize the role of expectation fulfilled/denied, then most listeners are left with the ink blot and not the Monet.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> I thought it was entertainment. I read these complaints about these threads by the same few and yet they keep showing up in them and, in spite of them, the threads themselves are some of the most popular in the forum. Which probably has to do somewhat with the fact that people get fired up about their position and, in the end, that's why many take part in forums to begin with.


It _is_ entertainment. I'm not particularly worried about it, just playing the game. I know that I'm going to meet you here, moaning about how horrible all music post-1900 is and I can't resist it.

You only cheat yourself with your reactionary views. As mmsbls has shown it's possible to become appreciative of newer music with some actual effort. Also, as he rightly points out, it's not all about avant-garde listening, very little in fact.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

Classical music was part of the mainstream of American music through the 1950s, even into the 1970s. There were lots of early TV programs in the 1950s that featured classical music and popular songs like "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes," originally from the 1930s but renewed often by singers into the 1950s, and "Cara Mia," a hit in both my dad's time and mine, were created from classical music themes. The Lawrence Welk Show, which ran on independent and network TV through the 1970s, often included classical music bits.

Even into the 1980s some cable channels like Arts & Entertainment and Ovation regularly featured classical music programming. Now about the only place you can see it is on public television -- and not very often. Even the Arts Channel from the Lloyd Rigler Foundation, which broadcast classical selections 24/7 without advertising, has gone strictly to streaming and departed broadcast television.

When I started collecting recordings in earnest about 1970 the industry was thriving. I agree it was never a large part of the American music scene but it was far better off than its become in the intervening 40-50 years. 

The one part of "classical" music that has thrived, and probably increased, is film music which now regularly takes its place on orchestral subscription concerts. But I don't think most classical music fans think of film music like they think of a Beethoven symphony or Brahms concerto. I saw lots of "Harry Potter" film music played by my high school's band at this year's halftime of football games, so it is clearly crossover music, not what some people used to call "serious" music.

I think there are a lot of reasons for the decline but none more important than the music itself. There hasn't been a piece of classical music that took the world by storm and created millions of new fans worldwide since … probably the early 1980s when Gorecki's Symphony No. 3 listed high on Billboard magazine sales charts. That's a whole lifetime without a hit record for classical music.

It once was that a 2 or 3 million seller recording, like Dorati's Haydn symphonies, could support the whole classical line for a recording company. The way things are today, with no stores selling recordings except resale places and the Internet diffusing everything, I don't see much chance of returning to an industry that once existed. Download sales are not profitable enough to support a fringe industry like classical music and streaming supports the streaming entity, not the artists.

Classical music isn't the only art form in decline, of course. Film is also in a state of decline. Look at all the Oscar nominees going back to 1980 and I'll bet you won't find a single year where all the nominees became classics. That was commonplace in the 1970s, even in the late 1930s and early 1940s. No more.

As far as literature is concerned, who is today's Truman Capote or Norman Mailer or David Halberstam, a giant intellectual dealing with the real issues of our world? In a larger sense, who are the great intellectuals of our time? This goes far beyond classical music but is part of the same thing.

I know people don't need to collect recordings anymore when they can play just about anything free somewhere, but I wonder if people any longer need art like they once did. Classical music, with its complicated scores, does things popular music does not and provides a certain satisfaction some people once needed. 

It probably should also be stated that one thing that's done in classical music is its old hoity-toity nature, its ridiculous performance habits (applauding a whole bunch of people that haven't done anything yet, for one,) and its once appeal to people's upper crust nature. I think that whole side of it is dead though I know there are people around the globe that still think they are in some way superior to others because they like it, understand it, and play it.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> It _is_ entertainment. I'm not particularly worried about it, just playing the game. I know that I'm going to meet you here, moaning about how horrible all music post-1900 is and I can't resist it.
> 
> You only cheat yourself with your reactionary views. As mmsbls has shown it's possible to become appreciative of newer music with some actual effort. Also, as he rightly points out, it's not all about avant-garde listening, very little in fact.


First of all, 'reactionary' doesn't apply when the mainstream is still the traditional pre 1950 CM. The majority of CM listeners have not moved on to the extent that the newer music takes precedence, the vocal group on TC notwithstanding.

As far as your last statement goes, that may be true, but those of you who support newer music might do a better job of describing just what music you're talking about because often when you make broad defensive statements, someone next to you is including a good segment of avant-garde & experimental music which is, by CM standards, bizarre. On my part, I have been emphasizing the latter as my issue which may not include newer music you prefer.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> First of all, 'reactionary' doesn't apply when the mainstream is still the traditional pre 1950 CM. The majority of CM listeners have not moved on to the extent that the newer music takes precedence, the vocal group on TC notwithstanding.


I think it's moved somewhat. The number of listeners who have a good deal of 20thc music in their collections is far greater than you might imagine.



DaveM said:


> As far as your last statement goes, that may be true, but those of you who support newer music might do a better job of describing just what music you're talking about because often when you make broad defensive statements, someone next to you is including a good segment of avant-garde & experimental music which is, by CM standards, bizarre. On my part, I have been emphasizing the latter as my issue which may not include newer music you prefer.


Come on now, the majority of newer music postings here concern composers from the 20th century, writing accessible music. The discussions of avant-garde music (I don't know if that term has any meaning in reference to it really) are few and have a limited following. That's why I see little point railing against it.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

There are some who think non-classical music has declined.

I discovered the following YouTube that addresses the state of pop music:






For the record I agree with everything the observations of the narrator.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant.


I'm not sure what you are saying. If you are speaking for yourself only, it makes more sense, but you refer to composers that "we" have, as if you are speaking for a larger collective. This is presumptuous.



KenOC said:


> ...Sure, we have diverting composers like John Adams, who has done interesting things but generally not of great substance.


If you are NOT saying you dislike contemporary music, then the net result is the same. Are we supposed to take this bait? How do you define "substance" in music? By concert attendance statistics?



KenOC said:


> ...And a lot of composers who seem more interested in the sounds of music than anything significant to communicate.


What's wrong with "the sound of music?" it sounds like you expect music to be literary, and to "resonate" as a language of shared meanings in a culture. If so, listen to Pink Floyd.



KenOC said:


> ...And other composers whose efforts seem more related to the literary than the truly musical.


You mean soundtrack music?



KenOC said:


> ...Please, tell me I'm wrong and point out the exceptions that are keeping the music in this genre alive!


You're wrong. These "Classical" music values you are vaguely referring are products of the past. Shostakovich and Rachmanninoff (the last great Romantic) were anomalies of the curious isolationism of Russia, a sort of time-warp of culture. "It's really a gas to sign this jazzy document," as Russians were depicted by the Firesign Theatre.

Exceptions? All the recordings of these old works, which keep coming out. I guess Arthur Fiedler counts for that sort of desire.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Strange Magic said:


> Another interpretation of what Phil is saying here is that the hierarchical structure of most music, with its balancing of fulfilling and thwarting expectations of what is to come (see Leonard Meyer's several books on this) leads people (most people) to being shown what the composer is saying, musically. When music abandoned or abandons this hierarchical structure and turns away from tonality and towards serialism, aleatory, other avant-garde techniques that minimize the role of expectation fulfilled/denied, then most listeners are left with the ink blot and not the Monet.


That does sound interesting as well and seems similar to my untrained ear's experience of "music that goes somewhere" vs. "music that seems to lack a narrative thread". I have often had a problem with the latter but find it most noticeably in *some *of the works of the composers like Debussy, Ravel, Vaughan-Williams and Szymanowski. I am getting over these prejudices of my ear. But I never found the problems in the composers most are often held up here as too modern in some way - say, Schoenberg, Carter or Kurtag. I suppose I did find it in Boulez for a while. So, I'm not convinced that tonality is the only route to a narrative. Excuse me if I express myself crudely - I really have no education in music at all.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

eugeneonagain said:


> I think it's moved somewhat. The number of listeners who have a good deal of 20thc music in their collections is far greater than you might imagine.


I think that's true, at least of me. I'd estimate 60% of my listening is 20th century (and that doesn't include Mahler since I don't listen to him much).

Please remember that the OP addresses music after about 1975, not 20th century music.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> I think it's moved somewhat. The number of listeners who have a good deal of 20thc music in their collections is far greater than you might imagine.


That doesn't change the facts as I stated them.



> Come on now, the majority of newer music postings here concern composers from the 20th century, writing accessible music. The discussions of avant-garde music (I don't know if that term has any meaning in reference to it really) are few and have a limited following. That's why I see little point railing against it.


That's simply disingenuous. There have been a number of threads in the not too distant past extolling some rather marginal avant-garde & experimental music and there is/was not a peep out of any of you clarifying that that is/was not the newer music you are/we're defending. On the contrary, all I heard was a general outcry against any criticism even though, apparently, it isn't what a lot of you are defending. Unless people clarify what they are talking about one assumes that they think all contemporary/newer music is the greatest thing since sliced bread.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

So the other 25 years of the same century? I'm joking, do you mean 21st century music then?


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> That doesn't change the facts as I stated them.


You stated no facts, just opinions.



DaveM said:


> That's simply disengenuos [sic]. There have been a number of threads in the not too distant past exstolling [sic] some rather marginal avant-garde & experimental music and there is/was not a peep out of any of you clarifying that that is/was not the newer music you are/we're defending. On the contrary, all I heard was a general outcry against any criticism even though, apparently, it isn't what a lot of you are defending. Unless people clarify what they are talking about one assumes that they think all contemporary/newer music is the greatest thing since sliced bread.


All people like me are defending is giving everything a chance rather than piling a ton of bricks on it as soon as it appears and sounds "wrong". You're simply quarrelsome about this and incorrigibly so. Nothing can be done for you.


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## Botschaft (Aug 4, 2017)

KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant.


That's the strangest misspelling of Brahms I've ever encountered.


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## Guest (Nov 2, 2018)

Phil loves classical said:


> I think you hit the crux of where the argument lies. A lot of contemporary music is robbed of musical context in my opinion. It was meant to be more open to interpretation, but most listeners want to be shown what the composer is saying, rather than it saying whatever the listener is feeling like ink blots. How can an ink blot compare with a Monet, etc.


I really wish this helped me to understand, but I don't think it quite explained what is meant by 'meaning' and relative 'significance.'

Like Enthusiast, I don't know what composers like Mozart 'meant' in their music because I only listen to it and enjoy it and learn about it and performances of it. If I have to decipher some kind of 'meaning' in any music then I believe that I am missing the point of the music itself; the point being the way it sounds.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

In addition to those already mentioned, I'd add Henze.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> You stated no facts, just opinions.


They are facts and anyone who knows anything about the size of the audience, number of recordings sold for given eras or almost any statistic you may want to use, knows it's true.



> All people like me are defending is giving everything a chance rather than piling a ton of bricks on it as soon as it appears and sounds "wrong". You're simply quarrelsome about this and incorrigibly so. Nothing can be done for you.


Every time you resort to personal responses, which has become a frequent occurrence, I assume that my point has substance that's hard to refute. Speaking of entertainment, sometimes those posts mysteriously disappear.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> They are facts and anyone who knows anything about the size of the audience, number of recordings sold for given eras or almost any statistic you may want to use, knows it's true.


The size of audiences for what? It's obvious that more concerts have been given and recordings made of Beethoven et al. there's been time enough. There are also now many recordings made and concerts given of 20thc century music. You're wittering on again about 'avant-garde' or very new music and these can't honestly compete with your (non)-facts. Ridiculous.



DaveM said:


> Every time you resort to personal responses, which has become a frequent occurrence, I assume that my point has substance that's hard to refute. Speaking of entertainment, sometimes those posts mysteriously disappear.


Stop being so soft about everything. There's nothing 'personal' about it. You are the one making the remarks you are making, not just passing on someone else's opinion, so any reply is obviously going to reflect upon you. There is nothing difficult to refute, but it is very much like a wine stain that won't come out, i.e: stubborn.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

arpeggio said:


> No it has not. I have been reading your complaints about this for years and no matter how many times we have provided to you examples that your observations are inaccurate you ignore them and a year later start up another thread with the same accusations. You want to go hide under rock because you believe no one composes the type on music you are familiar with, except Alma Deutscher, go right ahead. Most of us enjoy contemporary music, whether it is composed in a traditional or modern style.
> 
> Frankly I no longer give a damn what you think.


A vigorous expression and exposition of strongly-held views! Where can we find the statistical evidence to support the assertion that most of us enjoy contemporary music? Perhaps most of us do but it would be good to see the data; I missed it if it has been already provided.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

DaveM said:


> That's simply disingenuous. There have been a number of threads in the not too distant past extolling some rather marginal avant-garde & experimental music and there is/was not a peep out of any of you clarifying that that is/was not the newer music you are/we're defending. On the contrary, all I heard was a general outcry against any criticism even though, apparently, it isn't what a lot of you are defending. Unless people clarify what they are talking about one assumes that they think all contemporary/newer music is the greatest thing since sliced bread.


That's not how I remember these threads. There's one in particular that got a pretty strongly negative reaction from nearly all the self-professed modern music fans, including me.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

isorhythm said:


> That's not how I remember these threads. There's one in particular that got a pretty strongly negative reaction from nearly all the self-professed modern music fans, including me.


'nearly all'? I think not. Nowhere near, in fact.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> The size of audiences for what? It's obvious that more concerts have been given and recordings made of Beethoven et al. there's [sic] been time enough. There are also now many recordings made and concerts given of 20thc [sic] century music. You're wittering on again about 'avant-garde' or very new music and these can't honestly compete with your (non)-facts. Ridiculous.


_
'...many recordings made and concerts given_' does not refute my original claim. You need to do better.



> Stop being so soft about everything. There's nothing 'personal' about it. You are the one making the remarks you are making, not just passing on someone else's opinion, so any reply is obviously going to reflect upon you. There is nothing difficult to refute, but it is very much like a wine stain that won't come out, i.e: stubborn.


Hint: The number of adjectives directed at a poster is directly proportional to the number of posts that disappear.


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## isorhythm (Jan 2, 2015)

DaveM said:


> 'nearly all'? I think not. Nowhere near, in fact.


It was a majority, you can go and look.

This is getting off topic - I still don't really understand what KenOC meant by this thread and he doesn't seem inclined to explain himself, so maybe there's nothing else to say.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

It seems to me that this is a good thread for those who hate modern music.


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

isorhythm said:


> It was a majority, you can go and look.
> 
> This is getting off topic - I still don't really understand what KenOC meant by this thread and he doesn't seem inclined to explain himself, so maybe there's nothing else to say.


It's pretty simple to me: Ken thinks that "Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant." Since then he has frequently been asked to clarify what he means by 'significant,' but he can't come up with a good answer. He can't come up with a good answer because many of us don't see it that way at all, and don't think that the genre of music is dead/lacking significant music in the slightest. So yes, I think the 'thread' has run out in this sense, as we have answered the question and the result is that we have now been reminded that Ken doesn't like much contemporary music, but many of us do.

Of course, some people in this thread have agreed with Ken, which has led to some discussion. However, it still comes down to people simply having different tastes and experiences...

I tried to answer the question earlier regarding contemporary music that some nay-sayers could potentially find meaningful, and this could be a fruitful continuation of the thread. They probably won't find most of our suggestions to be substantial, but that's fine.

One beautiful, accessible work I listened to just yesterday was Sculthorpe's _Riverina_, written near the end of his life:


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

There have been countless examples of contemporary music worth hearing posted on this forum over the years. But the audience for CM is no longer as homogeneous as it once was. It's been diluted and may never be homogeneous again, but more fragmented and diversified, all of which can affect the demand for the new.

The world has changed. And one of the changes is that there's a glut in the market because almost 1000 years of music of every possible description has flooded the marketplace and there's no longer the same demand for new music in the late 20th and 21st Century because of technological advances in being able to distribute it virtually everywhere without cost, especially if listeners can find whatever fits their mood or situation.

The exception is that a great deal of the enjoyably fresh and new can be found in contemporary film scores (John Corigliano!) with orchestras that are designed to have immediate appeal, at least within the context in which it's being presented. I think that's where most of the better, most talented composers are because they are not interested in the BS and limited opportunities of the CM scene and they want to be financially rewarded rather than having to teach in a university or wait for the rare opportunities to give a live performance to make ends meet. The talented ones will go where they are valued, appreciated and rewarded in the same way that Mozart and Beethoven sought patrons.

So the market is flooded and will probably remain flooded, which isn't exactly of help to the strictly experimental CM composers of today, not to mention that they are competing in the marketplace with almost a thousand years of great CM music history that has been weathered and mostly digested over the years.

The "problem" with modern music is that one is required to have some active sense of curiosity about the unheard-to hunt for it, to seek out, and that's evidently too much of a bother because much of the music of today has not been predigested and already run through the wringer of public opinion. And it has to be heard to be sorted out. I'd like to see fewer repetitive complaints and a greater sense of adventure. But as one get's older there's a tendency to run out of gas and a possible laziness sets in where one's world ceases to expand and then one concludes that nothing new or challenging under the sun is worth hearing, and there's a certain joy in complaining, complaining, complaining...

Here's a wonderful contemporary work that I've loved over the years. It's beautiful and only one example that not all composers of today have lost their way. Lauridsen is still living.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

arpeggio said:


> It seems to me that this is a good thread for those who hate modern music.


But we foiled them by recommending Schnittke, Gubaidulina, Henze, Sculthorpe, Gorecki, Part, Glass, Feldman, Rzewski, Bolcom, Rorem, Adés, Abrahamsen, Penderecki....

Corpses strew the battlefield, but love always conquers hate.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Larkenfield said:


> ..Here's a wonderful contemporary work that I've loved over the years. It's beautiful and only one example that not all composers of today have lost their way. Lauridsen is still living.


What a wonderful work. Had never heard of it. Thanks!


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## Oldhoosierdude (May 29, 2016)

Are there a lot of widely recognized classical composers like in the early and mid 20th century. No, there are not. Due I believe in the changes in popular tastes in music.

The most popular and widely known composer today may be John Williams and some might debate that he is not strictly a classical composer.

I'm referring to popular recognition not to musical quality.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I’m getting old, if the vision of a world in decay is common to age. Now two women and a lawyer have been referred for criminal investigation to the DOJ for false rape claims against an honorable man – and the lawyer is a declared presidential candidate! The once proud press is full of screaming heads, shrilling semi-literately about the latest supposed scandal, the more salacious the better. And our vaunted President Trump, who criticizes them, is the shrillest screaming head of all. Careless of the truth? I am staggered at the understatement.

And to make matters worse, composers are authoring “atonal” music. Soon, if this doesn’t stop, poets will be penning stanzas that don’t rhyme.


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## PeterFromLA (Jul 22, 2011)

I was at a performance of Glass's _Satyagraha_ this past weekend, staged by the LA Opera (in the ENO's production). It was fantastic. The orchestra was in high form, the singing was top notch, the lighting and staging were riveting.

The audience at the performance was full, and only a handful of patrons departed early, indicating listeners were enjoying the work. Clearly there were Glass partisans in the audience, but also season subscribers as well.

Overheard during the two intermissions were such things as "the music is beautiful," and "the singers are wonderful." I didn't hear anyone badmouthing "modern music." The cheering at the opera's close was fulsome and deeply appreciative.

The audience was transfixed by an opera centered around events involving Gandhi dating from about 100 years ago, but the work also seemed relevant to the morass our own politics have descended to, raising the possibility that we too can rise above darkness. The ENO's version of the work has traveled widely (showing at the Metropolitan Opera, for instance), but also been performed in London itself during three separate seasons, I believe. Meanwhile, a new production of the opera landed this week at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Clearly, the work has legs.

This is only one example of a contemporary composer whose music is important to people, a vibrant testament to the power of staged music to hold one's attention, allowing us a moment of transcendence during which we alight on our humanity and place in history, and contemplate the importance of dignity and freedom.

So is this significant contemporary music that people want to hear? I'd say yes. The music and the opera's various tableaux remain in my mind's eye today; six days later, I continue to bask in the work's afterglow.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

PeterFromLA said:


> ...This is only one example of a contemporary composer whose music is important to people, a vibrant testament to the power of staged music to hold one's attention, allowing us a moment of transcendence during which we alight on our humanity and place in history, and contemplate the importance of dignity and freedom.
> 
> So is this significant contemporary music that people want to hear? I'd say yes. The music and the opera's various tableaux remain in my mind's eye today; six days later, I continue to bask in the work's afterglow.


Hi there PFLA. Good to hear you enjoyed the work and thought it worthwhile, not just for yourself but for others. You say, "only one example". I'd love to hear your views on other examples as well.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Lisztian said:


> It's pretty simple to me: Ken thinks that "Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant." Since then he has frequently been asked to clarify what he means by 'significant,' but he can't come up with a good answer. He can't come up with a good answer because many of us don't see it that way at all, and don't think that the genre of music is dead/lacking significant music in the slightest. So yes, I think the 'thread' has run out in this sense, as we have answered the question and the result is that we have now been reminded that Ken doesn't like much contemporary music, but many of us do.
> 
> Of course, some people in this thread have agreed with Ken, which has led to some discussion. However, it still comes down to people simply having different tastes and experiences...
> 
> ...


Unavailable:
The uploader has not made this video available in your country.


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## Guest (Nov 4, 2018)

Unfortunately I am still unclear what is meant by 'meaning' and what makes some music have more 'significance' than others in that regard.

I've been reading through the thread multiple times but I can't see KenOC's explanation anywhere.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

DaveM said:


> ...There have been a number of threads in the not too distant past extolling some rather marginal avant-garde & experimental music and there is/was not a peep out of any of you clarifying that that is/was not the newer music you are/we're defending. On the contrary, all I heard was a general outcry against any criticism even though, apparently, it isn't what a lot of you are defending. Unless people clarify what they are talking about one assumes that they think all contemporary/newer music is the greatest thing since sliced bread.


I'm not sure which threads you are referring to, but two recent threads that featured avant garde works are Exploring Contemporary Composers and Experimental/avant-garde music is the most informed of tradition. Both threads have many posts stating negative views of certain avant garde works by people who like contemporary music.

Maybe a difference is that people who like contemporary music will simply state that they do not like a particular piece or composer rather than stating that a style of music (e.g. avant garde) is awful/useless/garbage/etc.. Those people may push back at others who do make such generalizations using objective rather than subjective wordings.

The vast majority of contemporary works recommended on TC or that I hear are not what I would call avant garde (although some others might). I don't feel that I need to always say that I'm not referring to the more avant garde type of works when I say I like and support contemporary music.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

mmsbls said:


> I'm not sure which threads you are referring to, but two recent threads that featured avant garde works are Exploring Contemporary Composers and Experimental/avant-garde music is the most informed of tradition. Both threads have many posts stating negative views of certain avant garde works by people who like contemporary music.
> 
> Maybe a difference is that people who like contemporary music will simply state that they do not like a particular piece or composer rather than stating that a style of music (e.g. avant garde) is awful/useless/garbage/etc.. Those people may push back at others who do make such generalizations using objective rather than subjective wordings.
> 
> The vast majority of contemporary works recommended on TC or that I hear are not what I would call avant garde (although some others might). I don't feel that I need to always say that I'm not referring to the more avant garde type of works when I say I like and support contemporary music.


I would suggest that both sides be more specific. A poster above said that this thread is for those who hate modern music and yet, I just posted how much I liked a modern work presented by Larkenfield above.

For my part, my issue is with much experimental music which I don't believe is classical music, but rather a genre that experiments with sounds. Also, understanding that the the term avant-garde itself causes confusion, I find that what is often called avant-garde and sounds to me like unvarying cacophony is hard for me to call classical music. I'm not the biggest fan of atonal music, but I don't argue the fact that it is classical music and I would take it in a heartbeat over the aforementioned stuff.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

shirime said:


> Unfortunately I am still unclear what is meant by 'meaning' and what makes some music have more 'significance' than others in that regard.
> 
> I've been reading through the thread multiple times but I can't see KenOC's explanation anywhere.


Not speaking for KenOC, significance would mean to me that over time, a significant number of people have been, in some way, moved by the music and that it has had lasting value for them. For instance, taking an example of major meaning/significance, after 9/11 several orchestras played Beethoven's 9th, the programmers obviously assuming that the music would give some sort of profound solace to a good segment of the population.

Many of the major classical works have established significance to a greater to lesser extent in that they have moved people over several generations, the major concertos and symphonies, the Mozart operas and Requiem, the Beethoven quartets and on and on. I believe the OP is asking where are the works after Shostakovich that have made this kind of mark on listeners.


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant. Sure, we have diverting composers like John Adams, who has done interesting things but generally not of great substance. And a lot of composers who seem more interested in the sounds of music than anything significant to communicate. And other composers whose efforts seem more related to the literary than the truly musical.
> 
> Please, tell me I'm wrong and point out the exceptions that are keeping the music in this genre alive!


I think that Shostakovich was among the last of what can be called national monument composers. Others who would fit in that category are Vaughan Williams, Sibelius, Bartok, Villa-Lobos, Sculthorpe and probably Bernstein. They held a sort of musical ambassador status for their countries.

The best example of Western music communicating on a global scale is Shostakovich's Leningrad Symphony. First performed in the besieged city during World War II, it was subsequently played hundreds of times during the war (around sixty performances in the USA alone). Its the last example of a composer gaining the spotlight with music which spoke to millions, bringing into focus the epic struggle that was taking place between good and evil. This might sound a bit cliched today, but it isn't when we consider the circumstances of the premiere, with the musicians starved and many chairs on stage empty in tribute to colleagues fallen.

Times have changed. The Leningrad Symphony isn't the most performed of Shostakovich's pieces, although many other works by him are still a central part of the performance repertoire. Big statements like this are rare today, and oddly enough John Adams' On the Transmigration of Souls is the nearest equivalent I can think of. Adams said he took great care in composing this piece, not only because it was an important commission, but because of how he wanted to commemorate the tragic events of 2001 in the best way he could.

Perhaps compared to the times of Shostakovich music has lost its place as a source of uniting people for a cause, or uniting people even on a small scale in our families or communities. We no longer gather around a piano at home, or even around a radio, many of us - particularly the young - are listening to it with earbuds, in our room, or commuting, or even at work or school. I think apart from the various arguments put in this thread on how recording technology has changed the consumption of music, the most important thing I see is to try and regain its role in bringing people together again. It includes education, and Ken Robinson has given many good examples of how music - combined with other areas like poetry and drama - can help the often disenchanted and troubled youth of the West to reconnect with their emotions, creativity and community.

My argument goes beyond Western musicians or composers, but they can be part of this. I'll close with Vaughan Williams' comments about the composer's position in society. Although he talks about his own country, I think it can be related to other countries, and to suggest some way of lessening detachment between people which is still such a problem of contemporary life:

_Art for art's sake has never flourished in England. We are often called inartistic because our art is unconscious. Our drama and poetry, like our laws and our constitution, have evolved by accident while we thought we were doing something else, and so it will be with music. The composer must not shut himself up and think about art, he must live with his fellows and make his art an expression of the whole life of the community - if we seek for art we shall not find it._


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## Simon Moon (Oct 10, 2013)

arpeggio said:


> It seems to me that this is a good thread for those who hate modern music.


I'm shocked! Shocked I tell ya!

That couldn't happen on TC. 



KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant.


First of all, music does not have inherent meaning. It has meaning that each of us imbue it with.

Which brings me to another point. From my standpoint, classical music from the periods that most of the (anti late 20th century and contemporary) TC members most enjoy (Classical, Romantic, Baroque), which brings them meaning, brings me little to no meaning.

Being born post WWII, was old enough to remember the debacle that was the Vietnam war, and all the wars since then (with questionable motives), listening to music from 18th and 19th century composers, who composed in a milieu of Royal funding, powdered wigs, etc, has no meaning to me. For the most part, I am able to hear what appeals to fans of Mozart, Beethoven, Mahler, Brahms, etc, it just does not appeal me, from either the standpoint of containing meaning, or from a *purely musical* standpoint.



KenOC said:


> Sure, we have diverting composers like John Adams, who has done interesting things but generally not of great substance.


Not of great substance to whom? You perhaps?

While I am not a big Adams fan, I can tell from what I've heard, his music probably has 'great substance' for those that like his music.

I get great meaning from the vast majority of music in my collection, almost all of which, was composed after the mid 20th century.



KenOC said:


> ...keeping the music in this genre alive!


"Alive" how?

As a popular form of music with a relatively large following? Or as a living, breathing art form of constantly evolving music?

If you are hoping for the former, I can't imagine that happening. Even if composers were able to compose music that somehow harkened back to some era that you are a fan of, do you really think that would make classical music popular again?

And if you mean the latter, that is already happening. I am constantly discovering great new music from contemporary composers.


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## Oldhoosierdude (May 29, 2016)

KenOC said:


> I'm getting old, if the vision of a world in decay is common to age. Now two women and a lawyer have been referred for criminal investigation to the DOJ for false rape claims against an honorable man - and the lawyer is a declared presidential candidate! The once proud press is full of screaming heads, shrilling semi-literately about the latest supposed scandal, the more salacious the better. And our vaunted President Trump, who criticizes them, is the shrillest screaming head of all. Careless of the truth? I am staggered at the understatement.
> 
> And to make matters worse, composers are authoring "atonal" music. Soon, if this doesn't stop, poets will be penning stanzas that don't rhyme.


Soon multi million dollar athletes will refuse to play because they feel "disrespected".


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

DaveM said:


> Many of the major classical works have established significance to a greater to lesser extent in that they have moved people over several generations, the major concertos and symphonies, the Mozart operas and Requiem, the Beethoven quartets and on and on. I believe the OP is asking where are the works after Shostakovich that have made this kind of mark on listeners.


There are several ways to answer such a question.

1) We don't know yet. There have not been several generations since Shostakovich, and history tells us that these kind of questions take time to answer. Possibly 50 years or more from now there will be a number of late 20th century works that are played often and considered part of the canon.

2) Conditions have changed over the past 25- 50 - 75 years such that works are rarely played repeatedly in orchestral concerts. The changes have to do with recordings of music, the popular music industry, ...

3) Post 2050 music sucks because... composers don't care enough about the audience, composers don't have enough talent, ...

4) Contemporary composers write great music (as good as music of the past) that should be loved/appreciated/desired/etc. and should easily become part of the canon played by most orchestras, but the listening audience is hopelessly behind the times for a variety of reasons.

The only one of the reasons that I think has no substance is #3. The actual answer may have to do with some or all the others (or maybe even ones I have not listed). I'd actually like to know what composers and conductors think about this question.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

mmsbls

One of the aspects of these discussions that really bothers me is that some of the remarks are inaccurate.

I have no problem with a person expressing an opinion and disliking atonal music. But implying that most contemporary music is atonal is not true. The vast majority of the contemporary composers I am familiar with are tonal.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

arpeggio said:


> mmsbls
> 
> One of the aspects of these discussions that really bothers me is that some of the remarks are inaccurate.
> 
> I have no problem with a person expressing an opinion and disliking atonal music. But implying that most contemporary music is atonal is not true. The vast majority of the contemporary composers I am familiar with are tonal.


Who is saying that? Maybe somewhere a poster or two has said it, but it's not like it's a frequent occurrence.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

DaveM said:


> Who is saying that? Maybe somewhere a poster or two has said it, but it's not like it's a frequent occurrence.


I'll say it! Schoenberg along with Berg, Webern, and that whole crowd of thugs, murdering music! Yes, those grinning clowns Stravinsky and Bartok as well, pretending to be tonal. Even Shostakovich, with his "weakened tonal centers," boring from within, all in an effort to destroy our precious tonal music traditions!

Will nobody, _anybody_, stop this insidious effort? Who will Make Music Great Again? (MMGA, trademarked of course -- get your MMGA cap, just $4.99, PayPal accepted.)


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

KenOC said:


> Will nobody, _anybody_, stop this insidious effort? Who will Make Music Great Again? (MMGA, trademarked of course -- get your MMGA cap, just $4.99, PayPal accepted.)


That sounds vaguely familiar. I could swear I've seen hats like that before. You sure you're not plagiarizing that idea?


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

mmsbls said:


> There are several ways to answer such a question.
> 
> 1) We don't know yet. There have not been several generations since Shostakovich, and history tells us that these kind of questions take time to answer. Possibly 50 years or more from now there will be a number of late 20th century works that are played often and considered part of the canon.


It didn't take 50 years in the past for works to achieve a certain amount of importance. In fact, I would think that with recordings we have now and much cheaper than they used to be, a contemporary work with substance would be recognized as such more quickly.



> 2) Conditions have changed over the past 25- 50 - 75 years such that works are rarely played repeatedly in orchestral concerts. The changes have to do with recordings of music, the popular music industry, ...


As in 1), recordings should be an asset for the recognition of quality contemporary works as would be YouTube where one can listen for free before buying.



> 3) Post 2050 music sucks because... composers don't care enough about the audience, composers don't have enough talent, ...


I'm guessing you meant 1950. Assuming so since I'm not clairvoyant enough to anticipate post 2050 music, it's too broad a statement, but it strikes me that due to the nature of the present academics, I don't think composing for a broad audience is as important an objective as it used to be and when it comes to some contemporary music, the end result raises (in my mind at least) the question of the composer's talent.



> 4) Contemporary composers write great music (as good as music of the past) that should be loved/appreciated/desired/etc. and should easily become part of the canon played by most orchestras, but the listening audience is hopelessly behind the times for a variety of reasons.


I would agree that some contemporary composers are writing some very good music. The example that Larkenfield gave would be accessible to even those less familiar with classical music, but, overall, I'm not hearing great music that has the significance of pre 1950 music. Also, I doubt that I'll ever be convinced that the problem is a listening audience that is hopelessly behind the times.

IMO, many contemporary composers changed the rules of the game. Perhaps that was inevitable, but that doesn't make it the audience's fault. CM was always a challenge for the general public compared to popular music. Now the changes in CM have put much of it almost beyond reach for an even larger segment, especially when one takes into account that apparently (this from modern music supporters on this forum) a period of in-depth education is necessary to appreciate it.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

‘S true! Back in the old days, Beethoven’s Eroica was first performed in Italy in 1860, over half a century after it was written. Things are different today.

New music, for the most part, is available to anyone, anywhere, immediately. Most seems to be received with little but indifference. Even pieces that are premiered to warm receptions, like Chavez’s Magnetar, sink like a stone.

Where do we go from here?


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

KenOC said:


> Where do we go from here?


We listen to/explore music, and support what we feel inclined to support. Even better, we don't denigrate what we aren't inclined to like unless it's something that's actually morally reprehensible (say, a homophobic composer: NOT, say, Elena Rykova's latest work).


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

DaveM said:


> It didn't take 50 years in the past for works to achieve a certain amount of importance. In fact, I would think that with recordings we have now and much cheaper than they used to be, a contemporary work with substance would be recognized as such more quickly.
> 
> As in 1), recordings should be an asset for the recognition of quality contemporary works as would be YouTube where one can listen for free before buying.
> 
> ...


It's interesting that of my 4 suggested possibilities you argued against 1, 2, and 4 but seemed to basically accept 3 which was the only one I thought had little substance. We could argue for a long time about the reason for the apparent disconnect between contemporary composers and audience. In fact I can give good arguments both for and against my #1, #2, and #4 reasons. I don't know the exact answer though I have a much better sense than I did 10 years ago.

I think the answer is a complex combination of my #1, #2, and #4 reasons plus other possibilities even including part of #3. The part of 3 that _could_ apply would be that _if in fact composers cared more about the audience acceptance_ than the audience would accept the music more. That's probably true, but that might mean composers would either then be writing popular music (i.e. not classical or art music) or remaining stuck on composing music "of the past" (i.e. Romantic-like music).

Another interesting comment you made was the idea of assigning fault. You said "I doubt that I'll ever be convinced that the problem is a listening audience" and "that doesn't make it the audience's fault." Personally I don't think anyone's at fault, and I don't think the "problem" lies solely with the listening audience." I think composers have always been ahead of the listening audience in the sense that they "advanced" music by composing using new ideas. Audiences take time to catch up. I believe one of the "greatest" quartets even composed was Beethoven's Grosse Fuge which even today can confuse present audiences.

So maybe composers have always been a bit ahead and, for various reasons, have "surged" further ahead in the past 50-75 years or so. That may be the natural evolution of art music - at some time composers would be "forced" to move "to far ahead" of parts of their audience such that the present state occurs. It's not anyone's fault, and the "problem" is a complex combination of many effects that ultimately were almost guaranteed to evolve.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

It should be easy to accept that "classical music" isn't one thing anymore. 

The conservatives have their own music and their own tradition, including plenty of stuff composed in the past 100 years in old styles. They're flourishing. The audience is large and collectively rich, and recorded music is cheap. 

And the modernists have their own music and tradition. They're flourishing. The audience is large and collectively rich, and recorded music is cheap.

And of course some people enjoy both traditions, but we're the minority. 

The problems are that the two traditions need to share certain venues, which neither side can easily abide, and that both sides want to claim the status of listening to the elite music. A lot of fancy, vague words are necessary because no one wants to admit it, but fundamentally, that's what the argument is over. 

For the most part, of course, the modernists will win in the long run. It's the logic of culture. You can't win the future by rejecting present novelty. 

All the hair-pulling and hand-wringing and rage and wrath are exhausting and disappointing, but I suppose that's the only way such a wide variety of music can be produced.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I think maybe that it is time for _this _thread to run out.

I don't think it is going to go anywhere or even to contain arguments that are new to us and it is certainly not going to lead to a resolution. I suspect that is why KenOC has taken to joking and flippant answers but I don't think he OP was intended as a joke.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Lisztian said:


> We listen to/explore music, and support what we feel inclined to support. Even better, we don't denigrate what we aren't inclined to like unless it's something that's actually morally reprehensible (say, a homophobic composer: NOT, say, Elena Rykova's latest work).


This is classical music?


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant. Sure, we have diverting composers like John Adams, who has done interesting things but generally not of great substance. And a lot of composers who seem more interested in the sounds of music than anything significant to communicate. And other composers whose efforts seem more related to the literary than the truly musical.
> 
> Please, tell me I'm wrong and point out the exceptions that are keeping the music in this genre alive!


Plenty of significant music of import has been composed since '75; I personally don't hear much coming from modern classical though.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Harrison Birtwistle's _Deep Time_ performance history:

05/06/2017
World Premiere
Staatskapelle Berlin / Daniel Barenboim
Philharmonie, Berlin, Germany

06/06/2017
Staatskapelle Berlin / Daniel Barenboim
Konzerthaus, Großer Saal, Berlin, Germany

16/07/2017
UK premiere
Staatskapelle Berlin / Daniel Barenboim
Royal Albert Hall, London, United Kingdom


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

janxharris said:


> This is classical music?


That's awesome! I don't care what you want to label it, that's good stuff.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

janxharris said:


> Harrison Birtwistle's _Deep Time_ performance history:
> 
> 05/06/2017
> World Premiere
> ...


Meaning? A leading orchestra and conductor chose to premiere the work. A work I have not heard but quite a few of Birtwistle's major pieces over the last 15 years have been picked up by several exponents. Not a bad start. His operas also get performed. The test, I suppose, is what happens to his music when it is 50 years old. But rewarding listeners at the time of writing is a major part of what most composers try to do. Posterity is a somewhat romatintic ideal or perhaps a resort for composers who do not get performed when their work is fresh. I suspect Birtwistle will pass the posterity test as well but none of us can know for sure.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Enthusiast said:


> Meaning? A leading orchestra and conductor chose to premiere the work. A work I have not heard but quite a few of Birtwistle's major pieces over the last 15 years have been picked up by several exponents. Not a bad start. His operas also get performed. The test, I suppose, is what happens to his music when it is 50 years old. But rewarding listeners at the time of writing is a major part of what most composers try to do. Posterity is a somewhat romatintic ideal or perhaps a resort for composers who do not get performed when their work is fresh. I suspect Birtwistle will pass the posterity test as well but none of us can know for sure.


I was merely posting a fact.


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

janxharris said:


> This is classical music?


Ooo this part again (for some reason even though I said nothing about genre). This is where I say "yes, I think it is classical music out of the tradition of John Cage," followed by Ken disagreeing, followed by DaveM saying "but random sounds played by instruments that weren't built to make those sounds doesn't sound like Brahms." 
'
Look at it this way, though: evidently there is a disagreement regarding what is or isn't 'classical music.' But seeing as many of us do include that sort of thing -whether they like the music or not- what are you guys trying to accomplish? Is the aim for certain works to not be discussed in the classical section? This even though many who come here to talk about classical music hold the view that these works are part of the tradition, and some here genuinely enjoy the music? Why would anyone want this to happen?


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Lisztian said:


> Ooo this part again (for some reason even though I said nothing about genre). This is where I say "yes, I think it is classical music out of the tradition of John Cage," followed by Ken disagreeing, followed by DaveM saying "but random sounds played by instruments that weren't built to make those sounds doesn't sound like Brahms."
> '
> Look at it this way, though: evidently there is a disagreement regarding what is or isn't 'classical music.' But seeing as many of us do include that sort of thing -whether they like the music or not- what are you guys trying to accomplish? Is the aim for certain works to not be discussed in the classical section? This even though many who come here to talk about classical music hold the view that these works are part of the tradition, and some here genuinely enjoy the music? Why would anyone want this to happen?


Since it's a CM forum then genre is assumed.

What can I say? Listening to the piece feels quite bizarre. I assume there is very little compositional skill involved...but I guess I could be wrong. I cannot imagine such a piece ever achieving lasting success.

I've listened three times.


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## Lisztian (Oct 10, 2011)

janxharris said:


> Since it's a CM forum then genre is assumed.
> 
> What can I say? Listening to the piece feels quite bizarre. I assume there is very little compositional skill involved...but I guess I could be wrong. I cannot imagine such a piece ever achieving lasting success.
> 
> I've listened three times.


Which is completely fine for you to feel this way and express that feeling: even a few of those who like a lot of contemporary classical have expressed distaste regarding this composer. However, a work having been written with great compositional skill is not a pre-requisite for being classical music.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

janxharris said:


> I was merely posting a fact.


And I was merely asking why!

(A question about how the facts are relevant - what you feel they say to this discussion).


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

One more time.

I repeat, I have no problem with anyone who dislikes atonal music.

Contemporary tonal composers. A few on this list have recently passed away:

John Corigliano (Some of his music can be atonal)
James MacMillan (Like Corigliano some of his music can be atonal)
David Maslanka
John Harbison
John Williams (composes a lot of straight concert works including a great bassoon work)
Michael Daugherty
Frank Ticheli
Jack Stamp
Aulis Sallinen
Kalevi Aho
John Adams
Ned Rorum
Leonardo Balada
Joan Tower
Eric Whitacre
Richard Danielpour
Joseph Schwanter
Philip Sparke
James Barnes 
Ellen Taaffe Zwllich
Christopher Rouse
Tobias Picker
Einojuhani Rautavaara
John Robertson (Canadian composer I recently discovered)
Ron Nelson
H. Owen Reed
Fischer Tull
Donald Grantham
Cindy McTee (Currently married to Leonard Slatkin)
George Lloyd
Arvo Part
W. Francis McBeth
David Gillingham
Franco Cesarini
Julie Giroux (Hollywood composer, arrange who composes a lot of concert music. Just performed one of her works)
Mark Camphouse
Peteris Vasks
Steven Stucky
David Gillingham
Christopher Theofanidis
John Mackey
Bruce Broughton (Another Hollywood composer who does a lot of concert stuff)
Dan Welcher
Jake Heggie (Washington Opera will be staging his latest opera _Silent Night_)
Johan de Meij
Randol Bass
Samuel Jones
Mark Adamo
Peter Schickele (PDQ Bachs alter ego composes some great regular concert works)
Nico Muhly (His new opera _Marnie_ is being premiered by the Met. Not bad for a 37 year old.)

How many more do you want? Others have mentioned some of the above in other posts. One can find samples of their works on YouTube.

(Note: I have performed many works of the above composers including a few premiers)


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

Enthusiast said:


> Meaning? A leading orchestra and conductor chose to premiere the work. A work I have not heard but quite a few of Birtwistle's major pieces over the last 15 years have been picked up by several exponents. Not a bad start. His operas also get performed. The test, I suppose, is what happens to his music when it is 50 years old. But rewarding listeners at the time of writing is a major part of what most composers try to do. Posterity is a somewhat romatintic ideal or perhaps a resort for composers who do not get performed when their work is fresh. I suspect Birtwistle will pass the posterity test as well but none of us can know for sure.


I quite like The Moth Requiem and Angel Fighter, among his recent pieces. I wouldn't like to speak for the opinion of posterity, which in any case is presently acting like a bunch of babies. We'll see if they ever grow up and learn to appreciate some decent music.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> It didn't take 50 years in the past for works to achieve a certain amount of importance. In fact, I would think that with recordings we have now and much cheaper than they used to be, a contemporary work with substance would be recognized as such more quickly.


You are in error, because there are actually many works now routinely played which _did _take 50 years or longer to achieve importance or even notice. There are also some which were routinely played and have now disappeared into near obscurity and aren't really 'loved' in the same way.

More importantly you ignored a central point mmsbls was making: that music of the past was not competing with several new genres/styles (jazz, pop etc) and an entire music industry that has more or less sidelined concert music and 'art-music' to one sort of music among many (and not even a major player in either popular music or cultural tastes). Complaining about the slow popular acceptance under these circumstances is silly and pointless.

I know your retort will be that you are talking about reception and acceptance within that small classical listening circle, but I think we know by now that there is a correlation between the stalling of classical music as a 'mainstream' part of culture (if it ever was) and the rise of pop music. To the point where most concerts are now largely attended by old/older people with 'conservative' listening tastes. 
I place 'conservative' in those markings because if we were encountering a DaveM at the end of the 19th century, he would be firing at modernist lunatics like Wagner and Mahler. All those old people now packing out the halls for Mahler would have been throwing old bananas at the orchestra in 1900-1950.


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

eugeneonagain said:


> I know your retort will be that you are talking about reception and acceptance within that small classical listening circle, but I think we know by now that there is a correlation between the stalling of classical music as a 'mainstream' part of culture (if it ever was) and the rise of pop music.


I agree. And it's too bad that such observations always appear within threads debating the relative quality of contemporary music, since changes in the systems of distribution of music, the emergence of new methods for assessing popularity, and larger questions about the cultural prestige of a range of arts and artifacts could, at least in principle, all be discussed interestingly without dragging in baggage from other threads.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Enthusiast said:


> And I was merely asking why!
> 
> (A question about how the facts are relevant - what you feel they say to this discussion).


I guess I was a bit shocked that a composer such as Birtwistle had such few performances - 3 in 17 months.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Lisztian said:


> Which is completely fine for you to feel this way and express that feeling: even a few of those who like a lot of contemporary classical have expressed distaste regarding this composer. However, a work having been written with great compositional skill is not a pre-requisite for being classical music.


Nevertheless, you detect a high degree of crafting in the piece? I don't.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

janxharris said:


> I guess I was a bit shocked that a composer such as Birtwistle had such few performances - 3 in 17 months.


Oh - I had missed that. I thought you were posting about how a new work was premiered. If they were the only Birtwistle performances in the world during that period I also am surprised!


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## Steve Mc (Jun 14, 2018)

In response to the OP, there are a few composers keeping the torch burning, as others have mentioned.
Corigliano, MacMillan, Alan Jay Kernis, Part, perhaps Rouse (bit ambivalent about him), Delbaive (quite good), John Adams (he belongs) and John Williams (a definite successor to Tchaikovsky and Richard Strauss, not without his own distinct voice, both in film and in the concert hall).


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> You are in error, because there are actually many works now routinely played which _did _take 50 years or longer to achieve importance or even notice. There are also some which were routinely played and have now disappeared into near obscurity and aren't really 'loved' in the same way.
> 
> More importantly you ignored a central point mmsbls was making: that music of the past was not competing with several new genres/styles (jazz, pop etc) and an entire music industry that has more or less sidelined concert music and 'art-music' to one sort of music among many (and not even a major player in either popular music or cultural tastes). Complaining about the slow popular acceptance under these circumstances is silly and pointless.
> 
> ...


Oh yes. It wasn't so long ago that much orchestral Bartok was a rarity and a risk for concert planners ... and if you go back to maybe the 1940s it was considered brave to programme Sibelius. Some composers did better: Stravinsky's neoclassical works (despite his jealousy of the popularity of Britten) were probably more fashionable in the 50s and 60s than they are now. And you are right about Mahler: he was widely considered to be vulgar until the 60s and I am often conscious that Barbirolli's recording of the 9th with the Berlin Phil involved him introducing the work to the orchestra. There is no clear patter for how long it should take for a work to become entrenched in the repertoire or the route it takes to get there.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Steve Mc said:


> In response to the OP, there are a few composers keeping the torch burning, as others have mentioned.
> Corigliano, MacMillan, Alan Jay Kernis, Part, perhaps Rouse (bit ambivalent about him), Delbaive (quite good), John Adams (he belongs) and John Williams (a definite successor to Tchaikovsky and Richard Strauss, not without his own distinct voice, both in film and in the concert hall).


There are very many more than that! You have just listed ones that you like .... and you seem to me to have missed the "more important ones! We know that we all differ in our taste - both of music and performance - and we accept that ... except when it comes to the contemporary (where we seem to need to define things).


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

There may be the thought that the lack of concert performances for modern/contemporary works will lead to them being forgotten or is an indication that these works have little impact. In the past 100 years recordings have changed how people listen to music. People can listen to music without ever hearing it live either through purchasing a CD or more recently through streaming. I don't know how many people listened to Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique in 1900, but almost everyone heard it by attending a concert. How many people listened to Messiaen's Turangalîla-Symphonie last year? I don't know, but I'd be surprised if it were fewer than heard Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique in 1900. 

There are more than 10 recordings of the following works: Lutoslawski's Symphony No. 3, Ligeti's Violin Concerto, Reich's Music for 18 Musicians, Part's Te Deum, and Schnittke's Piano Concerto. I suspect that these are heard quite often, and I doubt they will be forgotten anytime soon. So maybe contemporary works are not programmed anywhere near as often in concert halls, but I suspect many are frequently heard, create a strong impact, and will be a staple of classical music listeners for a very long time.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

mmsbls said:


> It's interesting that of my 4 suggested possibilities you argued against 1, 2, and 4 but seemed to basically accept 3 which was the only one I thought had little substance...


If you read my response closely, I didn't basically accept 3. I was inferring that it applies to some of what people are calling contemporary music -thankfully at present a minority, but may be increasing if academic institutions keep supporting it- and to the composers that are composing music that seems directed at an extremely small audience, is questionably classical and questionably the result of great expertise.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

mmsbls said:


> There may be the thought that the lack of concert performances for modern/contemporary works will lead to them being forgotten or is an indication that these works have little impact. In the past 100 years recordings have changed how people listen to music. People can listen to music without ever hearing it live either through purchasing a CD or more recently through streaming. I don't know how many people listened to Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique in 1900, but almost everyone heard it by attending a concert. How many people listened to Messiaen's Turangalîla-Symphonie last year? I don't know, but I'd be surprised if it were fewer than heard Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique in 1900.
> 
> There are more than 10 recordings of the following works: Lutoslawski's Symphony No. 3, Ligeti's Violin Concerto, Reich's Music for 18 Musicians, Part's Te Deum, and Schnittke's Piano Concerto. I suspect that these are heard quite often, and I doubt they will be forgotten anytime soon. So maybe contemporary works are not programmed anywhere near as often in concert halls, but I suspect many are frequently heard, create a strong impact, and will be a staple of classical music listeners for a very long time.


One would suspect that if a sufficient number loved such recordings then concomitant live performances would occur.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

janxharris said:


> One would suspect that if a sufficient number loved such recordings then concomitant live performances would occur.


Why? It's not the same group of people.

Yet. As we all know, the concert hall crowd is aging out. Live performances will not be the same in 25 years.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> You are in error, because there are actually many works now routinely played which _did _take 50 years or longer to achieve importance or even notice. There are also some which were routinely played and have now disappeared into near obscurity and aren't really 'loved' in the same way.


The exception doesn't prove the rule unless you are saying that the majority of the works in question took 50 years or longer 'to achieve importance or even notice'. Are you?


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

Number of performances of Karl Jenkins's _The Armed Man_ since it was composed (1999): 
2486


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

janxharris said:


> Number of performances of Karl Jenkins's _The Armed Man_ since it was composed (1999):
> 2486


There will be a few pieces like that and, I think I am correct, many of them rapidly decline in popularity a little later. Maybe they are the equivalent of works like Foulds' World Requiem, marketed as a "cenotaph in sound" in the 1920s and briefly very popular. Since then it has lain more or less dormant and, to be frank, much of it is rather embarrassing (and I say this as a fan of Foulds).


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Blancrocher said:


> I quite like The Moth Requiem and Angel Fighter, among his recent pieces. I wouldn't like to speak for the opinion of posterity, which in any case is presently acting like a bunch of babies. We'll see if they ever grow up and learn to appreciate some decent music.


And ... Pulse Shadows, The Ring Dance Of The Nazarene and Earth Dances ... to name a few others that I think are really something. And Antiphonies must surely be one of the greatest piano concertos of the last 50 years. It is very powerful and not hard to comprehend once you have Harrison's language. .... And - probably it is a lesser piece but I love it greatly - the Cry of Anubis, a Tuba Concerto that delights me. Actually, I like so much of his music and would definitely go to a concert that programmed a major piece of his - so long as the rest of the programme was not too awful.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> The exception doesn't prove the rule unless you are saying that the majority of the works in question took 50 years or longer 'to achieve importance or even notice'. Are you?


Your tenacity is admirable, but misplaced. These are not exceptions, as you would have seen by reading above with regard to Mahler, Stravinsky, Bartok etc and then factoring-in the argument about changes in music over the last 100 years. They are major works/composers works that now have a fixed circulation, but once didn't.

It's a dead horse you are flogging, let it be.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

DaveM said:


> If you read my response closely, I didn't basically accept 3. I was inferring that it applies to some of what people are calling contemporary music -thankfully at present a minority, but may be increasing if academic institutions keep supporting it- and to the composers that are composing music that seems directed at an extremely small audience, is questionably classical and questionably the result of great expertise.


OK, I think it's interesting that of my 4 suggested possibilities you argued against 1, 2, and 4 but inferred that #3 applies to some of what people are calling contemporary music.

You pushed back on what I thought might be reasons late modern and contemporary works are not often represented in concert halls, but you did not push back on #3 which I thought was unlikely to be true. Do you have thoughts on the question, "Assuming works after Shostakovich have made no significant mark on listeners, why would that be so?"


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> Your tenacity is admirable, but misplaced. These are not exceptions, as you would have seen by reading above with regard to Mahler, Stravinsky, Bartok etc and then factoring-in the argument about changes in music over the last 100 years. They are major works/composers works that now have a fixed circulation, but once didn't.
> 
> It's a dead horse you are flogging, let it be.


You evaded the question, a not uncommon occurrence in your responses to my posts. If it's a dead horse, why did you respond to my post in the first place? Or maybe it becomes a dead horse when you realize you were wrong to begin with.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

janxharris said:


> One would suspect that if a sufficient number loved such recordings then concomitant live performances would occur.


I agree with science. Orchestra programmers likely believe that introducing contemporary works into present concert hall programs would alienate too much of their present audience. Maybe in time there will be new concert offerings that target those who enjoy or prefer contemporary works.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> You evaded the question, a not uncommon occurrence in your responses to my posts. If it's a dead horse, why did you respond to my post in the first place? Or maybe it becomes a dead horse when you realize you were wrong to begin with.


And you say the same thing every time. Accusations that you've been either personally abused or that your highly-enlightened questions have been avoided; usually both. I didn't answer it in the way you want, because it is a stupid question. I gave you the answer you needed.


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## PeterFromLA (Jul 22, 2011)

There are indeed post 1975 compositions that are loved by listeners and that they get excited about seeing performed or hearing on recording. Aside from others that have been mentioned up thread, I'd reference:

Ligeti's Piano Etudes. These are objects of intense fascination, especially among piano students, who apparently see them as a kind of personal Mount Everest.

Adams' Nixon in China, Harmonium, and Harmonielehre. The first is a major event whenever it is staged, even being screened in movie theaters across the US. The second was rapturously received when performed at the Proms -- see the youtube video; of the performance one chorus member wrote, "Singing as part of the choir for this performance was definitely one of the most exhilarating moments of my life﻿." Someone else wrote, "Amazing piece of music. Been keeping my eyes open for a performance of this for couple of years and was gutted I couldn’t make this﻿." Meanwhile, another poster noted, "The arrival of the chord at 17:22: perfect beauty. And the ecstasy of that spellbinding transition to the final movement "Wild Nights" is perhaps one of the most magical sections of all. This entire work leaves a lump in my throat, always. Bravi tutti!﻿" Harmonielehre has received numerous performances and judging by comments on line is similarly adored by its partisans.

Glass's Piano Etudes, which though only completed within the past ten years has already received six or more complete recordings. As with Ligeti's Etudes, these are works that intrigue piano students, some of whom will eventually grow up to be recitalists where they will likely program the Glass works (as well as the Ligeti pieces).

Arvo Part's Fratres and Spiegel im spiegel are touchstones for many. One performance of Spiegel on youtube has clocked 3.5 million views. 

And on and on. 

Does any of this music sound like Shostakovich? No, of course not. Is it in the tradition of notated concert music that he wrote in? Well, yes, as a matter of fact it is. Are people eager to listen to it? Without question. This is no longer the era of "bleep and bloop" music out of the Princeton-Columbia axis. We need to catch up with what has actually been happening in the past 40 years.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

eugeneonagain said:


> And you say the same thing every time. Accusations that you've been either personally abused
> ...


A little hyperbole there. But your habit of responding with personal insults instead of to the argument? I would give examples, but the posts have miraculously disappeared. Hmm.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

DaveM said:


> A little hyperbole there. But your habit of responding with personal insults instead of to the argument? I would give examples, but the posts have miraculously disappeared. Hmm.


There are no personal insults which equals the fact that you present no arguments, only complaints.

None of my posts have disappeared from this thread. Maybe you can start a thread about that at area 51 and I can arrive to heckle, like everyone did to me.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

KenOC said:


> Well…has it? Since the passing of Shostakovich, it seems hard to find newer music that means anything significant. Sure, we have diverting composers like John Adams, who has done interesting things but generally not of great substance. And a lot of composers who seem more interested in the sounds of music than anything significant to communicate. And other composers whose efforts seem more related to the literary than the truly musical.
> 
> Please, tell me I'm wrong and point out the exceptions that are keeping the music in this genre alive!


Perhaps we might also ask if there has been periods in history (lasting some 43 years) where no music was composed that was recognised as significant at the time (and which didn't subsequently became a staple of the concert hall either).

Perhaps the period you highlight isn't unique (assuming your lack of significance assertion is correct).


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

arpeggio said:


> One more time.
> 
> I repeat, I have no problem with anyone who dislikes atonal music.
> 
> Contemporary tonal composers.


Some of the composers you go on to list (it was post 143 for anyone who wants to review it) are among those who compose music I would include as "liking the first time I heard it but bored by the fifth time" (there is a discussion in another thread about music that makes you go WOW the first time you hear it) and some others continue to haunt me. There are also many that I just haven't heard (it is an impressive list!).

But, I really do wonder whether this categorisation of music into atonal and tonal is meaningful any more? I know nothing about music and would not find it easy to say if a piece is tonal or not. Purely as a listener, the division of music into these two categories seems only worthwhile for music from between the wars. I know I am probably in a minority (possibly a minority of one!) in this but it is how I experience it.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Perhaps music could be distinguished by the (occasional?) presence of a melody or melodies that were deliberately embedded as integral structure within the piece by the composer. These would be those sorts relying upon a hierarchical structure leading to a balancing of expectations fulfilled/thwarted as per the writings of Leonard Meyer. The other category would comprise works wherein, by design or by happenstance, there is no play of expectation fulfilled/thwarted inherent in the music--instead the listener, through rehearing the music many times, must substitute pure memory in order to create or replicate the idea of melody within a piece which never was initially crafted to have a deliberate melody.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

^^ I don't think I know and like any music where there are no memorable landmarks and developments as the piece progresses. So I agree with you. But I do suspect that, while some will agree that what I find in the music of (say) Carter or Birtwistle or Boulez (to choose three very different but relatively contemporary composers who I like), many others will only experience an amorphous mess. 

I did respond to your earlier post about the ideas of Meyer: it seems I do not link the experience of "music seeming to lack any sort of development or direction" with the presence or absence of tonal arguments in the music. So, if I am understanding the argument correctly, it seems I strongly disagree with it? Excuse me if this is clumsily put - but, as I have said, I am both ignorant of music theory and unable to find a compelling difference between tonal and atonal music!


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Enthusiast said:


> Excuse me if this is clumsily put - but, as I have said, I am both ignorant of music theory and unable to find a compelling difference between tonal and atonal music!


Are you saying you can't hear any difference at all or that you can distinguish them, but don't hear a significant difference?

I find it very hard to believe that someone couldn't distinguish between music with an obvious tonal centre and music which actively avoids it.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

^^ Well, if the music has an obvious tonal centre I would hear that. And I can hear _when _a piece was written. And I can identify I am listening to the early Serialist composers. But when it comes to post WW2 music I see some composers and some pieces referred to as tonal and some as atonal - but what I hear is conservatism or something more new _and this does not map onto whether or not the music is called tonal or atonal_ by those who know about these things. For this reason it seems to me the terms have had their day except when applied to the period between the two world wars. It is probably just me.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Enthusiast said:


> ^^ Well, if the music has an obvious tonal centre I would hear that.


Perhaps not if, as you said, you are ignorant of music theory. Obvious tonality is unmistakable. Stretched tonality (of the Debussy _et al_ variety) still recognisable, and a lack of that tonal pull is again clearly evident - due to the lack of tonal pull to a 'home' key.



Enthusiast said:


> And I can hear _when _a piece was written. And I can identify I am listening to the early Serialist composers. But when it comes to post WW2 music I see some composers and some pieces referred to as tonal and some as atonal - but what I hear is conservatism or something more new _and this does not map onto whether or not the music is called tonal or atonal_ by those who know about these things. For this reason it seems to me the terms have had their day except when applied to the period between the two world wars. It is probably just me.


They may well have had their day (I think they have). The vast majority of post-WW2 music is not even 'atonal'; some of it is markedly tonal, a lot of it is serialism, or a mix of the two with other elements into the mix (polystylist). To be able to hear what you call 'conservatism' and 'something' new means you actually can hear some difference.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Enthusiast said:


> ^^ I don't think I know and like any music where there are no memorable landmarks and developments as the piece progresses. So I agree with you. But I do suspect that, while some will agree that what I find in the music of (say) Carter or Birtwistle or Boulez (to choose three very different but relatively contemporary composers who I like), many others will only experience an amorphous mess.
> 
> I did respond to your earlier post about the ideas of Meyer: it seems I do not link the experience of "music seeming to lack any sort of development or direction" with the presence or absence of tonal arguments in the music. So, if I am understanding the argument correctly, it seems I strongly disagree with it? Excuse me if this is clumsily put - but, as I have said, I am both ignorant of music theory and unable to find a compelling difference between tonal and atonal music!


I am happy to affirm that my ignorance of music theory is probably more profound than your own; most of my ideas have been formed--properly or not--by my readings of Meyer's works. I doubtless share your uncertainty about whether the presence or absence of a tonal center necessarily affects one's perception of and response to melody. And there are other factors in our enjoyment of music: mood, the purely sensuous response to rhythm, timbre. But it seems to me that melody--whether deliberately crafted by the composer or instead the byproduct of a listener's excellent memory--is the most important ingredient in baking the cake, and those cakes with deliberately crafted melodies will outsell those without. I recall an anecdote about Winston Churchill sending a dish back into the kitchen with the remark "This salad has no theme."


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

eugeneonagain said:


> To be able to hear what you call 'conservatism' and 'something' new means you actually can hear some difference.


Oh God, yes - I can hear all sorts of differences! I just don't know when to call it atonal and have never found it matters (except when the whole thing was new with Schoenberg and his immediate followers). It (tonality/atonality) certainly is not part of what makes me like a piece or not.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Strange Magic said:


> I am happy to affirm that my ignorance of music theory is probably more profound than your own; most of my ideas have been formed--properly or not--by my readings of Meyer's works. I doubtless share your uncertainty about whether the presence or absence of a tonal center necessarily affects one's perception of and response to melody. And there are other factors in our enjoyment of music: mood, the purely sensuous response to rhythm, timbre. But it seems to me that melody--whether deliberately crafted by the composer or instead the byproduct of a listener's excellent memory--is the most important ingredient in baking the cake, and those cakes with deliberately crafted melodies will outsell those without. I recall an anecdote about Winston Churchill sending a dish back into the kitchen with the remark "This salad has no theme."


The trouble is: what is a melody? I remember reading in the booklet that accompanies Harnoncourt's Brahms symphonies ... he is asked a question about Brahms' alleged lack of facility with melodies and he answers (if I remember correctly) something to the effect that melodies are just themes or strings of notes .... (and that Brahms was a strong melodist). And I was listening to Birtwistle's Triumph of Time and Gawain's Journey yesterday and was stuck by how strongly melodic both pieces are - much of it in the solo trumpet. But I wonder whether many members would agree that there is any melody there at all? I agree melody is important but am not sure it is easy for a group of us to agree on what constitutes melody.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

Enthusiast said:


> The trouble is: what is a melody? I remember reading in the booklet that accompanies Harnoncourt's Brahms symphonies ... he is asked a question about Brahms' alleged lack of facility with melodies and he answers (if I remember correctly) something to the effect that melodies are just themes or strings of notes .... (and that Brahms was a strong melodist). And I was listening to Birtwistle's Triumph of Time and Gawain's Journey yesterday and was stuck by how strongly melodic both pieces are - much of it in the solo trumpet. But I wonder whether many members would agree that there is any melody there at all? I agree melody is important but am not sure it is easy for a group of us to agree on what constitutes melody.


There have been several TC discussions about whether a particular composer creates melodies in their music (Schoenberg is a major example). Melody is not well-defined in my opinion especially in the sense of how it is used by differing people. I believe many feel that "they know a melody when they hear it," but many of those people would not agree that Schoenberg, for example, has melodies in much of his music.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

It does help (me, anyway) if the composition repeats the same string of notes--with or without some variation--in rapid enough succession such that my feeble memory can say to itself "I just heard something very like this!". Then there is always the question "Do I like this 'melody'?" once I've determined that it is a melody.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

It may be uncharitable of me, but when I read complaints that some kind of music doesn't have melodies, I assume they mean the kind of melodies that become earworms.

And, leaving charity aside altogether, I believe that what actually bothers them in that music is usually phenomenon of rhythm. If you take the notes of any melody--even a really tonal one, say, "Happy Birthday"--and play them without an easily discernible rhythm (i.e. "at random times" and for arbitrary durations), they won't seem melodic.

If that's right, then much of what bothers conservative listeners about much of 20th century art music isn't the presence or absence tonality but the rhythmic freedom. That was, after all, what initially upset the audience of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. It was only later, revisionist (and, in their time, modernist) historians and theorists who drew attention away from Stravinsky's meters in that work to his harmonies. They projected the battle over Schoenberg back in time, reducing the entire history of western music to a simple "progressive" narrative of ever increasing dissonance. Meter, form, instrumentation, and all other issues were reduced to mere sidelines, with the result that most of us outside of academia lack even the basic vocabulary needed to discuss them. (Even if the academics themselves weren't entirely guilty of that reduction, their work led to it.)

Perhaps, however, the biggest reason that we've all embraced this reduction of all musical phenomena to the language of harmony is that it's so _easy_. With very little training, we can hear harmony and tonality within a few seconds of listening. We can then describe it on a simple spectrum from "clearly tonal" to "completely atonal." All our nonmusical friends are impressed, we complacently sip our martinis, and the conversation turns to whether any novelists since the Cold War have said anything of significance. But hearing even the most basic sonata form structure requires _several minutes_ of concentration, and the vocabulary for discussing it includes literally _more than one_ simple dichotomy. Ain't nobody got time for that. Or, imagine the focused attention one would need in order to recognize isorhythm! Could one ever use that on a date? And to discuss instrumentation or timbre--why, one would need to know a good bit about every single instrument, and how they developed over time, and even then the diversity and complexity of sound would render us almost inarticulate, which never makes a good impression.

But the principle of charity demands an alternative explanation. Rather than laziness, maybe we're driven by the need for antagonism. Maybe the reason we love the tonal/atonal dichotomy so much is that it so easily reduces us to two sides that can campaign relentlessly against each other.

I try to look on the bright side, but I can't persuade myself - we could, for example, have hundreds of threads in which the advocates of the passacaglia combat those of the chaconne.

Earlier today, I was working on an article about the history of Seoul, and now I have _Gangnam Style_ stuck in my head.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

If it helps (and it may not!) the melody I heard in those Birtwistle pieces kind of reminded me of that wonderful rather drunken trombone tune in Sibelius 7! So, although I would go along with the idea that serial Schoenberg includes melodies I can see that they may not ever be whistled by the milkman as Schoenberg hoped they would be. But what I hear in quite a lot of contemporary music that is, I think, atonal is much closer to what we _*all *_think of as melody .... but you do have to "learn" to hear it. It isn't always where you think it is going to be. It's funny but I think that when I first listen to a composer who is totally new to me my focus goes to what I later find out is more the decorative parts.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

> Science: "It may be uncharitable of me, but when I read complaints that some kind of music doesn't have melodies, I assume they mean the kind of melodies that become earworms.
> 
> And, leaving charity aside altogether, I believe that what actually bothers them in that music is usually phenomenon of rhythm. If you take the notes of any melody--even a really tonal one, say, "Happy Birthday"--and play them without an easily discernible rhythm (i.e. "at random times" and for arbitrary durations), they won't seem melodic.
> 
> If that's right, then much of what bothers conservative listeners about much of 20th century art music isn't the presence or absence tonality but the rhythmic freedom. That was, after all, what initially upset the audience of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring."


I excuse myself from those who complain(ed) about the "rhythmic freedom" of _The Rite of Spring_. When I first heard it, I was delighted with the fact that it was an extravagantly rich stew of melodies and themes; the rhythmic freedom aspect did not register in any way as a problem or drawback to my enjoyment. But you have put your finger on another barrier to a wider audience for certain musics--the lack of an easily discernible rhythm. Neither the absence of clearly recognizable melodies nor of easily discernible rhythm are good or bad in themselves, _de gustibus...._, but their absence will reduce the size of the potential audience for musics that lack these attributes. No big conspiracy, or even mystery.


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## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

I fully agree that it's a serious issue, but it kind of bothers me how many contemporary composers go on about nature and claim to be inspired by it--sometimes even write music that's supposed to reflect their environmentalism. I wish interviewers would just talk to them about music. It's all kind of smarmy. 

But perhaps this is neither here nor there.


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## lextune (Nov 25, 2016)

Taggart said:


> "New music has degenerated to mere noise, bludgeoning our ears rather than caressing them."*
> 
> Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.
> 
> *Frederick the Great in 1777, quoted in James Gaines "Evening in the Palace of Reason"


This is the third post of the thread. I honestly think this is all that is happening.

The last music(ian) that OP "got/gets" died in 1975. ...Since then it all seems like noise to him. Just as it did to Frederick the Great 200 or so years earlier.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

lextune said:


> This is the third post of the thread. I honestly think this is all that is happening.
> 
> The last music(ian) that OP "got/gets" died in 1975. ...Since then it all seems like noise to him. Just as it did to Frederick the Great 200 or so years earlier.


Sorry, not at all correct. Please read what I actually wrote.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

lextune said:


> This is the third post of the thread. I honestly think this is all that is happening.
> 
> The last music(ian) that OP "got/gets" died in 1975. ...Since then it all seems like noise to him. Just as it did to Frederick the Great 200 or so years earlier.


Frederick the Great apparently didn't like the 'modern music' of Mozart and Haydn. Given your analogy, I'm missing the composers since 1975 that rise to the level of Mozart and Haydn.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Frederick the Great was a bunghole in any event. When old Bach visited at his invitation, Frederick treated him without courtesy. When Bach sent him the Musical Offering, Frederick didn't even acknowledge it (so far as I know). So who cares what he thought? Just another bunghole, the world's still full of 'em.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

DaveM said:


> Frederick the Great apparently didn't like the 'modern music' of Mozart and Haydn. Given your analogy, I'm missing the composers since 1975 that rise to the level of Mozart and Haydn.


Exactly. Jut like Frederick the Great...



KenOC said:


> Frederick the Great was a bunghole in any event.


... or, perhaps I should say, just like many of the non-bungholes who happen not to appreciate the art music of their own time.


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## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Just in case, I wish to be super-duper clear that I don't think DaveM is in any way a bunghole... I really did think of that response before I saw Ken's post and then I thought it'd be funny.... No offense to DaveM!!!


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

science said:


> Exactly. Jut like Frederick the Great...


I'm still missing them. Help me out. Who are they?


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

DaveM said:


> I'm still missing them. Help me out. Who are they?


Excuse me. If refuse to believe that a person with your knowledge does not know the answer to the question.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

arpeggio said:


> Excuse me. If refuse to believe that a person with your knowledge does not know the answer to the question.


I don't know the answer to the question either, and I'm sure many others with considerable knowledge do not. If you do, perhaps you'll simply share your considerable knowledge and end the suspense?


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

DaveM said:


> I'm still missing them. Help me out. Who are they?


Let me give you 2 serious answers. I would be interested in your response to both.

1) Let's drop Mozart since he's generally considered one of the top 3 greatest composers in classical music over the past 400 years. In a 50 year or so time period we would not expect to see another like him (for example, in the period 1820 - 1950 we did not see another composer to "break into" the top 3). So let's pick Mahler and Dvorak. Two composers of similar stature composing in the contemporary period (1975 - present) would be Ligeti and Boulez.

2) There seem to be no contemporary composers that rank with Mozart and Haydn. There are reasons why we might have trouble recognizing, in the present, contemporary composers of similar stature. Also, classical music has changed such that individual composers may not make a huge impact on as many listeners as in earlier periods.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

*I Do Not*



Woodduck said:


> I don't know the answer to the question either, and I'm sure many others with considerable knowledge do not. If you do, perhaps you'll simply share your considerable knowledge and end the suspense?


I do not. As I have stated many times I am not an authority on classical music. The only area that I may have some expertise is in band music.

I have learned that around here most of the time when a members asks such a question they already know the answer and are trying to pick a fight.

But with a little research I am sure most of the members can find the answers for themselves.


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## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

*Wow*



mmsbls said:


> Let me give you 2 serious answers. I would be interested in your response to both.
> 
> 1) Let's drop Mozart since he's generally considered one of the top 3 greatest composers in classical music over the past 400 years. In a 50 year or so time period we would not expect to see another like him (for example, in the period 1820 - 1950 we did not see another composer to "break into" the top 3). So let's pick Mahler and Dvorak. Two composers of similar stature composing in the contemporary period (1975 - present) would be Ligeti and Boulez.
> 
> 2) There seem to be no contemporary composers that rank with Mozart and Haydn. There are reasons why we might have trouble recognizing, in the present, contemporary composers of similar stature. Also, classical music has changed such that individual composers may not make a huge impact on as many listeners as in earlier periods.


Wow, for a non-musician you know many things that I do not :tiphat: I have learned a great deal from you over the years. Thanks.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

mmsbls said:


> Let me give you 2 serious answers. I would be interested in your response to both.
> 
> 1) Let's drop Mozart since he's generally considered one of the top 3 greatest composers in classical music over the past 400 years. In a 50 year or so time period we would not expect to see another like him (for example, in the period 1820 - 1950 we did not see another composer to "break into" the top 3). So let's pick Mahler and Dvorak. Two composers of similar stature composing in the contemporary period (1975 - present) would be Ligeti and Boulez.
> 
> 2) There seem to be no contemporary composers that rank with Mozart and Haydn. There are reasons why we might have trouble recognizing, in the present, contemporary composers of similar stature. Also, classical music has changed such that individual composers may not make a huge impact on as many listeners as in earlier periods.


I think you might get some argument over the proposition that Ligeti and Boulez are composers of the stature of Mahler and Dvorak - not necessarily because they aren't, but because proper grounds for the comparison would not be easy to establish. We'd have at least to take account of some radical changes in the "language" of music and what the music in question has meant to its society. It's possibly too easy to assume that classical music has undergone a continuous, fairly smooth, and "logical" evolution, and that there's something fundamentally similar about the aesthetic presuppositions of composers across eras. But I think music's development has been less like the 19th-century concept of gradual evolution than like the development of technology after the industrial revolution: increasingly punctuated by individual contributions that shift the premises and purposes of the art drastically enough to call into question the value of comparisons between composers of the present and the past. There have been major stylistic shifts in many periods - ars nova vs. ars antiqua, the expressive monody of the Florentine camerata vs. Renaissance polyphony, galant elegance and the "sensitive style" vs. the Baroque, the Romantic plunge into the personal and the "sublime" vs. the Classical ideal of balance and the "beautiful" - but listeners in those eras adapted pretty quickly to the innovations and even welcomed with excitement novelties which initially startled their ears. In the past century, though, it seems either that listeners have become less adaptable or that the course of musical change has become harder to adapt to. I believe the latter is true.

With the breakdown of a common "language," not only in music but in the arts generally, it's more difficult for a listener to grasp what composers are up to, and therefore to assess how well they're doing whatever they're doing and how much it will matter in the end. We feel we know pretty well what Bach was trying to do - that we can understand not only the aesthetic but even the philosophical, moral, social, etc. significance of it - and we see that he did it supremely well and continue to be profoundly moved by it three centuries later. We can appreciate Wagner similarly; _Tristan_ is as recognizably a "great work" as the _St. Matthew_, and most musically knowledgeable people will agree with that even though they may strongly prefer one work or style to the other. We find these works "great," not merely because they give us great pleasure, but because they seem to address in important ways our sense of what it means to be human - each from the standpoint of the sensibility of its time, yet with timeless resonance - and to do so with enormous creative imagination and with highly developed skills in manipulating an artistic language, the language of Western tonal music, which has continued to hold great power and meaning for us across the centuries.

Neither Bach nor Wagner, different as they were in culture and outlook, set out to invent a new musical language; Wagner's art pays as much tribute to Weber's and Beethoven's' as Bach's does to Pachelbel's and Buxtehude's, even if it finally departs farther from its models. Wagner, the more "modern" artist, was more conscious of being an innovator and eager to promote new ideas, but still saw his project as the expression of basic and timeless human values and of a great tradition - indeed, as an attempt to restore the greatness of a tradition which he saw as beginning with the Greeks and falling into decadence in the modern world. How different this outlook is from that of most artists of the past century! 20th-century Modernism virtually defined itself in opposition to tradition, and although most 20th-century composers did not assume an ideologically Modernist stance, those who did so succeeded in making many people question the notion, not only of what music could sound like and say, but of what it was in its very essence. This was a real breakdown of artistic continuity, without precedent in past eras; it contributed to a widening rift between the composer and his audience, and presaged the postmodern phenomena of multiculturalism and artistic eclecticism in an increasingly global world.

When we consider how to compare the stature of contemporary composers to that of acknowledged masters of the past, I think it's pertinent to wonder about the likelihood that composers whom we or posterity would agree to call "great" will emerge from our fragmented, uncentered, fast-paced culture. There's no dearth of creativity around - a "one world" culture presents plenty of material and opportunity for trying new things and putting old things together in new ways - but I doubt that we will soon, if ever, see a repeat of the sort of milieu in which artistic greatness arose in the past: a well-defined, cumulative artistic tradition able to fertilize the ground from which a musical art can grow that can nourish a Bach, a Schubert, a Verdi or a Sibelius to maturity. Today, the composer takes what he fancies from a limitless smorgasbord, or tries to add something to the menu that no one has tasted before, and hopes the result will find him a niche in a world drowning in voices clamoring for attention. Such a culture doesn't strike me as fertile ground for the expression of deeply considered, eternal values, and any artist who nonetheless manages to express them deserves to be honored as a hero, and possibly a saint.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Woodduck said:


> Today, the composer takes what he fancies from a limitless smorgasbord, or tries to add something to the menu that no one has tasted before, and hopes the result will find him a niche in a world drowning in voices clamoring for attention. Such a culture doesn't strike me as fertile ground for the expression of deeply considered, eternal values, and any artist who nonetheless manages to express them deserves to be honored as a hero, and possibly a saint.


An interesting post as usual ... but cutting to the chase I wonder whether what you describe here is really what a contemporary composer is doing or how s/he experiences their art. I suspect, for example, that most young composers are drawn to this or that tradition (or fragment of one) and learn their art from that. The BBC recently showed a documentary about the relatively young British composer George Benjamin - for many the greatest living British composer (not an opinion I would argue against) - and it was clear that at a very young age he had decided that he wanted to learn from Messiaen ... and indeed he went to Paris to do so at the age of (I think) 16. Of course, he went on to study others and his professor at Cambridge (I may be wrong but perhaps Humphrey Searle) seems to have challenged him to broaden his influences. The picture the film painted was not of a composer struggling to find a niche but of one who didn't write much (he played piano in clubs) until he found musical ideas that he wanted to realise. He seems to have found an audience from his first works without challenge but not to have struggled or been driven to find one. The struggle may come when he has to choose between conducting (his reputation as a conductor may be growing) and composing .... something of a parallel with Boulez?

OK that's a neat story and more what I would have _expected_ of a living great composer. It may be too neat and too romantic and too retrospective but the picture you paint seems more like an empty head trying to find a career. Surely it can't be like that?


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

mmsbls said:


> Let me give you 2 serious answers. I would be interested in your response to both.
> 
> 1) Let's drop Mozart since he's generally considered one of the top 3 greatest composers in classical music over the past 400 years. In a 50 year or so time period we would not expect to see another like him (for example, in the period 1820 - 1950 we did not see another composer to "break into" the top 3). So let's pick Mahler and Dvorak. Two composers of similar stature composing in the contemporary period (1975 - present) would be Ligeti and Boulez.


I would just point out that my response that you referred to came about because a poster, as others have, compared, inaccurately, the limited acceptance of contemporary music in the present to the response to innovations in classical music in the distant past. However, in this case, the poster -knowingly or not- used a rather extreme analogy that involved the music of Mozart and Haydn which followed that of Bach.

As for your question, for the most part, I'll defer to Wooduck's response. Ligeti and Boulez may be bright lights for the contemporary music community, but I don't think they'll ever reach the overall stature of Mahler -who stands as a towering example of late romanticism- or even that of Dvorak.



> 2) There seem to be no contemporary composers that rank with Mozart and Haydn. There are reasons why we might have trouble recognizing, in the present, contemporary composers of similar stature. Also, classical music has changed such that individual composers may not make a huge impact on as many listeners as in earlier periods.


For the most part I agree except to say that an insult on injury is that IMO the structure of much of contemporary music and the splintering of the latter into so many different parts (along with confusing names) are not the sort of thing that is likely to bring about relative adulation of a given composer compared to those of the past.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

Woodduck said:


> I think you might get some argument over the proposition that Ligeti and Boulez are composers of the stature of Mahler and Dvorak - not necessarily because they aren't, but because proper grounds for the comparison would not be easy to establish. We'd have at least to take account of some radical changes in the "language" of music and what the music in question has meant to its society. It's possibly too easy to assume that classical music has undergone a continuous, fairly smooth, and "logical" evolution, and that there's something fundamentally similar about the aesthetic presuppositions of composers across eras. But I think music's development has been less like the 19th-century concept of gradual evolution than like the development of technology after the industrial revolution: increasingly punctuated by individual contributions that shift the premises and purposes of the art drastically enough to call into question the value of comparisons between composers of the present and the past. There have been major stylistic shifts in many periods - ars nova vs. ars antiqua, the expressive monody of the Florentine camerata vs. Renaissance polyphony, galant elegance and the "sensitive style" vs. the Baroque, the Romantic plunge into the personal and the "sublime" vs. the Classical ideal of balance and the "beautiful" - but listeners in those eras adapted pretty quickly to the innovations and even welcomed with excitement novelties which initially startled their ears. In the past century, though, it seems either that listeners have become less adaptable or that the course of musical change has become harder to adapt to. I believe the latter is true.


In general I strongly agree with your overall post. Modern/contemporary music seems very different to me than any other era. I once started a thread concerning the rate of change of modern music (although the thread focused on other aspects). A composer friend of mine once said he almost felt as though each composer has his/her own voice or language. Rather than becoming accustomed to the language of the Classical era or the Romantic era, one must become accustomed to the language of Ligeti, Stockhausen, Boulez, Messiaen, etc.. Clearly learning to understand or enjoy each language can be difficult and time consuming. It certainly has been for me.



Woodduck said:


> With the breakdown of a common "language," not only in music but in the arts generally, it's more difficult for a listener to grasp what composers are up to, and therefore to assess how well they're doing whatever they're doing and how much it will matter in the end.


Yes. Not only does learning the various languages require time and effort (for some), but also comparisons between composers become more difficult. Yes, Mahler wrote music that varied from Dvorak, but much of the structure and harmonies were similar. Boulez, Stockhausen, and Ligeti share far fewer similarities to my mind, and their music is extremely different from music of the Romantic era.



Woodduck said:


> When we consider how to compare the stature of contemporary composers to that of acknowledged masters of the past, I think it's pertinent to wonder about the likelihood that composers whom we or posterity would agree to call "great" will emerge from our fragmented, uncentered, fast-paced culture.


I do not know which modern/contemporary composers might be considered great. Perhaps you are correct that the variety exhibited in the past 100 years could be a serious impediment to accepting more recent composers in the same manner that Bach, Mozart, Wagner, or Brahms have been accepted.


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## mmsbls (Mar 6, 2011)

DaveM said:


> As for your question, for the most part, I'll defer to Wooduck's response. Ligeti and Boulez may be bright lights for the contemporary music community, but I don't think they'll ever reach the overall stature of Mahler -who stands as a towering example of late romanticism- or even that of Dvorak.


Maybe. Maybe not. I think we can say that most (almost all?) of us believe that classical listeners do not enjoy modern/contemporary composers as much as earlier ones. Still, I think classical music is alive, and composers are producing music enjoyed by many listeners. Perhaps the flame is smaller, but it still burns.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

mmsbls said:


> ...I do not know which modern/contemporary composers might be considered great. Perhaps you are correct that the variety exhibited in the past 100 years could be a serious impediment to accepting more recent composers in the same manner that Bach, Mozart, Wagner, or Brahms have been accepted.


Some time back I read a quote from Boulez, who was asked why so few "modernist" works like his had been accepted by the broad classical music public. He replied, as best I can remember, "Perhaps we did not adequately consider the way people listen to music."

I have no idea how to even begin to respond to that.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Enthusiast said:


> An interesting post as usual ... but cutting to the chase I wonder whether what you describe here is really what a contemporary composer is doing or how s/he experiences their art. I suspect, for example, that most young composers are drawn to this or that tradition (or fragment of one) and learn their art from that. The BBC recently showed a documentary about the relatively young British composer George Benjamin - for many the greatest living British composer (not an opinion I would argue against) - and it was clear that at a very young age he had decided that he wanted to learn from Messiaen ... and indeed he went to Paris to do so at the age of (I think) 16. Of course, he went on to study others and his professor at Cambridge (I may be wrong but perhaps Humphrey Searle) seems to have challenged him to broaden his influences. The picture the film painted was not of a composer struggling to find a niche but of one who didn't write much (he played piano in clubs) until he found musical ideas that he wanted to realise. He seems to have found an audience from his first works without challenge but not to have struggled or been driven to find one. The struggle may come when he has to choose between conducting (his reputation as a conductor may be growing) and composing .... something of a parallel with Boulez?
> 
> OK that's a neat story and more what I would have _expected_ of a living great composer. It may be too neat and too romantic and too retrospective but the picture you paint seems more like an empty head trying to find a career. Surely it can't be like that?


I wouldn't presume to know what's in the mind of any composer or artist (or anyone else) when they set out to do what they do. I was only describing what I take to be the general cultural situation of the modern classical composer.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

mmsbls said:


> Let me give you 2 serious answers. I would be interested in your response to both.
> 
> 1) Let's drop Mozart since he's generally considered one of the top 3 greatest composers in classical music over the past 400 years. In a 50 year or so time period we would not expect to see another like him (for example, in the period 1820 - 1950 we did not see another composer to "break into" the top 3). So let's pick Mahler and Dvorak. Two composers of similar stature composing in the contemporary period (1975 - present) would be Ligeti and Boulez.
> 
> 2) There seem to be no contemporary composers that rank with Mozart and Haydn. There are reasons why we might have trouble recognizing, in the present, contemporary composers of similar stature. Also, classical music has changed such that individual composers may not make a huge impact on as many listeners as in earlier periods.


I believe Ligeti and Boulez are on the same level as Mahler and Dvorak. I don't think I'm overrating or underrating from either era (well that's debatable), since I admire and like all of them about the same. I'll admit I like Dvorak the most of the 4, for his tunefulness, poetry, and the emotion I get from his works. But I don't think emotion is a requirement in music to enjoy or appreciate it, or for the music to make strong impact. I would say Ligeti is the most original of the 4.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

As Giambattista Vico wrote, as a philosophy of history, there are different "ages" of existence. The Age of Gods, The Age of Man, The Age of Heroes...modern composers are immersed in a different age now...the Age of Gods is over. Ligeti is not Beethoven or Bach...he can only look out at his Age, and do what is possible within those confines. The heavens have closed on Modern Man, so God will not reveal himself to us presently. 
It is only through the medium of art, of music, that we can commune and glimpse the Age of the Gods, a communication that transcends time. Music can be considered an "escape" from the immediate present, a window into other Ages. It takes me into a reverie, where I engage in an exchange of ideas with a composer. 
Listening to Mozart's 40 and 41 the other day, I was calmly and interestedly taking in each musical idea, each variation, as my own personal present from Mozart. This is music of another Age, an Age of Gods, but still it is for me, for my "being." 
Mozart somehow knew that he was communicating with his Age, and with other Ages: a larger entity, God, The Gods, Mankind, the Overmind, that I was presently a part of in this particular incarnation, looking back at his now long-gone Age, and his brief particularity, yet transcending time and being through the medium of art and music. 
A 'record' of our being, traced in stone, shared in much later times, amazingly effective and personal, transcending time and all Ages, as if time did not matter, in light of the overwhelming present!
That large presence of consciousness that we are all a part of, the wellspring of being...we are all a part of the same thing, and Mozart surely knew this, and acted on it. He took it as a 'given.' The axiom of being, of which we are all part of...our particularity is a brief interface with this, a small chance to "synch" to the larger grid...in grid we trust...Mozart surely did not waste his chance.
Let us glimpse into the other ages, and not lament that the door to heaven has been closed to us presently, in this age. Let us do what we can do, with what we have been given. If the pain of separation from the wellspring of being is too much to bear, then let us look to the past for our sustenance. The brave composers of the present Age are doing what they can do, given what they have been given.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

^^^ I don't know whether this is intended to add to our understanding of the state of contemporary music, but it seems at the very least a simplistic attempt to find coherence in history, if not a grandiose (and Eurocentric) fantasy. You speak as if there were some immense teleological determinism governing "mankind" as a whole, pushing him through these various "ages" and leaving previous "ages" behind. You don't bother describing these "ages" you speak of, but if there is an "Age of Gods," is it really over? Vast portions of the globe, and large and influential sectors of this country, would certainly dispute that.

Life on earth is not that coherent, s*** happens, and man remains man, pushed this way or that by circumstances, unchanged in his essence but capable of remarkable diversity of thought and behavior. Individual cultures have undergone their own "ages," evolving in their peculiar ways, occasionally coming into contact and influencing one another, but not congealing into a coherent, universal world-view. Despite progress in communication and transportation, all the "ages" still exist as living human experience; their products, musical and otherwise, can be alive and "contemporary" to anyone who identifies with them. 

Today, in the "age of information," virtually all times, cultures, philosophies and sensibilities - and art forms - are available for us to sample and, if we wish, claim as our own. Contemporary music makes this plain, which is why no one can say just what contemporary music is (though some claim to know what it should and shouldn't be). But if mankind as a whole is to assign itself an "age," it should probably be the Age of Ecological Collapse. If that realization fails to unify us, as everything else has failed, music will be nothing but fiddling while Rome burns - or, to switch metaphors, a hymn on the deck of the Titanic. 

What do you suppose the band will be playing as we go down? Beethoven, Ferneyhough, or Eminem?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Woodduck said:


> ^^^ I don't know whether this is intended to add to our understanding of the state of contemporary music, but it seems at the very least a simplistic attempt to find coherence in history, if not a grandiose (and Eurocentric) fantasy. You speak as if there were some immense teleological determinism governing "mankind" as a whole, pushing him through these various "ages" and leaving previous "ages" behind. You don't bother describing these "ages" you speak of, but if there is an "Age of Gods," is it really over? Vast portions of the globe, and large and influential sectors of this country, would certainly dispute that.


Giambattista Vico wrote a book called "The New Science," which is available if you wish to explore these ideas further. The immense teleological determinism is caused by new technologies, and the way they affect culture. This is indeed an immense subject, since it describes "ages" of history which occur over hundreds of years. Remember how different things used to be a mere fifty years ago? I do.



> ...Life on earth is not that coherent, s*** happens, and man remains man, pushed this way or that by circumstances, unchanged in his essence but capable of remarkable diversity of thought and behavior. Individual cultures have undergone their own "ages," evolving in their peculiar ways, occasionally coming into contact and influencing one another, but not congealing into a coherent, universal world-view. Despite progress in communication and transportation, all the "ages" still exist as living human experience; their products, musical and otherwise, can be alive and "contemporary" to anyone who identifies with them.


Yes, as I said, we can experience these "ages" through the medium of art. Wagner was perhaps the last authentic representative of the Age of Gods. But now is now, and it is what it is. We can't authentically recreate (in the sense of creating new works) Wagner's music, we can only observe. We can't be fully immersed and "be" in those other Ages.



> Today, in the "age of information," virtually all times, cultures, philosophies and sensibilities - and art forms - are available for us to sample and, if we wish, claim as our own. Contemporary music makes this plain, which is why no one can say just what contemporary music is (though some claim to know what it should and shouldn't be).


Yes, and doesn't that sum it all up? I'm sure Marshall McLuhan would agree wholeheartedly. We are now "outside" of the Age of Gods, looking in and sampling its riches. But we are not "of" that age, we are voyeurs, looking in.



> ...But if mankind as a whole is to assign itself an "age," it should probably be the Age of Ecological Collapse. If that realization fails to unify us, as everything else has failed, music will be nothing but fiddling while Rome burns - or, to switch metaphors, a hymn on the deck of the Titanic.


Yes, that's a good insight. This is certainly an "Age of Man," who seems bent on destroying himself and everything around him.



> What do you suppose the band will be playing as we go down? Beethoven, Ferneyhough, or Eminem?


Something ironic, without logic, the way Mahler used that organ-grinder's song, after he ran from his parents' argument into the street and encountered it, associating it with great tragedy.


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## Guest (Nov 29, 2018)

KenOC said:


> Some time back I read a quote from Boulez, who was asked why so few "modernist" works like his had been accepted by the broad classical music public. He replied, as best I can remember, "Perhaps we did not adequately consider the way people listen to music."
> 
> I have no idea how to even begin to respond to that.


This is very much in line with Boulez's self critical attitude, and by the 1960s he did not consider himself to be a composer of 'the avant garde' and went on to develop ways to make his music sound good on the surface, giving it some kind of 'immediate' appeal that he enjoyed so much in music by composers like Bartok and Stravinsky, whilst still retaining the structural complexity of works like Structures and Polyphony X. Interestingly, those are two works he did not think were particularly listenable and withdrew Polyphony X on account of the work being too rigid in terms of his approach to pitch and rhythm at the expense of effective orchestration and what he felt should have been a good listening experience. On the other hand, Le Marteau sans Maître is being performed regularly to this day, and that is a work Boulez felt he was successful in creating music that was graspable and interesting on its surface level in addition to its pretty much inaudible structural complexity. Boulez has excellent judgement that's for sure, but it took a while for him to really develop it.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

^^^ I listened to these three works yesterday and each of them struck me as being "apparently very approachable" but each time I listen to them I am also aware fairly quickly that there is something much more "deep" or "profound" (I'm trying to avoid the word "complex") about the music. It isn't just that the pieces are longer than they would be if they were just about the superficial attractiveness - there are other things going on but it took me quite a while to get to grips with them.

Although Boulez does make these pieces easy to relate to at first, this attractiveness (the excitement in the opening 10 minutes of Sur Incises, for example) is not of a type that _draws you in_. The listener is left with the fact that there is no easy route to "understanding" this music. So, in the end I am not sure Boulez succeeds in making his music more accessible. But I don't think that matters: these are amazing and powerful pieces in which a brilliant surface is attached to something profound that only becomes understandable after several hearings (or that is how it has been for me, anyway). I can't think of any other music that works in quite the same way. It is magic.


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## Guest (Nov 29, 2018)

Enthusiast said:


> ^^^ I listened to these three works yesterday and each of them struck me as being "apparently very approachable" but each time I listen to them I am also aware fairly quickly that there is something much more "deep" or "profound" (I'm trying to avoid the word "complex") about the music. It isn't just that the pieces are longer than they would be if they were just about the superficial attractiveness - there are other things going on but it took me quite a while to get to grips with them.
> 
> Although Boulez does make these pieces easy to relate to at first, this attractiveness (the excitement in the opening 10 minutes of Sur Incises, for example) is not of a type that _draws you in_. The listener is left with the fact that there is no easy route to "understanding" this music. So, in the end I am not sure Boulez succeeds in making his music more accessible. But I don't think that matters: these are amazing and powerful pieces in which a brilliant surface is attached to something profound that only becomes understandable after several hearings (or that is how it has been for me, anyway). I can't think of any other music that works in quite the same way. It is magic.


Actually, I think you have put it much better than I have. I agree, somewhat, because I am not entirely sure Structures book 1 has the same kind of more traditionally linear development that Sur Incises has and I am less inclined to describe it as 'approachable'in the same way Sur Incises might be. I'm not denying either of them can be considered 'approachable' works, for those who are into it.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Enthusiast said:


> .. So, in the end I am not sure Boulez succeeds in making his music more accessible. But I don't think that matters:..


I suspect that quote will have some use in the future.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

shirime said:


> Actually, I think you have put it much better than I have. I agree, somewhat, because I am not entirely sure Structures book 1 has the same kind of more traditionally linear development that Sur Incises has and I am less inclined to describe it as 'approachable'in the same way Sur Incises might be. I'm not denying either of them can be considered 'approachable' works, for those who are into it.


I was probably talking about a different thing but I read your post within half a day of listening to that CD and coincidentally thinking about how Boulez's music seems to work (in engaging with the listener) differently to the music of other composers I know. So I was already trying to understand how the pieces (particularly Sur Incises but also Anthemes 2) were working. As I forgot the picture of the disc, my post was probably not at all clear!


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## Guest (Nov 30, 2018)

Enthusiast said:


> I was probably talking about a different thing but I read your post within half a day of listening to that CD and coincidentally thinking about how Boulez's music seems to work (in engaging with the listener) differently to the music of other composers I know. So I was already trying to understand how the pieces (particularly Sur Incises but also Anthemes 2) were working. As I forgot the picture of the disc, my post was probably not at all clear!
> 
> View attachment 110271


Right! Thanks for the clarification. That's a great recording you have there.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

^^^ It is! 

I haven't seen you here for quite a while. I was away for a bit and I don't think I've see you since I cam back. Welcome back if you've been away.


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## Guest (Nov 30, 2018)

Enthusiast said:


> ^^^ It is!
> 
> I haven't seen you here for quite a while. I was away for a bit and I don't think I've see you since I cam back. Welcome back if you've been away.


Thanks, and welcome back to you too.  I've not been very active on any forums I visit lately because I'm currently on holiday visiting my girlfriend's family with her in Munich. When I'm back home in Melbourne I'll be here more often I hope.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

Taggart said:


> "New music has degenerated to mere noise, bludgeoning our ears rather than caressing them."*





Taggart said:


> *Frederick the Great in 1777, quoted in James Gaines "Evening in the Palace of Reason"


not quoted, but *ascribed* to him.

its from a book published in 2005 by some dubious fellow - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_R._Gaines

he is a media hack.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

that is, Frederick the Great did not say anything of the sort.


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