# Why do people dislike Stravinsky?



## SamBryant

Personally, he's one of my favorite composers. It seems that while classical music fans enjoy some of the expressive dimensions of music (happy/sad, subdued/intense), a lot of them do not like when composers play with the order/chaotic dichotomy. An an example of what I mean, Mozart is representative of the order side and the Rite of Spring is an example of a piece that leans towards the chaotic side. Though maybe chaotic isn't the best word...
I like Mozart but sometimes I find him to be too restrained and stuffy. At other times I love that about him. People don't give enough respect to the destructive chaotic power of music. To me there is something sublime about the primal chaos of Rite of Spring, or even Firebird.


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## BurningDesire

I don't dislike him at all as a composer  he's one of my favorite composers. I do however think he said many really stupid things, but thats the case with most people isn't it?


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## Art Rock

I thought in general he was very well respected, also here on TC. Except for the minority who thinks classical music ended with Brahms of course.


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## SamBryant

Well I wouldn't say that anti-modernists are not open minded. Many of them see where the modernists are coming from, and understand it to a degree, but they just don't like it. I personally like schoenberg (sometimes), but if you are not the type of person who likes feeling unsettled, then you probably don't. The anti-modernists view has elements of not being open-minded, but I think it is more about personal taste


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## SamBryant

Also the reason I asked was I was browsing the Worst composers thread http://www.talkclassical.com/249-who-do-you-consider.html, and it seemed like a lot of people were saying Stravinsky. It's a relief that this isn't the majority opinion otherwise I'm not sure I really have a place here.


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## Mahlerian

BurningDesire said:


> I don't dislike him at all as a composer  he's one of my favorite composers. I do however think he said many really stupid things, but thats the case with most people isn't it?


Most people don't get their stupidities published, though.

Anyway, he's one of my favorites as well. Always wrote to a very high standard; I could listen to a different Stravinsky piece every day for a month or more and enjoy his multifaceted talents.


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## Huilunsoittaja

When I get the time to, I will answer this question thoroughly, and with musical and historical evidence.

*tags thread*

As of now, I don't have time. :lol: I'll be away from talkclassical for few days.


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## Guest

"Can't we all just get along?" - Rodney King

I love Mozart AND Stravinsky. I love EVERYbody! God is Love. We are God's art. We create music in unconcsious imitation of God's creation. So stop arguing and ENJOY!


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## Crudblud

Jerome said:


> I love Mozart AND Stravinsky. I love EVERYbody! God is Love. We are God's art. We create music in unconcsious imitation of God's creation. So stop arguing and ENJOY!


And now we're going to start arguing about whether or not God exists.


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## arpeggio

*Here We Go Again*

There are some people who believe that anyone who dislikes modern music is a close minded reactionary.

There are also some people who believe that classical music died with Brahms.

Most rational people, including Art Rock, do not believe in such nonsense.


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## Tristan

SamBryant said:


> Well I wouldn't say that anti-modernists are not open minded. Many of them see where the modernists are coming from and understand it to a degree but they just don't like it. I personally like schoenberg (sometimes), but if you are not the type of person who likes feeling unsettled, then you probably don't. It has elements of not being open-minded but I think it is more just personal taste


This. I don't really like most post-1950 classical music, aside from a few exceptions. I don't care for most of the avant garde composers, unless you count Stravinsky. But I'm not closed-minded because I've listened to it and given it a chance; it's just not my thing.


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## arpeggio

I actually try to avoid "Who do you think the worst composer in the world" threads.

For one reason do you guys really care who I think is the worlds worst composer. As a matter of fact none of you have heard of him. I even can not remember who he is. I played one of his symphonies thirty years ago and his name has been lost in the recesses of my mind, what's left of it. Ah the one thing nice about Alzheimer's desease, every day you make new friends.

By the way who am I and what am I doing here?


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## ArtMusic

SamBryant said:


> Personally, he's one of my favorite composers. It seems that while classical music fans enjoy some of the expressive dimensions of music (happy/sad, subdued/intense), a lot of them do not like when composers play with the order/chaotic dichotomy. An an example of what I mean, Mozart is representative of the order side and the Rite of Spring is an example of a piece that leans towards the chaotic side. Though maybe chaotic isn't the best word...
> I like Mozart but sometimes I find him to be too restrained and stuffy. At other times I love that about him. People don't give enough respect to the destructive chaotic power of music. To me there is something sublime about the primal chaos of Rite of Spring, or even Firebird.


Not hated as much as John Cage.


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## Mahlerian

Adorno disliked Stravinsky's music because he considered it aesthetically false. To Adorno, Stravinsky's compositions were all play and affectation, refusing to give heed to the realities of life. For him, Schoenberg was the ideal of true, honest art.

On the other hand, Schoenberg himself loved Petrushka, although, like Boulez and Messiaen, he thought little of Stravinsky's Neoclassical works (he called Oedipus Rex "strange music and strange theater"). 

Shostakovich admired Stravinsky tremendously as a composer, although he was horribly mistreated by the elder composer the one time they met.

On that note, negative anecdotes regarding Stravinsky the man are not hard to find. By all accounts he was elitist, haughty, and could be quite insufferable. As a person, I certainly do not approve of Igor Stravinsky. As a composer, I approve of him wholeheartedly.


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## moody

Crudblud said:


> And now we're going to start arguing about whether or not God exists.


Oh I certainly hope not .

I have heard no anti-Stravinsky sentiments in general I must say.


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## arpeggio

"The whole world is festering with unhappy souls.
The French hate the Germans.
The Germans hate the Poles.
Italians hate Yugoslavs.
South Africans hate the Dutch and I don't like anybody very much!"

(Sheldon Harnick)


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## KenOC

Mahlerian said:


> Shostakovich admired Stravinsky tremendously as a composer, although he was horribly mistreated by the elder composer the one time they met.... By all accounts he was elitist, haughty, and could be quite insufferable.


Shostakovich wrote about Stravinky's first visit back to the Soviet Union, where he had often been ridiculed as a "lackey" of imperialism or capitalism or whatever. A Party functionary offered to shake hands and Stravinsky offered instead the head of his cane. "Thus proving," says Shostakovich, "who was really the lackey." [this is from memory...]

BTW I have tried to find some detail about Stravinsky's mistreatment of Shostakovich but have found nothing beyond the assertions that it occurred. Do you have any knowledge of this?


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## Xaltotun

I'll make this world a better place and de-derail this thread back to the topic!

I'm someone who doesn't like Stravinsky that much. I don't hate his music, actually I like it to a degree, and I can admire it in a cognitive way, but I can't get very enthusiastic about it. It's the same thing as with the impressionists; there's no Genius Artist there, there's no Romantic Hero, not even an Enlightenment Hero like Napoleon. There's not even God there, like in older music. There's no metaphysics, no invisible world of God/Virtue/Love/Progress to be found there. And there's not even a sorrow for the lack/non-existence of those things. Dare I say it - yes - there's no Beethoven there - Beethoven as in a sense of human agency, mind over matter, the will to triumph over obstacles.

That's why I'm not that crazy about Stravinsky. But I'm perfectly fine to hear him every once in a while.


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## Bone

If only for his 3 early ballets he would be considered one of the most important composers in the 20th century. Throw in his symphonies, chamber music, and successful experiments with just about every compositional method out there and I can't imagine anyone failing to give Igor proper respect.


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## Mahlerian

Xaltotun said:


> There's not even God there, like in older music. There's no metaphysics, no invisible world of God/Virtue/Love/Progress to be found there.


I disagree with all of your assertions here, but this one is particularly bizarre. Have you heard any of Stravinsky's choral/religious music? Granted, Stravinsky tended to set his texts in unorthodox ways, but he was certainly sincere about it.

Symphony of Psalms
Mass
Threni
Requiem Canticles



> Dare I say it - yes - there's no Beethoven there - Beethoven as in a sense of human agency, mind over matter, the will to triumph over obstacles.


Well, your problem with Stravinsky, it seems, is that he did not have a Romantic sensibility. It's true, he didn't, and in many ways his music, like that of the Impressionists and the other Neoclassical composers, is anti-Romantic in its tendencies. This is why he preferred the cooler Webern over the more hot-blooded Schoenberg and Berg, although he admired them.



KenOC said:


> I have tried to find some detail about Stravinsky's mistreatment of Shostakovich but have found nothing beyond the assertions that it occurred. Do you have any knowledge of this?


There's something about it in Fay's biography, but I forget the details. I read it years ago.


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## SamBryant

About John Cage:
If Stravinsky (circa rite of spring) is a move in the chaotic primal direction, then John Cage is a move in the abstract direction, generalizing the idea of music to sound, in any form. A consequence of making things more abstract is that it is harder for them to be expressive. How could a piece only fit into the bare bones definition of music and still be a powerful expressive work? At this least this is my take on it. Not that John Cage pieces can't be powerful. They just hit you in the head rather than in the soul.


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## SamBryant

Xaltotun, I see your point. I guess what you dislike about Stravinsky is why I like him. I also love impressionistic music specifically because of its ambiguity. One of my favorite pieces is Ravel's Trois Poemas par Mallarme. The ambiguity and emotional complexity of the piece allow you to listen to it a hundred times and have it be still shrouded in mystery. 

But back to the point, the idea of the Creative Hero can be a fallacy.
I admit that the image of the creative genius is romantic, but it obscures the truth. At the end of the day Mozart and Beethoven are humans just like the rest of us. I think enlightenment music like Beethoven's 9th symphony is a good example of what you are talking about. It embraces the idea of the brotherhood and triumphant potential of man, which is a beautiful image. But it is a false one. The enlightenment did not end with a virtuous utopia, but rather WWI & 2, arguably the bleakest moments in human history. 

Stravinsky, on the other hand, is willing to examine that part of humanity that Mozart tries to forget. His primitive animalistic nature. Yes it is true that God/Virture/Love/Progress is missing from the Rite of Spring. To me that is the point of it. It offers a more complete look at humanity. When we try to hide the uncomfortable parts of our psyche, we get locked into a repressive society that has no ability to cope with our true selves. In addition, at least to me, there is a grand artistic beauty to wild human animalism. 

You all might completely disagree with this, but I really like some of Stockhausen's work for this reason as well. I particular like the movement "Kommunion" from Aus den sieben tagen. It's rare that I am in the mood to listen to him, but when I am, it is wildly sublime. 

"I don't always listen to electronic serial music, but when I do, its wildy sublime" -had to do it


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## SamBryant

Tristan said:


> This. I don't really like most post-1950 classical music, aside from a few exceptions. I don't care for most of the avant garde composers, unless you count Stravinsky. But I'm not closed-minded because I've listened to it and given it a chance; it's just not my thing.


I think that was my point. You have given it a chance instead of just writing it off for being very different. It's personal taste. The states of mind conveyed by a lot of modern music are very extreme so they are harder to relate to at a comfortable personal level.


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## Weston

We have an all too simplistic tendency in these forums to dismiss people as not liking an entire genre or time period when in fact they only dislike a certain composer.

I don't appreciate Mozart as much as many others do, but I love Haydn, and Kraus, and Beethoven (who really is classical, sorry) and many others of that era.

In the same way, I have yet to hear a Schoenberg piece I enjoy. That doesn't mean I hate modern music. I think both Berg and Webern have written beautiful music. Yes, even some beautiful serial music. Just not Schoenberg.

But Stravinsky rises head and shoulders over all the above except Beethoven. His work is playful, joyous, dramatic, experimental, dark, beautiful, sometimes a _little_ dissonant, but not very often. What's not to like? And why lump him in with "modern" music when he is everything from neo-baroque to out there in some weird jazz rhythmic plane few others dare to venture? He seems timeless to me.


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## SamBryant

Weston said:


> In the same way, I have yet to hear a Schoenberg piece I enjoy. That doesn't mean I hate modern music. I think both Berg and Webern have written beautiful music. Yes, even some beautiful serial music. Just not Schoenberg.


Wow, I didn't think it was possible to like Berg and Webern but not schoenberg. Admittedly I haven't listened to either of them more than once or twice



Weston said:


> And why lump him in with "modern" music when he is everything from neo-baroque to out there in some weird jazz rhythmic plane few others dare to venture?


I would lump him in with modern music because I think that's one of the major hallmarks of modern music; the diversity of influences and styles. Think Ives or Gershwin.

I agree though. I don't think it's possible to say "I dislike modern music" and be fully telling the truth. Surely there is some modern composer you like. If not schoenberg than maybe shostakovich or reich.


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## Novelette

What always amazes me about Stravinsky, and I will only use the Sacre du Printemps as an example because it's probably his most well-known work, is this:

Can you imagine having these radical acoustic moments in mind and struggling to translate them into notation? I know the score well, and while I'm fairly good at musical dictation, I couldn't for the life of me put even a moment of that monument onto score. It is rather like conjuring a completely novel theory and having to invent radically the mathematic constructs to characterize it. Needless to say, it takes a very versatile genius to be able to compose such a compelling narration of primitivism. 

Like his music or not, I hope we can agree on that point, at least.

His personal quirks are only amusing and paint Stravinsky as a colorful person, in my reckoning.


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## violadude

Xaltotun said:


> I'm someone who doesn't like Stravinsky that much. I don't hate his music, actually I like it to a degree, and I can admire it in a cognitive way, but I can't get very enthusiastic about it. It's the same thing as with the impressionists; there's no Genius Artist there, there's no Romantic Hero, not even an Enlightenment Hero like Napoleon. There's not even God there, like in older music. There's no metaphysics, no invisible world of God/Virtue/Love/Progress to be found there. And there's not even a sorrow for the lack/non-existence of those things. Dare I say it - yes - there's no Beethoven there - Beethoven as in a sense of human agency, mind over matter, the will to triumph over obstacles.


Erm....what?


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## tdc

SamBryant said:


> Xaltotun, I see your point. I guess what you dislike about Stravinsky is why I like him. I also love impressionistic music specifically because of its ambiguity. One of my favorite pieces is Ravel's Trois Poemas par Mallarme. *The ambiguity and emotional complexity of the piece allow you to listen to it a hundred times and have it be still shrouded in mystery. *
> 
> But back to the point, the *idea* of the Creative Hero can be *a fallacy*.
> I admit that the image of the creative genius is romantic, but it obscures the truth. At the end of the day Mozart and Beethoven are humans just like the rest of us. I think enlightenment music like Beethoven's 9th symphony is a good example of what you are talking about. It embraces the idea of the brotherhood and triumphant potential of man, which is a beautiful *image*. But it is a* false* one. The enlightenment did not end with a virtuous utopia, but rather WWI & 2, arguably the bleakest moments in human history.


I agree with a lot of this, and for those reasons (unlike Xaltotun) I often find Romantic music sounds naive. The whole image of this type of virtue and heroism being false. I find impressionistic and neoclassical music generally sounds more classy and restrained. The genius is still there, but has no need to scream "hey! look at me, I'm a genius!". I know a lot of this comes down to personal biases but for these reasons impressionistic music generally comes across to me as more profound than Romantic music.


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## Xaltotun

Mahlerian said:


> I disagree with all of your assertions here, but this one is particularly bizarre. Have you heard any of Stravinsky's choral/religious music? Granted, Stravinsky tended to set his texts in unorthodox ways, but he was certainly sincere about it.
> 
> Symphony of Psalms
> Mass
> Threni
> Requiem Canticles
> 
> Well, your problem with Stravinsky, it seems, is that he did not have a Romantic sensibility. It's true, he didn't, and in many ways his music, like that of the Impressionists and the other Neoclassical composers, is anti-Romantic in its tendencies. This is why he preferred the cooler Webern over the more hot-blooded Schoenberg and Berg, although he admired them.
> 
> There's something about it in Fay's biography, but I forget the details. I read it years ago.


You're right in that I haven't heard his religious music, but maybe I worded my comments badly. Somehow, I still suspect, that even his religious music would not have that effect of "beyond-ness", that Romantic striving for "that other place that is not here", you know? It's seems to me that with Stravinsky and the impressionists, "what you see is what you get", and yes, God might be there, but... _there_, and not in a some place else, where you have to strive to get to.

I'm completely aware that my problem with Stravinsky is that he did not have a Romantic sensibility, and that was what he was aiming for, so there's no damage done towards anyone - this is my problem, not Stravinsky's. I even respect him for being so original and innovative, and bringing new methods and emotions to music. But he doesn't do the thing that gives me that certain feeling.


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## Xaltotun

SamBryant said:


> Xaltotun, I see your point. I guess what you dislike about Stravinsky is why I like him. I also love impressionistic music specifically because of its ambiguity. One of my favorite pieces is Ravel's Trois Poemas par Mallarme. The ambiguity and emotional complexity of the piece allow you to listen to it a hundred times and have it be still shrouded in mystery.
> 
> But back to the point, the idea of the Creative Hero can be a fallacy.
> I admit that the image of the creative genius is romantic, but it obscures the truth. At the end of the day Mozart and Beethoven are humans just like the rest of us. I think enlightenment music like Beethoven's 9th symphony is a good example of what you are talking about. It embraces the idea of the brotherhood and triumphant potential of man, which is a beautiful image. But it is a false one. The enlightenment did not end with a virtuous utopia, but rather WWI & 2, arguably the bleakest moments in human history.
> 
> Stravinsky, on the other hand, is willing to examine that part of humanity that Mozart tries to forget. His primitive animalistic nature. Yes it is true that God/Virture/Love/Progress is missing from the Rite of Spring. To me that is the point of it. It offers a more complete look at humanity. When we try to hide the uncomfortable parts of our psyche, we get locked into a repressive society that has no ability to cope with our true selves. In addition, at least to me, there is a grand artistic beauty to wild human animalism.
> 
> You all might completely disagree with this, but I really like some of Stockhausen's work for this reason as well. I particular like the movement "Kommunion" from Aus den sieben tagen. It's rare that I am in the mood to listen to him, but when I am, it is wildly sublime.
> 
> "I don't always listen to electronic serial music, but when I do, its wildy sublime" -had to do it


I totally get what you're saying, and I certainly know about all the valid criticisms that can be made to Romantic and Enlightenment thinking and utopias... but I still want those things in my music and my art in general


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## Xaltotun

tdc said:


> I agree with a lot of this, and for those reasons (unlike Xaltotun) I often find Romantic music sounds naive. The whole image of this type of virtue and heroism being false. I find impressionistic and neoclassical music generally sounds more classy and restrained. The genius is still there, but has no need to scream "hey! look at me, I'm a genius!". I know a lot of this comes down to personal biases but for these reasons impressionistic music generally comes across to me as more profound than Romantic music.


I like this comment as well, because I agree with you on where to put the fence, and why! I'm just on the opposite side... but I still like your fence


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## Xaltotun

violadude said:


> Erm....what?


Do you feel that I talk in too vague and non-musical concepts, or that I got it completely wrong about Stravinsky?


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## elgar's ghost

I can't see the problem with him. I like his works whatever the era. He initially flourished at that time when many younger composers had the option to either die complacently on the late-Romantic vine or have the gumption to create something more individual. Stravinsky moved on, and did it with style. Musically, the Rite of Spring may be no great shakes now, but it was a seismic shift at the time bearing in mind the double-whammy with the radical terpshichorean departure that Nizhinsky insisted on so as to create something new for the stage. There was relatively little controversy after that. Then Igor threw a curveball and de-constructed with his unique boiling down of the distant past. Many followed. Then we get to the even sparer textures of his later music but I would never consider them difficult or unapproachable - I haven't read any account saying he was trying to play catch-up with the Second Viennese School or any other 'modernists'. Stravinsky was his own man once he gave up using opus numbers - I have most of his works spanning a compositional timeframe of about 70 years and I can't bring to mind a single clunker. All this is old news, of course, but in my mind it still amounts to job done. Well done, Igor.


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## Mahlerian

elgars ghost said:


> I have most of his works spanning a compositional timespan of about 70 years and I can't bring to mind a single clunker.


The Cantata, perhaps? I like bits of that one too, though!



Xaltotun said:


> You're right in that I haven't heard his religious music, but maybe I worded my comments badly. Somehow, I still suspect, that even his religious music would not have that effect of "beyond-ness", that Romantic striving for "that other place that is not here", you know? It's seems to me that with Stravinsky and the impressionists, "what you see is what you get", and yes, God might be there, but... there, and not in a some place else, where you have to strive to get to.


Yes, he doesn't have that arch-Romantic aura of striving. But there's a lot more than simply surface-level polish (or roughness, in many cases) in Stravinsky's works, which do have significant depth.

If you haven't heard it, listen to the Symphony of Psalms. It is both relatively popular and generally considered a masterpiece.



Weston said:


> But Stravinsky rises head and shoulders over all the above except Beethoven. His work is playful, joyous, dramatic, experimental, dark, beautiful, sometimes a little dissonant, but not very often. What's not to like? And why lump him in with "modern" music when he is everything from neo-baroque to out there in some weird jazz rhythmic plane few others dare to venture? He seems timeless to me.


Stravinsky is, no doubt about it, a modernist. He took in every modern tendency of his era, and although none of them were his own invention (not primitivism, nor neoclassicism, nor serialism), he always made them his own and convinced others to follow. Also, don't underestimate how dissonant Stravinsky sounds to people who don't like Stravinsky. To some, there's little difference between him and Schoenberg. (To me, they both wrote wonderful music that I wouldn't be without!) His scores (in every period) are loaded with willfully clashing harmonies and unresolved dissonances.


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## GGluek

That's a silly quesion. It's difficult to get two classical music people to agree about anything.

Some people here dislike Stravinsky. Some dislike Schoenberg . . . Xenakis . . . Bruckner, Brahms, Mozart, Vivaldi . . . even Beethoven. No need to analyze it. People are different and have different tastes. So? You can go mad asking q


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## Xaltotun

Mahlerian said:


> Yes, he doesn't have that arch-Romantic aura of striving. But there's a lot more than simply surface-level polish (or roughness, in many cases) in Stravinsky's works, which do have significant depth.
> 
> If you haven't heard it, listen to the Symphony of Psalms. It is both relatively popular and generally considered a masterpiece.


Cool, seems we agree, then! Thanks for the tip, I've been listening to a lot of choral and religious music recently, will check this one out.


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## GGluek

That's a silly question. Classical music people can seldom agree about anything. Some dislike Stravinsky. Some Schoenberg. Some Xenakis . . . Bruckner . . . Brahms . . . Mozart . . . Vivaldi . . . von der Vogelweide . . . even Beethoven. Why try to analyze it? Tastes differ. Otherwise we'd all be the same and life would be exceedingly boring.

george


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## Xaltotun

GGluek said:


> That's a silly question. Classical music people can seldom agree about anything. Some dislike Stravinsky. Some Schoenberg. Some Xenakis . . . Bruckner . . . Brahms . . . Mozart . . . Vivaldi . . . von der Vogelweide . . . even Beethoven. Why try to analyze it? Tastes differ. Otherwise we'd all be the same and life would be exceedingly boring.
> 
> george


If we wouldn't analyze it, there'd be no TalkClassical forum  Seriously, I think I've already gained some great insights from this thread, both about my own preferences and those of others.


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## SamBryant

Xaltotun said:


> If we wouldn't analyze it, there'd be no TalkClassical forum  Seriously, I think I've already gained some great insights from this thread, both about my own preferences and those of others.


Yea I agree, your answers have been interesting. The reason I made this thread: I just joined today and looked at the worst composers thread (perhaps a mistake in retrospect). On the first page of the six people who gave answers, three of them put stravinsky in the top three worst composers. Since I really like Stravinsky, I was confused by the large amount of people agreeing that he is one of the _worst_ composers of all time. I mean, I understand that people have different opinions, but how could you honestly say he is one of the worst?

In hindsight they probably dislike him so much because of what rite of spring did for music. This is probably why Mahler haters are common as well.


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## Mahlerian

SamBryant said:


> In hindsight they probably dislike him so much because of what rite of spring did for music. This is probably why Mahler haters are common as well.


I don't think composers are generally disliked for their influence. I think they are disliked for what seems to a given person like undeserved prominence. Music histories of the WWI-WWII era 20th century generally point to Stravinsky, Schoenberg, and Bartok as the most significant composers, so it makes sense that they attract more attention, and not all attention is positive.

The period from 1880-1930 is just about my favorite in music, so I'm interested in all of the major developments of that time (and it's no coincidence that all of Mahler's symphonies fit into that period...).


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## SamBryant

Mahlerian said:


> I don't think composers are generally disliked for their influence. I think they are disliked for what seems to a given person like undeserved prominence. Music histories of the WWI-WWII era 20th century generally point to Stravinsky, Schoenberg, and Bartok as the most significant composers, so it makes sense that they attract more attention, and not all attention is positive.
> 
> The period from 1880-1930 is just about my favorite in music, so I'm interested in all of the major developments of that time (and it's no coincidence that all of Mahler's symphonies fit into that period...).


Yes but why are such composers given prominence? I would argue that it because of their influence. I think what I was trying to express is similar to what you are saying. If Stravinsky's rite of spring was unanimously viewed as a terrible composition and musical history veered back towards romanticism, then he may be the worst composer of all time, but no one would bother to post that.


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## PetrB

.....For the hoi-polloi, it seems that _L'Oiseau de feu_ and _Le Sacre du Printemps_ are the only Stravinsky works known [add maybe too, _Petrushka_].

_For many more, it is only Le Sacre which they have heard_. I'm afraid that some people decide they like or dislike Stravinsky based upon their familiarity with just one or two of those three early ballets. Many who generally do not care for 20th century music often cite 'Le Sacre' as 'THE "atonal" piece where they think "music went all wrong."' 

To say you like / dislike a composer based upon a familiarity with one or two pieces from early in that composer's career -- yet lack any real familiarity with the composer's later body of works -- 'credits' any opinion of that composer based on so little as 'not important.' Demonstrate a bit more familiarity with many more Stravinsky works (not those first three early career ballets) then an opinion comes from more than a superficial glance at the composer and his works.

Stravinsky is held in high enough esteem within the musical community that whether any one likes or dislikes Stravinsky is more of a matter of personal taste. The composer and his music have a very solid place in music history: 
Stravinsky is often tagged as "The Bach of the 20th century."


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## PetrB

SamBryant said:


> Yes but why are such composers given prominence? I would argue that it because of their influence. I think what I was trying to express is similar to what you are saying. *If* Stravinsky's rite of spring was unanimously viewed as a terrible composition and musical history veered back towards romanticism, then he may be the worst composer of all time, but no one would bother to post that.


Composers are 'given' prominence because their presence and the strength of their music were, historically, dominant... an irreversible historic fact.

Ergo your *'if' * postulation is in the realms of sci-fi, not reality.


----------



## PetrB

SamBryant said:


> Yea I agree, your answers have been interesting. The reason I made this thread: I just joined today and looked at the worst composers thread (perhaps a mistake in retrospect). On the first page of the six people who gave answers, three of them put stravinsky in the top three worst composers. Since I really like Stravinsky, I was confused by the large amount of people agreeing that he is one of the _worst_ composers of all time. I mean, I understand that people have different opinions, but how could you honestly say he is one of the worst?
> 
> In hindsight they probably dislike him so much because of what rite of spring did for music. This is probably why Mahler haters are common as well.


One more great reason to pretty much ignore all lists resulting from polls...


----------



## SamBryant

PetrB said:


> Composers are 'given' prominence because their presence and the strength of their music were, historically, dominant... an irreversible historic fact.
> 
> Ergo your *'if' * postulation is in the realms of sci-fi, not reality.


Yeah I thought of that conundrum as I was writing it but I was too lazy to reword what I was trying to say


----------



## violadude

Xaltotun said:


> Do you feel that I talk in too vague and non-musical concepts, or that I got it completely wrong about Stravinsky?


I just don't quite understand what you mean about not finding god or metaphysics in music is all.


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## Turangalîla

I never used to like Stravinsky all that much. I mean, he was a great composer, but he never really stood out to me among all the great composers.

Then I read something about Messiaen. He once singled out Monteverdi, Mozart, Chopin, Wagner, Mussorgsky, and Stravinsky for having written the music that was the most "strongly-coloured" (according to his synaesthesia). He also greatly admired Stravinsky for his creative use of rhythm. Now every time I listen to Stravinsky, I cannot get this idea of "colour" out of my head, and I don't know what it is, but I seem to enjoy his music a lot more.


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## millionrainbows

Why do people dislike Stravinsky?

Because he was an ugly little hunchback.


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## OboeKnight

I liked him right away the first time I heard him. It was probably either RoS or Firebird. I like the abstract quality and versatility of his music. Entertaining. Also love how he does double solos with bass clarinet and e flat clarinet often. That particular sound really appeals to me for some reason :lol:


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## ptr

I did not know that anyone disliked Igor, that is totally unjust and show a giant lack compassion!

/ptr


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese

Do I even need to say anything about Stravinsky, can you take a guess on that one........


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## StlukesguildOhio

In seems to me that Mozart is far more underestimated at TC than Stravinsky. Indeed... I can't really recall any anti-Stravinsky posts. Personally, there are Modern composers that I prefer to Stravinsky... but I quite admire any number of his works: Le Sacre du printemps, The Firebird, Petrushka, Symphony of Psalms, Symphony in 3 Movements, Les Noces, The Soldier's Tale, Le Rossignol, the Violin Concerto. Other works such as Persephone, Agon, Jeu de cartes, ApolloI have yet to have found really click with me... although I don't dislike them.


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## millionrainbows

It's hard to describe the animated meaning in Stravinsky's music. It's like the music is alive with his soul and thought processes, and is full of meaning which penetrates to the very center of your psyche. The only other analogy I can think of which affected me so strongly was the first time I heard Jimi Hendrix play; these were not just riffs or ideas, but he had somehow made the guitar a direct extension of his imagination and will. That's like Stravinsky is; a force of nature, alive and like a living being.


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## Guest

Crudblud said:


> And now we're going to start arguing about whether or not God exists.


Nah, no need to argue. He doesn't.



Jerome said:


> "Can't we all just get along?" - Rodney King
> 
> I love Mozart AND Stravinsky. I love EVERYbody! God is Love. We are God's art. We create music in unconcsious imitation of God's creation. So stop arguing and ENJOY!


Whether God has anything to do with the creation of music or not, we can hardly not debate (not 'argue') our tastes if we are to understand each other better.



Xaltotun said:


> there's no Genius Artist there, there's no Romantic Hero, not even an Enlightenment Hero like Napoleon. There's not even God there, like in older music. There's no metaphysics, no invisible world of God/Virtue/Love/Progress to be found there. And there's not even a sorrow for the lack/non-existence of those things. Dare I say it - yes - there's no Beethoven there - Beethoven as in a sense of human agency, mind over matter, the will to triumph over obstacles.


On the other hand, some people's opinions are so far away from mine, understanding is going to take a lot of hard work!



GGluek said:


> Why try to analyze it? Tastes differ.


Why try? Precisely _because _tastes differ.


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## ptr

MacLeod said:


> Nah, no need to argue. He doesn't.


I would say its more interesting to discuss the gender of God, if there is one, I'd be thoroughly disappointed if it is a bloke, they are so fantastically un-inventive that there is no way a He could have the kind of imagination that it would take to create all of this!  ... I'm all for God the hot chick!!

/ptr


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## JAS

moody said:


> I have heard no anti-Stravinsky sentiments in general I must say.


Okay, I'll bite. With the exception of Fire-Bird and a few other early pieces, I find Stravinsky's music unlistenable. It isn't that I have not tried . . . I have. I have even made a point of seeking out specific recordings that were praised by people who do like Stravinsky, not wishing to judge his music based on inferior performance. Dislike is perhaps too strong a term, but I simply don't "get" most of his music. It does nothing for me, and says nothing to me. Some of it is actively unpleasant for me. None of that adds up to liking the music.

In a broader sense, I see Stravinsky as part of the movement(s) that essentially killed classical music (much as I think Picasso killed art). What begins to come out afterwards is mostly self-conscious, self-indulgent pretense. It exists chiefly to be something other than what has come before. It descends into academic theory with no palpable application.

My question is why there are people who like Stravinsky's music, specifically the more "modern" pieces.


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## Guest

JAS said:


> My question is why there are people who like Stravinsky's music, specifically the more "modern" pieces.


I know...it's a complete mystery that we don't all share your opinion...


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## moody

MacLeod said:


> Nah, no need to argue. He doesn't.
> 
> Whether God has anything to do with the creation of music or not, we can hardly not debate (not 'argue') our tastes if we are to understand each other better.
> 
> On the other hand, some people's opinions are so far away from mine, understanding is going to take a lot of hard work!
> 
> Why try? Precisely _because _tastes differ.


Glad you're back and in good form.


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## moody

JAS said:


> Okay, I'll bite. With the exception of Fire-Bird and a few other early pieces, I find Stravinsky's music unlistenable. It isn't that I have not tried . . . I have. I have even made a point of seeking out specific recordings that were praised by people who do like Stravinsky, not wishing to judge his music based on inferior performance. Dislike is perhaps too strong a term, but I simply don't "get" most of his music. It does nothing for me, and says nothing to me. Some of it is actively unpleasant for me. None of that adds up to liking the music.
> 
> In a broader sense, I see Stravinsky as part of the movement(s) that essentially killed classical music (much as I think Picasso killed art). What begins to come out afterwards is mostly self-conscious, self-indulgent pretense. It exists chiefly to be something other than what has come before. It descends into academic theory with no palpable application.
> 
> My question is why there are people who like Stravinsky's music, specifically the more "modern" pieces.


But there are,I'm sure,plenty of people who don't like his music---don't worry about it, chill out!
Listen to something that you do like e.g. Vivaldi who is a composer I can't stand,but will not spend nights fretting about.


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## deggial

SamBryant, thanks to the resurrection of your thread, I listened to Stravinsky for the better part of the day and I am happy to report I liked everything I heard (some more than the others, but all in all I have found Stravinsky very clever and exciting). Here's my stamp of approval :tiphat:


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## JAS

MacLeod said:


> I know...it's a complete mystery that we don't all share your opinion...


The theme of the thread was why do people dislike Stravinsky? (I interpreted that as meaning his music rather than him as a person, although I understand that he was not a particularly pleasant person.) It seems to me perfectly appropriate to respond by addressing that question, as I did.

My subsequent question was a legitimate inquiry. I really am mystified by what appeal his music might have (admittedly to a fairly small subset of the already small subset of people who like classical music). You apparently took it as a personal attack, even though I don't even know who you are so it could hardly have been addressed at you in any case. If you cannot answer the question, that's fine. But to suggest that my post was somehow an attempt to force everyone to share my opinion is ridiculous.


----------



## Crudblud

After some years of having "fallen out" with his music I now find _L'histoire du Soldat_ and the _Ebony Concerto_ in heavy rotation on my playlist. They contain such a wealth of energy, personality and playfulness, and the bountiful rhythmic complexities are presented in a way that is easy to read but by no means predictable. I've also been looking in to _Agon_ and _Symphonies of Wind Instruments_, though these are not yet doing the business for me.


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## KenOC

JAS said:


> I interpreted that as meaning his music rather than him as a person...


Well, I knew Stravisky as a kid and he was rotten even then. And he was always making obnoxious sounds with his armpits.

http://www.earbox.com/posts/102


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## arpeggio

*Classical Music Is Dead????*



JAS said:


> In a broader sense, I see Stravinsky as part of the movement(s) that essentially killed classical music (much as I think Picasso killed art). What begins to come out afterwards is mostly self-conscious, self-indulgent pretense. It exists chiefly to be something other than what has come before. It descends into academic theory with no palpable application.


Along with TC, there are many fine classical music forums on the Internet: Brightceclia, The Good Music Guide Classical Music Forum and Amazon to name a few.

There have been many threads here and there that have already addressed many of these issues. There are many who have successfully challenged the notion that classical music is dead and Johnson killed it. All one has to do is search the archives of these forums to find them.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese

^ If it was dead - there would be no sites like these.............. without someone pushing the boundaries it would be dead.


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## JAS

EddieRUKiddingVarese said:


> ^ If it was dead - there would be no sites like these.............. without someone pushing the boundaries it would be dead.


No, it is dead. You can push a corpse around all you like, but that doesn't make it alive. People talk about the Mayan civilization too, but that doesn't make it alive. Those of us who are still devoted to classical music are mostly just fooling ourselves. (Pushing boundaries has brought in zero, that's right, zero audience. In most cases, it has simply chased people away. In the US, they don't even teach music in schools anymore, and orchestras are dying left and right. My 30-year old nephew has never heard a Beethoven symphony, and doesn't want to. The audience of the last concert I attended was mostly little old blue-haired ladies, most of whom can't be holding on much longer.) Hardly anyone outside of a trivial number has any idea of the rich and vibrant legacy . . . they are too busy listening to Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga (which might mean that music itself is dead).

Of course, that doesn't mean that it cannot, a la Monty Python, get better. (Bring out yer dead . . . ding . . . bring out yer dead . . . ding . . . )


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## KenOC

JAS said:


> Of course, that doesn't meant that it cannot, a la Monty Python, get better.


It's not dead. Merely stunned.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese

Think I'll do a Mayan composition next.................. with Lady Gaga style vocals! Can't do Bieber, can't stoop that low.....


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## Huilunsoittaja

I guess I never got around to answering this thread, even though I wanted to. Now I don't feel like ranting, and I'll just speak in plain terms, no screaming.

Concession:
Stravinsky is an _excellent _composer and orchestrator. I intensely enjoy his Russian-inspired early period (the early opuses up to Firebird). I will _never _compensate on my love of those works for the sake of everything else I'm about to say in this thread:

My main qualms with Stravinsky:

1) His turning from his Russian roots in a vengeful way rather than a happy revolution. I don't really support hatred being the reason for revolution, I appreciate the composers that did things because they respected the past, and directly built on it. You could say he did that with Neo-Classicalism, but he certainly didn't do that with his more recent origins. Prokofiev was staunch opposite: he went rebel because it made him happy, and although it was a struggle at the beginning, he came to seriously appreciate his predecessors for most of his life, so even though he changed his musical language quite a bit, he remained Russian at heart. Stravinsky's identity was in his lack of it. If I want to enjoy Stravinsky's middle and late period music, I will have to enjoy him as a Cosmopolitan Impressionist, and not as Russian Composer.

2) The _unintelligent _stuff he said about composers and music. 
_"Why is it that whenever I hear a piece of music I don't like, it's always by Villa-Lobos?" _
_"My childhood was a period of waiting for the moment when I could send everyone and everything connected with it to hell" _ :scold:
I learned a new quote of him the other night, he supposedly said that "_[Music is] essentially powerless to express anything at all_" 
...and some other quotes that irritated me to see that others have posted on other threads. Is this a man of wisdom? Sounds more like a guy embittered by the world and who had the power go to his head to say such proud, pessimistic statements that he expected everyone to hang on. Also, his badmouthing Glazunov and going around Europe telling people to stop performing his music (he was successful at convincing most). Also a revenge scheme: "_It's one of nature's ways that we often feel closer to distant generations than to the generation immediately preceding us_ [implying Glazunov 100%]."  Glazunov went from his idol to the devil in the space of a few years. Never is revenge more sweet than it is in those circumstances, I guess...

3) The quotes go along with his mindset about music. I'm pretty sure we would NOT have gotten along. He seems to have despised the idea of imagery in music, and thought it was paltry for a musician to invent imagery or stories to go along with abstract music for help with meaning. He wanted his abstract to have no connection to images, stories, etc. Well, if that's so, what the point of ME listening to it, since I love _imagining_ things when I listen to music, and he obvious didn't design his later music for that purpose? Just saying...

I'm pretty sure that if I ever met Stravinsky, he would hate MY guts, almost as much as he hated Glazunov. And I would be just fine with that. An enemy of my friend is my enemy.


----------



## Guest

JAS said:


> The theme of the thread was why do people dislike Stravinsky? (I interpreted that as meaning his music rather than him as a person, although I understand that he was not a particularly pleasant person.) It seems to me perfectly appropriate to respond by addressing that question, as I did.
> 
> My subsequent question was a legitimate inquiry. I really am mystified by what appeal his music might have (admittedly to a fairly small subset of the already small subset of people who like classical music). You apparently took it as a personal attack, even though I don't even know who you are so it could hardly have been addressed at you in any case. If you cannot answer the question, that's fine. But to suggest that my post was somehow an attempt to force everyone to share my opinion is ridiculous.


Ridiculous? Well, it seems we've each read into the other's post, something that wasn't there, I guess. I didn't read you as 'forcing' your opinion on anyone else, (nor did I read it as a personal attack) but there did seem to be a note of incredulity that anyone could like anything by the composer, and I did read it as a rhetorical address to the assembled members of The Forum!

My mistake.

So, since you say you posed a genuine question (though the opposite of the OP) I'll answer instead of making assumptions. I like _Rite of Spring_ for its rhythms, tension, colour, dinosaurs, pacing, surprise, volcanoes, excitement, dynamics, climaxes. It makes my blood run more vigorously, gives an adrenalin rush.

In short, it is a pleasurable piece of music which, like many a classical standard, is popular enough (contrary to some opinion expressed here) to feature quite frequently at The Proms.

(I'm not interested in him as a person.)



moody said:


> Glad you're back and in good form.


Thanks Moody!


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## PetrB

Somewhere in this thread is yet another post on how all modern music is actually some desperately lacking globally successful ruse.

The only ruse, again repeated many times in other 'why like or dislike' formats, is the common one where people write off the era / composer with another pedant paragraph revealing the ruse, and that all music from _____ or before, or after ______ is the only music with "The Right Stuff."

Re: Stravinsky, so many hardly ever get past
A.) The Firebird
B1.) Petruschka
B2.) Petrushka and Firebird
C.) Rite of Spring
C2) Any one, two, or all of above.

.... so little to go on to say anything, really.


----------



## Guest

PetrB said:


> Re: Stravinsky, so many hardly ever get past
> A.) The Firebird
> B1.) Petruschka
> B2.) Petrushka and Firebird
> C.) Rite of Spring
> C2) Any one, two, or all of above.
> 
> .... so little to go on to say anything, really.


Careful PetrB...you might inadvertently be suggesting that if the only thing you've listened to by Stravinsky is _Rite of Spring_, you've got nothing to base an opinion on either way, pro or con!

Of course, in one way, that would be right. I'm not in a position to laud or condemn the entirety of Stravinsky's oeuvre on the basis of one piece, but that's OK - that wasn't what I was being asked, was it? I have listening habits similar to many: I'll tend to certain composers and not others without dismissing or embracing entire oeuvres.

A friend of mine at college asserted quite vigorously that I couldn't possibly be a fan of Genesis (the rock group, not the Book) because I didn't own all the albums. As sometimes happens at such a tender age, we debated long into the night...

I'll go so far as to say that I'm a fan of _Rite of Spring_, and to that extent, I can say, when asked, what I like about Stravinsky on that basis.


----------



## PetrB

JAS said:


> No, it is dead. You can push a corpse around all you like, but that doesn't make it alive. People talk about the Mayan civilization too, but that doesn't make it alive. Those of us who are still devoted to classical music are mostly just fooling ourselves. (Pushing boundaries has brought in zero, that's right, zero audience. In most cases, it has simply chased people away. In the US, they don't even teach music in schools anymore, and orchestras are dying left and right. My 30-year old nephew has never heard a Beethoven symphony, and doesn't want to. The audience of the last concert I attended was mostly little old blue-haired ladies, most of whom can't be holding on much longer.) Hardly anyone outside of a trivial number has any idea of the rich and vibrant legacy . . . they are too busy listening to Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga (which might mean that music itself is dead).
> 
> Of course, that doesn't mean that it cannot, a la Monty Python, get better. (Bring out yer dead . . . ding . . . bring out yer dead . . . ding . . . )


It is alive, and you are dead to it, that is o.k. Many people have one or more composers or eras for which that music 'does not do it for them.' It is a lack of interest or connection to the ethos of the era, a rather sentimental reason but why else, fundamentally, listen to music if not first for some sort of pleasure?

"Hardly anyone outside of a trivial number has any idea of the rich and vibrant legacy"
Classical music has always been a minority pursuit, about three percent of the population, from the earliest eras through to contemporaneously.

Meh, Modernist music may just not have what you want in general. It speaks to far many more than a tiny sub-sub circuit, _Does that mean you think Stravinsky somehow 'obsure?' -- LOL._

A handful of negative opinions from the populist quarter is not going to at all fray the combined bloc majority vote from the populists plus as well as the votes of the Cognoscenti that Stravinsky's music is as good as the music of the great composers of the past.

Stravinsky's entire output is so rich, varied, and littered with masterworks that he is in the historic position of being called "The Bach of the 20th Century." -- that is, unless you think that is a perpetrated grand scheme of a conspiracy / hoax


----------



## PetrB

MacLeod said:


> Careful PetrB...you might inadvertently be suggesting that if the only thing you've listened to by Stravinsky is _Rite of Spring_, you've got nothing to base an opinion on either way, pro or con!
> 
> Of course, in one way, that would be right. I'm not in a position to laud or condemn the entirety of Stravinsky's oeuvre on the basis of one piece, but that's OK - that wasn't what I was being asked, was it? I have listening habits similar to many: I'll tend to certain composers and not others without dismissing or embracing entire oeuvres.
> 
> A friend of mine at college asserted quite vigorously that I couldn't possibly be a fan of Genesis (the rock group, not the Book) because I didn't own all the albums. As sometimes happens at such a tender age, we debated long into the night...
> 
> I'll go so far as to say that I'm a fan of _Rite of Spring_, and to that extent, I can say, when asked, what I like about Stravinsky on that basis.


Nothing you've posted here caused a rumple of my grey matter  I'm afraid you already have a reputation for being clear and reasonable (rats!)
If it had been _your_ OP with _Le Sacre_ in mind, I'm sure it would have read, 
"Why do / don't people like Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring." 

Many of these sorts of 'don't like'_ are_ based on but one or a few works of a composer -- by way of mentioning was 'just checking....'


----------



## Guest

PetrB said:


> Nothing you've posted here caused a rumple of my grey matter  I'm afraid you already have a reputation for being clear and reasonable (rats!)
> If it had been _your_ OP with _Le Sacre_ in mind, I'm sure it would have read,
> "Why do / don't people like Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring."
> 
> Many of these sorts of 'don't like'_ are_ based on but one or a few works of a composer -- by way of mentioning was 'just checking....'


Why thank you, PetrB. I'll take your compliment as intended, though I'd be very happy to rumble your grey matter with my posts (and some might translate your 'clear' as being 'direct and at times combative' which doesn't endear me to them!)


----------



## millionrainbows

All of the critical rejections of Stravinsky have been non-specific and vague. We can only assume that the qualities which distinguish Stravinsky's music from more conservative CP tonal works are the alienating factors: more complex rhythms, juxtaposed tonal entities, use of tritones, unorthodox root movement, dissonance...and we must further assume that these critical listeners simply do not "get" the ideas presented. 

Therefore, we must conclude that the acuity to perceive Stravinsky's comparatively more abstruse harmonic meanings (meanings which shift constantly) is similar to the ability of "experts" who have learned (and have inherent propensities) to perceive other types of perceptual meanings, like seeing visual meaning in abstract art, the ability to draw, to dance, throw a football, a master chef's sense of smell/taste, and other areas.

What I'm saying is that you either hear it, or you don't. The people who can hear meaning in Stravinsky's music are the ones who like it, and have a natural visceral propensity; the ones who say that they "reject" it are more often than not unable to hear it, based mainly on an inherently lower visceral propensity.

What I'm saying is that "your ear" (visceral) is the stimulus that "draws you in" to more difficult music. This is a very natural ability, and some folks have it, while others don't. This translates (after the fact) into "preference." 

This preference is not "debatable" on a credible level by those who are unable to hear it on a visceral level, because this boils down to inherent ability, not will or conscious choice. It's like some people don't enjoy dancing because they can't do it well (comparatively).

So any assessment of the "worthiness" of Stravinsky's music will ultimately be a picture of the listener's inherent visceral abilities, and not Stravinsky's music itself.


----------



## ptr

millionrainbows said:


> All of the critical rejections of Stravinsky have been non-specific and vague. ---SNIP--- and not Stravinsky's music itself.


Very well said, thank You!

/ptr


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## Eschbeg

Quite fittingly, the notion that a true appraisal of Stravinsky's music must be rooted in the music itself rather than intangible things like metaphysics, invisible worlds of God, or love (to quote some examples from above) is a notion for which we have Stravinsky himself to thank. It's hard to overstate how influential that notion has been on the twentieth century, and you gotta hand it to Mr. Stravinsky: no one was better at dictating the terms of his own reception.


----------



## JAS

millionrainbows said:


> All of the critical rejections of Stravinsky have been non-specific and vague. We can only assume that the qualities which distinguish Stravinsky's music from more conservative CP tonal works are the alienating factors: more complex rhythms, juxtaposed tonal entities, use of tritones, unorthodox root movement, dissonance...and we must further assume that these critical listeners simply do not "get" the ideas presented.


Actually, I think your list could be condensed to one element: dissonance. That seems to me the great red line that divides the bulk of his compositions from works with more mainstream acceptance. I think that it is probably the deal breaker for me. A little salt can enhance the flavor of a meal, but a meal made mostly of salt is likely to be inedible.



millionrainbows said:


> Therefore, we must conclude that the acuity to perceive Stravinsky's comparatively more abstruse harmonic meanings (meanings which shift constantly) is similar to the ability of "experts" who have learned (and have inherent propensities) to perceive other types of perceptual meanings, like seeing visual meaning in abstract art, the ability to draw, to dance, throw a football, a master chef's sense of smell/taste, and other areas.


Well, now you are drifting uncomfortably close to saying that those who like Stravinsky's music are more sophisticated than us poor country dolts who don't.



millionrainbows said:


> This preference is not "debatable" on a credible level by those who are unable to hear it on a visceral level, because this boils down to inherent ability, not will or conscious choice. It's like some people don't enjoy dancing because they can't do it well (comparatively). So any assessment of the "worthiness" of Stravinsky's music will ultimately be a picture of the listener's inherent visceral abilities, and not Stravinsky's music itself.


Although I dismiss the implication of lesser "ability," I accept that one either responds to Stravinsky's music favorably and unfavorably, and perhaps that is unlikely to change for either side. Being squarely in the "unfavorable" camp, I think I am wasting my time trying to find some meaning in what strikes me merely as noise. I have 2000 years worth of music to listen to, and won't fritter away another moment on Stravinsky. That choice will not bother him any more that it will deprive me.


----------



## Mahlerian

JAS said:


> Actually, I think your list could be condensed to one element: dissonance. That seems to me the great red line that divides the bulk of his compositions from works with more mainstream acceptance. I think that it is probably the deal breaker for me.


It would be hard to imagine many pieces with a higher level of mainstream recognition than The Rite of Spring. Also, there is a huge difference between "unorthodox root movement" and dissonance.

The following is unorthodox:
C major -> A major -> B-flat minor

The following is dissonant:
C major -> F-sharp major 7 -> E-flat augmented


----------



## KenOC

millionrainbows said:


> Therefore, we must conclude that the acuity to perceive Stravinsky's comparatively more abstruse harmonic meanings (meanings which shift constantly) is similar to the ability of "experts" who have learned (and have inherent propensities) to perceive other types of perceptual meanings...


Ah, the "expert" listener! As Babbitt puts it, "It often has been remarked that only in politics and the 'arts' does the layman regard himself as an expert, with the right to have his opinion heard. In the realm of politics he knows that this right, in the form of a vote, is guaranteed by fiat. Comparably, in the realm of public music, the concertgoer is secure in the knowledge that the amenities of concert going protect his firmly stated 'I didn't like it' from further scrutiny."

Well, we know where that argument ends!

http://www.palestrant.com/babbitt.html


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## Mahlerian

KenOC said:


> Ah, the "expert" listener! As Babbitt puts it, "It often has been remarked that only in politics and the 'arts' does the layman regard himself as an expert, with the right to have his opinion heard. In the realm of politics he knows that this right, in the form of a vote, is guaranteed by fiat. Comparably, in the realm of public music, the concertgoer is secure in the knowledge that the amenities of concert going protect his firmly stated 'I didn't like it' from further scrutiny."
> 
> Well, we know where that argument ends!
> 
> http://www.palestrant.com/babbitt.html


With people like Palestrant completely missing the entire point of your argument?


----------



## KenOC

Mahlerian said:


> With people like Palestrant completely missing the entire point of your argument?


I've never read Palestrant's response, so can't speak to that. But...do you agree with Babbitt's viewpoint in his paper? His analysis of the situation? His conclusions?


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## Mahlerian

KenOC said:


> I've never read Palestrant's response, so can't speak to that. But...do you agree with Babbitt's viewpoint in his paper? His analysis of the situation? His conclusions?


I agree with his assessment of the situation, namely that concert music and the public have gone in different directions (this is even more true now than then, and the fate of the tonal, "accessible" music of the same era cements this entirely). I agree that for a composer of his style (academic serialism), it may be the best solution to stay within his milieu and not interact with the concert-going public.

Concert music has continued on without them, though, and post-serial music, such as that of Boulez (Le marteau and after), Ligeti, and the spectralists, has had a greater impact on classical music than Babbitt or Wuorinen likely will. This is expressing my own taste as well, of course. I do not particularly enjoy much of Babbitt's music. I prefer either pre-serialist 12-tone music of Schoenberg, Berg, Webern, the aforementioned post-serialists, or the non-serialist "atonality" of composers like Sessions or Carter to it by a significant margin.


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## JAS

Mahlerian said:


> It would be hard to imagine many pieces with a higher level of mainstream recognition than The Rite of Spring. Also, there is a huge difference between "unorthodox root movement" and dissonance.


Except, of course, I did not say "recognition." I said "acceptance." And that is one, relatively short piece, for me made palatable only by the presence of dinosaurs (although I understand that Stravinsky never forgave Disney for that imposition).


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## Guest

millionrainbows said:


> The people who can hear meaning in Stravinsky's music are the ones who like it


If you then mean that 'the people who say they don't like it simply don't hear meaning', I would say, 'not necessarily'.

The only thing I would agree with in your post is that it is possible to 'understand' or 'hear' on a visceral level without the ability to assemble a technically informed explanation of that understanding.



millionrainbows said:


> We can only assume that the qualities which distinguish Stravinsky's music from more conservative CP tonal works are the alienating factors: more complex rhythms, juxtaposed tonal entities, use of tritones, unorthodox root movement, dissonance...and we must further assume that these critical listeners simply do not "get" the ideas presented.


Well, having sat down and listened to it again last night, I can safely say that I still heard only the things I previously listed. I may have 'heard' juxtaposed tonal entities, but I can't say that I heard them!

It is, of course, a terrifying piece of music, with much that is ugly, harsh, brutal. Whether you like that sort of thing is not necessarily dependent on an ability to make a critical analysis.


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## KenOC

Shostakovich admired Stravinsky and at one point said he was the greatest composer of the 20th century. But he also said that Stravinsky couldn't write a transition. Listening to Igor's music, I think there is truth in this.


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## millionrainbows

MacLeod said:


> The only thing I would agree with in your post is that it is possible to 'understand' or 'hear' on a visceral level without the ability to assemble a technically informed explanation of that understanding.


Yes, this "hearing of meaning" happens at a visceral, intuitive level, and is not overly dependent on cognition or technical knowledge.



MacLeod said:


> Well, having sat down and listened to it again last night, I can safely say that I still heard only the things I previously listed. I may have 'heard' juxtaposed tonal entities, but I can't say that I heard them!


Then this statement strikes me as coming from a listener who is "set in his ways," which even repeated hearings cannot overcome. I would have more faith in "innocent" younger listeners who like the music, yet have no idea why.



MacLeod said:


> It is, of course, a terrifying piece of music, with much that is ugly, harsh, brutal. Whether you like that sort of thing is not necessarily dependent on an ability to make a critical analysis.


I hear "primal truths" in Stravinsky, especially the Rite. This "brutality" and "terror of Man's unconscious compulsions" are precisely the reason I find his music fascinating.

It sounds like to me that someone who rejects this music is also "rejecting the darker side" of the human psyche, a suppressive tendency I see exemplified in Christian beliefs, where the dark side becomes "demonized" and rejected.

This is why many psychologists say that this sort of "partitioning" and rejecting of darkness is basically bad for the development of a balanced "self." To grow as an individual, we must "face our own shadow." This is a basic "101" assumption for anyone who has ever had to struggle with overcoming any kind of personality deficiency or evolution towards a fully integrated "self."


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## Guest

millionrainbows said:


> Then this statement strikes me as coming from a listener who is "set in his ways," which even repeated hearings cannot overcome. I would have more faith in "innocent" younger listeners who like the music, yet have no idea why.


Well, I may well be set in my ways, but I don't see how you get that from my telling you that there are things I don't hear: as I already said (probably ad nauseam for some readers here) I don't have the technical facility to recognise the things you describe - such as '_juxtaposed tonal entities'._


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## Kivimees

MacLeod said:


> I don't have the technical facility to recognise the things you describe - such as '_juxtaposed tonal entities'._


And I thought I was the only one.


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## millionrainbows

MacLeod said:


> Well, I may well be set in my ways, but I don't see how you get that from my telling you that there are things I don't hear...


That's true, I have no way of experiencing your experience; I must go by your admission that "you do not hear it."



MacLeod said:


> ...as I already said (probably ad nauseam for some readers here) I don't have the technical facility to recognise the things you describe - such as 'juxtaposed tonal entities'.


That's just a fancy way of saying 'bitonality' or two chords played at once, like the "Petroushka chord:" C major against F# major. It's not rocket science.


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## Guest

millionrainbows said:


> It's not rocket science.


It may not be rocket science to you, mate, but the inner workings of a Saturn V might be less impenetrable than



> "'bitonality' or two chords played at once, like the "Petroushka chord:" C major against F# major"


You might be able to hear 'C Major' when someone writes it in a forum post, but I can't, let alone 'C major against F# major!!

I'm assuming, howver, that if I look up 'the Petroushka chord' on Youtube, I'll find someone playing it?


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## Mahlerian

MacLeod said:


> You might be able to hear 'C Major' when someone writes it in a forum post, but I can't, let alone 'C major against F# major!!
> 
> I'm assuming, howver, that if I look up 'the Petroushka chord' on Youtube, I'll find someone playing it?


You can see and hear the example here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petrushka_chord


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## KenOC

MacLeod said:


> You might be able to hear 'C Major' when someone writes it in a forum post, but I can't, let alone 'C major against F# major!!


The idea here isn't the specific chords or notes being played, but that the two notes or chords are an augmented fourth (or tritone) apart. For example, F and B have the same effect as C and F#. The tritone sounds very dissonant -- in fact it was known as the "diabolus in musica," or "devil in music," in the good old days. It was largely avoided through the 19th century, but Stravinsky made a big thing of it in Petrushka.

Another popular work whose tension is largely derived from the tritone throughout (resolving only at the very end) is Britten's War Requiem.


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## millionrainbows

Another use of tritone chords is Bartók, but he saw the C major against F# major as two opposing, yet complementary tonalities: 7-note diatonic juxtposed with F# major pentatonic (5 notes), which add up to all 12 different chromatic notes. I think Stravinsky saw it as more harmonic; in C, his Petrushka chord is a C7b5b9.


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## PetrB

millionrainbows said:


> Why do people dislike Stravinsky?
> 
> Because he was an ugly little hunchback.


Do you want to hear the bells?








Fondly,
Q.


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## PetrB

Xaltotun said:


> I'll make this world a better place and de-derail this thread back to the topic!
> 
> I'm someone who doesn't like Stravinsky that much. I don't hate his music, actually I like it to a degree, and I can admire it in a cognitive way, but I can't get very enthusiastic about it. It's the same thing as with the impressionists; there's no Genius Artist there, there's no Romantic Hero, not even an Enlightenment Hero like Napoleon. There's not even God there, like in older music. There's no metaphysics, no invisible world of God/Virtue/Love/Progress to be found there. And there's not even a sorrow for the lack/non-existence of those things. Dare I say it - yes - there's no Beethoven there - Beethoven as in a sense of human agency, mind over matter, the will to triumph over obstacles.
> 
> That's why I'm not that crazy about Stravinsky. But I'm perfectly fine to hear him every once in a while.


1.) there's no Genius Artist there
...You're 100% incorrect. What you've got correct is that you do not recognize the Genius Artist in this particular case.... hey, you cannot win them all.

2a.) there's no Romantic Hero
...at least you've understood that much.

2b.) not even an Enlightenment Hero like Napoleon.
... again, at least you've understood that much!
... Stravinsky _is_ an 'enlightenment' composer of sorts, or rather, an 'enlightened' composer; he is not of the Enlightenment of the earlier centuries (a common but one wonders why mistake of seeking the sentiments and ethos of a former and other age in works from later centuries, one would think it is flamingly obvious, but people make the error time and time again.)

2c.) There's not even God there, like in older music. 
... Stravinsky, even though he officially 'abandoned' formal religion for a while, was a deeply devout and fairly mystic Orthodox Christian... I can not think of another composer since Bach who pretty much attributed the gifts and dedicated most of their works 'to the glory of God,' whatever the inscription on the dedication page.

3.) There's no metaphysics, no invisible world of God/Virtue/Love/Progress to be found there.
... About as astoundingly incorrect / blind / deaf / to all those things being in most of everything Stravinsky wrote -- again, I'm thinking you would not recognize any of those qualities or sentiments if dressed in 20th century or later clothing if you were out to dinner with them. 
...There is, about almost each Stravinsky piece, a feeling afterwards of some monumental construct, an edifice, and a 'summing up' as Bach was wont to be able to do, where the listener feels they have heard something clearly definitive about the type of music therein. The music lingers long in memory... this takes quite the talent and genius, and, some of what Beethoven had, a conscious awareness of 'musical strategy, ' or 'what comes and goes where to maximum effect.'

4.) there's no Beethoven there - Beethoven as in a sense of human agency, mind over matter, the will to triumph over obstacles.
... Though a titch less audible as being forcibly worked and shaped, I'd say Stravinsky just about equals Beethoven in brilliant artificial constructs which ultimately sound 'logical.' ergo, wildly synthetic yet sounding no longer artificial.

From your viewpoint, of course, all those things you said it lacks, it lacks -- only because you lack a template to recognize those elements in their 20th century dress and modes; they are 'no less' but they are no longer attached with the ethos or sentiments of the other eras.

To my ears, Stravinsky wrote often on an impossibly high metaphysical level, music of great 'depth,' spirituality, and 'merit.' Again, none other than Beethoven strikes me as so similarly a 'willful' composer, i.e. man shaping something and making the medium do exactly what he wanted it to do, while making something which sounded like 'it always was and should be.'

Stravinsky's music speaks quite directly to me. I'd say you're missing something huge, but you seem more content with listing what you sentimentally expect from older music as missing from newer music.... any argument 'for' is not going to entice someone with such a stunning lack of appetite for 'modern' music....

[That announced lack of appetite makes me generally wonder why those on this particular plank / platform feel the need to say anything about modern / contemporary music at all...  ]


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## Guest

I want to know why people keep asking "Why" anything? Why do people dislike Stravinsky? I didn't know people did dislike Stravinsky. It would be just as pointless to ask why people didn't like Liberace!! Or Andre Rieu (gulp).

Those last comments from PetrB were right on the money, though.


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## PetrB

JAS said:


> Okay, I'll bite. With the exception of Fire-Bird and a few other early pieces, I find Stravinsky's music unlistenable. It isn't that I have not tried . . . I have. I have even made a point of seeking out specific recordings that were praised by people who do like Stravinsky, not wishing to judge his music based on inferior performance. Dislike is perhaps too strong a term, but I simply don't "get" most of his music. It does nothing for me, and says nothing to me. Some of it is actively unpleasant for me. None of that adds up to liking the music.
> 
> In a broader sense, I see Stravinsky as part of the movement(s) that essentially killed classical music (much as I think Picasso killed art). What begins to come out afterwards is *mostly self-conscious, self-indulgent pretense. It exists chiefly to be something other than what has come before. It descends into academic theory with no palpable application.*
> 
> My question is why there are people who like Stravinsky's music, specifically the more "modern" pieces.


Just so you know, this quote of yours *(above, in green bold font)* can be found elsewhere, almost verbatim, as applied argument against any music of any era, any particular composer. It could, and has been said, of Bach, Beethoven, Mozart -- name your favorite. That it sounds to me as if written about all the mid to late Romantic era composers seems without doubt, but that is because that is a period where I think 'music went wrong' for a while, and, like you, I am perfectly well entitled to my 'opinion.'

You might imagine people liking Beethoven 'in his own time,' and that there are like souls in every generation, those who seek out the artwork, literature, entertainment, etc. from their contemporaries.

You, at least with classical music, probably do not have at all a contemporary soul. I've always found something way more than severely odd about a dynamic like that, and something flat out retro-reactionary about someone who thinks 'Picasso killed art' and 'Stravinsky killed music.' This is so patently disingenuous when people name two of the bigger creative masters of the arts -- from any century, and then 'credit / discredit' them with undoing the entire tradition and discipline, that the only thing which can be taken seriously about any of this is that you do not care for modern music and art, or at least dislike Stravinsky and Picasso, that it is personal and carries 'no weight' in the overall estimate of those artist's merit or place in history.

It seems to me that you barely know the array of works of either, both famous for constantly reinventing and refreshing themselves and the media in which they worked.


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## KenOC

PetrB said:


> It seems to me that you barely know the array of works of either [Picasso or Strvinsky], both famous for constantly reinventing and refreshing themselves and the media in which they worked.


Which totally begs the question of whether their art appeals to the person in question. I am very weary of seeing people who do not like "modern" visual art or music, or specific artists, having their preferences "explained" by their ignorance or general stupidity (compared with whomever's speaking!)

From a practical point of view, this attitude will help nobody expand their aesthetic horizons.


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## aleazk

Why do people dislike Stravinsky?. Well, there's a thing called bad taste. Some people have it.
"I see Stravinsky as part of the movement(s) that essentially killed classical music (much as I think Picasso killed art)", oh, c'mon!, there are children here, leave that for the public toilet... well, lol, it is in the only place in which such a statement will be taken seriously anyway. :lol:


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## PetrB

KenOC said:


> Which totally begs the question of whether their art appeals to the person in question. I am very weary of seeing people who do not like "modern" visual art or music, or specific artists, having their preferences "explained" by their ignorance or general stupidity (compared with whomever's speaking!)
> 
> From a practical point of view, this attitude will help nobody expand their aesthetic horizons.


Ken, I taught for decades. I recognize a closed, already happy with its conclusions, mind, and have, ultimately, learned to pick my battles. For example, the person who says, seriously, I may add, that, "To me, there is no classical music after 1900,' is not exactly a party I am about to entertain in order to bring them to the joys of 20th century masterworks, both large and small. That person has built a very tall and firm wall, and put a very heavy bolt on the gate... there are easier 'victims' 

Sometimes being dismissed as a ninny because one _is_ a ninny saying impossibly fluffy and shallow things based on three pieces of music from the beginning of a composer's lifelong career output makes that ninny begin to think about how to become less a ninny -- and better informed and experienced -- before they open up their mouth again....

oh, one can at least dream once in a while, at least


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## KenOC

PetrB said:


> oh, one can at least dream once in a while, at least


Sorry (a bit) for my post -- seem to be in a foul mood tonight. But I'll ask anyway: If you have no hope of helping somebody appreciate the music more, why post at all?


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## Guest

KenOC said:


> Sorry (a bit) for my post -- seem to be in a foul mood tonight. But I'll ask anyway: If you have no hope of helping somebody appreciate the music more, why post at all?


Because the 'burden' of responsibility doesn't fall on PB or others here. That belongs within the realm of composer/interpreter/listener - those 'co-composers' who interpret and listen to the work. Also, one can access any number of really good books, including lectures and written works by Leonard Bernstein about "modernism" (which, of course, is no longer 'modern').

We are talking about 1900? That music is already 113 years old now. What a variety of styles came out of the 20th century - Rachmaninov, Debussy, Ravel, Elgar, Vaughn-Williams, Milhaud, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Bartok, Webern, Berg, Delius, Khatchaturian, R. Strauss, Faure, Granados, Ives, Copland, Carter, Barber, Ginastera, Villa Lobos,.....just too many to name - and what VARIETY. This doesn't include the most recent composers. A feast.


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## KenOC

Of course that doesn't answer my question...


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## Guest

KenOC said:


> Which totally begs the question of whether their art appeals to the person in question. I am very weary of seeing people who do not like "modern" visual art or music, or specific artists, having their preferences "explained" by their ignorance or general stupidity (compared with whomever's speaking!)
> 
> From a practical point of view, this attitude will help nobody expand their aesthetic horizons.


I didn't detect any reference to ignorance or general stupidity in PetrB's post. Perhaps because I'm too ignorant or stupid ...



CountenanceAnglaise said:


> I want to know why people keep asking "Why" anything? Why do people dislike Stravinsky? I didn't know people did dislike Stravinsky. It would be just as pointless to ask why people didn't like Liberace!! Or Andre Rieu (gulp).


"Why (something)" is a perfectly legitimate question, and I don't see it as pointless at all. "Why (anything)" could be pointless, but that might depend whether you think the poster is asking a rhetorical or genuine question.


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## PetrB

KenOC said:


> Of course that doesn't answer my question...


It is a forum, with personal opinions acknowledged no more no less as such.

We at TC are a rag-taggle bunch with hugely varied backgrounds and experience with music.

It still happens that some people talk / post the most fatuous barely thought out smack: since it is all 'on record', those of us for whom the craft is a profession tend to have the impulse (double or treble that strength of impulse if one has taught for decades) to set the record straight. Part of a professional's job, after all, is to be an advocate / proponent for the craft itself, even when 'off-duty.'

Then too, some are truly unconscious that their 'problem' with one particular composer or an entire era is that they are indeed expecting musical procedures and intent to match the ethos and sentiment of their more favored composers or eras.... If Beethoven is your yardstick with which to measure all of music, little or no music from any other will ever fit those particular sets of measure, nor the ethos of the particular times Luigi lived in.

No one composer (or one era, or style) should ever become any ones 'standard' by which to judge all other work by other composers written in completely different times... and that, exactly and in detail, was a good part of the list of 'what was wrong / missing' re: Stravinsky, and to which I responded. (I am nonplussed when people do this, but they do, and rather often....)

By that set of possible 'ways to measure,' if Mozart was your yardstick, and a painter contemporary of Mozart your visual art yardstick, then Beethoven and J.W. Turner, respectively, could be accused of 'killing music and art'... Put into that context, there is an analogous 'lesson' to be learned about making any such a sweeping statement.

*Added:*
P.s. one way or t'other, to realize one is 'bound' by a certain aesthetic preference can be very revealing, i.e. then you better know the _why_ in "why you do or don't like a work, composer, or era." It is not at all a bad thing to clarify what 'informs' ones tastes. Many who are less busy than a lifetime full of an abstract art as their career have not spent much time in that arena. (I know that is shocking, but there 'tis


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## Guest

Again, PB, you make a great deal of sense here. The important thing to remember is that music, like other arts, is organic - in a constant state of flux. There is no particular benchmark of what is good; simply that some of us find some music 'better' or more enjoyable than other types of music. 

To ask the question "Why" people dislike Stravinsky, or like Stravinsky, and expect one or two people to answer for a few generations of listeners is a redundant question. Sure, we know about the riot at the first performance of the "Rite" - but that was 104 years ago. Theatre and concert-goers in earlier centuries were generally rowdier than they are today anyway.

Perhaps the question or discussion needs to be reframed as "I have difficulty with ....... and I'm wondering if others feel this way and, if so, could they explain their responses". Verbose, yes, but it does put the onus back onto the listener and takes the 'guilt' away from the composer!!


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## Guest

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> To ask the question "Why" people dislike Stravinsky, or like Stravinsky, and expect one or two people to answer for a few generations of listeners is a redundant question.


You seem upset by this question. Now it is 'redundant'? I don't suppose anyone believes in either asking or answering such a question that they are, or are expecting to answer on behalf of anyone but themselves.

However, I agree that your rephrasing is a more nuanced way of asking.


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## Guest

MacLeod said:


> You seem upset by this question. Now it is 'redundant'? I don't suppose anyone believes in either asking or answering such a question that they are, or are expecting to answer on behalf of anyone but themselves.
> 
> However, I agree that your rephrasing is a more nuanced way of asking.


Actually, I wasn't directing criticism about "Why" especially towards you because you'll notice a lot of questions on this messageboard are framed in this way.

Leonard Bernstein, that consummate polymath, admired Stravinsky. One of his Harvard Lectures is sure to cover such things, as there is one on modernism (from memory). He's never easy to listen to, actually, because he does speak to Harvard students. But what a brain and talent that man had!!


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## Guest

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> Actually, I wasn't directing criticism about "Why" especially towards you because you'll notice a lot of questions on this messageboard are framed in this way.


I didn't take it as criticism of me.

But you did say earlier, "Why anything" is pointless.


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## Guest

MacLeod said:


> I didn't take it as criticism of me.
> 
> But you did say earlier, "Why anything" is pointless.


Quite true. I need to re-phrase my original criticism, but now you know what I mean.

I found this U-Tube link. What's not to love about "Le Sacre"?






There are a great many in the ballet world who believe "Petroushka" is the greatest ballet ever written:






The piano reduction/arrangement of "Petroushka" is one of the marvel's of the 20th century keyboard repertoire!! And Stravinsky's music is deeply tonal.


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## JAS

PetrB said:


> Just so you know, this quote of yours *(above, in green bold font)* can be found elsewhere, almost verbatim, as applied argument against any music of any era, any particular composer. It could, and has been said, of Bach, Beethoven, Mozart -- name your favorite. That it sounds to me as if written about all the mid to late Romantic era composers seems without doubt, but that is because that is a period where I think 'music went wrong' for a while, and, like you, I am perfectly well entitled to my 'opinion.'


Please provide examples of where this was said about Beethoven, Mozart, or Tchaikovsky. This request, of course, is merely to provide support for your statement. Whether or not such statements have been made does not make them true. I am by no means convinced that there is such as thing as "true" in the context of such discussions, as I will explain further below. We can only evaluate such discussions for ourselves, so that "true" becomes a personal perspective and not a universal one. (Personally, I think it would be absurd to say that Beethoven descends into academic theory with no palpable application, except perhaps in those two or three string pieces which are so often pointed to as a historical precedent. These are certainly exceptional rather than representative examples among his compositions.)



PetrB said:


> You might imagine people liking Beethoven 'in his own time,' and that there are like souls in every generation, those who seek out the artwork, literature, entertainment, etc. from their contemporaries.


I do imagine such people, but I don't agree with their motivation. I seek out the artwork, literature, entertainment from all of recorded time available to me, including contemporaries. Sometimes my interest is historical, helping to establish part of the complex picture of a particular era. Sometimes my interest is merely curiosity to seek out something new. Most often, my interest is in revisiting or further exploring material that provoked some sort of positive response from me, intellectual, emotional, or whatever that might be. Through repeated effort, I have found no such responses, as a general statement, to many of the practitioners of contemporary arts. Although he is now a figure of a time that is entering the past, I have a similar lack of positive response to most of the music of Stravinsky, who was specifically named in the topic of this thread.



PetrB said:


> You, at least with classical music, probably do not have at all a contemporary soul.


This strikes me as an odd statement. I would be more inclined to say that what we call the contemporary movement is an active denial of soul.



PetrB said:


> I've always found something way more than severely odd about a dynamic like that, and something flat out retro-reactionary about someone who thinks 'Picasso killed art' and 'Stravinsky killed music.' This is so patently disingenuous when people name two of the bigger creative masters of the arts -- from any century, and then 'credit / discredit' them with undoing the entire tradition and discipline, that the only thing which can be taken seriously about any of this is that you do not care for modern music and art, or at least dislike Stravinsky and Picasso, that it is personal and carries 'no weight' in the overall estimate of those artist's merit or place in history.


What does carry weight in the overall estimate of any artist's merit or place in history? We can establish broad historical trends in responses to any particular vein of art/entertainment based on the surviving record, such as it may be. We can evaluate the frequency of performances, and perhaps judge some extent of popular versus professional estimation of such material. I am interested in this kind of background evaluation as a matter of history, and to see if there are ideas I had not considered which perhaps should consider. It is interesting to me, for example, that Tchaikovsky believed, or at least said that he believed, that Raff was the finest exponent of the symphony of his time. I have a set of Raff's symphonies, and I have listened to them several times. All of them strike me as pleasant, workmanlike, and serviceable compositions, but none of them seems to merit Tchaikovsky's expressed admiration. I cannot recall to my mind a single moment as I sit here typing this post. Ultimately, none of this matters as much as ones own personal response. In the end, that is really all one has, and, in the individual sense, all that really has any meaning.



PetrB said:


> It seems to me that you barely know the array of works of either, both famous for constantly reinventing and refreshing themselves and the media in which they worked.


And this, of course, is an utterly fatuous statement based on absolutely nothing. I have listened to a great deal of what would widely be considered contemporary music, including Stravinsky, and even the bizarre works of Cage. I attended several premiers of works by Christopher Rouse, and hope never to endure another. You know nothing about me other than what I have stated, just as I know nothing about you. I could make a similarly unfounded assertion that I think you just claim to like this music because you feel that it makes you aesthetically or intellectually superior to others, that you psychically feed off being associated with a relatively small clique, breaking you apart from the mass of humanity, and that this sense of special association has become a deeply seated part of your personal identity. I actually know several people to whom this assertion almost certainly does apply, but it would be as absurd for me to make this assertion about you based on such a slight interaction as we have had here as it is for you to make the assertion you have about me.

One of the problems of the very idea of this kind of discussion is that it rarely achieves what it intends to strive for. It is rarely a dispassionate offering of what one knows and believes, and an equal exploration of the similar offerings made by others. It mostly reveals how intangible are our responses, and how difficult they are to express, and how thin-skinned we are when our own views are put under a microscope or subject to disagreement. As a result, it almost always descends immediately into a reaction to the criticism of our own positions. Sometimes this is more a matter of reaction than intent. I cannot, for example, express my reaction to some of Stravinsky's music, merely using the person/works stated as the focus of the discussion, as noise without that being seen as a kind of attack -- as a kind of attack on the work and, by implication, on anyone who has a different reaction. Intended or not, this is almost always the response, and pretty much everything that follows becomes utterly a waste of time.


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## Guest

It's quite true that much music from the 20th century isn't readily 'accessible' to the listener, but I don't think it was ever intended to be. In fact, post-tonal music became more difficult as time went on. But there's a context here: two world wars the like of which the world had never seen. In WW1 20 million died of flu shortly after 1918. WW2 saw 55 million people dead. The arts reflected that turbulent, bleak, violent, amoral world view - other artists chose to revert to the past as another pathway to assuage grief and loss. But as sure as I'm sitting here watching the clock prepare to strike midnight, the world was never going to be "It's a Wonderful Life" for very long after those conflagrations. The US did have a kind of consumer-driven boom in the 50's when women became ecstatic about their refrigerators and dishwashers, but cynicism and mistrust was the order of the day for most of the 20th century - and for damn good reason.


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## JAS

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> It's quite true that much music from the 20th century isn't readily 'accessible' to the listener, but I don't think it was ever intended to be.


I agree, which is part of why I don't respond to it. (Here, the composer and I are in absolute "concert," if you will forgive the pun.) Worse than that, it seems to me that over time composers did not merely produce music without concern for its accessibility, but that the very lack of accessibility became a sort of perverse badge of honor.



CountenanceAnglaise said:


> In fact, post-tonal music became more difficult as time went on. But there's a context here: two world wars the like of which the world had never seen. In WW1 20 million died of flu shortly after 1918. WW2 saw 55 million people dead. The arts reflected that turbulent, bleak, violent, amoral world view - other artists chose to revert to the past as another pathway to assuage grief and loss.


Yes, intellectually I understand the context and the reaction, but I have no favorable response to the product that came or comes out of it. Art can be a powerful motivator for or against some given issue or ideal, but generally I am not interested in art that merely represents the ugliness that is already all too apparent in the world. I see that every day. I seek art that motivates to positive action, or inspires, or elevates the soul. (Yes, this probably puts me squarely in the camp of Roger Scruton.)


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## JAS

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> It's quite true that much music from the 20th century isn't readily 'accessible' to the listener, but I don't think it was ever intended to be.


So here is a question. If much of the music from the 20th century isn't intended to be readily accessible to the listener, is the listener to be blamed, or dismissed, for not responding favorably to it?


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## PetrB

JAS said:


> So here is a question. If much of the music from the 20th century isn't intended to be readily accessible to the listener, is the listener to be blamed, or dismissed, for not responding favorably to it?


It means, literally, that it is not for everybody, and that should allow you less 'stress' over why, or why it does not, 'speak to you.'

I find Stravinsky to be loaded with themes, motifs, melodies, a very audible and palpable bass-line, in short, nearly the full array of technical musical premises in place as used by composers for hundreds of years before him.

Nikolas Slonimsky's book of Musical invective will probably yield enough of harsh and petty academic things said about Beethoven, etc. I'm not going to research something as if it were for a term paper for school. School _is_ out here, if you haven't yet noticed.

I wonder why anyone agonizes over not liking a particular composer or piece which is either 1.) popular, or 2.) extolled and praised to the skies by 'the cognoscenti.' Whatever intellect is involved, personal taste is just that, and any lack of preference or a distaste 'for' Stravinsky' should not at all bother you, nor in any way affect your general 'credibility' re: music. I can not stand Tchaikovsky, or Puccini, but know well enough they are 'great composers.'

They were great composers whose work simply does nothing for me (well, o.k., the music of either is vaguely to horrifically annoying to me), and that is that. I am not at all plagued with any agony re: So many people like / love the music of Tchaikovsky and Puccini, I must be missing out on / 'not getting' something.

That some music is tortured or ugly, yet great, needs no further proof than Beethoven, who composed some of the greatest and most seriously unattractive sounding pieces which hold a very high place in the estimate of laymen and the cognoscenti alike: the Hammerklavier, the Grosse Fuga, etc. This is anything but music meant to 'appeal' to anyone other than the composer's satisfaction in working it out -- audience be damned: that particular relationship of artist / audience has been in existence seemingly forever. There is some fairly naive charm in people thinking the artists are thinking of 'what is accessible to us,' but at least as often as not, the artist is only thinking about "this great idea, and how to work it out," and not much else.

I do find it difficult that anyone who has heard Stravinsky's "Apollo" for string orchestra (imho one of the more / most serenely beautiful pieces anyone has composed to date) would not think something nearly the same about the piece, or that they would not / could not 'feel' a deep and immediate personal response upon hearing it, but that is me, responding to it viscerally (still after much repeat familiarity) as a most serenely beautiful piece.

I do have some large regret that anyone alive now feels like 'the offended 19th / 18th century,' but that, certainly, is a cross to bear for those who feel that way, not a cross to nail themselves up on in public: it is the 21st century, and someone needs that wood.


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## JAS

PetrB said:


> It means, literally, that it is not for everybody, and that should allow you less 'stress' over why, or why it does not, 'speak to you.'


There is no "stress" for me over the fact that I find nothing at all in most of contemporary music, in general, or most of Stravinsky's music, to address the thread topic specifically. I have some intellectual curiosity about whether or not I am missing something, particularly something that might, ultimately, give me a reason to listen to such music. Increasingly, through these kinds of discussions, it is apparent to me that even if there might be something of this sort, it is unlikely to be revealed, and I strongly suspect that it does not have to offer anything that I consider worth seeking. (I did not open this thread, but as I came upon it, I thought perhaps that this group, with participants from whom I had not already heard, might have something of merit to say. I regret, only slightly, that such does not appear to be the case.)

My only stress, to use your term, is the fact that the musical establishment upon which I am generally dependent to satisfy my interests (as I am not a composer nor a performer of an ability sufficient for the work) has worked so hard now for over a century to force me to accept what I find that I cannot accept. I had to stop attending concerts locally because the music director was determined to make me sit through two pieces I hated to hear one that I liked (and, often as not, that one I did like was something I had heard a hundred times before, and thus it was not worth enduring the other two to hear it again). I am grateful for the existence of a robust recording industry to satisfy my interest, and particularly grateful that many labels have sought out more obscure works or composers from the deep storage of history to satisfy my occasional interest for something "new."



PetrB said:


> Nikolas Slonimsky's book of Musical invective will probably yield enough of harsh and petty academic things said about Beethoven, etc. I'm not going to research something as if it were for a term paper for school. School _is_ out here, if you haven't yet noticed.


That's fine, but you will have to forgive me if I therefore relegate the comment to the place where all unsupported statements belong. Merely harsh, petty or dismissive statements would not rise to meet the specific challenge you raised in your reply.



PetrB said:


> I wonder why anyone agonizes over not liking a particular composer or piece which is either 1.) popular, or 2.) extolled and praised to the skies by 'the cognoscenti.' Whatever intellect is involved, personal taste is just that, and any lack of preference or a distaste 'for' Stravinsky' should not at all bother you, nor in any way affect your general 'credibility' re: music. I can not stand Tchaikovsky, or Puccini, but know well enough they are 'great composers.'


Again, I assure you that there is no agony involved, at least not by me. I also will not pity you or think less of you for disliking the music of Tchaikovsky or Puccini. (This position actually strikes me as at least more consistent and therefore more reasonable than someone who likes, or says that he likes, all of that music and Stravinsky.) I will grant that Stravinsky is an influential composer, and that he is by the extent of that influence an Important Composer. I will not grant him the title of great, but that is perhaps a matter of semantics.



PetrB said:


> That some music is tortured or ugly, yet great, needs no further proof than Beethoven, who composed some of the greatest and most seriously unattractive sounding pieces which hold a very high place in the estimate of laymen and the cognoscenti alike: the Hammerklavier, the Grosse Fuga, etc. This is anything but music meant to 'appeal' to anyone other than the composer's satisfaction in working it out -- audience be damned: that particular relationship of artist / audience has been in existence seemingly forever. There is some fairly naive charm in people thinking the artists are thinking of 'what is accessible to us,' but at least as often as not, the artist is only thinking about "this great idea, and how to work it out," and not much else.


Here I would not agree with you at all. "Great" music may contain elements of struggle (torture only in that sense would I accept), or even some touches of ugliness, but music that is essentially or overwhelmingly ugly cannot, in my view, be "great." Even if such music has a lasting influence, the inspiration to create more ugliness is hardly a goal worthy of "greatness." To me, "greatness" requires elevation, and "ugliness," as a thing unto itself, never elevates.


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## PetrB

MacLeod said:


> You seem upset by this question. Now it is 'redundant'? I don't suppose anyone believes in either asking or answering such a question that they are, or are expecting to answer on behalf of anyone but themselves.
> 
> However, I agree that your rephrasing is a more nuanced way of asking.


For starters, more would be revealed if the question had been, "Why do people like Stravinsky," or better, 'iWhat do you like about the music of Stravinsky? Then instead of a laundry list of 19trh and 18th century aesthetics as applied / embedded in the works of those centuries, the list given more in the nature of a complaint, there would be a series of statements about why Stravinsky's music 'works' for some, and why this composer is so highly esteemed. That brings about more an understanding of 'what he did do' rather than harping on 'what he did not / the music does not' do.'


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## PetrB

JAS said:


> That's fine, but you will have to forgive me if I therefore relegate the comment to the place where all unsupported statements belong.


Rather like what most of us have done with your list of 'what Stravinsky lacks.' LOL.

You resonate with music of earlier centuries -- big deal: that actually makes you _"average" _

I hope it is not, for you, "conflicted" info that I love -- not just like, the music of Guillaume de Machaut / Claudio Monteverdi / Jean-Philippe Rameau / Mozart / Schubert / Schumann / Mahler, etc. as well as love -- not just like -- the music of Stravinsky, as in almost all of it, from those best and widely known three early ballets, through his neoclassical period all the way through to the end with his quite personally stamped serial works.

Read any good books lately? Anything written after 1883? Just kiddin' ya.


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## millionrainbows

JAS said:


> So here is a question. If much of the music from the 20th century isn't intended to be readily accessible to the listener, is the listener to be blamed, or dismissed, for not responding favorably to it?





KenOC said:


> ...If you have no hope of helping somebody appreciate the music more, why post at all?


This stance, as represented by the above statements, seems to be a contradiction, because the thread itself is titled "Why do *people dislike* Stravinsky?" The thread subject is clearly asking for an explanation of _why people dislike Stravinsky,_ and these critics have shown up to represent their opinions, and we "Stravinsky-ites" are invited to try and explain this dislike.

Furthermore, the thread question is not probing the music itself; if it were, it would be titled something like "What qualities and musical elements of Stravinsky's music cause people to dislike it?", but _nooo..._the question focusses on the people.

Perhaps this conflict manifests as it does is because this 'dislike of Stravinsky' cannot be articulated by the critics. Thus, _the "Stravinsky-ites" are compelled to believe that this dislike is an omission, an inability, or a deficiency. _

That's the wages of inarticulated dislike; that's the price one pays for passively holding to an opinion which is not explained, but expected to be "believed" because of a sense of "entitlement." That's lazy; that's the easy way out.

So when I discuss the actual musical ideas in Stravinsky, you should _appreciate_ that I am avoiding personal references, and that I am focussing on music, not people, although my approach frustrates the "thread-bait," and seeks higher ground.

Instead, I get "flak" for this, as in posts #86 and #89, and illogical responses, as in posts #100 and #103.

My advice: think upon good things, and surround yourself with people who support your agenda; avoid conflict and drama.


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## JAS

PetrB said:


> Rather like what most of us have done with your list of 'what Stravinsky lacks.' LOL.
> 
> You resonate with music of earlier centuries -- big deal.
> 
> Read any good books lately? Anything written after 1883? Just kiddin' ya.


Ah, merely more proof of my contention that these discussions cannot be productive because too many of the participants are too busy being offended by disagreement to be bothered to engage in the discussion dispassionately.


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## JAS

millionrainbows said:


> This stance, as represented by the above statements, seems to be a contradiction, because the thread itself is titled "Why do *people dislike* Stravinsky?" The thread subject is clearly asking for an explanation of _why people dislike Stravinsky,_ and these critics have shown up to represent their opinions, and we "Stravinsky-ites" are invited to try and explain this dislike.


In the narrowest of interpretations, that is true, but it seems to me perfectly reasonable to take it as a opening to discuss both sides of the question.



millionrainbows said:


> Furthermore, the thread question is not probing the music itself; if it were, it would be titled something like "What qualities and musical elements of Stravinsky's music cause people to dislike it?", but _nooo..._the question focusses on the people.


It is my presumption that the title is somewhat poorly phrased, and that it is the music composed by this person rather than the person himself that is the subject proposed for discussion. How would one answer your question, about people who are doing the disliking, without discussing the thing that is liked or disliked?



millionrainbows said:


> Perhaps this conflict manifests as it does is because this 'dislike of Stravinsky' cannot be articulated by the critics. Thus, _the "Stravinsky-ites" are compelled to believe that this dislike is an omission, an inability, or a deficiency. _
> 
> That's the wages of inarticulated dislike; that's the price one pays for passively holding to an opinion which is not explained, but expected to be "believed" because of a sense of "entitlement." That's lazy; that's the easy way out.


But it has been articulated, at least as well as the opposing view has. There are too many posts here, in this very thread, for you to reasonably assert passivity or a lack of explanation. As for belief and entitlement, those cut both ways.



millionrainbows said:


> So when I discuss the actual musical ideas in Stravinsky, you should _appreciate_ that I am avoiding personal references, and that I am focussing on music, not people, although my approach frustrates the "thread-bait," and seeks higher ground.


And yet your entire post here has been personal and not about the music at all. Also, are you even replying to a post of mine that was in reply to a post of yours? I think there is some cognitive dissonance going on here.



millionrainbows said:


> Instead, I get "flak" for this, as in posts #86 and #89, and illogical responses, as in posts #100 and #103.


I feel no obligation to apologize for nor defend posts that I did not make. It makes it a bit confusing, in terms of this discussion, to combine replies to posts by different people.



millionrainbows said:


> My advice: think upon good things, and surround yourself with people who support your agenda; avoid conflict and drama.


So your advice is to never challenge your own ideas. Curious advice. My advice is to be willing to break out of your own enclosed world, at least occasionally, and actively seek out others who may be able to intelligently reveal new ideas. Whether or not there are such people here remains to be demonstrated.

I think there is more than a little irony here that, in a way, you are arguing for tonal harmony while I am arguing for a little dissonance.


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## millionrainbows

JAS said:


> In the narrowest of interpretations, that is true, but it seems to me perfectly reasonable to take it as a opening to discuss both sides of the question.


You are assuming quite a bit, but given this, why do you not question posts #86, 89, 100, and 103? It seems these are the posts you should be questioning, since they call into question the thread premise. They are opposed to your view.



JAS said:


> It is my presumption that the title is somewhat poorly phrased, and that it is the music composed by this person rather than the person himself that is the subject proposed for discussion. *How would one answer your question, about people who are doing the disliking, without discussing the thing that is liked or disliked?*


You're correct, a discussion of the actual music is implied and almost unavoidable. I would answer this by first offering tangible, specific musical evidence, and then offering reasons as to why the critics dislike these qualities, since no reciprocal musical specifics have been offered by critics, who prefer to play "victim." Therefore, I will play their game, remained focussed on the people, and postulate that dislike of Stravinsky's music is a deficiency in hearing ability, or perhaps world-view or mindset.



JAS said:


> But it has been articulated, at least as well as the opposing view has. There are too many posts here, in this very thread, for you to reasonably assert passivity or a lack of explanation.


I disagree, and your assertion is directly contradicted by posts #86 and #89, where the complaint is that my response is "too technical." Get specific, please.



JAS said:


> And yet your entire post here has been personal and not about the music at all.


This is in response to posts #100 and #103, which brought the subject of "personal" into our focus. I merely responded.



JAS said:


> Also, are you even replying to a post of mine that was in reply to a post of yours? I think there is some cognitive dissonance going on here.


This is a response. Be careful, you are straying into ad-hominem territory. Do you understand what I'm saying? Are you "on track" here?:lol:



JAS said:


> I feel no obligation to apologize for nor defend posts that I did not make. It makes it a bit confusing, in terms of this discussion, to combine replies to posts by different people.


Sorry, but the nature of your post fit perfectly with the view espoused by the other member. I combined them because they both represent the same view. Don't take it so personally.:lol:



JAS said:


> So your advice is to never challenge your own ideas. Curious advice.


I never said that.:lol:



JAS said:


> My advice is to be willing to break out of your own enclosed world, at least occasionally, and actively seek out others who may be able to intelligently reveal new ideas. Whether or not there are such people here remains to be demonstrated.


The key phrase here is "intelligently reveal new ideas." :lol:


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## millionrainbows

I think that the _*idea *_of Stravinsky, as well as atonal and serial music, is what allows us to speak in stereotypes this way. These musics represent an opposing mindset for the critics of it.

So really, this is not a discussion about music, but about "the politics of experience" and the worldviews which different musics can represent to different people.

Like any LadyGaga fan, classical fans like their music because it satisfies their criteria for good music, and perhaps further represents and reinforces their mindset, world view, and political/religious perspectives.

So what happened to the music? It's irrelevant to talk about it in this stereotyped manner. If it's not specifically about music, it's fodder for conflict; it is "...a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." :lol:


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## JAS

millionrainbows said:


> You're correct, a discussion of the actual music is implied and almost unavoidable. I would answer this by first offering tangible, specific musical evidence, and then offering reasons as to why the critics dislike these qualities, since no reciprocal musical specifics have been offered by critics, who prefer to play "victim." Therefore, I will play their game, remained focussed on the people, and postulate that dislike of Stravinsky's music is a deficiency in hearing ability, or perhaps world-view or mindset.


But specifics have been mentioned. In particular, I stated that I think the degree of dissonance is the deal breaker for me and for many others. The other differences listed may also be perfectly true, but I think that is the big one, and without the dissonance they might matter very little. Now, whether or not one should embrace dissonance, or do so in larger and larger proportion, is probably a mostly subjective issue. There might be possible some discussion of the effect of so much dissonance. But ultimately, I suspect we would end up debating whether or not it can, or even should, result in some kind of pleasure.



millionrainbows said:


> This is a response. Be careful, you are straying into ad-hominem territory. Do you understand what I'm saying? Are you "on track" here?:lol:


There is no ad-hominem attack here because no one is being accused of bad thinking, as a personal thing. The cognitive dissonance is merely the general result of mixing posts and replies, making a more ordered approach inherently and progressively less and less possible.



millionrainbows said:


> I never said that.:lol:


Actually, you said precisely that. Now, what you may have meant is the advice was intended only for me (or others who, like me, generally dislike Stravinsky's music). You may have been suggesting that we are too closed to new ideas to pursue it. But if that is the case, the statement is merely a snobbish attempt at an insult. I was giving you more credit than that.



millionrainbows said:


> The key phrase here is "intelligently reveal new ideas." :lol:


Yes, it is. Did you have a point to make upon the matter?


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## Mahlerian

JAS said:


> Here I would not agree with you at all. "Great" music may contain elements of struggle (torture only in that sense would I accept), or even some touches of ugliness, but music that is essentially or overwhelmingly ugly cannot, in my view, be "great." Even if such music has a lasting influence, the inspiration to create more ugliness is hardly a goal worthy of "greatness." To me, "greatness" requires elevation, and "ugliness," as a thing unto itself, never elevates.


I find Stravinsky's music beautiful. It does indeed elevate its material. The problem we have with your arguments is not that you say you dislike this music, but that you question that anyone could enjoy it in the same way you enjoy music. I love Stravinsky's music like I love that of Beethoven, Mozart, Bruckner, Mahler, Schoenberg, Messiaen, and Bach. Their music is enjoyable whether or not one understands the intellectual content that lies behind it.

JAS, to which composer do you think the following was applied in a contemporary review?

"'His rich, perhaps affected' harmony and his 'marvelous sound combinations' were worthy of a master, but he lacked soul: 'Only the intellect is stimulated, the heart is ignored.'"


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## JAS

Mahlerian said:


> I find Stravinsky's music beautiful. It does indeed elevate its material. The problem we have with your arguments is not that you say you dislike this music, but that you question that anyone could enjoy it in the same way you enjoy music. I love Stravinsky's music like I love that of Beethoven, Mozart, Bruckner, Mahler, Schoenberg, Messiaen, and Bach. Their music is enjoyable whether or not one understands the intellectual content that lies behind it.
> 
> JAS, to which composer do you think the following was applied in a contemporary review?
> 
> "'His rich, perhaps affected' harmony and his 'marvelous sound combinations' were worthy of a master, but he lacked soul: 'Only the intellect is stimulated, the heart is ignored.'"


I do not know, but will guess that it was directed at Beethoven. Still, it is not quite in the vein of academic theory without practical application. And I am not saying that you cannot find statements made that seem entirely to miss the point from a more modern perspective.

For modern music, I have often heard it stated, by advocates, that it intends to ignore the soul, as being an undesirable thing of sentiment. (Similarly, I have heard Tchaikovsky dismissed precisely as sentimental.) Another important distinction is that, for Stravinsky at least, we have a half-century of passed time for perspective. The immediacy of perception is often a terrible challenge.


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## Mahlerian

JAS said:


> I do not know, but will guess that it was directed at Beethoven.


Richard Strauss.



JAS said:


> Another important distinction is that, for Stravinsky at least, we have a half-century of passed time for perspective. The immediacy of perception is often a terrible challenge.


And his music continues to be performed and recorded and listened to. What does that say?


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## KenOC

Mahlerian said:


> JAS, to which composer do you think the following was applied in a contemporary review?
> 
> "'His rich, perhaps affected' harmony and his 'marvelous sound combinations' were worthy of a master, but he lacked soul: 'Only the intellect is stimulated, the heart is ignored.'"


I'm gonna guess Brahms, whose first symphony was reviewed as "a satchel full of dry philosophical treatises."

(added) Oops, I see the answer above. Well, good thing I didn't make it a true daily double!


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## JAS

Mahlerian said:


> Richard Strauss.


Interesting, and I might not disagree with that. His music can be epic, and thrilling, but is it really appealing to the heart? I suppose it depends on the specific work that was being reviewed.



Mahlerian said:


> And his music continues to be performed and recorded and listened to. What does that say?


Ah, that is what we were trying to discuss. In this case, I think Stravinsky's music has been continually pushed by the academies and generally forced on a mostly unwilling public that still hasn't really come around to his way of thinking. Indeed, the audience has been leaving for decades. (Lots more people seem to like Heavy Metal, although I suppose even that is somewhat passe today, which strikes me as much, much worse than Stravinsky.)


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## Mahlerian

JAS said:


> Interesting, and I might not disagree with that. His music can be epic, and thrilling, but is it really appealing to the heart? I suppose it depends on the specific work that was being reviewed.


It was the Prelude to Guntram (back when it was the only opera he had yet written), but the review was meant as a condemnation of his work in general.



JAS said:


> Ah, that is what we were trying to discuss. In this case, I think Stravinsky's music has been continually pushed by the academies and generally forced on a mostly unwilling public that still hasn't really come around to his way of thinking. Indeed, the audience has been leaving for decades. (Lots more people seem to like Heavy Metal, although I suppose even that is somewhat passe today, which strikes me as much, much worse than Stravinsky.)


What way of thinking is it that people have not yet come around to?

Stravinsky said a lot of things that I disagree with, about aesthetics, about fellow composers, and about the nature of music. That doesn't matter. His music works whether or not you agree with his thinking as a person.

And in terms of dissonance, heavy metal is usually far less than most later romantic music, simply because overdriven guitars sound incredibly muddy if they play any more than two notes at once. Perhaps dissonance isn't really the problem you have with these kinds of music (I don't particularly like metal, but the dissonance has nothing to do with that.)


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## JAS

Mahlerian said:


> It was the Prelude to Guntram (back when it was the only opera he had yet written), but the review was meant as a condemnation of his work in general.


I don't know that piece. I will have to look it up.



Mahlerian said:


> What way of thinking is it that people have not yet come around to? Stravinsky said a lot of things that I disagree with, about aesthetics, about fellow composers, and about the nature of music. That doesn't matter. His music works whether or not you agree with his thinking as a person.


I am thinking only of his musical ideas. Most people still pull back in revulsion, or cover their ears at hearing his later music, and in hearing music that follows in the path he set. It seems to me that this is the opposite situation to someone like Beethoven, who was perhaps chided by official critics, but was generally embraced by the general listener, and has worked its way into the history of music from the bottom up, as it were. In contrast, Stravinsky and Webern, etc. were adopted by the academies (yes, Bartok was at least initially shunned as I recall from some recollections of Miklos Rosza, who was warned as a student to avoid Bartok) and has been increasingly forced from the top down. It has an audience, but a very, very small one, without achieving a growing audience outside of academics. It is effectively becoming a dead end, academic music written for other academics.



Mahlerian said:


> And in terms of dissonance, heavy metal is usually far less than most later romantic music, simply because overdriven guitars sound incredibly muddy if they play any more than two notes at once. Perhaps dissonance isn't really the problem you have with these kinds of music (I don't particularly like metal, but the dissonance has nothing to do with that.)


It strikes me as loud, disordered noise. If that is not dissonance, well I suppose something could just as easily be quiet and dissonant, I don't know what to call it. Perhaps I should just leave it at noise. (And I am not one who considers all sound to be music, as someone stated of himself in, I think, another thread. Similarly, not all paint thrown on a canvas is art.)


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## KenOC

JAS said:


> I think Stravinsky's music has been continually pushed by the academies and generally forced on a mostly unwilling public that still hasn't really come around to his way of thinking.


I don't sense that Stravinsky's music is being "pushed" on anybody. You don't hear very much of his later music on the radio, and when orchestras want to give us a dose of "modernist" medicine at concerts, it's more likely to be Adams than Stravinsky.

That said, I've noticed that later Stravinsky does seem to be showing up with increasing frequency on the radio, at least around here. Well, *somewhat* later Stravinsky! Three pieces that are heard from time to time are Apollo, the Dumbarton Oaks Concerto, and the Ebony Concerto. But nothing that I can think of after about 1945.

This may be evidence that listeners are getting to like Stravinsky's later styles, gradually over time.


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## Guest

millionrainbows said:


> Instead, I get "flak" for this, as in posts #86 and #89, and illogical responses, as in posts #100 and #103.
> 
> My advice: think upon good things, and surround yourself with people who support your agenda; avoid conflict and drama.


My advice - engage with people of all shades of opinion. Embrace conflict and drama!

In what way were my two posts #86 and #89 'flak'? I think I was merely observing that it is possible to find both meaning and enjoyment in Stravinsky's music without have the technical resources to explain either. Or would you reject my personal description (#70) of what I liked and the meaning I found in _Rite of Spring_?

Lastly, I think most people here with half a brain knew exactly what is meant by 'liking/disliking' Stravinsky: or have you not come across synecdoche before?


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## Guest

JAS said:


> So here is a question. If much of the music from the 20th century isn't intended to be readily accessible to the listener, is the listener to be blamed, or dismissed, for not responding favorably to it?


I want to contextualize my comments and say that Beethoven didn't want to write his later works as "readily accessible" either. In fact, he ruthlessly disregarded what musicians were capable of - towards the end of his life. He said he was writing for the 'future' (later ages).

When Schonberg developed his serial system (which process was already underway and he 'codified' it: in that sense he was a latter day Guido of Arezza!!) he wasn't necessarily thinking, "I want to continue the mellifluous sounds of Johann Strauss Jnr"! He saw that the train was coming and wanted to provide the tracks which would keep it 'on the rails' permanently.

I don't think that art and music of the 20th century period represented 'ugliness' at all, as suggested by JAS. It's a good discussion to have. The music of Webern and Berg is exceptionally beautiful, with Berg full of the most lush romanticism IMO. Things WERE going to be different after two world wars - look at Satre, Beckett, Pinter just as very few examples. There was a different mindset, with new possibilities explored. And those 'possibilites' opened up a dazzling new way of thinking about and experiencing music. Sure, when we get to the avant garde period later in the century (or even earlier, with musique concrete - don't make me tell you my joke about that!!) things go over the top. When you take the emotional content out of music there isn't a lot left IMO. Having said that, there seem to be people who enjoy music stripped of its emotional possibilities and they're allowed to have that experience.

If you're interested in exploring Berg's music and his use of 'serialism' I'd recommend an excellent book, "Alban Berg and His World". But, of course, Berg died before WW2 - so his music is already 'old'.

And 'classical' music (I prefer kunstmusik) isn't for everybody anyway. It was never meant to 'appeal' to everybody - in fact, in the Medieval period it was quite arcane.


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## Guest

PetrB said:


> It means, literally, that it is not for everybody, and that should allow you less 'stress' over why, or why it does not, 'speak to you.'
> 
> That some music is tortured or ugly, yet great, needs no further proof than Beethoven, who composed some of the greatest and most seriously unattractive sounding pieces which hold a very high place in the estimate of laymen and the cognoscenti alike: the Hammerklavier, the Grosse Fuga, etc. This is anything but music meant to 'appeal' to anyone other than the composer's satisfaction in working it out -- audience be damned:


I must strenuously disagree that Beethoven's music - any of it - could be regarded as "seriously unattractive". Back in the 1820s there were people, like Count Razumovsky and Prince Rudolph, who DID get what Beethoven was doing (hence the dedications). It doesn't matter because he was writing for both himself and posterity: knowing he couldn't engage with the outside world provided an internal dialogue and for me his deeply contemplative, late contrapuntal works are a conversational trope for him. His communication was experienced internally through the workings of various musical 'voices' in his greatest masterworks, IMO, and they are amongst the most powerful and moving creations in the history of art. But they're not for everybody. I don't think Beethoven would care about that: he knew what he was doing.


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## tdc

I don't question Stravinsky's greatness, or dislike him, but I personally don't agree with the commonly held idea that he was the greatest composer of the 20th century, or that he was comparable to a Bach of the 20th century. For one thing Bach excelled (among many other areas) in compositions for solo instruments, an area Stravinsky was relatively weak in. Much of Bach's compositional style I sense was influenced by his own virtuosity as an instrumentalist, and I don't sense this about Stravinsky's compositions at all. Bach's music feels more organic to me, where Stravinsky's music comes across as much more constructed, but I don't mean this latter point as a knock on Stravinsky, just pointing out differences in style.

I think Stravinsky had strong and weak points as a composer, I don't think emotion or nostalgia or sentimentality in his music were his strong points, but he excelled in other areas such as innovation, freshness, orchestral color, structural clarity and versatility. Ultimately, I see Stravinsky as a towering figure of 20th century music, standing alongside such composers as Debussy, Ravel and Bartok, but not above them.


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## PetrB

JAS said:


> ...*I think Stravinsky's music has been continually pushed by the academies and generally forced on a mostly unwilling public*....


_Yeah: Right._ Talk about an imagined conspiracy / rationale to validate your taste.... Wow. Just 'Wow.'

Ayep, 'tis an elitist / cognoscenti conspiracy, near one thousand years old, meant to keep the retro-reactionary conservatives at bay and out of the concert halls, since it is of course terrible for the business that an audience might show up.

If I recall correctly (I am ancient) it was the same Cabal / Establishment who time and again have foisted one over on all of us in pushing de Machaut, Monteverdi, Couperin, Bach [_Mendelssohn pushed Bach on the public... the *******!_) / Rameau / Lully / Vivaldi / Mozart / Beethoven / Verdi / Schubert / Schumann / Chopin / Liszt / Wagner / Brahms / Bellini / Mahler / Dvorak / Bruckner & Tchaikovsky & Rachmaninoff ('they really pulled one over with these three!) / Ravel / Franck / Honegger / Hindemith / Berg / Webern / Schoenberg / Vaughan Williams / Britten / Prokofiev / Stravinsky, etc. in our faces.

Or maybe that establishment actually has the insider dope on 'what is good music,' and some of the general public is attached more by mere emotional sentiment (vs any other well-qualified reason) to the music of one era or another.

*Dissonance is entirely subjective and contextual, as are any emotive reactions anyone might have in association with consonance or dissonance.* Fact is, _relative consonance and dissonance are conceits, along with the diatonic scale, 'tonality,' leading tones, and all the rest of it._

Some of the 'dirtiest' of dissonances, and a superb use of them at that, can to be found / heard in the baroque splendors of Jean-Phillipe Rameau's works. (You may wish to steer clear of Rameau as well, then.)

If it is a 'level of dissonance' which finds you in or out, that is more a matter of your capacity of how many herbs and spices your personal palate can handle / you choose to handle; it is no way a valid measure of a piece of music being 'good,' or 'bad.'

"Appeal to the heart" is an entirely subjective and by the seat of your pants way to go at art. It might surprise you that for me, Stravinsky's music does appeal to me first on a wholly emotional and visceral level, while I also find it 'vital' while being intellectually engaging as well: this is a fundamental enjoyment quite the opposite of your maintained 'people like this stuff because they think it gives them an intellectual gloss,' (more telling about you than anything else while still being patently absurd.)

That is quite the opposite of your apparent need to parse it out as hollow academic, hollow technical exercises -- 'interesting' in the light of what you say you do not know about music. That particular critique sounds more like the 'sour grapes' retort of someone who feels 'left out' because there is prominent good press around something they do not care for or understand. It also sounds like a cribbed precis of the anti-serialism arguments as presented in Thomas Mann's novel, "Doktor Faustus."

Unfortunately typical of many a great writer, Mann's "understanding" of music in general, and specifically, serialist technique (and its results), as presented through the characters of the novel is about as far away from any realization of 'what it really is' as could be, all moralizing and moaning about the loss of one particular set of sentiments, all reactionary ether with no real ground beneath it... which led Mann to place his composer and contemporary music at the center of the fable of the man who sold his soul to the devil. (It is more than embarrassing when a truly great writer steps in it like Mann did re: modern music, but there it sits.)

Not that I care, but I will point out that you have yet to mention any number of works of Stravinsky, or specifically, musically, 'what is wrong with them.' Then again, you are by admission a lay listener and have any and all real 'rights' to your personal tastes. In a forum dedicated to classical music, with its member base comprised of people like yourself as well as in training young professionals and professionals, it should be no shock to you that well written critiques that are yet without any real pith other than your empiric call on 'what is good,' will get called out.


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## JAS

PetrB said:


> _Yeah: Right._ Talk about an imagined conspiracy / rationale to validate your taste.... Wow. Just 'Wow.'
> 
> Ayep, 'tis an elitist / cognoscenti conspiracy, near one thousand years old, meant to keep the retro-reactionary conservatives at bay and out of the concert halls, since it is of course terrible for the business that an audience might show up.


No, only about 100 years old. Unfortunately, rather than dominate the musical field, they have just mostly made the whole field irrelevant, and with it themselves as well. The audience is mostly gone.



PetrB said:


> Or maybe that establishment actually has the insider dope on 'what is good music,' and some of the general public is attached more by mere emotional sentiment (vs any other well-qualified reason) to the music of one era or another.


An experienced listener may have more insights to offer than an inexperienced one. But none of the self-avowed experienced listeners, and advocates, of Stravinsky have provided a solid defense of his music as "good" any more than anyone else has provided a solid attack on it as "bad." (Some of the specific details provided are somewhat interesting in and of themselves.) Although one may generically assume that "good" is "I like or admire" and "bad" is the opposite.These subjective terms are probably of little value in this discussion. Again, I think this is the wrong framing for the discussion. You are much too focused on the false idea of a winner and loser.



PetrB said:


> *Dissonance is entirely subjective and contextual, as are any emotive reactions anyone might have in association with consonance or dissonance.* Fact is, _relative consonance and dissonance are conceits, along with the diatonic scale, 'tonality,' leading tones, and all the rest of it._


Contextual, perhaps, but really subjective? Is there no defined criteria or measurement to reflect dissonance? I believe some studies have been done on the effect of dissonance, so some measure must be necessary. The assumption that consonance and dissonance are mere conceits is absurd. How could there be so much discussion of something that no one can hear?



PetrB said:


> If it is a 'level of dissonance' which finds you in or out, that is more a matter of your capacity of how many herbs and spices your personal palate can handle / you choose to handle; it is no way a valid measure of a piece of music being 'good,' or 'bad.'


Ah, capacity . . . again, a baldfaced and unmerited attempt to assert a higher ability for those who like dissonance. At best, it is merely a different taste, not better, and presumably also not worse, although not so widely shared.



PetrB said:


> "Appeal to the heart" is an entirely subjective and by the seat of your pants way to go at art. It might surprise you that for me, Stravinsky's music does appeal to me first on a wholly emotional and visceral level, while I also find it 'vital' while being intellectually engaging as well: this is a fundamental enjoyment quite the opposite of your maintained 'people like this stuff because they think it gives them an intellectual gloss,' (more telling about you than anything else while still being patently absurd.)


Visceral, I would believe without hesitation. (I also have a visceral response to an unexpected car horn.) Emotional? Well, I can accept that also on some level, but "appealing to the heart" I cannot accept, and I suspect Stravinsky would reject your suggestion as well. My recollection is that he lambasted sentiment of any kind in music on more than one occasion.



PetrB said:


> That is quite the opposite of your apparent need to parse it out as hollow academic, hollow technical exercises -- 'interesting' in the light of what you say you do not know about music. That particular critique sounds more like the 'sour grapes' retort of someone who feels 'left out' because there is prominent good press around something they do not care for or understand. It also sounds like a cribbed precis of the anti-serialism arguments as presented in Thomas Mann's novel, "Doktor Faustus."


It might be interesting if it were true. I think you are mistaken on this point, as just noted, and while Stravinsky has his supporters, that support if very shallow.



PetrB said:


> Not that I care, but I will point out that you have yet to mention any number of works of Stravinsky, or specifically, musically, 'what is wrong with them.' Then again, you are by admission a lay listener and have any and all real 'rights' to your personal tastes. In a forum dedicated to classical music, with its member base comprised of people like yourself as well as in training young professionals and professionals, it should be no shock to you that well written critiques that are yet without any real pith other than your empiric call on 'what is good,' will get called out.


Get called out? Who on either side has been called out? We are merely having a discussion about a disagreement. As far as I can tell, neither side has scored any particular points, nor was I attempting to do so. There is no winner in this discussion. It is either a successful exploration or not. The use of specific examples would almost certainly be of benefit in the discussion if there were any signs that there might be any benefit based on those who have shown an interest. That does not appear to be the case. You, in particular, are no more interested in saying anything than you are in hearing it. You just want your position to be "right." I am not asserting my position as "right." It is merely my position, but by no means as unsubstantiated as you might like to pretend.


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## Guest

Cognitive Dissonance (sour grapes) is often a factor in musical appreciation because it is perceived as the prerogative of the intelligentsia. For me, this is a feature of the current avant garde rather than kunstmusik in general. Snobbery has always hung around serious music (many art forms, actually) and a reason why many people have 'legged it' (moved away), as we say in Australia. 

Stravinsky is a mainstream composer these days. If the cognoscenti waxes lyrical about Stravinsky it will be because of his abilities as an orchestrator (fabulous) and his early ballets, IMO. I think PB's analogy with 'herbs and spices' is an excellent one as there are many similarities between food and music!! 

We don't all have to like everything! I dislike Bruckner and Mahler but I recognize their importance in the canon. For me they are too discursive and rambling. Purely a personal response.

Rameau and his dissonances! Yes, and what about JS Bach!! Wunderbah.


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## Mahlerian

JAS said:


> No, only about 100 years old. Unfortunately, rather than dominate the musical field, they have just mostly made the whole field irrelevant, and with it themselves as well. The audience is mostly gone.


Even if Stravinsky did drive audiences away, what about the numerous composers who have brought them in? Copland, Glass, Harris, Schuman?



JAS said:


> An experienced listener may have more insights to offer than an inexperienced one. But none of the self-avowed experienced listeners, and advocates, of Stravinsky have provided a solid defense of his music as "good" any more than anyone else has provided a solid attack on it as "bad." (Some of the specific details provided are somewhat interesting in and of themselves.) Although one may generically assume that "good" is "I like or admire" and "bad" is the opposite.These subjective terms are probably of little value in this discussion. Again, I think this is the wrong framing for the discussion. You are much too focused on the false idea of a winner and loser.


A number of us have told you what we enjoy about Stravinsky's music. Its rhythms, its color, its melodic and harmonic inventiveness, all put it in the realm of the greats. I could bring up specific examples if you really wish.



JAS said:


> Contextual, perhaps, but really subjective? Is there no defined criteria or measurement to reflect dissonance? I believe some studies have been done on the effect of dissonance, so some measure must be necessary. The assumption that consonance and dissonance are mere conceits is absurd. How could there be so much discussion of something that no one can hear?


Yes, and anyone who doesn't understand why a dominant 13th is used to express the utmost tension in Bruckner's 9th and the utmost relaxation in Debussy really understands nothing about the nature of dissonance and consonance.



JAS said:


> Ah, capacity . . . again, a baldfaced and unmerited attempt to assert a higher ability for those who like dissonance. At best, it is merely a different taste, not better, and presumably also not worse, although not so widely shared.


Okay, then, stop arguing for your position, if it's equal in stature to ours. Who cares how many people share it? Classical music of any kind is a minority interest.



JAS said:


> Visceral, I would believe without hesitation. (I also have a visceral response to an unexpected car horn.) Emotional? Well, I can accept that also on some level, but "appealing to the heart" I cannot accept, and I suspect Stravinsky would reject your suggestion as well. My recollection is that he lambasted sentiment of any kind in music on more than one occasion.


Do you prefer Schoenberg, then? He wrote an essay on the balance of "Heart" and "Mind" in music, and continued to believe in expression (hence expressionism), carrying on the Romantic forms of expression.



JAS said:


> Get called out? Who on either side has been called out? We are merely having a discussion about a disagreement. As far as I can tell, neither side has scored any particular points, nor was I attempting to do so. There is no winner in this discussion. It is either a successful exploration or not. The use of specific examples would almost certainly be of benefit in the discussion if there were any signs that there might be any benefit based on those who have shown an interest. That does not appear to be the case. You, in particular, are no more interested in saying anything than you are in hearing it. You just want your position to be "right." I am not asserting my position as "right." It is merely my position, but by no means as unsubstantiated as you might like to pretend.


You have not only disagreed with us, you have denied that we even _can_ enjoy the music the way we say we do. That's not asserting your position's correctness?


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## JAS

Mahlerian said:


> Even if Stravinsky did drive audiences away, what about the numerous composers who have brought them in? Copland, Glass, Harris, Schuman?


Copland has kept some seats in the concert audience. Glass, ummmm, I think not so much. (Here the incessant repetitive nature of his music, his earlier music at least, drove quite a few to leave more than one concert in which I was sitting.) The others, I doubt very much have made any discernible impact on the audience. But weren't we discussing Stravinsky? I do think that it is interesting that I can play a CD of a Beethoven symphony for people who are not really more than causally acquainted with symphonic music, and they will generally be willing to sit through the whole thing. They will find it overly long, being much more accustomed to 3-5 minute songs, and they may find much of it boring, but at least some of it will get a favorable response. If I play later Stravinsky works, the response is consistently one of "turn that off." Surely there is something reasonably objective going on here. Isn't that at all interesting?



Mahlerian said:


> A number of us have told you what we enjoy about Stravinsky's music. Its rhythms, its color, its melodic and harmonic inventiveness, all put it in the realm of the greats. I could bring up specific examples if you really wish.


And such details I acknowledged as being of interest, though I would not concede the idea that it puts him in the realm of greats. But again, this is a distraction, advocating a position beyond what can be reasonably established. Specific examples, I as noted before, would probably be of interest, but I don't see this discussion being worth your taking the time. (And let it be noted that I was replying to someone other than you. There is no reason why you should not respond, but do not that my complaints were aimed chiefly in the direction of the person to whom I was responding.)



Mahlerian said:


> Yes, and anyone who doesn't understand why a dominant 13th is used to express the utmost tension in Bruckner's 9th and the utmost relaxation in Debussy really understands nothing about the nature of dissonance and consonance.


But you do not deny that these things, dissonance and consonance, exist.



Mahlerian said:


> Okay, then, stop arguing for your position, if it's equal in stature to ours. Who cares how many people share it? Classical music of any kind is a minority interest.


In the context of replying to the posts to which I was responding, a little defense seemed quite appropriate. (In other words, the conversation necessarily drifted somewhat in that direction because that was the way the conversation was being directed. I was responding in kind, although also trying to steer it back more to the topic at hand.) Of course I am an advocate for my position, just as I expect you to be an advocate for yours, and the discussion will necessarily touch on such matters from time to time. I just think that overall, "right" and "wrong" are inappropriate frames. Even a comment on popularity isn't really intended as a statement of "rightness." It seems to me merely a fact that audiences have never warmed to Stravinsky's music, beyond a few of the early ballets, in anything like the way that they warmed to Beethoven. What precisely that says about the music, or the audience, is subject to discussion.



Mahlerian said:


> Do you prefer Schoenberg, then? He wrote an essay on the balance of "Heart" and "Mind" in music, and continued to believe in expression (hence expressionism), carrying on the Romantic forms of expression.


Outside of a few of his early works, I have never found any satisfying response to Schoenberg's music, but have not felt compelled to examine it very far. But were we discussing Schoenberg?



Mahlerian said:


> You have not only disagreed with us, you have denied that we even _can_ enjoy the music the way we say we do. That's not asserting your position's correctness?


I am disagreeing with the choice of words used, which I think have misrepresented the case. In visual arts, I have lots of people, sometimes including the artist, make lots of claims about what is "in" the work, mostly just to associate some words with positive connotations to their work, or to assert the presence of something that in response to a criticism of its absence. You assert a beauty in work that seems to me ugly, a somewhat problematic situation without using specific examples. If the gulf between our positions is so great that even words with common meanings do not mean what they usually mean, then there is no hope.


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## PetrB

Really, whether you are a professional musician zealous in advocacy of modern music or a retro-reactionary conservative lay listener, a simple matter of opinion one way or the other should not need to take nearly the time or column space so far taken with this subject.

At this point, of countless (imho sophomoric) constructs trying to self-validate your personal opinion, (we get it, it is an opinion, ergo, for the holder of said opinion, valid.) None of that requires a reliable footnoted source to back it up, because it is just... opinion.

Now it is, as it should be, between you and the composer's work.

Apollo, for string orchestra













Violin Concerto, 3rd mvmt, Aria II





Concerto in Eb, "Dumbarton Oaks'


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## JAS

PetrB said:


> Really, whether you are a professional musician zealous in advocacy of modern music or a retro-reactionary conservative lay listener, a simple matter of opinion one way or the other should not need to take nearly the time or column space so far taken with this subject.
> 
> At this point, of countless (imho sophomoric) constructs trying to self-validate your personal opinion, (we get it, it is an opinion, ergo, for the holder of said opinion, valid.) None of that requires a reliable footnoted source to back it up, because it is just... opinion.


Oh, for heavens sake. I am sorry to have interrupted your navel gazing. I had hoped that it might be possible to have a more elevated discussion, but apparently the rules of the internet apply even here. The three of four of you can just go back to whispering sweet nothings in your own ears.

I'm done. Feel free to have the last word if you like . . . I might or might not read it, but I won't reply.


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## PetrB

CountenanceAnglaise said:


> I want to contextualize my comments and say that Beethoven didn't want to write his later works as "readily accessible" either. In fact, he ruthlessly disregarded what musicians were capable of - towards the end of his life. He said he was writing for the 'future' (later ages).
> 
> When Schonberg developed his serial system (which process was already underway and he 'codified' it: in that sense he was a latter day Guido of Arezza!!) he wasn't necessarily thinking, "I want to continue the mellifluous sounds of Johann Strauss Jnr"! He saw that the train was coming and wanted to provide the tracks which would keep it 'on the rails' permanently.
> 
> I don't think that art and music of the 20th century period represented 'ugliness' at all, as suggested by JAS. It's a good discussion to have. The music of Webern and Berg is exceptionally beautiful, with Berg full of the most lush romanticism IMO. Things WERE going to be different after two world wars - look at Satre, Beckett, Pinter just as very few examples. There was a different mindset, with new possibilities explored. And those 'possibilites' opened up a dazzling new way of thinking about and experiencing music. Sure, when we get to the avant garde period later in the century (or even earlier, with musique concrete - don't make me tell you my joke about that!!) things go over the top. When you take the emotional content out of music there isn't a lot left IMO. Having said that, there seem to be people who enjoy music stripped of its emotional possibilities and they're allowed to have that experience.
> 
> If you're interested in exploring Berg's music and his use of 'serialism' I'd recommend an excellent book, "Alban Berg and His World". But, of course, Berg died before WW2 - so his music is already 'old'.
> 
> And 'classical' music (I prefer kunstmusik) isn't for everybody anyway. It was never meant to 'appeal' to everybody - in fact, in the Medieval period it was quite arcane.


It was Beethoven, who could not at all bank on being alive fifty years hence when he said it, who said that he did not care if it took fifty years until a piece he had written got heard, or understood. That is _not_ the frame of mind of a 'populist' composer, lol.


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## KenOC

PetrB said:


> It was Beethoven, who could not at all bank on being alive fifty years hence when he said it, who said that he did not care if it took fifty years until a piece he had written got heard, or understood. That is _not_ the frame of mind of a 'populist' composer, lol.


Well, Beethoven wrote what publishers could sell (thus the late quartets). And he always -- ALWAYS -- read his reviews! He even wrote a short notice to one of the music rags in his earlier years complaining about the bad reviews they were giving his music at the time (which they published). He said that of course he had no concern over what they wrote, but that sort of thing might discourage younger up-and-coming composers... :lol:


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## Cheyenne

JAS said:


> Copland has kept some seats in the concert audience. Glass, ummmm, I think not so much. (Here the incessant repetitive nature of his music, his earlier music at least, drove quite a few to leave more than one concert in which I was sitting.) The others, I doubt very much have made any discernible impact on the audience. But weren't we discussing Stravinsky? I do think that it is interesting that I can play a CD of a Beethoven symphony for people who are not really more than causally acquainted with symphonic music, and they will generally be willing to sit through the whole thing. They will find it overly long, being much more accustomed to 3-5 minute songs, and they may find much of it boring, but at least some of it will get a favorable response. If I play later Stravinsky works, the response is consistently one of "turn that off." Surely there is something reasonably objective going on here. Isn't that at all interesting?


Yes, and similarly my mother will gladly hum _The Waltz of the Flowers_ when she hears it in some film or tv show, but forbids me to play Schnittke when she's around, finding it 'melancholy' (the adjective used entirely on its own, as if that itself was necessarily a bad thing) and dark; shrill, demented, schizophrenic, and so on and so forth. I predict that if I were to present her first with _Waiting for Godot_ and then with _The Decameròn_, she would find the former pretentious, frigid: abstract to the point of meaninglessness; but she would find solace in the apparent simplicity of the stories of the latter. These are both great works, and they are both to be admired: should I care one bit that my mother will like _The Decameròn_ more?

You talk of objectivity, but to find it, you go to the uninitiated; is that really fair? Does a wider appeal - among those who will likely dismiss it anyway - really matter? And indeed, no matter how much my mother may enjoy humming _The Waltz of the Flowers_, she will likely never go any further, and stick to her pop music - and, I should add, her cheap thrillers. The only problem is that concert attendance numbers have diminished, but that can be attributed to far more than the advent of modernism in classical music, which I do not see as the main cause - the backbone of the concerts remain the classic works, after all. (This is so egregious that there have been several protests by young composers, calling for more new music to be played by large orchestras.)


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese

Glad to see we are discussing Stravinsky again !


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## Guest

Some comments have been made on this topic which are worthy of development. Firstly, consonance and dissonance are SIMULTANEOUSLY objective and subjective. It is possible to listen to Rameau, Schutz, Monteverdi and Bach today and hear no dissonance at all because of our experiences of tonality. One can analyze a score and say, "wow; look at that cheeky harmonic progression and it's lack of 'resolution'; its permanent 'suspense' in the air. This, of course, is a major feature of modality itself - it always sounds unresolved to modern ears". So, what we are used to informs our own subjective responses.

Secondly, Stravinsky isn't a niche composer with few acolytes. He's an internationally recognized innovator and musical genius. Look at the Russian school before Stravinsky and, with the exception of the chronically under-rated and schizophrenic Scriabin, the field looked pretty tonal and unadventurous. Prokofiev, the 'enfant terrible', was around at the same time as Stravinsky and his astringent piano pieces are daring and wonderful. But Stravinsky changed the way we thought about orchestration and musical idiom. 

Thirdly, you suggest Copland "has kept some seats in the concert audience". In fact, Copland went through a 'populist' period during the 1930's when the USA was in the midst of depression. He has vastly more cache that you give him credit for - both in terms of his works which deal with post-tonality and his more lyrical expressions of the American musical idiom. And, of course, he wrote film music!! That gets 'bums on seats' through a different medium.


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## Guest

tdc said:


> I don't question Stravinsky's greatness, or dislike him, but I personally don't agree with the commonly held idea that he was the greatest composer of the 20th century, or that he was comparable to a Bach of the 20th century. For one thing Bach excelled (among many other areas) in compositions for solo instruments, an area Stravinsky was relatively weak in.


Well, that's fine, if your definition of 'greatness' is to do with virtuosity and versatility. But if you're looking for originality, inventiveness, emotion, you might look elsewhere for 'greatness'.

Just for the record, I'm not claiming that Stravinsky is 'great', just putting an alternative view to the notion that Bach is great because he excelled in composition for solo.



JAS said:


> You assert a beauty in work that seems to me ugly, a somewhat problematic situation without using specific examples. If the gulf between our positions is so great that even words with common meanings do not mean what they usually mean, then there is no hope.


How is it problematic to find something ugly that someone else finds beautiful? It might be 'problematic' if one built an argument for greatness or irrelevance on the basis of an aesthetic perception...

Wait a minute...that is what some seem to be doing...!

Houston...Houston...? We have a-



Cheyenne said:


> The only problem is that concert attendance numbers have diminished, but that can be attributed to far more than the advent of modernism in classical music, which I do not see as the main cause


And the main cause is? Presumably, the rise of more readily digestible popular music, the long-playing record, TV, The Beatles etc etc?


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## PetrB

Novelette said:


> What always amazes me about Stravinsky, and I will only use the Sacre du Printemps as an example because it's probably his most well-known work, is this:
> 
> Can you imagine having these radical acoustic moments in mind and struggling to translate them into notation? I know the score well, and while I'm fairly good at musical dictation, I couldn't for the life of me put even a moment of that monument onto score. It is rather like conjuring a completely novel theory and having to invent radically the mathematic constructs to characterize it. Needless to say, it takes a very versatile genius to be able to compose such a compelling narration of primitivism.
> 
> Like his music or not, I hope we can agree on that point, at least.
> 
> His personal quirks are only amusing and paint Stravinsky as a colorful person, in my reckoning.


Apart from an elitist tendency for very Parisienne styled barbed 'bon mots,' and being both highly intelligent and fluid in French, there are a host of less than flattering comments about other composers, musicians, etc.... there was an overall underlying true humility in this composer. Rather like Bach giving credit to the creator for both his talent and what he made of it, Stravinsky held a similar view of his gifts and his work.

He said that he was 'the vessel through which Le Sacre passed.' This is radically polarized compared to that type of creative who says, 'Look what I thunk up -- aren't I brilliant!?"

He also said that one can not accept a compliment on ones talent, because talent is a gift for which the recipient can take no credit.

He loved, yes absolutely loved, music, knew truckloads of it across all the eras very well, and he loved making it. He was both delighted and grateful to be a composer who worked almost continually, because he did love what he was doing and was more than aware that a lot of luck was involved.

When there were criticisms for his supposed "sacrilege" done in the re-working of the music of Pergolesi (and others) into the sparkling ebullient jewel of the score of _Pulcinella_, (_the first truly neoclassical work which occasioned both the genre, the genre label_) his response in how he thought of Pergolesi vs. how his critics were reacting was, "You respect, but I love.'

Stravinsky was also a reviser... many of those revisions occasioned by the loss of copyright due to the policies of the post Tzarist regime: in some instances, he merely changed some bar lines or metrics here or there to qualify for new copyright. Most of the revisions, however, are actual revisions, in each instance cleaning up, clarifying, and improving the work. About half way or further along in his career, he said he could happily just revise his older works.

Such revisions are not the act or expression of a comfortably assured and smug artist, and apart from the economic necessity of regaining ownership of the copyright (he could have just changed the metrics on each revision and called it a day), he was always humble in the face of competing with excellence. Were that more in any profession were closer to Stravinsky in towing that mark 

By many verified reports, he could be insufferable as well. Sigh, another truly dimensional and flawed being, like Mozart, Beethoven, etc. -- what a shocker, eh?


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## PetrB

KenOC said:


> Well, Beethoven wrote what publishers could sell (thus the late quartets). And he always -- ALWAYS -- read his reviews! He even wrote a short notice to one of the music rags in his earlier years complaining about the bad reviews they were giving his music at the time (which they published). He said that of course he had no concern over what they wrote, but that sort of thing might discourage younger up-and-coming composers... :lol:


.... and a certain Luigi's income, always scrabbling for those Groschen and pfennigs


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## Guest

"Always humble in the face of competing with excellence". Apposite. And that 'excellence' related to the composer himself and a belief that he could do it better, hence the revisions.


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## PetrB

Xaltotun said:


> I totally get what you're saying, and I certainly know about all the valid criticisms that can be made to Romantic and Enlightenment thinking and utopias... but I still want those things in my music and my art in general


Ahhh, an escapist, seeking refuge in the glamor (_glamor = false magic_) of the notions of yesteryears.

...just pulling your leg, half-way, and just a little bit.

In a way, I think almost all art lovers are escapists, wanting to find a better, lovelier and more ideal reality than the brick and mortar ones around us which actually exist.

I do think it healthy to be realistic, and know that those noble and elevated works are a collective dream about a reality which did not exist and for which many from those previous eras yearned, and with the greatest of longing: too often people actually think the art from the past literally reflects the reality of the past -- a huge mistake, I think. More like it, it tells us about what they sorely knew was lacking and then hoped for....

Artists are certainly of a stripe: not finding the world to their liking, they create another. Very seductive, one has to admit


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## Guest

And what we want from our music will change: not only over the decades but from day to day, catering for a specific mood and need.


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## PetrB

SamBryant said:


> Also the reason I asked was I was browsing the Worst composers thread http://www.talkclassical.com/249-who-do-you-consider.html, and it seemed like a lot of people were saying Stravinsky. It's a relief that this isn't the majority opinion otherwise I'm not sure I really have a place here.


Now to the hero of the hour: I wonder what you make of this extract of a chronological list of Stravinsky's works, from *The Firebird* to the piece I am curious about as to your reaction, especially if you are unaware of what followed the Rite of Spring, listened to that, and then jumped immediately to -- '*Pulcinella*,'

*The Firebird*, ballet in two scenes, 1909-10
Two Poems of Paul Verlaine, Op. 9, for baritone and piano, 1910
*Petrouschka*, ballet in four scenes, 1910-11
Two Poems by K. Balmont for voice and piano, 1911
The King of the Stars, cantata for men's chorus and orchestra on a poem by K. Balmont, 1911
*The Rite of Spring*, ballet in two parts, 1910-13
Three Poems from the Japanese for soprano, 2 flutes, piccolo, 2 clarinets, bass clarinet, and string quartet, 1912-13
Three Short Songs from the Recollections of Childhood for voice and piano, 1913
*Rossignol*, lyric narrative in three acts, 1908-14
Three Pieces for string quartet, 1914
Pribaoutki, songs for medium voice and 8 instruments, 1914
Three Easy Pieces for piano four hands
The Cat's Cradle Songs: 3 pieces for alto and three clarinets
*Renard*, burlesque narrative to be played, sung and staged, 1915-16
Three Stories for Children, voice and piano, 1915-16
Five Easy Pieces for piano four hands, 1916
Chant du Rossignol, symphonic poem for orchestra, 1917, suite from the second and third acts of his opera Rossignol.)
*Etude for Player Piano 'Hispaniola'*, 1917
Unterschale, Russian peasant songs for women's unaccompanied chorus, 1914-17
L'Histoire du Soldat, to be recited, played, and danced; narrator, 2 speakers, clarinet, bassoon, trumpet, trombone, violin, double bass, and percussion
Rag-Time for 11 instruments: flute, clarinet, horn, cornet, trombone, cymbals, 2 violins, viola, double bass, percussion
Four Russian Songs for voice and piano, 1918-19
Piano-Rag Music, 1919
Three Pieces for Solo Clarinet, 1919
*Pulcinella*, ballet in one act with 3 solo voices, after Pergolesi, 1919





To that 'Stravinsky as the worst composer,' well, many of those who hold that opinion are quite ready to say Stravinsky killed music with that wild and dissonant Rite of Spring. Clearly, they have not heard any of the subsequent works, such as _Pulcinella_ 

[[This is not at all kind or good of me, but one of the least great or interesting composers (one can safely say it is seriously 'bad' music  on record was a business man who spent a lot of money self-promoting his runny / treacley piano compositions, the one (and only, I hope) Richard Nanes. He is the butt of many a joke about 'bad / worse composers,' and I doubt anyone would have ever heard of or from him musically if he had not spent a good deal of money pushing his own work out there: an unperturbed and evidently large and obdurate ego are to blame for his having made himself and his work public. Not allowing for the normal filters and channels to see if his work would gain general acceptance, or rather buying his way in because the works were not accepted, there is little sympathy for such a vanity-produced 'legacy,' or what people make of it.

I will not do either the late Mr. Nanes or music the disservice of posting a link, but a number of links with the composer performing are to be readily found on youtube....]]


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## Cheyenne

MacLeod said:


> And the main cause is? Presumably, the rise of more readily digestible popular music, the long-playing record, TV, The Beatles etc etc?


That it is no longer necessary to go to a concert to hear music; all else has simply evolved around that. Digestible popular music was around far before the 20th century: Mozart's Divertimento, for example, of which he composed several, to '_meet popular demand_', for they were '_easy listening_' (liner notes of Heinz Holliger edition, presumably by Susan Wynne but not very clear). The same can be said of Albinoni's oboe concertos, which he ostensibly rushed for similar reasons; it is unfortunate we do not know more about his later life.

I am not of the opinion that classical music is necessarily particularly 'intellectual', and that in fact the audience would be far bigger if it wasn't shrouded by this air of mystical elitism. Several persons whom I have known personally had a big appetite for film music, which could similarly be satiated by classical music, they just wouldn't know where and how to find it! There a tons of folk that love the imperial march, why not let them hear some Shostakovich: the second movement of the 10th symphony should get them very excited. However, the point of disagreement I was responding to was whether modernism and such was contributing to this veil, that was simply what I was disputing. I did not wish to seem, nor am I, an elitist brat, scowling at 'those youngsters with their silly pop music'. Though, of course, the presence of alternatives has contributed to a decline of market share. Here are the points from my previous, messy post (it was almost 2 o' clock in the night, in my defense) neatly summed up:

1. The advent of modernism has little to do with the decline of popularity of classical music.
2. A given piece's popularity doesn't have much to do with its quality, especially under the uninitiated, for whom the form is foreign.

These were simply in response to JAS's criticism of Stravinsky, which was vague because it was only in reaction to someone's else rather than an autonomous case. As he will not return, I shall rest.


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## tdc

MacLeod said:


> Well, that's fine, if your definition of 'greatness' is to do with virtuosity and versatility. But if you're looking for originality, inventiveness, emotion, you might look elsewhere for 'greatness'.
> 
> Just for the record, I'm not claiming that Stravinsky is 'great', just putting an alternative view to the notion that Bach is great because he excelled in composition for solo.


Well, my point was actually just that Stravinsky and Bach strike me as quite different as composers, not that Bach was great just because he excelled at solo compositions. For the record I think Bach's virtuosity was just a very small part of why he was great.

For example Paganini and Liszt were very virtuosic and wrote for solo instruments, where Wagner by contrast did not play an instrument well, and didn't really write (anything to my knowledge) for solo instruments, yet I would still consider Wagner a "greater" composer than Paganini or Liszt.


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## Guest

tdc said:


> Well, my point was actually just that Stravinsky and Bach strike me as quite different as composers, not that Bach was great just because he excelled at solo compositions. For the record I think Bach's virtuosity was just a very small part of why he was great.
> 
> For example Paganini and Liszt were very virtuosic and wrote for solo instruments, where Wagner by contrast did not play an instrument well, and didn't really write (anything to my knowledge) for solo instruments, yet I would still consider Wagner a "greater" composer than Paganini or Liszt.


Mmmm. I don't think Richard Wagner wrote much apart from operas. The "Siegfried Idyll" is pleasant enough, but the rest of Wagner is just over the top. The thing which gets me about it is the total lack of 'charisma' and humour in his work - an accurate reflection of the composer. Have any of you sat through some of those dismal "Ring" works? Endless hours of it. As George Cukor once observed about his film, "A Star is Born", and the producers' desire to augment it: "There's only so much the human **** can tolerate".:lol:

BTW, I'm not suggesting that Wagner wasn't an excellent composer - his lietmotifs are superb as are the tectonic shifts in the harmonics; it just doesn't appeal to me, that's all. Part of the problem, for me, is the endlessly delayed cadence points. Even in that superb aria at the end of "Tristan".


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## Guest

Cheyenne said:


> That it is no longer necessary to go to a concert to hear music; all else has simply evolved around that.


But you said the decline in audiences "_can be attributed to far more than the advent of modernism in classical music, which I do not see as the main cause"_ So, you say your main cause, but that doesn't seem to be 'far more': am I being picky?



Cheyenne said:


> Digestible popular music was around far before the 20th century: Mozart's Divertimento, for example, of which he composed several, to '_meet popular demand_', for they were '_easy listening_' (liner notes of Heinz Holliger edition, presumably by Susan Wynne but not very clear). The same can be said of Albinoni's oboe concertos, which he ostensibly rushed for similar reasons; it is unfortunate we do not know more about his later life.


That depends, I guess, on your interpretation of 'digestible' and 'popular'. Did Mozart write a 3 minute love song for guitar and drums which sold around the world in recorded form? In any case, it was the ready availability on a massive scale of 'pop' that I was really referring to - my list of reasons was not meant to be exhaustive, just illustrative.



Cheyenne said:


> Several persons whom I have known personally had a big appetite for film music, which could similarly be satiated by classical music, they just wouldn't know where and how to find it!


Difficult to test that one. I would argue that most of those who like film music like the films they are connected with. I'd be surprised if anyone built up a collection of film music on its own merits.



Cheyenne said:


> 1. The advent of modernism has little to do with the decline of popularity of classical music.
> 2. A given piece's popularity doesn't have much to do with its quality, especially under the uninitiated, for whom the form is foreign.


I'd agree with both of these points.



tdc said:


> Well, my point was actually just that Stravinsky and Bach strike me as quite different as composers, not that Bach was great just because he excelled at solo compositions. For the record I think Bach's virtuosity was just a very small part of why he was great.


And yet you specifically posted that you didn't count Stravinsky as great because, unlike Bach, he didn't write for solo!?


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## Guest

May I weigh in on the discussion about diminishing audiences for kunsmusik? The avant garde has some case to answer in this regard, but certainly not modernism and post-tonal music. But once we have string quartets which sound like a 'helicopter' and sound design which passes for music, IMO, Huston we have a problem....

But audiences, from my experience, love the music of the modernists and grow bored of the same repertoire repeated endlessly. I spoke to a young man at the Musikverein in Vienna in 2011 and he said, "we're up for anything here in Vienna". I think this is true to a certain extent, but they are also deeply conservative. The younger audiences are the ones to which my concert-going friend was referring. 

The modern, reduced attention span is a significant reason for the decline in listening skills. The 3 minute pop song also has a case to answer, but unquestionably the vast amounts of landfill which pass for popular culture have resulted in a war of attrition against more serious, demanding art forms. I cry about it every day - especially when I know I can mostly get excellent seats in the house!!! (Except for the Vienna Abonnements for which there is a 13 year waiting list for some of these!).


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## tdc

MacLeod said:


> And yet you specifically posted that you didn't count Stravinsky as great because, unlike Bach, he didn't write for solo!?


No, I did not post that, if you re-read what I posted one of the first things I wrote was actually that *I do not dispute Stravinsky's greatness*. I had two points I was trying to make, the first being that although I consider Stravinsky great, I don't consider him to be better than some of the other big name composers of the 20th century such as Debussy, Bartok, Ravel, and Ives for example who I feel were all equally as great.

*My second point had nothing to do with greatness *, I simply stated that I don't agree with the idea that Stravinsky was the Bach of the 20th century,* because the two composers (in my opinion) were quite different. I repeat my second point was not about stating that Bach was great and that Stravinsky was not great I was just highlighting some areas in which they were different. *


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## Minona

Some people perhaps prefer more organic continuity, and perhaps not so much what they perceive as psychitzoid... ("one minute it's a polka, the next a foxy trott in 7/8 ....aren't I so clever???!!!" ...style music. 

I love it all personally, but not for breakfast. My only dislike is oversized orchestras with everything from an absurdly large double bass to an irritating piccolo flute playing trills. Too many cooks. Less be more, etc.


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## Guest

tdc said:


> No, I did not post that, if you re-read what I posted one of the first things I wrote was actually that *I do not dispute Stravinsky's greatness*. I had two points I was trying to make, the first being that although I consider Stravinsky great, I don't consider him to be better than some of the other big name composers of the 20th century such as Debussy, Bartok, Ravel, and Ives for example who I feel were all equally as great.
> 
> *My second point had nothing to do with greatness *, I simply stated that I don't agree with the idea that Stravinsky was the Bach of the 20th century,* because the two composers (in my opinion) were quite different. I repeat my second point was not about stating that Bach was great and that Stravinsky was not great I was just highlighting some areas in which they were different. *


Ok. Obviously, that's not the way I read your posts. Thanks for clarifying.


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