# US composers supported by their music



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

John Adams has been mentioned as an American "classical music" composer who supports himself primary through his music -- commissions, recordings, conducting gigs, whatever. Who else is there or has there been? Torke? Stravinsky?

Big buck conductors and teachers at universities excepted, of course.


----------



## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Aaron Copland
Randy Newman
Dave Grusin


----------



## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

What about John Wiliams, Howard Shore and others who compose film music?


----------



## DrKilroy (Sep 29, 2012)

G. Gershwin was the richest classical composer ever, I think. He was at the same time a kind of pop star of his era, however. 

Best regards, Dr


----------



## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

DrKilroy said:


> G. Gershwin was the richest classical composer ever, I think. He was at the same time a kind of pop star of his era, however.
> 
> Best regards, Dr


He made most of his money from his Broadway music rather than his concert works, though, so that isn't really comparable to a composer trying to make it on his/her own in the concert world.


----------



## Rapide (Oct 11, 2011)

Rossini - his operas and his restaurants!


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Mahlerian said:


> He made most of his money from his Broadway music rather than his concert works, though, so that isn't really comparable to a composer trying to make it on his/her own in the concert world.


Lenny didn't see such a distinction. But of course by the time he matured (post 1945) the distinctions that had existed between 'high' and 'low' art where beginning to break down even more than before.

But Gershwin's few 'real' classical works are all core repertoire now. Most of them are (one that isn't that I can think of is the 2nd rhapsody - but I'd be happy to get royalties from these alone: Concerto in F - most popular American piano concerto - Rhapsody in Blue, American in Paris, Porgy and Bess, Cuban Overture, Catfish Row Suite).

Anyway, as for my answer, I have a strong hunch Alan Hovhaness would have racked in a good deal of cash from his Mysterious Mountain symphony, and maybe also the Mount St Helens Symphony. I am guessing here. In the 19th century, most composers made big bucks with just a handful of works (many of them 'lowbrow' - eg. Brahms' Hungarian dances, various encores and salon things of Saint-Saens and Elgar, Sarasate, stuff like this).

But if we let Gershwin and Copland in (they where both pianists and Copland also conducted a fair deal of music, not only his own, eg. he introduced the music of Chavez into USA) then we should let in Lenny too (not only pianist but conductor of course, as well as composer with big impact - and cash from royalties, I'd say).

Barber was also very bankable (even if solely from the Adagio for Strings and Violin Concerto - again, most popular American concerto for the instrument). Hindemith, Martinu and Bloch aslo had many commissions once they got to the USA - esp. from Koussevitzky.

Film composers as discussion (incl. 'locals' like Williams) and also people who came from Europe - Korngold, Rozsa, Max Steiner. Another local was Bernard Herrmann who did the scores for many of Hitchcock's movies.

& what about Philip Glass and Steve Reich? Glass has also done film scores, his album 'Glassworks' and also the one with Ravi Shankar must have earnt him a pretty penny.

& re Elliott Carter, he was getting commissions right up until he died. So?


----------



## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

SiegendesLicht said:


> What about John Wiliams, Howard Shore and others who compose film music?


Not only does a film composer like Williams receive a huge lump sum for their services, they will also receive royalties of varying values for film and soundtrack revenue, as such it is wholly incomparable to a composer who is commissioned by the local university chamber group to write a string quartet which is then only performed once every 10 years, if they're lucky.


----------



## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

*Pop Quiz*

I am having some real problems with this thread. The OP is very intelligent and knowledgable. He already knows the answer to this question. Most of us also know the answer to this question. Is this to be some sort of pop quiz for a freshman music appreciation class?


----------



## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

KenOC said:


> John Adams has been mentioned as an American "classical music" composer who supports himself primary through his music -- commissions, recordings, conducting gigs, whatever. Who else is there or has there been? Torke? Stravinsky?
> 
> Big buck conductors and teachers at universities excepted, of course.


John Adams. I saw _Death of Klinghoffer_ it was such a powerful opera with orchestral color quite unlike any.


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Other ones are Morton Gould and Ferde Grofe in the light music/more populist type classical area.



arpeggio said:


> I am having some real problems with this thread. The OP is very intelligent and knowledgable. He already knows the answer to this question. Most of us also know the answer to this question. Is this to be some sort of pop quiz for a freshman music appreciation class?


Well it does cut out the less popular composers. Ives would be the biggie there, but I also have liked or even loved what music I've heard from the likes of Henry Cowell, Harry Partch, Roger Sessions, Charles Tomlinson Griffes, & so on.

It doesn't only cut out non-household more 'highbrow' stuff like that but also 'lowbrow' stuff that you cannot stretch to call classical but which are still popular. Eg. Irving Berlin, one of the American greats, but more popular/jazz than classical. Cole Porter also, and those of 'the great American songbook' - which does though include Gershwin, who crosses the boundary into classicl. Artie Shaw did that a bit too, as did Duke Ellington. Others like composers of musicals too are left out.


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

arpeggio said:


> I am having some real problems with this thread. The OP is very intelligent and knowledgable. He already knows the answer to this question. Most of us also know the answer to this question. Is this to be some sort of pop quiz for a freshman music appreciation class?


I have no idea of the answer(s) to this question (I think I was drunk the entire freshman year...) I'm finding the names put forward interesting though. Of composers we would consider "classical," Copland I think would qualify. Certainly not Ives, who became quite wealthy in a totally different field. Hovhaness? Well, I don't know where else his money came from, so maybe...

But nobody's mentioned Stravinsky. I don't think he taught (did he?) and I haven't read of him holding down another job.


----------



## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

KenOC said:


> But nobody's mentioned Stravinsky. I don't think he taught (did he?) and I haven't read of him holding down another job.


Other than teaching a series of Harvard lectures as a guest, I don't think Stravinsky taught. He was able to survive on commissions and conducting gigs even when few people enjoyed what he wrote anymore, just because he was famous on the strength of his early ballet scores. Of course, he didn't get any royalties from those, so he put out marginally different revised versions to try to get some. It didn't work, as most people continued to perform the originals.


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Stravinsky also did a big world tour in the 1960's, aroud his 80th birthday, taking in the USSR and also Australia, funnily enough. Some people who where around at the time here do remember him coming, a big deal was made in the press about it. By then he was of course well known to classical audiences. He conducted his works everywhere he went on this tour.


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

If you keep it 'strictly classical' i.e. no pop or film music, which is not a pejorative intimation but a mere fact all of that is far more 'commercial' as to possible and expected revenues, all there are who fit your criteria are

Aaron Copland

John Adams

and that is ALL.

P.s. Torke and Hovhaness, maybe. Find the stats if you can.

P.p.s. Stravinsky, NOT AMERICAN, made as much or more from conducting as he did from composing, but he did sustain himself and his family solely from commissions, royalties and conducting.


----------



## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

PetrB said:


> If you keep it 'strictly classical' i.e. no pop or film music, which is not a pejorative intimation but a mere fact all of that is far more 'commercial' as to possible and expected revenues, all there are who fit your criteria are
> 
> Aaron Copland
> 
> ...


Copland did write some film music in the early days before he hit it big, partially to keep himself afloat financially.


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Re Carter I checked. Scratch him from my big post list above. He worked for universities for a long time, for dedaces.

As for Hovhaness, he is very strong in being able to support himself as a composer. According to a quick read of wikipedia, he only taught full time from 1948-51 at Boston. But after 1951 he relocated to NYC and became a full time composer for the rest of his long life. He taught at summer schools though, ad hoc stuff of the sort. Before 1948 he was supported in his music by the Armenian community of the USA.

So I'd chalk Hovhaness down as a yes. 

The otehrs I mentioned are strong candidates too: BArber, Gershwin, Reich, Glass & I would myself add film composers (all classically trained and they had 'purely' concert hall works too that are nowadays getting out there more) and possibly emigre 'serious' composers who spent a large portion of their lives in USA (the patronage of Koussevitzky was a boon for them).

I mean America was and is the land of capitalism. So I think classically trained composers who make money from their art are good answer to this thread. We're not talking of say a Communist regime here. Nor is it Australia, where classical only took off more after 1945, esp. in the 1960's. This is America, for goodness sake, American came of age as a source of classical music in Modern times.


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

I checked with Barber. All I can find as to him teaching as to doing it at the Curtis Institute 1939-42. As far as I can see otherwise, he lived from his music (early on I think he also sang as a baritone). People can correct me too. I'm not being a Cold War Warrior here but why so much resistance, esp. from our American members, or discomfited feel re composers making cash and being successful. It does not necessarily invalidate, in my mind, the more academic or not so bankable composers. But its an issue for another thread and we've had plenty like that here...


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

PetrB said:


> If you keep it 'strictly classical' i.e. no pop or film music, which is not a pejorative intimation but a mere fact all of that is far more 'commercial' as to possible and expected revenues, all there are who fit your criteria are
> 
> Aaron Copland
> 
> ...


Both Copland and Adams made (make) money from conducting, and both wrote film scores (Adams's in retrospect). And Stravinsky was indeed an American, officially as of 1945. He had lived in the United States since 1939.


----------



## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Both Copland and Adams made (make) money from conducting, and both wrote film scores (Adams's in retrospect). And Stravinsky was indeed an American, officially as of 1945. He had lived in the United States since 1939.


Having your music licensed for a film is not the same as writing a film score. I don't think Adams has done the latter.


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Mahlerian said:


> Having your music licensed for a film is not the same as writing a film score. I don't think Adams has done the latter.


True, that's why I said "in retrospect." And in fact I doubt the film fattened his bank account much! 

BTW, there is a film score that was written by Adams. Is it incorrect to say, "John Adams wrote a film score"? If Beethoven wrote a song (say, as part of a set) and later sold the rights to Armour to use in an advertisement, would it be incorrect to say, "Beethoven wrote the Armour hot dog song"?


----------



## Rapide (Oct 11, 2011)

Rachmaninoff spent the last twenty-five years of his life in America (and Europe). Athough he did not write much during these years, he made a living to support his family largely as a pianist.


----------



## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

KenOC said:


> True, that's why I said "in retrospect." And in fact I doubt the film fattened his bank account much!
> 
> BTW, there is a film score that was written by Adams. Is it incorrect to say, "John Adams wrote a film score"? If Beethoven wrote a song (say, as part of a set) and later sold the rights to Armour to use in an advertisement, would it be incorrect to say, "Beethoven wrote the Armour hot dog song"?


The Beethoven jingle example doesn't run parallel to the film score issue. A film score is commissioned and composed specifically for a film, music created for other purposes that is then licensed for use in a film is called "additional (or licensed) music". For example, Wendy Carlos composed music specifically for Stanley Kubrick's _The Shining_, while Penderecki wrote _Anaklasis_ as a stand alone work, a recording of which Kubrick then licensed and used in his film. To use another Kubrick example, the soundtrack to _2001: A Space Odyssey_ consists entirely of additional music, as not one piece on it was written specifically for the film. That is the difference.


----------



## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

Aaron Copland was just so versatile, he conducted, he composed film music and was paid well for that, he taught music .... the man was just an all-rounder!


----------



## Lunasong (Mar 15, 2011)

Eric Whitacre. I'm going to call him a "classical" composer because he's not writing for the pop market.

I like this quote from his website; excellent advice:
_If you want to learn to compose, compose a piece of music. Don't ask anyone how to do it. Look at other scores, write your best piece, FINISH IT and then get real human beings to perform it. You will learn more from that single experience than you ever will from a teacher._


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

^^Michael Tippett said virtually the same thing, gave the same sort of advice to young composers in an interview I read. He basically said the best thing is to find your own musical voice, and use your ears more, your head less. That's just his approach but I think it worked for him, and he started quite late as a composer, he only started to study music seriously/rigorously at something like age 18.

BTW I'm ok with Whitacre and another one in that kind of traditional leaning choral 'bracket' is Morten Lauridsen.


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Both Copland and Adams made (make) money from conducting, and both wrote film scores (Adams's in retrospect). And Stravinsky was indeed an American, officially as of 1945. He had lived in the United States since 1939.


Nationality of a composer, despite naturalization, is generally accounted for as country of birth and formative musical training.

Schoenberg, American, is a 'German Composer.' Ditto, even though emigre much younger, was Lukas Foss, and the early 'stable' of "Hollywood," almost all emigre naturalized Americans.... It is a 'convention' most observe. Stravinsky was also prior to being American, "French."

Born there, trained there is your compositional 'nationality.' By that other reasoning, Chopin would be another one of the most famous of French Composers. LOL.

Many a conductor is invited to conduct their own works, the opportunity to get the interpretation you want, plus the fee, often near the same as a commission which takes up to nine or months to complete, is a job common enough to 'being a successful composer.' Who, if they could, would pass up the job?

I think the only musicians you will find who make a living solely off royalties, who neither teach, perform, conduct, are in the pop genre sectors -- Andrew Lloyd Weber, Frank Loesser (Guys and Dolls, "I'd like to get you on a slow boat to China, etc." Harold Arlen, Irving Berlin, all of that ilk.

It is a Blazing Flash of the Obvious that popular sells more and more readily.


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

ArtMusic said:


> Aaron Copland was just so versatile, he conducted, he composed film music and was paid well for that, he taught music .... the man was just an all-rounder!


This is very 'usual.' Composer, teacher, performer, film score here and there, 'utitilty' music for theater productions, conducting. Many of the better known composers HAD to be all rounders.... Stravinsky was taken aside, early on, I forgot by whom, and told he needed to learn conducting, because he would be invited to conduct his own work: reason - an opportunity for the interpretation you most want, even moreso, good revenue!


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Wrong slot, apology for the clutter.


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Lunasong said:


> Eric Whitacre. I'm going to call him a "classical" composer because he's not writing for the pop market.
> 
> I like this quote from his website; excellent advice:
> _If you want to learn to compose, compose a piece of music. Don't ask anyone how to do it. Look at other scores, write your best piece, FINISH IT and then get real human beings to perform it. You will learn more from that single experience than you ever will from a teacher._


LOL. Be default (I believe what he makes is 'sincere') I call his music 'easy on the ear popular modernist.' He is hugely successful, partially because he is very skilled in writing a lot of choral music which is within the performing range of high school and college choirs - and popular choral music sells lots of copies. He's found a niche, and is writing, I think, essentially, 'more of the same' just about each time he comes up with another. It is 'good writing.'


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Sid James said:


> I checked with Barber. All I can find as to him teaching as to doing it at the Curtis Institute 1939-42. As far as I can see otherwise, he lived from his music (early on I think he also sang as a baritone). People can correct me too. I'm not being a Cold War Warrior here but why so much resistance, esp. from our American members, or discomfited feel re composers making cash and being successful. It does not necessarily invalidate, in my mind, the more academic or not so bankable composers. But its an issue for another thread and we've had plenty like that here...


'Successful' for a composer usually means, by your mid-forties, you are making in a good year what a CPA or executive secretary makes, annually, by the time they are in their mid-twenties or age thirty. Nothing to begrudge -- or envy, either 

'They' work longer and harder than many in other fields who make more, while making less, as a rule. Part of the territory.

Steve Reich, now I think 'successful,' drove a taxi at least through his early forties....


----------



## waldvogel (Jul 10, 2011)

Of course, there is the famous story about George Gershwin, who felt somewhat insecure as a classical composer and continually looked to "improve" his composition skills. In this story, he went to Stravinksy, at some point in the early 1930's, to ask if he could take composition lessons.

Stravinsky asked Gershwin one question: "How much money did you make last year?" Gershwin answered around $150 000, which was a fortune in depression-era America.

Stravinsky then answered: "Perhaps I should be taking lessons from you?"


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

KenOC said:


> True, that's why I said "in retrospect." And in fact I doubt the film fattened his bank account much!
> 
> BTW, there is a film score that was written by Adams. Is it incorrect to say, "John Adams wrote a film score"? If Beethoven wrote a song (say, as part of a set) and later sold the rights to Armour to use in an advertisement, would it be incorrect to say, "Beethoven wrote the Armour hot dog song"?


The composer's web page lists all his works, published and non (those all earlier) and matter of factly after some titles is (film score) -- all of them small indies, likely docus.

I'm wondering if those with more of the average / normal careers, vertical climb within the company or trade, are weirdly fascinated with not only how 'jack of all trades with the skill applied wherever it can be applied' a composer's existence is, but completely flabbergasted that anyone would pursue or choose a career path which was so mined with uncertainty as to a regular income, and a far lower than average one at that?

Ingram Marshall (recipient of a MacArthur grant - private endowment; they find you, you don't apply for anything) has one work which was lately chosen and used by Scorsese in "Shelter Island"

'Fog Tropes.' An electronic piece first made as 'audio' for a gallery presentation, John Adams, a colleague and friend of Marshall's, suggested that Marshall write brass parts to go with that taped piece (something Adam's had done on his electronic / synth piece, 'Light over water' - which also first saw light of day as 'ambient' music for another art gallery presentation.)

It is gorgeous;





The piece gained some popularity prior its being chosen by Martin Scorese as part of the music or his film, the film choice and exposure therefrom has brought Marshall to a larger public. (Scorsese, like Kubrick, has quite a feel for choosing extant classical music to use in his movies - Kubrick's 2001 launched Ligeti's music into a far wider awareness.)


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Thanks PetrB! You made me check -- John Adams's Wiki entry lists three film scores, only one of which (I am Love) is noted as made up from preexisting pieces.

Re "completely flabbergasted that anyone would pursue or choose a career path which was so mined with uncertainty as to a regular income, and a far lower than average one at that?" Even LvB, at the time quite a successful composer, was rejected as a son-in-law by the family of a girl he wanted to marry, evidently at least partly for that reason. Our times are probably not unique!


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Crudblud said:


> Not only does a film composer like Williams receive a huge lump sum for their services, they will also receive royalties of varying values for film and soundtrack revenue, as such it is wholly incomparable to a composer who is commissioned by the local university chamber group to write a string quartet which is then only performed once every 10 years, if they're lucky.


"Commercial" music attached to a popular product. I agree, not the 'classical' venues or 'classical' business.


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

PetrB said:


> "Commercial" music attached to a popular product. I agree, not the 'classical' venues or 'classical' business.


I can well believe that 50 or 100 years from now, some of today's film scores (or suites derived from them) will be included in whatever then is regarded as "classical music." Just as suites of incidental music to plays or masques, or overtures etc. from operas, are viewed today. I don't understand the rush to exclude this music from our overly-circumscribed musical world.


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

KenOC said:


> I can well believe that 50 or 100 years from now, some of today's film scores (or suites derived from them) will be included in whatever then is regarded as "classical music." Just as suites of incidental music to plays or masques, or overtures etc. from operas, are viewed today. I don't understand the rush to exclude this music from our overly-circumscribed musical world.


I can well believe you are only partially correct in that prediction: they will be 'classic' film scores, maybe run with 'those really OLD movies,' and generally on the classical orchestra's -- or their subsidiary band's -- Pops concerts.

That is unless you and some others here form a body so influential to the experts, those who write and / or edit Groves, or LaRousse, etc. redefine 'what classical music is' and at that, redefined by less than expert non-pros and re-written in Groves, LaRousse.

What you are speaking of is contemporary with Ligeti, Adams, Reich, Beat Furrer, Tristan Murail, Arvo Part, etc. This is NOT A CLASS WAR, but a simple matter of discerning one thing for another, like a red car from a blue car or a coupe from a sedan.

But having put it as you have, so casually, makes it seem like you have no discernment at all between both quality, and intent, of one genre to the other... 'Sounds classical like, must be classical.'

I really don't care how much 'youse guys' love your film scores and musicals -- I seriously doubt they are going to be re-categorized so you can feel more 'high-brow' about that area of your musical tastes....

..that "High, Low and Middle brow" [it really, really Needs To Go and Die It's Long Overdue Death] is most revealing about those who use the terms, evidently feeling their is some social status, like 'King, Lords and Serfs' to which they are tagged when liking this, that or the other genre of music. It is more than a titch absurd, and rather sad.


----------



## Wandering (Feb 27, 2012)

^ That wasn't at all helpful. The Deviation between these scholars and everyone else is the real kisser? Oops, what a second, this is nothing new, but they were all simply peasants prior, WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED!!!


----------



## Wandering (Feb 27, 2012)

Sid James said:


> I checked with Barber. All I can find as to him teaching as to doing it at the Curtis Institute 1939-42. As far as I can see otherwise, he lived from his music (early on I think he also sang as a baritone). People can correct me too. I'm not being a Cold War Warrior here but why so much resistance, esp. from our American members, or discomfited feel re composers making cash and being successful. It does not necessarily invalidate, in my mind, the more academic or not so bankable composers. But its an issue for another thread and we've had plenty like that here...


Too bad he didn't live long enough for the profit of The Elephant Man and Platoon, what a bummer man!


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Clovis said:


> ^ That wasn't at all helpful. The Deviation between these scholars and everyone else is the real kisser? Oops, what a second, this is nothing new, but they were all simply peasants prior, WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED!!!


It would be nice to know the people writing those books can discern between a John Williams film score suite, all original but all derivative, and say, David Lang, also tonal and not derivative, and the Lang requiring of the listener a length of musical thought over five sustained minutes. Lobbying for the other 'as classical' is like lobbying for novels written to the reading level of a 'tween', and that with a shorter than adult attention span, to sit side by side on the scale with great adult literature. After that lowered standard is achieved, it can plummet in level of expectations of quality again, until it is at the Lowest Common Denominator - all middle of the road safe and non-challenging mediocrity.

Some would have it 'high, low, or middle brow.' -- which sounds more like Goldilocks and the three bears related to music and taste than anything else.

One avowed hater of contemporary classical feels particularly "Enlightened" in their limited musical taste, and is on a messiah-like mission to enlighten everyone else on the matter. Evidently, devout amateur listener they are, they think theirs is the mean line arbiter of all that taste could and should possibly be.

Others are on a campaign to make anything 'classical' more 'egalitarian,' maybe because they feel socially inferior because they happen to like some more pop venue film scores as much as they do Beethoven, as ridiculous and little boy self-conscious as that may seem.

So, the messianic crusader, and those of similar mentality -- their proposals are exactly like a proposal to devalue the more valuable currencies to favor the lesser valued currencies so 'everyone is on the same level.' That has NEVER worked....

I'm sick of it, and lobbying flat out for "all high brow all the time," 
No IQ tests required to step up to the plate in levels of discernment or length of attention span, no bizarre imagined class distinctions.


----------



## Wandering (Feb 27, 2012)

^ This intellectual value system you speak of in closing, not all mere mortals have the time for this lofty and analytically inclined brandishing system of yours, this is all I'm saying, only some of your brave mutinied scholars included.

I'm just joking of course.


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

PetrB said:


> That is unless you and some others here form a body so influential to the experts, those who write and / or edit Groves, or LaRousse, etc. redefine 'what classical music is' and at that, redefined by less than expert non-pros and re-written in Groves, LaRousse.
> 
> What you are speaking of is contemporary with Ligeti, Adams, Reich, Beat Furrer, Tristan Murail, Arvo Part, etc. This is NOT A CLASS WAR, but a simple matter of discerning one thing for another, like a red car from a blue car or a coupe from a sedan.
> 
> ...


The wish, as always, is father to the thought. I lobby for nothing, merely try to see the future. And the future of music, as always, is what a significant portion of people want to listen to.


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

KenOC said:


> The wish, as always, if father to the thought. I lobby for nothing, merely try to see the future. And the future of music, as always, is what a significant portion of people want to listen to.


There will and has been an ocean of popular fare in all the arts, and some remains 'fine' and some not.... I don't really give a fig for 'the categorization' but really really wonder what level of less demand, less involvement and 'lighter entertainment' that would lead to.

It is a more 'plebean' and 'middle class' consumer society than in the past centuries of classical music.... That sector is becoming more and more the driving force in all sorts of commercial ventures, the 'fine arts' included. Those same sectors are beginning to thrill they 'have a voice' in something, almost as if they are crying out that centuries of previous fine art deliberately 'left them out,' or 'ignored their taste.' The taste, though, even for 'quality' is Average and Common... What was 'the people's choice back then does not include the swooping demographic of what 'the peoples choices' are now -- all leading to the lukewarm bowl of porridge in the medium sized bowl, Goldilocks finds her comfort zone. Good for Goldie.

Much more is thought of directly as marketable product. I suppose I should say those who like all the more popular might later regret that is all they are getting -- lukewarm porridge in a medium sized bowl. Have a seat. Make yourself 'comfortable.'

All porridge and no protein makes for eventually rather dulled minds.

Don't think too hard, it might hurt


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

PetrB said:


> There will and has been an ocean of popular fare in all the arts, and some remains 'fine' and some not.... I don't really give a fig for 'the categorization' but really really wonder what level of less demand, less involvement and 'lighter entertainment' that would lead to.l It is a more 'plebian' and 'middle class' consumer society than in the past centuries of classical music.... much more is thought of directly as marketable product. I suppose I should say those who like all the more popular might later regret that is all they are getting.


God forbid that classical music might appeal to plebeian tastes! :lol:

I feel an example is in order. In 1912, Elgar wrote the music for a masque named "Crown of India." The narration was basically a paean to British imperialism. Elgar is said to have cut to parts with the most excess, but he left plenty in. Some people here would have objected strongly to categorizing the music as "classical," the appeal being middlebrow at best.

Today the masque is mostly forgotten (but fun for those who can find it). The music, though, lives on, categorized as "classical" with no question asked. Who doesn't love The Dance of the Nautch Girls, or the March of the Mogul Emperors?


----------



## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

KenOC said:


> God forbid that classical music might appeal to plebeian tastes! :lol:
> 
> I feel an example is in order. In 1912, Elgar wrote the music for a masque named "Crown of India." The narration was basically a paean to British imperialism. Elgar is said to have cut to parts with the most excess, but he left plenty in. Some people here would have objected strongly to categorizing the music as "classical," the appeal being middlebrow at best.
> 
> Today the masque is mostly forgotten (but fun for those who can find it). The music, though, lives on, categorized as "classical" with no question asked. Who doesn't love The Dance of the Nautch Girls, or the March of the Mogul Emperors?


LOL, those who have never cared for bland and mediocre late romantic music, to name a few.


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

waldvogel said:


> Of course, there is the famous story about George Gershwin, who felt somewhat insecure as a classical composer and continually looked to "improve" his composition skills. In this story, he went to Stravinksy, at some point in the early 1930's, to ask if he could take composition lessons.
> 
> Stravinsky asked Gershwin one question: "How much money did you make last year?" Gershwin answered around $150 000, which was a fortune in depression-era America.
> 
> Stravinsky then answered: "Perhaps I should be taking lessons from you?"


That anecdote is variously related with Gershwin asking not only Stravinsky but also Ravel and Schoenberg for lessons. Gershwin would have met/known all three, Ravel & Stravinsky when he went to Paris and Schoenberg once he got to L.A. But I do know that Schoenberg agreed to give lessons to Gershwin in L.A. So Arnie regularly visited Gershwin's place, but they always somehow ended up playing tennis or ping pong. In any case, Gershwin was greatly influenced by Berg's _Wozzeck_ and incorporated the lessons he learnt from that influence, so to speak, into _Porgy and Bess_.

As an aside to all this, I think Gershwin definitely ranks amongst the finest melodists in any genre - classical, jazz, popular - equal in my mind to Schubert. His 'serious' works like the Concerto in F come across as like his songs in orchestral form. Its similar with Schubert, how he was thinking vocally whilst composing instrumentally. & that crossing of boundaries/genres, may well be one of the secrets to his success and continuing endurance of his music, played by musicians of all kinds & loved by listeners across all boundaries.

So yeah, I think he didn't need lessons from any of those guys, for these reasons at least. He was able to naturally absorb the modern trends anyway.


----------



## Wandering (Feb 27, 2012)

Art is subjective, for example, a book on the similarities and differences between the English and soon after American 'Punk' musical movements, I'd buy that.

_'Note to self, no posting while intoxicated.'_


----------



## palJacky (Nov 27, 2010)

<<<Too bad he didn't live long enough for the profit of The Elephant Man and Platoon, what a bummer man! >>>
actually he died just a few months AFTER the release of 'the elephant man".
Of course, that doesn't mean that there was a royalty check cut before his death.


----------



## Wandering (Feb 27, 2012)

That can probably be investigated, I'm on it.

Too bad, we all no a whole load of songwriter live it up with labels and royalties, Van Morrinson, Costello, Bacharach. Don't know if many composer, especially back then, had this same option, considering the label contracts and such. Curious as to if his family was at all compensated financially?


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Another possibe one is *John Corigliano*, who has done both film and 'serious' concert hall type works. I think he initially made a big splash with his score for _Altered States_. He also did the_ Aids Symphony_, and I think has won some big awards (an Oscar for a score or two).


----------



## arpeggio (Oct 4, 2012)

Sid James said:


> Another possibe one is *John Corigliano*, who has done both film and 'serious' concert hall type works. I think he initially made a big splash with his score for _Altered States_. He also did the_ Aids Symphony_, and I think has won some big awards (an Oscar for a score or two).


Pulitzer for his _Second Symphony_.


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Sid James said:


> Another possibe one is *John Corigliano*, who has done both film and 'serious' concert hall type works. I think he initially made a big splash with his score for _Altered States_. He also did the_ Aids Symphony_, and I think has won some big awards (an Oscar for a score or two).


Sid, please be aware that several people here have assured me that film music is not and never will be "classical music." Since such distinctions seem important to them, Mr. Corigliano may be SOL.


----------



## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

KenOC said:


> Sid, please be aware that several people here have assured me that film music is not and never will be "classical music." Since such distinctions seem important to them, Mr. Corigliano may be SOL.


Well he's done a mix of things, not only film, as I said. In any case I see film music as the equivalent of incidental music of the past. Indeed, the early guys who did Hollywood scores - like Korngold - did both film and incidental musics. It was easy for them to segue from one to another.

But I don't want to open yet another debate on this. I personally don't put things in boxes of genre and even style and so on. Distinctions like this aren't important to me. I like film music as well as many other types of music.


----------

