# Article: Crisis in Contemporary Music



## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

http://www.classical-composers.org/page/article_crisis_in_contemporary_music

Don't know if anyone here cross-references or reads other classical music articles. Here's one 

Golightly (yes yes - he does cast heavy footsteps for a man going about classically) seems to locate contemporary music within arguments over the economics of its survival. In any case, I found some fascinating quotes and snippets which he refers to. I can't stop myself rambling now 



> 1. Performers and audiences, I believe, should be rewarded by those emotional elements in music which make us all 'more than we are'.





> 2. There is a whole industry of academic pretentiousness that has been nurtured and cultivated by the contemporary music establishment which is, in my opinion, a million miles away from the motivation and philosophy of composers from past generations.





> 3. How can you align a contemporary piece of art music (that may repeat a similar phrase over and over again, or a vast ever changing sound world where dissonance is piled on dissonance with no perceptible, and I underline the word perceptible, logic to the gradient), with the dramatic vivid orchestral colours of a film score? True - to anticipate a reply - 'one is absolute music and the other is wallpaper' (pretty sophisticated wallpaper, too, I might add!). The tragedy is that, in today's climate, the essence of heart and soul, traditionally found in all music is now, in the wallpaper, not the absolute, and worse - the consumer knows it. I accept that a lot of good contemporary music has been written and published in the last few years.


Do these 3 quotes from Golightly lay a litmus test for contemporary music?

Should contemporary music reward us with an emotional experience which reveals to us, 'more than what we are?'

If so, much contemporary music would struggle to meet no.1, let alone no.2, or no.3. I'm sure there are much more richer and profound readings from Golightly's light article too.

This bit intrigues me:


> It would be much more rewarding and aesthetically pleasing to listen to a complete string quartet, than just one movement. However we live in a consumer environment and to market a product, no matter what its artistic stature, you have to employ the elements that are psychologically common to that society.


I find, it would be much more rewarding and aesthetically pleasing, to listen to a complete string quartet cycle. However the very marketing forces which Golightly decries, close down marketing for complete string quartet cycles do they not? Who here, has ever heard all of Jindrich Feld's string quartets on CD? The leading exponent of contemporary Czech music, still hasn't had his complete string quartets recorded....!


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

The only crisis I can think of in contemporary classical is that (at least here in Australia) it is fast becoming a dead medium (dead white males, etc). It is rare to hear works like Carter's _Concerto for Orchestra _in our concert halls (probably hasn't been done for 20 years). & if that's the case, what hope is there for new works of much younger composers?

I think the problem is that many (older) classical fans are just plainly inflexible, they want their steady diet of Beethoven's _Symphony No. 5 _& Tchaikovsky's_ Piano Concerto No. 1_. This type of "safe" repertoire, with a few of the more established contemporary classical composers thrown in tokenistically, leads to this country becoming an artistic backwater (& orchestras & ensembles get no chance to develop more fully artistically).

Even our airwaves are dominated by the established repertoire. Contemporary classical has now become a token things. This is what I'm worried about. The problem is not in the supposed quality of the music being composed, which is as wide ranging today as it was 50-100 years back. There's a range of styles from everything conservative to avant-garde to in-between. The problem is that the attitudes of more conservative older classical fans are becoming mainstream, and influencing the opinions of younger listeners.

Maybe it's a case of supply & demand, like in any business (which our symphony orchestras and chamber ensembles are, no doubt). But it's also important for these organisations to lead the way, and expose us to things that are new and magical, perhaps not always look at the bottom line, and how to please the conservatives. I'm pretty sure that if we keep going the way we are there will be little classical music left as a live medium in the next 100 years, perhaps even much less. Art which fails to renew itself simply becomes a dead medium, a relic, which belongs in a museum or archive, not performed live in a concert hall. These are my thoughts to begin with, anyway...


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## Guest (Feb 26, 2010)

Head_case said:


> Do these 3 quotes from Golightly lay a litmus test for contemporary music?


In a word, no.

Notice that with few exceptions Golightly doesn't mention any names or any pieces. He never defines any of his terms, including the main one. He only rarely, and then to no purpose, gets off the highest level of generality. If you like empty assertions, and judging from posts to online forums of all types, many people do, then you'll love Golightly's article. If you like some specifics, some definitions, some real argument with some thought and some logic, you'll be very aggravated by this long, unbearable screed.

I'd love to say more, but until Golightly deigns to tell us what he means by "contemporary music," there's really nothing to talk about!! (Well, OK, one thing. He keeps mentioning the last forty years, but the generalities (glittering, of course!!) could easily and equally refer to trends in 1810 or 1848 or 1870 or... or, in other words, years, decades before oh, say, Schoenberg for example. And his naive assertion that listeners just instinctively know what's good. Wow.)

Oh, almost forgot. Andre, music is doing pretty well in Australia, at least judging from the CDs I have of Ross Bolleter, Oren Ambarchi, Martin Ng, Philip Samartzis. (I might have more, but I don't really listen by country. Sorry!) And folks nearby* in New Zealand are no slouches, either. And if it's more "traditional" instrumental contemporary music you want, then there's the ISCM World Music Days coming to Australia this spring. (The current head of ISCM is based in Australia.) I know, one swallow does not a summer make, nor one festival a thriving new music scene. The guys I mentioned above, though, who live and work in Australia all year long, might make the place seem summery. (You can't go just by the mainstream venues. The concert halls and opera houses. Music's left those; and to hear new, thriving music, you have to go to the bars and coffee shops and abandoned factories where it's being played.) Happy listening!!

*Just my little joke.


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

Thanks for the thoughts guys. 

Andre - sounds pretty much on ball - over here we too have a generation of classical music listeners who are passing away. Does classical music feature in t.v. adverts still? I remember music from childhood - things like 'the Hamlet cigar' advert and the classical music that accompanied that. These days, I guess the theme tune to the original Star Wars films probably classify as classical music for teenagers. 

A while back, orchestras had it really tough, flying from concert to concert. They were banned from carrying their instruments as hand luggage and risked being damaged in the cargo hold. I guess a pop quartet also hasn't got as many people and equipment to bring to a huge concert venue (amazing what amplification does), compared to a large travelling orchestra. 

Some_guy - 'Mr Golightly' is exactly as his name describes! I don't think he's intending to be taking seriously! He offers interesting tidbits for reflection, that's all. It's probably safe to assume he doesn't mean Mozart


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

some guy said:


> The guys I mentioned above, though, who live and work in Australia all year long, might make the place seem summery. (You can't go just by the mainstream venues. The concert halls and opera houses. Music's left those; and to hear new, thriving music, you have to go to the bars and coffee shops and abandoned factories where it's being played.) Happy listening!!


This is true, there are some regional festivals & the like of experimental music, in less mainstream venues here in Australia. There are also some smaller ensembles which do quite varied programs, not always contemporary, but less mainstream anyway.

I'm just worried that performing some of the less-travelled repertoire, whether it be new or old, is in danger of becoming a fringe thing because of older classical fan's conservative attitudes. I mean, how many times do they want to listen to Beethoven's 5th? Isn't there more to classical music than that? Apparently not if you look at the big symphony orchestras, I mean I was looking at the current season of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, and contemporary music (by this I mean post WWII) had been sidelined to tokenistic 5-10 minute pieces in SOME concerts. How sad this is, they should be more at the cutting edge & pushing boundaries. But it's a good thing how chief conductor Vladimir Ashkenazy has made a commitment to performing the Mahler cycle in the next few years. Even things like this are a good thing, but we should definitely have more recent music performed more wholistically also. What about a complete cycle of Henze or Penderecki symphonies? It's interesting to imagine what the greys would make of this...


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## Guest (Mar 1, 2010)

Good one, Andre!

I can tell you what this grey would say to that: "Too old timey! Where's your turntablists and your noise bands and your soundscape artists?"

(It's true, though. A lotta greys are giving the rest of us a bad name. I listen largely to music written in the past 15 or twenty years. (I'm 58; I'm not old!))


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Yes, with people like you in mind Some Guy, maybe I should stop using the term "greys" as IT IS AGEIST!!! I know. Maybe I should simply use the term "conservatives" because it is a state of mind, not really age-related.


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## scytheavatar (Aug 27, 2009)

Question: is it actually a crime to..... *gasp* hate modern classical music? Must everyone feel that Henze or Penderecki are geniuses on the same level as Beethoven?


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

I'd like to reverse your question: is it actually a crime to love modern/contemporary classical music (and want to see it performed live instead of endless repeats of Beethoven et al for the conservatives). Just food for thought...


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## Guest (Mar 2, 2010)

Scythe, your first question assumes a context that doesn't exist. No one, at least on this thread, has come even close to suggesting that there's something wrong about hating "modern/contemporary classical music."

It might be considered rather odd to dislike the musics of one's own time. To be unable to keep up, as a listener, to what composers of today are doing. That would be something like not liking Beethoven in 1810. Wondering if it's a crime to hate Beethoven. But there could be all sorts of reasons for disliking anything, Tallis _or_ Tone.

I think that while not literally criminal (and I apologize for trampling all over your hyperbole), it can certainly be considered bad form to turn one's personal dislike of contemporary music into a criticism of the music itself. You can test the validity of this conclusion with a simple equation.

Person A listens to a contemporary piece and thinks it's ugly.
Person B listens to the same piece and thinks it's beautiful.

In both cases, the notes are exactly the same. The only difference is in the listeners.

If you can find a number of listeners with the same level of experience listening to recent musics who all find a piece to be ugly, then there might be some justification in concluding that something is wrong with that piece. But only "might be."

As for your second question, that too is contextless. And not only that, it attempts a comparison between unlikes. Both Henze and Penderecki (neither of them particularly cutting edge, though they are both alive and composing in 2010) are setting out to accomplish different things than Beethoven set out to accomplish. They both live in a very different time than Beethoven did, with different assumptions and different backgrounds and different histories. Both Henze and Penderecki have, for instance, Beethoven as part of their cultural heritage. Beethoven did not.

It's 2010. If there's any genuine crisis, it's in the situation of there being large numbers of classical listeners who are not only out of touch with what's happening today, but out of touch with what's been happening for an entire century or more. Who have little or no experience to justify their dislike of that century's worth of music-making. Who have no trouble dismissing, sound unheard, the musics their contemporaries are making. (Or who, if they have heard some contemporary music, without understanding or enjoying it, have no trouble identifying their dislike as a quality of the music. See equation, above!)

As that situation has been going on for TWO hundred years now, and composers continue to compose, I suppose that "crisis" is perhaps the wrong word!


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## Argus (Oct 16, 2009)

scytheavatar said:


> Question: is it actually a crime to..... *gasp* hate modern classical music? Must everyone feel that Henze or Penderecki are geniuses on the same level as Beethoven?




The percentage of people who haven't even heard _of_, let alone the music of Henze or Penderecki and would still class Beethoven as greater composer must be pretty high. The ratio of people who refer to modern classical music as 'noise' or 'ugly' to those who dislike the past masters like Beethoven must be an astronomical figure:1.
Although saying that, I bet most people would prefer Coldplay or U2 to any piece of classical music, past or present.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, modern classical/avant-garde music has no reason to be popular or _try_ to appeal to anyone. Pop, rock, dance, R&B and such, now fill that role. If you look at music as a whole and not one particular segment of it, you'll see it still fulfills what it did in the past, plus lots of other uses. Not to say classical composers shouldn't be allowed to try and get popular, make loads of money, and spend it on blow and giant bass clef shaped swimming pools.(The two dots would be jacuzzi's, if you were wondering).


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## Guest (Mar 2, 2010)

Andre, one thing at least is sure: no one will ever accuse me of being conservative!!

When my hair was brown (and was only on the top of my head), I liked Rachmaninoff, Haydn, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, Grieg, and so forth. 

When I had hair in other places besides the top of my head, I added Bartok, Varese, Mumma, Cage, Carter, and so forth to the first list.

As my hair has greyed (though so far only that that's being cultivated on my face), I have spent more and more time with more and more recent (and perhaps more and more extreme) musics. Niblock, eRikm, Goeringer, Parlane, and so forth.

This, I think, is a good trend. There may be other trends, but this is the one that keeps one current, if nothing else. "Current" may not necessarily translate into "better" or even into "good." But I think knowing something about the creative work going on all around you, now, is a healthy thing. If nothing else, it means you can take part in the conversation.

That's the only (tiny) quibble I would have with Argus' cool response to Scythe--the modern/avant-garde classical (non-pop) music of today certainly appeals to me! It may have no reason to appeal to anyone, but it certainly does appeal to many anyones.


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

> Not to say classical composers shouldn't be allowed to try and get popular


Why shouldn't they get popular?

Classical music is too much in underground. That's the problem.

There is no such person, but if there would appear a composer that would compose rich and sophiscitated music but not avant-garde he would be considered as pop-classical composer by lot of classical people. I mean more literal music.

If Beethoven would not compose, say, 7th symphony and it would be composed today, people that now consider it great would call it rubbish work of a populist.

But it is a good shrubbery.

We need a guy that will have reputation of Mick Jagger, sleep with Megan Fox and Angelina Jolie, live in Beverly Hills 90210 and compose great music which will not be popular among common people, but it will make classical music live again with new, refreshed life out of academic mustiness. What I wrote seems extreme, but how diffrent is this portrait from what we know about Liszt for example?


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## Guest (Mar 2, 2010)

Aramis, what you wrote does not seem extreme, just extremely chimerical.

One, Liszt was wildly popular as a performer, not as a composer. As a composer, he was considered one of the avant garde, a proponent of New Music, and thus viewed with suspicion by an increasingly backwards looking concert world. That is what we know (what we should know) about Mr. Liszt.

Two, sophisticated and popular are going to be uneasy bedfellows at best. And mutually exclusive categories at worst. Beethoven's symphony no. 7 is not by any means popular, except to a very small, sophisticated (!) group of people who listen to classical music. Classical music generally is not very popular.

Three, Beethoven's symphony no. 7 could only have been written when it was written and by whom it was written. It is odd how pervasive (and how universal) ahistorical notions have become. It is true that a composer today could write a pastiche of practically any earlier composer, but that piece could never hope to be anything more than that, a pastiche. You can't ignore--well, you _can,_ but not without consequences!--the time you live in. The assumptions, the visions, the revisions, the shared ideas of this time. It is out of those that the individual named Beethoven created the distinctive piece called symphony no. 7.

It would not have been possible to have written that much before the time it was actually written. And while it would have been "possible" to write something like it later, what would have been the point? If someone today were to write a symphony that sounded as if Beethoven could have written it, then everyone's response would be that it sounds like a Beethoven rip-off. Not "populist," not "rubbish," but certainly a rip-off. That's because, as I pointed out before, we have Beethoven in our past. Beethoven did not. He did have Mozart in his past, though, and you can see how his art developed from things that sounded like Mozart to things that sounded like no one else but Beethoven. What if he had continued to write pieces that sounded like Mozart? Do you think anyone would still be listening to his music today? Do you think he would have achieved the stature he has today if he had done so?


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## Aramis (Mar 1, 2009)

some guy said:


> One, Liszt was wildly popular as a performer, not as a composer. As a composer, he was considered one of the avant garde, a proponent of New Music, and thus viewed with suspicion by an increasingly backwards looking concert world. That is what we know (what we should know) about Mr. Liszt.


Yes, but that was not the same avant-garde as we have today. It was the romantic revolution, inspired and thrilling fight for musical ideals an goals that was lead by young, energic people. Not the same thing as two old gaffers talking at live show watched by ten people around the world and saying: "Mr. X your new symphony for ten sopranos and half of orchestra is very interesting, very interesting, yes, very instense, very hrrrrrrrrrrr <sleeps>"



> Classical music generally is not very popular.


Some works are. You can find many metalheads or "sensitive girls" listening to more tuneful things and claiming to be fascinated.



> Three, Beethoven's symphony no. 7 could only have been written when it was written and by whom it was written. It is odd how pervasive (and how universal) ahistorical notions have become. It is true that a composer today could write a pastiche of practically any earlier composer, but that piece could never hope to be anything more than that, a pastiche. You can't ignore--well, you can, but not without consequences!--the time you live in. The assumptions, the visions, the revisions, the shared ideas of this time. It is out of those that the individual named Beethoven created the distinctive piece called symphony no. 7.(...)


 I'm talking more about idea, not the style. Literal, that's what I've said before. Literal music is something that has clearly visible points, it's tonal and even if you don't understand you see that here is some sad tune on string, here is majestic fanfare etc. And this is what today's composers are afraid of I think. Beethoven's 7th is all the way melodic and literal and for this reason it would be thrown away like trash (if composed today).


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## Elgarian (Jul 30, 2008)

some guy said:


> I think that while not literally criminal (and I apologize for trampling all over your hyperbole), it can certainly be considered bad form to turn one's personal dislike of contemporary music into a criticism of the music itself. You can test the validity of this conclusion with a simple equation.
> 
> Person A listens to a contemporary piece and thinks it's ugly.
> Person B listens to the same piece and thinks it's beautiful.
> ...


I'd just like to highlight this as one of Some Guy's characteristically illuminating statements. I don't think I know enough to contribute significantly myself to the main theme of this thread, but there are some great flashes of light in it from this reader's point of view.

It makes me wonder how important it is, to be 'in touch' with the art of one's times. To be 'in touch' with painting in England in the 1840s would have been to be looking at a good deal of sterile, dull, formulaic art. By contrast, to be 'in touch' 10-15 years later would have been very exciting, with the PreRaphaelites flooding the academy walls with colour and razor-sharp inspiration. Must be the same in music, isn't it? Sometimes you'd be in touch with magic, other times with dead wood. I think what's bothering me is that in order to stay significantly in touch with the art of my day, I'd have to spend quite a lot of my time trying to engage with some fairly dodgy stuff. Is that a price one just has to pay? I do tend to cheat quite a bit, I admit, by using time as a filter - if only to keep the burden manageable.

But then - ach, I remember a few years back walking into Tate Liverpool when Janet Cardiff's _40-part Motet_ installation was on show. Generally speaking the words 'installation art this way' make me walk in the opposite direction, but on this occasion I walked in because it sounded so interesting! A big room, with 40 speakers arranged in an ellipse, with a special recording of Tallis's _Spem in Alium_ playing. It had been recorded with one microphone per singer, and then each of those 40 recordings was being replayed through each speaker. Everything was there, including the chatter before they started singing, and the chatter at the end. Well, you could walk around that room eavesdropping on each singer; or you could stand in any one of an infinite number of positions and get a different perspective on the music. I spent all afternoon in there, listening to the recording over and over and over again, listening to the music, listening to the conversations, exploring this astonishing audio/musical space. The memory is as vivid and glorious as if it were yesterday, and I've never experienced anything like it since.

That, of course, is the benefit of making at least some attempt to stay in touch with the art of one's time. And I might have missed that, through mere prejudice. And now I wonder whether I've just hijacked the thread through self-indulgence. My apologies, if so.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

There's always a crisis with contemporary music, they were probably saying the same in Beethoven's day for example. The crisis however tends to be with the listeners rather than with the music itself, but after a while they get over it and life goes on.


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## StlukesguildOhio (Dec 25, 2006)

It makes me wonder how important it is, to be 'in touch' with the art of one's times. To be 'in touch' with painting in England in the 1840s would have been to be looking at a good deal of sterile, dull, formulaic art. By contrast, to be 'in touch' 10-15 years later would have been very exciting, with the PreRaphaelites flooding the academy walls with colour and razor-sharp inspiration. Must be the same in music, isn't it? Sometimes you'd be in touch with magic, other times with dead wood.

This has been my thinking, exactly. The history of the arts reveals periods of great innovation and artistic brilliance... and eras of "dead wood". Not to dismiss the whole of any era... there are always talented individuals to be found even in the leanest times. When discussing the arts of the present, however, there seems to be those pretentious individuals who champion the notion that anyone who does not embrace the art of the present is a conservative fuddy-duddy out of touch with what is happening. From my memory of art history there were painters such as Jacques Louis David or William Blake who rejected the whole of the art of their time... and yet were anything but conservative. The music of the present, it would seem, is an area open to great dispute where no one has the ultimate say upon where the "magic" lies.


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## Guest (Mar 3, 2010)

Hey Elgarian, you are too kind, as usual!!

I don't know if it's inevitable that one would have to suffer some fairly dodgy stuff in order to stay current. I do stay current, but that's because I love music. That is, I'm not staying current because that's good to do. I'm staying current because I enjoy current musics. I go to a lot of concerts, and I hear a lot of what seems to be fairly weak music. I say "seems" because I don't think judging a piece on one hearing at one concert is going to be a reliable activity. For CDs or downloads that can be listened to over and over again, maybe judgments can be more reliable.

Point is, no matter how good you get with understanding and appreciating recent musics, there's always a possibility that what you think is "fairly dodgy" today might seem the cat's meow tomorrow. Case in point, I have had _Final Ballet_ by M. Behrens in my collection for several years. Every once and awhile I take it out for a spin. Meh.

Two days ago (after several years of listening to a lot of very sparse minimalism--both repetitive and non-repetitive), I took out _Final Ballet_ for another spin. Magic! A wholly satisfying listen. And this happens to me over and over again, even though I attend lots of concerts and have trained myself to be a better listener--at a concert, you only get one chance!

That being said, I would argue that staying current is a good thing, even if the pay-off sometimes seems small. By constantly subjecting yourself to new music, you train your ears to respond to more and more things, opening yourself up to more and more possibilities, as they occur. Of course there will be dead wood, but I would say there will be dead wood in any time, and there will be innovation and brilliance in any time as well. Only by keeping up will you know!

As for letting time do some winnowing for you, consider this: it's not really "time" doing that, but other people. Other people listening and judging and passing on the results to you. I'd much rather listen and judge and enjoy for myself. If others agree, that's nice. If others disagree, "oh well." I guess I'm willing to put up with some dodgy stuff en route to exciting discoveries I might never have made had I not been willing. For me, at least, the pay-off has been worth it.

Happy listening!


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

Certainly a test of music is whether it can stand repeated listening. 

Some music can be simple enough that it can be assessed quite quickly, but much music (particularly classical) requires more effort. It's also a matter of tuning into the style and comparing the music with other pieces in that style to see which is more creative.


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## Elgarian (Jul 30, 2008)

some guy said:


> I do stay current, but that's because I love music. That is, I'm not staying current because that's good to do.


I knew you'd say that! That's the best argument! The actual rough and tumble of engagement (with the good, the possibly bad and the in-between) _feels_ right, when you love the activity itself.



> Of course there will be dead wood, but I would say there will be dead wood in any time, and there will be innovation and brilliance in any time as well. Only by keeping up will you know!


Yes, though a great deal of the dead wood (including, admittedly, some _good_ wood too) does fall by the wayside as time goes on. Which brings us to your last point:



> As for letting time do some winnowing for you, consider this: it's not really "time" doing that, but other people. Other people listening and judging and passing on the results to you. I'd much rather listen and judge and enjoy for myself.


Yes of course you're right - it's just that the initial mass of available material, unwinnowed by _any_ process, often seems overwhelming when the available time is so short, and available resources (cash!) so limited: not just for exploring music, but for exploring any art. I suppose I'm more or less subconsciously following Ruskin's suggestion, for all its flaws, when he says:

"If it be true ... that nothing has been for centuries consecrated by public admiration, without possessing in a high degree some kind of sterling excellence, it is not because the average intellect and feeling of the majority of the public are competent in any way to distinguish what is really excellent, but because all erroneous opinion is inconsistent; and all ungrounded opinion transitory."

That's not a sure guide, but it can provide a rough start: finding treasure in the art of the past is a good deal easier than finding it in the art of the present. And yet, having said that, I remind myself that the great majority of the pictures hanging on my overcrowded walls were made during the last thirty years or so, and most people probably wouldn't acknowledge them to be pictures at all. Beware! I may be talking nonsense!


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## Scott Good (Jun 8, 2009)

This conversation makes me very happy!



Elgarian said:


> I knew you'd say that! That's the best argument! The actual rough and tumble of engagement (with the good, the possibly bad and the in-between) _feels_ right, when you love the activity itself.


Yes - loving the activity. Longing for new experiences and seeking them out. This is why if I have a choice, I always go to see new things, rather than old. Not always, but mostly. I am excited and motivated by what I do not yet know.


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