# Shostakovich's Snobbery



## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

In the January 1965 volume of _Music Journal_ Shostakovich has a publication called 'Music and the Times' where he makes some rather interesting things about his contemporaries, albeit they are statements which are outlandish and insulting to individuals and the music world as a whole.

Firstly, just a disclaimer on my use of the word 'snobbery' in the title of this thread. Shostakovich is hardly someone we would immediately think of as a snob, and in the article he _does_ favourably acknowledge the great impact of 'light music' styles in the 20th century he defines as jazz, popular songs and dance music.

What I find really interesting about this article is where he attempts to address what he believes to be an issue of quality and artistic skill in composition; an issue he thinks is worth bringing up but only to say (repeatedly) that '"vanguardism" is a screen for many composers to hide their lack of talent' (examples he gives: Boulez, Stockhausen, Henze, Stuckenschmidt, Schoenberg).

I wonder what kind of authority Shostakovich has to deem composers as influential as Boulez and Stockhausen as 'lacking talent' when even their innovations have influenced widely admired popular music and musicians. What I think is rather funny about Shostakovich making such a claim is that he admits to not being able to tell the difference between the music of the composers he listed, adding Stravinsky's latest works as well.

I also wonder what kind of authority Shostakovich has to be able to speak on behalf of a wide and diverse audience and his assertion that audiences can only 'understand' certain types of music, as if he was 'in the know' of what the audience wants. He says: 'Pioneering for the new must proceed within the current of realism if that new is to be progressive and comprehensible to the people for whom art is being created.'

Reading the article, it becomes quite clear that when Shostakovich is referring to 'the audience' he is really referring to _himself_, and this is where that real snobby attitude about what constitutes as 'quality' and 'artistic skill' in composition comes in. 'So-called vanguardism troubles me greatly' is what he says when he first introduces the topic; it troubles specifically Shostakovich. He may not like the music of Boulez, Stockhausen et al, but to use the article as a platform to compare the work of his contemporaries in order to place himself above them will not do anything to further anyone's understanding or appreciation of any composers at all.

Man, I appreciate Shostakovich's layered criticisms of the regime under which he composed, and I adore many of his compositions (particularly his 2nd and 4th symphonies, The Nose, Lady Macbeth and the 13th string quartet), and I greatly admire his humanistic endevours as a composer, but why rant about _this_ of all things???


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

As one of the two leading composers of "serious" music in the 20th century, I'm not sure Shostakovich needs to appeal to any "authority" for his musical opinions. I'd read, ruminate, and move on.

BTW I have my own opinions and certainly am not inclined to appeal to authority to support them. Like 'em or lump 'em!


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

General comment. What famous composers have much of anything favorable to say about one another? Virtually all renown composers feel that only they're doing it the way it should be done. They have a blind spot. Read Tchaikovsky's criticism of Brahms. Chopin about Liszt. Schoenberg about Stravinsky. Stravinsky about Prokofiev... and many other instances could be mentioned. Composers are locked into their own creative source. So I always take such comments with a huge grain of salt and I think it's something to be kept in mind as far as what a famous composer has to say, plus composers can be highly competitive with each other. Negative comments from composers are very easy to find online, so I tend to give someone like Shostakovich a bit of slack. And of course, the criticisms from Boulez towards other composers are quite condescending and well known, such as about Olivier Messiaen. I would consider him for more scathing and condescending than anything by Shostakovich, who had managed to survive Stalin and was lucky to be alive.

https://www.cmuse.org/harshest-composer-on-composer-insults-in-classical-music/


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

shirime said:


> why rant about _this_ of all things???


Its a topic many people have strong opinions about. These types of threads typically generate a lot of responses, so to me it seems like a fairly common thing to rant about. I think whether one agrees with him or not, what he is saying essentially echoes the general sentiments of a lot of other people too. Outside of academia there are not a lot of people who care much about the atonal composers mentioned, with the exception perhaps of Schoenberg, who was tonal in some of his music.


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

He was a composer, not a critic. He had his own artistic viewpoint, which didn't necessarily give him the right vantage point to survey the state of music. The value in the article is what it says about Shostakovich's musical personality, not what it says about other composers.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Anything from Dmitri during the Soviet reign must be carefully considered - did he write it? A party functionary? Anyway, I don't completely agree with him. In music and indeed in most of the arts, it's been easier for a fraud to enter the field than it was say 150 years ago. In the 20th c with the attitudes of "anything goes" and "how dare you judge me", less talented composers, painters, sculptors, etc entered the arena. I know several "composers" today in their 20s and 30s who somehow have been mislead to think they're good. They write ugly, formless, awful sounding crap. Some of them never studied counterpoint. They have minimal understanding of orchestration. They can't hear in their head - everything has to be done on computer or at the piano - which they don't play well, either. I think this is part of what Shosty is saying - to be a good, not to mention great, composer, you must have strong basic musical skills. And judging from what a lot of modern music sounds like, the composers skipped some coursework.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

I wish people could be content with having a subjective opinion about music without feeling a need to belittle others' music and be "right" about it. If it really is so ugly and unlikable, I don't see the need to belittle. If you don't like some music, don't listen to it, great, it's all worked out. If you really have to make a critique, what's wrong with "I don't like it, it sounds ugly to me" and why do you have to be right and others wrong? The two sides of this seem to be "spout a bunch of pointless negativity and claim it's a fact" and "don't spout a bunch of pointless negativity".


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## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

And Shostakovich was the only person, musician or not, Soviet or not, who wept for the direction "Art Music" was heading in the 1960's???

And didn't those he slagged off use even more entrenched "arrogance" to belittle the more traditional "anachronistic" composers like Dmitri?

Touche!


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

The inclusion of Henze is very surprising, since his style was very eclectic but often quite conservative, and that he was openly an active communist, seeking a broader public
http://socialistreview.org.uk/375/obituary-hans-werner-henze-1928-2012


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

shirime said:


> He says: 'Pioneering for the new must proceed within the current of realism if that new is to be progressive and comprehensible to the people for whom art is being created.'


I tend to fall in with the crowd that believes DSCH to have been a man of complete integrity, but under such challenging pressure to conform or suffer the worst of consequences that the best he could do was to offer covert resistance in his music.

(I recognise that there is another legitimate interpretation which has him as, largely, a conformist, and his music is all visible, on the surface - there is no hidden resistance.)

Consequently, I'm always slightly disappointed when yet another example of his shortcomings emerges. Music that is in the vanguard must, by its very nature, be outside of the "current of realism" (taking that to be a curious paraphrase for 'mainstream', though it could be a reference to the Soviet authorities' preference for realism over formalism).

Perhaps he was issuing a warning to those he thought should take care not to upset the Soviets?


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

If those were his real opinions and not some kind of Soviet propaganda, it seems like he may have changed his mind later on, because his late works sound very modern to me, almost completely distinct from his earlier works. I feel like being close to death brings out some composers' best music, case in point Feldman's Piano, Violin, Viola, Cello.


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

MacLeod said:


> I tend to fall in with the crowd that believes DSCH to have been a man of complete integrity, but under such challenging pressure to conform or suffer the worst of consequences that the best he could do was to offer covert resistance in his music.
> 
> (I recognise that there is another legitimate interpretation which has him as, largely, a conformist, and his music is all visible, on the surface - there is no hidden resistance.)
> 
> ...


This occurred to me, particularly because of his inclusion of the word 'realism'. I like to believe that Shostakovich was urged to write this article just to make it difficult for Soviet authorities to get him in trouble for writing 'formalist' music ever again.

His support for Ustvolskaya seems to reveal his support for the more avant-garde trends anyway, but, again it's difficult to say.


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

joen_cph said:


> The inclusion of Henze is very surprising, since his style was very eclectic but often quite conservative, and that he was openly an active communist, seeking a broader public
> http://socialistreview.org.uk/375/obituary-hans-werner-henze-1928-2012


Yes I thought it was odd too. At one other point in the article he references a conversation he had with an Italian composer of avant-garde music, whose music Shostakovich disliked and whom he thought had no talent (according to the article). The composer remains unnamed, but if it happened to be Luigi Nono then would have certainly been interesting to include another composer of communist tendencies. Boulez was an ardent leftist as well, but he never let that interfere with his professionalism.

What fascinates me, however, is that he mentions Copland (also very notable for his left-wing views) as someone 'vehemently opposed to "vanguardism" [and has] been producing splendid realistic works of music' at a time when Copland had been writing some of his most significant serial compositions. Earlier in the article he wrote: 'Dodecaphony, serial, pointillist and other kinds of music are one of the greatest evils of 20th century art.' I'm quite certain that Copland had very favourable views of composers that Shostakovich went out of his way to call talentless (Boulez et al).


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Some at least of those he had named had also criticised him. Is this more than one of those wars between composers that went on in the middle of the 20th Century? It seems to me that composers then took a while to get used to the fact that their time was one of a huge diversification in creative approaches and still behaved as if there was one route, one tradition. I would have been surprised if his views on music could be boiled down to appreciation of their political persuasion.

There is also the question of how much contemporary music he had access to and how quickly. He would have relied mostly on recordings that were not easily available in the USSR. With Soviet block composers he may have had better access and knowledge (did he criticise, for example, Lutoslawski?) and, as well as Ustvolskaya, didn't he also offer some support to Gubaidulina?


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## San Antone (Feb 15, 2018)

> '"vanguardism" is a screen for many composers to hide their lack of talent' (examples he gives: Boulez, Stockhausen, Henze, Stuckenschmidt, Schoenberg


If this was written in 1965, then the context was that time when the battle lines were pretty brightly drawn between the traditionalists and the avant garde. So, he is placing himself squarely in the traditionalist camp. And I am not sure I disagree with him, except concerning Schoenberg. The irony is that of all these composers, including Shostakovich, the only one whose music may still be played in 100 years is Schoenberg's.

Of course, that's just my subjective opinion.


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## janxharris (May 24, 2010)

San Antone said:


> If this was written in 1965, then the context was that time when the battle lines were pretty brightly drawn between the traditionalists and the avant garde. So, he is placing himself squarely in the traditionalist camp. And I am not sure I disagree with him, except concerning Schoenberg. The irony is that of all these composers, including Shostakovich, the only one whose music may still be played in 100 years is Schoenberg's.
> 
> Of course, that's just my subjective opinion.


I cannot imagine Shostakovich's music not being regularly played in 100 years time as it is now. Only Schoenberg? Really?


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## Eschbeg (Jul 25, 2012)

Enthusiast said:


> There is also the question of how much contemporary music he had access to and how quickly. He would have relied mostly on recordings that were not easily available in the USSR. With Soviet block composers he may have had better access and knowledge (did he criticise, for example, Lutoslawski?) and, as well as Ustvolskaya, didn't he also offer some support to Gubaidulina?


The decade or so leading up to the article was part of Kruschev's "Thaw," when Stalin-era censorship was relaxed a bit, so Shosty probably did have decent access to Western contemporary music during that time. Plus he was one of the very few Soviet artists allowed to travel abroad, so in the previous decade he had gotten to hear some of it firsthand.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Didn't Tchaikovsky call Brahms 'a giftless bastar.d'? Boulez, to non-serial composers, 'useless'? And so on. Composers with a clear aesthetic _vision_ tend to think they are the ones that got art right and not their 'aesthetic enemmies'... and, as we know, there's nothing more shameful and _rightfully damnable_ than to be in the wrong side of that noble search which is the search for the 'true truth'; what, they think, gives them authority is simply that they are the obvious possessors of the objective artistic truth. I really don't care what they thought (besides historical interest and to better understand their aesthetic positions).


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

I doubt Shostakovich wrote the passage quoted in the OP. Paraphrasing and condensing what Laurel Fay has written on p. 173 of _Shostakovich: A Life_: Much of what was published over Shostakovich's signature was ghosted by others, and sometimes he didn't even bother to read it before signing. Ghost-writing the speeches and public statements of prominent figures was standard for anything "that touched even remotely on matters of state policy or image." "[Shostakovich] expected others to pay as little heed to the numbing clichés of Soviet public discourse as he did himself." Based on the thread above, it seems he might have expected too much. 

Bottom line: It would be naive to assume anything in the quotation reflects the beliefs and opinions of Shostakovich.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Composers have very strong opinions of others from the gossip I've read. They usually take a musical stand and compose to it, and those different than them are inferior. I sort of see where DSCH is coming from, his style is more conservative than the ones he criticized, and my impression is he sees them trying to be original in cheap ways and not proving themselves by writing in more traditional and accepted forms.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_What I find really interesting about this article is where he attempts to address what he believes to be an issue of quality and artistic skill in composition; an issue he thinks is worth bringing up but only to say (repeatedly) that '"vanguardism" is a screen for many composers to hide their lack of talent' (examples he gives: Boulez, Stockhausen, Henze, Stuckenschmidt, Schoenberg). I wonder what kind of authority Shostakovich has to deem composers as influential as Boulez and Stockhausen as 'lacking talent' when even their innovations have influenced widely admired popular music and musicians. _

I never knew this existed and am relieved that a composer as great as Shostakovich, whose body of work compares favorably to Beethoven, Bach and Mozart, could see the fraud around him. Just about all serious followers of classical music have seen it but, until now, I never knew it was addressed this early by any major composer.

As to the final question, Shostakovich was certainly qualified to make such an assessment, being the last great symphonist in the world, writing some of the world's most memorable concertos, string quartets and solo piano music, and having written one of the last operas to enter the standard repertory. If one looks dispassionately at the outcome of later composers in these time-tested classical formats after Shostakovich (he died 1975) it becomes even more clear he was our last great composer.

It is now nearly a half-century since his death and not a single classical composer has written the combination of one symphony, concerto, string quartet and opera that has taken the world by storm the way his "Leningrad" symphony did in 1941 when the giants of the podium all fought to see who would conduct the Western premiere. It becomes increasingly more clear each day nothing like this will happen in our lifetimes or perhaps ever again.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

We've been down this bumpy road before, I think ...


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

larold said:


> _What I find really interesting about this article is where he attempts to address what he believes to be an issue of quality and artistic skill in composition; an issue he thinks is worth bringing up but only to say (repeatedly) that '"vanguardism" is a screen for many composers to hide their lack of talent' (examples he gives: Boulez, Stockhausen, Henze, Stuckenschmidt, Schoenberg). I wonder what kind of authority Shostakovich has to deem composers as influential as Boulez and Stockhausen as 'lacking talent' when even their innovations have influenced widely admired popular music and musicians. _
> 
> *I never knew this existed and am relieved that a composer as great as Shostakovich, whose body of work compares favorably to Beethoven, Bach and Mozart, could see the fraud around him.* Just about all serious followers of classical music have seen it but, until now, I never knew it was addressed this early by any major composer.
> 
> ...


And why are you "relieved?" You lived in fear of the possibility that Shostakovich liked Schoenberg? 

If those guys have no talent, we don't need it explained to us. We can hear for ourselves, no?


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

larold said:


> It is now nearly a half-century since his death and not a single classical composer has written the combination of one symphony, concerto, string quartet and opera that has taken the world by storm the way his "Leningrad" symphony did in 1941


I'm sorry. I don't understand this bit. No one has written "a "combination" to compare with the 7th Symphony?


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

larold said:


> _What I find really interesting about this article is where he attempts to address what he believes to be an issue of quality and artistic skill in composition; an issue he thinks is worth bringing up but only to say (repeatedly) that '"vanguardism" is a screen for many composers to hide their lack of talent' (examples he gives: Boulez, Stockhausen, Henze, Stuckenschmidt, Schoenberg). I wonder what kind of authority Shostakovich has to deem composers as influential as Boulez and Stockhausen as 'lacking talent' when even their innovations have influenced widely admired popular music and musicians. _
> 
> I never knew this existed and am relieved that a composer as great as Shostakovich, whose body of work compares favorably to Beethoven, Bach and Mozart, could see the fraud around him. Just about all serious followers of classical music have seen it but, until now, I never knew it was addressed this early by any major composer.


See #19 above. The chances this was actually written by Shostakovich are small. But it is nice to see that your views on modern music align so well with those of Kruschev's and Brezhnev's cultural apparatchiks. I wonder if the composer would appreciate you allying yourself with the thugs who made his life miserable and against, for all you know, colleagues and fellow travelers he respected? And it is good to see that his utility as a sock-puppet has not diminished since the USSR put him to work as an unwilling mouthpiece for their narrow official views. Such a fine tradition deserves a new champion!


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

Thankfully, musical quality is a subjective parameter, so we don't have to lose any sleep over Shostakovich's opinion.


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

EdwardBast said:


> See #19 above. The chances this was actually written by Shostakovich are small. But it is nice to see that your views on modern music align so well with those of Kruschev's cultural apparatchiks. I wonder if the composer would appreciate you allying yourself with the thugs who made his life miserable and against, for all you know, colleagues and fellow travelers he respected? And it is good to see that his utility as a sock-puppet has not diminished since the USSR put him to work as an unwilling mouthpiece for their narrow official views. Such a fine tradition deserves a new champion!


Hey, Kruschev's cultural apparatchiks had impeccable taste!


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_I don't understand this bit. No one has written "a "combination" to compare with the 7th Symphony? _

No composer since Shostakovich's 1975 death has written a combination of traditional works -- a symphony, a concerto, a string quartet and an opera or a similar grouping -- that compare to Shostakovich's great works and/or created worldwide fame with their appearance.

Regarding authenticity of the 1965 piece … there is also opinion today that the famous Volkov book about Shostakovich wasn't true. But that same opinion holds that the book accurately portrays Shostakovich and his beliefs. Likely so too the 1965 piece even if ghosted.

_If those guys have no talent, we don't need it explained to us. We can hear for ourselves, no?_

Whether or not a person is talented or his/her work is good are subjective judgments. What is not subjective is art that has lasting value that endures for years, decades or centuries, that is continued to be played, recorded and in demand by performers and listeners.

Shostakovich, when he wrote his First Symphony as a graduation exercise, was alive with the following composers: Richard Strauss, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Edward Elgar and Jean Sibelius, four of the greatest composers in history who rank with or near Shostakovich in any ranking of composers.

The music of these five composers, especially their very best music such as Elgar's Enigma variations, Sibelius' Violin Concerto, Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben, Shostakovich's 5th Symphony and Vaughan Williams 4th Symphony, have continuously been played in concert, on radio broadcasts, and have continuously been recorded and re-recorded.

If you apply this standard to the composers Shostakovich derided as vanguardists, it doesn't deny that you may like their music but it certainly shows their music does not have the same lasting value as the better composers. I think that's because their music is lousy, and that Shostakovich was right. We'll know better about this in another 50 years but, for today, I'd say the evidence is with Shostakovich.


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

larold said:


> *I don't understand this bit. No one has written "a "combination" to compare with the 7th Symphony?
> 
> No composer since Shostakovich's 1975 death has written a combination of traditional works -- a symphony, a concerto, a string quartet and an opera -- that compare to Shostakovich's great works and/*or created worldwide fame with their appearance.*
> 
> ...


I have bolded all the opinions in the text above, so we're clear on the subjectivity vs. objectivity balance.

I have also underlined all of the appeals to popularity in the text above. Popularity is not subjective, but is the basis of logically fallacious reasoning, and can thus be safely disregarded.

I hope this helps others to extract the relevant information from this post.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

nathanb said:


> ...I have also underlined all of the appeals to popularity in the text above. Popularity is not subjective, but is the basis of logically fallacious reasoning, and can thus be safely disregarded.


I don't believe you can support that position without recourse to your own totally subjective arguments. I would say, while trying to retain some semblance of objectivity, that popularity largely determines the music that is performed year after year, and its lack determines the music that slips beneath the waves of history and is forgotten.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

"Popularity" is not necessarily mutually exclusive of quality, and that's why it's perhaps unwise to assume that because something is "popular," there's no other reason why a work continues to be played over years, decades, centuries and hold great interest to the listening public. There are times when popularity and quality can be viewed as going together and unable to be separated. If that distinction is ignored or glossed over, I feel it's a very weak argument to argue popularity as a way of discounting a work or composer. The works of popularity may be very well deserved because of their inherent quality of worth. As the years of public interest pile up, that can represent an objective measure of something's worth whether one personally accepts that or not from their own subjective viewpoint.


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

KenOC said:


> I don't believe you can support that position without recourse to your own totally subjective arguments. I would say, while trying to retain some semblance of objectivity, that popularity largely determines the music that is performed year after year, and its lack determines the music that slips beneath the waves of history and is forgotten.


I can't support the position that an argumentum ad populum is a logical fallacy? I know it's risky to cite wikipedia and all but it ought to be an acceptable start...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

larold said:


> Regarding authenticity of the 1965 piece … there is also opinion today that the famous Volkov book about Shostakovich wasn't true. But that same opinion holds that the book accurately portrays Shostakovich and his beliefs. Likely so too the 1965 piece even if ghosted.


"Truth," whatever that's supposed to mean in this context, is irrelevant. Volkov's claims about the nature of Testimony and it's provenance have been shown to be fraudulent. Nothing in that book that is not confirmed in other sources can be taken to be the word of Shostakovich. So you are using a fraudulent source as support for the opinions of one ghost-written by some party hack? That's ridiculous. You haven't the slightest idea what Shostakovich thought about that 1965 piece.



larold said:


> If you apply this standard to the composers Shostakovich derided as vanguardists, it doesn't deny that you may like their music but it certainly shows their music does not have the same lasting value as the better composers. I think that's because their music is lousy, and* that Shostakovich was right.* We'll know better about this in another 50 years but, for today, I'd say the evidence is with Shostakovich.


So you are going to pretend you know Shostakovich was right about something he never wrote? Until you present any reliable data about what the composer thought on these issues, please stop claiming you are expressing Shostkovich's views.


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

aleazk said:


> Boulez, to non-serial composers, 'useless'?


Not exactly. Boulez later clarified that in order to consciously reject serialism, it's better to consciously understand what one is rejecting considering that serialism itself had become such a big deal in post-war Europe. (Boulez admired and conducted Ligeti's music, who certainly did understand serialism but didn't compose serial music, a fact you know very well.) Otherwise it would be like someone coming to the conclusion that the cherries on the top of a tree are sour and disgusting, just because they can't reach them, or someone saying a composer is 'talentless' just because they don't like the very very few pieces they have heard.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

shirime said:


> Not exactly. Boulez later clarified that in order to consciously reject serialism, it's better to consciously understand what one is rejecting considering that serialism itself had become such a big deal in post-war Europe. (Boulez admired and conducted Ligeti's music, who certainly did understand serialism but didn't compose serial music, a fact you know very well.) Otherwise it would be like someone coming to the conclusion that the cherries on the top of a tree are sour and disgusting, just because they can't reach them, or someone saying a composer is 'talentless' just because they don't like the very very few pieces they have heard.


Ugh... yes, it's even stated like that in the quote itself, I was just mentioning it in the flyby. And, he said '...who has not experienced - I do not say understood, but, in all exactness, experienced - the necessity...' i.e., a visceral feeling for its necessity, not mere 'conscious undertanding'. 

I, in turn, assert that any poster who has not experienced - I do not say understood, but, in all exactness, experienced - the necessity for pedantry is USELESS. For his whole post is irrelevant to the needs of his pedantry.


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## Guest (Aug 8, 2018)

boulez was an angsty boi


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

nathanb said:


> I can't support the position that an argumentum ad populum is a logical fallacy? I know it's risky to cite wikipedia and all but it ought to be an acceptable start...
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum


What you wrote was, "Popularity is not subjective, but is the basis of logically fallacious reasoning, and can thus be safely disregarded." I responded that perhaps we don't want to disregard what is probably the most important determiner of a work's success and survival.

Nothing to do with any logical fallacy.


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

KenOC said:


> What you wrote was, "Popularity is not subjective, but is the basis of logically fallacious reasoning, and can thus be safely disregarded." I responded that perhaps we don't want to disregard what is probably the most important determiner of a work's success and survival.
> 
> Nothing to do with any logical fallacy.


We absolutely should not disregard popularity when it comes to predicting a work's success and survival, considering, ya know, the fact that success and survival are measures of.. popularity.

Unfortunately, I was talking about neither success nor survival, but only pure objective quality.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

The fact that some composers are more popular than others doesn't mean that less popular composers are not as good. In general, what is "popular" seems to be what is easily accessible, not necessarily what takes the most talent and creativity, and none of that should be relevant to the enjoyment of art. It seems very sad to feel proud of one's self because you like what's popular and dislike what's unpopular. Good for you for going with the flow and possibly not forming your own opinions.....


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

nathanb said:


> Unfortunately, I was talking about neither success nor survival, but only pure objective quality.


Ah, if I'd known you were speaking of "objective quality," I would have held my tongue. And politely moved on, keeping one hand carefully on my wallet.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Fredx2098 said:


> ...It seems very sad to feel proud of one's self because you like what's popular and dislike what's unpopular. Good for you for going with the flow and possibly not forming your own opinions.....


Oh dear, I seem to have said something to offend you. Please let me know what it was - a direct quote would be helpful - so that I can apologize with the accuracy and fervor required. I am not a proud person, so if you think groveling may be helpful, I can do that too. Whatever it takes!

No, sorry, I won't go so far as to offer money as compensation.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

Fredx2098 said:


> It seems very sad to feel proud of one's self because you like what's popular and dislike what's unpopular. Good for you for going with the flow and possibly not forming your own opinions.....


I don't believe that anyone on TC fits the above description, although you keep making this claim with some regularity.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

Bulldog said:


> I don't believe that anyone on TC fits the above description, although you keep making this claim with some regularity.


Because people mention popularity when talking about the quality of music, that popular music is popular because it's good and unpopular music is unpopular because it's bad. That's not entirely how popularity works, and it often works the opposite way as well.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

Fredx2098 said:


> Because people mention popularity when talking about the quality of music, that popular music is popular because it's good and unpopular music is unpopular because it's bad. That's not entirely how popularity works, and it often works the opposite way as well.


You know, size and popularity are not bad things; they both matter. They even matter to you, because you keep paying them attention.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

Bulldog said:


> You know, size and popularity are not bad things; they both matter. They even matter to you, because you keep paying them attention.


I'm not saying that popularity is bad. I'm saying that popularity and unpopularity are not the same as good and bad. If anyone agrees with that, then I don't see why popularity is brought up as an argument for why one type of music is better than another.


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

nathanb said:


> I can't support the position that an argumentum ad populum is a logical fallacy? I know it's risky to cite wikipedia and all but it ought to be an acceptable start...
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argumentum_ad_populum


I don't think that pointing out that something is popular is necessarily the same as an argumentum ad populum.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

MacLeod said:


> I don't think that pointing out that something is popular is necessarily the same as an argumentum ad populum.


I've never seen someone mention popularity except to argue that what's popular is better than what's unpopular. I don't see any other reason to mention it, because the popularity of a piece of music is separate from the music, and unless there's a thread about what composers/works are the most popular, it seems irrelevant. Popularity is less about how masterful a composer/piece is and more about how easily accessible and "catchy" it is, not to say that people shouldn't like what's popular, but it's not a reason that, for example, tonal music is "better" than atonal music, not that it is or isn't, because that's subjective. Popularity is just an objective phenomenon based on accessibility and luck.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Fredx2098 said:


> I've never seen someone mention popularity except to argue that what's popular is better than what's unpopular.


Uh, who did that? A quote would be nice...


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

Fredx2098 said:


> I've never seen someone mention popularity except to argue that what's popular is better than what's unpopular. I don't see any other reason to mention it, because the popularity of a piece of music is separate from the music, and unless there's a thread about what composers/works are the most popular, it seems irrelevant. Popularity is less about how masterful a composer/piece is and more about how easily accessible and "catchy" it is, not to say that people shouldn't like what's popular, but it's not a reason that, for example, tonal music is "better" than atonal music, not that it is or isn't, because that's subjective. Popularity is just an objective phenomenon based on accessibility and luck.


nathanb (post #29) dismissed all larold's references to popularity as they are "the basis of logically fallacious reasoning". I don't think that pointing to the popularity of a musical work as a measure of its value is the same as an "argumentum ad populum"


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

KenOC said:


> Uh, who did that? A quote would be nice...


Posts #21 and 28. I don't see what popularity has to do with this thread, or any discussion of art. He was using popularity as a reason to agree with the alleged opinion of Shostakovich.

"Shostakovich, whose body of work compares favorably to Beethoven, Bach and Mozart, could see the fraud around him [...] Shostakovich was certainly qualified to make such an assessment, being the last great symphonist in the world, writing some of the world's most memorable concertos, string quartets and solo piano music, and having written one of the last operas to enter the standard repertory [...] it becomes even more clear he was our last great composer [...] If you apply this standard to the composers Shostakovich derided as vanguardists, it doesn't deny that you may like their music but it certainly shows their music does not have the same lasting value as the better composers. I think that's because their music is lousy, and that Shostakovich was right."

To paraphrase, "because it is popular, it is better"


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

San Antone said:


> If this was written in 1965, then the context was that time when the battle lines were pretty brightly drawn between the traditionalists and the avant garde. So, he is placing himself squarely in the traditionalist camp. And I am not sure I disagree with him, except concerning Schoenberg. The irony is that of all these composers, including Shostakovich, the only one whose music may still be played in 100 years is Schoenberg's.
> 
> Of course, that's just my subjective opinion.


Ironic, because Schoenberg's music is barely played now. Unless you mean Verklaerte Nacht, which seems to get a reasonable number of performances.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

MacLeod said:


> nathanb (post #29) dismissed all larold's references to popularity as they are "the basis of logically fallacious reasoning". I don't think that pointing to the popularity of a musical work as a measure of its value is the same as an "argumentum ad populum"


Just as fallacious as suggesting that such and such a work is not accepted now, because it is 'music of the future'. There have been many examples of this actually occurring ie a work is not accepted by contemporary audiences but has been accepted in its future. But that is hardly a given. The first non-tonal works of the 2nd Viennese school were spoken in this light, as if inevitably there would be audience interest on par with Beethoven for this music, 'one day'. We have been waiting for over 100 years for that 'one day'.

Shostakovitch on the other hand has never interested me that much. A lot of his work sounds overblown, and thematically simplistic to a disconcerting degree. Even as satires of, or 'about' Stalin, much of his stuff leaves me cold. Then comes the self-pitying Shotakovitch, worrying about death and thinking about it lots but not taking the plunge. DSCH, DSCH indeed. I would rather listen to the best of Xenakis, Boulez or Nono than run of the mill Shostakovitch


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

Fredx2098 said:


> Posts #21 and 28. I don't see what popularity has to do with this thread


I agree. It doesn't figure in the OP. My point was purely about whether citing the popularity of something must automatically be rejected as fallacious.



Eusebius12 said:


> Just as fallacious as [etc.]


Sorry, but I don't see how your post is a response to mine.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

If popularity and size of the audience shows the value of music, then modern pop music is clearly the most valuable. It's more popular and has a larger audience than any classical music has or ever has had. The popularity of this kind of classical music or that kind of classical music is a moot point because all of it would be "valueless" compared to pop music.


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

Fredx2098 said:


> If popularity and size of the audience shows the value of music, then modern pop music is clearly the most valuable. It's more popular and has a larger audience than any classical music has or ever has had. The popularity of this kind of classical music or that kind of classical music is a moot point because all of it would be "valueless" compared to pop music.


If you think popularity has no place in this thread, please stop perpetuating its presence!


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

MacLeod said:


> I agree. It doesn't figure in the OP. My point was purely about whether citing the popularity of something must automatically be rejected as fallacious.


If someone refers to popularity or unpopularity as an argument for or against something, that seems fallacious to me. Otherwise I don't see the point of simply stating that something is popular in a thread about the quality of music.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

MacLeod said:


> If you think popularity has no place in this thread, please stop perpetuating its presence!


I'm gonna try! I wasn't the first to mention it, and I just find it bothersome that the subject keeps popping up in irrelevant threads.


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## San Antone (Feb 15, 2018)

Eusebius12 said:


> Ironic, because Schoenberg's music is barely played now. Unless you mean Verklaerte Nacht, which seems to get a reasonable number of performances.


No, because Schoenberg is the best composer of those listed.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

I know lots of people have reacted against your two main posts in convincing ways but I had to comment as well because this post is one of the most extraordinary that I have ever seen here. Possibly this is because of the certainty and apparent objectivity of your language. If you had just said "to me" and "I think" a few times it might have read as mere enthusiasm (misguided in my opinion but legitimate for all that).



larold said:


> I never knew this existed and am relieved that a composer as great as Shostakovich, whose body of work compares favorably to Beethoven, Bach and Mozart, could see the fraud around him. Just about all serious followers of classical music have seen it but, until now, I never knew it was addressed this early by any major composer.


Relieved? Were you feeling under evolutionary pressure? Yours is an amazing statement and makes me wonder where you have been for the last 50 years. Firstly, few would agree that Shostakovich compares favorably to Bach, Mozart and Beethoven. I don't think that many would even think he was the greatest of his own time. I say this as a fan - I have multiple recordings of most of his major works - but one who loves a lot of 20th Century music. Incidentally, composers were complaining about each other long before the 1960s!



larold said:


> As to the final question, Shostakovich was certainly qualified to make such an assessment, being the last great symphonist in the world, writing some of the world's most memorable concertos, string quartets and solo piano music, and having written one of the last operas to enter the standard repertory. If one looks dispassionately at the outcome of later composers in these time-tested classical formats after Shostakovich (he died 1975) it becomes even more clear he was our last great composer.


I have some sympathy with the idea that he was the last great symphonist as I do think the importance of the symphony as a form declined during the 20th Century. But there have been great symphonists since - Pettersson is one - although, along with Shostakovich I think, they do not reliably succeed in getting as much out of the form as the greats of the past (Sibelius might be the last to achieve that). But concertos, quartets, sonatas, solo piano music ... there are just so many examples of composers who excelled in all these. And to state that he wrote (some 80 years ago) one of the last operas to enter the standard repertory is plainly wrong unless you mean "one of many". I also wonder why you think "mastery" of the forms of the past is a benchmark of greatness. For, while Shostakovich was in no way the last to write great music in the various formats you mention, new forms have also been invented by composers who were less willing or able to live imprisoned solely by the forms of the past. If that was not allowed then music should have stopped before it started!



larold said:


> It is now nearly a half-century since his death and not a single classical composer has written the combination of one symphony, concerto, string quartet and opera that has taken the world by storm the way his "Leningrad" symphony did in 1941 when the giants of the podium all fought to see who would conduct the Western premiere. It becomes increasingly more clear each day nothing like this will happen in our lifetimes or perhaps ever again.


Many have commented on this extraordinary statement. I don't know if any works have ever "taken the world by storm" in the way that Shostakovich 7 did but I'm sure you realise that the reason for that had little to do with musical merit!


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Bulldog said:


> You know, size and popularity are not bad things; they both matter. They even matter to you, because you keep paying them attention.


Really, Bulldog! The reason why "popularity" is regularly mentioned on this forum as an important criterion for success in musical creation is invariably when it is used to demonstrate that more avant garde music is rubbish. It is then incumbent upon those of us who actually like some avant garde music to point out that popularity proves nothing. If popularity and lasting popularity are so important then let's all go home and enjoy the latest pop or (for lasting popularity) the likes of the Rolling Stones. Why waste our time with classical music? Don't get me wrong. I don't dislike the best of the Rolling Stones but I don't think it replaces Shostakovich or Boulez.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

MacLeod said:


> I agree. It doesn't figure in the OP. My point was purely about whether citing the popularity of something must automatically be rejected as fallacious.
> 
> Sorry, but I don't see how your post is a response to mine.


You were talking about popularity, I addressed the point as to how composers look to some unspecified 'future' as a justification. It wasn't in any sense a rebuttal of your post, necessarily. It might have been tangentially related to yours, but still related. Then I went on another riff about Shostakovitch, which may have been not particularly related to your post but related to the thread in general. Actually I could have replied to a number of posts with the same answer indeed, just yours happened to be the one I was reading when I more or less crystallized those thoughts.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

Fredx2098 said:


> If someone refers to popularity or unpopularity as an argument for or against something, that seems fallacious to me. Otherwise I don't see the point of simply stating that something is popular in a thread about the quality of music.


Popularity is different from generally held view of artistic merits by educated and discerning listeners. Most attendees of concerts of art music are more discerning than your average rap consumer. Mass popularity has nothing to do with it.


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

MacLeod said:


> nathanb (post #29) dismissed all larold's references to popularity as they are "the basis of logically fallacious reasoning". I don't think that pointing to the popularity of a musical work as a measure of its value is the same as an "argumentum ad populum"


I think they're exactly the same.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

Popularity is different from canon, and canon is different from repertoire.


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

Eusebius12 said:


> You were talking about popularity, I addressed the point as to how composers look to some unspecified 'future' as a justification. It wasn't in any sense a rebuttal of your post, necessarily. It might have been tangentially related to yours, but still related. Then I went on another riff about Shostakovitch, which may have been not particularly related to your post but related to the thread in general. Actually I could have replied to a number of posts with the same answer indeed, just yours happened to be the one I was reading when I more or less crystallized those thoughts.


Thanks for the clarification.



nathanb said:


> I think they're exactly the same.


That's fine. I don't. Here's my reasoning.

The argumentum ad populum says, in its simplest version, that it is a fallacy to claim that a proposition is true merely because it is held to be true by a large number of people. So, using a musical example, it would be fallacious to claim that the proposition "Shostakovich is the greatest symphonist of the 20th C" is true simply because it can be shown that a large number of people believe it to be true.

"Popularity" on the other hand, is not a proposition. It is a vague descriptive term that would need refining into a proposition which could then be tested. "Shostakovich is the most popular symphonist of the 20thC" is a testable proposition, and, ironically, one where the number of people who attend concerts or buy the music could be offered as legitimate supporting evidence.

larold merely said (though not in thsese explicit terms) that DSCH's popularity is a measure of his worth. But as "popularity" is an unspecific term, I don't think it can be rejected as an argumentum as populum fallacy - there is no specific proposition on offer to reject.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

There seems to be some misunderstanding of what is "popular" and "classical" music around here. Popular music is zeitgeist, music of its time, often with little or no lasting value beyond its time. Classical music lasts over time -- years, decades, centuries.

Plenty of so-called "pop" tunes can be considered classics: Duke Ellington's "Take The A Train," Frank Sinatra's "That's Life," Karen Carpenter's "Close To You" and The Beatles "Hey Jude" are a few examples. Plenty of religious songs are the same -- "Holy, Holy, Holy" is an example. There are even songs from our Civil War era like "Aura Lee" and "Long Time Ago" still being performed. These tunes are as fresh and relevant today as the day they were born. These, and tunes like them, have lasting value beyond popular music and people will sing them as long as people sing.

But most popular music is of its time and lives and dies in its time. I think the music of composers like Boulez and Stockhauzen as being popular music, perhaps in classical music formats, but not classics. The compositions, while timely and possibly considered important in their day, have little extension to modern times. The composers join a long list of so-called classical composers whose music was no longer relevant a generation after its creation.

The idea of something being a classic is of course tied to its popularity because it has such wide, longlasting and enduring appeal. This is just as true for the blue blazer as it is for Beethoven's 5th symphony. And any art that retains its hold over a lifetime is far greater than merely popular, just as music that is here today and gone tomorrow lacks similar qualities.


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

oh, lord........


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_I never knew this existed and am relieved that a composer as great as Shostakovich, whose body of work compares favorably to Beethoven, Bach and Mozart, could see the fraud around him. Just about all serious followers of classical music have seen it but, until now, I never knew it was addressed this early by any major composer...Relieved? Were you feeling under evolutionary pressure? _

I was feeling no pressure. I was relieved to know that some people in the musical intelligentsia, as far back as 1965, could see the difference. Based on the spreads classical music magazines gave Boulez when he died, it did not appear anyone at that time knew the difference. It was comforting to know someone did, at least once.


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## Guest (Aug 9, 2018)

larold said:


> There seems to be some misunderstanding of what is "popular" and "classical" music around here.


Does there? Where?


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## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

larold said:


> But most popular music is of its time and lives and dies in its time. I think the music of composers like Boulez and Stockhauzen as being popular music, perhaps in classical music formats, but not classics. The compositions, while timely and possibly considered important in their day, have little extension to modern times. The composers join a long list of so-called classical composers whose music was no longer relevant a generation after its creation.


Not sure I agree, but eloquently put. Certainly food for thought.....


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Modernism has always been despised by fascists and dictatorships. Shostakovich was just toeing the line, submitting to fear of Stalin.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

larold said:


> There seems to be some misunderstanding of what is "popular" and "classical" music around here. Popular music is zeitgeist, music of its time, often with little or no lasting value beyond its time. Classical music lasts over time -- years, decades, centuries.
> 
> Plenty of so-called "pop" tunes can be considered classics: Duke Ellington's "Take The A Train," Frank Sinatra's "That's Life," Karen Carpenter's "Close To You" and The Beatles "Hey Jude" are a few examples. Plenty of religious songs are the same -- "Holy, Holy, Holy" is an example. There are even songs from our Civil War era like "Aura Lee" and "Long Time Ago" still being performed. These tunes are as fresh and relevant today as the day they were born. These, and tunes like them, have lasting value beyond popular music and people will sing them as long as people sing.
> 
> ...


It is possible that Duke Ellington's Take the A Train (actually written by Billy Strayhorn) and Hey Jude will outlast Stockhausen, even in an 'art music' sense. The best of jazz in any case generally qualifies as art music. It is true that jazz is dying and western art music of previous centuries is actually more popular and more performed. This shows the enduring, almost everlasting, quality of the canon of great music. Very little of today's ephemera (or possibly none at all) is likely to have that enduring power. But some music in almost all genres is worth preserving and has at least some artistic merits imo.


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## aussiebushman (Apr 21, 2018)

Fredx2098 said:


> I wish people could be content with having a subjective opinion about music without feeling a need to belittle others' music and be "right" about it. If it really is so ugly and unlikable, I don't see the need to belittle. If you don't like some music, don't listen to it, great, it's all worked out. If you really have to make a critique, what's wrong with "I don't like it, it sounds ugly to me" and why do you have to be right and others wrong? The two sides of this seem to be "spout a bunch of pointless negativity and claim it's a fact" and "don't spout a bunch of pointless negativity".


This one of the most intelligent comments I have read in a while!

There are many composers and much music I do NOT like, but that does not mean they are without value to someone. I regard my musical tastes as moderately progressive and that certainly included Shostakovich, Shoenberg, several Estonian composers etc, but with also much love of the Baroque and Romantic offerings. I personally dislike many "modern" composers but recognize that they have something to offer.

Several of my friends are "stuck" with music I regard as mainstream at best - they simply will not tolerate anything outside their fairly narrow comfort range and I am guilty of attempting to introduce them to other composers/works. However, it does not mean I am "right" and they are "wrong" If they cannot enjoy say, the Shostakovich Viola sonata, Stravinsky's ballets, Wagner etc etc, it is their loss, not mine


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

There still has to be a place for expressing opinions, positive and negative. Any sort of criticism seems verboten in some quarters. The greats that are almost universally accepted as such amongst the relatively small domain of 'modern classical music lovers' were subjected to sound critical thrashings in their day. If Mozart can be beaten to death by (mostly non-cogent) criticism, then the moderns should be open to it, and yes others have the freedom to rebut it. The problem is, if all new music is 'good' and all criticism is attacked defensively and reflexively, then how can others judge what are masterpieces of the recent past and what are also rans?

Trouble is, anything not of the 'barbed-wire-school' tends to be snobbishly dismissed (ironically in respect of the OP). There is no want of criticism and snobbish dismissal of the non-barbed-wire stuff, whilst in wounded voice and visage, the barbed-wire-warriors vociferously attack and/or studiously ignore anything not 'theirs '


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Unfortunately, nothing Shostakovich says about Boulez, Stockhausen, Henze, Stuckenschmidt, or Schoenberg will stop me from listening to their music.
As well, nothing anyone says about Shostakovich will keep me from listening to his.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

Eusebius12 said:


> There still has to be a place for expressing opinions, positive and negative. Any sort of criticism seems verboten in some quarters. The greats that are almost universally accepted as such amongst the relatively small domain of 'modern classical music lovers' were subjected to sound critical thrashings in their day. If Mozart can be beaten to death by (mostly non-cogent) criticism, then the moderns should be open to it, and yes others have the freedom to rebut it. The problem is, if all new music is 'good' and all criticism is attacked defensively and reflexively, then how can others judge what are masterpieces of the recent past and what are also rans?
> 
> Trouble is, anything not of the 'barbed-wire-school' tends to be snobbishly dismissed (ironically in respect of the OP). There is no want of criticism and snobbish dismissal of the non-barbed-wire stuff, whilst in wounded voice and visage, the barbed-wire-warriors vociferously attack and/or studiously ignore anything not 'theirs '


It's not that all modern music is good. The problem is there are people saying that no modern music is valuable. There are ways to criticize things without being insulting, like saying "I personally don't like this, and the style just isn't my thing," instead of "This music is garbage and has no value." Making any kind of broad objective statement like that is ridiculous, and I don't see what would drive someone to want to assert their opinions as fact and insult artists who they just don't like.


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## Byron (Mar 11, 2017)

Fredx2098 said:


> It's not that all modern music is good. The problem is there are people saying that no modern music is valuable. There are ways to criticize things without being insulting, like saying "I personally don't like this, and the style just isn't my thing," instead of "This music is garbage and has no value." Making any kind of broad objective statement like that is ridiculous, and I don't see what would drive someone to want to assert their opinions as fact and insult artists who they just don't like.


Yeah, but this doesn't only happen in relation to modern music on this message board. It happens with just about every composer, no matter how revered, from Bach to Mozart to Beethoven to Stravinsky, where broad criticisms about the music being boring or bombastic or predictable are made.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

Byron said:


> Yeah, but this doesn't only happen in relation to modern music on this message board. It happens with just about every composer, no matter how revered, from Bach to Mozart to Beethoven to Stravinsky, where broad criticisms about the music being boring or bombastic or predictable are made.


Giving reasons that you personally dislike a composer or piece of music is different from arguing that entire styles of music are valueless and pretentious.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

Fredx2098 said:


> Giving reasons that you personally dislike a composer or piece of music is different from arguing that entire styles of music are valueless and pretentious.


Yes to both what you typed and what you replied to from Byron. One can still express one's views with a certain amount of vigour, in my view (heaven help us if everyone's views were as firm as blancmange) so long as one has a basis for those views and are willing to allow them to be challenged.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_It is possible that Duke Ellington's Take the A Train (actually written by Billy Strayhorn) and Hey Jude will outlast Stockhausen, even in an 'art music' sense._

I think it may already have done so. There is more usage of these tunes than the latter. One edition of the Penguin Guide cited certain Beatles' tunes -- Eleanor Rigby in particular -- as having similar characteristics to Schubert art songs. There were 2 listings, less than one column, for Stockhauzen in the 2010 Penguin Guide.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

Larkenfield said:


> General comment. What famous composers have much of anything favorable to say about one another? Virtually all renown composers feel that only they're doing it the way it should be done. They have a blind spot. Read Tchaikovsky's criticism of Brahms. Chopin about Liszt. Schoenberg about Stravinsky. Stravinsky about Prokofiev... and many other instances could be mentioned. Composers are locked into their own creative source. So I always take such comments with a huge grain of salt and I think it's something to be kept in mind as far as what a famous composer has to say, plus composers can be highly competitive with each other. Negative comments from composers are very easy to find online, so I tend to give someone like Shostakovich a bit of slack. And of course, the criticisms from Boulez towards other composers are quite condescending and well known, such as about Olivier Messiaen. I would consider him for more scathing and condescending than anything by Shostakovich, who had managed to survive Stalin and was lucky to be alive.
> 
> https://www.cmuse.org/harshest-composer-on-composer-insults-in-classical-music/


Well put and exactly right. And in most cases, one can't be too harsh on these composers for hurling these insults at their rivals, real or imagined. Forging a significant new creative path requires an almost fanatical belief that one's own approach is not only right, but superior, even necessary and inevitable. There are naysayers and skeptics, and sometimes booing audiences or empty seats, to ignore. There is often a lack of financial reward and recognition that at the same time is lavished on lesser artists who have less talent, or worse, cynically pander to the fashions of the moment and lobby to inflate their reputations.

Music criticism from a composer nearly always must be taken with a large grain of salt.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

larold said:


> _It is possible that Duke Ellington's Take the A Train (actually written by Billy Strayhorn) and Hey Jude will outlast Stockhausen, even in an 'art music' sense._
> 
> I think it may already have done so. There is more usage of these tunes than the latter. One edition of the Penguin Guide cited certain Beatles' tunes -- Eleanor Rigby in particular -- as having similar characteristics to Schubert art songs. There were 2 listings, less than one column, for Stockhauzen in the 2010 Penguin Guide.


Yes, interesting. Without state subsidy, and snobbish condescension, certain works outside what is considered the western art canon will survive, and perhaps other works supposedly within it will wither. Time, as the cliche says, will tell. Some jazz is already well considered art. How will 'crossover' be categorized in the future? Paul McCartney has attempted an oratorio and other 'classical' things (not that successfully though). Who is to say that some of modern popular music has no artistic value? Is it of less value than folk music, so happily plundered by all and sundry for centuries?


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## Byron (Mar 11, 2017)

Fredx2098 said:


> Giving reasons that you personally dislike a composer or piece of music is different from arguing that entire styles of music are valueless and pretentious.


So saying Bach sucks because its stilted, boring, mechanical and whatnot is so different than saying modern music sucks because its pretentious noise? I don't think so. Both sound like incredibly silly and generalized criticisms to fans of the music.


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## fluteman (Dec 7, 2015)

larold said:


> _It is possible that Duke Ellington's Take the A Train (actually written by Billy Strayhorn) and Hey Jude will outlast Stockhausen, even in an 'art music' sense._
> 
> I think it may already have done so. There is more usage of these tunes than the latter. One edition of the Penguin Guide cited certain Beatles' tunes -- Eleanor Rigby in particular -- as having similar characteristics to Schubert art songs. There were 2 listings, less than one column, for Stockhauzen in the 2010 Penguin Guide.


Eleanor Rigby is written in the Dorian Mode, as is Schubert's Der Konig in Thule, for example. But the Beatles also had a healthy respect for Stockhausen, as can be seen in their Revolution 9. The White Album in general, especially its similarity in places to fiddling with a tuning knob and passing through multiple radio stations, also evokes Stockhausen, who famously used radio-like sounds.
Edit: The Beatles even put Stockhausen on the cover of Sgt. Pepper. I forgot about that.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

Byron said:


> So saying Bach sucks because its stilted, boring, mechanical and whatnot is so different than saying modern music sucks because its pretentious noise? I don't think so. Both sound like incredibly silly and generalized criticisms to fans of the music.


Those are very different. One is talking about one composer and giving real reasons, and the other is making a statement about an entire era of music without any real criticism. "Pretentious" is not a word to describe music. But I wouldn't say "[composer/style/era] sucks," I would say "I don't like [composer/style/era]." How is it that no one knows how to state a subjective opinion? I recommend that people really read the definitions of "pretentious" and "snobby" and realize that saying "all modern music is bad" is exactly those things, not making or enjoying it.


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## Byron (Mar 11, 2017)

Fredx2098 said:


> Those are very different. One is talking about one composer and giving real reasons, and the other is making a statement about an entire era of music without any real criticism. "Pretentious" is not a word to describe music. But I wouldn't say "[composer/style/era] sucks," I would say "I don't like [composer/style/era]." How is it that no one knows how to state a subjective opinion? I recommend that people really read the definitions of "pretentious" and "snobby" and realize that saying "all modern music is bad" is exactly those things, not making or enjoying it.


Sounds like splitting hairs to me. Saying a composer is "boring" is just a lame and lazy criticism as well. But maybe you should save yourself the headache and when you see a statement like "modern music has no melody", you can mentally reconstruct it to "I don't perceive any melody in modern music", since that's really what's being said anyway.

This board thrives on negativity, whether it's putting down eras of music, declaring popular works overrated, or bashing composers for their personal failings. It's not just aimed at modern music.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Byron said:


> *This board thrives on negativity*, whether it's putting down eras of music, declaring popular works overrated, or bashing composers for their personal failings. It's not just aimed at modern music.


I think it thrives on a balance of negativity and positivity. Too much of the former and the fighting spins out of control, too much of the latter and the board becomes boring and less learning occurs.


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

Unless a listener is mentioning a specific recording that they’ve heard to form an opinion — and if they don’t like the music it may be only one recording and a poor one — I usually hold their opinions as suspect. They may have chosen a poor or ineffective performance without realizing it and then blame their dissatisfaction on the composer. Better for some to ask to hear more of the well-known performances before forming an opinion based on what could have been a lousy recording. There are so many great recordings online of just about anyone, but that’s no guarantee that the critics have found them, and they may be doing themselves a great disfavor without being aware of it, though no composer is universally liked and classical music sales go to only about 3% of the population. How’s that for the popularity of the music to begin with? It’s better to mention a specific recording that everyone can hear and reach some level of agreement that it’s at least a good one, and then the opinions mean something, whether disapproving or not.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

Byron said:


> Sounds like splitting hairs to me. Saying a composer is "boring" is just a lame and lazy criticism as well. But maybe you should save yourself the headache and when you see a statement like "modern music has no melody", you can mentally reconstruct it to "I don't perceive any melody in modern music", since that's really what's being said anyway.
> 
> This board thrives on negativity, whether it's putting down eras of music, declaring popular works overrated, or bashing composers for their personal failings. It's not just aimed at modern music.


You don't see a difference between saying that a specific composers is bad and giving reasons and saying that an entire era of music is bad for no real reason? Saying that any art "IS" bad is a rude, ignorant thing to do. I've never said that a composer "is" bad. Nowhere am I implying that modern music is the only victim or the only thing I want to protect. That's not any part of what I'm saying, but it seems more common for someone to hear the first minute of one modern piece of music (usually atonal serialism, which is just one type of modernism) and claim that all modern music is bad than for someone to hear one minute of Bach and claim that all Baroque music is bad. I'm saying that if someone says that a composer/style/era "is" bad, which is an objective statement beyond an opinion, that will always be wrong, rude, ignorant, pretentious, and snobby.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Fred you have a point, but you are just repeating it endlessly now. There will always be some ignorant comments here or there. If the Post modern music you like is as good as you feel it is, it will not be affected much by some comments on a message board. Show some confidence in your tastes.


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

tdc said:


> Fred you have a point, but you are just repeating it endlessly now. There will always be some ignorant comments here or there. If the Post modern music you like is as good as you feel it is, it will not be affected much by some comments on a message board. Show some confidence in your tastes.


It's hard for me to sit idly by when aggressively ignorant things are being said. It doesn't affect my opinions at all, it just annoys me the way people state their opinions not wanting them to just be opinions. I would think they're trolls if they weren't seemingly the most supported group on the website. The experience of this website would be more enjoyable if there wasn't such an abundance of people thinking that what they like is right and if someone feels differently then they're wrong.


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## Eusebius12 (Mar 22, 2010)

If someone is right then someone else is probably wrong. But that might be you (in fact statistically, this is likely quite often the case). If two diametrically opposed statements are made, then both cannot be equally true. 

Do you mean people say ignorant things with absolute certainty on the internet?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I generally find people who agree with my views rational and reasonable, while many of those who disagree are "aggressively ignorant." So I must absolutely agree with Fredx!


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## Fredx2098 (Jun 24, 2018)

Eusebius12 said:


> If someone is right then someone else is probably wrong. But that might be you (in fact statistically, this is likely quite often the case). If two diametrically opposed statements are made, then both cannot be equally true.
> 
> Do you mean people say ignorant things with absolute certainty on the internet?


I don't think very many things are black and white, right or wrong, especially not with art, so when someone says something like "that composer is talentless and bad, and their music is meaningless and pointless," that seems inappropriate to me. It would be a dream if people just talked about how much they hate composers rather than asserting that the composers themselves are wrong.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Eusebius12 said:


> If someone is right then someone else is probably wrong. But that might be you (in fact statistically, this is likely quite often the case). If two diametrically opposed statements are made, then both cannot be equally true.
> 
> Do you mean people say ignorant things with absolute certainty on the internet?


Doesn't most great art have at least two sides - usually opposites?


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Larkenfield said:


> Unless a listener is mentioning a specific recording that they've heard to form an opinion - and if they don't like the music it may be only one recording and a poor one - I usually hold their opinions as suspect. They may have chosen a poor or ineffective performance without realizing it and then blame their dissatisfaction on the composer. Better for some to ask to hear more of the well-known performances before forming an opinion based on what could have been a lousy recording. There are so many great recordings online of just about anyone, but that's no guarantee that the critics have found them, and they may be doing themselves a great disfavor without being aware of it, though no composer is universally liked and classical music sales go to only about 3% of the population. How's that for the popularity of the music to begin with? It's better to mention a specific recording that everyone can hear and reach some level of agreement that it's at least a good one, and then the opinions mean something, whether disapproving or not.


The trouble is that there are just as many (or more) disagreements about which performances are good and which are not!


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## Triplets (Sep 4, 2014)

MacLeod said:


> I tend to fall in with the crowd that believes DSCH to have been a man of complete integrity, but under such challenging pressure to conform or suffer the worst of consequences that the best he could do was to offer covert resistance in his music.
> 
> (I recognise that there is another legitimate interpretation which has him as, largely, a conformist, and his music is all visible, on the surface - there is no hidden resistance.)
> 
> ...


You are disappointed to find out the He was a human being, who had likes and dislikes, and that he didn't conform to your model of a progressive Composer? Shame on him for following his own creative muse


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## Guest (Aug 11, 2018)

Triplets said:


> You are disappointed to find out the He was a human being, who had likes and dislikes, and that he didn't conform to your model of a progressive Composer? Shame on him for following his own creative muse


Yes. It's always disappointing to discover one's idols have feet of clay. :lol:


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