Xenakis Piano Concerto "Synaphai"

[Derek]

I'm going to go listen to some real music now.

I hope you're all as "open minded" as you say you are, and listen to this excellent song by Manowar.

[jre58591]

i respect your decision to like the music you like, now do the same for us that like xenakis's music and dont diss it. or else get off this thread and dont say anything.

[maxreger]

I imagined Derek's next post would be a disarming type post,  or semi joke.

Right on cue, Metal is fun, I like alot of it as well, I love alot of music, but not nearly as much as modern classical music. That is what I really think speaks to me the most, I just find it funny that a guy like Derek has to try to make everyone feel like his opinion on Xenakis (and its clearly extremely limited at that, the opinion that is.) is the only way to hear and "feel" the music.

Its just about perspective, its like looking at Jackson Pollock and looking for a Monet, its not going to be there, you have to look at a work or hear a work, from the right angle. Its almost a form of mis communication, like hearing someone speaking to you in a language you dont know, and cursing at them for not making sense.

The more you come to try to understand their language, the more you will come to see and hear what they have to say, once that opens up, the music becomes very clear. (by this I dont mean theory btw, though you could study it from that angle as well.)

There is alot of emotion in Synaphai, they are just not emotions you can label as "sad, or happy"... maybe thats why I think alot of this music, and the whole 20th century in general is better at expressing human emotion. Its not "nice" music, its powerful for the ability it has to convey to you moments in your life when things were not always "nice". Whichever emotion that may be, as it will not be the same for everyone.

Im just trying to say, that yes, there is a deep emotional connection with this music, not just "brain" and "music nerd" connection. But deep rooted, emotional connection, to what Xenakis, and the second half of the 20th century have to say (at least this connection exists for me).

[danny elfboy]

But deep rooted, emotional connection, to what Xenakis, and the second half of the 20th century have to say (at least this connection exists for me).

You seem to imply that the second half of the 20th century music is all expressed in nex complex, avant-garde, post-modern, aleatory and experimental style.
This again proves my point about an orthodoxy since there tons of composers that have been written emotional powerful and worth works in the second half of the 20th century not in those style. When you associate a chronological period with an amount of limited styles rather than whatever work has been written in that year no matter the style ... it says a lot.

[maxreger]

You missed my point, I said the second half of the 20th century, which implies all music I like in that period of time (after world war II).

Though, I do personally actually find that the effects of world war II ARE best expressed inside the music of alot of the Polish and Eastern European Avant garde. (which would make sense)...

I (again IMO), dont like to much "retro" music that has come out in the past 60-75 years... meaning, "neo" tendencies (funny, as Penderecki is still my favorite composer, I tend to like his earlier period works and transition period works alot more than his true neo romantic works.)

In the end, again, this is all technical talk for something much simpler, Ligeti and Penderecki (up to about the 1st violin concerto- which I still love alot actually) are the two composers I "feel" the most listening too. I dont concern myself so much with "why" or "how" it happens in regards to my experience as a listener (I am a composer, and so I do concern myself with that as a composer.)

But, alot of the times, I can separate those two events (being a composer, and just being a listener.)

[danny elfboy]

There's nothing retro.
Styles are just means of expression and the more style we have at our disposal the better.
Chronologically any ideology is already old in the moment it comes out and everything which is being composed right now is all chronologically old.
But this doesn't mean anything since we're the products of the past and we can't exist without influences, derivations and in a sort of time amnesia.
In fact even the composers who naively believe to be able to be innovative (meaning breaking with the past) are just people who don't maintain this coherency in everything else concerning their life since they wealth they seek, the stability and contentness they seek, the moral beliefs they hold, the means they use, the socialization skills, the conventional behaviors they have ... are all products of the past.
The most hypocritical thing about the belief that there's a neat boundary between past and future is that one is able to delude himself with this only as long as such belief is decontextualized but it's an ideology that shows all of its hypocritical ideological weakness and lack of coherence once it is faced with real life.

The kind of music you're talking about can't be identified as "music from the last half of the 20th century" since there have been still a lot of worth music in this 60 years that doesn't comply with the avant-garde, aleatory and experimental style and uses other means to express itself.

[maxreger]

I understand your point, though I think you dont quite see it as I see it, granted... its not a worth while argument to have on here, it will be too long and too complex, and in the end its just about how you see something in comparison to how I see it.

I didnt mean though, one should reject the past, I feel the past, like you say, as Im sure everyone does, and it does influence everything I "we" do.

[maxreger]

*also, i said music from the past 60 years, because thats when it was composed, lol.*

In the last 60 years.

[Derek]

I just don't believe that musical subjectivity can really be taken as far as many of you do. It seems to me you're so obsessed with subjectivity that it is DUE to that internal obsession that you deceive yourself into liking something as horrifying as Xenakis.  I do believe that musical enjoyment is subjective to a huge degree...but COME ON. This is like the din of Hell or something like that. And it definitely sounds like flatulence.

[maxreger]

-im glad you feel that way derek, thanks for dropping on by.

Just stick to Liszt, Bach and Man o War, and be happy. No one is forcing you to listen to Xenakis or anything else I would hope.

I for one, love Bach and Liszt as well. Just, Bach and Liszt dont manage to say "everything" I would like a composer to say to me (neither does Xenakis, or anyone for that matter, thats why I listen to certain works at certain times in my life.)

Anyway, this thread is pretty pointless now, I will just leave it, hope you guys all enjoy whatever music it is you do enjoy. I will gladly go on enjoying alot of these post world war II works as well.

[Derek]

I thought I was broadminded to enjoy nearly every genre of music and every era of classical music except "chance music" and I suppose "stochastic music", but apparently there are some who enjoy EVEN THOSE. That just amazes me! I still don't believe it. I can only attribute it to self-deception, but of course I'll never be able to determine if that is the case.

[maxreger]

Yes, we are all just liars, I in fact hate Synaphai, and only pretend to like it, for the great emotional enjoyment of seeing people piss on Xenakis's hard work and dedication... having people tell you what you like is "sh*t", "crap", and "worthless" is what makes my day a little better, and so, pretending to like Xenakis serves a great purpose for me; a form of positive therapy if you will.

*sarcasm off*

[Derek]

But why else would someone tell themselves that they like this music, other than to feel vastly superior to all the "normal" people out there who would be horrified by it and think that the gates of Hell had opened?

[maxreger]

*this isnt the case of xenakis per say*

But, consider that, when half the people you knew get blown away during world war II, and exterminated... "the gates of hell" might be exactly the very thing you want to express.

It seems to me, that for you, music is about enjoyment (as in just, "for fun"), and not "artistic", as in for "expression". Trying to see what these people have to tell us about "their" time frame and state of mind is what makes their music so special to me.

What we experience changes our music, just as what a painter sees in his life changes his art work. I enjoy their music, because alot of times what they are saying "to me", is what I feel about the world around me (my present view on life).

[ahinton]

But why else would someone tell themselves that they like this music, other than to feel vastly superior to all the "normal" people out there who would be horrified by it and think that the gates of Hell had opened?

There are those who do that, I guess, but most people who tell you that they enjoy listening to something or are excited, moved or whatever by it do so simply because they are.

Best,

Alistair

[Derek]

*this isnt the case of xenakis per say*

But, consider that, when half the people you knew get blown away during world war II, and exterminated... "the gates of hell" might be exactly the very thing you want to express.

Okay, I buy that. So am I to assume everyone who likes Xenakis once had twice as many friends?

[maxreger]

-again, you are limiting yourself to specifics, if it was "that precise" then no one would like any art at all. Especially music.

Liszt once said (paraphrase), "the worst artist in the world can draw better tree's then us..."

The point being, feeling depressed, or anxious, or sad, or devastated is as much part of life as feeling "happy", or "joyfull". In art, those sides human emotion should IMO, be represented as well.

I did lose alot of family (that I never met, as I was not born, in WWII), that isnt to say that when I listen to music from the 1950's-1960's that is specific to "those" events, that its the only thing I reflect off of it onto my own persona.

But, the fact that their is a reflection, is what you have to realize, to the listener, maybe you cannot reflect anything off of it, other then chaos, or noise. But, in that organization of chaotic events is where I personally feel most comfortable in.

Im again, lumping in a bunch of works from post WWII, talking superficially about the whole thing, but, trying to show you where the emotional connection can happen and does happen, for myself. 

[maxreger]

*hope my last post isnt too confusing,

the Liszt quote is in relation to trying to portray specific events, in music.

Where as, the rest is in relations to emotions in music.

[m]

I just felt everyone should hear this piece

Thanks for posting it. Who are performers?

On the other note, any chance for Penderecky Piano Concerto recording?

[jre58591]

Thanks for posting it. Who are performers?

On the other note, any chance for Penderecky Piano Concerto recording?

the pianist for synaphai is hiroaki ooï and the conductor is arturo tamayo. and yes, i have the penderecki piano concerto with barry douglas.

[_dhj_]

I don't doubt that there is always a dominant paradigm at any given point in time in history. That paradigm is a reflection of the zeitgeist and a reaction to the previous dominant paradigm. Ironically, once an individual identifies a paradigm as a paradigm, it is no longer dominant and instead becomes a part of history for that individual. In any society (in the specific sense), the paradigm is no longer dominant when most of that society, or the dominant forces of that society, identifies it as a paradigm.

The funny thing about art is that, despite being supposedly an avenue of individual expression, prominent artists will use the dominant paradigm as a frame of reference, either by embracing it in their works or by rejecting it. To take a superficial example outside of art, hipsters will dress in accordance with the trend that is "in", but at the same time there is probably a reactionary trend that rejects the dominant trend. This behavious is no product of a conspiracy, although at times it may appear to be, but rather a product of human nature.

I can think of a few examples of trends but I won't bore you with a list. The important thing is that the so-called "avant-garde" style of music is no exception. Post-modernism, in general is merely a period of dominant discourse, just as Modernism and Romanticism were before it. It is a trend in artistic circles, just as "indie" is a trend in popular culture.

[dialhead]

The tyranny of academic music began when it was discovered some systems of composition could be used to subvert younger composers into writing trash. This of course only heps the professorial losers whose musical talent remains in question (ala Boulez). Some folks do indeed prefer what is weird and freakish, and others have no bent for things poetic whatsoever. Still others see no meaning in anything musical, just their own sad-sack narcissism to the exclusion of the heart and feelings of others. Truly great music touches not only the child, but the plumber, the housewife and other vox populi. So long as the academics make good money spewing their inhuman and ridiculous aesthetic, there is scant reason they will ever chenge. Take away their incomes on the basis of their lack of real talent, and they will quickly and cowardly sing a different tune!

[mephisto]

Truly great music touches not only the child, but the plumber, the housewife and other vox populi.

No.

[m]

the pianist for synaphai is hiroaki ooï and the conductor is arturo tamayo. and yes, i have the penderecki piano concerto with barry douglas.

Thanks. Any chance to hear the Penderecky?

[jre58591]

sure ill upload the penderecki. im not sure if im allowed to psot it here, seeing that he is still alive and all...

[maxreger]

-that I know, the concerto was never commercially released, I have the promo version sent to me by the Penderecki camp. Im not sure if it was ever meant for sale (the recording I have)... I think its Ian Pace playing. Have you found a commercial release of it?

[jre58591]

mine is a non-commercial recording of barry douglas playing it in munich in 2005.

[maxreger]

-now that you mention it, I think mine is the same, I was sent it, and its not labelled

I dont know why I came up with Ian Pace's name, I thought he had played it, but now I cannot confirm that.

[m]

Babayan also played Penderecky. The performances were with Gergiev. One can only imagine the level of musicianship there, but no any recordings.

If there is a problem with posting it here, could you PM?

Would greatly appreciate.

Best regards, M

[jre58591]

ill pm you douglas's recording. just send me a pm to remind me.

[pies]

a

[retrouvailles]

There is no point in continuing this argument. People (I won't mention names, but you know who you are) will continue to be close minded idiots and there is nothing I or anyone else can do about it.

[Derek]

Why don't we continue it? Debating is fun. Anyway, here's what I think:

I'm a composer myself, after a fashion. And after long alternating cycles of intense conservatism and tonality and intense modernity and crazy atonality in my own music, I have found, in my own experience, that writing music like Xenakis is remarkably easy compared to writing a simple, beautiful, evocative melody in major key (or any key, or in a combination of keys, or anything else).    I suppose, if one came up with a complicated enough system of rules or other unnecessary method for composing Xenakis style music, one could make it hard for oneself and declare that it is a craft as deserving of merit as intuitively writing a beautiful melody. But, creating that unnecessary method, then, is artificial. Nobody created the 7 tone scale...it is just there, in nature. Making a melody from it is not, and has never been artificial.  That's why I am suspicious of those who say they truly enjoy Xenakis...music like this has been artificially created by those who for whatever reason, have abandoned musical simplicity in favor of intellectualism and feeling superior to others.  That's my opinion in a nutshell. 

[viking]

Try smoking a fat joint before listening to Xenakis.  Then you'll like it...

Sam

[retrouvailles]

I'm a composer myself, after a fashion. And after long alternating cycles of intense conservatism and tonality and intense modernity and crazy atonality in my own music, I have found, in my own experience, that writing music like Xenakis is remarkably easy compared to writing a simple, beautiful, evocative melody in major key (or any key, or in a combination of keys, or anything else).    I suppose, if one came up with a complicated enough system of rules or other unnecessary method for composing Xenakis style music, one could make it hard for oneself and declare that it is a craft as deserving of merit as intuitively writing a beautiful melody. But, creating that unnecessary method, then, is artificial. Nobody created the 7 tone scale...it is just there, in nature. Making a melody from it is not, and has never been artificial.  That's why I am suspicious of those who say they truly enjoy Xenakis...music like this has been artificially created by those who for whatever reason, have abandoned musical simplicity in favor of intellectualism and feeling superior to others.  That's my opinion in a nutshell.

How much training do you have as a composer? I am curious to know.

[mephisto]

Nobody created the 7 tone scale...it is just there, in nature. Making a melody from it is not, and has never been artificial.  That's

Are you sure about that? This is not an attack, but a question.

[ahinton]

I'm a composer myself, after a fashion.

Yet you seem to go on to suggest that fads and fashions in music are not a good thing and they're followed by certain kinds of composer whose music you don't much care for.

And after long alternating cycles of intense conservatism and tonality and intense modernity and crazy atonality in my own music, I have found, in my own experience, that writing music like Xenakis is remarkably easy compared to writing a simple, beautiful, evocative melody in major key (or any key, or in a combination of keys, or anything else).

OK, so you've had the good sense and courage to spend time trying to find yourself rather than just taking anything for granted, which iin itself is admirable, but whilst what you say about tonal melody writing is undoubtedly true (but then it's partly so because so much of it's been done already and the more that's done the harder it then gets to do something that's not been done before), how do you conclude in all conscience that "writing music like Xenakis is remarkably easy"? Have you done it - and as well as Xenakis himself did it? I rather doubt it, othewise you'd realise that it, too, is difficult and challenging.

I suppose, if one came up with a complicated enough system of rules or other unnecessary method for composing Xenakis style music, one could make it hard for oneself and declare that it is a craft as deserving of merit as intuitively writing a beautiful melody. But, creating that unnecessary method, then, is artificial.

But have you not given thought to doing the same where tonal melody writing is concerned? Have you, for example, examined the drafts for some of Chopin's works, for example, which show that, for all their apparent spontaneity, many pages of sketches, drafts, amendments et al were gone through before the finished article wa produced?

In any case, melody, for all its undeniable importance, does not have to be tonal and is not the be all and end all in composition whether or not one writes tonally. Consider how the sweeping melodic lines that characterise the first three piano concerts, the second symphony and many of the songs of Rakhmaninov give way in his later works to a much more generalised mature Rakhmaninovian manner - which is not to say that he turned his back on melody but that his priorities changed - you need only to examine some of the Études-Tableaux to note the beginnings of this change of emphasis and those all-too-few works written while in exile demonstrate its fruition, yet are these works inferior? Not a bit of it.

Neither Xenakis nor Carter followed the dominant diktats of Darmstadt in the postwar years; Carter spent many years finding his way and, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, his methods got so complex that a 20 minute piece might involve several years' work and thousands of pages of draft - but this was how he achived the fluency he wanted (he doesn't work like that any more and he's now producing far more music than he used to do, even now - he'll be 99 on Tuesday). In his early days, Carter wrote tonal music, too - look at the first symphony, Holiday Overture and piano sonata. Then tell us that writing music like Carter has done is "easy"!

I am suspicious of those who say they truly enjoy Xenakis...music like this has been artificially created by those who for whatever reason, have abandoned musical simplicity in favor of intellectualism and feeling superior to others.  That's my opinion in a nutshell. 

Leave the nut inside it, then. Are you really telling us that there is no intellectual thrust behind the great works of Bach, Beethoven, Chopin and Brahms? And are you suggesting that The Art of Fugue, the C# minor Quartet, the Fourth Ballade and the C major piano trio embrace "simplicity"? - for if you do, you intellectual capacity must be far greater than mine!

Best,

Alistair

[indutrial]

Nobody created the 7 tone scale...it is just there, in nature. Making a melody from it is not, and has never been artificial.

Um, no.... The seven-tone scale is not all-encompassing. Some parts of the world based their "natural" folk musics on smaller and larger scale systems. As long as objects that exist at all can channel vibrations, the numbers of "natural" pitches are limitless. An out of tune sounding microtone sounds just as extant as a universally-accepted in-tune note. Don't let the fact that you happen to take a personal likeness to the major scale give you the overassuming idea that nature is on your side and that people who dare to add notes are compromising humankind's natural dignity. If anything, saying that the septatonic scale is IT does just that. If that's the pinnacle of human nature in music, than the birds and insects in the world are more musically advanced than we are! When composers first started using polytonality and incorporating accidentals, they were attempting to get closer to emulating folk idioms. When an improvising jazz player like Evan Parker spends days examining the microtonal singing style of wild birds, he is weighing his limitations as a restrained human against the entropic sound-world of a natural world we may have not yet equated. I'm pretty confident in my own idea that Do-Re-Mi-etc.. is but a stepping stone.

Let's be real. The whole "natural" idea that certain melodies are societally ingrained is an idyllic crock of sh*t that unadventurous and overly comfortable musicians need to shove back up their asses from whence it was drawn. Just because we don't know who wrote "Red River Valley" (maybe we do, but let's make believe we don't) doesn't mean that was never composed and that it spontaneously generated from some populist primordial ooze. It was composed by some yokel 100s of years ago and a lot of people liked it, so it's popular now.

Now...Xenakis is doing the same thing as that anonymous yokel did except he's doing it in terms of the time period he lives in, i.e. he's putting notes together according to whatever his own instincts are and with the tools at his disposal. AND he remembered to write his name on the first page! Just because the music doesn't make you want to make you run to grab your harmonica or use it as a cell-phone ring doesn't make it any less valid. To lambast a composer for using intellectual methodology to compose is a ludicrous platform to stand on. Since the glory days of anonymous folk tunes, Dionysian chants, and sacrificing virgins because everyone was f**king too stupid to do anything better with their time, the human world has made considerable progress in delineating the realm of the individual. To knock someone for making music in that context no matter what the result is anachronistic and backwards. A person exists inside of their own head. Any social existence that is perceived (norms, ideals, standards, anxiety-driven morals) don't hold a candle to whatever that individual's standards dictate. Xenakis did what Xenakis wanted to do. If you want to clip his wings and demean his legacy by making it some immaterial matter of right-and-wrong or black-and-white, is anything really being accomplished?

[ahinton]

Um, no.... The seven-tone scale is not all-encompassing. Some parts of the world based their "natural" folk musics on smaller and larger scale systems. As long as objects that exist at all can channel vibrations, the numbers of "natural" pitches are limitless. An out of tune sounding microtone sounds just as extant as a universally-accepted in-tune note. Don't let the fact that you happen to take a personal likeness to the major scale give you the overassuming idea that nature is on your side and that people who dare to add notes are compromising humankind's natural dignity. If anything, saying that the septatonic scale is IT does just that. If that's the pinnacle of human nature in music, than the birds and insects in the world are more musically advanced than we are! When composers first started using polytonality and incorporating accidentals, they were attempting to get closer to emulating folk idioms. When an improvising jazz player like Evan Parker spends days examining the microtonal singing style of wild birds, he is weighing his limitations as a restrained human against the entropic sound-world of a natural world we may have not yet equated. I'm pretty confident in my own idea that Do-Re-Mi-etc.. is but a stepping stone.

This is absolutely correct. If one is going to talk about "naturalness" in terms of intonation, one would be better off citing the harmonic series of which, of course, none of the upper partials coincide precisely with the equal temperament system to which we have been accustomed over the past 300 years or so in which the octave is divided into 12 equal intervals. Whilst it was obviously necessary to "bend" some of these in order to force them into a harmonic language built upon some of them, this is just what Skryabin did in his later works, his so-called "mystic chord" being a six-note formulation from them.

Let's be real. The whole "natural" idea that certain melodies are societally ingrained is an idyllic crock of sh*t that unadventurous and overly comfortable musicians need to shove back up their asses from whence it was drawn.

Let's indeed be "real", but let's not be gratuitously abrasive at the same time, otherwise Derek and others of like mind will be less likely to learn anything from what you are saying here. Of course nothing has ever really been "ingrained" in that way at any time other than artificially at the hands of people who are indeed unadventurous and accordingly complacent and who wish somehow to preserve certain aspects of musical methodology and language in aspic without apparently either realising or caring that this is not what Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, Brahms et al ever did.

Just because we don't know who wrote "Red River Valley" (maybe we do, but let's make believe we don't) doesn't mean that was never composed and that it spontaneously generated from some populist primordial ooze. It was composed by some yokel 100s of years ago and a lot of people liked it, so it's popular now.

Now...Xenakis is doing the same thing as that anonymous yokel did except he's doing it in terms of the time period he lives in, i.e. he's putting notes together according to whatever his own instincts are and with the tools at his disposal. AND he remembered to write his name on the first page! Just because the music doesn't make you want to make you run to grab your harmonica or use it as a cell-phone ring doesn't make it any less valid.

This is very true. The yokel of yesteryear would not have given much, if any, thought to the place of his invention in any kind of tradition to be passed on from generation to generation, still less preserved by being written down with the opportunity that comes with such written recording to identify the originator on the script; he/she would instead have been concerned primarily with the immediacy of his/her expression. It is also worth remembering that the tools at the disposal of such composers as Liszt, Bartók, Kodály and Ligeti included folk music but their use of it - or rather response to it, since the results were often suggestive rather than literal - was part of a process of expanding the expressive capacity of music and relating the past the the present and future (although there have also been plenty of other ways of doing that, of course).

To lambast a composer for using intellectual methodology to compose is a ludicrous platform to stand on. Since the glory days of anonymous folk tunes, Dionysian chants, and sacrificing virgins because everyone was f**king too stupid to do anything better with their time, the human world has made considerable progress in delineating the realm of the individual. To knock someone for making music in that context no matter what the result is anachronistic and backwards. A person exists inside of their own head. Any social existence that is perceived (norms, ideals, standards, anxiety-driven morals) don't hold a candle to whatever that individual's standards dictate. Xenakis did what Xenakis wanted to do. If you want to clip his wings and demean his legacy by making it some immaterial matter of right-and-wrong or black-and-white, is anything really being accomplished?

Again, no need for the abrasion but otherwise all very pertinent points. It can work both ways, too, though. In the UK, towards the end of the 1960s there developed a régime at BBC under the aegis of Sir William Glock that did a very necessary thing in fervently promoting many of the latest developments in music in the remainder of Europe in a dyed-in-the-wool Britain largely ignorant of much of it, yet the downside of this was that certain English composers got sidelined for some time, with the result that certain ways of expression were being almost overturned and replaced by quite different ones instead of being added to; that was, in one sense, a kind of "clipping of wings", too. Things have moved on a lot since then.

Perhaps of all composers, Xenakis appears to have responded more to his own demands and questionings than to anything in his musical past (Webern, Boulez, Stockhausen and Nono, for example, reflected their roots and heritages far more clearly from time to time) but, if that was what made Xenakis what he was, then that was as it should have been.

Now, Derek, I know nothing of your music and you may perhaps know nothing of mine, but never mind that for now - what say you to all of this?

Best,

Alistair

[pies]

a

[ahinton]

What is this argument about?

I would have thought it reasonably obvious that the crux of "this argument" (though there are details to it as well) is "about" on the one hand someone who claims that writing like Xenakis is quite easy to do and ignores some of the immutable fundaments of human music-making and on the other hand those who find such claims to be quite hopelessly hollow and wrong-headed as well as a gross insult to the integrity of the composer whose work is the subject of this thread.

Is it clear now?

Best,

Alistair

[indutrial]

Perhaps of all composers, Xenakis appears to have responded more to his own demands and questionings than to anything in his musical past (Webern, Boulez, Stockhausen and Nono, for example, reflected their roots and heritages far more clearly from time to time) but, if that was what made Xenakis what he was, then that was as it should have been.

Leave it to Alastair to do a better job of summing up my argumentative thrust better than I can on my own! I certainly admit guilt of striking a very bitter and confrontational tone when I get fired up about something. I just think it's ludicrous that certain modern musics have to be viewed as "suspect" just because certain listeners are not comfortable with the level of engagement required from either the composer or the listener. Whether some people want to see it or not, intelligence is a component of human nature, and the ability to direct one's thoughts and focus one's ideas and perceptions should not make us run screaming towards the escape hatches of ignorant bliss and unattainable ideals like child-like genius and innocence. As long as humans have the ability to think, they should never bother nurturing guilt feelings towards that ability. It creates stress and confusion, which likely will just spider-web into more rigid sentiments towards the outside world ("This Xenakis piece is suspect" evantually becomes "I don't know why but I hate Xenakis' works").

It comes down to people needing to learn how to filter out morals, ethics, tastes and expectations from their engagement with an artistic phenomenon.

[counterpoint]

Why don't we continue it? Debating is fun. Anyway, here's what I think:

 I have found, in my own experience, that writing music like Xenakis is remarkably easy compared to writing a simple, beautiful, evocative melody in major key (or any key, or in a combination of keys, or anything else). 

But is it really of importance, if composing is easy or tricky, or hard?

From my view, the really important thing is, whether a piece of music is convincing or not. I know many "tonal" pieces that are not convincing and I know some completely "atonal" pieces that are very convincing to me.

If a piece was easy to compose and it is convincing, that's absolute fine for me.

I can't say much about Xenakis' music, because I don't know much of it. From what I know, it sounds really interesting, but if you look at the score, there is not much logic in it. Perhaps there is logic in it, but it is not the same as what you hear. So one could say, the interesting sound of Xenakis' music is a product of a misunderstanding.

WYSINWYG music.

[mephisto]

I am going to steal Alistair possible post:

There is utter logic in Xenakis music.

[ahinton]

Leave it to Alastair to do a better job of summing up my argumentative thrust better than I can on my own!

Thank you for the compliment, but I'm not sure that I have really achieved what you say I have here!

I certainly admit guilt of striking a very bitter and confrontational tone when I get fired up about something.

OK, I'm sure we can all accept and understand that!

I just think it's ludicrous that certain modern musics have to be viewed as "suspect" just because certain listeners are not comfortable with the level of engagement required from either the composer or the listener. Whether some people want to see it or not, intelligence is a component of human nature, and the ability to direct one's thoughts and focus one's ideas and perceptions should not make us run screaming towards the escape hatches of ignorant bliss and unattainable ideals like child-like genius and innocence.

I would think it sad, if not actually ludicrous, if people view certain musics as "suspect" purely for the reason that you describe here, but that should have to include music from all periods and nations - not just "certain modern musics" - for, when it comes down to the nitty gritty of it all, we would have to accept that the "problem" here is simply the music - any music - that is unfamiliar to the listener and accordingly challenges certain people's preconceptions of what great music should be.

As long as humans have the ability to think, they should never bother nurturing guilt feelings towards that ability. It creates stress and confusion, which likely will just spider-web into more rigid sentiments towards the outside world ("This Xenakis piece is suspect" evantually becomes "I don't know why but I hate Xenakis' works").

Agreed entirely! The point is not, in any case, whether this or that Xenakis work appeals or doesn't appeal; I do not pretend to find very many of his works especially appeal to me, as it happens, but that fact in no wise compromises either my respect and admiration for him or his integrity as a creative musician, for he was undoubtedly one of the past century's most original and questing musical minds. And he loved listening to the late works of Brahms! The question of what some people believe may be "suspect" needs to be exposed for what it truly is; if one has insufficient ability to examine, analyse and conclude on something, whether or not it be a piece of music, one should take care in making bald comments about the "suspect" nature of what one has observed. That is quite a different matter to that of whether certain music attracts or repels certain individual listeners.

Another issue here is that of music that provides "enjoyment", as though "enjoyment" is all - or the best - that music is supposed to provide to the listener prepared to engage with it. What rubbish! "Enjoyment" suggests what we might call "entertainment" in the sense in which it is used nowadays. I am more interested in music that engages all of the emotional and intellectual faculties of the listener than whether or not it provides mere "enjoyment". Now if that sounds arrogant and "composerly", can I please ask any doubters if they really find parts of the St. Matthew Passion, the C# minor Quartet, the sixth symphony of Mahler or the ninth symphony of Pettersson "enjoyable"? I don't! Do these works engage the emotional responses to the uttermost? Well, not everyone's, of course, but they are at least capable of doing so and they indeed do so for some people, most certainly including the present writer.

It comes down to people needing to learn how to filter out morals, ethics, tastes and expectations from their engagement with an artistic phenomenon.

Well, I don't think that this is quite right, actually, but you're nevertheless onto what is right here, I think - which is that people need not necessarily "filter out" these things but put them into the most appropriate perspective and recognise that their perspectives in such issues might be fundamentally challenged by certain music yet, if that music is of sufficient emotional and intellectual power, then the best thing to do is go with the flow and hope to become a more rounded person with a greater capacity for emotional and intellectual receptivity as a consequence of those listening experiences! My earlier remarks about how the Glock era in UK tended for a time to suppress certain music in favour of certain other music is a case in point; what none of us needs is anything that doesn't expand our horizons. We don't have to accept, admire or warm to just everything because it's new and perceived to be important; our personal judgemental faculties have to be expanded just as much as our emotional and intellectual receptors have to be expanded by what we absorb, but they won't be unless we DO absorb, with as much intelligence as we can muster, every time we listen to any music.

Best,

Alistair

[ahinton]

Derek - we are all still waiting for your response...

Best,

Alistair

[retrouvailles]

I think he realizes the stupidity of his statements and no longer wishes to make a fool of himself, which is a smart decision if you ask me.

[counterpoint]

I think he realizes the stupidity of his statements and no longer wishes to make a fool of himself,

If that would be case, he would be smarter than you 

[ahinton]

I think he realizes the stupidity of his statements and no longer wishes to make a fool of himself, which is a smart decision if you ask me.

I'm not asking you, as it happens, but you could well be right; that said, let Derek speak for himself and let's neither of us try to anticipate what he might say. It would be a "smart decision" for him to say exactly what he thinks, but only in terms of how his thoughts may have coalesced having considered all the responses that his remarks attracted, whatever those thoughts (to which he is entitled) may be.

Let's see what he has to say...

Best,

Alistair

[retrouvailles]

If that would be case, he would be smarter than you 

What the hell is that supposed to mean? Wanna take this outside so we can settle this like men?