# Too complicated by half!



## malc

It seems to me that young composers coming out of the academe bubble have the idea that the more complex a piece is , the better. Maybe this all started with serial music etc.. As they start their career in the real music world , they probably find it extremely hard to get their pieces played once , let alone twice . As a player in a foward looking concert band , i am dubious asking people to come along to a "challenging" programme . Should these composers stick to their coterie of chums , or ....?


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## Sekhar

malc said:


> It seems to me that young composers coming out of the academe bubble have the idea that the more complex a piece is , the better. Maybe this all started with serial music etc.. As they start their career in the real music world , they probably find it extremely hard to get their pieces played once , let alone twice . As a player in a foward looking concert band , i am dubious asking people to come along to a "challenging" programme . Should these composers stick to their coterie of chums , or ....?


Part of it is the students being eager to put all the stuff they learned into practice, which is only natural and will evolve over time. But the other (potentially more harmful) part IMO is the way academia rewards and encourages bizarre compositions, which wires you into favoring that kind of music even after you graduate. Happens in other fields too, like in fashion or film school, where the highest scoring short is too often the craziest one.


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## JAS

And complexity is a thing at the moment.


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## joen_cph

The concerts I´ve experienced here in Denmark with new music by young composers doesn´t really have extreme complexity as the main feature, I think. That said, I don´t frequent them a lot. But at a recent one with orchestral music, I overheard the elder composer Hans Henrik Nordstrøm grumpily complaining, that a composer repeated himself too much in a piece. Two of three pieces were rather late-romantically coloured, I think. I´d find a truly conservative, melodic style of lesser interest only.


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## Phil loves classical

I don't see contemporary music as complex, no matter what some may try to advertise. Just detailed. I see them as just following a certain type of idiom, just like some try to write in a baroque, Classical or Romantic style, rather than intentionally being bizarre , although I've seen and heard some that do.


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## Carol Rein

Complexity is easier than simplicity.


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## Guest

I guess it depends which academia we are talking about. The composition teachers at Curtis are extremely different to the composition teachers at Harvard. I've never met any composition student or teacher who is of the opinion that complexity = better, but I have met many who have said that the composition projects that get higher marks are usually the ones that show an excellent knowledge of the craft. The 'simple' music may be complex in its own way, just not as highly detailed. I tend to think of the difference between an ornate cathedral and a modern eco-home; the former may be highly detailed and have a very complex surface that's difficult to take in all at once, whilst the latter may be visually a lot simpler and more geometric yet have a very sophisticated design for maximum sustainability.


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## E Cristobal Poveda

I think complexity for the sake of complexity is what is ruining modern classical music. I think musicality and sensible harmonic development as well as compelling use of color and varied articulation (Percussive vs. Tender) is the key to making quality music.

I think a lot of people are pressured to be "innovative" to the point where they no longer are. It stifles creativity, imo.

I mean, I could easily write an atonal, percussive technical piece within a week, but it would sound as hollow as my intentions... No, music should be about letting your heart and mind wander along its own path, not forced down one lane that the intelligentsia have deemed "creative and innovative".


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## paulc

Complexity is not something I seek out in music. I listen to some music that is complex, but that's not its appeal.

I don't understand how anyone could favour complexity if it were at the expense of other aspects of music.


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## Larkenfield

_"Simplicity is the final achievement. After one has played a vast quantity of notes and more notes, it is simplicity that emerges as the crowning reward of art." -Frederic Chopin_






_"The spirit's foe in man has not been simplicity, but sophistication." -George Santayana_

_"Seek simplicity but distrust it." -Alfred North Whitehead_


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## MarkMcD

I think the focus of many contemporary composers has changed wildly over the last century or so. It seem that music is no longer written for the masses, as was the case when the great masters where writing music. Classical music didn't really exist up until the latter half of the 19th century, before then, it was just music, intended to be heard by everyone. Now it seems that classical music no longer appeals to the masses, even though there is a huge section of society that still appreciates it, it is not really written for them, but rather to be accepted by an "elite" group of aficionados who insist that new music must always be breaking new ground, and that there is no place for music that goes over "old" ground.

In a time when really "originality" no longer exists, as everything has already been done in one form or another, it seems the only avenue left open is the increasingly bazar (complex) mashing together of notes that a lot of the time I find hard to even call music.

To give an example of just what I mean by the focus of classical music having changed form being for the masses, to being for the acceptance of an elite few:- I belong to 4 classical music forums that in my experience are oriented (in the main) to favour the more modern aspect of composition. This is not a complaint, I greatly enjoy participating on these forums, however, they are not at least accessed by "the masses". I also have a sound cloud page, which I would consider to be much more accessible to the masses. The difference in comments left by the members of the two different types of forum is quite noticeable. That is to say that I believe the general public still seem to favour music that is familiar to them, that is comfortable for them to listen to, and in general, the reverse is true for the other, less accessible (to the public) forums.

This leads me to believe that the direction classical music is taking is no longer driven by the general population, and as such is no longer trying to please them, but rather a different group entirely.


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## Carol Rein

Classical music still exists, but it has evolved into film soundtracks. The composers just like (specially) Howard Shore or (also) Hans Zimmer, just to talk about a couple of them, are as good as the masters were.
The leimotiv of Gladiator, when Lucila (Connie Nielsen) gets up in the coliseum, is amazingly simple, beautiful and at the same time magnificently powerful. Any master of the classical would been touched by Zimmer's Gladiator leitmotiv.
The magnificence and richness, the spiritual transcendentality, the deepness of the dimensional architecture and the impressive textures of LOTR music, is an evolution of Wagner. R.Wagner opened the gate to the archetype that Shore developes (you could say Shore's not original), but the scope of Shore couldn't have been achieved by Wagner, so the archetype wasn't fully incarnated yet, while the masters were alive.
None of them did something similar to the Gladiator leitmotiv I've mentioned above, so the archetypes are still waiting for completion in matter of incarnation onto musical forms.
So the simplicity that Chopin talked about, is still the grail of the music.


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## Phil loves classical

^^ I doubt the Masters would be impressed by the film music nowadays. It is mainly overblown homophonic stuff. A bit oversimplistic, and thinly stretched over long periods of time with lots of repetition. A good example, the Dances with Wolves soundtrack is really just 3 different themes rearranged to sound slightly different.


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## Carol Rein

You doubt it. That's your doubt.


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## malc

Repetition is used above as a negative .So many of the modern composers [Glass, Reilly et al] use repetition as a basic.
There is a debatable use of "the masses" many people are far more broad minded than are given credit.Maybe one should take into account the Judge advising the Jury on deciding the intent of the defendant , was the composer trying to impress his peers by the erudite , and arcane references in the ever changing kaleidascope of his inspiration!!!


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## Phil loves classical

The repetition by John Barry and some film composers is like rehashing old ideas with minimal variation to fill time, rather than developing the themes or actually utilizing the repetition. That is my impression from a critical standpoint. I loved the John Dunbar Theme and wanted to hear more development, but instead is some unimaginative adding of a few string accompaniment notes. I agree the Howard Shore LOTR had a lot more variation, but still I feel there isn't that much meat. The Leonard Roseman LOTR score did have lots of themes and development, but is a rare thing.


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## JAS

Music functions in different ways in different films. In some cases, repetition (or at least close repetition) gives a certain continuity to a rambling film. And it must be remembered that the way a score plays out in a film is often very different than the way it does as a soundtrack. Newer movies in particular seem to give composers less of an option for asserting a strong voice, or a canvas on which to express a lot in terms of theme or development.


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## Guest

Phil loves classical said:


> ^^ I doubt the Masters would be impressed by the film music nowadays. It is mainly overblown homophonic stuff. A bit oversimplistic, and thinly stretched over long periods of time with lots of repetition. A good example, the Dances with Wolves soundtrack is really just 3 different themes rearranged to sound slightly different.


Listen to Jonny Greenwood's scores and report back. Studied with Penderecki and wrote music for some of PT Anderson's films. I'll agree that most film music is boring and unoriginal, though. I immediately tune out when someone says they love Hans Zimmer.



malc said:


> It seems to me that young composers coming out of the academe bubble have the idea that the more complex a piece is , the better. Maybe this all started with serial music etc.. As they start their career in the real music world , they probably find it extremely hard to get their pieces played once , let alone twice . As a player in a foward looking concert band , i am dubious asking people to come along to a "challenging" programme . Should these composers stick to their coterie of chums , or ....?


"Forward looking concert band"...that's hilarious. "Avant-garde" in the band world is about 75 years behind the rest of classical music. Even the professional orchestral scene is lagging behind. Chamber music is where the most adventurous stuff is being written, so don't compare what you hear from that neck of the woods to band music. We can't stay stuck in the romantic era forever, either. Composers are generally concerned with adding distinction to the repertoire, not bulk. The most successful artists usually don't like treading over well-traveled paths, at least not too much. If new music bothers you so much, go back to Percy Grainger and Gustav Holst.


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## Carol Rein

With the music happens the same thing than with movies scripts.
The problem is the academy itself. They rate the art as they say it must be...and we have to follow that veredict, no matter what.
For example, most "prepared" and intellectual people would say that Memento or Interestellar are deep films, while Bedazzled (remake) is a shallow comedy, when in fact Bedazzled is far far deeper than the other two, its esoteric content is impressive and so exact to the occult knowledge, but as it has been packed in a comedy format (simplicity way), it is automatically underrated. While Memento and Interestellar have nothing but complexity regarding the true deepness, their intellectual format make them overrated.
The same occurs with Hans Zimmer's music. As it is doesn't show any complexity in its packagement, it has to be definitely mediocre.
Those people who state that kind of vredict aren't perceiving the very essence behind the format. 
A single phrase from Mother Theresa has truth, and is deeper than an entire book of Sartre.


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## Guest

I'm certainly more attracted to the textural complexity of music by composers like Bach, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, Wagner, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Debussy, Strauss, Ravel, Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Berg, Bartok and Boulez than the textural simplicity that is much more apparent in so many lesser known composers. In order for something to be really interesting for me to listen to, there's gotta be some kind of counterpoint, or the composer has to have a good awareness of how every interdependent voice in a texture adds up to a greater whole.

In one of my most recent pieces I have decided to display a greater awareness of texture, so I composed a piece of music where the texture can sometimes be quite complex, but only in comparison with simpler textures in other parts of the piece. I don't view the work as especially complex itself; aside from generating pitches for an overall structural harmonic plan, the rest of the composing was very intuitive. I do hope that there are some interesting things to listen to without a sense of the music being shallow.

Probably my best non-solo piece so far, but still a long way to go


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## Carol Rein

Complexity Entartete Kunst


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## Haydn70

Carol Rein said:


> Classical music still exists, but it has evolved into film soundtracks. The composers just like (specially) Howard Shore or (also) Hans Zimmer, just to talk about a couple of them, are as good as the masters were.
> The leimotiv of Gladiator, when Lucila (Connie Nielsen) gets up in the coliseum, is amazingly simple, beautiful and at the same time magnificently powerful. Any master of the classical would been touched by Zimmer's Gladiator leitmotiv.
> The magnificence and richness, the spiritual transcendentality, the deepness of the dimensional architecture and the impressive textures of LOTR music, is an evolution of Wagner. R.Wagner opened the gate to the archetype that Shore developes (you could say Shore's not original), but the scope of Shore couldn't have been achieved by Wagner, so the archetype wasn't fully incarnated yet, while the masters were alive.
> None of them did something similar to the Gladiator leitmotiv I've mentioned above, so the archetypes are still waiting for completion in matter of incarnation onto musical forms.
> So the simplicity that Chopin talked about, is still the grail of the music.


To place Shore and Zimmer on the same level as the masters is incredibly laughable to say the least. Zimmer can't even be considered a composer…he can barely read music. Here in Los Angeles it is well known in the music community that he more a coordinator and/or producer than a composer. He is referred to as a "hummer": a film "composer" who actually doesn't know how to compose but records melodic fragments which he passes on to his team of trained, uncredited composers who flesh out those fragments and actually write the music. And the music itself, however well it might work in a particular movie, doesn't warrant comparison with music of the masters.

Here is an interesting thread in which Zimmer is discussed:

__
https://www.reddit.com/r/classicalmusic/comments/3s7zpt


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## Carol Rein

I already knew he passed the fragments to a team that actually develops the composition. But the melodic form lies in him, not in the rest of the uncredited composers. 
Yes, that's well known!
That's exactly what I was talking about above, there is something else than technical stuff to make the music to be music.
Zimmer can be compared to a person who doesn´t know how to compose a book, but he has a good topic, a good story to tell, so a crew of writers do the mechanical job.
The comnposer is him, not them.
The music is the angel, the idea, not the technique neither the performance.
If someone has a perfect writing technique, and knows all the grammatical rules to perfection, it doesn't mean that person has a any idea to transmit.


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## Carol Rein

I myself have a lot of fragments that are not heard out there, are mine, and original... may be I´ll take the time to arrange those in a composition, or may be I won't have the will to do it, and I'll pass them to another musicians for them to arrange it.
It's the same for me, I don't care at all, the composition will always be mine, I am the creator, because the idea comes from me, not them.
Most today "good" composers that know all musical rules to perfection, and write (and even play with virtuosity) their own music that is considered as WOW... well, I've listened to them and I really feel their music it is the same as throwing a piano and bunch of musical orchestral instruments down the stairs, and write the resulting notes.
Entartete Kunst, Entartete Musik, as I said before. 
So they're the laughable ones.


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## adrien

Carol Rein said:


> Complexity Entartete Kunst


My 7yo son has been playing with Notion on my phone. He's punched in a few tunes he likes (including the melody to Ode to Joy), so he can work pitch and duration and rests.

He made a piece the other day which was "just random notes" (his words). It reminded me of a lot of "music" I've heard performed written by people who have had many years of training, get commission grants and kudos. There are a lot of naked emperors out there.

I personally think that maybe the time of the composer who writes music not to please but to shock or elicit some other reaction in audiences is drawing to a close, as the music is getting less shocking as we get inured to it, and in the end it becomes more surprising to hear tonal music.


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## Guest

Personally I am not surprised at all to hear tonal music. Or atonal. Or modal. Or anything in between. The musical language itself doesn't make music complex, nor is 'complex' even a bad thing. The music language will never automatically make a piece of music 'shocking' as that is something human beings will bring to the music themselves. I have met dozens of composers working in just as many idioms and styles, and all of them have only been interested in communicating music that is authentically their own voice, made as interesting and engaging for a listener as possible.

Whether the music is complex or not, let me just say this: Beatles songs are complex. Bach is compelx. Mozart is complex. Tchaikovsky is complex. Human beings are complex and we have complex thoughts and emotions and we enjoy complex things as much as we enjoy simple things. There's a difference between complex and complicated; there's a difference between simple and simplistic. I highly doubt that people like 'complicated' and 'simplistic' music, but I can sure as heck tell anyone that they like music that is complex and music that is simple.

Someone like Unsuk Chin writes music that is praised incredibly highly by many on this forum and I find her music both complex and highly engaging. Her music can certainly be enjoyed simply for what it is, but underneath the exterior is a complex web of inner-workings that form a highly developed, personal compositional language and approach that is unique to her.

It seems reductive and inaccurate to equate music that is complex with random notes punched in to a music notation software by a 7 year old. However, I don't think it is necessarily right to imply that the music of current composers is being labelled 'entartete kunst', it just seems a roundabout way of calling those who don't like it sympathetic to Nazi views on art and culture. From hindsight, we know that the exhibition was by far one of the most popular, if not _the _most popular art exhibitions in Nazi Germany. We know and understand how and why the artworks are important culturally, but also important technically from a purely analytical perspective. There's still a lot we can learn from them, and a lot we can create for the future, so I suggest that the best course of action for composers is to stay true to what they want to create, without being put off by anyone saying it's bad to be complex or that they are naked emperors or anything that could harm the livelihood of a creator of music. The result will naturally be a vast array of personal and individual styles, simple music, complex music and everything in between. There will be an audience for anything so long as the music is interesting and it comes from a composer who is interested in the music they are creating.


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## Guest

Is this a naked emperor? I sure hope not! It _would_ be splendid if this was considered as culturally and technically important as anything in that Entartete Kunst exhibition, though!


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## Carol Rein

shirime said:


> Is this a naked emperor? I sure hope not! It _would_ be splendid if this was considered as culturally and technically important as anything in that Entartete Kunst exhibition, though!


I've heard your composition very carefully, and I have to say that it would be interesting for it to appear sometimes in the middle of a concert, as a resource for depicting some strange sceneries, specially the transition ones in a very deep misterious mood, making the audience to feel insecure and unable to handle any helping rail. So you can conduct the audience in a virgin and unstructured state into the next stage. So the impact would be amazing when they arrive to the new structure.
But then is needed to reopen a secure scenery with recognizable forms.
At least that's my idea of a rich composition.
Your work is very rich, and quite interesting as a resource like that, really!!!

But, if your Koan is exposed only as it is, it could fall into the abyss of the entartete, because that kind of job works more like a decomposition resource than a composition one.


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## malc

Shirime brings a bit of wisdom to the topic [debate] , and reminds me of a friend who , reacting to our evengelical following of certain bands , said that he played the music that suited his mood at the time , so his collection was eclectic , and ours was narrow and snotty!


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## adrien

shirime said:


> Personally I am not surprised at all to hear tonal music. Or atonal. Or modal. Or anything in between. The musical language itself doesn't make music complex, nor is 'complex' even a bad thing. The music language will never automatically make a piece of music 'shocking' as that is something human beings will bring to the music themselves. I have met dozens of composers working in just as many idioms and styles, and all of them have only been interested in communicating music that is authentically their own voice, made as interesting and engaging for a listener as possible.
> 
> Whether the music is complex or not, let me just say this: Beatles songs are complex. Bach is compelx. Mozart is complex. Tchaikovsky is complex. Human beings are complex and we have complex thoughts and emotions and we enjoy complex things as much as we enjoy simple things. There's a difference between complex and complicated; there's a difference between simple and simplistic. I highly doubt that people like 'complicated' and 'simplistic' music, but I can sure as heck tell anyone that they like music that is complex and music that is simple.
> 
> Someone like Unsuk Chin writes music that is praised incredibly highly by many on this forum and I find her music both complex and highly engaging. Her music can certainly be enjoyed simply for what it is, but underneath the exterior is a complex web of inner-workings that form a highly developed, personal compositional language and approach that is unique to her.
> 
> It seems reductive and inaccurate to equate music that is complex with random notes punched in to a music notation software by a 7 year old. However, I don't think it is necessarily right to imply that the music of current composers is being labelled 'entartete kunst', it just seems a roundabout way of calling those who don't like it sympathetic to Nazi views on art and culture. From hindsight, we know that the exhibition was by far one of the most popular, if not _the _most popular art exhibitions in Nazi Germany. We know and understand how and why the artworks are important culturally, but also important technically from a purely analytical perspective. There's still a lot we can learn from them, and a lot we can create for the future, so I suggest that the best course of action for composers is to stay true to what they want to create, without being put off by anyone saying it's bad to be complex or that they are naked emperors or anything that could harm the livelihood of a creator of music. The result will naturally be a vast array of personal and individual styles, simple music, complex music and everything in between. There will be an audience for anything so long as the music is interesting and it comes from a composer who is interested in the music they are creating.


Actually I agree with pretty much everything you say here, and it is well said.

However, I think the picture has a few more aspects (and actually comparison with art is often useful).

One of the main problems that orchestras face is declining revenue. Halls are not filled, musicians are not well-paid. It's a sick ecosystem. If we want to have orchestras we need musicians. It's a hard road becoming good enough to get a paid orchestral gig, but most orchestras rely heavily on sponsorship or state funding.

I went to a concert recently playing Boulez and John Adams. Hall was half empty. It's usually full for that orchestra.

I personally think that all forms of art have equal right to exist, however I think during the 20th C, and still now, there is a view that composers should break new ground. This has had a suppressive impact on writers of more traditional tonal music.

I personally feel this is largely incompatible with orchestras being commercially successful. There seems to be a disconnect between the programmers and the audiences. Here where I live, if you go to a modern music concert, you are unlikely to find tonal music. So I think the audience has been alienated, and the people that turn up are the tip of the iceberg.

Likewise I'll tear my hear out if our orchestra programmes another season of Haydn symphonies. I find it odd that programmers would segregate modern and older music.

I find it interesting that after playing with atonal avant garde music in the 60s and early 70s, filmmakers largely abandoned it. That to me speaks volumes about what the masses want.

I also think we've been conditioned not to criticize or voice our true opinions. I went to an outdoor sculpture exhibition a while back, where one of the works was "buried jewels". You couldn't see anything as the "jewels" were supposedly buried (if there was even anything there. So this was just an idea and a plaque. Personally I thought it was complete BS. I think it's one thing to make art of all forms, it's another to start excluding major parts of the audience, and invent language to exclude major forms of music composition - terms such as "derivative", "inauthentic" etc etc. I think this is where the problem comes in.

I also have enough frustration in my daily life, so do not wish to go to a concert designed to frustrate or anger me. Such concerts should come with a warning.

I look forward to the day when audiences feel entitled and enabled to cheer or boo a work they like or dislike.


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## JAS

My biggest problem with Zimmer is that the scores attributed to him generally do not illuminate the movie they accompany. Part of this is not entirely his fault, or rather the fault of his general approach, but the fact that the production and editing of the modern film industry tends to discourage close support between score and film. On the other hand, the scores that bear his name tend to feel very generic, as if he has them mostly written before hand, and just pulls them off the shelf for the next effort, without really doing something that reveals or augments the film. His fondness of ethnic instruments, merely because they sound interesting, creates bizarre scores, such as for the Sherlock Holmes films (which in this case doesn't really bother me so much because I consider those films to be abominations and not worthy of good scores anyway).


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## Guest

adrien said:


> [...]
> 
> One of the main problems that orchestras face is declining revenue. Halls are not filled, musicians are not well-paid. It's a sick ecosystem. If we want to have orchestras we need musicians. It's a hard road becoming good enough to get a paid orchestral gig, but most orchestras rely heavily on sponsorship or state funding.
> 
> I went to a concert recently playing Boulez and John Adams. Hall was half empty. It's usually full for that orchestra.
> 
> [...]


I agree with a large proportion of what you are saying in your full post, but it is this part of it that I have a personal interest in.

I think times are certainly changing and people are getting a better awareness and understanding of what repertoire thrives in what performance context.

Orchestra programmes work best with certain kinds of repertoire, of course. Having a Mahler symphony be performed after hours in an art gallery, in a large basement or warehouse, in a nightclub or even just in a New Music Festival would make it feel similarly out of place. However, music on the more experimental side can thrive in other kinds of venues and events. Taking Darmstadt or Donaueschingen as _international_ examples, people are willing to make a pilgrimage to see the latest works of experimental music theatre or what have you, because there are fans of this kind of stuff. Trying to fill a concert hall of an orchestra that usually plays orchestral, concert hall repertoire (warhorses and related repertoire) would be trying to attract the attention of subscribers and concertgoers who are familiar with the kind of repertoire that usually goes on there.

There's a good side and a bad side to being adventurous with programming: audiences would be exposed to something new and composers will obviously be making some money out of it and potentially there could be a considerable amount of new fans of new music. However, a large proportion of people might just not be too interested because of less familiar repertoire. Oh well. What can we do?

I can take this even further and examine how adventurous programming can be done extraordinarily well, and the prime example of that would probably be with Boulez and the New York Phil. He was an absolute expert in creating porgrammes that were well suited for the general subscribers, showcasing much familiar and standard repertoire and world renowned soloists. He would also occasionally programme mini-festivals as portraits of composers, such as he did I think with Schubert (or maybe Schumann, I forget) where he would conduct well known works of theirs alongside composers who influenced them and lesser well known works from their oeuvre. In addition to that, and this is where it really is genius, he understood completely that including the 'avant-garde' or the 'experimental' in the main concert series would not be economically viable, so he set up the Rug Concerts. $5 entry for anyone, performances by the NY Phil musicians in a carpeted area set up in the foyer with beanbags and cushions, featuring music by Mozart, Bach, Beethoven.......and Berg, Ligeti, Stockhausen, Cage and others! Highly contrasting programmes that were extremely popular due to the creation of an informal atmosphere and a space for audiences to feel welcomed and comfortable. They were, I believe, even encouraged after the performance of a work to ask questions to the musicians and get to know them the music even better.

Music is necessary for a functioning society. It helps us learn and grow as human beings. Things that are necessary to society are typically state funded, at least in part. I don't know what part of the world you live in, but in Australia we have organisations that are both privately and publicly funded, and having that combination works, I think. I guess it also has to do with culture, though, and what aspects of culture is regarded as important in different parts of the world. Music, as is heavily implied by our government, education and media, is of little importance in Australia, but in Japan (from what I've noticed when I've stayed there for periods of time) there's a much bigger cultural awareness and embrace of music, including a lot of western classical music. Heck, even David Oistrakh's name popped up in some anime series I watched once, and I've seen references to Ravel, Bach, Mozart and others in others! The orchestras there and the musicians certainly seem to be thriving, or at least that is how they are presented on their arts and culture channel and in other media there. What I take away from the musical experiences I have had in Japan (where Tower music is still a thing and there are entire floors devoted to classical music, and huge shelves of experimental Japanese composers alone!) is that when media, education and the government put an effort into providing music for the general public, it is embraced by the millions. In countries that don't emphasise that, there is less public embrace and more cynicism. It might be a bit of a reductive conclusion to make, so I'd love to understand a bit better what your take on this is.

Sorry for the long post, btw.


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## Guest

adrien said:


> I personally think that all forms of art have equal right to exist, however I think during the 20th C, and still now, there is a view that composers should break new ground. This has had a suppressive impact on writers of more traditional tonal music.
> 
> [...]


I would like to address this bit as well......as I said in my previous post, I don't really know where you live so I can't comment so much on the geographic suppression of traditionally tonal composers.

Since the 70s especially there's been an overhanging 'anything-goes' sensibility in terms of the style and musical language employed by composers. Some of the most successful composers alive (financially successful, I guess) compose with a musical language that certainly fits within a modern understanding of tonality, and a more traditional, neo-Romantic or post-minimalist style. Wolfgang Rihm, Arvo Pärt, Philip Glass, John Adams, Nico Muhly, Missy Mazzolli, Magnus Lindberg, Penderecki and others have an enormous influence on composers of my generation (early 20s and younger). Some are more influential than others, of course! On a more local level, there are Australian composers like Nigel Westlake, Elena Kats-Chernin and Ross Edwards that have a very big influence on younger Australian composers as well, and I am sure there are influential composers of a 'tonal' musical language that inspire the budding professional composers in your neck of the woods too. More than anything, I am extremely grateful about how individual each of these composers are, getting the message across that there are still many new ideas and compositions that can be created in the style they want to pursue and make their own!



> I also think we've been conditioned not to criticize or voice our true opinions. I went to an outdoor sculpture exhibition a while back, where one of the works was "buried jewels". You couldn't see anything as the "jewels" were supposedly buried (if there was even anything there. So this was just an idea and a plaque. Personally I thought it was complete BS. I think it's one thing to make art of all forms, it's another to start excluding major parts of the audience, and invent language to exclude major forms of music composition - terms such as "derivative", "inauthentic" etc etc. I think this is where the problem comes in.
> 
> [...]


What an awful exhibition! I'd ask for my money back!

On the topic of terms such as 'derivative' and 'inauthentic'.......I actually think there should be a strive for personal authenticity in musical composition. If there isn't, there's a lack of trust in oneself, a lack of interest in the act of composing a piece of music. A lack of personal investment and a lost musical personality that won't have the chance to shine through. 'Derivative' and 'inauthentic' aren't terms that exclude major forms of musical composition, but are deeply rooted to the personal interest that a composer has in their craft.


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## adrien

Yes the issue of authenticity is hard to get a good handle on, and I actually started a thread in general discussion about it a while back, as it seemed to be used often as a way to put music down - by saying it was inauthentic, whereas if we look to the true meaning (being related to authorship) then it's hard to write inauthentic music without cynicism, and therefore honest composition is almost by definition authentic.

Pastiche is another term I find pejorative. Maybe I'm wrong in my interpretation of that as well. It's often used to seemingly put down works done in any particular pre-existing style (rather than creating a new style). If the style is new enough and hasn't been populated beyond some mystic threshold then it seems to be ok as long as you get on the bus quickly enough to avoid being labelled as unoriginal.

The whole issue of "styles" is problematic, and tends to lead my mind towards concepts such as pigeonholing, subjectivity, classifying. One view could be every piece has its own style if it's not a complete rip-off of another. Clearly this definition has no real value. To derive more value from the concept of style, one must perform it seems more and more generalizations, and shave off the edges of pieces that make them deviate slightly from some supposedly-identified style, until one discovers enough examples of pieces that share the shavings so that one may define a new style. This is a frequent pursuit of humans and I wonder at its true merits. We stamped this out when it comes to classification of humans - the Eugenics movement died a deserved death. We are still racists when it comes to pet animals, happily attributing behavioural tendencies to genetics when it comes to dogs/cats etc, in spite of the evidence or lack thereof.

If we pick away at the basis of classification, then all the things built upon it fall down.

Maybe this only really means I should seek counselling 

On the subject of your piece, I've been struggling to evaluate it in any terms of reference or framework which I have, and many more than I usually use to evaluate a piece of music.

My analytical brain fails to discern any melody or harmony from it, so is left frustrated there. I'm an engineer by training, and information theory has a concept of information content, relating to the ability to predict the next sequence based on what has come before. With this analysis your piece has a high information content, but the highest possibile information content is true randomness. However even though I listened to the majority of the piece several times, I could not at this point distinguish the piece from many others I've heard. I could not take away (remember) a melody that I could cling to nor harmony. These are the things that I (and I suspect many others) use to "recognise" a piece. I wonder whether as much research has been done into how we recognise music vs how we recognise for example our mother's voice, or people's faces.

In the end your piece for me just raised questions, rather than provided answers.

I often like to compare the art of music to the art of cuisine. We still are largely eating the same things we've been eating for centuries if not more. There are similar concepts of texture, palatability, flavour etc. Whilst your piece had a lot of texture, I think people in general look for more than just texture in food, and also in music. If you consider listening to a performance of a work you've never heard before, it's like a blind person being fed a meal. With a time-linear thing like music, you don't get to see an overview of the plate to know what you're about to be fed.

I used to go out to dinner a lot with someone who was a very adventurous eater, he always took the lambs brains option! Me, I could never bring myself to eat that, and I"m probably closer the other end of that particular spectrum, although I'm not completely unadventurous with food or music.

In the end though, it comes down to what your goals are for the piece to see whether you achieved them. I don't know of any exact science. The ultimate arbiter is time itself. Survival of the fittest applies just as well to music I think.


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## JAS

shirime said:


> There's a good side and a bad side to being adventurous with programming: audiences would be exposed to something new and composers will obviously be making some money out of it and potentially there could be a considerable amount of new fans of new music.


I was going to ask what the good side was, but I see that _was_ supposed to be the good side.


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## Guest

Pastiche is absolutely not pejorative, at least it isn't when I use it. Being able to compose a successful pastiche is a real skill, certainly pertinent when film scoring requires a strong understanding of a wide variety of musical styles both past and present. Not only that, but a successful pastiche shows a truly deep understanding of older composers' craft. It's a display of knowledge and understanding; I don't see how that could be interpreted as a bad thing. 

By definition it is unoriginal, but that doesn't mean it isn't a useful skill to have and can't be implemented in new works where appropriate to quote earlier techniques and aesthetics. 

I use the word 'style' knowing that it is very much limited to the composer of a said style or the general trends present in a particular time and place in music history. Mozart's style is different from Haydn's which is different from Kraus's etc. but they are also even more different from Boulez and more different from Palestrina. 

I see no value in thinking of 'style' as something a composer should always be aware of. Natural inclinations of a composer's innate sense of musicality will come through over years and decades of composing. People will listen and musicians will want to play it if it's something they like and if it's music they can't more readily get from another composer.


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## adrien

shirime said:


> [...]
> People will listen and musicians will want to play it if it's something they like and if it's music they can't more readily get from another composer.


I'm not so sure about this. If music were truly performed due to its ease of availability then we'd get sick of hearing the stuff over and over that's the easiest to obtain. There's certainly an issue with amateur groups playing works that are still in copyright as many don't have a budget to hire works.

But I find we often look for more exponents of a style. Why should Manfredini be any less worthy of performance than Corelli? Just because he's not as well-known?

In my food analogy, you want to eat every day. An orchestral or chamber musician really wishes the punters would go to a lot more concerts if only for job security. You might like apple pie. You might like to try the apple pie from a bunch of different places, all will taste slightly different, but they are all apple pie.

I may wish to be free to make apple pie with a bit of cayenne in it without attracting labels.


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## Guest

I don't really understand the food analogy. Music seems to be too different from food to me....

But also I think we need to differentiate whether we are talking about composition in the professional sphere or composition in the amateur sphere, acknowledging also those who are active in both.

From concerts I've been to, I really appreciate the love for music that amateur musicians and composers have, knowing that they aren't taking it as a career themselves. Whatever style a composer within this amateur sphere wishes to forge for theirself is always admirable, because it shows their innate sense of musicality and a love for music combined and unique for them. I don't think there's any issue with pastiche when it comes from a personal love for music. I also have no problem calling it pastiche; it is what it is.

On the topic of _exponents_ of a style, I also have no problem if people want to perform Manfredini over Corelli or vice versa. I'm listening to Manfredini at the moment and I believe that there are musicians who would love to perform this. Corelli's music has been the subject of more study than Manfredini, and entered into a more mainstream canon of repertoire, which is something that can be viewed as problematic when it overshadows brilliant works from composers less regularly performed. There's definitely been an interest in creating a 'canon' of repertoire, which works for marketing repertoire as _better_ and _worthy of being famous_ in order to attract people to it, but it comes at a cost of obscuring other kinds of repertoire. Embrace it all; there will always be people interested in it no matter what, but it would have to be presented and marketed well enough to attract the kind of audiences (including musicians and publishers) that the composers (and advocates for their music) want it to have.


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## Guest

E Cristobal Poveda said:


> I think a lot of people are pressured to be "innovative" to the point where they no longer are. It stifles creativity, imo.


Since no-one wants a "new" composer to rehash or copy what has gone before, this is hardly surprising, is it? I suspect that the new composer herself will settle for 'distinctive' rather than innovative.



MarkMcD said:


> It seem that music is no longer written for the masses, as was the case when the great masters where writing music.


I don't think this was the case at all. The masters wrote for their aristocratic paymasters and the moneyed audiences of the opera and concert hall.

"The masses" were too busy tilling the fields and being swallowed up by the industrial revolution to be listening to the masters.



ArsMusica said:


> To place Shore and Zimmer on the same level as the masters is incredibly laughable to say the least. Zimmer can't even be considered a composer…he can barely read music.


To attempt to compare Zimmer and Shore with "the masters" is, of course, valueless. Despite the scorn some show for the products of Zimmer Studio, he has been hugely successful in his field - not just in commercial terms, but in providing scores that have worked well with the visual image - certainly to the satisfaction of the directors he has worked with (and Ridley Scott is known to be picky!)


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## Guest

I like MacLeod's attitude here and I think it's spot on.

Pretty sure that when someone goes to see a famous soloist perform in a recital or with an orchestra, they are admiring their distinctive interpretation, their personal musicality, what makes them unique and worthwhile hearing. It would really be a bit of a sad thing if musicians started imitating great performers of the past (and not quite living up to those musicians) instead of coming up with new ways of interpreting the repertoire. It would just create a sense of 'oh wasn't it wonderful when people used to play music like this?' and I can't imagine that would be good for the livelihood of living musicians at all.


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## JAS

shirime said:


> . . . and not quite living up to those musicians . . .


This is the only part of what you propose that is genuinely negative.


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## adrien

shirime said:


> I like MacLeod's attitude here and I think it's spot on.
> 
> Pretty sure that when someone goes to see a famous soloist perform in a recital or with an orchestra, they are admiring their distinctive interpretation, their personal musicality, what makes them unique and worthwhile hearing. It would really be a bit of a sad thing if musicians started imitating great performers of the past (and not quite living up to those musicians) instead of coming up with new ways of interpreting the repertoire. It would just create a sense of 'oh wasn't it wonderful when people used to play music like this?' and I can't imagine that would be good for the livelihood of living musicians at all.


Actually there's a lot more to admire about a performance than just interpretation. For example as an orchestral violinist I really like hearing the different tone people get, the power, energy etc. I guess you could say this is part of interpretation, but actually I think in many cases it's more a factor of the performer's technique or personal style. Some players can play the most incredibly difficult stuff as if it's extremely easy, or they are really silky smooth, or whatever.

Many pieces don't leave much room for messing around with the tempo, rubato, or changing dynamic from what's written. On the other hand many of the great works have several editions which do occasionally have material differences even in the solo parts. In some cases the composer may even have released several editions of the work.

We've found some pieces where different editions even have different numbers of bars. Weber Bassoon concerto comes to mind there. That was a lot of fun when we figured out some of us were playing from different editions in the orchestra's library set.

But back to the point. I think there should be room to "interpret" a performance, but we need to be sensible about it. Dramatically altering tempo or dynamic, or putting severe rubato in when it's not written can leave an audience wishing they were just listening to the old master. So the opposite of what you suggest could be true. "Bad" interpretations can be worse than just copying the style of some past master, and let's face it, who would even know.

It's also natural for a player to admire the way certain other players play passages in works, what they do here or there, and it's natural to borrow from that. In the end the player does need (IMO) to take a fairly strong lead from what the composer wrote.


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## adrien

shirime said:


> I don't really understand the food analogy. Music seems to be too different from food to me....
> [...]


They have a LOT in common.

1. Taste is subjective
2. People consume it
3. satisifaction
4. flavour 
5. texture
6. comfort
7. familiarity

etc etc. If you just start with the first one, being about taste being subjective you can transfer a lot of what derives from that with food over to music, especially when you consider an audience. And no I'm not suggesting music become like McDonalds


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## Guest

adrien said:


> Actually there's a lot more to admire about a performance than just interpretation. For example as an orchestral violinist I really like hearing the different tone people get, the power, energy etc. I guess you could say this is part of interpretation, but actually I think in many cases it's more a factor of the performer's technique or personal style. Some players can play the most incredibly difficult stuff as if it's extremely easy, or they are really silky smooth, or whatever.
> 
> Many pieces don't leave much room for messing around with the tempo, rubato, or changing dynamic from what's written. On the other hand many of the great works have several editions which do occasionally have material differences even in the solo parts. In some cases the composer may even have released several editions of the work.
> 
> We've found some pieces where different editions even have different numbers of bars. Weber Bassoon concerto comes to mind there. That was a lot of fun when we figured out some of us were playing from different editions in the orchestra's library set.
> 
> But back to the point. I think there should be room to "interpret" a performance, but we need to be sensible about it. Dramatically altering tempo or dynamic, or putting severe rubato in when it's not written can leave an audience wishing they were just listening to the old master. So the opposite of what you suggest could be true.  "Bad" interpretations can be worse than just copying the style of some past master, and let's face it, who would even know.
> 
> It's also natural for a player to admire the way certain other players play passages in works, what they do here or there, and it's natural to borrow from that. In the end the player does need (IMO) to take a fairly strong lead from what the composer wrote.


Yeah I absolutely agree. If a musician can really captivate and interest people with their performance by showing a great and distinctive sense of musicality, then people will listen.

To bring the discussion back to the main point about 'complicated' or 'complex' music (the topic of interpretation is very interesting and I agree with all that you said there so I don't see much more point in continuing along those lines)........

I think composition is just another way human beings express their own innate sense of musicality. It's hard to write simple or complex music that can really win people over and attract some interest (simple, well-crafted music like Arvo Pärt or complex, well-crafted music like Pierre Boulez), but it's easy to write simplistic or complicated music right off the bat through a lack of experience in being able to actually express that innate musicality effectively.

A general apathy towards one's appreciation of the craft, tools and techniques of composition will result in music that basically just won't sound particularly well-crafted, convincing or _musical._ Vested interest and a love of learning about the craft and a passion for improving one's technique will result in music that does express that innate musicality very well.


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## Guest

adrien said:


> They have a LOT in common.
> 
> 1. Taste is subjective
> 2. People consume it
> 3. satisifaction
> 4. flavour
> 5. texture
> 6. comfort
> 7. familiarity
> 
> etc etc. If you just start with the first one, being about taste being subjective you can transfer a lot of what derives from that with food over to music, especially when you consider an audience. And no I'm not suggesting music become like McDonalds


Oh, right I see! I wasn't really understanding it from the point of nutritional value and stuff like that. Food definitely is something that stimulates the senses, like music does, and many people have different tastes I guess.

My take on it is that there's delicious food that is packed with flavour and ingredients with attention to detail, and there's delicious food made from few ingredients with simple flavours. But there's also food that is burnt, undercooked, dropped on the floor etc. if whoever is cooking is simply not caring for what they are doing.


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## adrien

MacLeod said:


> Since no-one wants a "new" composer to rehash or copy what has gone before, this is hardly surprising, is it?


Depends what you mean by copy.

I wouldn't object if someone wrote another clarinet concerto that was on a par with Mozart's in the same style, I think there's room for more than one.

I don't even object too much when people use classical music themes in pop music.

So I don't think you can claim no-one wants this, who knows. I'd think film producers want this sort of thing all the time.


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## adrien

shirime said:


> A general apathy towards one's appreciation of the craft, tools and techniques of composition will result in music that basically just won't sound particularly well-crafted, convincing or _musical._ Vested interest and a love of learning about the craft and a passion for improving one's technique will result in music that does express that innate musicality very well.


I take your point that anyone may potentially improve their ability to execute their musical whims with a bit of study, but I wouldn't go so far as to say you couldn't make music without it. How much it suffers from lack of training will be down to the natural talent of the composer, but it may still be quite effective and musical.


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## Guest

adrien said:


> Depends what you mean by copy.


I mean copy.



adrien said:


> I wouldn't object if someone wrote another clarinet concerto that was on a par with Mozart's in the same style, I think there's room for more than one.


"Another" clarinet concerto "on a par" with Mozart would not be what I mean by copy - anymore than "another" symphony on a par with Beethoven's 9th would be a copy.



adrien said:


> I don't even object too much when people use classical music themes in pop music.


Pop music? I thought this was a thread about new classical composers?



adrien said:


> I'd think film producers want this sort of thing all the time.


Hence my defence of Hans Zimmer - but again, I assumed we were talking about new composers for the concert hall - not for cinema which is a different product altogether.


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## malc

A great education just reading all the erudite posts. When i see a pianist thrashing through the arpeggios of Chopin etc..[think of the conductor with a whip trying to control a rearing grand piano!] i am dazzled by the virtuosity of the player , but left with a meal that has gone right thru in double quick time .[sorry] Count von Grobschnitt might have been impressed by the swish and swizzle , but he was paying good d'marks to learn the piano from Flash Harrisburg.


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