I really don't understand what is with you all wannabeoverintelligent people.
Since few if any serious respondents to this thread fit into such a category, we must assume that such a category is of your own making and to suit your own agenda rather than being of relevance in the context of this thread. Each member here is possessed of whatever intelligence he/she happens to have. If you can't accept that, it's no wonder that you can't understand it either.
Why should anyone appreciate 'music' that has been deliberately composed so that >99,99% of the population would think it sounds absolutely horrible.
Have you actually conducted a survey of the entire world population that has led you to cite this particular statistic (which, taken literally, would mean that 600,000 people think otherwise, which I'm sure is a gross underestimate but it's not that small a number anyway); if not, please keep your guesswork to yourself or at least have the grace to admit that your figures are entirely random rather than scientifically provable. Furthermore, what is the evidence for your claim that Xenakis "deliberately composed (
Synaphai) so that >99,99% of the population would think it sounds absolutely horrible"? Did you know Xenakis personally and did he tell you that (and, if so, did you believe him?); do you, on the other hand, have access to correspondence or other documentation that supports such a claim? If so, please declare it and, if not, please withdraw your claim.
Even if the ever-so-complicated composing principle was based on Gell-Mann matrices of quantum chromodynamics it would still be inferior to actual pieces of music since it even fails to fulfill the basic definition of music generally considered to be the enjoyment - not the headache one gets from listening to it.
Er - whose definition of music is that, then? Music can generate all kinds of emotional states, which is one of its great strengths, not just that of what you call "enjoyment" - and this is hardly anything new; in seeking from music something that seems to be akin to mere light entertainment (of which certain music is, of course, amply capable - that's to say the kind of music designed for such a purpose), your prioritising of "enjoyment" might appear to exclude works or parts of works from almost all period in music that set out to do something other than provide mere "enjoyment". Do you consider, for example, that the provision of "enjoyment" alone was the object in the finale of Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony, the first movement of Shostakovich's Fourth Symphony, Pettersson's Ninth and Tenth Symphonies, the close of Mahler's Sixth Symphony, Chopin's Second Piano Sonata, Musorgsky's
Night on a Bare Mountain, the opening fugue of Beethoven's C# minor Quartet, the middle movement of Alkan's Grand Duo for violin and piano (subtitled
l'Enfer) and so and and so on? (and you may care to note that all of the above examples are tonal works)...
Derek's article was great.
Which particular articel are you referring to here?
I wish the 'sophisticated' people
Who exactly are they and how are you seeking to define their "sophistication"?
would regain their sanity
On what grounds do you claim that any (unspecified) people here have lost it in the first place?
and stop being like pianistimo in their own small world.
I don't think that pianistimo has anything to do with this, frankly - and as to this "small world" of which you write, how do you know what worlds anyone inhabits in terms of musical taste? It might seem as though you are implying that certain people who appreciate Xenakis are incapable of appreciating and/or unwilling to appreciate Mahler, Brahms, Beethoven, Haydn, Bach, etc., to which I could respond only that I've yet to encounter any such person...
Best,
Alistair