# Emotional banality and bad taste pomposity



## aleazk

When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremelly sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring. I think it is the musical equivalent of this:










Typical examples of this musical abomination are, for me:

Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1: 




My God!... that introduction... the tea was already sugared but you added a Coke to it!. Not good for your blood glucose level I can assure you!.

Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3: 




A beautiful and masterly constructed movement... but, did the good old Sergei drop his saccharin tablets over the score at 23:04?. Such a wonderful built up ending in that wounded dog climax... a great opening theme for the next soap opera, that's for sure...

:tiphat:

Take a composer with an extremely refined and good taste like Schumann:

Schumann - Piano Concerto: 




The climax at 30:24 shows that one can be sentimental without the need of all those cheap resources.


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## StlukesguildOhio

Nonsense........


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## Crudblud

StlukesguildOhio said:


> Nonsense........


This is a substantial and well thought out argument.


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## Weston

Not entirely nonsense. I sometimes feel the same way about that style of music -- but not all the time. Often I can go ahead and suspend my aversion to the over-the-top bombast and just wallow in it along with the composers. Tastes change. You have to take it in the context of its time in order to not be embarrassed. For example I would probably best listen to the Tchaikovsky Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture with its cliched love theme in private. And not too loudly.


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## aleazk

Nevermind............................. (I misinterpreted something!)


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## mmsbls

Obviously tastes vary. I can see someone describing that music along the lines of "their dramatic content so overly exaggerated", but for me I find the Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff simply beautiful. Yes, they differ from Schumann or Mozart, but all I ask of a composition is that I find it beautiful and/or moving and/or interesting, etc. The Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff satisfy me. I guess I like sugar.


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## PetrB

aleazk said:


> When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremely sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring.
> 
> Typical examples of this musical abomination are, for me:
> 
> Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My God!... that introduction... the tea was already sugared but you added a Coke to it!. Not good for your blood glucose level I can assure you!.
> 
> Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A beautiful and masterly constructed movement... but, did the good old Sergei drop his saccharin tablets over the score at 23:04?. Such a wonderful built up ending in that wounded dog climax... a great opening theme for the next soap opera, that's for sure...
> 
> :tiphat:
> 
> Take a composer with an extremely refined and good taste like Schumann:
> 
> Schumann - Piano Concerto:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The climax at 30:24 shows that one can be sentimental without the need of all those cheap resources.


LOL -- already one vote that the content of your post is nonsense........

I find it no less nonsensical as the diabetic coma which such music can actually induce, create, endangering both the listener, and the sound system, if it is being played from a recording.

There is no reasoning this, just like some people automatically react to ______ tonality or repertoire as making them nervous, uncomfortable, etc.

That late romantic age was, I think, sincere in its perceptions and what it at least thought it was expressing. To some, not much later (I am one of them) their preoccupation with longing, death, weltschmertz, angst, unrequited love -- did I mention death yet -- loss, and the other preoccupation with expressing both an idea of "Glory" and that other preoccupation, "Gigantism" are more than difficult for later 20th century listeners to take, _or take at all in earnest anyway._

I am one of those who can only admire the craft and be completely repelled or uninterested in what those works are, their mechanics, their harmonic provinces, and what to me can also be serious over-engineering (a German trait to this day.)

Ergo - the most profoundly intended and more than well-written pieces from that era sound to me exaggeratedly overblown, excessive... and more than just a little vaguely ridiculous.

I've never responded well to just about all of the larger works by anyone post Schumann until Mahler came onto the scene.

Barring the first cliche ballet experience of the Nutcracker, and being at least moderately convinced of the effectiveness of Sleeping Beauty _as a theater piece_, not a standalone score -- I can not, literally, bear to listen to Tchaikovsky... nor any Rachmaninoff (not romantic by date, actually modernist throughout as per vocabulary, but retro romantic.)

The undeniably great Liszt and Chopin -- the avant garde of their time -- don't do it for me either, though I have nothing but sincere near hero-worship for the rowdy and intensely advanced music of Chopin, which I consider as far more interesting to play than to listen to: as for Liszt, it is only admiration and -- almost nothing else.

That particular envelope of repertoire, save for not ironically the smaller and more intimate chamber music, songs, when these composers were not so deliberately overt and self-consciously trying to "express themselves" or calculatedly trying to manipulate the listener into "Feeling this specific emotion," is pretty much a wash for me.

This particular take _(Aleazk, pay heed)_ also made me conclude I am mostly or almost exclusively a classicist, and that is my aesthetic rudder and thermometer if music is healthy for me to consume and will hold my interest.

I think of those several generations of romantic composers as the "First Wave Emo / Screamo" before it was ever a notion in late 20th century pop music, which I think is also music (and lyric content) verging on the egregiously self-indulgent.

If music had not gone through this progression, we would not have had the resulting development of the high chromatic, nor the subsequent developments in the turns of later modernism, the reaction against the late romantic being part of that. Music and how it grew through history could not have been what it became in the 20th century without these composers, but I happily avoid them.

"Cheap sentiment" is exactly how I evaluate the emotional import of much of it. Its a serious lacuna in what many a music lover enjoys, nearly a whole era. But there it is. I know "what I'm missing," and it is not necessarily a chip in my brain that others have which I lack. Too, I sometimes think once my lack of preference (to put it very mildly) for this repertoire is known to others it leads people to think I'm without any emotional capacity or devoid of empathy, or cold, which is not, I can vouch, any logical conclusion based on the fact of my lack of preference for that repertoire.

A concert pianist pal, knowing my taste, asked, "C'mon, now. When you hear that opening horn call in Brahms' first piano concerto, don't you want to kill yourself, just the least little bit?" (meaning of course, go down the path of north European melancholy, feel that ache for knowing an era and way of life you were fond of was about to go away forever, and all that.)
I said, "Sure, but not for the reasons you would. I'd feel like killing myself just a little bit because I know I'm in for forty minutes of Brahms.'


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## Sid James

Only point I'd make is the Russian tradition tends towards more colourful orchestration and heart on sleeve emotion compared to the West Europeans. Also note the profound impact on many Russian composers of their own choral traditions and also the numerous church bells which where spotted all around the country. Its different to Schumann or Beethoven for that matter as say French music is to German/Austrian or Spanish music to say British. Different cultural contexts, different histories, different traditions. Not arguing they're completely separate though!


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## aleazk

I guess I'm a classicist too. Which is interesting because I'm not a big fan of Mozart et all. But I realized I'm very fond of certain ideas and aesthetic notions from that period, what I don't like is the actual content of their music (CPT, silly sounding appoggiaturas, etc.). But keep the structure and replace the content with modal and chromatic harmony and I will be all ears.


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## Guest

Watching Kent Nagano yesterday - Bruckner's 8th Symphony - similar thoughts crossed my mind: 'wrought' certainly': 'overwrought' probably. Perhaps I just wasn't in the mood ( just moved house for the second time in 5 months!).


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## moody

Weston said:


> Not entirely nonsense. I sometimes feel the same way about that style of music -- but not all the time. Often I can go ahead and suspend my aversion to the over-the-top bombast and just wallow in it along with the composers. Tastes change. You have to take it in the context of its time in order to not be embarrassed. For example I would probably best listen to the Tchaikovsky Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture with its cliched love theme in private. And not too loudly.


Please give us a break.


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## moody

MacLeod said:


> Watching Kent Nagano yesterday - Bruckner's 8th Symphony - similar thoughts crossed my mind: 'wrought' certainly': 'overwrought' probably. Perhaps I just wasn't in the mood ( just moved house for the second time in 5 months!).


I usually fall asleep to Bruckner,are you on the run or something?


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## moody

aleazk said:


> I guess I'm a classicist too. Which is interesting because I'm not a big fan of Mozart et all. But I realized I'm very fond of certain ideas and aesthetic notions from that period, what I don't like is the actual content of their music (CPT, silly sounding appoggiaturas, etc.). But keep the structure and replace the content with modal and chromatic harmony and I will be all ears.


What do you like,I know sowing machine stuff.
I love over the top,emotional,loud music. Give me Tchaikovsky,Rachmaninoff,R.Strauss,Mahler,etc. weepy tear jerking lieder and Victorian ballads,Irish songs sung by John MacCormack, Liszt,Gottschalk,Brahms piano concertos-fantastic. 
You might not believe it but some people listen to music for its emotion.


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## Couchie

A little caution please when extolling your love of subtlety, or you'll take somebody's eye out. 

Schumann is ok. It's the sort of thing you can listen to without worrying about upsetting your tea.


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## aleazk

Couchie said:


> A little caution please when extolling your love of subtlety, or you'll take somebody's eye out.
> 
> Schumann is ok. It's the sort of thing you can listen to without worrying about upsetting your tea.


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## PetrB

moody said:


> What do you like,I know sowing machine stuff.
> I love over the top,emotional,loud music. Give me Tchaikovsky,Rachmaninoff,R.Strauss,Mahler,etc. weepy tear jerking lieder and Victorian ballads,Irish songs sung by John MacCormack, Liszt,Gottschalk,Brahms piano concertos-fantastic.
> You might not believe it but some people listen to music for its emotion.


Is the 'sowing' machine deliberate or do you mean 'Sewing Machine?'



moody said:


> You might not believe it but some people listen to music for its emotion.


You might not believe it, but some people get all those sensations and emotions you listed in reaction to listening to a completely different set of sets of repertoire -- no kidding! And those who do are not quite as happily quick and ready to call you out (indirectly, of course  as a coldhearted sociopath.


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## PetrB

Couchie said:


> A little caution please when extolling your love of subtlety, or you'll take somebody's eye out.
> 
> Schumann is ok. It's the sort of thing you can listen to without worrying about upsetting your tea.


...And some people are so dull and insensate that the only thing which can move them is about as subtle as 10 semi rigs, 9 steamrollers, 8 diesel locomotives, etc. all running them over at once.


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## moody

PetrB said:


> Is the 'sowing' machine deliberate or do you mean 'Sewing Machine?'
> 
> You might not believe it, but some people get all those sensations and emotions you listed in reaction to listening to a completely different set of sets of repertoire -- no kidding! And those who do are not quite as happily quick and ready to call you out (indirectly, of course  as a coldhearted sociopath.


I just wanted to cheque that you were awok.
Did he call me a sociopath--I thought that was Carter's special test.


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## PetrB

moody said:


> I just wanted to cheque that you were awok.
> Did he call me a sociopath--I thought that was Carter's special test.


No, the cold-hearted sociopath is my assigned role as per some TC member's casting directives, due to my not caring for the runnier mid to late romantic repertoire. Hey, its as good a beard as any.


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## PetrB

PetrB said:


> No, the cold-hearted sociopath is my assigned role as per some TC member's casting directives, due to my not caring for the runnier mid to late romantic repertoire. Hey, its as good a beard as any.


But it IS a little after 5 a.m. here, and very near my bedtime. If I don't get there, after having covered all the windows and the skylight, the sunlight will cause me to burst into flames.


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## CyrilWashbrook

moody said:


> *I usually fall asleep to Bruckner*,are you on the run or something?


I do too, but that's because I usually listen to music I enjoy when I'm going to sleep. That's the plan, anyway: sometimes I end up lying awake for an hour while I wait for it to finish.

(Related: this cartoon.)


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## BurningDesire

I am a romantic, and so I tend to adore the spectrum from quiet and subtle to loud and grand emotional displays. I don't really appreciate romanticism being boiled down into such a simplistic thing  I'm not obsessed with death and unrequited love and longing. I don't ignore those things either, but its a more complex thing than that. It would be like me saying classicists are just people obsessed with form and clarity and (the impossible concept) of artistic objectivity, and thats it. There's more to it than that I'm sure.

But yeah, I don't agree aleazk, but I won't call your well-thought out posts nonsense.  that would be the real nonsense of this thread surely?


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## Ukko

^ ^

The civilized response, _BD_; but when they is wrong, they is wrong, no matter how you slice it.


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## Couchie

PetrB said:


> ...And some people are so dull and insensate that the only thing which can move them is about as subtle as 10 semi rigs, 9 steamrollers, 8 diesel locomotives, etc. all running them over at once.


Semi-steamroller-train wrecks sounds like 20th century fare to me.


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## PetrB

Couchie said:


> Semi-steamroller-train wrecks sounds like 20th century fare to me.


Sure: Honegger, Pacific 231, symphonic poem about a train engine, or Manneheim Steamroller, that other great 20th / 21st century ensemble which occasions so many "Is this classical" questions 

None of 'em hold a candle to the first big epic movie effects composer, your hero, Richard Wagner.


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## Jobis

would OP say the same about say, the Tristan und Isolde prelude, or berlioz' romeo and juliet? If so I'd consider him something of a philistine.


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## Mahlerian

I unabashedly love the emotional overload of the Romantic period, especially the late Romantic period, but only if it is backed up by complexities of form, harmony, and counterpoint to justify its excursions. To do otherwise is to attempt to capture the feeling without the psychological basis, and thus a cheapening of it.


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## KenOC

"Martha, close the windows and turn the TV up. The apollonians and the dyonesiacs are at it again."


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## Guest

moody said:


> I usually fall asleep to Bruckner,are you on the run or something?


No, had to sell first, then rent before able to find a new house to buy. So, no phone line, no broadband for a fortnight, posting using my smart phone, but like posting a letter through a keyhole...arghh!! Next job is to get hi fi set up again so I can enjoy some music.
Oh, and dropped my Cowon S9 (mp3 player) and it's bust.

I'll be happy to fall asleep to Bruckner! ;-)


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## PetrB

Jobis said:


> would OP say the same about say, the Tristan und Isolde prelude, or berlioz' romeo and juliet? If so I'd consider him something of a philistine.


As long as you then allow as legitimate someone else maybe coming along and saying your taste for the prelude to Tristan und Isolde and Berlioz' Romeo and Juliet amounts to a proclivity for obvious cheap sensationalism quite expected of the petite bourgeoisie.

IMHO, far too many TC threads tumble down into this sort of glib name-calling, and any discussion on music, including the name-calling re: any individual's taste, is far more interesting without.


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## SiegendesLicht

PetrB said:


> That late romantic age was, I think, sincere in its perceptions and what it at least thought it was expressing. To some, not much later (I am one of them) their preoccupation with longing, death, weltschmertz, angst, unrequited love -- did I mention death yet -- loss, and the other preoccupation with expressing both an idea of "Glory" and that other preoccupation, "Gigantism" are more than difficult for later 20th century listeners to take, _or take at all in earnest anyway._


I wonder, why is that? What has changed in the listeners' perception? Have the 20th century listeners become more cynical and jarred?


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## bigshot

I think we live in an autistic age where people are afraid to feel. Everyone sublimates their emotions to their intellect. In the romantic era they used the intellect to express their feelings. We are too weak and fearful to open up like that today. So we create antiseptic austerity as a hair shirt to wear and pretend that we know better.

To be honest, this attitude may be exaggerated by internet chat forums, where autism is usually a big part of the discourse.


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## apricissimus

bigshot said:


> I think we live in an autistic age where people are afraid to feel. Everyone sublimates their emotions to their intellect. In the romantic era they used the intellect to express their feelings. We are too weak and fearful to open up like that today. So we create antiseptic austerity as a hair shirt to wear and pretend that we know better.
> 
> To be honest, this attitude may be exaggerated by internet chat forums, where autism is usually a big part of the discourse.


So are we supposed to like Tchaikovsky, et al., if only we were all more well-adjusted?


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## Ingélou

bigshot said:


> I think we live in an autistic age where people are afraid to feel. Everyone sublimates their emotions to their intellect. In the romantic era they used the intellect to express their feelings. We are too weak and fearful to open up like that today. So we create antiseptic austerity as a hair shirt to wear and pretend that we know better.
> 
> To be honest, this attitude may be exaggerated by internet chat forums, where autism is usually a big part of the discourse.


I think it's not so much afraid to feel as that younger people want to seem 'cool' and therefore if there is a big straightforward emotion it seems naive to them. They would want to mock it, take it in a spirit of irony and so on - as you say, people equate emotions with the crowd and lack of intellect. Of course, some emotions it's fashionable to feel - I can't see some young wit taking 'Schindler's List' with a pinch of postmodern irony (whatever that means), and a good thing too.

Personally, I love Tchaikovsky - and I love Handel too. I love Pope and Dryden, but I love Keats and Tennyson too. Sometimes I want to admire the cleverness of a work of art, and sometimes I want just to love it, or to laugh or to cry.


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## Op.123

aleazk said:


> When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremelly sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring. I think it is the musical equivalent of this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Typical examples of this musical abomination are, for me:
> 
> Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My God!... that introduction... the tea was already sugared but you added a Coke to it!. Not good for your blood glucose level I can assure you!.
> 
> Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A beautiful and masterly constructed movement... but, did the good old Sergei drop his saccharin tablets over the score at 23:04?. Such a wonderful built up ending in that wounded dog climax... a great opening theme for the next soap opera, that's for sure...
> 
> :tiphat:
> 
> Take a composer with an extremely refined and good taste like Schumann:
> 
> Schumann - Piano Concerto:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The climax at 30:24 shows that one can be sentimental without the need of all those cheap resources.


At 2:45 in the Tchaikovsky, I see what your talking about. And, yes, the Schumann concerto in excellent.


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## Op.123

Burroughs said:


> At 2:45 in the Tchaikovsky, I see what your talking about. And, yes, the Schumann concerto in excellent.


I just listened to the rachmaninoff you were on about. I must buy a recording of it. Amazing.


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## GreenMamba

bigshot said:


> I think we live in an autistic age where people are afraid to feel. Everyone sublimates their emotions to their intellect. In the romantic era they used the intellect to express their feelings. We are too weak and fearful to open up like that today. So we create antiseptic austerity as a hair shirt to wear and pretend that we know better.


This does not describe anything close to the culture we live in. We think too much, feel too little? How much of our popular entertainment are you familiar with?


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## Yardrax

bigshot said:


> I think we live in an autistic age where people are afraid to feel. Everyone sublimates their emotions to their intellect. In the romantic era they used the intellect to express their feelings. We are too weak and fearful to open up like that today. So we create antiseptic austerity as a hair shirt to wear and pretend that we know better.
> 
> To be honest, this attitude may be exaggerated by internet chat forums, where autism is usually a big part of the discourse.


Apparently we also live in an age where it's OK for people to talk about serious neurological conditions without having any understanding of what those conditions actually entail beyond popular stereotypes.


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## SiegendesLicht

PetrB said:


> A concert pianist pal, knowing my taste, asked, "C'mon, now. When you hear that opening horn call in Brahms' first piano concerto, don't you want to kill yourself, just the least little bit?" (meaning of course, go down the path of north European melancholy, feel that ache for knowing an era and way of life you were fond of was about to go away forever, and all that.)


That kind of sentiment in music rather puts me in a fighting mood, not in the sense of physical fighting, of course, but in the sense of determination to see the world as I know and love it, the world that still has a place for glorious music, preserved against all the forces that would oppose it.


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## Skilmarilion

The first movement alone of the Tchaikovsky 1 conveys so many emotions that I think it is unfair to single out the opening theme, though it remains one of the most astonishingly gorgeous openings ever written. 

Out of context perhaps it comes across a 'certain way', as the OP alludes to, but beyond it the piece delves into many a dark passage amidst a vast emotional scope.


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## Jobis

PetrB said:


> As long as you then allow as legitimate someone else maybe coming along and saying your taste for the prelude to Tristan und Isolde prelude and Berlioz' Romeo and Juliet amounts to a proclivity for obvious cheap sensationalism quite expected of the petite bourgeoisie.
> 
> IMHO, far too many TC threads tumble down into this sort of glib name-calling, and any discussion on music, including the name-calling re: any individual's taste, is far more interesting without.


You're quite right - I find I have a kind of over-indulgent almost morbid fascination for the heavily romantic stuff like Tristan and Isolde - it fills me with all sorts of strange feelings of passion and longing. This is evidence for it being a powerful piece of music, but it can be a little excessive if you don't keep a kind of respectful distance, or you overdo listening to it.


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## Feathers

I enjoy music by both Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff, but I think I see where the OP is coming from. Sometimes, the amount of actual musical "content" in a piece of music may seem off-balance with the exaggerated ways in which it is displayed. However, I personally don't mind it, and when I consider the degree that popular music sometimes "exaggerates" and throws their emotions into people's faces without enough musical content to balance it, the "cheesiness" of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff is honestly insignificant. Expressing extreme emotions shouldn't be a bad thing though, as long as it has musical materials to support it. It should also noted that this "balance" is a subjective thing and varies with different listeners.


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## Ebab

Jobis said:


> You're quite right - I find I have a kind of over-indulgent almost morbid fascination for the heavily romantic stuff like Tristan and Isolde - it fills me with all sorts of strange feelings of passion and longing. This is evidence for it being a powerful piece of music, but it can be a little excessive if you don't keep a kind of respectful distance, or you overdo listening to it.


That is well put. I just don't believe though that there is a real Tristan experience without abandoning the safe distance, at least temporarily. It's very erotic actually, all about both control _and_ letting go.


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## StlukesguildOhio

What do you like,I know sowing machine stuff.
I love over the top,emotional,loud music. Give me Tchaikovsky,Rachmaninoff,R.Strauss,Mahler,etc. weepy tear jerking lieder and Victorian ballads,Irish songs sung by John MacCormack, Liszt,Gottschalk,Brahms piano concertos-fantastic. 
You might not believe it but some people listen to music for its emotion.

I would add that for some people there are times when they are in the mood for Tchaikovsky's piano concerto, Rachmaninoff, Richard Strauss, Wagner, etc... and there are times when Offenbach, Lehar, Strauss II, etc... are what they want... and still others times its Dufay, Gesualdo, Monteverdi, Bach, Biber, Haydn, Mozart... or even Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Muddy Waters, or (dare I say it?) the Rolling Stones.

Now Schoenberg, on the other hand...


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## bigshot

apricissimus said:


> So are we supposed to like Tchaikovsky, et al., if only we were all more well-adjusted?


"Like" is entirely dependent on personal taste. "Appreciate" is what I'm talking about.

People who aren't afraid to feel passion can appreciate what Tchaikovsky was doing. Those who aren't able to feel passionately might see it as hyper-emotional kitsch. That's a blind spot in them, not in the music.


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## bigshot

Ingenue said:


> I think it's not so much afraid to feel as that younger people want to seem 'cool' and therefore if there is a big straightforward emotion it seems naive to them. They would want to mock it, take it in a spirit of irony and so on


That's why I think it is fear. If you just don't understand something, the natural reaction is to just be puzzled and shrug your shoulders and move on. But that isn't what I see. I see people going out of their way to denegrate raw passion. That's the smell of fear.


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## bigshot

GreenMamba said:


> This does not describe anything close to the culture we live in. We think too much, feel too little? How much of our popular entertainment are you familiar with?


I was talking about classical music. I think in classical music there has been a trend towards pulling back from emotions and focusing on technical aspects and pursuing some sort of generalized ideal form. Interpretations that delve into deeper areas are thought of as "excessive".

In popular music, the trend is towards surface emotions... the sorts of emotions that don't equivocate or have layers. Black and white. Thankfully, classical music has never sunk to that low of a level.

Emotions are complex and contradictory. They point in directions where we can't control ourselves. The romantics embraced all that and tried to express it in music. I don't see a lot of that today.


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## bigshot

Jobis said:


> You're quite right - I find I have a kind of over-indulgent almost morbid fascination for the heavily romantic stuff like Tristan and Isolde - it fills me with all sorts of strange feelings of passion and longing. This is evidence for it being a powerful piece of music, but it can be a little excessive if you don't keep a kind of respectful distance, or you overdo listening to it.


Try breaking down that distance and overdo a bit!


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## science

The opening of Tchaikovsky's 1st PC probably shouldn't be isolated like that, but even in context it challenges my tolerance for melodrama. But even then, no matter how I feel about it, a part of me has to sit back and admit that it is _good_. When Tchaikovsky wanted to go over the top, he really knew how to go over the top. I feel about the same way about the opening of Brahms' first piano concerto as well.


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## bigshot

If a group of food critics got together and started writing catty reviews of ice cream, saying it was "over the top sweet and creamy" and "self indulgent bad taste masquerading as a frozen dessert", you can bet that eventually there would be some poor sap parroting that opinion in an internet forum even though it's self evident that everyone enjoys ice cream.


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## apricissimus

bigshot said:


> If a group of food critics got together and started writing catty reviews of ice cream, saying it was "over the top sweet and creamy" and "self indulgent bad taste masquerading as a frozen dessert", you can bet that eventually there would be some poor sap parroting that opinion in an internet forum even though it's self evident that everyone enjoys ice cream.


Just because "everyone like it" doesn't mean that some people can legitimately not like it for the very qualities that makes it appealing to others.

And as it happens, I actually don't like ice cream that much.

I also think it's uncharitable to imply that when people say they don't like something that they're not being truly sincere and just saying what they think they _ought_ be saying.


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## bigshot

apricissimus said:


> And as it happens, I actually don't like ice cream that much.


Well feel free to substitute the word "sex" for "ice cream".


----------



## science

bigshot said:


> Well feel free to substitute the word "sex" for "ice cream".


You're gonna get the same problem....

Actually I think sweetness is a really good analogy. I'm not a big fan of ice cream either, but I do like sweet and fatty things... but I can't get through a Cold Stone ... whatever it is... and I don't even like the smell of a Cold Stone. But evidently other people love it and can't resist it - exactly the way I feel about Cinnabon (given some coffee to balance things out).

I'd much rather have eggplant or spinach or zucchini than any ice cream. That's based on taste, not health or food critics.

We could replace these things with Rachmaninoff, Tchaikovsky, Delius, Brahms, etc.


----------



## bigshot

You folks aren't human!


----------



## PetrB

bigshot said:


> You folks aren't human!


You can readily tell us apart by the visible trail of slime -- ectoplasm -- we trail behind us.


----------



## science

bigshot said:


> You folks aren't human!


Do we not bleed?


----------



## KenOC

science said:


> Do we not bleed?


We bleed, but we do not die! We just keep staggering forward, hungry for flesh...


----------



## science

KenOC said:


> We bleed, but we do not die! We just keep staggering forward, hungry for flesh...


And brains! Delicious raw or cooked.


----------



## bigshot

*are we not men?*


----------



## PetrB

science said:


> Do we not bleed?


Yes, but the fluid is green, the cells clearly from a completely different species.


----------



## BurningDesire

bigshot said:


> View attachment 20116
> 
> 
> *are we not men?*












We Are Devo!


----------



## superhorn

Often it's the fault of the performers when the music of Tchaikovsky ,Rachmaninov and other ripely romantic composers sounds overblown ,sentimental and bombastic . It's very easy for performers to go overboard and oversentimentalize the music , whether conductors or pianists etc . 
Of course, you don't want a prim or bloodless perfomnce of their music either. There is a happy medium between these two extremes .


----------



## bigshot

"The chief enemy of art is good taste." Pablo Picasso


----------



## ZombieBeethoven

aleazk said:


> When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremelly sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring. I think it is the musical equivalent of this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Typical examples of this musical abomination are, for me:
> 
> Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My God!... that introduction... the tea was already sugared but you added a Coke to it!. Not good for your blood glucose level I can assure you!.
> 
> Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A beautiful and masterly constructed movement... but, did the good old Sergei drop his saccharin tablets over the score at 23:04?. Such a wonderful built up ending in that wounded dog climax... a great opening theme for the next soap opera, that's for sure...
> 
> :tiphat:
> 
> Take a composer with an extremely refined and good taste like Schumann:
> 
> Schumann - Piano Concerto:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The climax at 30:24 shows that one can be sentimental without the need of all those cheap resources.


Five pages of discourse and I still don't know what happened to your puppy? Is she feeling better yet?


----------



## aleazk

I'm sorry to say she died, she choked in her own vomit... I thought the Tchaikovsky would be good for her!.


----------



## Crudblud

aleazk said:


> I'm sorry to say she died, she choked in her own vomit... I thought the Tchaikovsky would be good for her!.


Appropriately grim for a Tuesday morning.


----------



## aleazk

Crudblud said:


> Appropriately grim for a Tuesday morning.


Yeah, tell me, I had to clean the mess!.


----------



## moody

apricissimus said:


> Just because "everyone like it" doesn't mean that some people can legitimately not like it for the very qualities that makes it appealing to others.
> 
> And as it happens, I actually don't like ice cream that much.
> 
> I also think it's uncharitable to imply that when people say they don't like something that they're not being truly sincere and just saying what they think they _ought_ be saying.


You know very well that many people go with the latest trend and will follow the music gurus,food gurus and the same with fashion.
Only yesterday I was told that squash is "out" and now considered an old man's game !!


----------



## apricissimus

moody said:


> You know very well that many people go with the latest trend and will follow the music gurus,food gurus and the same with fashion.


And it's our job to spot them and expose them!


----------



## apricissimus

moody said:


> You know very well that many people go with the latest trend and will follow the music gurus,food gurus and the same with fashion.


Who are these "gurus", and how do you know which ones are worth paying attention to?


----------



## moody

apricissimus said:


> Who are these "gurus", and how do you know which ones are worth paying attention to?


They are the false prophets who pray on the gullible. You ignore them and decide for yourself and rely on your own judgement.


----------



## moody

superhorn said:


> Often it's the fault of the performers when the music of Tchaikovsky ,Rachmaninov and other ripely romantic composers sounds overblown ,sentimental and bombastic . It's very easy for performers to go overboard and oversentimentalize the music , whether conductors or pianists etc .
> Of course, you don't want a prim or bloodless perfomnce of their music either. There is a happy medium between these two extremes .


Happy medium---never---I like Stokowski doing Tchaikovsky and I also like Szell doing him.
The only way to get a happy (?) medium there is to put them into a cement mixer,what comes out will be medium.
I've always preferred over the top in everything throughout my life,no wishey-washey for me.


----------



## Guest

moody said:


> Only yesterday I was told that squash is "out" and now considered an old man's game !!


That just makes it easier to get court time! One of the advantages of being uncool.


----------



## apricissimus

moody said:


> They are the false prophets who pray on the gullible. You ignore them and decide for yourself and rely on your own judgement.


But how do the gullible rely on their own judgment...? Seems like a conundrum.

Maybe a list of opinions worth holding/worth ignoring would make it easier for rubes like me.


----------



## moody

apricissimus said:


> But how do the gullible rely on their own judgment...? Seems like a conundrum.
> 
> Maybe a list of opinions worth holding/worth ignoring would make it easier for rubes like me.


A. By blundering through.
B. If somebody gives you a list of opinions that makes them a blooming guru innit ?


----------



## apricissimus

moody said:


> A. By blundering through.
> B. If somebody gives you a list of opinions that makes them a blooming guru innit ?


I was hoping you'd let me know what was "trendy".


----------



## Ingélou

I've been trying to figure that out for forty-five years, but every time I think I've got it, they change it...


----------



## PetrB

aleazk said:


> I'm sorry to say she died, she choked in her own vomit... I thought the Tchaikovsky would be good for her!.


We all know how much you loved that puppy -- the cost you went to in commissioning the memorial monument shows how much you cared for that pooch.


----------



## bigshot

moody said:


> Happy medium---never---I like Stokowski doing Tchaikovsky and I also like Szell doing him.


You and I are probably the only ones around here who have read David Hall's "The Record Book". I loved it because I knew my tastes in Tchaikovsky was his polar opposite. If the book said, "This recording is marred by the most excessive sort of lilly gilding..." I knew it was a recording I needed to get!


----------



## PetrB

moody said:


> Happy medium---never---I like Stokowski doing Tchaikovsky and I also like Szell doing him.
> The only way to get a happy (?) medium there is to put them into a cement mixer,what comes out will be medium.
> I've always preferred over the top in everything throughout my life,no wishey-washey for me.


cheap thrills seeker


----------



## PetrB

bigshot said:


> You and I are probably the only ones around here who have read David Hall's "The Record Book". I loved it because I knew my tastes in Tchaikovsky was his polar opposite. If the book said, "This recording is marred by the most excessive sort of lilly gilding..." I knew it was a recording I needed to get!


So, Bigshot, out of curiosity, which of these two renderings of Dido's Lament would you take to that proverbial desert island?




or this (with commentary)




and without commentary - bless youtube, it is not at the same pitch level 





Actually knowing of both, I'd hate to know of only one of those two


----------



## PetrB

apricissimus said:


> I was hoping you'd let me know what was "trendy".


Trendy is what the eternally and tragically hip are consuming, wearing, doing. Of course, the rest of us will never be those people, so finding out, let alone keeping up, is impossible.


----------



## moody

apricissimus said:


> I was hoping you'd let me know what was "trendy".


Trendy ? TRENDY? I didn't get where I am today by being TRENDY.
Go and blunder and decide on the trend by yourself.


----------



## moody

PetrB said:


> cheap thrills seeker


You might say a hedonist even !!


----------



## Ingélou

moody said:


> You might say a hedonist even !!


We might - but it seems highly improbable. 

You didn't get where you are today by being trendy. Um - where are you?


----------



## moody

Ingenue said:


> We might - but it seems highly improbable.
> 
> You didn't get where you are today by being trendy. Um - where are you?


Don't you start asking daft questions now on top of the above and if you don't know where that saying comes from you should hide your head.


----------



## bigshot

PetrB said:


> So, Bigshot, out of curiosity, which of these two renderings of Dido's Lament would you take to that proverbial desert island?


I'll take the one that doesn't sound like a pig being strangled in a public washroom.


----------



## PetrB

bigshot said:


> I'll take the one that doesn't sound like a pig being strangled in a public washroom.


bbbbbut the emmmmotion, its just so over the top and raw and you know, like real?


----------



## bigshot

I'm sure the pig was quite sincere.


----------



## science

Authenticity is a pop-music value.


----------



## moody

Ingenue said:


> We might - but it seems highly improbable.
> 
> You didn't get where you are today by being trendy. Um - where are you?


Hedonism : Pursuit or devotion to pleasure,especially of the senses.
So why improbable, what sort of an image of me have you got ?


----------



## Ingélou

moody said:


> Hedonism : Pursuit or devotion to pleasure,especially of the senses.
> So why improbable, what sort of an image of me have you got ?


Well, I suppose I've always thought of hedonists as *easy-going*!


----------



## moody

Ingenue said:


> Well, I suppose I've always thought of hedonists as *easy-going*!


That's the last thing they are,it takes a big effort all round.


----------



## PetrB

science said:


> Authenticity is a pop-music value.


I'd call it more of an issue than a value


----------



## Ingélou

moody said:


> That's the last thing they are,it takes a big effort all round.


A big effort, hey? You surprise me, sir.
I'd pictured you lying on a velvet couch, with a bunch of grapes in one hand and a blonde in the other, a bottle of champers in a bucket of ice nearby, the scent of roses wafting through the room, and washing over you, the glorious sound of Glenn Gould playing Bach, just to add a little bite ...
:tiphat:


----------



## moody

Ingenue said:


> A big effort, hey? You surprise me, sir.
> I'd pictured you lying on a velvet couch, with a bunch of grapes in one hand and a blonde in the other, a bottle of champers in a bucket of ice nearby, the scent of roses wafting through the room, and washing over you, the glorious sound of Glenn Gould playing Bach, just to add a little bite ...
> :tiphat:


Well now,the effort that I would expend having to listen to Gould would be exhausting enough--as for Bach, not quite the right music for that sort of thing.


----------



## Ingélou

moody said:


> Well now,the effort that I would expend having to listen to Gould would be exhausting enough--as for Bach, not quite the right music for that sort of thing.


Makes one wonder if someone should set up a poll asking what *is* the right music for 'that sort of thing'! 
In the case of the actress Viviane Ventura, it was famously 'Scheherezade'...


----------



## julianoq

Since I clicked on the YouTube link of Argerich playing Tchaikovsky PC1 and the introduction almost put tears on my eyes (and I have a lot of difficult to cry, even if I try to) I think I do not agree with the OP


----------



## Ingélou

Well done you, julianoq!  
After all, what is wrong with a bit of emotion?


----------



## julianoq

Ingenue said:


> Well done you, julianoq!
> After all, what is wrong with a bit of emotion?


I agree 

And also I just remembered that I was moved last week when I re-watched the movie Le Concert (for those who not watched, it is centered around Tchaikovsky violin concerto) and they add a lot of more emotion to an already emotive music, so I _definitely _disagree with the OP


----------



## Cheyenne

Interpretation certainly affects the 'bad taste' too. Example: one of my favorite passages of music that one could call melodramatic is in Brahm's fourth symphony. Observe:

Furtwängler, as is expected, expands fully the melodramatic tension: 





Jochum, on the other hand, keeps it restrained and more sublte:





Toscanini, the old rascal, plays it at an incredible tempo, and towards the end (when all the violins chune in) it sounds like he just wants to get it over with:





Bernstein too uses the melodrama, but brings out the wind instrument more: 





Celibidache lets it slowly unfold:





For whatever reason one may condemn such exasperating emotion, that time I spend in solitude listening to music of so melodramatic a nature allows me to confront feelings of intensity that perhaps would else have never been shown in the full light of day, remaining hidden in the hollows of pretended nobleness and sensibility that characterize so much of my daily endeavors; and perhaps that too is precisely what bothers one: the relentless penetration of those passages, that for once lay before us in its full sublimity melodrama that reflects the eternal thoughts and longing of our hearts.


----------



## moody

Ingenue said:


> Makes one wonder if someone should set up a poll asking what *is* the right music for 'that sort of thing'!
> In the case of the actress Viviane Ventura, it was famously 'Scheherezade'...


I thought it was normally Ravel's "Bolero".


----------



## Couchie

superhorn said:


> Often it's the fault of the performers when the music of Tchaikovsky ,Rachmaninov and other ripely romantic composers sounds overblown ,sentimental and bombastic . It's very easy for performers to go overboard and oversentimentalize the music , whether conductors or pianists etc .
> Of course, you don't want a prim or bloodless perfomnce of their music either. There is a happy medium between these two extremes .


Didn't both Rach and Tchaik make use of the _forte forte __fortissimo_ (_ffff)? _If they're frequently left in the oven too long at least some of the blame falls to the recipe.


----------



## Mahlerian

Couchie said:


> Didn't both Rach and Tchaik make use of the _forte forte __fortissimo_ (_ffff)? _If they're frequently left in the oven too long at least some of the blame falls to the recipe.


According to Wikipedia, Ligeti beats both in both directions:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamics_(music)


----------



## starry

bigshot said:


> That's why I think it is fear. If you just don't understand something, the natural reaction is to just be puzzled and shrug your shoulders and move on. But that isn't what I see. I see people going out of their way to denegrate raw passion. That's the smell of fear.


I've said this on popular music forums, that some have a fear of emotion within some forms of music. They call something old fashioned or even cheesy if it has more emotion to it. A beautiful smooth sound can be held as the ideal over anything which is more direct in feeling.



PetrB said:


> ...And some people are so dull and insensate that the only thing which can move them is about as subtle as 10 semi rigs, 9 steamrollers, 8 diesel locomotives, etc. all running them over at once.


And this fits in as well, as popular music like black metal or hardcore can be considered fashionable still as it's more extreme.



bigshot said:


> I was talking about classical music. I think in classical music there has been a trend towards pulling back from emotions and focusing on technical aspects and pursuing some sort of generalized ideal form. Interpretations that delve into deeper areas are thought of as "excessive".
> 
> In popular music, the trend is towards surface emotions... the sorts of emotions that don't equivocate or have layers. Black and white. Thankfully, classical music has never sunk to that low of a level.
> 
> Emotions are complex and contradictory. They point in directions where we can't control ourselves. The romantics embraced all that and tried to express it in music. I don't see a lot of that today.


I don't think the problem is as great in classical music either. Though performances can relate to this because they can at times be purely about perfect technical ability and pristine sound over more emotional interpretation.



apricissimus said:


> But how do the gullible rely on their own judgment...? Seems like a conundrum.
> 
> Maybe a list of opinions worth holding/worth ignoring would make it easier for rubes like me.


It takes time to actually develop your own opinions and judgement. Just transplanting someone else's opinion into your brain won't exactly help that.


----------



## Op.123

aleazk said:


> When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremelly sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring. I think it is the musical equivalent of this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Typical examples of this musical abomination are, for me:
> 
> Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My God!... that introduction... the tea was already sugared but you added a Coke to it!. Not good for your blood glucose level I can assure you!.
> 
> Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A beautiful and masterly constructed movement... but, did the good old Sergei drop his saccharin tablets over the score at 23:04?. Such a wonderful built up ending in that wounded dog climax... a great opening theme for the next soap opera, that's for sure...
> 
> :tiphat:
> 
> Take a composer with an extremely refined and good taste like Schumann:
> 
> Schumann - Piano Concerto:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The climax at 30:24 shows that one can be sentimental without the need of all those cheap resources.


I am sorry but that piece of Rachmaninoff is one of the most beautiful things ever. Do not critisise it. Not in any way!


----------



## Op.123

aleazk said:


> When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremelly sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring. I think it is the musical equivalent of this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Typical examples of this musical abomination are, for me:
> 
> Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My God!... that introduction... the tea was already sugared but you added a Coke to it!. Not good for your blood glucose level I can assure you!.
> 
> Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A beautiful and masterly constructed movement... but, did the good old Sergei drop his saccharin tablets over the score at 23:04?. Such a wonderful built up ending in that wounded dog climax... a great opening theme for the next soap opera, that's for sure...
> 
> :tiphat:
> 
> Take a composer with an extremely refined and good taste like Schumann:
> 
> Schumann - Piano Concerto:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The climax at 30:24 shows that one can be sentimental without the need of all those cheap resources.


I actually think I like this stuff. I am always thinking near the end of the Grieg concerto, at that final melody. "Repeat it, but this time, louder, more romantic, more strings, more trumpets, more emotion, louder, louder, louder." I always feel slightly disappointed when the orchestra recedes and lets the piano continue the melody.


----------



## aleazk

Burroughs said:


> I am sorry but that piece of Rachmaninoff is one of the most beautiful things ever. Do not critisise it. Not in any way!


I'm going to criticize whatever I want... who the hell are you for telling me what to criticize?...


----------



## aleazk

starry said:


> I've said this on popular music forums, that some have a fear of emotion within some forms of music.


You are completely mistaken... I'm not criticizing emotions, I'm criticizing the banal and superficial nature of some of the emotions expressed in the pieces I mentioned.


----------



## apricissimus

starry said:


> It takes time to actually develop your own opinions and judgement. Just transplanting someone else's opinion into your brain won't exactly help that.


And if after all that time you still think that some of the so-called "false prophets" might actually have something to say worth listening to... then I guess there's just no helping you!

My point being, cautioning against the "false prophets" (and presumably there's a specific sort of false prophet in mind) seems nearly as prescriptive as what the false prophets are accused of doing. And I don't think people should be called gullible for liking a certain kind of music.


----------



## aleazk

Mahlerian said:


> I unabashedly love the emotional overload of the Romantic period, especially the late Romantic period, but only if it is backed up by complexities of form, harmony, and counterpoint to justify its excursions. To do otherwise is to attempt to capture the feeling without the psychological basis, and thus a cheapening of it.


Like those kids who only eat the meringue with their fingers and leave without tasting the full cake.


----------



## bigshot

aleazk said:


> Like those kids who only eat the meringue with their fingers and leave without tasting the full cake.


Or the listener who hears the dynamic swells in Rachmaninoff and walks away from it thinking that's all there is to Rachmaninoff.


----------



## apricissimus

I think cake is sometimes better without a lot of frosting. The sweetness can overpower the rest of the cake. Sometimes I'll scrape a bit off first.


----------



## Taggart

apricissimus said:


> I think cake is sometimes better without a lot of frosting. The sweetness can overpower the rest of the cake. Sometimes I'll scrape a bit off first.


Depends on the cake. Sometimes the frosting is the best bit!


----------



## PetrB

KenOC said:


> "Martha, close the windows and turn the TV up. The Apollonians and the Dyonesiacs are at it again."



Prize winner! ............


----------



## aleazk

bigshot said:


> Or the listener who hears the dynamic swells in Rachmaninoff and walks away from it thinking that's all there is to Rachmaninoff.


Well, if you read my critique in the OP, certainly I'm not that listener.


----------



## PetrB

science said:


> The opening of Tchaikovsky's 1st PC probably shouldn't be isolated like that, but even in context it challenges my tolerance for melodrama. But even then, no matter how I feel about it, a part of me has to sit back and admit that it is _good_. When Tchaikovsky wanted to go over the top, he really knew how to go over the top. I feel about the same way about the opening of Brahms' first piano concerto as well.


BUMP. a-yep. I don't think there is any argument _they were masters at it_, at least I hope not. There is a world of difference between preference and recognizing that someone more than knew what they were doing and they did it superbly.


----------



## PetrB

apricissimus said:


> But how do the gullible rely on their own judgment...? Seems like a conundrum.
> 
> Maybe a list of opinions worth holding/worth ignoring would make it easier for rubes like me.


Just learn, and one can pick it up by tone, really, who those who are terminally hip are -- or who think they are terminally hip, at any rate.


----------



## HaydnBearstheClock

I sometimes get that feeling when I listen to Beethoven - yes, it's epic, yes, it's bombastic - but where are the humour, the wit, the optimism and the fun experiments with musical effects? Ah, and then I come to Haydn .


----------



## PetrB

HaydnBearstheClock said:


> I sometimes get that feeling when I listen to Beethoven - yes, it's epic, yes, it's bombastic - but where are the humour, the wit, the optimism and the fun experiments with musical effects? Ah, and then I come to Haydn .


Certainly there is some more than plucky and overt humor in Beethoven. There is that other humor, too, of Beethoven taking himself so seriously that we find _that_ funny... which I am sure would have [email protected]@ed him off


----------



## Winterreisender

HaydnBearstheClock said:


> I sometimes get that feeling when I listen to Beethoven - yes, it's epic, yes, it's bombastic - but where are the humour, the wit, the optimism and the fun experiments with musical effects? Ah, and then I come to Haydn .


I tend to think that the opening movement of the 7th symphony contains humour, wit and optimism.


----------



## HaydnBearstheClock

Winterreisender said:


> I tend to think that the opening movement of the 7th symphony contains humour, wit and optimism.


I can tell that Beethoven's 7th is very well crafted and has some excellent melodies. The 2nd movement is also highly dramatic and provides a great contrast to the other movements. Also, I like the war-like horns and the strong rhythm of the finale, but in terms of wit and optimism, I hear more of it in Haydn. Beethoven has more conflict in his music, Haydn more contentment. With Beethoven it sounds like he's battling with himself, whereas in Haydn, to me, the music sounds like the composer is enjoying himself.


----------



## Musician

I think that this dog reminds me of Ravel's piano concerto for the left hand...



aleazk said:


> When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremelly sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring. I think it is the musical equivalent of this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Typical examples of this musical abomination are, for me:
> 
> Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My God!... that introduction... the tea was already sugared but you added a Coke to it!. Not good for your blood glucose level I can assure you!.
> 
> Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> A beautiful and masterly constructed movement... but, did the good old Sergei drop his saccharin tablets over the score at 23:04?. Such a wonderful built up ending in that wounded dog climax... a great opening theme for the next soap opera, that's for sure...
> 
> :tiphat:
> 
> Take a composer with an extremely refined and good taste like Schumann:
> 
> Schumann - Piano Concerto:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The climax at 30:24 shows that one can be sentimental without the need of all those cheap resources.


----------



## HaydnBearstheClock

Winterreisender said:


> I tend to think that the opening movement of the 7th symphony contains humour, wit and optimism.


Well, didn't mean to 'put down' Beethoven (and I can't, hehe), I really enjoy his music, just sometimes instead of a forte you could insert something else . That's what I meant.


----------



## bigshot

What are you suggesting inserting?!!


----------



## PetrB

bigshot said:


> What are you suggesting inserting?!!


oh, no.... don't go there!


----------



## HaydnBearstheClock

PetrB said:


> oh, no.... don't go there!


Why not? Insert a clever melodic move, a surprise, an unexpected transition. Or don't make the forte drown out everything else.


----------



## dgee

hahahaha - what a great OP! Irony regarding pomposity in the tunes and pomposity in the post aside, you have to acknowledge Tchaik Piano 1 and Rocky 3 are both leading examples of bogus tosh. Sentimentality is fine, but it has to be good. 

Speaking of which, I was listening to the Tristan Liebestod earlier today...


----------



## moody

dgee said:


> hahahaha - what a great OP! Irony regarding pomposity in the tunes and pomposity in the post aside, you have to acknowledge Tchaik Piano 1 and Rocky 3 are both leading examples of bogus tosh. Sentimentality is fine, but it has to be good.
> 
> Speaking of which, I was listening to the Tristan Liebestod earlier today...


Nonsense,there is nothing tosh-like about Tchaikovsky in any way at all. I often find that statements like that are bad -taste pomposity.


----------



## Garlic

I love this thread, lol
The OP expresses very well my problems with some strains of classical music, but others have good points in opposition.
I do resent the suggestion that a dislike of this type of music is down to fear of emotion, one could easily make the same argument about people who dislike Schoenberg. 
What would be an example of good taste pomposity? Brahms?


----------



## Piwikiwi

bigshot said:


> I think we live in an autistic age where people are afraid to feel. Everyone sublimates their emotions to their intellect. In the romantic era they used the intellect to express their feelings. We are too weak and fearful to open up like that today. So we create antiseptic austerity as a hair shirt to wear and pretend that we know better.
> 
> To be honest, this attitude may be exaggerated by internet chat forums, where autism is usually a big part of the discourse.


If you look at the history of music the 20th century seems to be more about bringing the emotional level to what is was. The romantic period is really the exception if you compare it to what comes before it and what comes after.

I like my music a little colder than most romantic music but I think it's ridiculous to see one or the other as superior. It seems that this discussion is just about taste.


----------



## dgee

Indeed sir, Schoenberg was THE expressionist after all (and I'm a big fan). 

I think an argument might have formed around perceptions of "facile" emotion in music. 

I dunno about taste pomposity tho - if you don't like it, don't listen to it, right? Brahms is so viscerally emotive for me sometimes i have to drop it back to Scarlatti (or Steely Dan or Takemitsu - something to cool off)

I think what a bunch of people on here might be saying is that they don't find Tchaik or Rach very moving. Certainly the case for me (although both have some fun moments - last movement of T6 or the Symphonic Dances? HUGE wow factor) 

I doubt it's that people think they're too excellently refined to listen to it because they read it's not the "done thing" (despite what some seem to want to think!)


----------



## Ukko

_dgee:_

"I doubt it's that people think they're too excellently refined to listen to it because they read it's not the "done thing" (despite what some seem to want to think!)"

You're right. It's pretty clear that those people don't think.


----------



## Celloman

The slow movement from Rachmaninoff's 2nd Symphony isn't sappy.


----------



## starthrower

HaydnBearstheClock said:


> I can tell that Beethoven's 7th is very well crafted and has some excellent melodies. The 2nd movement is also highly dramatic and provides a great contrast to the other movements. Also, I like the war-like horns and the strong rhythm of the finale, but in terms of wit and optimism, I hear more of it in Haydn. Beethoven has more conflict in his music, Haydn more contentment. With Beethoven it sounds like he's battling with himself, whereas in Haydn, to me, the music sounds like the composer is enjoying himself.


Beethoven's 7th is the one piece of classical music I fell in and out of love with the fastest. As a young listener, this emotionally charged, ear candy fest really drew me in, but I haven't been able to listen to it for decades.

And I'm not criticizing Beethoven. I can't listen to volumes of my favorite stuff anymore. It's like a drug that no longer gives me a high. I'm just a jaded old fart.


----------



## moody

starthrower said:


> Beethoven's 7th is the one piece of classical music I fell in and out of love with the fastest. As a young listener, this emotionally charged, ear candy fest really drew me in, but I haven't been able to listen to it for decades.
> 
> And I'm not criticizing Beethoven. I can't listen to volumes of my favorite stuff anymore. It's like a drug that no longer gives me a high. I'm just a jaded old fart.


Well you said it didn't you!


----------



## starthrower

Hey, just being honest. But luckily there's a lot of great music in the world yet to discover. At the moment I'm really enjoying Bruckner's 7th and 8th symphonies. And I never thought I would bother with Bruckner, since I'm mainly a 20th century music listener.


----------



## DeepR

I find in late romantic music there's good "over the top" and bad over the top. And I have to agree that Rachmaninoff sometimes tips over to the bad side, as much as I love some of his music. I'm not a fan of the third PC.


----------



## PetrB

Celloman said:


> The slow movement from Rachmaninoff's 2nd Symphony isn't sappy.


That depends if you care for music which oozes -- and what kind of ooze it iz.


----------



## moody

PetrB said:


> That depends if you care for music which oozes -- and what kind of ooze it iz.


The more ooze the better I always say !


----------



## PetrB

moody said:


> The more ooze the better I always say !


Hey, I'm fine with that, as long as I don't have to be the one to do the mopping up afterwards.


----------



## Aries

aleazk said:


> Typical examples of this musical abomination are, for me:
> 
> Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> My God!... that introduction... the tea was already sugared but you added a Coke to it!. Not good for your blood glucose level I can assure you!.


I like it. That music is great. You need sometimes an other composer for relief of course.


----------



## spradlig

aleazk: I love Tchaikovsky's music in general but I share our dislike for the beginning of his first piano concerto. I find it, and most of the rest of the piece, extremely cheesy. I much prefer his second piano concerto. I also love much of Beethoven's music, but find some of it pompous and exaggerated (e.g. final movement of 5th symphony). I would not use the word "sugary" for Beethoven, though. 

Just my personal taste, of course.


----------



## starry

I love that piano concerto, though I could see how the first movement of the 4th symphony might seem overblown.

Some of Beethoven could be too strident though I don't mind the 5th symphony.


----------



## Huilunsoittaja

Performing pieces that I don't like listening to have often given me a new appreciation for them. Even Beethoven's 3rd Symphony, which I hated playing for the most part, but it's actually a Beethoven symphony I know almost by heart. You gotta know what you hate sometimes, right? I've played bits of the other Beethoven symphonies too, and I _much _prefer that over just going to a concert to listen to them. Playing the 1st mvmt of Beethoven 5 is a lot different than just listening to it, a lot more cognitive/immersive experience. I think this all goes to show that I was meant to be a performer, not just a listener, because I can handle playing things I hate to listen to otherwise...


----------



## mstar

Warning: I am both a Tchaikovskian and a passionate Rachmaninov listener-to. 

Which is paradoxical, since I wholeheartedly agree with Aleazk that Tchaikovsky's first concerto is certainly much too pompous, and the rest is either saccharinely jovial or wounded-dog-like. Likewise, Rachmaninov's third concerto is unnecessarily technically advanced, resulting in a blur and mix of notes and themes. 
Saying this, it is also necessary to emphasize the importance of emotional quality in a musical work. Emotionless music fades away into the mysterious, unexplained realm of time, where it is ignored and neglected, perhaps forever. 
The problem here, Aleazk, is not music saccharine with emotion - what do you think of Tchaikovsky's 6th symphony, or perhaps even Beethoven's 5th Piano Concerto "Emperor?" Rather, the issue that seems to need addressing is that of music saccharine with pleasure - as in musical pleasure. For example, when one listens to a singer, and she reaches a very high note, that may be the musical pleasure I speak of. Perhaps, it is a certain depth in the orchestra, or the strings reaching a certain height.... 
Overdoing that may result in a very saccharine work, which I do not like. Even so, we must remember that Tchaikovsky had quite a sensitive heart, and sought to escape from such pain resulting in his music at times (even the 5th), and as for Rachmaninov, he was modern/romantic eras, and just passionate enough not to be saccharine in that sense. Even so, both composers have crossed that fine line many, many times in some of their works... as Aleazk has mentioned in the original post.


----------



## Tristan

lol, this is funny. You highlighted two of my favorite works and some reasons why I _do_ listen to their composers.  Rachmaninov's "emotional" sound, which is exemplified best in his 2nd & 3rd piano concerti and his 2nd symphony, is exactly what I love Rachmaninov! I wouldn't want to listen to music like that all the time; if a whole piece were nothing but that, I'd probably consider it over-the-top too. But Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky do it well, in my opinion. And Rachmaninov's "emotional" music is one of the appeals of the composer to me. There are so many instances where I have his emotional melodies on my mind and I love it 

But honestly, one of my favorite genres of music is vocaloid, an often very cutesy Japanese style of music. I am drawn to cute and emotional; I consider it a legitimate artform. It's not for everyone.





 1:16-2:07 another good example that'll probably make some listeners want to throw up


----------



## ArtMusic

aleazk said:


> When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremelly sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring. I think it is the musical equivalent of this:
> 
> ....


"Bombastic" is probably the word, like the big, lengthy Bruckner symphonies. But that's the late Romantic for ya - it's where musical development took itself to - to "serious" epic style pieces. Nothing wrong with that. I can enjoy a Bruckner "bombast" once a while and that adds a good deal of balance to my listening basket, so it's good that these serious and exaggerated styles were there.

What I don't like to read though, is to infer that earlier pieces especially say the Classical symphonies of early Haydn or Mozart are therefore lightweight and "not serious", unimportant pieces.


----------



## PetrB

mstar said:


> Warning: I am both a Tchaikovskian and a passionate Rachmaninov listener-to.
> 
> Which is paradoxical, since I wholeheartedly agree with Aleazk that Tchaikovsky's first concerto is certainly much too pompous, and the rest is either saccharinely jovial or wounded-dog-like. Likewise, Rachmaninov's third concerto is unnecessarily technically advanced, resulting in a blur and mix of notes and themes.
> Saying this, it is also necessary to emphasize the importance of emotional quality in a musical work. Emotionless music fades away into the mysterious, unexplained realm of time, where it is ignored and neglected, perhaps forever.
> The problem here, Aleazk, is not music saccharine with emotion - what do you think of Tchaikovsky's 6th symphony, or perhaps even Beethoven's 5th Piano Concerto "Emperor?" Rather, the issue that seems to need addressing is that of music saccharine with pleasure - as in musical pleasure. For example, when one listens to a singer, and she reaches a very high note, that may be the musical pleasure I speak of. Perhaps, it is a certain depth in the orchestra, or the strings reaching a certain height....
> Overdoing that may result in a very saccharine work, which I do not like. Even so, we must remember that Tchaikovsky had quite a sensitive heart, and sought to escape from such pain resulting in his music at times (even the 5th), and as for Rachmaninov, he was modern/romantic eras, and just passionate enough not to be saccharine in that sense. Even so, both composers have crossed that fine line many, many times in some of their works... as Aleazk has mentioned in the original post.


LOL. If you can provide all with a rock solid and non-subjective definition of "non-emotional" music, the entire musical world waits with baited breath.


----------



## starry

Huilunsoittaja said:


> Performing pieces that I don't like listening to have often given me a new appreciation for them. Even Beethoven's 3rd Symphony, which I hated playing for the most part, but it's actually a Beethoven symphony I know almost by heart. You gotta know what you hate sometimes, right? I've played bits of the other Beethoven symphonies too, and I _much _prefer that over just going to a concert to listen to them. Playing the 1st mvmt of Beethoven 5 is a lot different than just listening to it, a lot more cognitive/immersive experience. I think this all goes to show that I was meant to be a performer, not just a listener, because I can handle playing things I hate to listen to otherwise...


I could see how performing a piece and even more performing within a group of other musicians would be a more physical experience than listening to something off a cd which would be more intellectual and detached.

And the general feeling now towards more overblown sounding music I think is reflective of our times. You won't find much of that style of music in modern works because music tends more to being reflective than being optimistically confident and loud. So to understand either enlightenment optimism or Romantic emotional frenzy you probably have to get into the style.


----------



## aleazk

PetrB said:


> That late romantic age was, I think, sincere in its perceptions and what it at least thought it was expressing. To some, not much later (I am one of them) their preoccupation with longing, death, weltschmertz, angst, unrequited love -- did I mention death yet -- loss, and the other preoccupation with expressing both an idea of "Glory" and that other preoccupation, "Gigantism" are more than difficult for later 20th century listeners to take, _or take at all in earnest anyway._
> 
> That particular envelope of repertoire, save for not ironically the smaller and more intimate chamber music, songs, when these composers were not so deliberately overt and self-consciously trying to "express themselves" or calculatedly trying to manipulate the listener into "Feeling this specific emotion," is pretty much a wash for me.
> 
> I think of those several generations of romantic composers as the "First Wave Emo / Screamo" before it was ever a notion in late 20th century pop music, which I think is also music (and lyric content) verging on the egregiously self-indulgent.
> 
> A concert pianist pal, knowing my taste, asked, "C'mon, now. When you hear that opening horn call in Brahms' first piano concerto, don't you want to kill yourself, just the least little bit?" (meaning of course, go down the path of north European melancholy, feel that ache for knowing an era and way of life you were fond of was about to go away forever, and all that.)
> I said, "Sure, but not for the reasons you would. I'd feel like killing myself just a little bit because I know I'm in for forty minutes of Brahms.'


This hits the nail for me. I do not connect with the music because the conceptual framework in which it was conceived is completely alien and of no appeal to me. I understand the ideas and the emotions behind it, but they fail to move me, since I do not share them at all.


----------



## PetrB

aleazk said:


> This hits the nail for me. I do not connect with the music because the conceptual framework in which it was conceived is completely alien and of not appeal to me. I understand the ideas and the emotions behind it, but they fail to move me, since I do not share them at all.


Right:
Get it. Check

Understand the more than admirable quality of craft, structure, things musical, theoretical and well-met execution of intent. 
Check

Understand the "emotional base" and the aesthetic, the Ethos in the ether of the era.
Check.

Feel it.
No.

which brings me back to a song title / lyric I love to quote for these sort of occasions:
*"They're singing songs of love, but not for me."*


----------



## Petwhac

There is nothing pompous nor emotionally banal (whatever that means) in Tchaik PC 1.
Those who thing there is, are merely projecting on to the music what they have in their own head as a result of over exposure and association that has nothing to do with the composer.
You are simply listening wrongly and need to re orientate yourselves!
Either that or perhaps someone can point to which elements of pitch, rhythm phrasing and dynamics in the work are the culprits.


----------



## starry

I agree, I think it's a very melodic and creative work and in the concerto form that doesn't always happen. In the romantic period such music can often just cater for virtuoso display but the Tchaikovsky piece somehow marries that with some direct creative impetus. It is a matter of perspective, those who are open to more virtuoso pieces would probably appreciate it. Rachmaninov may at times be another matter, or maybe I just haven't cracked his style yet. I can appreciate his second concerto though as it's less flabby and more direct.


----------



## dgee

Petwhac said:


> There is nothing pompous nor emotionally banal (whatever that means) in Tchaik PC 1.
> Those who thing there is, are merely projecting on to the music what they have in their own head as a result of over exposure and association that has nothing to do with the composer.
> You are simply listening wrongly and need to re orientate yourselves!
> Either that or perhaps someone can point to which elements of pitch, rhythm phrasing and dynamics in the work are the culprits.


Probably the most memorably banal and pompous rhythmic moment is when the soloist blats out the dotted upbeats right after the big exposition at the start.


----------



## starry

The bombastic moments are more fleeting than permanent I feel. And if you have something which is forceful like that give it a good tune and it can be tolerated. If it had a crap tune then it would fail for many more people.


----------



## Petwhac

dgee said:


> Probably the most memorably banal and pompous rhythmic moment is when the soloist blats out the dotted upbeats right after the big exposition at the start.


If you are referring to bar 25, do you think removing the dots and having the soloist play the motif as straight 8th notes would solve your banality issue? Perhaps it is question of dynamics, not rhythm and a less forceful entry would be less pompous but also less memorable. I'm not 100 per cent sure why the dots are there but perhaps that becomes clearer later in the movement. At any rate, I don't think it can be described as either pompous or banal.


----------



## starry

The Grieg concerto starts with a big intro too, but I don't think the tune is as good. He brings it back at the end but it fits better at the start I feel.


----------



## Couchie

So is exploring the nuances of the amplified cactus more or less self-indulgent than swelling an orchestra to a forte-fortissimo?


----------



## HaydnBearstheClock

Couchie said:


> So is exploring the nuances of the amplified cactus more or less self-indulgent than swelling an orchestra to a forte-fortissimo?


Are you referring to my comment on Beethoven's symphonic style? I'm not sure who you've replied to.


----------



## PetrB

Petwhac said:


> There is nothing pompous nor emotionally banal (whatever that means) in Tchaik PC 1.
> Those who thing there is, are merely projecting on to the music what they have in their own head as a result of over exposure and association that has nothing to do with the composer.
> You are simply listening wrongly and need to re orientate yourselves!
> Either that or perhaps someone can point to which elements of pitch, rhythm phrasing and dynamics in the work are the culprits.


Obviously, you did not read post #152.

I could easily plagiarize your copy, substitute "Schoenberg" or whatever composer you have no feeling for or a work you do not care for, send it your way the next time you "dissed" that unfavored work or composer with whatever emotive adjectives came to your mind, and address it directly to you... and it would be no more or less "valid."

Fail.


----------



## Couchie

HaydnBearstheClock said:


> Are you referring to my comment on Beethoven's symphonic style? I'm not sure who you've replied to.


It's an open question.


----------



## HaydnBearstheClock

Couchie said:


> It's an open question.


I see - but what do you mean by the nuances of the cactus?


----------



## Couchie

HaydnBearstheClock said:


> I see - but what do you mean by the nuances of the cactus?


Here I will invoke "ignorance is bliss" and not tell you.


----------



## Petwhac

PetrB said:


> Obviously, you did not read post #152.
> 
> I could easily plagiarize your copy, substitute "Schoenberg" or whatever composer you have no feeling for or a work you do not care for, send it your way the next time you "dissed" that unfavored work or composer with whatever emotive adjectives came to your mind, and address it directly to you... and it would be no more or less "valid."
> 
> Fail.


I don't know what you're on about dear fellow.

It is possible to write banal music but that is not the same thing as music which is emotionally banal.
Do you see the difference?

Einaudi and Richard Nanes write/wrote banal music.

*ba·nal 
/ˈbānl/
Adjective
So lacking in originality as to be obvious and boring.
Synonyms
trite - commonplace - hackneyed - trivial - platitudinous
*

Tchaikovsky was one of the GREAT ORIGINALS.

Pass!


----------



## HaydnBearstheClock

Couchie said:


> Here I will invoke "ignorance is bliss" and not tell you.


I must admit I don't feel very ignorant because of not knowing how to decipher the nuances of a musical cactus.


----------



## PetrB

Petwhac said:


> I don't know what you're on about dear fellow.
> 
> It is possible to write banal music but that is not the same thing as music which is emotionally banal.
> Do you see the difference?
> 
> Einaudi and Richard Nanes write/wrote banal music.
> 
> *ba·nal
> /ˈbānl/
> Adjective
> So lacking in originality as to be obvious and boring.
> Synonyms
> trite - commonplace - hackneyed - trivial - platitudinous
> *
> 
> Tchaikovsky was one of the GREAT ORIGINALS.
> 
> Pass!


Well of course he was one of the great originals, doh. The Romeo and Juliet Overture was unprecedented in its overt sensual / sexual implications, and he was also the original over-the top overtly sentimental guy -- which some THINK or FEEL is rather runny, drippy, and, uh, banal. There are different levels of banal, like levels of anything else. So he was the high poobah of a kind of banality, sensationlism, a champeen sequencer to the point where many, apart from those who find it banal, are put off or lose interest right there.

Well then, he was The Big Original of being often enough Trite, Obvious and Boring.

See? He still gets your prize, but with a few of the actual details thrown in


----------



## PetrB

Petwhac said:


> There is nothing pompous nor emotionally banal (whatever that means) in Tchaik PC 1.
> Those who thing there is, are merely projecting on to the music what they have in their own head as a result of over exposure and association that has nothing to do with the composer.
> You are simply listening wrongly and need to re orientate yourselves!
> Either that or perhaps someone can point to which elements of pitch, rhythm phrasing and dynamics in the work are the culprits.


Recognizing what one writer so aptly called "Cheap Sentiment" is a far cry from projecting any personal emotion or psychology on to that cheap sentiment.

Sometimes, your sense of smell is the best way to detect it -- a slightly dead body fake chemical candy sweetness -- if it is there, it may be: 
a dead body
artificially flavored candy
artificially scented soap or cheap perfume
or maybe some of the late romantic fare, great though it may still be.


----------



## Blancrocher

PetrB said:


> Recognizing what one writer so aptly called "Cheap Sentiment" is a far cry from projecting any personal emotion or psychology on to that cheap sentiment.
> 
> Sometimes, your sense of smell is the best way to detect it -- a slightly dead body fake chemical candy sweetness -- if it is there, it may be:
> a dead body
> artificially flavored candy
> artificially scented soap or cheap perfume
> or maybe some of the late romantic fare, great though it may still be.


PetrB--you make me think of Eduard Hanslick's notorious comments on Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto: he said it was "long and pretentious" and that it "brought us face to face with the revolting thought that music can exist which stinks to the ear."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violin_Concerto_(Tchaikovsky)

Tchaikovsky has drawn other comments to that effect, I'm sorry to say. I like a lot of his music, by the way, so I really am sorry to say it!


----------



## PetrB

Blancrocher said:


> PetrB--you make me think of Eduard Hanslick's notorious comments on Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto: he said it was "long and pretentious" and that it "brought us face to face with the revolting thought that music can exist which stinks to the ear."
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violin_Concerto_(Tchaikovsky)
> 
> Tchaikovsky has drawn other comments to that effect, I'm sorry to say. I like a lot of his music, by the way, so I really am sorry to say it!


Then and now, it has struck many that way, musicians and fans of classical. I suppose this keeps his music 'controversial' but that is not anywhere near what I would call controversial.

The fact he is loved and nearly reviled having been the status quo for so long is what makes me wonder why anyone gets their knickers in a twist when yet another party says they don't care for it.

None of this has diminished his popular status in any way whatsoever, so what is to discuss about it? Whatever it is that people love about it or less than love about it, this music is not going to rewrite itself or anything like.


----------



## starry

PetrB said:


> Well of course he was one of the great originals, doh. The Romeo and Juliet Overture was unprecedented in its overt sensual / sexual implications, and he was also the original over-the top overtly sentimental guy -- which some THINK or FEEL is rather runny, drippy, and, uh, banal. There are different levels of banal, like levels of anything else. So he was the high poobah of a kind of banality, sensationlism, a champeen sequencer to the point where many, apart from those who find it banal, are put off or lose interest right there.
> 
> Well then, he was The Big Original of being often enough Trite, Obvious and Boring.
> 
> See? He still gets your prize, but with a few of the actual details thrown in


For many the Romeo and Juliet Overture has some great tunes, and that overrides any bombastic effects.


----------



## Petwhac

PetrB said:


> Well of course he was one of the great originals, doh. The Romeo and Juliet Overture was unprecedented in its overt sensual / sexual implications, and he was also the original over-the top overtly sentimental guy -- which some THINK or FEEL is rather runny, drippy, and, uh, banal. There are different levels of banal, like levels of anything else. So he was the high poobah of a kind of banality, sensationlism, a champeen sequencer to the point where many, apart from those who find it banal, are put off or lose interest right there.
> 
> Well then, he was The Big Original of being often enough Trite, Obvious and Boring.
> 
> See? He still gets your prize,* but with a few of the actual details thrown in*


What details? More like generalisations and what people THINK or FEEL.

For champeen sequencer and pomposity see Wagner. For sensationalism see Stockhausen. For sentimentality see Shostakovich.

At least that's what some think!

:lol:


----------



## dgee

What's a "champeen sequencer"? If it's the champion user of sequence (in the music theory sense) to the point of banality then Schumann's your man (but I still love him!)


----------



## Petwhac

dgee said:


> What's a "champeen sequencer"? If it's the champion user of sequence (in the music theory sense) to the point of banality then Schumann's your man (but I still love him!)


That's what I took it to mean.
Nothing wrong with a sequence here and there. Love Schumann, Wagner and Tchaikovsky! And of course ELGAR!


----------



## Turangalîla

Petwhac said:


> There is nothing pompous nor emotionally banal (whatever that means) in Tchaik PC 1.
> Those who thing there is, are merely projecting on to the music what they have in their own head as a result of over exposure and association that has nothing to do with the composer.
> You are simply listening wrongly and need to re orientate yourselves!
> Either that or perhaps someone can point to which elements of pitch, rhythm phrasing and dynamics in the work are the culprits.


It's a legitimate thought, but highly subjective...


----------



## Crassus

Are you are denying that music in its prime isn't supposed to bring the extreme idealization fo something?


----------



## sharik

aleazk said:


> When I listen to some pieces, particularly from the late Romantic period, I find some sections so overly pompous, their dramatic content so overly exaggerated, that they become caricatures of their original intentions. Like if the composer was thinking "yeah, I want the public to feel the 'drama'... how can I do it?... of course!: more louder, more big, and, above all, extremelly sugared!...". I find that cheap, banal, predictable, and boring


methinks there's something wrong not with them the late romanticists but with *us* today's snobs that we feel ashamed of natural human emotions and are spoilt with bad taste understanding of how thing progress in this life, that is, for example 'fashionable' or 'hip' by default means 'better' to us.

the famous Danish writer Hans Christian Andersen once wrote a story called _The Snow Queen_ where this desase (and snobism is really a desease) is attributed to the mythical 'Trolls Mirror' that once broken to smithereens which get in people's eyes turns them into snobs and nihilists who can only criticise every thing natural and kind.


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## sharik

PS:

the epitome of bad taste would be to judge any event or work from hindsight and out of the respective context.


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## starry

Lots of blanket judgements on 'emotion' and particular composers, but the music comes first not the response of the listener. So criticism is better placed on the compositional skill of someone.


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## sharik

indeed, let someone write a better music than 'emotional banality and bad taste pomposity' and then we'll talk, because the 20th century hasn't offered anything comparable with that yet.


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## moody

PetrB said:


> Well of course he was one of the great originals, doh. The Romeo and Juliet Overture was unprecedented in its overt sensual / sexual implications, and he was also the original over-the top overtly sentimental guy -- which some THINK or FEEL is rather runny, drippy, and, uh, banal. There are different levels of banal, like levels of anything else. So he was the high poobah of a kind of banality, sensationlism, a champeen sequencer to the point where many, apart from those who find it banal, are put off or lose interest right there.
> 
> Well then, he was The Big Original of being often enough Trite, Obvious and Boring.
> 
> See? He still gets your prize, but with a few of the actual details thrown in


Watch your step buddy, I like Tchaikovsky and do not recognise your description.
But take heart ,there is plenty of dry as dust sewing machine stuff for your ilk.
What's wrong with sensual/sexual implications ?


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## Joris

You got it right sir, except that I don't really care for "sexual" implications, which I personally doubt they are in the R&J or the Pathetique


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## SiegendesLicht

sharik said:


> the famous Danish writer Hans Christian Andersen once wrote a story called _The Snow Queen_ where this desase (and snobism is really a desease) is attributed to the mythical 'Trolls Mirror' that once broken to smithereens which get in people's eyes turns them into snobs and nihilists who can only criticise every thing natural and kind.


Sounds like most modern opera directors - they cannot create anything beautiful and harmonious on their own, so they do their best to trample the beauty that had been created before them, into the mud.


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## PetrB

moody said:


> Watch your step buddy, I like Tchaikovsky and do not recognise your description.
> But take heart ,there is plenty of dry as dust sewing machine stuff for your ilk.
> What's wrong with sensual/sexual implications ?


Whatever was said does not change the music, or its popularity, one iota -- I'm shocked that offense is taken with a different = non-agreed with _opinion_. Many people love Tchaikovsky, a good number of people less than love it: this should not be news, nor subject to its expression being sharply near-remanded 

"...dry as dust sewing machine stuff" -- you referring to Bach, Vivaldi, and all that ilk, the formulaic, the crossword puzzle made manifest as transliterated into pitches?


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## Guest

Joris said:


> You got it right sir, except that I don't really care for "sexual" implications, which I personally doubt they are in the R&J or the Pathetique


No sex in Romeo and Juliet?


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## PetrB

MacLeod said:


> No sex in Romeo and Juliet?


Someone must be out to lunch, and one very long lunch it must be / have been, for them to be able to say that ;-)


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## moody

PetrB said:


> Whatever was said does not change the music, or its popularity, one iota -- I'm shocked that offense is taken with a different = non-agreed with _opinion_. Many people love Tchaikovsky, a good number of people less than love it: this should not be news, nor subject to its expression being sharply near-remanded
> 
> "...dry as dust sewing machine stuff" -- you referring to Bach, Vivaldi, and all that ilk, the formulaic, the crossword puzzle made manifest as transliterated into pitches?


Offense? My post was fairly "tongue in cheek",you can take humour Petr surely and you are my friend after all. But the "in thing" at the moment is apparently to disparage Tchaikovsky which is a mistake I'm sure. The man is deep and listening to his opera,
Songs,chamber music,in fact his whole output also a genius.Certainly you don't need to like him, but I think that a person such as yourself having undoubted credibility ,should not act as a cheerleader thereby influencing newbies into believing that your opinion is the way to go.
I suppose that Liszt will be next on your list ?


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## starry

Some Tchaikovksly is popular and some isn't, you could actually say that for every single composer who has had some kind of fame.


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## Vesteralen

I'm glad there is a "late romantic" period. Sometimes I'm in the mood for it.

Other days, I feel a little bit like the OP.

But, recognizing my own fallibility and changeableness, I try not to take myself too seriously when I get grumpy.


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## moody

Vesteralen said:


> I'm glad there is a "late romantic" period. Sometimes I'm in the mood for it.
> 
> Other days, I feel a little bit like the OP.
> 
> But, recognizing my own fallibility and changeableness, I try not to take myself too seriously when I get grumpy.


I'm often in the moody f0r it and you're too young to get grumpy.


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## Vesteralen

moody said:


> and you're too young to get grumpy.


You don't know how much I *wish* that were true.


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## science

PetrB said:


> Someone must be out to lunch, and one very long lunch it must be / have been, for them to be able to say that ;-)


Actual professional teachers even at private schools have told me they "skip" those parts. I'm like, really? All of them? In _Romeo and Juliet_? Yes, in Shakespeare, Homer, Salinger, in every single one in every single case.

And in the case of public school teachers, I think I understand. I know high school biology teachers afraid to teach evolution, and that's like the central stinking thing in biology, so I forgive the public school literature teachers.

But that is probably one reason so many students hate literature.

As a teacher at private institutions in Korea, I am free to teach pretty much however I think best (test scores after all are the _only_ thing that matters, and if I doubt that I'm free to find another job), so I never avoid those topics. When my students come to class to read something like _Romeo & Juliet_, unless they actually have never heard about my classes, they already know it's going to be dirty. So on about page two ("the heads of the maids or their maidenheads") I just give them a bit of a warning speech along the lines of, "Ok, now, this is going to get really dirty really fast. But you're all in ninth grade, practically adults [as they think they are], and no matter what your sweet little innocent parents may believe, I know you've figured out how to turn off safe search. So we're going to read this and understand it and discuss it at a mature level, like the adults you're about to become, and you're all going to deal with it and it's going to be ok. There are worse things in the world than rape jokes." And about half of them snap to attention, like, "Whoa, I heard this was dirty but that's a whole 'nother level." Funny thing, I never have problems with students falling asleep during _Romeo & Juliet_.

It amazes me how misplaced our worries are. It's a story about teenage suicide. Dirty jokes vs. teenage suicide. If not already then within a few years these kids will all know someone who commits suicide, and they've all grown up watching _Two and a Half Men_, and the thing we think we need to protect them from is Shakespeare's jokes.

Anyway, it might not be a long lunch. It might just be a scared teacher.


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## Vaneyes

*Just say yes* to Shakespeare, Vivaldi, and Tchaikovsky.

View attachment 27969


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## Ingélou

I wonder if the idea of an emotional response, or not, to music is subject to a *swing in fashion*, as it has been in literature. I am posing this as a question - I don't know the answer.

But when I was growing up, the idea was floating in the air that literary criticism could be conducted like science, with objective principles. When I wrote my essays on Shakespeare or poetry, I was to avoid constructions using 'I', and try to keep things neutral and impersonal.

Then, towards the end of my career, I was required to teach my students to 'engage with the text'; while discussing a play or analysing a poem, they had to prove that they were moved or emotionally involved with the literature. So 'I' as a way of introducing an opinion was not only okay, but advisable. In practice, it wasted too much exam time to write sentences merely emoting, so we'd spend lessons on how to introduce weasel adjectives into the criticism that *implied* emotional connection, such as 'poignant', 'exhilarating', 'uneasy'...

Talk about jumping through hoops!

'Relativism' is also more widespread than in my youth. We didn't talk about 'my reality' or 'his reality' or 'her truth'. Just 'reality' and 'the truth'. Could this philosophical shift also account for the argument that no agreement can be reached on subjective responses - it is just peculiar to each person - and therefore that it's not productive to discuss an emotional response when talking about music. Just stick to the technical stuff.

Just asking...


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## Vaneyes

Absolutely, swing in fashion, and I'm twixt 'n 'tween at the benefits derived. Enthusiasm should be a part of learning, but there must be more to it than, "Far out, Dude."

Important forks in the road were 1960's "Groovey", and the evolution of electronics. The latter causing, for many, great distraction to learning.

Let's not forget the North American phenomenon (maybe elsewhere) of school grades going out the window. Grading can be injurious to the child.


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## Cheyenne

Ingélou said:


> When I wrote my essays on Shakespeare or poetry, I was to avoid constructions using 'I', and try to keep things neutral and impersonal.


We still have to do that. Using 'I' at all - _at all_ - gets several points deduced, for one. It's an imperfect system because you can't judge anything: all you can do is point out that something is present. As a result, one basically has to take over the preconceived notions of the writers' skill and quality that you were taught. That, along with being forced into interpretations - often incomplete or bad ones, as admitted by the teachers forced into them too - makes modern literary criticism in school quite flawed.

As for music and emotion, I agree it is often somewhat ambiguous what emotions the composer wants to convey, but to set it aside as complete relative is a little excessive. That the principles that govern it are largely unknown, I accept, but at least one can gauge the result decently through witness testimony and personal experience.

Have there, in any case, been any inquiries into the nature of emotions as related to certain musical elements?


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## Vaneyes

Even serious criticism can entail a slippery slope, if those involved in the criticising and/or learning don't respect the elements and society of the creator. Some of what science said can apply here. Fasten your seatbelts, it wasn't a namby pamby lifestyle then. Coddling is a destructor of learning.

But it helps to remember, teachers are usually tightly guidelined as to what and how they can teach. The reins are loosened in university settings, but this can be good and bad.


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## Sid James

starry said:


> Lots of blanket judgements on 'emotion' and particular composers, but the music comes first not the response of the listener. So criticism is better placed on the compositional skill of someone.


Well that was always the problem with criticisms of Rachmaninov's music in particular. They didn't look much at his technique, and when they did they exerted their bias. For example, early on Rachmaninov was a progressive in piano technique just as Scriabin was. Both of them studied under Arensky, so there is this common lineage. There where composers who emerged at that time (just before 1900) in Russia who where far more conservative than Rachmaninov was, but he was always compared unfavourably to Scriabin, because after study under Arensky they went in different directions, compositionally speaking.

You also look at how Rachmaninov's style evolved in terms of taking on things like jazz and the rhythmic innovations of Stravinsky. Funny thing there is that Rachmaninov's music, the final movement of his First Suite for Two Pianos imaging bells in music influenced Stravinsky in the piano part of Petrushka. While people like Adorno - who also pulled down Sibelius - had a lot of negative things to say about Rachmaninov's music, Stravinsky remained tight lipped. He did express praise for Rachmaninov's piano playing, and when they met there was no animosity between them.

In terms of emotion, Rachmaninov's music was not just rehash of Tchaikovsky. Technically his music doesn't owe that much to Tchaikovsky, its more in terms of that Romantic aesthetic and zeitgeist that Rachmaninov clung onto throughout his life. The other thing is that Rachmaninov was influenced by others, not only Stravinsky, but also the likes of Grieg, Liszt, Anton Rubinstein, Chopin and so on.

Rachmaninov also was a fastidious craftsman, and a perfectionist. He didn't publish any music that was below a high standard. His own standard in fact, the highest there is for any composer of such skill. He was one of the best in the art of theme and variations, and that itself comes from strong knowledge of thematic development and basically the classics - Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and so on.

Rachmaninov was also a polymath of sorts, he was not only admired for his work as a composer and pianist but also as a conductor. In terms of the latter, he was compared favourably to one of the most highly regarded conductors of his time, Arthur Nikisch.

I am currently reading a book on Rachmaninov that has shed new light on these things and more. I knew he was given a raw deal by critics during his life, but I didn't know it was this bad. From the start, principally from the ultra-nationalists in Russia, there was a kind of campaign against him. This is despite the fact that Rimsky-Korsakov admired him, and the feeling was mutual. However again, in some ways it was not safe to express such admiration and support in public. Just as with many other composers in history, there where cliques and cabals out to shut Rachmaninov out of certain places. The one in St Petersburg was worse than in Moscow, where generally things where more receptive. Before leaving Russia, Rachmaninov became the president of the Russian Imperial Music Society. So he did have respect from many quarters, but he had to fight hard for it.

I can go on but for more, stay tuned. I am thinking of doing an article on this forum once I have finished reading the book. The good thing is that by the 1970's things had changed. Music scholarship began to recognise the depth of Rachmaninov's contributions to music. This had to do with the ideological shift away from hard line Modernism then to a more balanced assessment of music history in the first half of the 20th century. I suppose this is not so unusual, with hindisight clearer understanding of the past can be attained.


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## Svelte Silhouette

The world needs sugar and spice, tea and coffee, black and white along with the greyscale between and a spectrum of colours bleeding into one another. Without some relaxing Tchaikovsky after 10 rounds of or in the ring with Wagner where would we all be


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## ThatClassyKid

I think this is one of those extremely common preference problems. For me, I enjoy those big loud climaxes. It highlights the point where all this emotion is happening. If climaxes were subtle, it would be very inconvenient for first listeners. Also, I think that the thought of the branding these climaxes as cliché and predictable, is the equivalent of calling a V-I cadence uninspired and overused. This is because grand huge climaxes are effective and therefore favored,instead of predictable. Traditional instead of banal. Also, the fact that large climaxes are common makes composers put in more effort into making their climax differ from others, making the piece secretly deep instead of cheap. Looking for these differences makes the interaction between the music and experienced listeners more interesting instead of boring. Overall, what I am trying to say is that the usual might actually have underlying newness.


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## Sid James

I would add to my post above that I am not invalidating the opinion that Tchaikovsky's or Rachmaninov's music are banal or in bad taste. Its why I focussed on facts in that post. Maybe its not entirely in the right place here to talk about those things. If people have opinions that are not the same as my own, I can live with that. I think its the same as distinguishing between opinions or feelings and facts - the latter coming from the scores themselves, the history, scholarship and so on. 

In any case, both these composers where conscious of this reaction to their music, they where very self critical but at the same time tended to accept and think about constructive criticism. For example, out of two cadenzas he wrote for the end of the first movement of his third concerto, Rachmninov always played the less flashy and bravura one (and so did Horowitz for that matter).

I will try do that article on Rachmaninov, especially since my previous article on Haydn got a good response.


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## PetrB

Svelte Silhouette said:


> The world needs sugar and spice, tea and coffee, black and white along with the greyscale between and a spectrum of colours bleeding into one another. Without some relaxing Tchaikovsky after 10 rounds of or in the ring with Wagner where would we all be


LOL. You've just cited two of my least favored composers in that construct... and is there anything "relaxing" about the almost always near hysterical / histrionics of Tchaikovsky?


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## Copperears

Tried to blow my brain up today by going from Szigeti's performance of the Bach b Partita for Solo Violin to an available track from Lady Gaga's upcoming "Artpop."

I'm still here.

Just joined the forum, have already enjoyed the wit in this thread, thank you! Have to make some posts for more access, this is my first one.

I love late-19th-century romanticism, I think the problem is that we get exposed to it too often in movies, and as kids with forced visits to performances of The Nutcracker during Xmas.

But it's not intrinsically that; just requires a freshening of the palate/palette before attempting a re-approach.

Certain things become too habitual and clichéd as a musical experience after overexposure. Hard for me to listen to Beethoven's 9th; easier to listen to Bartok Quartets, for example. Or even Lady Gaga.

Try listening to some death or thrash metal for a few weeks, you'll come back starving for Tchaikowsky and Rachmaninoff.


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## Copperears

superhorn said:


> Often it's the fault of the performers when the music of Tchaikovsky ,Rachmaninov and other ripely romantic composers sounds overblown ,sentimental and bombastic . It's very easy for performers to go overboard and oversentimentalize the music , whether conductors or pianists etc .
> Of course, you don't want a prim or bloodless perfomnce of their music either. There is a happy medium between these two extremes .


Excellent point. This is why I like my Tchaikovsky played by Karajan, and my Handel played by, well, any Schmalzmeister will do, maybe Neville Marriner, say.


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## Copperears

starthrower said:


> Hey, just being honest. But luckily there's a lot of great music in the world yet to discover. At the moment I'm really enjoying Bruckner's 7th and 8th symphonies. And I never thought I would bother with Bruckner, since I'm mainly a 20th century music listener.


I have yet to get into Bruckner; I feel like I'm listening to a musical version of an Anthony Powell novel. I have some now, though, any hints as to where to find the door and turn on the lights without slipping in the motor oil?


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## Copperears

starry said:


> I agree, I think it's a very melodic and creative work and in the concerto form that doesn't always happen. In the romantic period such music can often just cater for virtuoso display but the Tchaikovsky piece somehow marries that with some direct creative impetus. It is a matter of perspective, those who are open to more virtuoso pieces would probably appreciate it. Rachmaninov may at times be another matter, or maybe I just haven't cracked his style yet. I can appreciate his second concerto though as it's less flabby and more direct.


I have gone back to the verge of being musically illiterate, but I have vague recollections of the idea that over time, counterpoint got sacrificed on the idol of melody (T. and R.) and harmony (Ravel, Debussy). Shorthand for a more complex thought.

The music being discussed here doesn't seem intrinsically bombastic or pretentious, we just have developed such associations with it. But it does seem to forego a former complexity and dialectic for the sake of everything at once and the kitchen sink all heading in the same direction.... at which point the 20th century shows up and says hey, dissonance, what a concept.

Movies these days seem to be our equivalent of 19th-century Lush: everything all over the top, all the time. I predict imminent counterpoint.


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## Copperears

Cheyenne said:


> We still have to do that. Using 'I' at all - _at all_ - gets several points deduced, for one. It's an imperfect system because you can't judge anything: all you can do is point out that something is present. As a result, one basically has to take over the preconceived notions of the writers' skill and quality that you were taught. That, along with being forced into interpretations - often incomplete or bad ones, as admitted by the teachers forced into them too - makes modern literary criticism in school quite flawed.
> 
> As for music and emotion, I agree it is often somewhat ambiguous what emotions the composer wants to convey, but to set it aside as complete relative is a little excessive. That the principles that govern it are largely unknown, I accept, but at least one can gauge the result decently through witness testimony and personal experience.
> 
> Have there, in any case, been any inquiries into the nature of emotions as related to certain musical elements?


To be fair, at a certain level of education, for those between the years of 11-19 in age, basically, getting them to imagine anything EXCEPT their newly-found selves with associated highly excitable apparatus is probably THE most important signal educational achievement you can strive for.

Some never make the leap and, sadly, end up as politicians or movie critics.


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## Mahlerian

Copperears said:


> I have yet to get into Bruckner; I feel like I'm listening to a musical version of an Anthony Powell novel. I have some now, though, any hints as to where to find the door and turn on the lights without slipping in the motor oil?


Well, Bruckner's first movements are in the same sonata form as Beethoven's, just with each section lengthened considerably. Bruckner does this so that the lengthy themes he uses will have the same space for development and resolution as the short motifs of Mozart and Beethoven. Whenever a contrasting shift occurs (soft to loud, brass to winds, contrapuntal to homophonic) occurs, it usually marks off a section or subsection of the piece, and these shifts can seem unnecessarily jarring to some.

Some people have an easier time with Bruckner's Scherzo movements, which are always in the following form: Scherzo - Trio - Scherzo, with each being a ternary form, ergo ABA CDC ABA.


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## Copperears

Thank you; I think it's more the spaciousness and leisurely rate of elaboration I find difficulty staying with, more than the abruptness of the transitions. I feel like it's too easy to lose direction as a result. Increasing familiarity will no doubt reduce this frustration.

Writing on Bruckner is generally uninspiring to me, as well; he's mysterious, still, to us all. I do hear "the organ" behind his orchestration, but there's also an almost Zen aspect to the sustained moments I have to struggle to match with adequate attention.


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## Blake

Copperears said:


> Thank you; I think it's more the spaciousness and leisurely rate of elaboration I find difficulty staying with, more than the abruptness of the transitions. I feel like it's too easy to lose direction as a result. Increasing familiarity will no doubt reduce this frustration.
> 
> Writing on Bruckner is generally uninspiring to me, as well; he's mysterious, still, to us all. I do hear "the organ" behind his orchestration, but there's also an almost Zen aspect to the sustained moments I have to struggle to match with adequate attention.


I initially had a hard time getting into Bruckner, but now I adore his music. What have you heard of his, and by what conductor?


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## Copperears

The 3rd, with Haitink; plus, now working through Barenboim with the Chicago Symphony, which I really like. I usually end up liking most what is at first difficult or obscure. I've reached a point where I just can't continue to listen for the umpteenth time to the most popular repertoire (the first 200 things on all the TC "Best Of" Lists), so it's time to expand my horizons.


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## Blake

Copperears said:


> The 3rd, with Haitink; plus, now working through Barenboim with the Chicago Symphony, which I really like. I usually end up liking most what is at first difficult or obscure. I've reached a point where I just can't continue to listen for the umpteenth time to the most popular repertoire (the first 200 things on all the TC "Best Of" Lists), so it's time to expand my horizons.


I think your recordings could be the problem. You might need a little fire with your Bruckner. Check out Wand with the Kölner Rundfunk Sinfonie Orchester. The brass is earth-shattering, and the strings are heavenly... the whole performance is beautifully articulate. Wand has a powerful command over this music:

http://www.amazon.com/Bruckner-Symphonies-Nos-1-9/dp/B0042U2HLY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1384138417&sr=8-1&keywords=wand+bruckner


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## Mahlerian

Copperears said:


> The 3rd, with Haitink; plus, now working through Barenboim with the Chicago Symphony, which I really like. I usually end up liking most what is at first difficult or obscure. I've reached a point where I just can't continue to listen for the umpteenth time to the most popular repertoire (the first 200 things on all the TC "Best Of" Lists), so it's time to expand my horizons.


The 3rd only works in its original version. Haitink unfortunately records the more common revision of 1877. I agree with Vesuvius's suggestion of Wand, but not for the 3rd (where he takes the even worse 1889 version!). My go-to recordings for this symphony are Young/Hamburg and Tintner/Royal Scottish National Orchestra.


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## Blake

Mahlerian said:


> The 3rd only works in its original version. Haitink unfortunately records the more common revision of 1877. I agree with Vesuvius's suggestion of Wand, but not for the 3rd (where he takes the even worse 1889 version!). My go-to recordings for this symphony are Young/Hamburg and Tintner/Royal Scottish National Orchestra.


Opinions vary. I've found the performance to greatly outweigh the version. I preferred Wand's 3rd over Tintner's, and it's mainly due to such a powerful performance. Wand's cycle is one of the greatest, without question.


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## Copperears

Vesuvius said:


> Opinions vary. I've found the performance to greatly outweigh the version. I preferred Wand's 3rd over Tintner's, and it's mainly due to such a powerful performance. Wand's cycle is one of the greatest, without question.


Both sound appealing, and I've seen recommended elsewhere. If my interest is sustained I'll give them both my attention.

Still learning which symphonies I like, and why; I can very much hear Bruckner's proximity to Mahler, and I remember having similar reactions upon first encounter with Mahler's work, many, many years ago.

Also wonder whether there's any influence on Shostakovitch in his late work, from Bruckner? Somehow the 15th comes to mind.


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## Blake

Copperears said:


> Both sound appealing, and I've seen recommended elsewhere. If my interest is sustained I'll give them both my attention.
> 
> Still learning which symphonies I like, and why; I can very much hear Bruckner's proximity to Mahler, and I remember having similar reactions upon first encounter with Mahler's work, many, many years ago.
> 
> Also wonder whether there's any influence on Shostakovitch in his late work, from Bruckner? Somehow the 15th comes to mind.


For sure. All recordings mentioned are worth your time. If you've figured out Mahler then you can get Bruckner... very rewarding composer. If you want to hear something heart-achingly beautiful, check out the 2nd movement of symphony 7.


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## Mahlerian

Vesuvius said:


> Opinions vary. I've found the performance to greatly outweigh the version. I preferred Wand's 3rd over Tintner's, and it's mainly due to such a powerful performance. Wand's cycle is one of the greatest, without question.


In the case of any other Bruckner symphony, I agree with you, but I find the revised 3rd unbearable, no matter how good the performance is.


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## joen_cph

To me there´s one towering recording of the 3rd - Inbal on Teldec (original version).


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## Blake

Mahlerian said:


> In the case of any other Bruckner symphony, I agree with you, but I find the revised 3rd unbearable, no matter how good the performance is.


I hear you. Everyone has their unique way.


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## Copperears

Mahlerian said:


> In the case of any other Bruckner symphony, I agree with you, but I find the revised 3rd unbearable, no matter how good the performance is.


I'm curious -- and not to argue -- why you find it unbearable, specifically? Asking only out of interest, not the desire to judge.


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## Mahlerian

Copperears said:


> I'm curious -- and not to argue -- why you find it unbearable, specifically? Asking only out of interest, not the desire to judge.


The original version of the 3rd is a massive conception, Bruckner's longest symphony to that point (its first movement is the longest he wrote), with quotations from his beloved Wagner interspersed throughout. It's not perfect: the orchestration is flawed and perhaps at points it does go on a bit longer than it really needs to, but it is daring in its harmony and form.

The revisions sought to tame this unruly beast somewhat, and the orchestration is significantly improved in many places. The form is tightened up to some degree as well, and the direct Wagner quotations are removed. But the trade-off is that the supports underlying this massive cathedral have been weakened, and it stands with some significant effort. Climaxes arrive more quickly, but without adequate preparation. Removing the string chorale at the end of the development of the first movement (which was related passages in Die Walkure and Tristan) has robbed the transition back to D minor of its expressive effect. Similarly for the coda to the second movement, which turned a similar phrase back to the major. The scherzo survived almost completely intact, but the evened phrase lengths feel like so much added filler.

The real crux of the matter, though, is the finale. The original version of the finale was a sonata form movement with three theme exposition, development, and recapitulation/coda. The form was a bit lopsided, with the exposition lasting nearly half the movement and the development only a quarter. The coda included references to all of the previous movements, as in Beethoven's Ninth (a symphony in the same key), and these led to the triumphant D major ending.

The 1889 revised version of this finale does nothing to correct the movement's imbalances, and actually makes them far worse. The exposition lasts almost as long as in the original and the development is shortened considerably and dovetailed onto the recapitulation of the second theme, with the rest of the recapitulation removed. This is then joined almost directly to the coda, which feels completely perfunctory because there's no tonal force to the move to D major (in other words, we hear that we're "there", but don't feel that we've "arrived" anywhere at all).


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## Blake

Insightful, indeed.


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## joen_cph

Timings illustrate the reductions

Inbal/Teldec: 24:00 - 18:51 - 6:07 (played very fast) - 16:14
Wand/Köln: 21:25 - 13:42 - 6:41 - 12:37


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## Mahlerian

joen_cph said:


> Timings illustrate the reductions
> 
> Inbal/Teldec: 24:00 - 18:51 - 6:07 (played very fast) - 16:14
> Wand/Köln: 21:25 - 13:42 - 6:41 - 12:37


And that's in spite of the fact that Inbal chooses faster initial timings on all of the movements...

Inbal - 65BPM, 55BPM, 212BPM, 132BPM
Wand - 61BPM, 48BPM, 198BPM, 114BPM


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## Blake

I just listened to Tintner's 3rd again... and it is beautiful, I must admit. Though I still really enjoy Wand's 1889. I have enough room for them both. 
:tiphat:


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## Copperears

That does it, thank you, Mahlerian; a wonderful analysis. I've picked up Tintner's 3rd with the Royal Scottish, it's quite good.


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## Blake

It's beautiful, indeed. But also very long-winded. I wouldn't recommend Tintner to someone who isn't already fond of Bruckner....

I can't stress enough to pick up Wand. He'll change your perspective on Bruckner, I can almost guarantee it. You can get his whole cycle on Amazon for $25... really, it's one of the best cycles I own.


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## Copperears

Vesuvius said:


> It's beautiful, indeed. But also very long-winded. I wouldn't recommend Tintner to someone who isn't already fond of Bruckner....
> 
> I can't stress enough to pick up Wand. He'll change your perspective on Bruckner, I can almost guarantee it. You can get his whole cycle on Amazon for $25... really, it's one of the best cycles I own.


How would you compare it to the Blomstedt/Gewandhaus cycle? When I start on something I tend to go all in, am going to have to hold off a bit spending on more music for now, but either of these do sound attractive.

I don't mind long-winded, Shostakovitch is one of my favorite composers.


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## Blake

Copperears said:


> How would you compare it to the Blomstedt/Gewandhaus cycle? When I start on something I tend to go all in, am going to have to hold off a bit spending on more music for now, but either of these do sound attractive.
> 
> I don't mind long-winded, Shostakovitch is one of my favorite composers.


Can't say that I've heard Blomstedt. I have Wand, Jochum, Skrowaczewski, Tintner, and Karajan. Now, they're all great in their own way, particularly the first three. But Wand brings a near perfect balance of sheer power and delicate beauty that's accompanied by immaculate articulation and execution. It's that good.

I'd also like to check out Celibidache, but winter is coming and my money tree isn't baring as much fruit....

:tiphat:


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## joen_cph

There´s a big difference between the DG Celibidache and the generally slow EMI Celibidache. The DG 3rd is good and lively. Concerning the EMI 3rd, I´ll be listening to it tonight.


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## Blake

Thanks for the heads up, j. Let me know what you think after further inquiry.


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