# How do you classify the music of Wolfgang Rihm?



## kanishknishar (Aug 10, 2015)

His music is seen to be a composite of many styles, a new style itself or varying styles.

I think he doesn't belong to any such categories. He simply creates music as it manifests in his genius of a brain.

What do you think? Is he "inherently conservative"?


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

As far as I can tell he's one of those composers who goes eclectic to make up for never having any really original ideas of his own.

I want to be super clever and say he's the least important most important German composer of his generation since Hasse, but I can't because Wolfgang von Schweinitz is about the same age and I'm pretty sure he's more important.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Hildadam Bingor said:


> As far as I can tell he's one of those composers who goes eclectic to make up for never having any really original ideas of his own.


So, rather like those composers who develop a unique style to make up for lack of truly interesting thematic material?


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Hildadam Bingor said:


> As far as I can tell he's one of those composers who goes eclectic to make up for never having any really original ideas of his own.





Chordalrock said:


> So, rather like those composers who develop a unique style to make up for lack of truly interesting thematic material?











Booooooooooooo


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## Andolink (Oct 29, 2012)

Rihm is one of those living composers whose music I eagerly investigate whenever something new of his appears on disc.

His style has mellowed a lot from the early years i.e. after the mid '90s.

My favorite fairly recent recording is this one that features the stunning 11th String Quartet:


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> So, rather like those composers who develop a unique style to make up for lack of truly interesting thematic material?


Well no. If you come up with interesting thematic material (which also means you have a unique style, at least a unique thematic style), that's yours, and if you can't do that and come up with a unique style to compensate, that's yours too. Rihm - and again, this is all As Far As I Can Tell - doesn't have much of anything that's his own, just a bunch of stuff from a bunch of other people.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Reasonably conservative, minimalism awareness.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Hildadam Bingor said:


> Well no. If you come up with interesting thematic material (which also means you have a unique style, at least a unique thematic style), that's yours, and if you can't do that and come up with a unique style to compensate, that's yours too. Rihm - and again, this is all As Far As I Can Tell - doesn't have much of anything that's his own, just a bunch of stuff from a bunch of other people.


But do you think his music is good, bad, or great? You seem to have left that unsaid.


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## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

Andolink said:


> Rihm is one of those living composers whose music I eagerly investigate whenever something new of his appears on disc.


This for me also. One of the finest and most interesting living composers in my estimation.


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## WaterRat (May 19, 2015)

SimonNZ said:


> This for me also. One of the finest and most interesting living composers in my estimation.


Ditto for me. I am always intrigued by his works.

The variety of his styles only accentuates that intrigue.


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> But do you think his music is good, bad, or great? You seem to have left that unsaid.


Uh... definitely not great, not extreme enough to be bad (like, mediocre 900 ton late romantic symphonic music is BAD, but Rihm's just ignorable - I mean, probably not ignorable if don't listen to modern music, but if you're used to the hairy stuff...), probably he worked hard enough on it that we should at least call it "good" but not really my thing (if I'm going to listen to freaky modern German music I'd rather get it uncut from Stockhausen and Lachenmann, if I'm going to listen to New Simplicity I'd rather get _that_ uncut from von Schweinitz - it would be different if Rihm were somehow SYNTHESIZING instead of doing a little bit of this and then a little bit of that and none of it ever sounds new, but As Far As I Can Tell he ISN'T)...

...sorry, thought that was self explanantory.


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## kanishknishar (Aug 10, 2015)

ArtMusic said:


> Reasonably conservative, minimalism awareness.


*Rihm* is conservative? Since when? Who's out there and extreme then?


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

ArtMusic said:


> Reasonably conservative, minimalism awareness.


What does that mean?


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## dgee (Sep 26, 2013)

Well, just enjoy it first - he's written some great music alongside some less great music which is what happens with highly prolific composers. Classification wise I understand Rihm was thought of as a main figure of "the new simplicity" in the 70s/80s following Stockhausen's change in direction - look it up, it's an interesting phenom and if you've listened to a bit of Rihm it should fit (although it's certainly not a complete or neat explanation and you probably couldn't describe his work literally as "simplicity"!)


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Herrenvolk said:


> *Rihm* is conservative? Since when? Who's out there and extreme then?


Well I mentioned Helmut Lachenman, and, uh, Brian Ferneyhough and Michael Finnissy I guess?


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

dgee said:


> Well, just enjoy it first - he's written some great music alongside some less great music which is what happens with highly prolific composers.


So which are the great pieces?


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Hildadam Bingor said:


> Uh... definitely not great, not extreme enough to be bad (like, mediocre 900 ton late romantic symphonic music is BAD, but Rihm's just ignorable - I mean, probably not ignorable if don't listen to modern music, but if you're used to the hairy stuff...), probably he worked hard enough on it that we should at least call it "good" but not really my thing (if I'm going to listen to freaky modern German music I'd rather get it uncut from Stockhausen and Lachenmann, if I'm going to listen to New Simplicity I'd rather get _that_ uncut from von Schweinitz - it would be different if Rihm were somehow SYNTHESIZING instead of doing a little bit of this and then a little bit of that and none of it ever sounds new, but As Far As I Can Tell he ISN'T)...
> 
> ...sorry, thought that was self explanantory.


Was Handel ever new? Yet he was/is thought of as great.

And yes, your feelings on Rihm were rather clear, since your critique was rather clearly not much more than knee-jerk rationalisation. For example, your claim that there can't be interesting thematic material without a unique style, that there can't be a great melody without it having some great composer's fingerprint on it, seems like such obvious nonsense that you must not have spent a lot of time thinking about why you ACTUALLY dislike Rihm.

Now that you did respond in more depth, my guess is you dislike his music because it doesn't do what your fairly biased - and fairly arbirtrary - needs would have it do. Or something.


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Was Handel ever new?


Uh yeeeeeees. How is that even a question? Who sounded like Handel before Handel? Like, the Corelli influence is obvious, but Handel can AFFORD that because he's also obviously gone beyond the influence - Corelli never sounds MASSIVE like Handel often does, even when he's just writing for keyboard.



Chordalrock said:


> For example, your claim that there can't be interesting thematic material without a unique style, that there can't be a great melody without it having some great composer's fingerprint on it, seems like such obvious nonsense that you must not have spent a lot of time thinking about why you ACTUALLY dislike Rihm.


But, uh, none of that had anything to do with Rihm...



Chordalrock said:


> Now that you did respond in more depth, my guess is you dislike his music because it doesn't do what your fairly biased - and fairly arbirtrary - needs would have it do. Or something.


Uh, no, what I'm saying is the opposite of biased and arbitrary. I'm saying Rihm can do whatever, but it has to be SOMETHING that I can't just as well get somewhere else. That's the broadest possible criterion. Otherwise you're just saying anybody who writes music is great.

And I don't dislike Rihm. I just don't see much there. Like, maybe if I lived in Germany where they actually program him pretty often, I might get to dislike him, but in the US that's not a problem.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Hildadam Bingor said:


> I'm saying Rihm can do whatever, but it has to be SOMETHING that I can't just as well get somewhere else.


Too much of a good thing?

Also, your idea of what constitutes that SOMETHING and whether Rihm is that SOMETHING seems to differ from that of some other people. Is there a reason why a person should listen to you on this topic rather than those other people?

Mind you, I wouldn't mind your critique if it weren't seemingly based on such weak philosophy. Like, why would you even care if he doesn't achieve a unique style? I don't think you'll run into the risk of confusing actual works of his for any other actual works that exist.

Now Haydn symphonies, that's too much of a good thing right there, though I wonder if your critical approach to music has the consistency required for agreeing with me on Haydn: what I'm saying is that it shouldn't matter whether a piece of music resembles too much that of another by the same composer OR that of another by a different composer.


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Like, why would you even care if he doesn't achieve a unique style?


If he's not unique, why should I care about HIM?



Chordalrock said:


> I don't think you'll run into the risk of confusing actual works of his for any other actual works that exist.


Well maybe I'm not gonna confuse Louis Spohr with anybody else either, but he's still less original than Schubert.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Hildadam Bingor said:


> If he's not unique, why should I care about HIM?


I was trying to distinguish between unique works and a unique style. You still don't seem to appreciate that what constitutes a style is relatively insignificant compared with what constitutes actual musical material, actual melodies, actual counterpoint, etc.

So to answer your question: you should care because some of his works are good enough and unique enough, regardless of whether there's anything at all unique about his style or whether any style(s) can be identified at all.



Hildadam Bingor said:


> Well maybe I'm not gonna confuse Louis Spohr with anybody else either, but he's still less original than Schubert.


Well, I find Schubert's style rather laughable, but he sometimes has splendid themes and splendid music, and that's what counts.


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> You still don't seem to appreciate that what constitutes a style is relatively insignificant compared with what constitutes actual musical material, actual melodies, actual counterpoint, etc.


But what constitutes actual musical material, actual melodies, actual counterpoint, etc. IS what constitutes a style.



Chordalrock said:


> So to answer your question: you should care because some of his works are good enough and unique enough, regardless of whether there's anything at all unique about his style or whether any style(s) can be identified at all.


If his works are unique, then he has a unique style. I don't find his works all that unique.



Chordalrock said:


> Well, I find Schubert's style rather laughable, but he sometimes has splendid themes and splendid music, and that's what counts.


What counts is whatever the composer does that's unique (if the composer does anything that's unique). If Schubert has splendid themes then he has a splendid thematic style. If he has splendid music then he has a splendid musical style.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Hildadam Bingor said:


> But what constitutes actual musical material, actual melodies, actual counterpoint, etc. IS what constitutes a style.


When you distinguish a Mozart piece from a Haydn piece, there's not all that much that does constitute style. They both compose tonal music - this is not style, but shared practice. They both use the sonata form the most prominently - not style, but shared practice. The texture is about as thick in both, there is counterpoint, but it's not exactly polyphonic music - again not style, but a shared practice of music of the Viennese classical period. Their melodies tend to last about the same time - not style, but shared practice of the era.

When we get down to what actually distinguishes a Mozart piece from a Haydn piece, we will mostly notice different thematic material, different melodies, and so on. We will have to do very careful analysis to be able to say what, if anything, distinguishes those works stylistically.



Hildadam Bingor said:


> If his works are unique, then he has a unique style.


What usually makes a work of music unique is that it uses material that no other work of music uses and material that sounds somehow (very) distinct. Musical material can be more or less distinct sounding, i.e. more or less unique. Some little features of that material may betray the existence of style, but such features are rarely prominent and never paramount.



Hildadam Bingor said:


> If Schubert has splendid themes then he has a splendid thematic style. If he has splendid music then he has a splendid musical style.


If that were true, then ALL of Schubert would be splendid, but it's not. As I clearly said, I think that only SOME of his music is splendid. Now how could that be if it's his style that is splendid and his style that makes the music splendid? See, that sort of reasoning, or lack of reasoning, is why I think your position is philosophically weak.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

dgee said:


> Well, just enjoy it first - he's written some great music alongside some less great music which is what happens with highly prolific composers. Classification wise I understand Rihm was thought of as a main figure of "the new simplicity" in the 70s/80s following Stockhausen's change in direction - look it up, it's an interesting phenom and if you've listened to a bit of Rihm it should fit (although it's certainly not a complete or neat explanation and you probably couldn't describe his work literally as "simplicity"!)


I'm not anywhere near being familiar with a large swath of his work, but I would never describe what I've listened to as being in the simplicity catergory. A lot of his stuff is complex, and I'd describe him as a maximalist.

Rihm obviously has a lot of influences that he's absorbed and regurgitated in his various pieces, and his extreme intelligence and musical skill allowed for this at a very young age. But I agree with your initial statement. Just listen and enjoy what sounds good at first. And I like the fact that Rihm favors a certain amount of lyricism and melody in his music, so it's not all hardcore edgy, dark, screetchy, and relentlessly abstract.

As for some of my favorite works, I like the Anne-Sophie Mutter CD that features his piece for violin and orchestra, Lichtes Spiel (it's highly lyrical and romantic) as well as another Rihm work, and some music by Penderecki, and Sebastian Currier's Time Machine. And there's a couple of Hanssler CDs that feature his early, short symphonies, and Nachtwach, and another one with his music for oboe and orchestra. And I really like the 3rd string quartet on the Minguet Quartet's Rihm volume one Col Legno release. You can also find this work on an Arditti Quartet CD that features 5 & 8 as well.

I suppose a certain amount of experienced avant garde music listeners will dismiss Rihm as derivative and unimportant, but I think others may find something to enjoy. He's definitely got a large and varied body of work to explore.


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> When you distinguish a Mozart piece from a Haydn piece, there's not all that much that does constitute style.


That's not so. Mozart symmetrically balances his phrases, Haydn doesn't care, Mozart is more chromatic, Haydn is full of seemingly technically naive visceral effects and humor like false endings and fart jokes (you can say something like the statue's chords from Don Giovanni have a visceral effect, but it doesn't seem naive) - zooming out: Haydn sounds like a country boy master craftsman, Mozart sounds like a city boy with a taste for esoteric harmony - they even come from different places: Haydn is CPE Bach made less spastic, Mozart is JC Bach made less bland (now Charles Rosen's estate is gonna sue me).



Chordalrock said:


> What usually makes a work of music unique is that it uses material that no other work of music uses and material that sounds somehow (very) distinct.


That's obviously not so, because a lot of great music is made out of generic material (something like Haydn making a movement out of half a descending scale), and a lot of great music is made out of material stolen from less great music (Handel and Telemann, Wagner and Mendelssohn).



Chordalrock said:


> If that were true, then ALL of Schubert would be splendid, but it's not. As I clearly said, I think that only SOME of his music is splendid. Now how could that be if it's his style that is splendid and his style that makes the music splendid? See, that sort of reasoning, or lack of reasoning, is why I think your position is philosophically weak.


It's like you think a style is something that floats around in the air independent of actual pieces of music. If Schubert only wrote mediocre music, he wouldn't have much of a style. But he wrote some great music, which is in a great style.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Hildadam Bingor said:


> That's not so. Mozart symmetrically balances his phrases, Haydn doesn't care,


And actual analysis shows that it's often the other way around.



Hildadam Bingor said:


> Mozart is more chromatic,


Maybe if you look at his whole ouvre and do a generalisation based on that. But if you take a piece of his that isn't particularly chromatic and compare it with a piece of Haydn that isn't particularly chromatic, then we obviously have a different story than the one you're trying to sell.



Hildadam Bingor said:


> Haydn is full of seemingly technically naive visceral effects and humor like false endings and fart jokes (you can say something like the statue's chords from Don Giovanni have a visceral effect, but it doesn't seem naive) - zooming out: Haydn sounds like a country boy master craftsman, Mozart sounds like a city boy with a taste for esoteric harmony - they even come from different places: Haydn is CPE Bach made less spastic, Mozart is JC Bach made less bland (now Charles Rosen's estate is gonna sue me).


And did you notice all of these differences you've mentioned are rather trivial? They're not something to base greatness or uniqueness on.

Of course, you could do like Brendel and say that nobody used chromaticism as brilliantly as Mozart except for Wagner. Then you'd be making a point. But that's no longer a question of style, it's a question of skill and imagination and very high personal standards.



Hildadam Bingor said:


> It's like you think a style is something that floats around in the air independent of actual pieces of music


No, I just think it's incidental to actual pieces of music. Nobody listens to a style - most people don't even know in what manner different composers differ in terms of style. They listen to melodies, harmonies, counterpoint, harmonic progression, and rhythm. They probably don't even have any coherent and sensible idea of what style should mean.


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

[Double post sorry!!]


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> And actual analysis shows that it's often the other way around.


Uhhhh where?



Chordalrock said:


> And did you notice all of these differences you've mentioned are rather trivial?


No because they're not.



Chordalrock said:


> They're not something to base greatness or uniqueness on.


No, they're a quick description of the characteristics of the two kinds of greatness.



Chordalrock said:


> Of course, you could do like Brendel and say that nobody used chromaticism as brilliantly as Mozart except for Wagner. Then you'd be making a point. But that's no longer a question of style, it's a question of skill and imagination and very high personal standards.


A question of style is a question of skill and imagination. A style is its realizations.



Chordalrock said:


> ONo, I just think it's incidental to actual pieces of music. Nobody listens to a style - most people don't even know in what manner different composers differ in terms of style. They listen to melodies, harmonies, counterpoint, harmonic progression, and rhythm.


Melodies, harmonies, counterpoint, harmonic progression, and rhythm are part of what makes a style.


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## Chordalrock (Jan 21, 2014)

Too much work to look for examples re phrase symmetry, so I'll concede the point for now. If you're saying that Mozart never breaks his symmetries, then that would indeed be a rather significant stylistic limitation that he's imposed on himself. It's not as significant as you seem to think though: by adding some suitable little bridges, you could adapt Mozart's passages into Haydn's style and the other way around, so far as phrase symmetry (or lack of) goes. So again, I stick to my belief that these stylistic features are immaterial when it comes to evaluating the greatness or uniqueness of the music.

Regarding the rest of your message, you seem to think that pretty much everything is style, so naturally you would think that converse applies, i.e. that style is everything. I'm not terribly interested in arguing over pure semantics, so we'll have to agree to disagree.


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## Xenakiboy (May 8, 2016)

I classify Rihm as a rollercoaster of music, situated on a large mountain. I haven't heard everything he's written but what I have heard, such as some of the symphonies and chamber music, I have liked quite a bit. Though I can't make much of a judgement because I've discovered him at the same time as a heck of a lot of other composers, so I need more time for Rihm!


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Chordalrock said:


> Regarding the rest of your message, you seem to think that pretty much everything is style...


Not pretty much. Everything. Consider how everything works together (or doesn't) and that's the style (or lack of style).



Chordalrock said:


> ...so naturally you would think that converse applies, i.e. that style is everything.


Well probably not what you mean by "style" - which is, what, sonata form?


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## Hildadam Bingor (May 7, 2016)

Like, you can't say Rihm doesn't send me because I only care about what YOU call style, because that's not what I call style.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

violadude said:


> What does that mean?


His music has much minimalism traits, and minimalism has been around for a while now. I think his music also shows much other influence from the first 1/2 of the 20th century. I am not an expert on his music, just based on some parts of what I have listened.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

ArtMusic said:


> His music has much minimalism traits, and minimalism has been around for a while now. *I think his music also shows much other influence from the first 1/2 of the 20th century.* I am not an expert on his music, just based on some parts of what I have listened.


I agree with this part of the sentence, his music shows some influence from the 2nd Viennese School. But I've never heard minimalism in his music. Can you point me to an example?


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