tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13593902.post3258724456636425687..comments2024-02-11T09:55:50.468-08:00Comments on The Eastside View: Bride concertoCharles Sherehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10480432901356490235noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13593902.post-89137425402723847222009-10-31T08:19:58.278-07:002009-10-31T08:19:58.278-07:00I think 19th Century composers like Liszt, were al...I think 19th Century composers like Liszt, were almost writing topical "essays" on current events. A symphony following a big conflict, for instance, was like an allegorical narrative epic by a poet (like Byron). <br /><br />What those "essays" actually said, however, is open to interpretation. Elegy is perhaps the easiest, like Tennyson's In Memoriam, compared to Chopin's death march. Janacek's 1.X. 1905.Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13593902.post-11592667957755897382009-10-29T13:12:29.655-07:002009-10-29T13:12:29.655-07:00Hmmm. Much to think of here. Accident and chance c...<i>Hmmm. Much to think of here. Accident and chance can of course be used in decisions regarding sounds — their origins, their dimensions (pitch, duration, loudness, etc.), their distribution within a piece of music. That’s been standard operating procedure for half a century. <br /><br />Some of us think all significant aspects of music occur “only for the duration of the playing.” That said, for many of us, score study and reduction performance ere not particularly awkward; they’re reliable and productive tools in the job of “learning” pieces of music.<br /><br />Your comment suggests a deeper subject, particularly when I return to your opening paragraph: the nature of “program” in the writing, playing, or hearing of music. I think program is present very much more often than purists realize. Leonard Ratner wrote a very interesting book (</i>Classic Music: Expression, Form and Style<i>; MacMillan Publishing Company, 1985) discussing this (among other things); much music commonly thought to be “abstract” had in fact rhetorical “meaning” to the audiences who knew the “language.”<br /><br />Most of us have lost that language, and can no longer listen to traditional music for its intended affect. Mozart and Beethoven are no more “understood” by the average concertgoer than are Cage and Stockhausen; it’s only the familiarity of their music that’s known, not its “meaning.” <br /><br />There’s a lot to be written, said, and thought about in the subject of musical “meaning,” and I think accident and chance — and understanding and, more to the point, more poignant and delightful: misunderstanding — cannot be considered apart from the context of musical “meaning.” But this is resistant, and I’ve got work to do.</i>Charles Sherehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10480432901356490235noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13593902.post-82183727529735783042009-10-29T11:13:04.594-07:002009-10-29T11:13:04.594-07:00Reading your comments, here, I'm reminded of t...Reading your comments, here, I'm reminded of the debate which once raged regarding the tension between "programmatic" and "pure" music in the musical quarterlies. <br /><br />Regarding music and time: I'm not sure Duchamp's notions of accident and chance can be very successfully imported into musical expression, since the "evidence" of the accident occurs only for the duration of the playing, and can't be studied the way a physical object can be (except through awkward means--studying a score, playing a "reduction" etc). What is an accident in sound--like hearing a car horn that sounds like Prokofiev--may have a literal relationship only by virtue of the coincidence of instrumental ranges/pitches. "Listening" through the available generators of traditional sound may seem narrow and too discrete, but otherwise sound is just the chaotic occurrence of use, or the residue of physical events (engines and birdsong). An enigma.Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.com