# The Spirit of Other Times



## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Getting into the spirit of the times and places associated with the classical music you're playing or listening to has always been important to me. It was emphasized by my piano teachers that to play Mozart well you need to experience his operas and get a feel for the gestures and actions. Whether it was late gothic cathedrals in connection with the 15th century Flemish composers, or the Viennese liedertafel and Schubert, I find the images and ideas of the past bring an added richness to the music. But in recent years, at least in North America, interests of this type seem to have receded. Does anyone else find "the spirit of times past" related to their musical enthusiasms?


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## cheregi (Jul 16, 2020)

I used to be pretty firmly on the side of 'context shouldn't matter to my listening, or if it does, then only musical context i.e. to what extent this work is innovative or conservative,' but I found that regardless of my intentions, knowledge of the social contexts of music-making inevitably seeped into my affective relationship to a work anyway, so now I embrace it. For example my current listening is almost entirely 16th century Italian madrigals, and part of that is I just love the idea of music written for amateur enthusiasts, rather than public performance, and that the singers, not being professionals or composers themselves, wouldn't necessarily know what a piece even sounded like until they were all in the middle of singing it... I don't know why that appeals to me so much.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Not exactly to be called as enthusiasm, but focus, due respect. As a person born into our age, it is quite necessary to understand as much as possible the historical background of the subject you learn. It is not just about music, there is such debate as how to interprete a literary work with and without its historical background. For example, in 19th century France, there were two schools of literary critics, one takes literature as an independent artefact of art, out of its general context even out of its writers life, ideological convictions, beliefs etc, the other, just does the vice versa. Guess who prevails today? The latter. Thanks to our prevailing common sense, to learn within the contextual understanding is still the reasonable way to go for the foreseeable future.


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## classical yorkist (Jun 29, 2017)

I love context for the music I listen to. I love to find out about the prevailing thoughts and artistic me cements of the time.


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## Fabulin (Jun 10, 2019)

Try hearing The Rite of Spring from the perspective of Alexander Glazunov and other elder Russians. They heard it as a string of borrowings from their own music, done in an obnoxious plink-plonk fashion. Once you do, it will never quite be the same.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_Does anyone else find "the spirit of times past" related to their musical enthusiasms?_

I think it broadens the experience gained from the music to at least mentally share some concept of its moment of conception, zeitgeist or in any way to parallel the times of the music with the music itself. I think about this often when listening to 20th century music, especially the music written after the war that is either atonal, tonal but unromantic, or 12 tone. I often try to understand what the composers were experiencing and trying to say through their music.

Composers of music tend to be just like other application artists which is to say copycats. Most follow the traditional roads laid out in front of them then apply their personalities and traverse them. Occasionally a great one will come along and alter the path but most are comfortable fitting into the rubric.

The common complaints about 20th century and postwar music, that it is not pretty or tuneful, tell you a lot about the times of its composition: they weren't pretty and full of apprehension. Since World War I the only decade of the 20th century that was truly hopeful was the 1990s after the fall of European communism.

That's when Spielberg's cinematic dinosaurs were treated differently than dinos ever had been in film -- as objects of respect and awe rather than enemies to be destroyed. John Adams -- probably our most famous and accomplished living composer -- penned his violin concerto and El Nino oratorio in this time.

But along came 9/11 and that optimism ended. Adams composed his opera Dr. Atomic about Oppenheimer afterward (2004). I can't in any way see that as being hopeful or optimistic. A few years later (2010) Englishman John Hegge wrote his opera Moby Dick about the larger than life God-like white whale that man could not corral, Another indication via art we live in times we cannot control?

This was six years before the backward-seeking vote in the U.K. to leave the European market and the Donald Trump election in USA -- both attempts to remake nations: to put the great back into Great Britain and to make America great again. We have since learned there is no way to go backward in time other than viewing the first Superman movie.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

It is sad people forget that history always repeats itself but the past art will not happen again. As Joseph Conrad says:

"History repeats itself, but the special call of an art which has passed away is never reproduced. It is as utterly gone out of the world as the song of a destroyed wild bird." 

Look forward for what? samples of extinct species, barren polluted lands, compounding lies, suckling secret banks, among which we find new music..em.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

If you mean nostalgia, hell no, it was too stupid for me to conceive the problem properly. Why even post the question in such a circumventing way? I am very much a forwardlooker, but there are way too many lies compounding one another to block the way, seriously anyone think our age is truly sweet and peaceful? Our age is deprived of culture and taste that is all, I am not interested in the convoluted leftist theories about historical paradoxes, like those depicted in Christopher Nolans movies. Art for arts sake, simple, concentration and focus, why it has to sound dated? It is so strange, everybody goes horray for stupid fads and parades. I know acting takes a lot of talents, but it has nothing to corroborate with the modern age to call common sense of respecting tradition as nostalgia. I would call Bach would like to let us to hear his works, so would do many ancient composers, you know, we are the lucky ones to hear them, so by providence we are the destined heirs. Nostalgy, no, but rightful right to our heritage.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Along with the historical contexts:hymns, literature, paintings, lutheran movements, Council of Trent, Johannes Kepler, colonialization are all our heritage, our eternal source of fortune, our identity, our revelation, our spiritual fountain of life. Are you going to give them up for this destroyed corrupted ruin of filthy rubbles called modernism. We will move along, taking along with us all the heritages no leaving behind a shred of paper, while crushing, trampling upon garbages laid out cheaply before you as decoys, like what a chinese proverb says: picking up a grain of sesame for leaving a melon behind. Modern stuff mostly are fake, cheap trashes, to trick you to leave behind your best heritages. 

We have to fight as we go forward, in order to hold onto our compass of faith and eternal honor, our musical heritage a part of this compass.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

Roger Knox said:


> Getting into the spirit of the times and places associated with the classical music you're playing or listening to has always been important to me. It was emphasized by my piano teachers that to play Mozart well you need to experience his operas and get a feel for the gestures and actions. Whether it was late gothic cathedrals in connection with the 15th century Flemish composers, or the Viennese liedertafel and Schubert, I find the images and ideas of the past bring an added richness to the music. But in recent years, at least in North America, interests of this type seem to have receded. Does anyone else find "the spirit of times past" related to their musical enthusiasms?


I knew someone who was a real fan of the Classical period: Haydn, Mozart and early Beethoven and their contemporaries. He was also something of a historian and would read about this period a lot. In this reading there were descriptions of concerts of the time, with an example of a program of the music performed. He would sometimes structure his listening to recreate one of these concerts, which might only present one movement of a symphony among an aria or two from an opera, a string quartet, a piano sonata, etc.

I'm not sure if this is on-topic for the thread, but is what I thought of when I saw your title.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

cheregi said:


> For example my current listening is almost entirely 16th century Italian madrigals, and part of that is I just love the idea of music written for amateur enthusiasts, rather than public performance, and that the singers, not being professionals or composers themselves, wouldn't necessarily know what a piece even sounded like until they were all in the middle of singing it... I don't know why that appeals to me so much.


It appeals to me also. I miss my choir now. Being "in the middle of singing it" creates a certain bond, even among people whose connection is only through music. One is also in the middle of creating the music if it's a new piece. Madrigals convey the vitality and exuberance of at least a certain part of 16th-century Italy. Thanks for sharing your enthusiasm!


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

I spent a considerable amount of time (and money!) trying to capture that "spirit of the time" to help me appreciate and understand certain composers better. The problem as I soon discovered was that most of the culture of those times is now Gone With the Wind. The two world wars swept it away, and our modern era which has little patience for learning history and seems hell bent on destroying western culture is heading in the wrong direction as far as I'm concerned. Yet, if you go to certain places, listen carefully, look closely you can still pick up echos of times gone by and catch a glimpse of those times. The first day I was in London I walked everywhere trying to imagine what life was like for Elgar, Vaughan Williams, Holst, Boult, Barbirolli and other English heroes. Walking the Vienna Woods I felt a closeness to Beethoven's Pastoral more that I ever had before. In Fussen, Germany walking through the castles gave me an insight into Wagner more than any book could. In Mexico, walk through the ruins of ancient Mayan cities and Revueltas' Sensemaya became so much more real. So yes, I think the spirit of the times makes a huge difference. Spend an afternoon in Spillville, Iowa and then listen to the New World; new perspective. There is a real nostalgia out there for simpler, maybe better, times - depends on how you define and perceive it. But look at the enormous popularity for Downton Abbey. We may have come a long ways technologically but we sure lost a lot of humanity along the way.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Christopher Nolan is a great director, just a disclaimer. 

The complicated concenptualizations within the western modern culture are unsurpassed and they pose a great obstacle to the understanding of traditional heritages. For example, some leftist writers from the west call on developping countries to reject free thinking, free speech modern idioms for them being too westernized, in the name of protecting the local cultures. What do they take for these local cultures? naturally oppressive voodoo cults? The left provokes the animosity toward classicism all the time, sorry for many people, but I think internet is the best medium to counter them, never take too far the debate with their half-baked arguments. 

Back to music, madrigal is a polyphonic development of Renaissance secular chansons, frottolas. Before Cipriano de Rore, the genre remained quite melodic, de Rore introduced uncertain tempos and dissonances into madrigals, so we have these typically dissonant madrigals untill middle 17th century. Still, dissonance has revealed to us its immensely powerful expressiveness for secular texts. In fact, dissonance within madrigals proved the endless potential of polyphonic contruction, offsetting better force for emotional impacts than simple homophonic melodies. Madrigals will never bore a listener, dissonance is a netherworld of hidden treasures, it still applies to our craziest rock, it is one of the greatest innovations of humanity.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

SanAntone said:


> He would sometimes structure his listening to recreate one of these concerts, which might only present one movement of a symphony among an aria or two from an opera, a string quartet, a piano sonata, etc. ... I'm not sure if this is on-topic for the thread, but is what I thought of when I saw your title.


Thanks for your reply. Yes it is on-topic, someone really "getting into" the music in a certain way, with a different perspective. I also meant more casual associations that evoke another time or place.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

mbhaub said:


> I spent a considerable amount of time (and money!) trying to capture that "spirit of the time" to help me appreciate and understand certain composers better. The problem as I soon discovered was that most of the culture of those times is now Gone With the Wind. The two world wars swept it away, and our modern era which has little patience for learning history and seems hell bent on destroying western culture is heading in the wrong direction as far as I'm concerned. Yet, if you go to certain places, listen carefully, look closely you can still pick up echos of times gone by and catch a glimpse of those times. ...


I agree with you. We have lived and are living in bad times. I hope my post doesn't cause further upset, and also don't want to downplay the seriousness of our current troubles. History shows that we have often failed to learn from history, but people and culture have come through other disasters. You express the "spirit of the time" idea better that I could and it really helps me face the future.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Ariasexta said:


> Not exactly to be called as enthusiasm, but focus, due respect. As a person born into our age, it is quite necessary to understand as much as possible the historical background of the subject you learn. It is not just about music, there is such debate as how to interprete a literary work with and without its historical background. For example, in 19th century France, there were two schools of literary critics, one takes literature as an independent artefact of art, out of its general context even out of its writers life, ideological convictions, beliefs etc, the other, just does the vice versa. ...


Your example of literary critics in 19th century is helpful! I spent some time with 19th-century French poetry and it seems to me that the idea of "pure poetry" was flawed. Probably it was a reaction against romantic speculation, maybe coming from fear of too much political ideology.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Fabulin said:


> Try hearing The Rite of Spring from the perspective of Alexander Glazunov and other elder Russians. They heard it as a string of borrowings from their own music, done in an obnoxious plink-plonk fashion. Once you do, it will never quite be the same.


Petrouchka also borrowed Russian songs. Igor, we never knew ye ...


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Larold, your ideas are far-reaching, will have to think about them!


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## Fabulin (Jun 10, 2019)

Roger Knox said:


> Petrouchka also borrowed Russian songs. Igor, we never knew ye ...


Yes, that's why it was initially blocked from publishing in Russia, wasn't it?


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Ariasexta said:


> ... I would call Bach would like to let us to hear his works, so would do many ancient composers, you know, we are the lucky ones to hear them, so by providence we are the destined heirs ...


The way you express it brings much insight! I wasn't trying to convey nostalgia, but something more like taking up classical music's challenges from the past by getting into the spirit of the music's time and place as well as its formal and technical aspects.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Fabulin said:


> Yes, that's why it was initially blocked from publishing in Russia, wasn't it?


I'm not sure. Later on Stravinsky came up with a new version, I believe to avoid copyright trouble.


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## Roger Knox (Jul 19, 2017)

Ariasexta said:


> ... Back to music, madrigal is a polyphonic development of Renaissance secular chansons, frottolas. Before Cipriano de Rore, the genre remained quite melodic, de Rore introduced uncertain tempos and dissonances into madrigals, so we have these typically dissonant madrigals until middle 17th century.*Still, dissonance has revealed to us its immensely powerful expressiveness for secular texts.* In fact, dissonance within madrigals proved the endless potential of polyphonic construction, offsetting better force for emotional impacts than simple homophonic melodies. Madrigals will never bore a listener, dissonance is a netherworld of hidden treasures, it still applies to our craziest rock, it is one of the greatest innovations of humanity.


It's true -- in church we sing the sacred polyphony but not the secular madrigals that were so influential in the use of dissonance among other things.


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## classical yorkist (Jun 29, 2017)

I like early music, baroque etc and looking at the visual arts of the time, reading the fiction or understanding the scientific and technical advances of the time helps to enrich the experience for me. Looking at Canaletto's paintings of the Thames and listening to Handel enhances both and improves my personal listening experience. However, having said all that, it's not essential for music, or art, to move me.


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## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

Roger Knox said:


> Getting into the spirit of the times and places associated with the classical music you're playing or listening to has always been important to me. It was emphasized by my piano teachers that to play Mozart well you need to experience his operas and get a feel for the gestures and actions. Whether it was late gothic cathedrals in connection with the 15th century Flemish composers, or the Viennese liedertafel and Schubert, I find the images and ideas of the past bring an added richness to the music. But in recent years, at least in North America, interests of this type seem to have receded. Does anyone else find "the spirit of times past" related to their musical enthusiasms?


I have it the other way around. In my country there are plenty of medieval, baroque and classical monuments of the past, and the music of these composers helps me reconnect with them, rather than that the monuments helped me reconnect with the music. One of the things that is amazing about classical music is that it spans several centuries and so offers a direct contact with the people of the past eras and to learn some history (if you are willing to learn about the times the composers lived in)


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## Simplicissimus (Feb 3, 2020)

Was anybody else involved with the Renaissance fair craze that was at its peak in the 1970s? As "the spirit of other times," it was mostly inauthentic, but at times fun. I spent my late teens and twenties playing with early music ensembles at innumerable fairs, most outdoors but sometimes in shopping malls. I was getting bored with it when, in the mid-1980s I had to go overseas for work and hung up my costumes. What I enjoyed was the musical performance, though it was repetitive (endless Terpsichore), and the fellowship. Having to interact with lots of drunk and high people, schlepping the instruments all over the place, coping with poor hygiene conditions, all that was tiresome, but it was all about the spirit of Renaissance times - or really, what we wanted to believe those times were like.


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

They're still very much alive. Rain or shine, but says nothing about Covid or not.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Roger Knox said:


> It was emphasized by my piano teachers that to play Mozart well you need to experience his operas and get a feel for the gestures and actions.


*[ 5:14 ]*





*[ 5:02 ]*


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Roger Knox said:


> Your example of literary critics in 19th century is helpful! I spent some time with 19th-century French poetry and it seems to me that the idea of "pure poetry" was flawed. Probably it was a reaction against romantic speculation, maybe coming from fear of too much political ideology.


You are welcomed, it is a persistent debate untill today, recently we have some marxists joining in and further flaming the whole thing. Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve is the one who proposed applying historical framework into the literary study, while the circle of Marcel Proust was against it. I think such debate applies well to musical study too, my point is historically informed performance, musicology has aleady cover this concern so, such debate has not really tear into the musical department right now, I hope it would not.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Roger Knox said:


> The way you express it brings much insight! I wasn't trying to convey nostalgia, but something more like taking up classical music's challenges from the past by getting into the spirit of the music's time and place as well as its formal and technical aspects.


The left relies on propaganda literature so they have to make literature their forefront. A huge headache. Music just needs historically informed respect, informed performance, informed perspective. Not like literature which needs credentials from the academies to join, in music one only need to start from common sense.

I am also critical of the idea of pure poetry thing, because there is no such thing, it is a lie of the left too when they want people to keep silent, while they would use it to attack other writers for neglecting reality. Pure literature does not exist anywhere. Just like what Dante said about hell, the onlookers are to be pit into hellfire also. Literature can never stand to sing imagery flowers and happiness. Some critics do criticize Shakespeare for being too classy and pure, that is false, no one explains human nature better than him untill today, human nature you know, is the center of the magic. Ugly reality is a lie, the truth is rather fantastic.


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