in this country, the middle class spends enough time in front of the TV to 
make up for any possible economic reason for not going to a concert, 
particularly when the new music concerts put on by the university are 
free. identifing and persueing new music requires a little bit of 
iniciative, which most people lack. luckaly, tv programming provides much 
(though transparent) exposure to new (abstract) music. it is usually 
accompanied by some complex abstract effect in the video layer or in the 
narration, so most of the time it isn't paid much due and its disorienting 
enough that we don't want to hear the depiction in our everyday lives.

an anticdote, when the carl stalling project came out, i was working in a 
pizza place. we used to listen to it over and over in the prep area, 
because we were just that crazy. people on the line would beg us to turn 
it off because it was driving them daffy and making their already 
stressful work more stressful. the people in the dining room could hear it 
faintly, and generally wrote us off as crazy kids (as we'd randomly run 
out of the kitchen with our hands in the air screaming 'abiddy abiddy 
abiddy!") all of us grew up on those (albeit racist) cartoons and knew the 
music intimately. but context required certian responses to it.

(composed in pine without spellcheck... sorry)
kelly


On Mon, 29 Nov 2010, peiman khosravi wrote:

> I get your point. Maybe I am being too pedantic but I am still not
100% in agreement.

You have to be relatively well off to be able to afford the time or
energy to read books, go to concerts and so on. Middle class families
don't read books to have a topic to talk about at dinner but primarily
because they can afford it. It is a luxury, like going to the
restaurant or having the time to cook instead of buying ready-made
oven-chips.

At the same time there is the misconception that classical music is
and always has been for the middle classes. It is this misconception
that puts everyone else who can afford it but do not associate
themselves with the 'middle classes' off classical music. And anyway
the point is that the decline of the popularity of classical music is
a different issue from that of contemporary classical music. Your
average middle class concert-goer would not appreciate Ligeti or
Feldman.

So what is the solution? More money and thought put into cultural
education. But hey we can't expect that much nowadays, at least not
here in the UK.

Best,

Peiman


On 29 November 2010 17:08, Michael Gogins  wrote:
> Compared to the past, they have lost some of their audience. When I
> was in college, classical music sales were 10% of a growing market for
> recorded music. Now, they are 5% of a shrinking market. Something like
> that.
>
> "Function" in this context is a sociological term, not an artistic
> term. The term "function" does not mean "good" or "bad." It is an aid
> to understanding what is happening, not a value judgment.
>
> If you do not listen to classical music, do not read books or stories,
> never consume any kind of art including movies or TV you cannot be
> middle class because if you dined with middle class people you would
> be at a loss for words and would be quite uncomfortable. I exaggerate,
> but I hope I have made my point more understandable. If you consume
> only "low-brow," "popular art, e.g. only TV, the discomfort may lessen
> but is still there.
>
> Regards,
> Mike
>
> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 11:51 AM, peiman khosravi
>  wrote:
>>>
>>> One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
>>> thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
>>> longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
>>>
>>
>> Really? So why is it that the music of Bach and Brahms and Schubert
>> have not lost their audience? How many new interpretations are out
>> there of the classical repertoire?
>>
>> Also I don't think the 'function' of music has ever been to 'make'
>> people bourgeois, the fact that the audiences were primarily bourgeois
>> does not mean that they became bourgeois by listening to the music! No
>> more than Hitler became an anti-semite by listening to Wagner.
>>
>> Best
>>
>> Peiman
>>
>>
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>>
>
>
>
> --
> Michael Gogins
> Irreducible Productions
> http://www.michael-gogins.com
> Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com
>
>
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i would say that good art requires study because for art to be good it has 
to be insightful (to me) but, that study doesn't necessarily have to be 
withen the domain of 'art'. i think many 'faux' bands are musical 
geniuses, for their social commentary and humor, but not on their 
musical virtuousity. good art, non the less...

k.

On Tue, 30 Nov 2010, Greg Schroeder wrote:

> I would love to see some sort of poll organized re: opinions on this
> topic.
> The two sides (with minor adjustments within them) I see:
>
> 1) Performance for a general audience takes precedence over all else.
> 2) Good art requires study to appreciate.
>
> I'd bet we'd find the first set contains a whole lot of widely-known,
> influential people who call themselves musicians, and the second
> set . . . well, ask your mother if she's heard of them.
>
> I'd also be dreadfully curious about how many artists in the second set
> play a realtime instrument regularly and generally can/do improvise with
> it. That's not an insinuation, that's a genuine question that I'd like
> to hear teased out into a conversation.
>
> I'm absolutely flabbergasted at the response here. I thought my opinion
> (#1) was true to the point that it didn't bear discussion and that #2
> was at least temporarily put to rest.
> But then, I might be too young and inexperienced in listening as art
> form to understand these things.
>
> Greg
>
> ps - The re: thing is getting even more obnoxious.
>
>
> On Mon, 2010-11-29 at 10:57 +0000, john ffitch wrote:
>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>> about it.
>>
>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>
>> ==John ff
>>
>>
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>
>
>
>
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This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
about it.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music

==John ff


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I read it and was about to place a comment there, but then thought it  
was not worth it. Not sure it sheds any new light on the subject.  
Maybe some of its premises are not quite right: that post-1945 music  
is shunned by concert-goers (e.g. Stravinsky), that there is more  
enthusiasm for modern visual arts (than for contemporary music) and  
that the use of some modern music in films is a proof that larger  
numbers of people can appreciate it if given more exposure to it.

One or two comments seemed interesting though: the dimension of time  
in Music seems to be a disincentive (if compared to people  
appreciating modern art) and, related to that, that we have developed  
a difficulty to concentrate for longer periods of time.

It is good to see the topic being discussed at this level, though. I  
do not see a lot of Music discussion these days in the papers.

Victor

On 29 Nov 2010, at 10:57, john ffitch wrote:

> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
> about it.
>
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>
> ==John ff
>
>
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Mureil has a similar view of the temporal dimension:

"Asking people to listen to a piece of music takes some of their time,
some of their life: the composer is stealing a little bit from the
life of each listener. Is this the reason why contemporary music is so
much less popular than the contemporary visual arts, which are
certainly no easier to comprehend? While watching an exhibition, the
public maintains control of their time. If they do not like it, they
can leave at any point—while with music, the composer’s time is
necessarily imposed upon the listener. This creates an enormous
responsibility on the part of the composer.
This responsibility means that music can neither be purely
experimental nor eliminate all elements of research. It should always
provide interesting, and even new (daring though the word seems to us
today) propositions, while remaining perceptible so that it can be
received by the listener. This must be true even when the composer is
looking for extreme novelty or complexity: somewhere there must exist
a common ground where the composer and his audience can share an angle
of approach."

On 29 November 2010 11:13, Victor Lazzarini  wrote:
> I read it and was about to place a comment there, but then thought it was
> not worth it. Not sure it sheds any new light on the subject. Maybe some of
> its premises are not quite right: that post-1945 music is shunned by
> concert-goers (e.g. Stravinsky), that there is more enthusiasm for modern
> visual arts (than for contemporary music) and that the use of some modern
> music in films is a proof that larger numbers of people can appreciate it if
> given more exposure to it.
>
> One or two comments seemed interesting though: the dimension of time in
> Music seems to be a disincentive (if compared to people appreciating modern
> art) and, related to that, that we have developed a difficulty to
> concentrate for longer periods of time.
>
> It is good to see the topic being discussed at this level, though. I do not
> see a lot of Music discussion these days in the papers.
>
> Victor
>
> On 29 Nov 2010, at 10:57, john ffitch wrote:
>
>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>> about it.
>>
>>
>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>
>> ==John ff
>>
>>
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>> csound"
>>
>
>
>
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> csound"
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>


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john ffitch wrote:
> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
> about it.
>
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>   

Follow the money. It's far cheaper for radio stations and Philharmonic 
groups to schedule music by dead composers who don't need paid.

I attended new music programs almost every week in Los Angeles for 
nearly five years. In that time the audience was comprised of the same 
people, give or take a handful leaving or coming in to the fold. In a 
city of 8 million people the LACMA series drew maybe two hundred per 
show (and I think that number's probably a bit too high). The concerts 
at CalArts were just as poorly attended.

OTOH when Boulez came to town they rolled out the carpet for him. No 
expense was spared, and he conducted a fabulous program filled with 
music by Webern, Carter, Schoenberg, and PB himself. The place was 
packed (the concert was held on the UCLA campus, IIRC). But then, it's 
fair to say that PB is something of a celebrity.

Frankly, I'm not sure any of it matters. As Victor points out, Ross's 
points aren't especially novel, but it's good to see someone talking 
about such things.

Best,

dp





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I meant pre-1945 by the way when I said about Stravinsky. For  
post-1945, the writer has more of a point.

On 29 Nov 2010, at 11:13, Victor Lazzarini wrote:

> I read it and was about to place a comment there, but then thought  
> it was not worth it. Not sure it sheds any new light on the subject.  
> Maybe some of its premises are not quite right: that post-1945 music  
> is shunned by concert-goers (e.g. Stravinsky), that there is more  
> enthusiasm for modern visual arts (than for contemporary music) and  
> that the use of some modern music in films is a proof that larger  
> numbers of people can appreciate it if given more exposure to it.
>
> One or two comments seemed interesting though: the dimension of time  
> in Music seems to be a disincentive (if compared to people  
> appreciating modern art) and, related to that, that we have  
> developed a difficulty to concentrate for longer periods of time.
>
> It is good to see the topic being discussed at this level, though. I  
> do not see a lot of Music discussion these days in the papers.
>
> Victor
>
> On 29 Nov 2010, at 10:57, john ffitch wrote:
>
>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>> about it.
>>
>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>
>> ==John ff
>>
>>
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>> "unsubscribe csound"
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>
>
>
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Indeed! Good quote. You can aim too high or too low, the trick is to  
do at the right height. This is where both Ferneyhough and Nyman go  
wrong.
(and. paradoxically, possibly where they get it right, maybe neither  
being a particular stellar example of a composer, but using the high- 
brow and low-brow
  approaches, get very well by; so maybe not such good examples, oh  
well, you know what I mean).

Also interesting to read one in of the comments that they did not  
think "that Pollock was a crook, but some of his followers were". I  
suppose that can be
said again of contemporary music.

Victor
On 29 Nov 2010, at 11:16, peiman khosravi wrote:

> Mureil has a similar view of the temporal dimension:
>
> "Asking people to listen to a piece of music takes some of their time,
> some of their life: the composer is stealing a little bit from the
> life of each listener. Is this the reason why contemporary music is so
> much less popular than the contemporary visual arts, which are
> certainly no easier to comprehend? While watching an exhibition, the
> public maintains control of their time. If they do not like it, they
> can leave at any point—while with music, the composer’s time is
> necessarily imposed upon the listener. This creates an enormous
> responsibility on the part of the composer.
> This responsibility means that music can neither be purely
> experimental nor eliminate all elements of research. It should always
> provide interesting, and even new (daring though the word seems to us
> today) propositions, while remaining perceptible so that it can be
> received by the listener. This must be true even when the composer is
> looking for extreme novelty or complexity: somewhere there must exist
> a common ground where the composer and his audience can share an angle
> of approach."
>
> On 29 November 2010 11:13, Victor Lazzarini  
>  wrote:
>> I read it and was about to place a comment there, but then thought  
>> it was
>> not worth it. Not sure it sheds any new light on the subject. Maybe  
>> some of
>> its premises are not quite right: that post-1945 music is shunned by
>> concert-goers (e.g. Stravinsky), that there is more enthusiasm for  
>> modern
>> visual arts (than for contemporary music) and that the use of some  
>> modern
>> music in films is a proof that larger numbers of people can  
>> appreciate it if
>> given more exposure to it.
>>
>> One or two comments seemed interesting though: the dimension of  
>> time in
>> Music seems to be a disincentive (if compared to people  
>> appreciating modern
>> art) and, related to that, that we have developed a difficulty to
>> concentrate for longer periods of time.
>>
>> It is good to see the topic being discussed at this level, though.  
>> I do not
>> see a lot of Music discussion these days in the papers.
>>
>> Victor
>>
>> On 29 Nov 2010, at 10:57, john ffitch wrote:
>>
>>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>>> about it.
>>>
>>>
>>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>>
>>> ==John ff
>>>
>>>
>>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>>> "unsubscribe
>>> csound"
>>>
>>
>>
>>
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>>
>
>
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yes, we cannot discard the power of having a celebrity status.
On 29 Nov 2010, at 11:17, Dave Phillips wrote:

> OTOH when Boulez came to town they rolled out the carpet for him. No  
> expense was spared, and he conducted a fabulous program filled with  
> music by Webern, Carter, Schoenberg, and PB himself. The place was  
> packed (the concert was held on the UCLA campus, IIRC). But then,  
> it's fair to say that PB is something of a celebrity.



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Yes I agree about Ferneyhough and Nyman. There is a real danger of
becoming self indulgent in composition or too carried away by the
image of the audience.

Contemporary music certainly does contain a bunsh of crooks!

BTW I should correct my mistake, the quote was by Murail not 'Mureil'.

Best,

Peiman

On 29 November 2010 11:36, Victor Lazzarini  wrote:
> Indeed! Good quote. You can aim too high or too low, the trick is to do at
> the right height. This is where both Ferneyhough and Nyman go wrong.
> (and. paradoxically, possibly where they get it right, maybe neither being a
> particular stellar example of a composer, but using the high-brow and
> low-brow
>  approaches, get very well by; so maybe not such good examples, oh well, you
> know what I mean).
>
> Also interesting to read one in of the comments that they did not think
> "that Pollock was a crook, but some of his followers were". I suppose that
> can be
> said again of contemporary music.
>
> Victor
> On 29 Nov 2010, at 11:16, peiman khosravi wrote:
>
>> Mureil has a similar view of the temporal dimension:
>>
>> "Asking people to listen to a piece of music takes some of their time,
>> some of their life: the composer is stealing a little bit from the
>> life of each listener. Is this the reason why contemporary music is so
>> much less popular than the contemporary visual arts, which are
>> certainly no easier to comprehend? While watching an exhibition, the
>> public maintains control of their time. If they do not like it, they
>> can leave at any point—while with music, the composer’s time is
>> necessarily imposed upon the listener. This creates an enormous
>> responsibility on the part of the composer.
>> This responsibility means that music can neither be purely
>> experimental nor eliminate all elements of research. It should always
>> provide interesting, and even new (daring though the word seems to us
>> today) propositions, while remaining perceptible so that it can be
>> received by the listener. This must be true even when the composer is
>> looking for extreme novelty or complexity: somewhere there must exist
>> a common ground where the composer and his audience can share an angle
>> of approach."
>>
>> On 29 November 2010 11:13, Victor Lazzarini 
>> wrote:
>>>
>>> I read it and was about to place a comment there, but then thought it was
>>> not worth it. Not sure it sheds any new light on the subject. Maybe some
>>> of
>>> its premises are not quite right: that post-1945 music is shunned by
>>> concert-goers (e.g. Stravinsky), that there is more enthusiasm for modern
>>> visual arts (than for contemporary music) and that the use of some modern
>>> music in films is a proof that larger numbers of people can appreciate it
>>> if
>>> given more exposure to it.
>>>
>>> One or two comments seemed interesting though: the dimension of time in
>>> Music seems to be a disincentive (if compared to people appreciating
>>> modern
>>> art) and, related to that, that we have developed a difficulty to
>>> concentrate for longer periods of time.
>>>
>>> It is good to see the topic being discussed at this level, though. I do
>>> not
>>> see a lot of Music discussion these days in the papers.
>>>
>>> Victor
>>>
>>> On 29 Nov 2010, at 10:57, john ffitch wrote:
>>>
>>>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>>>> about it.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>>>
>>>> ==John ff
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>>
>>
>>
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When we were in LA in the 1980s (my tank warfare days) we got tickets to
see Lutaslawski conducting a concert of his own works at UCLA.  I was
surprised that we could get tickets so easily, only the previous day or
so.  OTOH operas by Birtwistle and Glass were full in London.

My take on this topic is time commitment.  In the 1870s we followed a
deliberate policy of attending contemporary "classsical" concerts in UK
and USA.  I think it to about 8 years before I felt that I understood
enough to comment on a piece that it was not very good.  Visuals provide
instant gratification, while a Tippett opera is a long journey.  What i do
not understand is why people are not prepared to make commitments.  After
all it took years to learn to read, and riding a bicycle was quite a
challenge.

==John ff
>
> I attended new music programs almost every week in Los Angeles for
> nearly five years. In that time the audience was comprised of the same
> people, give or take a handful leaving or coming in to the fold. In a
> city of 8 million people the LACMA series drew maybe two hundred per
> show (and I think that number's probably a bit too high). The concerts
> at CalArts were just as poorly attended.
>
> OTOH when Boulez came to town they rolled out the carpet for him. No
> expense was spared, and he conducted a fabulous program filled with
> music by Webern, Carter, Schoenberg, and PB himself. The place was
> packed (the concert was held on the UCLA campus, IIRC). But then, it's
> fair to say that PB is something of a celebrity.
>
> Frankly, I'm not sure any of it matters. As Victor points out, Ross's
> points aren't especially novel, but it's good to see someone talking
> about such things.
>
> Best,
>
> dp
>
>
>
>
>
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>
>
>




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Also note that Boulez does conduct works by dead composers (not that
there is anything wrong with this!). So he has very cleverly tapped
into both cultures. I suspect that this has somehow trapped him
though, he is worried if he will be remembered as a composer or as a
conductor.

It seems that composers try to communicate with the audiences often by
going the 'canonical' way like Boulez or the 'popular' way like Glass.
Alternatively they make a 'spiritual' song-&-dance like Stockhausen.

But some just compose[d!]: Xenakis, Feldman, Ligeti, Grisey, Nancarrow...


Peiman

On 29 November 2010 11:37, Victor Lazzarini  wrote:
> yes, we cannot discard the power of having a celebrity status.
> On 29 Nov 2010, at 11:17, Dave Phillips wrote:
>
>> OTOH when Boulez came to town they rolled out the carpet for him. No
>> expense was spared, and he conducted a fabulous program filled with music by
>> Webern, Carter, Schoenberg, and PB himself. The place was packed (the
>> concert was held on the UCLA campus, IIRC). But then, it's fair to say that
>> PB is something of a celebrity.
>
>
>
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I stumbled across this Miller Puckette essay awhile back and found it
enlightening.
http://www-crca.ucsd.edu/~msp/m209/puckette.html

I was exposed to Berg and the like (even some Wagner!) for the first
time in college, and it was gratifying to hear someone I know "matters"
agree with me.
Greg



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Greg Schroeder wrote:
> I stumbled across this Miller Puckette essay awhile back and found it
> enlightening.
> http://www-crca.ucsd.edu/~msp/m209/puckette.html
>
>   

MP wrote:

"... the 12 tone system appears to be a mere aberration brought on by 
our insistence on sticking with the composer/paper/musician model long 
after it became unviable."

Umm, *which* 12-tone system does he mean ? The "classical" 12-tone of 
Schoenberg's early dodecaphonic ventures, or his use of the system in 
Moses Und Aaron ? Babbitt's time-point system ? The 12-tone system of 
George Rochberg's Serenata d'Estata ? Hauer's tropes ? Wolpe's "total 
chromatic" ? Copland's use of it ? Roger Sessions' methods ? The 
serialism of Boulez ? I ask, because these composer are remarkably 
different from one another in their works, which at least points to some 
flexibility of the system. And btw, the 12-tone system became "unviable" 
exactly when ? The argument is a straw man anyway. The 12-tone system is 
just one more tool in the composer's kit, useful for some things, not so 
useful for others.

Btw, I never took the university trip. I dropped out of college after 
one semester and took private lsesons from that time on. At least I 
avoided the scenario MP describes, and I found my own way into 
contemporary music. (Modus Novus helped a lot.)

Rochberg decided to go renegade and returned to tonality. And of course, 
there were and have always been plenty of modern pieces in well-worn 
keys and meters that could be played by contemporary groups. But why pay 
a living composer when we can endlessly recycle the antique characters - 
including apparently their students, their uncles, and their old 
teachers, none of whom made music worth a fart, but it all takes up 
valuable air time, and none of it costs the purveyors one penny. Tonal 
or no, living composers charge fees for their works, a real annoyance 
that can be avoided simply by ignoring them in favor of the trifles of 
Telemann or the newly discovered and wholly predictable sonatas by 
Hummell's brother-in-law.

I also find it interesting that painters and sculptors can get away with 
highly abstract approaches to their materials. The public neither knows 
nor cares about historical continuity in such works, they respond simply 
to colors and shapes per se, without restricting painting and sculpture 
to some Soviet-style "work of & for the folk". But when it comes to 
music it seems that we must have a simple meter, we must have 
recognizable tonality (i.e. it must remind us of what we know and like 
already), it must have a singable melody, and above all it mustn't 
bother us while we sleep.

Eliot's dictum that "no 'vers' is 'libre' enough for the man who has 
something to say" seems relevant here. Schoenberg *evolved* dodecaphony 
precisely because he felt he'd reached a limit to the expressiveness of 
his available tools.

"In short, must a song always be a song ?" (C. Ives)

While I admire and respect Miller Puckette in many ways, when it comes 
to music I'll tend towards Ives. And hey, I might even use Miller's 
tools for my utterly unpopular work.

And I'll just sing and play my guitar if I want recognition from the public.

"Give them a jig and a tale of bawdry, else they sleep." (W. Shakespeare 
on his contemporary audience.)

Best,

dp





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> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music

My two cents:

The paper compares music and painting, with Pollock's popularity 
illustrated by the price of one of his painting. That's the point 
actually: money.

You can speculate on a painting, which is a single and unique physical 
object, but you can't speculate on a piece of music, which cannot be so 
easily possessed and traded.

So it is possible (dare I say probable) that in both music and painting, 
many modern art pieces are bogus and of no interest. But if enough 
people think they are worth something, there is a market. So painters 
are bound to be celebrated as geniuses because if they weren't, the art 
market would collapse. For composers nobody cares, and only the actual 
quality of the music eventually matters, except for critics who love to 
be the ones who dig what others don't get. For the broad public, much of 
the modern production goes down the drain, and for good reasons IMO.


Stef


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Great response Dave,

Perception (not possession) is 9/10 of the law. Perceived value is often 
manufactured.

In presenting concerts to the general public (i.e. outside academia), 
though I have had very good press, I have found audiences to be small. 
These days everyone is extremely busy and to get people to leave their 
homes, even if they are interested, after a long day there has to be a 
compelling reason. Recognition is usually that reason, which is 
manufactured. Marketing.

Being both a painter and a composer, and using a similar approach for 
both, it is obvious to me that people in general are very much more 
interested in the paintings than the music. I consider it likely that 
since everyone is extremely busy they cannot slow down enough to spend 
the time it would require to delve into a piece of music and really get 
to know it. Sure there is much popular music today. For most of it, if 
you listen to the first 20 seconds you know the entire song. Land of 
short attention span. The music and the paintings I create both require 
this in-depth involvement in order to be completely experienced. But the 
paintings do provide an opportunity for a person to get a quick glance 
and then walk away. The music does not.  I think that is in large part 
why new visual art is often more acceptable than sound art.

I am at peace with my creations. I paint and compose for myself. I make 
the images and colors that I want to see and I make the sounds and 
sequences that I want to hear. If someone else would like to hear it... 
icing on the cake... either way, it does not effect what I am doing.



On 11/29/10 8:33 AM, Dave Phillips wrote:
> Greg Schroeder wrote:
>> I stumbled across this Miller Puckette essay awhile back and found it
>> enlightening.
>> http://www-crca.ucsd.edu/~msp/m209/puckette.html
>>
>
> MP wrote:
>
> "... the 12 tone system appears to be a mere aberration brought on by 
> our insistence on sticking with the composer/paper/musician model long 
> after it became unviable."
>
> Umm, *which* 12-tone system does he mean ? The "classical" 12-tone of 
> Schoenberg's early dodecaphonic ventures, or his use of the system in 
> Moses Und Aaron ? Babbitt's time-point system ? The 12-tone system of 
> George Rochberg's Serenata d'Estata ? Hauer's tropes ? Wolpe's "total 
> chromatic" ? Copland's use of it ? Roger Sessions' methods ? The 
> serialism of Boulez ? I ask, because these composer are remarkably 
> different from one another in their works, which at least points to 
> some flexibility of the system. And btw, the 12-tone system became 
> "unviable" exactly when ? The argument is a straw man anyway. The 
> 12-tone system is just one more tool in the composer's kit, useful for 
> some things, not so useful for others.
>
> Btw, I never took the university trip. I dropped out of college after 
> one semester and took private lsesons from that time on. At least I 
> avoided the scenario MP describes, and I found my own way into 
> contemporary music. (Modus Novus helped a lot.)
>
> Rochberg decided to go renegade and returned to tonality. And of 
> course, there were and have always been plenty of modern pieces in 
> well-worn keys and meters that could be played by contemporary groups. 
> But why pay a living composer when we can endlessly recycle the 
> antique characters - including apparently their students, their 
> uncles, and their old teachers, none of whom made music worth a fart, 
> but it all takes up valuable air time, and none of it costs the 
> purveyors one penny. Tonal or no, living composers charge fees for 
> their works, a real annoyance that can be avoided simply by ignoring 
> them in favor of the trifles of Telemann or the newly discovered and 
> wholly predictable sonatas by Hummell's brother-in-law.
>
> I also find it interesting that painters and sculptors can get away 
> with highly abstract approaches to their materials. The public neither 
> knows nor cares about historical continuity in such works, they 
> respond simply to colors and shapes per se, without restricting 
> painting and sculpture to some Soviet-style "work of & for the folk". 
> But when it comes to music it seems that we must have a simple meter, 
> we must have recognizable tonality (i.e. it must remind us of what we 
> know and like already), it must have a singable melody, and above all 
> it mustn't bother us while we sleep.
>
> Eliot's dictum that "no 'vers' is 'libre' enough for the man who has 
> something to say" seems relevant here. Schoenberg *evolved* 
> dodecaphony precisely because he felt he'd reached a limit to the 
> expressiveness of his available tools.
>
> "In short, must a song always be a song ?" (C. Ives)
>
> While I admire and respect Miller Puckette in many ways, when it comes 
> to music I'll tend towards Ives. And hey, I might even use Miller's 
> tools for my utterly unpopular work.
>
> And I'll just sing and play my guitar if I want recognition from the 
> public.
>
> "Give them a jig and a tale of bawdry, else they sleep." (W. 
> Shakespeare on his contemporary audience.)
>
> Best,
>
> dp


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To me it's all about overhead.  Left to its own devices, a brain
processing visual information more often than audible information will
get better at processing the visual, and worse at processing the
audible.  It takes effort to improve both.  Is it any wonder that the
purely audible is getting pushed out by the purely visual in this day
and age?  Maybe the next "great" composer will have mastered both?



On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 5:57 AM, john ffitch  wrote:
> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
> about it.
>
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>
> ==John ff
>
>
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>


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But music is not purely auditory. The brain always draws from the
multisensory experience of the world outside music, even in a purely
acousmatic situation.

If the audience is afraid of the auditory experience alone it is the
composer's fault for intimidating the audience into excluding all
other sense modalities.

Best,

Peiman

On 29 November 2010 14:21, andy fillebrown  wrote:
> To me it's all about overhead.  Left to its own devices, a brain
> processing visual information more often than audible information will
> get better at processing the visual, and worse at processing the
> audible.  It takes effort to improve both.  Is it any wonder that the
> purely audible is getting pushed out by the purely visual in this day
> and age?  Maybe the next "great" composer will have mastered both?
>
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 5:57 AM, john ffitch  wrote:
>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>> about it.
>>
>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>
>> ==John ff
>>
>>
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>>
>
>
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hi

On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 5:57 AM, john ffitch  wrote:
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music

conspicuous by its absence is any mention of recorded music [from wax
cylinders to mp3s], which has completely changed all music culture.
also, schoenberg and friends were hardly the only interesting music of
the day [gershwin and ellington are still played (to say nothing of
the carter family)].

"What must fall away is the notion of classical music as a reliable
conduit for consoling beauty – a kind of spa treatment for tired
souls"
but that's the product they sell!

i agree that money has something to do with it too. i think the
markets are speaking [as a capitalistic analysis would suggest].
maintaining an orchestra [to say nothing of actually rehearsing new
and challenging music] is a way to lose money.

and for people just interested in hearing new and captivating stuff-
well, now we're back to csound again.

-- 
\js : "verbing weirds language." -calvin  [http://or8.net/~johns/]


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I cannot agree that the investment of time favors the seen arts over
the heard arts. The fact of the matter is, that when people come of
age, go off to fight, marry, celebrate anniversaries and birthdays,
and are buried there absolutely has to be music. There does not have
to be paintings, movies, videos... but there has to be music and there
usually has to be dancing. And of course words. These are the primary
arts. This discussion is basically ignoring the function(s) of the
arts. There are many functions, but it is beyond question that, to be
human, art is not optional, it is required.

I propose that if an art languishes, its functions are not required
but are being achieved by some other art. I find that music is
extremely wide spread in our civilization. In addition to the ritual
occasions mentioned, it is in elevators. It accompanies many plays,
almost all dance theater, almost all movies, almost all television,
most long auto trips and much dishwashing. No shortage of music
here!...

One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
accurately, the nature and social function of the middle class has
changed greatly and continues to change in ways that reduce its
consumption of art music, music purely for listening. As long as there
was a market for this stuff, you could make new versions of it and
also make money. Now it is a museum and a school, and opportunities
are correspondingly reduced.

What I need -- and perhaps what we need -- is a way to (a) learn about
good new pieces without wasting too much time, (b) have a chance to
get our own stuff heard by people who might like it, and (c) get
together and form some sort of community. The evident difficulty of
doing this is simply evidence of the scale and pace of change. For
nothing could be more certain than that is a temporary phenomenon, see
the necessary functions of music and the vast quantity of music made
and consumed above. Until such time as stability returns, we are in
the trenches, ladies and gentlemen. Just keep your heads down and keep
shooting, I mean producing.

Regards,
Mike





On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 9:21 AM, andy fillebrown
 wrote:
> To me it's all about overhead.  Left to its own devices, a brain
> processing visual information more often than audible information will
> get better at processing the visual, and worse at processing the
> audible.  It takes effort to improve both.  Is it any wonder that the
> purely audible is getting pushed out by the purely visual in this day
> and age?  Maybe the next "great" composer will have mastered both?
>
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 5:57 AM, john ffitch  wrote:
>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>> about it.
>>
>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>
>> ==John ff
>>
>>
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>>
>>
>
>
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-- 
Michael Gogins
Irreducible Productions
http://www.michael-gogins.com
Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com


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>
> One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
> thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
> longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
>

Really? So why is it that the music of Bach and Brahms and Schubert
have not lost their audience? How many new interpretations are out
there of the classical repertoire?

Also I don't think the 'function' of music has ever been to 'make'
people bourgeois, the fact that the audiences were primarily bourgeois
does not mean that they became bourgeois by listening to the music! No
more than Hitler became an anti-semite by listening to Wagner.

Best

Peiman


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Compared to the past, they have lost some of their audience. When I
was in college, classical music sales were 10% of a growing market for
recorded music. Now, they are 5% of a shrinking market. Something like
that.

"Function" in this context is a sociological term, not an artistic
term. The term "function" does not mean "good" or "bad." It is an aid
to understanding what is happening, not a value judgment.

If you do not listen to classical music, do not read books or stories,
never consume any kind of art including movies or TV you cannot be
middle class because if you dined with middle class people you would
be at a loss for words and would be quite uncomfortable. I exaggerate,
but I hope I have made my point more understandable. If you consume
only "low-brow," "popular art, e.g. only TV, the discomfort may lessen
but is still there.

Regards,
Mike

On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 11:51 AM, peiman khosravi
 wrote:
>>
>> One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
>> thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
>> longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
>>
>
> Really? So why is it that the music of Bach and Brahms and Schubert
> have not lost their audience? How many new interpretations are out
> there of the classical repertoire?
>
> Also I don't think the 'function' of music has ever been to 'make'
> people bourgeois, the fact that the audiences were primarily bourgeois
> does not mean that they became bourgeois by listening to the music! No
> more than Hitler became an anti-semite by listening to Wagner.
>
> Best
>
> Peiman
>
>
> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>



-- 
Michael Gogins
Irreducible Productions
http://www.michael-gogins.com
Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com


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I get your point. Maybe I am being too pedantic but I am still not
100% in agreement.

You have to be relatively well off to be able to afford the time or
energy to read books, go to concerts and so on. Middle class families
don't read books to have a topic to talk about at dinner but primarily
because they can afford it. It is a luxury, like going to the
restaurant or having the time to cook instead of buying ready-made
oven-chips.

At the same time there is the misconception that classical music is
and always has been for the middle classes. It is this misconception
that puts everyone else who can afford it but do not associate
themselves with the 'middle classes' off classical music. And anyway
the point is that the decline of the popularity of classical music is
a different issue from that of contemporary classical music. Your
average middle class concert-goer would not appreciate Ligeti or
Feldman.

So what is the solution? More money and thought put into cultural
education. But hey we can't expect that much nowadays, at least not
here in the UK.

Best,

Peiman


On 29 November 2010 17:08, Michael Gogins  wrote:
> Compared to the past, they have lost some of their audience. When I
> was in college, classical music sales were 10% of a growing market for
> recorded music. Now, they are 5% of a shrinking market. Something like
> that.
>
> "Function" in this context is a sociological term, not an artistic
> term. The term "function" does not mean "good" or "bad." It is an aid
> to understanding what is happening, not a value judgment.
>
> If you do not listen to classical music, do not read books or stories,
> never consume any kind of art including movies or TV you cannot be
> middle class because if you dined with middle class people you would
> be at a loss for words and would be quite uncomfortable. I exaggerate,
> but I hope I have made my point more understandable. If you consume
> only "low-brow," "popular art, e.g. only TV, the discomfort may lessen
> but is still there.
>
> Regards,
> Mike
>
> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 11:51 AM, peiman khosravi
>  wrote:
>>>
>>> One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
>>> thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
>>> longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
>>>
>>
>> Really? So why is it that the music of Bach and Brahms and Schubert
>> have not lost their audience? How many new interpretations are out
>> there of the classical repertoire?
>>
>> Also I don't think the 'function' of music has ever been to 'make'
>> people bourgeois, the fact that the audiences were primarily bourgeois
>> does not mean that they became bourgeois by listening to the music! No
>> more than Hitler became an anti-semite by listening to Wagner.
>>
>> Best
>>
>> Peiman
>>
>>
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>>
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Michael Gogins
> Irreducible Productions
> http://www.michael-gogins.com
> Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com
>
>
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>
>


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Living in East France not far from Verdun, I like your trenches image.

Francois

Le 29/11/2010 15:50, Michael Gogins a écrit :
> I cannot agree that the investment of time favors the seen arts over
> the heard arts. The fact of the matter is, that when people come of
> age, go off to fight, marry, celebrate anniversaries and birthdays,
> and are buried there absolutely has to be music. There does not have
> to be paintings, movies, videos... but there has to be music and there
> usually has to be dancing. And of course words. These are the primary
> arts. This discussion is basically ignoring the function(s) of the
> arts. There are many functions, but it is beyond question that, to be
> human, art is not optional, it is required.
>
> I propose that if an art languishes, its functions are not required
> but are being achieved by some other art. I find that music is
> extremely wide spread in our civilization. In addition to the ritual
> occasions mentioned, it is in elevators. It accompanies many plays,
> almost all dance theater, almost all movies, almost all television,
> most long auto trips and much dishwashing. No shortage of music
> here!...
>
> One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
> thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
> longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
> accurately, the nature and social function of the middle class has
> changed greatly and continues to change in ways that reduce its
> consumption of art music, music purely for listening. As long as there
> was a market for this stuff, you could make new versions of it and
> also make money. Now it is a museum and a school, and opportunities
> are correspondingly reduced.
>
> What I need -- and perhaps what we need -- is a way to (a) learn about
> good new pieces without wasting too much time, (b) have a chance to
> get our own stuff heard by people who might like it, and (c) get
> together and form some sort of community. The evident difficulty of
> doing this is simply evidence of the scale and pace of change. For
> nothing could be more certain than that is a temporary phenomenon, see
> the necessary functions of music and the vast quantity of music made
> and consumed above. Until such time as stability returns, we are in
> the trenches, ladies and gentlemen. Just keep your heads down and keep
> shooting, I mean producing.
>
> Regards,
> Mike
>
>
>
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 9:21 AM, andy fillebrown
>   wrote:
>    
>> To me it's all about overhead.  Left to its own devices, a brain
>> processing visual information more often than audible information will
>> get better at processing the visual, and worse at processing the
>> audible.  It takes effort to improve both.  Is it any wonder that the
>> purely audible is getting pushed out by the purely visual in this day
>> and age?  Maybe the next "great" composer will have mastered both?
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 5:57 AM, john ffitch  wrote:
>>      
>>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>>> about it.
>>>
>>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>>
>>> ==John ff
>>>
>>>
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>>>
>>>
>>>        
>>
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>>
>>
>>      
>
>
>    


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Everyone asking *which* twelve-tone system is part of the problem -
He means the same chromatic series of notes which developed out of the
classical diatonic scales, and which until very, very recently you used
more or less 7 notes from at a time in the Western tradition. 99.999% of
audiences don't give a damn if it's Babbitt's or whoever's.
When I listen to music, which so many of you old-timers claim to value
so much, I generally don't notice the subtle differences in fractions of
hertz between two atonal series', nor does virtually anyone.
Are you people seriously walking away from that article trying to one-up
him on musical knowledge? Do you people read for comprehension?

Greg



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Well I think Michael's point is partly that on average most of the
audiences of classical music (not necessarily contemporary classical
music) are middle class. That is very likely a fact, regardless of the
amount of TV the middle classes watch on average.



On 28 November 2010 08:17, kelly  hirai  wrote:
> in this country, the middle class spends enough time in front of the TV to
> make up for any possible economic reason for not going to a concert,
> particularly when the new music concerts put on by the university are free.
> identifing and persueing new music requires a little bit of iniciative,
> which most people lack. luckaly, tv programming provides much (though
> transparent) exposure to new (abstract) music. it is usually accompanied by
> some complex abstract effect in the video layer or in the narration, so most
> of the time it isn't paid much due and its disorienting enough that we don't
> want to hear the depiction in our everyday lives.
>
> an anticdote, when the carl stalling project came out, i was working in a
> pizza place. we used to listen to it over and over in the prep area, because
> we were just that crazy. people on the line would beg us to turn it off
> because it was driving them daffy and making their already stressful work
> more stressful. the people in the dining room could hear it faintly, and
> generally wrote us off as crazy kids (as we'd randomly run out of the
> kitchen with our hands in the air screaming 'abiddy abiddy abiddy!") all of
> us grew up on those (albeit racist) cartoons and knew the music intimately.
> but context required certian responses to it.
>
> (composed in pine without spellcheck... sorry)
> kelly
>
>
> On Mon, 29 Nov 2010, peiman khosravi wrote:
>
>> I get your point. Maybe I am being too pedantic but I am still not
>
> 100% in agreement.
>
> You have to be relatively well off to be able to afford the time or
> energy to read books, go to concerts and so on. Middle class families
> don't read books to have a topic to talk about at dinner but primarily
> because they can afford it. It is a luxury, like going to the
> restaurant or having the time to cook instead of buying ready-made
> oven-chips.
>
> At the same time there is the misconception that classical music is
> and always has been for the middle classes. It is this misconception
> that puts everyone else who can afford it but do not associate
> themselves with the 'middle classes' off classical music. And anyway
> the point is that the decline of the popularity of classical music is
> a different issue from that of contemporary classical music. Your
> average middle class concert-goer would not appreciate Ligeti or
> Feldman.
>
> So what is the solution? More money and thought put into cultural
> education. But hey we can't expect that much nowadays, at least not
> here in the UK.
>
> Best,
>
> Peiman
>
>
> On 29 November 2010 17:08, Michael Gogins  wrote:
>>
>> Compared to the past, they have lost some of their audience. When I
>> was in college, classical music sales were 10% of a growing market for
>> recorded music. Now, they are 5% of a shrinking market. Something like
>> that.
>>
>> "Function" in this context is a sociological term, not an artistic
>> term. The term "function" does not mean "good" or "bad." It is an aid
>> to understanding what is happening, not a value judgment.
>>
>> If you do not listen to classical music, do not read books or stories,
>> never consume any kind of art including movies or TV you cannot be
>> middle class because if you dined with middle class people you would
>> be at a loss for words and would be quite uncomfortable. I exaggerate,
>> but I hope I have made my point more understandable. If you consume
>> only "low-brow," "popular art, e.g. only TV, the discomfort may lessen
>> but is still there.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Mike
>>
>> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 11:51 AM, peiman khosravi
>>  wrote:
>>>>
>>>> One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
>>>> thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
>>>> longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
>>>>
>>>
>>> Really? So why is it that the music of Bach and Brahms and Schubert
>>> have not lost their audience? How many new interpretations are out
>>> there of the classical repertoire?
>>>
>>> Also I don't think the 'function' of music has ever been to 'make'
>>> people bourgeois, the fact that the audiences were primarily bourgeois
>>> does not mean that they became bourgeois by listening to the music! No
>>> more than Hitler became an anti-semite by listening to Wagner.
>>>
>>> Best
>>>
>>> Peiman
>>>
>>>
>>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
>>>            https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=81968&atid=564599
>>> Discussions of bugs and features can be posted here
>>> To unsubscribe, send email sympa@lists.bath.ac.uk with body "unsubscribe
>>> csound"
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Michael Gogins
>> Irreducible Productions
>> http://www.michael-gogins.com
>> Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com
>>
>>
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>> csound"
>>
>>
>
>
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Probably Frank Zappa did the best job in the last 40 years of exposing
more people to modern classical music and ideas by blending them with
comedy and popular music.

On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 3:07 PM, peiman khosravi
 wrote:
> Well I think Michael's point is partly that on average most of the
> audiences of classical music (not necessarily contemporary classical
> music) are middle class. That is very likely a fact, regardless of the
> amount of TV the middle classes watch on average.
>
>
>
> On 28 November 2010 08:17, kelly  hirai  wrote:
>> in this country, the middle class spends enough time in front of the TV to
>> make up for any possible economic reason for not going to a concert,
>> particularly when the new music concerts put on by the university are free.
>> identifing and persueing new music requires a little bit of iniciative,
>> which most people lack. luckaly, tv programming provides much (though
>> transparent) exposure to new (abstract) music. it is usually accompanied by
>> some complex abstract effect in the video layer or in the narration, so most
>> of the time it isn't paid much due and its disorienting enough that we don't
>> want to hear the depiction in our everyday lives.
>>
>> an anticdote, when the carl stalling project came out, i was working in a
>> pizza place. we used to listen to it over and over in the prep area, because
>> we were just that crazy. people on the line would beg us to turn it off
>> because it was driving them daffy and making their already stressful work
>> more stressful. the people in the dining room could hear it faintly, and
>> generally wrote us off as crazy kids (as we'd randomly run out of the
>> kitchen with our hands in the air screaming 'abiddy abiddy abiddy!") all of
>> us grew up on those (albeit racist) cartoons and knew the music intimately.
>> but context required certian responses to it.
>>
>> (composed in pine without spellcheck... sorry)
>> kelly
>>
>>
>> On Mon, 29 Nov 2010, peiman khosravi wrote:
>>
>>> I get your point. Maybe I am being too pedantic but I am still not
>>
>> 100% in agreement.
>>
>> You have to be relatively well off to be able to afford the time or
>> energy to read books, go to concerts and so on. Middle class families
>> don't read books to have a topic to talk about at dinner but primarily
>> because they can afford it. It is a luxury, like going to the
>> restaurant or having the time to cook instead of buying ready-made
>> oven-chips.
>>
>> At the same time there is the misconception that classical music is
>> and always has been for the middle classes. It is this misconception
>> that puts everyone else who can afford it but do not associate
>> themselves with the 'middle classes' off classical music. And anyway
>> the point is that the decline of the popularity of classical music is
>> a different issue from that of contemporary classical music. Your
>> average middle class concert-goer would not appreciate Ligeti or
>> Feldman.
>>
>> So what is the solution? More money and thought put into cultural
>> education. But hey we can't expect that much nowadays, at least not
>> here in the UK.
>>
>> Best,
>>
>> Peiman
>>
>>
>> On 29 November 2010 17:08, Michael Gogins  wrote:
>>>
>>> Compared to the past, they have lost some of their audience. When I
>>> was in college, classical music sales were 10% of a growing market for
>>> recorded music. Now, they are 5% of a shrinking market. Something like
>>> that.
>>>
>>> "Function" in this context is a sociological term, not an artistic
>>> term. The term "function" does not mean "good" or "bad." It is an aid
>>> to understanding what is happening, not a value judgment.
>>>
>>> If you do not listen to classical music, do not read books or stories,
>>> never consume any kind of art including movies or TV you cannot be
>>> middle class because if you dined with middle class people you would
>>> be at a loss for words and would be quite uncomfortable. I exaggerate,
>>> but I hope I have made my point more understandable. If you consume
>>> only "low-brow," "popular art, e.g. only TV, the discomfort may lessen
>>> but is still there.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Mike
>>>
>>> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 11:51 AM, peiman khosravi
>>>  wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
>>>>> thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
>>>>> longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Really? So why is it that the music of Bach and Brahms and Schubert
>>>> have not lost their audience? How many new interpretations are out
>>>> there of the classical repertoire?
>>>>
>>>> Also I don't think the 'function' of music has ever been to 'make'
>>>> people bourgeois, the fact that the audiences were primarily bourgeois
>>>> does not mean that they became bourgeois by listening to the music! No
>>>> more than Hitler became an anti-semite by listening to Wagner.
>>>>
>>>> Best
>>>>
>>>> Peiman
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
>>>>            https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=81968&atid=564599
>>>> Discussions of bugs and features can be posted here
>>>> To unsubscribe, send email sympa@lists.bath.ac.uk with body "unsubscribe
>>>> csound"
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Michael Gogins
>>> Irreducible Productions
>>> http://www.michael-gogins.com
>>> Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com
>>>
>>>
>>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
>>>            https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=81968&atid=564599
>>> Discussions of bugs and features can be posted here
>>> To unsubscribe, send email sympa@lists.bath.ac.uk with body "unsubscribe
>>> csound"
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>>
>
>
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>


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Greg Schroeder wrote:

> Are you people seriously walking away from that article trying to one-up
> him on musical knowledge? Do you people read for comprehension?
>   

No. Yes.

Best,

dp



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I came to the discussion too late to address all of the interesting points made, so am just going to post a rant.
Music is fundamentally different to visual arts in more ways than just the temporal aspect. Appreciation of complex harmonies and rhythms, unusual timbres, and other advanced musical properties is NOT something the average listener is capable of. Appreciation of such aspects is a LEARNED skill. 
When I first started playing music, complex harmonies were literally something I could not hear. I started playing guitar, like millions of others, with the utterly unsubtle riff rock of "Smoke on the Water" by Deep Purple. Why? Because my idiot ears at that time could really only make sense of that power chord composed only of the tonic and fifth. Major, minor? Couldn't hear it. I have jammed with hundreds of "musicians" who still can't.
After majors and minors came pentatonics, seventh chords, then 11ths, 13ths, augmented, diminished, harmonic minor, etc etc. Then on to xentonality from there. Can a Western Classical music expert uneducated in Hindu music really give an worthwhile opinion on a particular Hindu classical music performance? Or an experimental noise piece?
The same "acquired taste" syndrome applies to such aspects as unusual time signatures, polyrhythms, etc. So my idea is that aside from cultural bias and conditioning factors (which are obviously huge and hugely obvious), much of the resistance to "experimental" music is that most listeners are insufficiently prepared to be able to appreciate it. They literally "just cannot hear it".
I always remember the quote which goes something like "Wagner's music is not as bad as it sounds". For me it was initially difficult to understand this quote, as I thought Wagner's music was brilliant the first time I heard it. Now I understand that to most people living of that the time that quote was produced, it just sounded bad. And I am sure if a poll was taken worldwide today, results would not be much different.
There are other interesting differences in music as opposed to visual arts in our society particularly. What type of music a person likes is generally considered as a statement of their personality type, political views, etc., and is closely tied our fractured and crumbling mating practices. The same cannot be said for visual art. Most people I know will basically only like the music they listened to while in their courting years (16-30) for the rest their lives. 
But I will leave discussions of these aspects for others to tackle if they find them interesting.
I'll end the rant with a quote from an ex-girlfriend of mine - "Frank Zappa? He's not cute at all!".

BW
 		 	   		  

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Mike, is stability likely to return? Or have we reached the point where the pace of change is such that stability is no longer possible? I don't find it likely that the current state of affairs is temporary in the way you suggest. Hope I'm wrong, though. 

Best,
Chris

On Nov 29, 2010, at 9:51 AM, "Michael Gogins"  wrote:

> What I need -- and perhaps what we need -- is a way to (a) learn about
> good new pieces without wasting too much time, (b) have a chance to
> get our own stuff heard by people who might like it, and (c) get
> together and form some sort of community. The evident difficulty of
> doing this is simply evidence of the scale and pace of change. For
> nothing could be more certain than that is a temporary phenomenon, see
> the necessary functions of music and the vast quantity of music made
> and consumed above. Until such time as stability returns, we are in
> the trenches, ladies and gentlemen. Just keep your heads down and keep
> shooting, I mean producing.
> 
> Regards,
> Mike
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 9:21 AM, andy fillebrown
>  wrote:
>> To me it's all about overhead.  Left to its own devices, a brain
>> processing visual information more often than audible information will
>> get better at processing the visual, and worse at processing the
>> audible.  It takes effort to improve both.  Is it any wonder that the
>> purely audible is getting pushed out by the purely visual in this day
>> and age?  Maybe the next "great" composer will have mastered both?
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 5:57 AM, john ffitch  wrote:
>>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>>> about it.
>>> 
>>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>> 
>>> ==John ff
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>>> Discussions of bugs and features can be posted here
>>> To unsubscribe, send email sympa@lists.bath.ac.uk with body "unsubscribe csound"
>>> 
>>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>> To unsubscribe, send email sympa@lists.bath.ac.uk with body "unsubscribe csound"
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Michael Gogins
> Irreducible Productions
> http://www.michael-gogins.com
> Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com
> 
> 
> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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> 


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On 11/29/2010 5:37 PM, Brian Wong wrote:
>
> I came to the discussion too late to address all of the interesting
> points made, so am just going to post a rant.

I'm here late too, but I'll respond just to your post.

> Music is fundamentally
> different to visual arts in more ways than just the temporal aspect.
> Appreciation of complex harmonies and rhythms, unusual timbres, and
> other advanced musical properties is NOT something the average listener
> is capable of. Appreciation of such aspects is a LEARNED skill.

I agree.

Curiously, one of the people who commented on the article said something to 
the effect, "Music is *the one* art that should require no training." This 
person seemed to think that because music is abstract, it should be 
entirely intuitive---that it should somehow appeal to a deep core in the 
brain, something beyond intellect and beyond any acquired knowledge.

This is not an entirely irrelevant comment, but I think for the most part 
it's the other way around: because music is the most abstract of the arts, 
it requires a learned response.

Think about visual perception. Anyone who's not blind has developed a very 
complex appreciation of visual information just by going through childhood. 
Our brains are very sophisticated in the way they parse visual information 
and find patterns. Even though 20th-century fully-abstract art requires 
some new ways of seeing, people undertake that adventure with a very 
sophisticated apparatus. This is just like someone's who's already learned 
calculus is in a much better position to learn linear algebra than someone 
who has no math experience.

But a person's ability to parse musical patterns is only as sophisticated 
as they've taken the time to develop through experience.

Now, I think it *is* true that music can appeal to something beyond 
intellect; something in our animal selves that predates the evolution of 
thought and language. But it can only do that via creating patterns, and 
you can only be affected by the music if you notice the patterns.

Mike


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Mike,
Art appreciation and production is a personal matter, so focusing musical appreciation only on one's "intuitive" like or dislike is of course a valid artistic choice. However since music is the result of human invention and activity it seems probable that intuitive preferences would be hard to distinguish from cultural conditioning and personal bias.
You make a good point about the human neurological bias towards visual information, which probably relates to Andy's point about "needing video" for music to be successful today. Back when people actually had enough money to pay to see live music, the visuals were provided by the musicians.
Brian

----------------------------------------
> Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 19:30:20 -0800
> From: mpm@alumni.caltech.edu
> To: csound@lists.bath.ac.uk
> Subject: [Csnd] Re: RE: Re: Re: [OT] Why do we hate modern classical music?
>
>
>
> On 11/29/2010 5:37 PM, Brian Wong wrote:
> >
> > I came to the discussion too late to address all of the interesting
> > points made, so am just going to post a rant.
>
> I'm here late too, but I'll respond just to your post.
>
> > Music is fundamentally
> > different to visual arts in more ways than just the temporal aspect.
> > Appreciation of complex harmonies and rhythms, unusual timbres, and
> > other advanced musical properties is NOT something the average listener
> > is capable of. Appreciation of such aspects is a LEARNED skill.
>
> I agree.
>
> Curiously, one of the people who commented on the article said something to
> the effect, "Music is *the one* art that should require no training." This
> person seemed to think that because music is abstract, it should be
> entirely intuitive---that it should somehow appeal to a deep core in the
> brain, something beyond intellect and beyond any acquired knowledge.
>
> This is not an entirely irrelevant comment, but I think for the most part
> it's the other way around: because music is the most abstract of the arts,
> it requires a learned response.
>
> Think about visual perception. Anyone who's not blind has developed a very
> complex appreciation of visual information just by going through childhood.
> Our brains are very sophisticated in the way they parse visual information
> and find patterns. Even though 20th-century fully-abstract art requires
> some new ways of seeing, people undertake that adventure with a very
> sophisticated apparatus. This is just like someone's who's already learned
> calculus is in a much better position to learn linear algebra than someone
> who has no math experience.
>
> But a person's ability to parse musical patterns is only as sophisticated
> as they've taken the time to develop through experience.
>
> Now, I think it *is* true that music can appeal to something beyond
> intellect; something in our animal selves that predates the evolution of
> thought and language. But it can only do that via creating patterns, and
> you can only be affected by the music if you notice the patterns.
>
> Mike
>
>
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I'm not sure I agree with this. The diatonic scale may be based on  
seven pitches, but you're unlikely to find non-trivial any example of  
tonal
music from the 'canonic' repertory of common practice (ca.1600-1900)  
that is based on just seven pitches. Also this limit would stop things
like the octophonic scale being as easily 'understood' as the diatonic  
collection (which is not seen in practice).

There are mathematical concepts that point to certain 'desirable'  
characteristics of the diatonic set, e.g. it is a "well-formed" scale  
in a very
defined sense (also known as a moment-of-symmetry scale) and it has  
some other possibly useful characteristics. But I do not think things
can be too simply defined.

Victor

On 30 Nov 2010, at 05:20, Aaron Krister Johnson wrote:

> One example is the neurological importance of the number 7, being a  
> "cognitive limit" of sorts. That is to say, groups of things larger  
> than 7 cannot be directly grasped w/o deliberate counting.
>
> This may explain the prevalence of the diatonic scale (and related  
> sets of similar size) as an interesting boundary where things can be  
> rich and complex without being TOO rich and complex...it's right on  
> the border of 'directly graspable



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I see what you mean, Dave, but MP has a point there. The 19th-century  
concept of the 'big composer' is now somewhat anachronic. Schoenberg  
and his serial method were at the crossroads where this concept was  
loosing its value and where the "shut up and listen to the master" was  
also reaching its zenith.

I think most sensible composers these days would regard any of the 12- 
tone-derived pitch-permutation procedures as sterile on their own. In  
my own view, good composers would produce interesting music despite  
using these methods (and not because of them) and of course, opinions  
about what is good music will vary a lot (I, for instance, can't stand  
Schoenberg, tolerate Berg and enjoy Webern, as a matter of personal  
taste).

What MP was railing at, I think, is what he perceived as the  
established University composer attitude and, as an outsider, my  
impression is that he had a point. I think he might see this happening  
at his own institution (not sure when he wrote this, though).

Victor

On 29 Nov 2010, at 13:33, Dave Phillips wrote:

> Greg Schroeder wrote:
>> I stumbled across this Miller Puckette essay awhile back and found it
>> enlightening.
>> http://www-crca.ucsd.edu/~msp/m209/puckette.html
>>
>>
>
> MP wrote:
>
> "... the 12 tone system appears to be a mere aberration brought on  
> by our insistence on sticking with the composer/paper/musician model  
> long after it became unviable."
>
> Umm, *which* 12-tone system does he mean ? The "classical" 12-tone  
> of Schoenberg's early dodecaphonic ventures, or his use of the  
> system in Moses Und Aaron ? Babbitt's time-point system ? The 12- 
> tone system of George Rochberg's Serenata d'Estata ? Hauer's  
> tropes ? Wolpe's "total chromatic" ? Copland's use of it ? Roger  
> Sessions' methods ? The serialism of Boulez ? I ask, because these  
> composer are remarkably different from one another in their works,  
> which at least points to some flexibility of the system. And btw,  
> the 12-tone system became "unviable" exactly when ? The argument is  
> a straw man anyway. The 12-tone system is just one more tool in the  
> composer's kit, useful for some things, not so useful for others.
>
> Btw, I never took the university trip. I dropped out of college  
> after one semester and took private lsesons from that time on. At  
> least I avoided the scenario MP describes, and I found my own way  
> into contemporary music. (Modus Novus helped a lot.)
>
> Rochberg decided to go renegade and returned to tonality. And of  
> course, there were and have always been plenty of modern pieces in  
> well-worn keys and meters that could be played by contemporary  
> groups. But why pay a living composer when we can endlessly recycle  
> the antique characters - including apparently their students, their  
> uncles, and their old teachers, none of whom made music worth a  
> fart, but it all takes up valuable air time, and none of it costs  
> the purveyors one penny. Tonal or no, living composers charge fees  
> for their works, a real annoyance that can be avoided simply by  
> ignoring them in favor of the trifles of Telemann or the newly  
> discovered and wholly predictable sonatas by Hummell's brother-in-law.
>
> I also find it interesting that painters and sculptors can get away  
> with highly abstract approaches to their materials. The public  
> neither knows nor cares about historical continuity in such works,  
> they respond simply to colors and shapes per se, without restricting  
> painting and sculpture to some Soviet-style "work of & for the  
> folk". But when it comes to music it seems that we must have a  
> simple meter, we must have recognizable tonality (i.e. it must  
> remind us of what we know and like already), it must have a singable  
> melody, and above all it mustn't bother us while we sleep.
>
> Eliot's dictum that "no 'vers' is 'libre' enough for the man who has  
> something to say" seems relevant here. Schoenberg *evolved*  
> dodecaphony precisely because he felt he'd reached a limit to the  
> expressiveness of his available tools.
>
> "In short, must a song always be a song ?" (C. Ives)
>
> While I admire and respect Miller Puckette in many ways, when it  
> comes to music I'll tend towards Ives. And hey, I might even use  
> Miller's tools for my utterly unpopular work.
>
> And I'll just sing and play my guitar if I want recognition from the  
> public.
>
> "Give them a jig and a tale of bawdry, else they sleep." (W.  
> Shakespeare on his contemporary audience.)
>
> Best,
>
> dp
>
>
>
>
>
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> "unsubscribe csound"
>



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>From the 1950s....

"If you want modern music to get a firmer grip on an audience", said
Dame Hilda Tablet, with the aphoristic conclusiveness we have learnt
to expect from her, "make it last longer. Not that I personally care
much whether mine grips people or not. My business is to write music;
the audience's business is to like it if they can and keep very, very
quiet."

http://www.webrarian.co.uk/reed/opinions.html


> I see what you mean, Dave, but MP has a point there. The 19th-century
> concept of the 'big composer' is now somewhat anachronic. Schoenberg
> and his serial method were at the crossroads where this concept was
> loosing its value and where the "shut up and listen to the master" was
> also reaching its zenith.
>




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Victor Lazzarini wrote:

> I see what you mean, Dave, but MP has a point there. The 19th-century 
> concept of the 'big composer' is now somewhat anachronic. Schoenberg 
> and his serial method were at the crossroads where this concept was 
> loosing its value and where the "shut up and listen to the master" was 
> also reaching its zenith.

Hi Victor,

Perhaps a part of the problem I have with the assertion is that it was 
made vigorously by other composers as far back as the 1970s. And I 
wouldn't date the change from as early as Schoenberg, I'd date it from 
the early 1950s. Yes, Darmstadt is to blame. ;)  Except that Darmstadt 
wasn't just about Stockhausen and Boulez. IIRC it accommodated Xenakis 
and Mauricio Kagel too, hardly what I'd call representatives of the 
then-new serialism.

This discussion happens to coincide with my reading a lot of articles on 
music from the 1970s and 1980s, particularly the Perspectives Of New 
Music series. It fascinates me to read so much in-depth analysis of 
then-modern works, though of course an interesting analysis hardly makes 
up for a lack of musical appeal. Fortunately most of the works under 
discussion are worthy musical examples.

It occurs to me that the Perspectives series reveals much of the 
attitude that eventually resulted in the situation described in MP's 
article. I look at the various articles and analyses, and I start 
thinking about the significance of what they *didn't* discuss, i.e. 
approaches not characteristically derived from 12-tone and serial 
procedures. In later years Ben Boretz attempted to change that aspect of 
the Perspectives series, but he's sometimes a bit incoherent. Like MP I 
think he knew that serialism qua pedagogy was a bad idea from the start.

>
> I think most sensible composers these days would regard any of the 
> 12-tone-derived pitch-permutation procedures as sterile on their own. 
> In my own view, good composers would produce interesting music despite 
> using these methods (and not because of them) and of course, opinions 
> about what is good music will vary a lot (I, for instance, can't stand 
> Schoenberg, tolerate Berg and enjoy Webern, as a matter of personal 
> taste).
>

It would appear then that I am not a sensible composer. :(

Yes, the method is "sterile on its own". So is a major scale. Those are 
*devices* for composers to work with, and we're free to follow the 
possibilities and implications of a system or device as strictly or 
freely as the particular instance requires. Even Boulez admitted 
tweaking passages in Le Marteau to make them sound "better".

Aaron Copland made some interesting comments about 12-tone methods. I 
think he would have disagreed re: "despite" vs. "because of". As Copland 
discovered, the method often reveals harmonic relationships unlikely to 
be discovered when working with more tonal procedures.

Btw, which Schoenberg don't you like ? Pelleas ? Erwartung ? The string 
quartets ? The American works ? I worked with a band leader who once 
told me that he hated Schoenberg's music. When I asked him what he knew 
of it he told me that they'd "covered it" in a class. Pardon my 
obtuseness, but I doubt they "covered" much of the man's work at all. 
And given the widespread antipathy his name inspires it's doubtful his 
music got a fair day in court. Sorry, I meant "classroom".

It's the same for Berg. The Lyric Suite ? The piano sonata ? The operas 
? All of it ?

Webern is far simpler to comprehend than either of the others. It's also 
fair to say that his work doesn't present itself in evolutionary 
periods, i.e. it's pretty much a la mode throughout his productions. 
That makes him an easier subject to approach, and personally I find his 
sound world to be one of the doors into Boulez's music.

Btw, I love pieces by all three of those composers. I don't care for 
*everything* they wrote, I simply like some pieces better than others.

With John Cage the situation gets even worse. Far more people know his 
name than know his music, which is again a real shame. His output is 
huge and varied, and  statements regarding his "musical worth" should be 
backed up by a familiarity with his works that is too often altogether 
lacking.

There is the plain fact that the output from composers like Schoenberg 
and Cage is quantitatively daunting. Unless someone cites specific works 
I'm leery of blanket asessments.

And a little note to Greg S: No, I don't listen to these composers in 
order to recognize the rows or to puff myself up because I can recognize 
recurrent patterns in non-tonal music. I listen to their music because 
it communicates with me. As Schoenberg himself wrote, I'm not interested 
in the fact that a man speaks Chinese, I'm interested in *what he has to 
say*. Like any music I enjoy, their work gives me a greater perspective 
on my own world. So does a lot of pop music. I do try to stay open to 
new modes of expression.

> What MP was railing at, I think, is what he perceived as the 
> established University composer attitude and, as an outsider, my 
> impression is that he had a point. I think he might see this happening 
> at his own institution (not sure when he wrote this, though).

The teaching I received emphasized actually being able to hear atonal 
and 12-tone melodic patterns. Since I didn't attend CalArts I can't say 
what the teachers emphasized as a compositional norm, but certainly the 
music of my teacher and his friends was anything but atonal.

However, upon reading accounts of Glass and other composers from his day 
I find plenty of confirmation for the assertion that composition 
instruction at the university level had largely favored 12-tone and 
serial methods. Personally I find such a tack abhorrent, but certainly 
not because I find the method so. As far as I'm concerned the old 
methods are still the best for a strong foundation, i.e. ear-training 
(tonal and otherwise), sight-singing, and dictation. Lots of it. And 
counterpoint, lots of it too.

Yes, I'm a very conservative fellow. :)

Btw, I totally agree with his assessment of "graduating teachers". 
CalArts had a good policy - once you're out they expected you to make a 
living as a composer. It's what they train for, and that's what most of 
their graduates were trying to do when I was in LA.

A few more points, then I'll get back to work. Someone referred to the 
rehearsal problem. It can be a terrible obstacle to getting a decent 
impression of a contemporary piece, regardless of method involved. 
Elliott Carter has written of his amazement at the level of competence 
from a group rehearsing Le Marteau in Europe. It's not that the players 
were better - the point was that such a committment cost money and that 
the Europeans were willing to pay for it. Here, individual players can 
attain high levels of competence on their own, but ensembles are another 
animal and subject to rather different economic considerations.

Regarding how & what we hear "naturally", I'm not sure that matters in 
art, at least not in my own work. Yes, pentatonic modes occur 
"naturally" almost everywhere in the world, 7-tone modes more rarely, 
and 12-tone sets not at all. So what ? Are we then to make sure we don't 
cross some sort of line provided by nature ? Some artists are driven to 
work beyond the limits of the known and accepted. They take risks, to be 
sure, but life's more exciting that way. Art too, IMO.

Okay, enough from this corner of the world.

Best,

dp



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Again, the issue I'm raising is not one of values and it is not even
one of what people intend, what they like or dislike. I am a Martian,
observing Earthlings, and I find you can't be middle class without a
lot of a certain kind of music.

I do take your point about music not only being middle class. Of
course, music is loved by all classes and classical music has
historically been loved and supported by the upper class as well as
the middle (I really should have said "upper middle"). And the
creators -- performers, composers, and presenters -- have their own
set of values and motives which are completely different and, I would
argue, at least as important.

I don't agree that the fate of Ligeti can be separated from that of
Mozart. Once you have a museum, there's only so much room, and a lot
of stuff ends up going into the storeroom or being sold off. In my
experience, I am hearing more modern stuff in concert than I did 30
years ago. I expect that if classical music becomes an utter museum
and nothing else, it will have what I would recognize as a pretty fair
sample of what matters in it, including Ligeti, Cage, and whatnot.

About "putting off," this is something that I think everyone with any
experience in classical music will recognize. Nothing could more
clearly establish what I am saying about classical music and class
than this self-segregation.

There is no solution in cultural education. To be perfectly blunt, the
issues are far deeper than that. My starting point would be to survey
the evolving culture and identify places where people are using music
for similar purposes to classical music, e.g. for pure listening, for
edification, etc. In point of fact "intelligent dance music", "ambient
music", and some New Age music serve these functions for small
audiences. What is missing in these places, of course, is the
connection to history. For that link to truly break would be to truly
acknowledge the end of "Western civilization" and the rise of
something to replace or succeed it. It's a question in my mind how
much this is indeed the case. This also is not a value judgment, it is
a question.

Regards,
Mike

On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 1:34 PM, peiman khosravi
 wrote:
> I get your point. Maybe I am being too pedantic but I am still not
> 100% in agreement.
>
> You have to be relatively well off to be able to afford the time or
> energy to read books, go to concerts and so on. Middle class families
> don't read books to have a topic to talk about at dinner but primarily
> because they can afford it. It is a luxury, like going to the
> restaurant or having the time to cook instead of buying ready-made
> oven-chips.
>
> At the same time there is the misconception that classical music is
> and always has been for the middle classes. It is this misconception
> that puts everyone else who can afford it but do not associate
> themselves with the 'middle classes' off classical music. And anyway
> the point is that the decline of the popularity of classical music is
> a different issue from that of contemporary classical music. Your
> average middle class concert-goer would not appreciate Ligeti or
> Feldman.
>
> So what is the solution? More money and thought put into cultural
> education. But hey we can't expect that much nowadays, at least not
> here in the UK.
>
> Best,
>
> Peiman
>
>
> On 29 November 2010 17:08, Michael Gogins  wrote:
>> Compared to the past, they have lost some of their audience. When I
>> was in college, classical music sales were 10% of a growing market for
>> recorded music. Now, they are 5% of a shrinking market. Something like
>> that.
>>
>> "Function" in this context is a sociological term, not an artistic
>> term. The term "function" does not mean "good" or "bad." It is an aid
>> to understanding what is happening, not a value judgment.
>>
>> If you do not listen to classical music, do not read books or stories,
>> never consume any kind of art including movies or TV you cannot be
>> middle class because if you dined with middle class people you would
>> be at a loss for words and would be quite uncomfortable. I exaggerate,
>> but I hope I have made my point more understandable. If you consume
>> only "low-brow," "popular art, e.g. only TV, the discomfort may lessen
>> but is still there.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Mike
>>
>> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 11:51 AM, peiman khosravi
>>  wrote:
>>>>
>>>> One of the functions of classical music -- which is partly what this
>>>> thread is about -- was to make people bourgeois. The bourgeois no
>>>> longer have a function, therefore their arts languish. Or perhaps more
>>>>
>>>
>>> Really? So why is it that the music of Bach and Brahms and Schubert
>>> have not lost their audience? How many new interpretations are out
>>> there of the classical repertoire?
>>>
>>> Also I don't think the 'function' of music has ever been to 'make'
>>> people bourgeois, the fact that the audiences were primarily bourgeois
>>> does not mean that they became bourgeois by listening to the music! No
>>> more than Hitler became an anti-semite by listening to Wagner.
>>>
>>> Best
>>>
>>> Peiman
>>>
>>>
>>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Michael Gogins
>> Irreducible Productions
>> http://www.michael-gogins.com
>> Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com
>>
>>
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>>
>
>
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-- 
Michael Gogins
Irreducible Productions
http://www.michael-gogins.com
Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com


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I would love to see some sort of poll organized re: opinions on this
topic.
The two sides (with minor adjustments within them) I see:

1) Performance for a general audience takes precedence over all else.
2) Good art requires study to appreciate.

I'd bet we'd find the first set contains a whole lot of widely-known,
influential people who call themselves musicians, and the second
set . . . well, ask your mother if she's heard of them. 

I'd also be dreadfully curious about how many artists in the second set
play a realtime instrument regularly and generally can/do improvise with
it. That's not an insinuation, that's a genuine question that I'd like
to hear teased out into a conversation.

I'm absolutely flabbergasted at the response here. I thought my opinion
(#1) was true to the point that it didn't bear discussion and that #2
was at least temporarily put to rest.
But then, I might be too young and inexperienced in listening as art
form to understand these things.

Greg

ps - The re: thing is getting even more obnoxious.


On Mon, 2010-11-29 at 10:57 +0000, john ffitch wrote:
> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
> about it.
> 
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
> 
> ==John ff
> 
> 
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> 




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Not sure you are: you agree with the assertion in your second  
sentence. ;-)
On 30 Nov 2010, at 13:40, Dave Phillips wrote:

> It would appear then that I am not a sensible composer. :(
>
> Yes, the method is "sterile on its own". So is a major scale. Those  
> are *devices* for composers to work with, and we're free to follow  
> the possibilities and implications of a system or device as strictly  
> or freely as the particular instance requires. Even Boulez admitted  
> tweaking passages in Le Marteau to make them sound "better".



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Greg Schroeder wrote:
> 1) Performance for a general audience takes precedence over all else.
>   

I've been a performer most of my life, in contexts ranging from 
pop/rock/blues to classical, with byways into Renaissance and Medieval 
performance groups.

Some music I make for a general audience, some I make for a more 
restrictive group, i.e. those with the ears to hear it.

> 2) Good art requires study to appreciate.
>   

I would agree that it takes study to learn its methods of construction, 
but I don't think it takes any special study to appreciate art, good, 
bad, or otherwise.

> I'd also be dreadfully curious about how many artists in the second set
> play a realtime instrument regularly and generally can/do improvise with
> it. That's not an insinuation, that's a genuine question that I'd like
> to hear teased out into a conversation.


I'm not sure if I fall into either of your sets, but I am a full-time 
instrumental instructor. I play out two or three times a month with my 
band, my students have regularly scheduled performances, and I 
occasionally play solo and duet gigs.

Sometimes I engage in conversation with non-playing non-singing 
musicians. It's typically a difficult exchange - they don't see the 
point of learning to play an instrument, and I often consider much of 
what they're doing a sort of "paint by numbers" music-making, i.e. push 
this colored button to trigger this sound, move that other-colored fader 
to trigger another sound (usually created by someone else), and so 
forth. HOWEVER: That's all about the method, not the music, and I am 
sometimes astonished by what I hear. In the end I'm really concerned 
primarily with a work's musical appeal, that's its true value for me.

Methods fascinate me. Complex things fascinate me. So do simple ones. If 
it's something I can use, I use it. Otherwise I throw it back. Maybe 
later I'll develop a taste or need for it. Tempora mutantur, et nos 
mutemur in illis - the times change, and we must change with them. Ya 
gotta bear with us old-timers, Greg, we're a little slow sometimes, but 
we do have the benefit of a perspective gained only through time and 
long involvement. Not that that perspective is worth anything per se. 
There's always a context, isn't there ?

And yes, I hate those freaking re's too.

Best,

dp



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greetings

On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 9:00 AM, Michael Gogins
 wrote:
> For that link to truly break would be to truly
> acknowledge the end of "Western civilization" and the rise of
> something to replace or succeed it.

as sun ra said, "it's after the end of the world, don't you know that
yet?" [also alan moore in _promethia_, also many others]

i think that "western civilization" world is over [how does
'wikileaks' fit in with j.s.bach?]. of course, it's not like a
guillotine, more like waves just fading away. and yet, music endures.
so if you love music, it doesn't really matter, because there will
still be interesting things to listen to.

-- 
\js : "verbing weirds language." -calvin  [http://or8.net/~johns/]


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Good art requires study to appreciate. Most people have completed some
version of this course of study in a very informal way without
realizing what has happened to them. It is still study, for without it
(years of cartoon music, movie music, party music) they would
definitely reject what they now seek out. Of course, becoming more
conscious of what has happened to one is the foundation of true
civilization. It's nice to be able to talk about why one likes
something or what is remarkable about it.

To go off in a slightly different direction, in my experience (and
this is a question I've pursed by both personally questioning
composers and by reading biographies and histories), there is no
single answer to what the occasion of composition is, but a lot of
composers of recent days that I personally spend a lot of time
listening to compose mainly so that they can actually hear the kind of
music that they want to hear. That doesn't mean they don't think
about, seek out, and cultivate audiences.

To take this to a deeper level, I believe that many great musicians,
performers as well as composers, don't have plans or preconceptions
for production. They have what Keats termed "negative capability." In
literature this is the ability to remove oneself from the equation to
enable identification with the experience of nature and of others. In
musical terms, this can be the ability to open oneself up fully to
silence and hear the strange new music playing in it. Preconceptions
kill this ability, but musical tradition, cultivation, and skill
enable one to deal with it, to translate

I used to play a realtime instrument regularly, sometimes even for
money, and I could quite definitely improvise on it -- the flute.

On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 9:03 AM, Greg Schroeder  wrote:
> I would love to see some sort of poll organized re: opinions on this
> topic.
> The two sides (with minor adjustments within them) I see:
>
> 1) Performance for a general audience takes precedence over all else.
> 2) Good art requires study to appreciate.
>
> I'd bet we'd find the first set contains a whole lot of widely-known,
> influential people who call themselves musicians, and the second
> set . . . well, ask your mother if she's heard of them.
>
> I'd also be dreadfully curious about how many artists in the second set
> play a realtime instrument regularly and generally can/do improvise with
> it. That's not an insinuation, that's a genuine question that I'd like
> to hear teased out into a conversation.
>
> I'm absolutely flabbergasted at the response here. I thought my opinion
> (#1) was true to the point that it didn't bear discussion and that #2
> was at least temporarily put to rest.
> But then, I might be too young and inexperienced in listening as art
> form to understand these things.
>
> Greg
>
> ps - The re: thing is getting even more obnoxious.
>
>
> On Mon, 2010-11-29 at 10:57 +0000, john ffitch wrote:
>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>> about it.
>>
>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>
>> ==John ff
>>
>>
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>
>
>
>
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>



-- 
Michael Gogins
Irreducible Productions
http://www.michael-gogins.com
Michael dot Gogins at gmail dot com


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Hi Aaron.

On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 7:20 AM, Aaron Krister Johnson
 wrote:
> There's ample evidence that many of the complexities considered basic for
> much of 20th century (and beyond) music are too much for the average Joe who
> is musically untrained or highly literate in current trends.
>
> One example is the neurological importance of the number 7, being a
> "cognitive limit" of sorts. That is to say, groups of things larger than 7
> cannot be directly grasped w/o deliberate counting.
>
> This may explain the prevalence of the diatonic scale (and related sets of
> similar size) as an interesting boundary where things can be rich and
> complex without being TOO rich and complex...it's right on the border of
> 'directly graspable'.

The 7 unique items thing is well-known and probably close to
inviolable, but there's another very basic- even obvious- set of
principles called Gestalt principles, Gestalt laws, or Gestaltung,
that humans (and probably most vertebrates) use to group items.
Proximity, similarity, closure, symmetry, common fate (similar
motion), etc. Some good illustrations:
http://www.infovis-wiki.net/index.php?title=Gestalt_Laws
A very common example is looking at someone through a chain-link
fence. You don't perceive a whole bunch of irregularly colored
diamond-shaped pieces, you perceive a person and a fence.

The famous "Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two" paper merits
reading, as Miller goes on to point out that we are capable of
immediately recognizing and assigning meaning to well over 7 things,
as in the 26 letters, 10 digits, and numerous punctuation marks you're
reading right now, or the hundreds (thousands?) of human faces you
would instantly recognize without having to think for a second. Tens
of thousands of words, hundreds of melodies, who knows how many
universal symbols. You can't consciously concentrate on all of them at
once, but that just means hearing more than 7 *completely unrelated*
notes at the same time, with no musical context, would be frustrating
(actually far less than 7!). Miller suggests we make multiple
simultaneous classifications.
We don't approach the world trying to label every thing as
independent, and definitely not while listening to music. I don't
believe that most listeners identify each *pitch* as a unique item and
get confused if there are more than 7 (or 9) pitches; they
involuntarily sense patterns in them, and those patterns aren't just
based on the harmonic series or some scale or a mental list of
pitches. You can throw in a lot of momentary dissonance if it follows
some discernible pattern. Even a standard 12-bar blues uses more than
7 individual notes, but they're conveniently arranged in 3 very
obviously related dominant seventh chords. And it's one of the most
popular progressions in all of music, used by millions of people,
including many who can barely read or write.

One of my favorite JI harmonies is 1:1 - 7:6 - 3:2 - 7:4. It doesn't
conveniently fit into any harmonic or subharmonic series; it could be
labeled a 12:14:18:21, but I don't think anyone "hears" an imaginary
1:3 as the root of that, nor do most people hear the 21st harmonic as
particularly consonant. But there is a very simple pattern to the
frequencies that can be perceived without confusion. Two 7:6 intervals
separated by 3:2 is a simpler pattern than the 12th, 14th, 18th and
21st harmonics.


> This also might explain why 12-tone music is way too much for the vast
> majority of folks.

I think that also has to do with the specific intention of the
composer to make it hard to compute. Crafted to avoid any sense of
magnetism or resolution. Plenty of pieces use "all 12 tones" ;) but
are completely tonal. I wouldn't doubt that even Bach wrote some
(disregarding the WTC, which is like a suite).


> I'm a big advocate of microtonality, but I think the best way to introduce
> it to people, and maybe the the best way to use it in general, is to present
> limited pitch sets, not vast aggregates of new pitches that will completely
> drown the listener....novelty, but without overwhelming new spicy flavors!

If a pitch is compellingly related to the pitches around it, then "new
pitches" is relative.


> From an information theoretical point-of-view, things that are 'rich' and
> 'classic' tend to be in a sweet spot where predictability and surprise are
> well balanced. Total predictability has little information, and total chaos
> is perceived as random, and carries little meaning.

I agree 100%. My musical goals are primarily psychological, not
theoretical. My sister has been known to tell me, "I know nothing
about music, but everyone tells me your music is really good, so
congratulations!" which comes off as a bit of an insult. I have been
known to tell her, "If it doesn't sound good without analyzing it,
then I failed." Which, of course, I want to know!
On the other hand, my professor used to tell me that if I didn't
complete certain themes or resolve certain things, my listeners
wouldn't be satisfied, and I responded that I didn't want to
necessarily satisfy listeners, but to affect them. Although I enjoy
doing both!


> The two polar trends of
> 20th century art music, minimalism and dodecaphony, most often miss the mark
> because they aren't even aiming for it. Hence the understandable desire of
> the classical loving masses for Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Chopin.

I don't think Schoenberg or Bartok were aiming for top ten.
Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring', on the other hand, with its complex
polyrhythms, polytonality, and deliberate disruption, was used
alongside the Nutcracker Suite and Dance of the Hours in a very
popular and enduring Disney film!

-Chuckk


>
> I'd bet that the music of our time that will survive (scant little) will do
> so b/c it retains a sense of 'traditional' sense of what this balance
> is....what do you all think?
>
> AKJ
>
> On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 4:57 AM, john ffitch  wrote:
>>
>> This article appeared in the national press today.  Still thinking
>> about it.
>>
>>
>> http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/nov/28/alex-ross-modern-classical-music
>>
>> ==John ff
>>
>>
>> Send bugs reports to the Sourceforge bug tracker
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>> csound"
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Aaron Krister Johnson
> http://www.akjmusic.com
> http://www.untwelve.org
>
>



-- 
http://www.badmuthahubbard.com


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Okay, I just read some more of the thread and I see that lots of what
I mentioned was already brought up... my bad.
Consider my post just a response to the magical number 7 idea.

-Chuckk



On Wed, Dec 22, 2010 at 12:48 PM, Chuckk Hubbard
 wrote:
> Hi Aaron.



> I don't think Schoenberg or Bartok were aiming for top ten.
> Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring', on the other hand, with its complex
> polyrhythms, polytonality, and deliberate disruption, was used
> alongside the Nutcracker Suite and Dance of the Hours in a very
> popular and enduring Disney film!
>
> -Chuckk


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