Whatever Happened to Classical Music?

[goldentone]

I don't know when it started, or when the process began, but sometime last century, the first third perhaps, the output of classical music compositions just died.  Classical music itself has evolved, of course, from Bach to Charles Ives, and I know there are *some* composers left (e.g. Philip Glass) but what happened?  We gather here to discuss piano, but it's as if our love for music is ensconced in a time capsule and we're always looking back to an age where this music flourished.  Is there a reason?  Am I just unaware of masterpieces composed since the 1940s?  Perhaps American culture coming into its own in the 20th century eroded the desire for classical music, exporting rock to the world, and capturing the cultural demand for it.

I would love to see a resurgence of classical music.  I am interested in your thoughts.     

[pies]

Modern/contemporary classical has been as vibrant (if not more) as common practice classical music. 

[mcgillcomposer]

Modern/contemporary classical has been as vibrant (if not more) as common practice classical music. 

Perhaps, but in an ever shrinking sphere that is more and more exclusive to the musical 'elite'. I wonder how many everyday Joes have heard of even the best-known modern composers: Ligeti, Stockhausen, etc.

[indutrial]

I would love to see a resurgence of classical music.  I am interested in your thoughts.      

Classical music has indeed lost relevance to the broader public but it has easily been more productive in it's own realm during the twentieth century than it ever had been before. Saying that the output of compositions dried up in the early 1900s couldn't be more wrong. This forum is not a good gauge of 'classical music' as a whole because it's mostly comprised of badly-educated monochromatic pianist losers who don't know sh*t about modern music history and overinflate the importance of music written before 1900.

You shouldn't hold your breath waiting for the public to accept classical music again any longer than you should hold your breath waiting for the public to stop eating McDonalds or driving SUVs. Sad as it is to say, classical music is an elitist field and will only reach out to the public in base ways, like if Evanescence were to do a goth version of 'Ave Maria' or some sh*t.

[indutrial]

Perhaps, but in an ever shrinking sphere that is more and more exclusive to the musical 'elite'. I wonder how many everyday Joes have heard of even the best-known modern composers: Ligeti, Stockhausen, etc.

I've never been convinced of the idea that the arts are really that 'exclusive', since no heavy financial or social boundaries really prevent people from accessing media these days, especially since the internet arrived. I just think that rock and pop music are the musical analogues to consumerism and that mass appeal leads most people to perceive that as the only music that matters. Art has never been able to mean more to the public than entertainment. Whenever an artist manages to get through to the wider public, it usually involves a thorough compromise that totally diminishes the art by "selling out." Since a lot of the best classical composers of the 20th century stand out by being true to themselves and the musicians they write for, the best classical pieces go further and further underground.

The same thing has happened with every art form, especially literature. These days, Danielle Steele and Dean Koontz sell millions of books while superbly talented writers are stuck contributing to college journals that reach a much smaller audience. That's just our planet's way. It doesn't matter how lame everything is, as long as we can still buy it.

[daniloperusina]

Let's not think that Beethoven was ever pop music, or that he sold his music in quantities anywhere near that. With the advent of recordings there was suddenly a new way to make money on music. And when popmusic sold in the tens of millions it stole away all media attention, so people don't hear about what goes on in our little arty corner of the 'industry'. Before our modern consumer culture, it used to be the 'best' that captured attention, in the crafts and in the arts. Now you are judged by how much you sell. That's how good you are. But it's not all that black and white, and this quite popular site is one proof of that!

[bob3.1415926]

I think there will never be a resurgence in baroque/classical/romantic era music. The problem here is that creativity and originality go hand in hand.

Anyone who is a creative musical genius on a par with the greats, born today, will surely want to do something new and exciting. That's the problem with creativity, it won't be happy to rehash old work. Anyone who does write baroque/classical/romantic style music, will just be a not so good version of Bach/Mozart/Beethoven, etc. They're massive shadows to live in, and there's been hundreds of genius composers writing music in these eras. There isn't avenues left for a new composer to create a distinctive 'sound' without trying something new.

During the romantic era, there wasn't anyone writing great baroque music. I think people with the real talent will always try to be original, so music will continue to change.

[counterpoint]

What happened to classical music?

It is alive even after hundreds of years and people want to hear and perform it!

What will happen to the new music of our days?

I don't know.

[bob3.1415926]

Good point, although many of the great composers weren't recognised as such until years after their death, and had no public success in their own time. (Schubert is a great example)

Who can say who'll be remembered, and who won't? I'm not brave enough to hazard a guess.

[thalbergmad]

I wonder how many everyday Joes have heard of even the best-known modern composers: Ligeti, Stockhausen, etc.

Probably none, which would also equate to how many would listen to them again after an initial introduction.

[ahinton]

Probably none, which would also equate to how many would listen to them again after an initial introduction.

But how do you suppose that this might end up? and where do you suppose it may go? Into a situation that "classical music" will eventually be forgotten altogether or that it will increasingly have to come to be seen as museum-piece art because its representative composers's works get to be farther and farther away in time from the era of those still listening to their work? What do you think about that, then?

Best,

Alistair

[thalbergmad]

I have no idea how it will end up.

People are still listening to the music of Bach 300 years after it was written. I cannot imagine that the likes of Finissy will be.

Thal

[ahinton]

I have no idea how it will end up.

People are still listening to the music of Bach 300 years after it was written. I cannot imagine that the likes of Finissy will be.

Thal

What you imagine - like the way you don't spell Finnissy - is up to you, of course - and people do indeed listen to the music of God (sorry, Bach - another accidental mistyping of mine) three centuries after it was composed, but what I was seeking to ask you was how you'd feel if some cut-off point in the history of Western "classical music" were somehow to impose itself so that future generations could only listen to music from ever farther back in history. Can you imagine, for example, how people would connect to listening to the late works of Brahms as the last examples of Western "classical music", for example, at a point when those works will be, say, 600 years old?

Anyway, Finnissy is just one of tens of thousands of composers working today...

Best,

Alistair

[thalbergmad]

Anyway, Finnissy is just one of tens of thousands of composers working today...

I wish him a happy retirement.

Thal

[pies]

LOL, thal cracking jokes about Finnissy again, he's quite an internet comedian!! Funny guy!! 

[thalberg]

I don't know when it started, or when the process began, but sometime last century, the first third perhaps, the output of classical music compositions just died.  Classical music itself has evolved, of course, from Bach to Charles Ives, and I know there are *some* composers left (e.g. Philip Glass) but what happened?  We gather here to discuss piano, but it's as if our love for music is ensconced in a time capsule and we're always looking back to an age where this music flourished.  Is there a reason?  Am I just unaware of masterpieces composed since the 1940s?  Perhaps American culture coming into its own in the 20th century eroded the desire for classical music, exporting rock to the world, and capturing the cultural demand for it.

I would love to see a resurgence of classical music.  I am interested in your thoughts.     

Well, we're always separated from the great things going on in our own time.  Future generations will look back with awe on many of the things musicians are doing today.  Which musicians?  In which countries?  Only time will reveal that.

What would people have said during Mozart's time?  They may have wondered if there were any geniuses around......meanwhile, Mozart just couldn't seem to find a job.  It's the same way now--we just don't have a lot of perspective yet.

But you can rest assured a much greater quantity of music is being written now than back then, and there are many more styles. 

I think what would cheer you up is to  really investigate some of the many modern composers and find some that you like.  Where do you find them?  Universities.  There's even a section in the music history textbook entitled "The University as Patron" that talks about how Universities are now providing a living for composers now that the nobility is gone and the church no longer supports composers.

[ahinton]

I wish him a happy retirement.

Thal

Then I fear that your wish, however kind in intent, will not likely be granted, for he is an extremely prolific composer who, on the strength of the sheer amount of work he has already accomplished, look set to be writing much more music over the next however many years he has left (he is now aged 61); retirement therefore seems a most improbable option...

Best,

Alistair

[indutrial]

But you can rest assured a much greater quantity of music is being written now than back then, and there are many more styles. 

Indeed. Like Thalberg pointed out, most musicians out there receive roughly the same regard as Mozart did in his own time. Even Bach, though consistently employed, was probably not as widely known as we'd like to think. His renown probably developed a lot more momentum post facto.

In the past hundred years, there have definitely been quite a few classical-ish composers, guys who solidly follow the examples of composers from the 1700s-1800s, in terms of profundity and outlook. It's tough to see, because 1.) the music world is oversaturated; 2.) the public doesn't care so the money is always tight; 3.) music students on average do not care enough and are not taught to properly appreciate music and its history; and 4.) aesthetically, those who do care in the music world have become increasingly fragmented and bipartisan between avant-gardism and conservatism. Unfortunately, many musicians get lost in the mix of that critical onslaught and loads of great composers who published things less than 50 years ago have almost nothing in print.

I'm pretty convinced that the slow and tedious death of the publishing firms and the negligence of most copyright holders and libraries are only going to make this situation more grave. I've pontificated before about how some publishing firms are essentially holding music hostage for prices that even libraries can't justify. As an active student of 20th century music, I'll be the first to say that it's probably the most difficult and costly era of music to study and attain materials for.

The publishers' reaction to their own impending obsolescence puts the ball roughly into the court of anyone who can somehow wrest control over the copyrights. It's really a shame that more lesser-known composers don't have something like Alastair's Sorabji Archive. A lot of composers' manuscript collections are buried away in library off-site warehouses, growing mildew and detiorating while Cage's and Glass's overpriced scores are popping up all over the shelves and CDsheetmusic is tiredly revolutionizing ways in which to resell public domain pieces from 200 years ago.  I recently bitched out a music librarian for having two copies of Cage's 4'33 from CF Peters (which I'm sure cost more than $10 a piece) while there were zero copies of Bartok's 4th and 5th string quartets available.

[mcgillcomposer]

I recently bitched out a music librarian for having two copies of Cage's 4'33 from CF Peters (which I'm sure cost more than $10 a piece) while there were zero copies of Bartok's 4th and 5th string quartets available.

That is really sad, especially since Cage, in terms of sheer talent and craft, is not even comparable to Bartók.

[indutrial]

That is really sad, especially since Cage, in terms of sheer talent and craft, is not even comparable to Bartók.

It's not even a question of talent or craft, but a matter of ink vs. dollars. Cage's scores are printed on enormous paper (some pages of which house 2-3 notes total and lots of empty staves) and cost a f**king ton. All six string quartets of Bartok's under one cover is about $50. I'm sure they'll get even more affordable when Universal Edition gets their talons out of Bartok's corpse and Dover can reprint them. Cage's scores must be a cash cow for C.F. Peters. Glancing at their web store, they actually sell t-shirts of the 4'33 score.  If you ask me, that's one step further into pretension for psuedo-intellectual brats who've gotten tired of wearing their Che shirts at the coffee house.

Getting back to my point, nobody should buy that f**king score because you can pretty buy a package of 500 of them for $4 at any Staples store. Strangely enough, the pack of copying paper will likely yield more artistic value over time.

[ihatepop]

I would love to see a resurgence of classical music.  I am interested in your thoughts.      

The styles of music have changed. They have evolved, and quite drastically. No one imagined we would one day be listening to music created by electricity, and vulgar words included in lyrics of a song.

'Classical' Music (if thats how you define it) is unlikely to make a comeback. Not everybody cares anymore. Of course, there is the occasional 'Baroque' revival etc., but the impact caused by them are nonequivalent to new, 'hipper' songs that appear every single day.

It's sad to see the 'old oldies' slowly vanish.

ihatepop

[indutrial]

'Classical' Music (if thats how you define it) is unlikely to make a comeback. Not everybody cares anymore. Of course, there is the occasional 'Baroque' revival etc., but the impact caused by them are nonequivalent to new, 'hipper' songs that appear every single day.

Though they don't get much reputation in the recording world, there are composers like David Loeb (b. 1939) who takes a very classical approach to composing contemporary repertoire. Loeb's written hundreds of works for solo instruments and chamber settings. Like Hovhaness, Loeb draws heavily off folk musics from all over the world (including tons of material and methods from Asia). This is not to say that anything he's done evinces a throw-back to the harmonies and counterpoints of the 1700s, but the approach to composition is very similar to the instrumental output of guys like Bach.

There are plenty of great composers who you barely hear about who take a similarly industrious approach to their music, including composers like Leo Kraft, Michael Cunningham, Jan Van Dijk, Nancy Van de Vate. I feel like composers of this sort are an increasingly dying breed, but it's hard to tell because there aren't many publishing houses that make it easy to find out what the hell younger composers are even doing these days. From what I've seen, the composing world seems to be oversaturated with 20-30 year old "geniuses" out there who are overly drunk on avant-garde ideas and seem content to produce nothing but esoteric b.s. that few will ever hear.

[mcgillcomposer]

It's not even a question of talent or craft, but a matter of ink vs. dollars. Cage's scores are printed on enormous paper (some pages of which house 2-3 notes total and lots of empty staves) and cost a f**king ton. All six string quartets of Bartok's under one cover is about $50. I'm sure they'll get even more affordable when Universal Edition gets their talons out of Bartok's corpse and Dover can reprint them. Cage's scores must be a cash cow for C.F. Peters. Glancing at their web store, they actually sell t-shirts of the 4'33 score.  If you ask me, that's one step further into pretension for psuedo-intellectual brats who've gotten tired of wearing their Che shirts at the coffee house.

Getting back to my point, nobody should buy that f**king score because you can pretty buy a package of 500 of them for $4 at any Staples store. Strangely enough, the pack of copying paper will likely yield more artistic value over time.

Haha - I understand that your original point was a question of ink versus dollars. I was just adding that, as a composer, I can learn a lot more from a Bartók string quartet than pretty much anything Cage wrote. The only thing I like about him is his incredibly homosexual sounding voice; it amuses me.

[mcgillcomposer]

This is a sonata for clarinet and piano by Canadian composer Michel Edward. I think this may fall into the category of 'classical' music that the creater of this thread is after. The forms refer more to the Baroque, and the method of composition reflects a solidity of craft characteristic of the great composers of the European tradition.

http://dosblanc.ca/music/clarinet_sonata/clarinet_sonata_2.mp3

The outer movements are also available on his website @ http://dosblanc.ca/music

[soliloquy]

...and I know there are *some* composers left (e.g. Philip Glass) but what happened?  ... Am I just unaware of masterpieces composed since the 1940s?    

uhhhhhh

[mcgillcomposer]

uhhhhhh

oyyyyyy

[danny elfboy]

I don't know when it started, or when the process began, but sometime last century, the first third perhaps, the output of classical music compositions just died.  Classical music itself has evolved, of course, from Bach to Charles Ives, and I know there are *some* composers left (e.g. Philip Glass) but what happened?  We gather here to discuss piano, but it's as if our love for music is ensconced in a time capsule and we're always looking back to an age where this music flourished.  Is there a reason?  Am I just unaware of masterpieces composed since the 1940s?  Perhaps American culture coming into its own in the 20th century eroded the desire for classical music, exporting rock to the world, and capturing the cultural demand for it.

I would love to see a resurgence of classical music.  I am interested in your thoughts.      

First of all consider that the term "classical music" means nothing.
Music is music and the difference between the music created in a garage by a band and created in an accademy by a composer is just contextual.

So maybe you're talking about melodic music or instrumental melodic music or form-music (sonata, rondo, fantasia, concerto ...) or tone poem or symphonic incidental music.

That being said it's very flawed and simplistic to claim that people listen to varied genre of music because they're ignorant and stupid and that if they were smart they would listen accademic music. In fact it's very flawed to claim that accademic music is in any way a better or higher music.

No serious musicologist underestimates the huge important of popular music in the 900.
The evolution of our society and its political aspects is way more tied to popular music than to anything accademists have produced. There are big tomes in dozen of volumes just to analyze the importance of black music, of dancing music of the 40's, of country and the social ballads of the war time.

Another important aspect of music is that music has always and will always be an aggregative and social mean. Music exists as a way to tie people together and even for example the tradition of christian music is based on creating aggregation in like-minded religious people.

Add to that that music doesn't really evolve.
The difference in genres and styles is not like the difference between latin and italian, where italian is the evolution of an oudated latin, but more like the difference between animation and comics where the creation of animation stands on its own as "one of many" artistic means and not as an evolution of comics making them absolete and old.
The famous philosopher Carl Popper has written many treatises about the flaws in our understanding of time. What he stated is that in sociality and its products (like music, art, morality, laws, politics) there's no evolutionary straight line going from less evolved to more evolved but a circumstantial spectrum of contexts existing on their own and cycling.
That's is: history doesn't follow any kind of evolution.
In music this is even more straightforward since we're not dealing with standards changing and making old stardards absolete, but we're dealing with "tools" to communicate with this emotional and unintellectual mean called music.

So music doesn't proceed by stilistic novelty but by social contexts and individual creativity.
So you have a composer who has a predisposition for expressing emotions and ideas through the musical mean, which looks in this "box of tolls"and with those create what he/she feels creating which is clearly likely to be subconciously influenced by the social context in which he/she lives.

No honest composer composes with the goal of "creating new musical standards" or "advancing the theories of harmony". Those are nothing but collateral consequences which the compose himself/herself doesn't deal with and they're are not NECESSARY at all to create beautiful music that impact the lives of many people. No, a composer goal is to release his/her creative tension by "speaking through music".

So from this you can see that the kind of music you're talking about depends more on the social and cultural context and not on the theorical timeline. Because the truth is that the work of the theorist is not what makes music just like the knife is not what makes the dish.
Music resides somewhere else in the intention, spirit and emotive and creative core of the musician, the means of music (notes, parallel seventh, harmony, rests, poliphony, minimalism, chords, progressions, modulation ...) are nothing but cold impersonal timeless tools.

Talking about the social context you need to analyze the 900 well to understand what happened to music. Consider the depression years, where whatever person picking up veggies from an orchard had a task way more important that whatever accademist and when accademism was the prerogative of the wealthy, you can see how created a fracture between the ivory tower world of accademies and the real world of people.

Since the places of aggregation changed (from the theater, halls, cameras to the squares, fairs, dancing hall and political stands) the music that could be performed in those setting changed too. The living conditions changed and people were less likely to live in houses with pianos. The renting and flats economy changed more portable instruments became the norm for the cultural music of the 50's. Then came the black music, a strong life affirming music created by a group of discriminated people who nonetheless used music as a way to transmit hope rather than a way to ruminate about the negative aspect of the world.
People also were slowly breaking free from a tradition of norms and etiquettes whose only meaning was creating power division and were trying to get in touch again with a more instinctive side of their being. So all the dancing, rioting and simple music found a very good fertile terrain for this.

There's way more to this but you have to realize that not much changed.
Music (and popular music too) has been dealing with the social and cultural context in the same way that Debussy or Beethoven did. Many composers would be dealing with popular music if they were alive, because they knew that what matters is what YOU have to say, not what way you use to say it. Those composers chose the way according to the context they lived in, often looking for the most prolific one which is what they would nowadays.

Think about the difference between living in a world without radios versus a world with radios, think about the difference between living in a world where the social struggles between the very rich that can listen to music and the very poor who hardly have enough bread to keep their children alive versus a world were even the lower classes can afford lps, cds, tapes, think about the difference between a living in a world were citizens still lack the right to influence the politics versus a world were politicians are like social workers hired by every citizens, think about the difference between a world were not many can afford the teather versus a world were tickects for concerts are affordable, think about the difference between a world which has been free from the huge social rioting of black people emancipation, women emancipation, students emancipation, anti-war rebellion and a world after all of this has happed, this about the difference between a world where music can'tbe easily recorded and distributed versus a world where everyone can listen to the same piece over and over, think about a world where the teather is the most comfortable way to play live music and where outdoor performance were rare and and hard to organize versus a word were the portability of music has increased massively ...

... and so on. We have also to realize that many things we have been doing in classical time doesn't depend on will but on necessity. For example certain writing forms were created to accomodate the lack of mass printing of nowadays. If Mozart were alive nowadays he would have used radios, midi, synths, music-notation software, concerts and what not.

The bottom line is that we're accumulated tools that we can use to better express through music what we feel and have to say. We have also developed means of distribution that allows someone in Finland to easily get the CDs of a small group of local singers of Tanzania.

Now it's just time to stop focusing on form, theory, harmony, musical evolution that doesn't exist by its very nature and just make music in the most total freedom we have ever had knowing that it's easy nowadays to reach the people that would appreciate what we have the say with our music and that all music with an honest creative intention behind it needs to be respected and that there's no objective criteria for what is better or worse for what is more worthy to be listened and what not. We need way less pretentious accademism and technicalism nowadays (a moment in time in which we're turning into predictable robots and alienating ourselves from other people and genuine humna contacts) and way more genuine human humble creative crafts which can genuinely make people laugh, cry, think and doubt ... even if just for a night.

[webern78]

The same thing that happened to western civilization has a whole: decadence.

This is the future of classical music:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byGI1mDi3no

Just get used to it (or kill yourself, works the same). 

[lostinidlewonder]

Also note that Classical music is really only a small period of the worlds musical history. I would feel bad if it lasted forever, music has to progress and change.

[indutrial]

In response to your painfully long speeches, I would rather listen to people talk about theory, harmony, counterpoint, or anything academic rather than read any more pages of your sulky, overdramatic dollops of anti-intellectual pap. If every musician adopted your point of view, very little would be interesting about music. There's always a push and pull between the intellectual side of music and the natural and inexplicable side you call freedom.

I understand the value of total freedom, but there are always limits. I've met free-improv musicians who rely way too heavily on following their feelings and after a while it seems like a bit of a self-indulgent cop-out. The best example I can think of is John Zorn, whose saxophone improvs are very hit or miss. Sometimes, I feel like he's just treading water by repeatedly assailing the listener with the squawks and squeaks. In a way, the total subtraction of intellecuality can turn into a worse form of cerebral limitation.

Besides, a lot of the anti-intellectual pissers and moaners I've dealt with are bitter musicians who can't live with the fact that they can't immediately understand everything they encounter. I've worked with assholes who decide that it's easier to hate on composers like Wuorinen, Carter or Finnissy because their pieces can't be studied or listened to with the same ease (and comfort level) as a Bach prelude or a jazz standard. I'm not accusing you or anyone here of that, but I will say that it's starting to reek heavily of the same b.s. around here.

[dnephi]

Re: Whatever Happened to Classical Music?