20th Century Music

[Gimble]

With such amazing music written by composers such as a Respighi, Hindemith, Mathias, and especially Walton [Who I Personally regard as one of the greatest composers ... check out his violin and viola sonatas if you're not familiar with them, such a rich and beautiful language of non-functional harmony] why did 19th Century composers prefer to write in blatantly "intellectual" unmusical forms ?

You know, as mathematically "perfect" as Boulez's Structures were, like seriously can anyone claim to actually putting on a recording of them and truly being absorbed within the music, to be totally moved by its craft. Check out Respighi's Queen of Sheba or Walton's Canzonetta for Violin and Orchestra. That trully gives me goosebumps, and its crafted in a totally awesome fashion. And then directly listen to Boulez or Webern or Schoenberg's serialism [i can't bag him TOO much, he wrote alot of really really good books on traditional musical ideology]. What can you get out of that? What can even the composer get out of that? Whenever I try writing something based on pitch classes or outright serialism I honostly never can say Im proud of what I've achieved...

So why were composers like Walton shunned upon for want of embracing this sense of neo-romantasism. Why were they looked down upon just because they obeyed the inherent laws of harmony derived from the nature of intervals/sound itself [check out hindemiths craft of musical composition ...]

In Australia, where i study and get my stuff performed, the tonal traditional is looked upon in a better light, but works of this style premiered in Europe are often shunned and/or heavily critisised.

So what do you guys think of this, especially as most of you would be trying to appeal to the populist in relation to games/tv/film composition? How do you feel on a personal level about this ? I dont understand why say, composers like Mathias [check out his harp concerto] are relatively unknown, writing harmonically intricate works and absolutely beautiful melodies, which are forgotten, only to be taken place by guys like Cage who wrote SILENCE!

Is this even fair ?

Has Concert Hall music become too "academic" ?

[JaapVisser]

It's not easy to answer such a question.

Like everything you have to see it in its context. When Schoenberg left tonality and stepped into the world of atonality it was not something he "just" did. With every change of style there is a certain amounts of happenings leading to it.
At the end of the 19th century composers where looking to expand their expressions. The need to express themself grow bigger and bigger. The looked in every possible way to adjust their level of expressions. Orchestra's grew like nuts, they looked on the edges of tonality (Wagner - Tristan und Isolde) to expand and to renew their options.
Schoenberg did the same in his early years. He wrote for massive orchestra's in a style that was still "tonal". He felt limited and due to feeling limited he stepped over the border and left tonality. Debussy and others did the same. Tonality was too limited.

In the 30's after the crash of the economics styles became simpler, the need to express was limited and it went more "underground". There was need for national composers again and nationalism was raising in a lot of countries (not just Germany). We know the result. It led into world war 2
After world war 2 the Darmstadt generation (Boulez, Stockhausen, Goeyvaerts) realised that expressions in music could be a dangerous thing. Just like the time being in the 50's they wanted to look forward and forget the past and exclude any form of feelings that could lead again to a distrastrous war and/or society.
They created a system which totally renewed music and excluded a lot of options such as personal expression. When you research that time period it was not a strange thing. It happened all through society and not just in art.

As a reaction on this at the end of the 60's and in the beginning of the 70's people where looking for ways to express themself again and in that period persons like Cage, Reich and Glass stood up. The formed a counter-reaction.
Cage went on a different level and researched the possibilities of "coinsidence" and how nature is working with its laws in music (read Silence, its a good book to understand Cage better). For him music was not just an expression of HIS feelings. Music consisted of many factors (environment, personal judgement, physical laws etc) and he experimented with the extremes to test these setups.
Reich and Glass went into the minimalism to give their voice again serialism in this way. They where experimenting with a new form of expression...time.
When you look to the 70's it was not strange that they started to express this way of working.

I can go on for a while explaining why every period is a reaction on the period before it. The problem modern classical music has is that they the public moved another way.
Modern music has never been music for the big mass. It hasn't in the time of Beethoven and Mozart and it will not be in 100 years.
The whole evolution of styles in classical music is purely action-reaction, just like in every art form.

I like it a lot. I have worked for years as contemporary composer and I still make modern compositions for ensembles. I love it. For my work as composer and sound designer for the film and game industry I work with different techniques since it is music for a different audience. The same goes for when I write music for a rock band. It is simply a different audience with a different taste.

[johng]

So, Gimble asks about the music and receives a long explanation -- that is exactly the problem.

Nobody wants to pay 50 Euros or $150 or whatever and need an instruction manual to "appreciate" the piece. It's boring for all but a few, so, to attract an audience and maintain subscriptions, orchestras tend to revert to the old warhorses. Great as they are, these composers won't be writing anything new! Young people don't go because it's not cool because the works are 50-150 years old or more -- it's not what's happening.

So that's why some of us chose film music. It may be pedestrian and artistically unambitious at times but at least it's consumed by a living, breathing audience. And sometimes it reaches the level of art, or, more often, "high craftsmanship."

I like art music a lot -- Penderecki, Lutoslawski, the whole gang -- but it needs to grab an audience. Hopefully, composers like Arvo Part will re-ignite interest in art music that, while popular, visceral and immediately accessible, still is informed by academic tradition and rigor.

[nikolas]

The beginning of the thread smells a bit like juvinile 20th century music attack! At least it feels like it!

I can reverse the very same argument and mention how much more popular Arvo Part and Schnittke perhaps, or Takemitsu are against Cage, or Cumb, or Ives (to mention some american names). At least here in Europe, Schnittke and Part, etc are very very popular. CDs come through, concerts are being done, etc. While poor Cage sits almost alone where he is and Cumb is almost forgotten, no matter the huge work he's done!

Messiaen sits in the middle!

Isn't it unfair for composers to spend their life trying to progress the art of music and get forgotten in front of the immensly more popular williams, or gawd forbid Zimmer? Even worst Britney?

I think that right now we stand at a crossroads with very many different options!

You get the Internet and Youtube where you can view anything you like. You get the Internet where you can meet people and see/hear whatever you feel.

The time is no longer that of atonality, or serialism, or musique concrete, or anything simmilar anymore. The time is that of John, Japp and Nikolas (and anyone else in here)! Romantic? May so, but it doesn't remove the fact that nobody, outside academia perhaps, or small-ish circles, want to follow a set path anymore. At least to my experience in London and Greece.

_________________

Academia is very closely linked to education and should remain to that. I won't deny that it has escaped outside the schools, but I will say that it bothers me and it feels alienated from the rest of the world!

Exactly like Japp I work at more commercial venues at computer games and the media, and I do write music for contemporary ensembles! I ejnoy both worlds and I cannot deny that I seperate the two! Still it doesn't seem wrong, right, or whatever. IT feels only natural!

_____________________

On a personal story:

I went in Paris, in 2001 or so to try and enter the Superiere Conservatoire the music et de danse de Paris for composition. I failed! I was given a quartet to analyse, which I had no idea what it was. It was the 2nd quartet by Ligeti! I went back home in Athens and found a CD to listen to it. What an ugly piece of trash! Immensly rubbish!

Skip to 2008. I'm teaching composition to a private student and I decide to give him that very same quartet to analyse. I find the same CD to give it to him for listening purposes. And I listen to it as well! I was amazed at the interest it arouse! At the lovely music that came out!

It simply seems that I grew older, or more 'mature', and more receptive to such music!

I do think that audience can be trained (through listening, not academically, or through analysis, etc), and they can change their listening habbids!

As I said I'm too romantic I think, no?

[OneThrow]

You finally got back online Nikolas! :)

I don't know where modern classical music is today. But I hear all sorts of music in films. And that's good up to a point. The trouble with films is that the pictures get in the way of the music. But then without pictures there wouldn't be any movies so I suppose we have to make some allowances.

But I do agree that we now have the opportunity to listen to almost whatever we like, we no longer have to be swayed by the great and the good. Each person's opinion is as good as another's.

[Gimble]

Thanks for the responses, it's great to see what other people feel about this. I'd have to say I agree with everyone of you on different levels.

I totally agree with JohnG for starters, I mean I really believe that film and ESPECIALLY video games are taking music down the path of where it should have gone last century. It almost seems like the logical progression from the way that music was [of course there are always exceptions, such as Zimmer, who's music serves film well, but would fall flat if it was to be taken by it's self i.e the gladiator soundtrack on cd is so boring to listen to, although in the context of the movie its not bad]

But if you look at the music produced by say Jeremy Soule or similar, That kind of stuff has the power to connect with people, on levels that say, "I am Sitting in a Room" cannot. But then again, that doesnt mean im so absolutely inclined that way, you mention Pederecki, his Threnody has the power to move me and make me feel in ways that could not be achieved anyway else. And to be honost, what he achieved with that could not be replicated with say "traditional" musical concepts. Same to a piece the other day that i heard "Density 21.5", [I've forgotten the composer], while nontonal, it was actually really good.

But when EVERY new peice produced has to sound like taking an axel grinder to your face, it really wears thin.

And don't get me wrong Nikolas, Reich and Part are actually two of my all time favourite composers as well ! See though, Im currently studying at the Conservatorium of Sydney, and it still feels like there's a huge push to replicate the sounds of a work site with the orchestra. I get advice from teachers/mentors to follow this sort of style.I see everyweek countless composers here push out indistinquished and bland timbral soundscapes which I spose would be alright to sample for a SFX lib or something , but music? We had one guy write a work which involved putting a microphone in a box and shaking it around ... !!

We dont study Reich; We dont study Part; Jeez, the only Ravel we study is Bolero ...
Instead our time is spent analyzing the "wonders" of the likes of Stockhousen and Boulez

And Jaap, I do understand the cultural context for these changes...for art is but a reaction to the times at hand. But it seems to me almost immature and nonsensical to link music to humanity and its compulsion for greed and war in such a way that these composers did. And that these people are remembered far better than their counterparts who actually wrote decent music ...

Aaaaaaaaaand thats my bitter rant for the day

[ewkarl7777]

You're in college. Stravinsky, Hindemith, Bartok, etc. were what happened in early 20th century classical music. Boulez, Stockhausen, Cage, etc. were what happened in late 20th century classical music.

Like it or not, it's history. Your college would be doing you a disservice if it didn't attempt to give you a broad overview of what happened.

That said, they should also be including Minimalism, neo-romanticism, and all the other ism's that happened up to today. If they're not, seek out the info yourself.

And yes, I do listen to Boulez and Stockhausen for pleasure. Honest. :)

[johng]

One interesting aspect of this that we're all touching on is the relationship of any composer or artist to audience -- and which audience. In the olden days, an artist / poet / playwright / musician had to please an audience, whether that was a king or a bunch of illiterates. Sometimes of course that produced drivel, sometimes Salieri, sometimes Mozart or Shakespeare.

One reason why film music and, 100 years ago, opera or oratorio are and were interesting is that they force the composer to cope with an audience. You can write dumb music or you can push things around more and try to take it somewhere else. Thomas Newman in his way does this; Michael Nyman does it a different way.

I guess I never liked at university the assumption that anything popular must be lame intellectually. Tchaikovsky was the first symptom that I ran across in school as we progressed forward in time -- despite being one of the most beloved composers of all time, he gets disdain and condescension from most professors. Frankly, I don't really like listening to Tchaikovsky either, but I still object to this weird superiority.

So, I like Edgar Varese and some of the others, but I bet in 50 years 8 of the 10 most revered composers of the 20th century will be completely forgotten because you need an instruction manual to be told why they are good. Henry Fielding, Jane Austen, Shakespeare, Mozart, Beethoven, Raphael, Stravinsky, Part, much of Bartok -- even a little bit of Hindemith and Schoenburg are fun to read or listen to.

By contrast, without singling out someone's favourite 20th century whacko, much of it is stuff that defines the artist as some kind of Tortured Genius who knows More Than You Do, and thus is entitled -- just the word -- to generate reams of music that is often dull to listen to whilst being at the same time very difficult to play. Or even print, because of the belief at universities that inventing one's own notation is that much cleverer than using the boring stuff that Beethoven did.

Don't get me wrong, I have my "festive fifty" of the moderns and I like a lot of them. I especially like the ones that seem to be interested in communicating with another human being, rather than mathematically-generated tone series or some other non-musical reference. That stuff, to me, sounds like -- and is -- total rubbish.

[SergeD]

ewKarl7777 is right on as it's history. I heard some of thosemodern cold "cerebral" music and felt that because they had no talent to compose music they instead choose to decompose it.

I love Reich but cannot stand Stockhausen or Cage. But it it is a matter to explore and expand our view.

"The Rest Is Noise" by Alex Ross covers that matter and i's on my winter wishlist.

SergeD

[johng]

+1 for "the rest is noise." It's fun to read.

[andorascendor]

Good topic. I am self-taught. Started with "Early Music", made it thru Schoenberg's book on theory, music concrete, played in a bunch of jazz combos to grasp what I could from the jazz world...went to various places in asia to see gamelan with my own peepers, japan twice fer koto, phillipines for whatever...spent a lot of time in Prague and Berlin, checking out the euro-classical tradition...Played some heavy rock gigs...got comfy with early music tech- supposed technologies that were to "Change music Forever"...mellotrons, theramins...I built a VCO that could make a sinusoid proper...that made me get into how we physically process sound and this and that...basically I tried and am still trying to get as much as I can into myself. There is stuff that I hate and stuff I love. Serialism does not do it for me. Cut and drop (music concrete=acid loops, all the same) ain't my bag. I love Ives, Bartok and that school of stuff...I love Bach and Mozart. I like the Velvet Underground. I get the most outta music by creating it. Its all a search...I don't know what it's like to go to school for music "understanding"...It seems like that has to come from with in... Maybe because when I was a child and my mom would sing Bach or something while she was cooking- maybe it was that that made me like this or that...who knows...There are changes in music made possible by technology (the piano, tempered tuning...amps....etc) and there are changes in music made possible by that elusive creative part that comes from the desire to do just that. Create. It's all big and mushy for me- The desire to grow musically is the same as the desire to grow spiritually. It's gunna come 2 everyone in different ways. To argue "best" or "worst" objectively is really the desire for someone to prove that they are somehow rooted in an organized system. After all, feeling lost all the time can be quite scary. What am I getting at? Im rambling. Personally, I agree...I don't think that a person should have to read a 100 page explanation on whatever to enjoy music- but then again my understanding of chord structure, the difference between a fugue or round, being able to anticipate a cadence but than being cleverly tricked by the composer- I do think that there is a lot of stuff to learn that can deepen the experience of listening to great music...Remember this arguement? "I would never take lessons because they would destroy my creativity". That's dumb. It's like a writer who refuses to learn new words. Doi?IMO...practically everyone these days has a mac lap something that comes with garageband or fruity loops...I think that there are more people now than ever that call themselves "musicians"...Just drag and drop...drag and drop...anyway, good post...

[andorascendor]

Jaap- good comments. Im self-taught and was lucky because i've always been surrounded by good musicians, good composers...Im 33 and my introduction to playing music was being a drummer in a punk-sorta band. Anyway, I decided to teach myself what I thought was music history, music theory and then some. I started at what I thought was the beginning, early music, ren, gothic, baroque, classical, romantic, late romantic, early 20th century...trying to soak everything in while also learning how to play piano and other instruments. Eventually it payed off and I was able to make a living off it, I am a piano and drum teacher now, I own a studio and have a bunch of goodies, I've had minor minor success, i've sold a bit over 30,000 units and was fortunate again in the way that thru learning music travel and touring became possible so I was able to go to places on this planet I would of never been able to go to. I've played thousands of shows, in many different styles. Rock, "modern" classical, jazz combos...I have a particular fondness for the early 20th century guys aka bartok, ives, gershwin, webern, ravel, blah blah. I also have a very deep appreciation for rock and roll- the big beat that migrated from africa via slaves, afro-cuban, new orleans stuff, robert johnson, forward forward 50's, 60's, people like phil spectr or van dyke parks...brian wilson, the velvets, than bands like the dolls, lou reed, eno, roxy music, bowie, krautrock...psych stuff...yay yay...backwards again with jazz ending up with miles going modal- like in the early days. I must say, people these days (at least people in my generation) still have that itch inside them where they want to destroy to go forward- where I live and go in the states at least- I see a blind acceptance to the concept of atonality...so many new bands think that by rejecting consonance they are doing something new and neato. Bach to them sounds like "rich persons music". The "Noise" scene is so big infact...it's kind of getting out of control. With the proliferation of programs that enable people to "drag and drop" samples and tweak the Q, all still performing behind their mac...I don't like it a bit. The noise scene is so big in my home-town that it has seemed to take everything over. Similar things are happening in Brooklyn, Chicago, LA...So now then there is another reaction to that which is the neo-art-folk movement...So you got another bad reaction, which is just that, an entire movement based on doing the opposite of the noise scene so again we have the acoustic playing coffee-house chords in a particularly boring way. I guess what i am getting here is that from my lens I see a blanket lack of desire for any sort of understanding music and it's history...I just see these microcosms of reaction to another reaction- all the stuff being based on concepts that have already been explored a long time before these people were born. It troubles me...also: it seems like orchestral music these days is just here for movie scores and video-games and commercials. I admit, I don't know of to many modern orchestral-ish composers who write just for the music, not a movie. I am so sick of hearing all sorts of versions of holst's planets re-arranged and tagged onto a movie's opening credits...I can't think of 2 many scores that do anything fer me...Williams, Zimmerthis, Oi...is that all we have? I really don't know.

Early 20th century orchestral stuff is my personal fav. Something really special happened back then. The chordal vocabulary became so complex and forms opened up...it was a period where everyone was kinda doing their own thing...Stravinsky went that way, Schoenberg had to go serial on it. The american composers started to incorporate some jazz vocab...everyone was doing something interesting. I know that at the end of the day most everything can be written off as something legit because of context but now, here in 2008 the context is meaningless (mostly). A reactionary stance works well in base politiks but here now in the world of music "reactionary ideology" and how that applies to innovation and honest art...it has no meaning.....

My 2 or 3 cents!

[DavidC]

I'm getting my masters in composition right now, and of course I'm writing primarily dissonant, atonal music. On the other hand, I've turned in some tonal work, and my teacher (who writes a lot of tonal music) loves it. I think the tide turned against strictly atonal music long ago, and while there will always be dissenting camps, tonal and atonal need to coexist, even-or maybe especially-within the same piece of music. Write with technique, but write from your heart.

DavidC

[DallasComposer]

Without going into a long winded rant about modern/post modern or whatever they call it nowadays in the marble halls of Ivy town, but those composers did what they did because well, that’s what they wanted to do. The 20th century was a bit more complicated than the 19th or 18th with advances in technology, science and war to name a few, thus reflects in music, as well as in art.

I also see it as they have opened the door to a much more diverse and richer sound palate than ever before available in previous generations. I may compose something ‘tonal’ and also use ‘modern’ string fx, throw in some dissonant atonal ‘noise’, a few passage of minimalism and probably wouldn’t even raise an eyebrow because of the composers who have come before and still take all the heat for the noise they made, to them I say ‘Thank you’.

[MPDmike]

... The 20th century was a bit more complicated than the 19th or 18th with advances in technology, science and war to name a few, thus reflects in music, as well as in art. ...Although the historical developments in music probably seemed more dramatic at the time than we can now appreciate, it is true I think that the music of the 18th and 19th centuries seems to follow some logical progression.

It is only when we enter the early part of the 20th century that various schools of music go off in tangential directions. I love some of the best of 20th century music, particularly Bartok, Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Ravel and Copland. But how many of the other "great" composers of the 20th century will be forgotten in another 100 years time?

Weirdness and dissonance might seem good for making an artistic statement, but would I want to listen to some of these works more than once in the concert hall? Some film music is atonal and "modern" and matches the action of the cinema very well, although I doubt I would like to listen to such music in isolation.

The best music stands on its own merits. It is complete and has its own story, and takes us on a journey. In comparison much of 20th century music was too gimmicky; it had nothing to say, and it is boring to listen to. Good music is always in tune with the feelings of the human soul.

[LittleLeadMen]

"Has Concert Hall music become too "academic" ?"

You're having this conversation now? Really? How timely, only half a century too late.

[MrAlex]

Andorascendor, I don't know what to make of your views. On the one hand I think it is great that you have explored the world of music from within yourself, seen it and felt it, not read it in some book or copied loops from someone else and called yourself a musician.

I admire this attitude. You can't speak unless from experience.

And while I am still agreeing with you, I believe it is true that the ease of availability of low cost programs like garage band has exposed a wider variety of people to the art of music composition, sequencing, mixing and mastering, sound design. Some of these people, possibly a majority, will only dabble, they haven't got the talent or willpower to improve. These people are not a threat. Then you have the arrogant minority who will simply copy the modern style of the day, to cash in on a trend. This happens in any artform, and it always has done.

But who is left?

People like me?

I grew up with technology, but in a different era - the era of personal computers. Your views against computer based sequencers and younger people I find generally offensive, in the same way any person of any group would take personal offense at general statements about them. It's hurtful and pointless to see a supposedly mature 30 something carry on about the degredation of morality and inteligence in the younger generation, or the loss of the drive to explore the boundaries, and it's truly frustrating being that you should be a role model to us, to show us the way, without knocking us down. You instead choose to preach your incorrect understandings of what modern sequencers enable people to do (they are not toys), and some unfair views of what people are doing with their music these days.

The world isn't ending. It's just music. The music of my generation was a direct statement against the rigid conformity of the elder generations. As I am sure was yours. As will be my childrens. None of it is new. So its fashionable to loop beats and samples at the moment. The next generation will either refine the technique or rebel against it. It's always unfashionable to be in fashion at some stage in your life, and that is where the musical underground comes from, and it is from the underground where new forms of art always rise.

These things are beyond our control. We just do what feels right to us at the time. We are either there, and we get it, or we aren't, and we don't.

I don't write music for "ideals". I write music for practicality. I compose beats and melodies. I create new sounds from their basic waveforms. I sample interesting sources. I arrange these in FLStudio, a highly competent and well thought out piece of DAW software, where I can record guitar, vocals and any effect I want, I can literally create a picture with sound, whether it is impressionist, abstract, realist, dada, whatever... I have total control over what noise goes where to suit my whim. I don't subscribe to a genre. My music could be called electronic, but some of it sounds a lot like rock and roll, some sounds like hardcore techno, some of it is orchestral and composed according to rigid parameters, some of it flows freely from one ambient texture to the next without concern for the legality of the move, some (perhaps most) is quite distinctly crap. But I write my music for me... Because I love writing music. That is why I do it, not for some abstract ideal or as a music-composing automaton working on a crap salary for a corporation whose only desire is to cash in as much as possible on the latest marketing trends.

I just... close my eyes, take a few deep breaths, and the feel where I want my next notes to go. That is all.

When people start composing to an ideal, they are putting into action a belief that they hold a superior ideal. By composing in such a way, the aim is to showcase to anyone who will listen the superior ideal, YOUR ideal in effect. The aim is to have everyone agree with the ideal. Ideals can be harmful, like in the case of fundamental religious differences leading to violent clashes between entire nations. Generally for music, ideals are just trivial banter between people who get too much intellectual stimulation and find it hard to switch off after a day of complex composing.

My ideals in life and in music are to try and help people where I can, try not to hurt them if I can't help them, and never do something at my own expense, try to find the silver lining in everything. This flows on into my music. I write it for myself, I do not denigrate or steal from others, and if others enjoy it then that is a welcome bonus for both them and myself. Why does it need to be anything more than that? Music from the soul, to express my feelings and creativity. You don't have to like it, but as your standards and mine are different, you are only judging me by your standards, whether you think it is better or worse for you to do so is of no importance to anyone but yourself - they are your standards, important only to you and the people like you. It's just a bit sad that people can't drop their standards and open their eyes to a wider perspective.

I would never say that my music is better than any other music, or that of any other generation, or that of anyone using different tools than I am acustomed to. Despite admittedly enjoying my own music considerably more than most other music I hear (after all, I do compose it primarily for my own enjoyment), I can still respect the passion, the soul and the energy that goes into creating true works of art - even those I don't understand or enjoy.

I hope you see where I am coming from. If I am not rare, then us youngers aren't all as bad as you seem to be making out, nor is your generation any more creative or passionate than ours, or indeed any other. Some people, I must admit, push the boundaries of decent behavior regarding plagarism - given that it is so easy these days - such people hardly ever survive with reputations intact in the industry. Unless, like a certain hip hop producer, they are backed by a wealthy legal team. But such is life. You're a musician, make music. Philosophy is for people who take too many drugs and think too much about things that don't ultimately matter to them on a pragmatic level.

So I guess if you think it's meaningless, that everything has been done already, than there is no drive to explore or create anymore... well... why are you doing it? Music must have a meaning for you, otherwise it is pointless for you to do it. It almost sounds like you're feeling defeated by something... Or are you feeling defeated on behalf of a generation you don't fully understand?

[OneThrow]

This thread seems to have developed since I last read it. I'll have to come back.