# The Importance of a Composer's or a Composition's Originality



## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

Is it necessary for a composer to be original in style to be considered a good or competent composer? Reginald Smith Brindle in his book “Serial Composition” provides the following argument that no, they do not. I always had thought they did, but I must say, the following does make me think, makes me wonder if I may be wrong (or maybe there is no right or wrong), or at least that the argument against my belief is a valid one.

What do you think and what do you think of his argument? Here is the excerpt, keep in mind he is speaking from the point-of-view of a serial composer and serial compositions, but it could apply to any style or period of music:
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“So many student compositions are also stylistically nondescript because young musicians feel compelled to be stylistically “original”. But is it so necessary to be original in style? The truth is that we make too much of stylistic originality. Not only is it quite impossible for thousands of composers to write in thousands of different styles, but if they did, the consequences would be undesirable. We would be lost in an incomprehensible labyrinth of fashions, artistic trends would lose direction, and in all probability musical progress would disintegrate.

Certainly we have seen tremendous changes of fashion in music since 1945, but there is now every sign that for the time being rate of change is slowing down. But even so, it is certain that what to us seem great stylistic differences, may in the long run be of little permanent significance.

Everything is of relative importance and we must see things in their historical perspective. If we can do this, we may decide that stylistic purity (in existing idioms) is much more important than stylistic individuality.

This question of stylistic familiarity is just as important today. When our music is already largely incomprehensible even to the most ardent amateurs, it is important to maintain stylistic consistency in order that idioms may become familiar and the musical content easily assimilated.

It therefore seems that though stylistic exploration is certainly not to be ignored, it is only for the few. For the vast majority, stylistic purity in existing idioms should be aimed at and originality demonstrated in what is expressed rather than how it is said.

Such concepts would probably be energetically disputed by the more extreme elements of the avant-garde and their camp followers. But their aggressive policy of change and revolution merely demonstrates either that change is pursued for its own sake, or that the products of their school have such impermanence that ceaseless change has become a policy of necessity.

In stylistic matters we should have no inhibitions, nor should we allow ourselves to be coerced into stylistic paths which do not suit our own fantasy. Our prime considerations must be communicability and faithfulness to our own ideals and instincts.”
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I like the point about the “thousands of different styles” and its problems, most originality having little permanent significance in the long run, and the points about the avant-garde. But the whole argument is rather convincing. I see it from both sides though. However, he does concede that the originality is “only for the few”. Is that a good point?


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

I say you can be a competent composer without being original at all. Competence has nothing to do with originality. But if you want to be a good composer, then the stuff shouldn't be too derivative or commonplace. There has to be some creativity, some application of certain principles, rather than relying solely on over-used patterns. I'd like to think that there has to be some sort of challenge or perspective to the listener. And the skill, technique has to measure up to what is being expressed.


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## Vasks (Dec 9, 2013)

Torkelburger said:


> It therefore seems that though stylistic exploration is certainly not to be ignored, it is only for the few. For the vast majority, stylistic purity in existing idioms should be aimed at and originality demonstrated in what is expressed rather than how it is said.
> 
> Such concepts would probably be energetically disputed by the more extreme elements of the avant-garde and their camp followers. But their aggressive policy of change and revolution merely demonstrates either that change is pursued for its own sake, or that the products of their school have such impermanence that ceaseless change has become a policy of necessity.


Sounds right to me



Torkelburger said:


> In stylistic matters we should have no inhibitions, nor should we allow ourselves to be coerced into stylistic paths which do not suit our own fantasy. Our prime considerations must be communicability and faithfulness to our own ideals and instincts."


The key point for me is "communicability and faithfulness to our own ideals and instincts." with emphasis on "own". That means no pastiche/imitation

LOL! I have owned that book for eons but I don't recall that passage.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

A composer does need a voice of their own, I think. Is that originality? And I do also think that composers need to be in their time but I'm not sure why. In theory it ought to be possible for a modern composer to write inspired music that is convincingly of the time of, say Mozart or Brahms. But it never happens.


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

> LOL! I have owned that book for eons but I don't recall that passage.


Haha! It's the beginning of Chapter 13, page 139 second paragraph if you have the Oxford paperback.


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

Phil loves classical said:


> I say you can be a competent composer without being original at all. Competence has nothing to do with originality. But if you want to be a good composer, then the stuff shouldn't be too derivative or commonplace. There has to be some creativity, some application of certain principles, rather than relying solely on over-used patterns. I'd like to think that there has to be some sort of challenge or perspective to the listener. And the skill, technique has to measure up to what is being expressed.


I think that's a good point. There is a happy medium between the two sides. I mean, if everything is always stylistically familiar in an established stylistic idiom, then how does music every progress? Brindle seems to try and save himself and his argument by saying this type of extreme creativity is reserved "for the few". Do you agree? How does he know who constitutes "the few"? That's what I would ask.


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

Vasks said:


> Sounds right to me
> 
> The key point for me is "communicability and faithfulness to our own ideals and instincts." with emphasis on "own". That means no pastiche/imitation
> 
> LOL! I have owned that book for eons but I don't recall that passage.


Amen, definitely NO PASTICHE!


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

Enthusiast said:


> A composer does need a voice of their own, I think. Is that originality? And I do also think that composers need to be in their time but I'm not sure why. In theory it ought to be possible for a modern composer to write inspired music that is convincingly of the time of, say Mozart or Brahms. But it never happens.


That's true, and I think that a voice will always come out naturally, just like how someone writes a letter or speaks. They do certain things musically that no one else does, or that is just somewhat unique. They're not "reinventing the wheel" like some composers feel they need to do, but it is just they way they "speak" musically. It should happen *naturally*.


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

Enthusiast said:


> A composer does need a voice of their own, I think. Is that originality? And I do also think that composers need to be in their time but I'm not sure why.


We can put on costumes, and that is a lot of fun, or can be, but in the end anyone can see that someone in a costume is in a costume.



> In theory it ought to be possible for a modern composer to write inspired music that is convincingly of the time of, say Mozart or Brahms. But it never happens.


There are some who try, quite a few, actually. They never succeed. For example, all of the pastiche completions of Mozart's Requiem that I personally have ever heard never convince. And those of the 20th c. (looking at you, Robert Levin) sound much less convincing than Süssmayr, and that's really saying something.

In the end, why would you want ersatz Brahms when the real thing is so readily available?


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

One consideration when defining originality and what it means will be the quality of invention within the writing. The approach to any aspect of composing, from a vertical spacing perhaps, or the way a motive is manipulated through to a rhythmic or idiomatic device, is where this telling trait can manifest itself and is often the result of a lateral way of thinking and an adventurous and clever imagination.

I've lost count of the number of times I've followed a score by someone like Britten or Dutilleux and just marvelled at the original strokes that are the result of an individuality manifesting itself through invention as well as other ways. Am I making any sense here? 

I take the view that anything deemed original (by others), will happen if it is meant to, but not until one has mastered what they instinctively feel they need to in terms of technique. I also take a view that writing in a tonal way is fine but as above....not pastiche.


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

I agree that there are numerous domains of originality. For example, Shostakovich. Pretty conservative overall, so much so that his music was dismissed by the likes of Pierre Boulez. But how could you argue it isn't original? Shostakovich's musical style is unmistakably his! The immediacy of the musical concept transcends the conservative harmony and rhythm.



mikeh375 said:


> I also take a view that writing in a tonal way is fine but as above....not pastiche.


You must come to an original understanding of what tonality means for you, and not merely copy how others did (except as a study.)

But certainly, the mere fact of using tonality (or elements of it), or not, tells me very little about a composer's originality.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Thinking that one needs to be original to be good is putting the cart before the horse. It seems to me that before the Romantic idea that art is primarily a revelation of its creator's personal vision fused with the notion of "progress" in art, composers assumed that their main job was to do something well, not to do something differently. If originality is always notable in the art we value most highly, it's because the great artist has by nature the ability to find a mode of expression that arises from deep within his own nature, which will be unlike anyone else's. He has no need to create an ersatz "individuality."

At a cultural level, I see an apparent paradox in the fact that, traditionally, original personal styles arose in the context of a wider, generally understood cultural style. A composer's personal language was an inflection of, and was perceived against the background of, an established musical language, in terms of which both he and his listeners understood his innovations. I think it no exaggeration to say that the value of originality depends on conformity; in a musical culture without an established stylistic substrate, the meaning and value of a composer's innovations is problematic at the very least. Thus in our time we've been offered an abundance of "original" music, most of which, I'm afraid, will turn out to be more ephemeral than fashions in clothing. At least clothing will be bought and worn for a year.


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

Woodduck said:


> Thus in our time we've been offered an abundance of "original" music, most of which, I'm afraid, will turn out to be more ephemeral than fashions in clothing. At least clothing will be bought and worn for a year.


It has ever been so.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Knorf said:


> It has ever been so.


Music may be ephemeral for different reasons. Most music vanishes from history because it lacks distinctive character, the originality that comes from having something to say that transcends the moment. Music may also disappear because it affects a novelty which has little or nothing to say even at the time of its creation. It creates a "fashion" that no one ever wears.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

I think, in part, it hinges on what we consider "style" to be. Arguably Mozart and Haydn and Boccherini, and Salieri and Dittersdorf all composed in the same global "style," nevertheless, we can tell them apart on hearing. What's originality, what's style, and what is just standard deviation based upon personality, training, and competence?


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

MarkW said:


> I think, in part, it hinges on what we consider "style" to be. Arguably Mozart and Haydn and Boccherini, and Salieri and Dittersdorf all composed in the same global "style," nevertheless, we can tell them apart on hearing. What's originality, what's style, and what is just standard deviation based upon personality, training, and competence?


That's an excellent point. And to me, originality is when a composer writes something so ground-breaking and new, that it changes the course of music history, to where everybody after him will copy what he's done. Like Beethoven simply changing the instrumentation of the orchestra forever in the 9th, and altering the very definition of what a melody is or isn't in the late quartets, and tearing down the conventions of form, etc. Like Wagner changing the course of history with the Tristan chord (and his whole output for that matter). Or when a whole new category of music is invented by a composer, like Minimalism (credited to Glass?). To me those things represent originality.

To me standard deviation based on personality is when a composer's voice is unique in a specific style or musical idiom, but hasn't changed the course of music history. This is like Veracini in the Baroque era. Or highly distinctive composers like Gesualdo, Zappa, Takemitsu, and so on.

My problem with so many popular composers today is that, I'll watch a lot of interviews with them about their "premieres" and they almost always say the same thing. They were bored or tired of, or found a certain musical attribute of today to be a total dead end and not suitable for their expressive needs, so that had to re-invent a whole new way of doing something in the piece. Like they don't like how melodies are written for example, or such and such harmony, orchestration, etc. So they try and re-invent the wheel with each new piece and try and do something ground-breaking. I get tired of it. It's totally overdoing it and is obvious and is trying way too hard. It's done so much that it's also getting to be cliche. What I also hate is that composition contests today ask you to do it. They advertise for highly original and distinct pieces that are ground-breaking (maybe not those exact words but I believe that's what they mean). I like originality but it just gets taken too far sometimes.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Woodduck said:


> Thinking that one needs to be original to be good is putting the cart before the horse. *It seems to me that before the Romantic idea that art is primarily a revelation of its creator's personal vision fused with the notion of "progress" in art, composers assumed that their main job was to do something well, not to do something differently. *If originality is always notable in the art we value most highly, it's because the great artist has by nature the ability to find a mode of expression that arises from deep within his own nature, which will be unlike anyone else's. He has no need to create an ersatz "individuality."
> 
> At a cultural level, I see an apparent paradox in the fact that, traditionally, original personal styles arose in the context of a wider, generally understood cultural style. A composer's personal language was an inflection of, and was perceived against the background of, an established musical language, in terms of which both he and his listeners understood his innovations. I think it no exaggeration to say that the value of originality depends on conformity; in a musical culture without an established stylistic substrate, the meaning and value of a composer's innovations is problematic at the very least. Thus in our time we've been offered an abundance of "original" music, most of which, I'm afraid, will turn out to be more ephemeral than fashions in clothing. At least clothing will be bought and worn for a year.


That could have almost been a tenet of some serialists WD. Dodecaphony was viewed as your "substrate" and was to have a democratising effect on the business of composition, much in the way any style in its time would have - it became the common stock of material resource. It didn't preclude originality as such of course, nor did it preclude fantasy, but I think there was an intention to dial down the ego in composition for some composers.

However the inherited narcissism of the 1800's didn't fully go away (how could it?) and one can discern in the Brindle quote above, a sense of justification and defence for the serial or technically disciplined approach over the practice of exaggeration, excess and the extreme. I feel that for Brindle, the creative balance between the personality and the technician is more akin to pre-Romantic writing.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

I can already hear the groans as I once again summon forth the spirit of Leonard Meyer and his explication of the New Stasis in Music and the Arts. Meyer, in a lightning bolt of real perception in the 1960s, wrote presciently of this phenomenon in his wonderful 1967 book _Music, the Arts, and Ideas_. And even here, Meyer was preceded by Ortega y Gasset's 1930 _The Revolt of the Masses_ wherein Ortega y Gasset perhaps unconsciously foretold, with no clue of the coming of satellite communication and the Internet, the coming simultaneous superfluity of originality and yet, through its unimaginable abundance, its loss of value. Woodduck's post touches on this aspect.

Let's quote Meyer: "...change and variety are not incompatible with stasis. For stasis, as I intend the term, is not an absence of novelty and change--a total quiescence--but rather the absence of ordered sequential change. Like molecules rushing about haphazardly in a Brownian movement, a culture bustling with activity and change may nevertheless be static. Indeed, insofar as an active, conscious search for new techniques, new forms and materials, and new modes of sensibility (such as have marked our time) precludes the gradual accumulation of changes capable of producing a trend or series of connected mutations, it tends to create a steady-state, though perhaps one that is both vigorous and variegated. In short......a multiplicity of styles in each of the arts, coexisting in a balanced, yet competitive, cultural environment is producing a fluctuating stasis in contemporary culture."

Music is no longer evolving, or, alternately, it is evolving in every conceivable direction simultaneously, constantly. Not only is every niche occupied but new niches are being created all the time. What's old is still right here, rubbing shoulders with the eternal new. The universe is expanding. Dark Energy. The New Stasis.


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## Vasks (Dec 9, 2013)

mikeh375 said:


> Dodecaphony was viewed as your "substrate" and was to have a democratising effect on the business of composition, much in the way any style in its time would have - it became the common stock of material resource. It didn't preclude originality as such of course, nor did it preclude fantasy, but I think there was an intention to dial down the ego in composition for some composers.
> 
> However the inherited narcissism of the 1800's didn't fully go away (how could it?) and one can discern in the Brindle quote above, a sense of justification and defence for the serial or technically disciplined approach over the practice of exaggeration, excess and the extreme. I feel that for Brindle, the creative balance between the personality and the technician is more akin to pre-Romantic writing.


The first paragraphs of Brindle, page 139 (LOL) deals with this (Torkel's quoting begins with the 3rd paragraph). Not quite like you're thinking Mike, but sort of. Here's a few select sentences paraphrased

"The mechanics of serialism is easy to learn, but to turn it into a well sculptured piece is another matter"

"Thoughts must be expressed though _style_ which goes hand in glove with _method_."

"Students must have good grounding of serial technique as well as awareness of all the styles used by serialists since the 20's"


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

*"Is it necessary for a composer to be original in style to be considered a good or competent composer?"
*
No. But without exception every "great" composer did something original that set him apart from the crowd.

There are zillions of merely good and competent composers: Raff, Rubinstein, John Williams, Peterson-Berger, Fibich, George Schumann. And there's nothing original about any of them. All highly derivative of others and there's nothing wrong with that; they still produced enjoyable and technically competent music.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

I think any good art is the expression of a human's "being" or creative essence and experience. For me, Frank Zappa exemplifies this, as well as Bob Dylan or...The Beatles. That's why Sir George Martin, their producer, stood back in awe as the music was created by these "uneducated semi-literate" lads from Liverpool. He was trained at the Royal Academy of music. He saw this.
When you are in the presence of genius, you will see it. I saw it with Itzhak Perlman, Eric Johnson, Keola Beamer, Tony Campisi, and others. It's easier to see it in performance.

Elliott Carter was a genius; so was Milton Babbitt, Stockhausen, and John Cage. All in different ways, some more apparent. All casting their pearls before swine to some degree.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

mikeh375 said:


> Dodecaphony was viewed as your "substrate" and was to have a democratising effect on the business of composition, much in the way any style in its time would have - it became the common stock of material resource. It didn't preclude originality as such of course, nor did it preclude fantasy, but I think there was an intention to dial down the ego in composition for some composers.
> 
> However the inherited narcissism of the 1800's didn't fully go away (how could it?) and one can discern in the Brindle quote above, a sense of justification and defence for the serial or technically disciplined approach over the practice of exaggeration, excess and the extreme. I feel that for Brindle, the creative balance between the personality and the technician is more akin to pre-Romantic writing.


Interesting idea. It seems ironic to me that composers could have thought that atonal serialism - the most tradition-negating artifice in the whole history of Western music to that date - would become a new norm on the basis of which a musical culture could be founded. How bizarre to think that the fundamentals of an art as complex as classical music can be recreated in the laboratory! Far from representing a dialing down of ego, the hubris of it might be equaled only by Wagner's characterization of the music drama as the "artwork of the future" (but even he was modeling his work on Greek drama, a tribute to the past). It's not surprising that theorists, beginning with Schoenberg himself, had to work overtime to frame "the method" as the inevitable next phase of music's evolution, and that we still encounter teleological conceptions of harmony that take us from _Tristan_ to _Le Marteau sans maitre_ in one easy lesson. The ideology of "progress" dies hard.

I do see how some composers would have seen serialism as an opportunity to focus on a new craft and escape the burden of emotional expression. Stravinsky of course found his own way of shucking off Romanticism (but fortunately not before writing _Firebird_).


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

millionrainbows said:


> Elliott Carter was a genius; so was Milton Babbitt, Stockhausen, and John Cage. All in different ways, some more apparent. All casting their pearls before swine to some degree.


In some cases they were casting cornhusks before jewelers.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Strange Magic said:


> I can already hear the groans as I once again summon forth the spirit of Leonard Meyer and his explication of the New Stasis in Music and the Arts. Meyer, in a lightning bolt of real perception in the 1960s, wrote presciently of this phenomenon in his wonderful 1967 book _Music, the Arts, and Ideas_. And even here, Meyer was preceded by Ortega y Gasset's 1930 _The Revolt of the Masses_ wherein Ortega y Gasset perhaps unconsciously foretold, with no clue of the coming of satellite communication and the Internet, the coming simultaneous superfluity of originality and yet, through its unimaginable abundance, its loss of value. Woodduck's post touches on this aspect.
> 
> Let's quote Meyer: "...change and variety are not incompatible with stasis. For stasis, as I intend the term, is not an absence of novelty and change--a total quiescence--but rather the absence of ordered sequential change. Like molecules rushing about haphazardly in a Brownian movement, a culture bustling with activity and change may nevertheless be static. Indeed, insofar as an active, conscious search for new techniques, new forms and materials, and new modes of sensibility (such as have marked our time) precludes the gradual accumulation of changes capable of producing a trend or series of connected mutations, it tends to create a steady-state, though perhaps one that is both vigorous and variegated. In short......a multiplicity of styles in each of the arts, coexisting in a balanced, yet competitive, cultural environment is producing a fluctuating stasis in contemporary culture."
> 
> Music is no longer evolving, or, alternately, it is evolving in every conceivable direction simultaneously, constantly. Not only is every niche occupied but new niches are being created all the time. What's old is still right here, rubbing shoulders with the eternal new. The universe is expanding. Dark Energy. The New Stasis.


Sounds like what's been going on with the quantum and sub-quantum worlds over the last 35 years.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Torkelburger said:


> I think that's a good point. There is a happy medium between the two sides. I mean, if everything is always stylistically familiar in an established stylistic idiom, then how does music every progress? Brindle seems to try and save himself and his argument by saying this type of extreme creativity is reserved "for the few". Do you agree? How does he know who constitutes "the few"? That's what I would ask.


I wondered about that "few". It sounds a bit limiting. In the end I think composers should just express whatever they feel, regardless of whether it's been done before or not. Naturally there will be music that's out-there, and music more similar to others. Not that I really consider myself a composer (I'd like to think a true one would be more dedicated to the craft).


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

Speaking for myself as a composer, I gave up trying to be original for its own sake long ago. I can only hope, and trust, that if I engage with my own creativity and craft with as much honesty and commitment as I can, it will be original enough in the end. 

I mean, it's not like "avant garde" has any meaning anymore, anyway.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Knorf said:


> Speaking for myself as a composer, I gave up trying to be original for its own sake long ago. I can only hope, and trust, that if I engage with my own creativity and craft with as much honesty and commitment as I can, it will be original enough in the end.
> 
> I mean, it's not like "avant garde" has any meaning anymore, anyway.


Let's hear your stuff.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Now that it's the post-modern era, tradition and serialism can all be part of the same vision. Frank Zappa proved this with "Lumpy Gravy" and his Synclavier compositions, and his eclectic love of all forms of music, popular and classical. Lamenting or being skeptical of "the attempted murder of centuries of tradition" is like defending an abandoned fort. Things have moved forward quite nicely, thank you.


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

mbhaub said:


> *"Is it necessary for a composer to be original in style to be considered a good or competent composer?"
> *
> No. But without exception every "great" composer did something original that set him apart from the crowd.
> 
> There are zillions of merely good and competent composers: Raff, Rubinstein, John Williams, Peterson-Berger, Fibich, George Schumann. And there's nothing original about any of them. All highly derivative of others and there's nothing wrong with that; they still produced enjoyable and technically competent music.


Do you feel a composer should strive to be "great" and original in style so that he/she can be set apart from the crowd? Is it futile? Or should he/she be content as being merely competent and possibly forgotten?

Brindle seems to indicate that composers were all trying to be great and original in style, but tripping over themselves and failing miserably, when they would actually be more successful just trying to write competent music. I think you'd probably agree with this. Of course, he says he is talking about students. What about professionals as I mentioned in several posts above? Are they successful in their musical en devours to be great and original?


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Torkelburger said:


> Do you feel a composer should strive to be "great" and original in style so that he/she can be set apart from the crowd? Is it futile? Or should he/she be content as being merely competent and possibly forgotten?
> 
> Brindle seems to indicate that composers were all trying to be great and original in style, but tripping over themselves and failing miserably, when they would actually be more successful just trying to write competent music. I think you'd probably agree with this. Of course, he says he is talking about students. What about professionals as I mentioned in several posts above? Are they successful in their musical en devours to be great and original?


It depends on what your mission and goal is, I suppose. I know a very prolific composer of music for junior high and elementary band programs. He writes music that is educational and hopefully present enough of a challenge that the students improve their musicianship. He doesn't pretend to be Beethoven. It's competent and professional and that's all anyone expects. I know another composer who write what he calls "industrial music" to accompany things like TV documentaries or video games. It's functional, not great.

But then there are the "serious" composers, mostly academics who won't waste their time writing such trash - they believe they're writing masterworks that will survive the test of time. Did the great masters of the past write for posterity, knowing (hoping) that their works would join the immortals? I don't think so - at least for most of them. They wrote music as competently as they could, using the skills and talent they had, and let's not fool ourselves, they wrote music to be entertaining. I think most of them would be astonished to find out that their work is still being played. For the first 200 hundred or so years of classical music as we know it, most concerts consisted of NEW music. I often think how exciting it must have been to be a concert goer in the late 19th c to hear so many works for the first time that are now hallowed masterworks. But nowadays you go to a concert and practically everything was written back in time for those audiences. And when you do hear something new, too often it fails to engage the listener or turns him off so completely that the music is never played again.

I think composers who want to be successful in the future need to cut out all the over the top special effects, get back to basics: melody and harmony at the top of the list. It doesn't have to sound old and stuffy. Pick up where the likes of Ravel, Debussy, Respighi left off. 20th C music took a seriously wrong turn by following the 2nd Viennese school, then on to Darmstadt, and all the atonal, aleatoric, serial nonsense. Film composers seem to understand this: if you want to connect to an audience, write music that the brain can readily appreciate. Don't try to write masterworks - just write the best you can, and if you're lucky, a masterwork or two might happen. Of course this assumes there are enough educated, sophisticated listeners out there who care. Of that, I don't hold much hope as most audiences are solidly in love with Bach through Mahler and that's about it.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

But mbhaub, whilst I can't disagree with you, there is sometimes an irresistible urge to push the boundaries as there always has been. The more one learns the more one is inclined to experiment, to explore, to discover. The line between acceptance or not is a fine line that one can easily cross over without being fully aware of doing so, especially when ears begin to accept through familiarity, harsher dissonance as being less so. 

One can even ignore the line completely and clearly the choices one makes inevitably have a bearing on how one is received. If a composer has a mindset prepared to go beyond popular convention and can do so with conviction, then perhaps originality is more readily achieved, discerned and accepted.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

mikeh375 said:


> But mbhaub, whilst I can't disagree with you, there is sometimes an irresistible urge to push the boundaries as there always has been. The more one learns the more one is inclined to experiment, to explore, to discover. The line between acceptance or not is a fine line that one can easily cross over, or even ignore and the choices one makes inevitably have a bearing on how one is received. If going beyond popular convention is done with conviction, then perhaps originality is more readily achieved, discerned and accepted.


I'm sure Beethoven would have agreed with this. Haydn would have at least thought it, but he'd have had to keep Count Esterhazy in mind.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Woodduck said:


> I'm sure Beethoven would have agreed with this. Haydn would have at least thought it, but he'd have had to keep Count Esterhazy in mind.


lol, I thought it too in my career, but had to keep Saatchi & Saatchi in mind, especially if my mind started to fantasise on the job about using more than three chords for that Fairy Liquid ad.

I think it was Tarusken who wrote that since LVB, the beautiful in music has been slowly and purposely eroded for the cause of self expression.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

mikeh375 said:


> I think it was Tarusken who wrote that since LVB, the beautiful in music has been slowly and purposely eroded for the cause of self expression.


You're dropping a bomb into the middle of this conversation. I love it, but for the moment I'm ducking for cover.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

ooops….it was Tarusken Sir, honest, not me, honest Sir..he said it....and mbhaub too, yeah, he started it..Sir, not me….


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## Ethereality (Apr 6, 2019)

My question is, we have a list of greatest composers. Where's the list of most-original composers, so that we can compare? I would have a hard time imagining many great composers on such a list...

Even before the threshold of Romantic music where greatness was more synonymous to originality, I don't know if the originality was nearly as grand as today. It instead seems we can only credit originality for the proper evolution it yielded, (as well as for diversity), and not for all the other stuff.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

A very brief list of composers who produced novel, original works (some, anyway): Beethoven: _Eroica_; Brahms: PC No.1; Stravinsky: _Le Sacre_; Prokofiev: Toccata Op.11, PC No.2; Debussy, _Afternoon_; Mosolov: _Iron Foundry_...

Some of these led to abundant new music. I'd be interested in others' candidates.


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

mikeh375 said:


> I think it was Tarusken who wrote that since LVB, the beautiful in music has been slowly and purposely eroded for the cause of self expression.


Taruskin is full of opinions.



The Dude said:


> Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.


Before we can decide who the "most original composers" are, we would have to agree on what that means. Can we agree at least that "original" is better served in music by associating it with that which is distinctive, and not merely that which is novel?

I mean, I wish to include J. S. Bach as an original composer. Yes, before his death, Bach's music was widely* considered to be hopelessly old-fashioned. But I think that's because a lot* of people were totally missing what he was really accomplishing, and were confusing fashion for originality. Bach wasn't particularly fashionable, except maybe as an organist when he was young. But as a composer, he was absolutely one of the originals. No one, and I mean no one, entirely sounds like J. S. Bach: not Telemann, not Handel, not Zelenka, not Heinichen, not anyone German from his generation much less anyone else. I'd never confuse any of them for Bach, though I might confuse some of them for each other. Perhaps Bach was less novel than, say, Biber, but in my opinion no less distinctive. And, of course, Bach showed a much higher level of craft, which in his case is distinctive by itself.

Anyway, without a definition of "original" that could at least potentially include J. S. Bach, I'm not on board, myself.

(*Widely and *a lot, of course, in Bach's lifetime were restricted to part of what is now Germany and that's about it.)


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

Strange Magic said:


> A very brief list of composers who produced novel, original works (some, anyway): Beethoven: _Eroica_; Brahms: PC No.1; Stravinsky: _Le Sacre_; Prokofiev: Toccata Op.11, PC No.2; Debussy, _Afternoon_; Mosolov: _Iron Foundry_...
> 
> Some of these led to abundant new music. I'd be interested in others' candidates.


Nice list. If we are just picking one per composer, I'd say these off the cuff were novel and original and one could argue changed the course of music (with exception of Haydn):

Bach's Brandenburgs
Mozart Sym 41
Haydn The Creation
Wagner Tristan and Isolde
Mahler 5
Schoenberg Pierrot Lunaire
Shostakovich Sym 5


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

Torkelburger said:


> Nice list. If we are just picking one per composer, I'd say these off the cuff were novel and original and one could argue changed the course of music (with exception of Haydn):
> 
> Bach's Brandenburgs
> Mozart Sym 41
> ...


Haydn's whole approach to the symphonic form was novel!

It's certainly an exaggeration to say Haydn invented the symphony, but there's little doubt that the genre would have ended up totally differently without his numerous but astonishingly varied contributions.

I would dispute none of the examples on that list as being original in various important ways.


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## DeepR (Apr 13, 2012)

When so much between silence and white noise has already been done, I wonder how a current composer can still be original while having some kind of lasting, universal appeal at the same time.


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

I think original would mean something along the lines of it being the first of it's kind. So there is nothing before it that you could point to that it is derivative of. And after it's writing other composers were highly influenced by it. I think that also falls under "distinctive" as well.

Like Strange Magic's example of The Rite of Spring. Stravinsky was influenced by Rimsky-Korsokov at the time, however, there is really nothing of RK's that you can point to that The Rite of Spring is really like. It's more derivative of non-classical influences. That's what made it so unique. It was truly the first of it's kind and influenced almost everything written thereafter.


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

Knorf said:


> Haydn's whole approach to the symphonic form was novel!
> 
> It's certainly an exaggeration to say Haydn invented the symphony, but there's little doubt that the genre would have ended up totally differently without his numerous but astonishingly varied contributions.
> 
> I would dispute none of the examples on that list as being original in various important ways.


Thanks Knorf for the correction! You are right!


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

DeepR said:


> When so much between silence and white noise has already been done, I wonder how a current composer can still be original while having some kind of lasting, universal appeal at the same time.


Well, it's kind of like along the lines of what mbhaub was saying, imho. When he was saying it might be best to pick up where composers like Debussy left off.

I agree with this. In fact, when I often listen to Debussy (orchestral works), I often am amazed at how MODERN it sounds. Not only that, but how MORE modern it sounds than some of what is written TODAY. It is so refreshing. He truly was the first modern composer. Sometimes composers should just go back to basics and use that as a starting point for their "originality", methinks.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

I'll tack on Orff's _Carmina Burana_ to our growing list of novel and/or original works. Might as well add Ravel: _Boléro_ to it also; maybe _La Valse_ also. I am happy with the cumulative choices so far.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Berlioz. I'm surprised they didn't lock him up.


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## Strange Magic (Sep 14, 2015)

Scriabin and his dreams of the apotheosis of music, art, color, ecstasy, and the Final Whatever.....


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## DaddyGeorge (Mar 16, 2020)

Interesting question. I think that originality should not be the main postulate of creation. With some exceptions (for example, Wagner, who worked very conceptually and who should be also in the list), the composer should not approach the work in order to create new, but mainly to remain ingenuous and authentic. Possible originality of the work will somehow "come out" by itself. As for the list, I think it would be worth considering to add Luciano Berio's _Sinfonia_ and most of Janáček's works. I think Janáček was very original and his compositional methods based on "speech tunes" (difficult to translate "nápěvky mluvy") were quite innovative, the question is whether someone directly followed him.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Knorf said:


> I mean, I wish to include J. S. Bach as an original composer.







I think whether or not something is original depends to some degree on individuals' perspective. Brahms said that Mozart's Idomeneo was something completely new. C.P.E. Bach called his F sharp minor Fantasie "C.P.E. Bach's feelings" and Mozart called his Haydn quartets his "six children". I think there existed an idea of personal expression before Beethoven's time. It just wasn't widespread yet.



hammeredklavier said:


> Professor Craig Wright views Mozart as an innovator, in his 3 lectures:
> 14.1 - Piano Concerto in D minor
> "... Just as Haydn was more or less the inventor of the modern string quartet, so Mozart was the father of the piano concerto. He set out the structural framework of the piano concerto, one that lasted into the romantic era, here it is. Mozart developed a stereotypical approach to the first movement of the concerto. It goes by several names, concerto form, double exposition form are the two most common. Double exposition form is a good name for this form because there are as you can see, two expositions. We have one exposition as we had in sonata-allegro form development, recapitulation. But now we have another exposition added at the beginning. The first exposition allows the orchestra to present most of the themes by itself. The pianist will add a couple later on, and do so all in the tonic key.
> ...
> ...


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

I wonder if people think that this rather beautiful song suffers from a lack of musical originality.


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## Portamento (Dec 8, 2016)

mbhaub said:


> I think composers who want to be successful in the future need to cut out all the over the top special effects, get back to basics: melody and harmony at the top of the list. It doesn't have to sound old and stuffy. Pick up where the likes of Ravel, Debussy, Respighi left off. 20th C music took a seriously wrong turn by following the 2nd Viennese school, then on to Darmstadt, and all the atonal, aleatoric, serial nonsense. Film composers seem to understand this: if you want to connect to an audience, write music that the brain can readily appreciate. Don't try to write masterworks - just write the best you can, and if you're lucky, a masterwork or two might happen. Of course this assumes there are enough educated, sophisticated listeners out there who care. Of that, I don't hold much hope as most audiences are solidly in love with Bach through Mahler and that's about it.


It's not as simple as "picking up" where Ravel, Debussy, and Respighi left off because that was over 80 years ago. I'm not telling you how to write a piece, but it is a composer's responsibility as an artist to engage with the present day. Writing off everything post-2nd Viennese School just because you don't like it isn't a great idea either. I get that the music is esoteric and typically doesn't have the necessary reference points to achieve mass appeal, but a lot of this also has to do with political climate. In the '60s, Stockhausen was a lot more of a household name than he is today; since then, the rightward shift in Western politics has prevented this from every happening again.

Steve Reich's music _does_ have the reference points for mass appeal, but he was also a great admirer of someone like György Ligeti. He shunned the elitist culture, not the music itself. Ironically, ignoring music since the '30s would be just as elitist as what Boulez et al. did! Wynton Marsalis tried it in jazz by ignoring the 'avant-garde' of the '60s and '70s, and look what happened -- jazz remains noncommercial, in large part due to (again) the shifted political climate. Bottom line: setting boundaries on what good music is or isn't, what was a "wrong turn" or not, etc., _does not work_.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

Torkelburger said:


> That's true, and I think that a voice will always come out naturally, just like how someone writes a letter or speaks. They do certain things musically that no one else does, or that is just somewhat unique. They're not "reinventing the wheel" like some composers feel they need to do, but it is just they way they "speak" musically. It should happen *naturally*.


Absolutely. But many aspiring artists fail to find their voice. And I have never been convinced about the idea of a composer _searching_ for new things to say. It is far more likely (it seems to me) that the music of good composers is made up of want to say ("musical ideas"), their technical ability to say these things and their own voice. There may be other factors and when they come together you may have a successful composer ... but getting recognised as such might take them a lifetime while others get widely praised only to be forgotten later.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Enthusiast said:


> Absolutely. But many aspiring artists fail to find their voice. And I have never been convinced about the idea of a composer _searching_ for new things to say.* It is far more likely (it seems to me) that the music of good composers is made up of want to say ("musical ideas"), their technical ability to say these things and their own voice*. There may be other factors and when they come together you may have a successful composer ... but getting recognised as such might take them a lifetime while others get widely praised only to be forgotten later.


Yes. One could add formative influences too.


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

Portamento said:


> It's not as simple as "picking up" where Ravel, Debussy, and Respighi left off because that was over 80 years ago. I'm not telling you how to write a piece, but it is a composer's responsibility as an artist to engage with the present day. Writing off everything post-2nd Viennese School just because you don't like it isn't a great idea either. I get that the music is esoteric and typically doesn't have the necessary reference points to achieve mass appeal, but a lot of this also has to do with political climate. In the '60s, Stockhausen was a lot more of a household name than he is today; since then, the rightward shift in Western politics has prevented this from every happening again.
> 
> Steve Reich's music _does_ have the reference points for mass appeal, but he was also a great admirer of someone like György Ligeti. He shunned the elitist culture, not the music itself. Ironically, ignoring music since the '30s would be just as elitist as what Boulez et al. did! Wynton Marsalis tried it in jazz by ignoring the 'avant-garde' of the '60s and '70s, and look what happened -- jazz remains noncommercial, in large part due to (again) the shifted political climate. Bottom line: setting boundaries on what good music is or isn't, what was a "wrong turn" or not, etc., _does not work_.


From my perspective it's a little different as I love the 2nd Viennese School and serialism very much. As well as much of the musical trends post 1950, including SOME avant-garde. However, today there seems to be a prevalence of banal writing, especially in film music and student work, where composers aren't even using a language as complicated as Tchaikovsky. Even he is more complex than what they're doing and he's been dead 127 years.


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## Fabulin (Jun 10, 2019)

mbhaub said:


> I think composers who want to be successful in the future need to cut out all the over the top special effects, get back to basics: melody and harmony at the top of the list. It doesn't have to sound old and stuffy. Pick up where the likes of Ravel, Debussy, Respighi left off. 20th C music took a seriously wrong turn by following the 2nd Viennese school, then on to Darmstadt, and all the atonal, aleatoric, serial nonsense. Film composers seem to understand this: if you want to connect to an audience, write music that the brain can readily appreciate. Don't try to write masterworks - just write the best you can, and if you're lucky, a masterwork or two might happen. Of course this assumes there are enough educated, sophisticated listeners out there who care. Of that, I don't hold much hope as most audiences are solidly in love with Bach through Mahler and that's about it.





mbhaub said:


> But without exception every "great" composer did something original that set him apart from the crowd.
> 
> There are *zillions of merely good and competent composers: Raff, Rubinstein, John Williams, Peterson-Berger, Fibich, George Schumann. *And there's *nothing original about any of them*. All highly derivative of others and there's nothing wrong with that; they still produced enjoyable and technically competent music.


Let me just say that the placement of John Williams in that row, or in a pot of "zillions of merely good and competent composers" is rather ridiculous. I could understand James Horner, or William Alwyn. But Williams? The unmistakable, highest order syncretist? Some say that Robert Schumann's music is more complex than it sounds. Many others that Bach was not merely "old-fashioned", but instead perfected existing idioms, becoming in many cases better than the originals. Williams is closer to these two than to riff Raff and Anton Notenquatscher. He definitely picked up where Debussy, Prokofiev, Herrmann, Hindemith, Copland, Enescu, Dutilleux, Tchaikovsky, Rimsky, Respighi, Hanson, Shostakovich, Korngold, Orff, Holst, and others left. The absorption of the idioms of these composers into a river of jazz harmonies and melodies is verbatim something Henry Pleasants prophetized in _The Agony of Modern Music_ (1950) as a wished for solution to the great rift between composers and the modern audience.

This is not the disdainful and prejudiced 1990s anymore. After ca. 2000 instrumentalists, who are great fans of his work, started entering top orchestras. You should have seen the crying and joyful musicians of the Vienna Philharmonic when they finally got to play _E.T. the Extra-Terrestial_ in the Golden Hall. Wherever Williams goes, he is welcomed like Rossini and like Verdi were in their heyday. And as far as posterity is concerned, he is as good a composer as either of the two (likely even better).

Tell me, have you ever looked at the pages of his most complex scores? How many books / articles / other analyses of his music have you actually read? Have you taken care to really look for yourself into what he does? Or did you just listen to a commerical LP "soundtrack" album or two?


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

^ I'd say John Williams is a very competent composer, great ear, etc., but with zero originality. His music doesn't add anything to the stuff he borrows. His movie soundtracks are kind of like a medley of themes, which work for the purpose he wrote it for, but is kind of boring to listen to straight without the storyline (to me). His concert works show a lot of skill, but not really anything that jumps out.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Torkelburger said:


> From my perspective it's a little different as I love the 2nd Viennese School and serialism very much. As well as much of the musical trends post 1950, including SOME avant-garde. However, today there seems to be a prevalence of banal writing, especially in film music and student work, where composers aren't even using a language as complicated as Tchaikovsky. Even he is more complex than what they're doing and he's been dead 127 years.


Thing is TorkelB, as you will doubtless know, midi and samples have dumbed down media music. Nowadays, composers without training think they can score for orchestra if they have a sample set and DAW. The sample companies themselves are partly responsible for the modern sound of scores, especially because of those damned spiccato string sounds they take great stock in supplying with their articulation sets. 
I was about to apologise for the digression, but actually the reliance on technology to overcome a lack of musical education has also led to work of great originality and should not be dismissed really, except in the context of orchestral art music, where an education is the bare minimum requirement to start scoring well.


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## Vasks (Dec 9, 2013)

mikeh375 said:


> midi and samples have dumbed down media music. Nowadays, composers without training think they can score for orchestra if they have a sample set and DAW.


God, I could go on a long rant about how there's an explosion of amateurs flooding the world with worthless stuff._* "Look Ma! I'm a composer!"*_



mikeh375 said:


> I was about to apologise for the digression, but actually the reliance on technology to overcome a lack of musical education has also led to work of great originality and should not be dismissed really, except in the context of orchestral art music, where an education is the bare minimum requirement to start scoring well.


If by originality, you're referring to electronica. I agree. There are many interesting pieces being created on laptops. And I'd agree about your "_exception_" if you'd simply reduce it to include any instrumental art music.


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

Vasks said:


> God, I could go on a long rant about how there's an explosion of amateurs flooding the world with worthless stuff._* "Look Ma! I'm a composer!"*_
> 
> *If by originality, you're referring to electronica. I agree. There are many interesting pieces being created on laptops. And I'd agree about your "exception" if you'd simply reduce it to include any instrumental art music.*


Yes to both Vasks. I got side tracked with film scoring. Me and you together in a bar could rant forever on this.


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

Ranting, you say? In a bar, you say? I'll buy the first round.


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## Torkelburger (Jan 14, 2014)

Hmm, I'm a bit skeptical. Maybe sometime you could post some examples (in the Non-Classical forum?) and let me take a listen to what you are praising.


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## Vasks (Dec 9, 2013)

Well, I am a bit thirsty, guys


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## mikeh375 (Sep 7, 2017)

:cheers::cheers::cheers::cheers::cheers:


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## Portamento (Dec 8, 2016)

Torkelburger said:


> From my perspective it's a little different as I love the 2nd Viennese School and serialism very much. As well as much of the musical trends post 1950, including SOME avant-garde. However, today there seems to be a prevalence of banal writing, especially in film music and student work, where composers aren't even using a language as complicated as Tchaikovsky. Even he is more complex than what they're doing and he's been dead 127 years.


Contemporary composers are largely operating in a feedback loop, whether they are recycling the ideas of Ligeti or Respighi and earlier. The way to break this cycle is to engage with the present day in a way that Ligeti and Respighi cannot... because they are both dead. This means different things to different people, but composers needs to exit their "classical bubble" from time to time.


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