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Seriously, is this music?

110.141.12.206
Posted on November 30, 2021 at 15:47:47
John C. - Aussie
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I'm interested in a wide variety of music but some of the contemorary efforts are not very entertaining. No doubt a lot of clever thought and work went into the composition, but I'm sorry, not for me. Many of the latest efforts make Stochhausen sound melodic!! But maybe others here can shed a more positive light on this situation?

What can be more subjective than music? It reflects our personal tastes and preferences.

 

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No (nt), posted on November 30, 2021 at 19:17:03
Ferrous Oxide
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 nt

 

RE: Seriously, is this music?, posted on November 30, 2021 at 21:22:15
welly
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 Just played the first few tracks via Spotify... Definitely not my cup of tea, even though and I do like some strange stuff (according to Mrs. Welly).

Can't say I'll be hunting this one down...

Cheers

Welly
He hoped and prayed that there wasn't an afterlife. Then he realized there was a contradiction involved here and merely hoped that there wasn't an afterlife.
- Douglas Adams


 

"Can't say I'll be hunting this one down...", posted on December 1, 2021 at 02:06:52
Chris from Lafayette
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 Fortunately, the album is "out of stock" at the site which John linked to! ;-)

 

Labels: Kairos, Wergo, Stradivarius, Mode..., posted on December 1, 2021 at 03:13:13
SE
 There is a universe of this type of abstract-expressionist organized sound sometimes related to "classical music" but often more aural painting rather than speech in coherent sentences.

As with many things, it is not for everyone. Think Jackson Pollock, and maybe that can serve as the quickest path towards, as least, getting a handle on why it exists.

Hey, John Cage started it!:-) Or, maybe it was those pesky, clangy ancient Japanese composers. Honestly, just look at the category of "World Music" to find a pile of tunes that cannot be hummed!:-)

 

To put it differently, it is NOT MUSIC...but it IS art!:-)..., posted on December 1, 2021 at 04:32:48
SE
 The link by the OP points to a statement by the composer (I think "composer" is still relevant, even if the work isn't "music" per se) that the individual pieces should be played apart from "the whole" -- which makes total sense as, even for those that are amused by the works, they quickly become tedious. As with all abstract uber-artsy stuff, at some point you just want to listen to some Rolling Stones and eat a hamburger!:-)

Now, back to the German Meisters...........

 

And before anyone toss their avant-garde lp's...., posted on December 1, 2021 at 09:30:08
jdaniel@jps.net
 Some are valuable.

I sold an lp featuring the composer literally banging on kitchen dishes for over $100. Cool artwork though. I can't recall the title.

I also sold two first-issue Harry Partch lps for a nice profit.

In any case I'd sit though any of the above music over most modern broadway musicals. : )

 

Strikes me as "musique concrete" without any cement, posted on December 1, 2021 at 13:09:45
Jim Treanor
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 I didn't like what I heard of THAT in the 1950s, and this attempt to combine voice and piano sans any relationship to each other apart from pacing sounds every bit as sterile. "Creativity" on the cheap.



Jim

 

Interesting music vs. music that interests..., posted on December 1, 2021 at 13:13:04
peppy m.
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 Some classical music is "interesting". It beckons me to listen from the outside, in.

Other classical music interests me. Somehow, it beckons me to listen from the inside, out.

The music example you've cited is of the former type, I think.

 

+1 n/t, posted on December 1, 2021 at 14:13:28
SE
 .

 

Yes, But, Mahler Said, posted on December 1, 2021 at 20:09:10
Ferrous Oxide
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 "Interesting is easy. Beautiful is hard".

(Keep in mind that the concept of beauty in the 19th cent was vastly different from how we understand the term now. It more closely might be translated into late 20th cent/early 21st cent terms as "profound truth", or
"rarefied experience").

 

Pretty sure that a lot of 20th/21st Century art aims at ugly..., posted on December 2, 2021 at 06:02:43
SE
 to provide profound truth -- not something, AFAIK, that we could readily find in 19th Century or prior classical music. The "rarified experience" could surely be attributed to 20/21 reality (thinking a couple of world wars here, paired with a few sides of genocide and an amuse bouche of pure barbarism).

To me, it is only if we remove our historic prejudices regarding the shape and content of classical music, and align ourselves with the underlying intentions of hardness, alienation and, perhaps, anger that we can begin to sympathize with a lot of what has recently taken place in musical composition. For me (anyway), this is the true value of Shostakovich and Prokofiev -- they were the last major bridges between the glance back and the Post WWII bleakness.

Mahler is quaint by comparison!:-)

If we reject ugly and violent as artistic expression, IMO, we are striking at the root of dislike of many towards most of what is taking place in contemporary classical music. Also, IMO, this change will never be reversed -- unless, of course, we are talking about politically correct children's books. At least, that would be my take on things given the parallel direction that literature, philosophy and the culture at large have been, and continue to be, heading. Cue Elgar's nobilmente...

 

I'm still waiting for archaeologists to uncover the filing cabinet that holds all the late 20th C tonal, posted on December 2, 2021 at 07:00:59
jdaniel@jps.net
 masterworks, buried deep underground by extremist Academics.

I'll always beat my drum (poly-rhythms, of course) for Ligeti, whose sound worlds are IMHO interesting and often beautiful. Adams' Harmonialehre is another work that I visit for both the soundscapes, irresistible rhythms and Ravelian beauty. Ingrahm Marshall's "Fog Tropes" is also very evocative, and, IMHO "beautiful."

I've been meaning to sit through the Adams and Elfman (!) Violin Concertos but haven't gotten around to it.

A list of "listener-friendly" late 20th C works, (and might as well include the 21st C since we're -- gasp! -- 20 years in), would be helpful, if anyone specializes in that era.

 

For new(er) works, I actually stay away from anything too "retro"..., posted on December 2, 2021 at 08:36:20
SE
 If I want old, I listen to old!:-) BTW, the same goes for singers. If I want Freni (she's another beauty), I listen to Freni. I embrace the new, angular stuff...sorry!?:-)

 

"'istener-friendly' late 20th C works", posted on December 2, 2021 at 11:32:34
Chris from Lafayette
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 Sounds like a great topic for a thread in itself. I'd start with Part*, and I agree with you about Ligeti. (And, let us not forget: Ligeti was one of us - an audiophile!)

*Please pretend that there's an umlaut over the "a". ;-)

 

BTW, I appreciate your reference to "extremist Academics" [nt] ;-), posted on December 2, 2021 at 11:35:51
Chris from Lafayette
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I greatly enjoy Ligeti, but I am amazed that you consider him..., posted on December 2, 2021 at 12:16:08
SE
 "listener friendly"!:-) I mean, wouldn't that open up the universe of Rihm, Sorabji, even Xenakis for some consideration? This gets us WAY out there!

How about tamer stuff like Richard Arnell, Malcolm Arnold, Matthew Taylor, Philip Sawyers...much less angular, but highly recommended (Neo-Romantic, all, I would describe them as) -- f#ck, I'm speaking like Yoda again (hate that, I do)!:-)

 

I'm late-comer to Malcolm Arnold, thanks to TAS list, posted on December 2, 2021 at 17:53:35
jdaniel@jps.net
 The English, etc Dances are charming, beginning to end.

His 5th Symphony, (EMI, conducted by the composer) is wonderful as is the 2nd, the finale of which contains one of the most orgasmic, earth-shattering unexpected chord progressions ever. (27:08-09) An audiophile dream at that point as well. Gives me the chills even heard on my .5" computer speakers.








View YouTube Video

 

Ligeti's Piano Etudes are indeed listener friendly IMHO, posted on December 2, 2021 at 17:54:28
Chris from Lafayette
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 I think that one can hear lines of descent from Bartok, Scriabin (at least sometimes!) and others. I agree that Sorabji and Xenakis are "out there" in a way I can't appreciate, and I don't know Rihm well enough to say.

Of the other four you mention, Malcolm Arnold is OK, but I don't know Arnell, Taylor and Sawyers.

 

RE: To put it differently, it is NOT MUSIC...but it IS art!:-)..., posted on December 4, 2021 at 13:40:07
Utley1
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 Are you saying that Jackson Pollock did not make art. Even PIC came around to admire him.Do not doubt the market; there is a dozen abstract expressionists and pop artists whose auction value exceed the 'value $" of most museums in the world. The trouble with modern music ,excluding Webern,the length of most pieces is as long as the classical or church style recordings. I find them good for my brain=poetic puzzles full of sound surprises. I need it as a musical drug addict...

 

No, you are misreading me a bit..., posted on December 4, 2021 at 15:17:01
SE
 it is subtle. I am saying that some of the most avante-guarde or hyper-modern "music" compositions can, understandably, be hard to consider as music -- they are near to cacophony, and more like just organized sound. This "pure organized sound", however, is still art.

Similarly, Pollock's non-figurative, seemingly random drippings may be considered, from a classical perspective, as "not being art" -- but, it IS art (very excellent art, in fact) but...it plays by different rules and sensibilities.

 

I have to tell you, Chris..., posted on December 7, 2021 at 05:15:04
SE
 I've just listened to the Ligeti Etudes and many of the Sorabji Etudes (Ullen). To me, they are cut from the exact same cloth, and I like them both!:-)

 

RE: To put it differently, it is NOT MUSIC...but it IS art!:-)..., posted on December 7, 2021 at 18:59:44
Zarlino
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 "Art is what you can get away with" - Andy Warhol

 

RE: To put it differently, it is NOT MUSIC...but it IS art!:-)..., posted on December 7, 2021 at 19:09:31
Utley1
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 I recall he got shot in the gut; he did not get away with very much did he? That comment fits about everything in the world-despite all it was his singer girlfriends that shot him

 

RE: To put it differently, it is NOT MUSIC...but it IS art!:-)..., posted on December 7, 2021 at 19:10:40
RV817
 good quote, Warhol would know considering what he got away with !

what's the other one ... something about if the checks clear?

 

The line between Art and pretensions nonsense is a fine one -nt, posted on December 8, 2021 at 06:04:37
Feanor
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 nt


Dmitri Shostakovich

 

If there is a line at all, it is a blurry one., posted on December 8, 2021 at 10:22:23
peppy m.
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 Halls and galleries designed to showcase traditional forms of "art" have remained basically the same, while definitions of art have changed dramatically. Art that would never have seemed deserving of showcase status now has that status. Much of what seems to be "pretentious nonsense" in art today might be the result of modern artists trying to use the status symbols of past times to promote their artistic products, today.

It all seemed like a "shoe-in" to some, and one bound to increase the public exposure, fame, and profits that modern artists hoped to enjoy. But I might say, "If feelings change, find (or return to) the appropriate venue.".

The sensation of absurdity that some of us experience when we walk into a "grand" or classically-styled art gallery or concert hall and see or hear the kinds of art forms that might have once been confined to (or "showcased" in) battlefields, fireside gatherings, kitchens, or barns might not be a groundless one.

The past remains in our memories. It resonates, still.

 

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