Drama to be eradicated from Radio 3

[french frank]

Wouldn't one say evaluating the "known" is due part and parcel of the open scientific principle?

Some people's 'evaluations' might be more searching and discerning than those of others, depending on their background I have neither the personal knowledge nor the interest to evaluate how 'Soft Machine' (who they?) or Pet Shops Boys or Florence and the Machine rate musically so as to have attracted the attention of better musical minds than mine!

[Ein Heldenleben]

You must know a different cross-section from many of the ethno-musicologists I've encountered, who tend to be very imperious about the qualitative superiority of "their" areas of study to (a completely fictitious) elitist, white-male and monolithic Western tradition.

I don’t think I’ve ever knowingly met one. I do know that “classical “musicologists and ethnos tend to sneer at each other .

[Serial_Apologist]

Their attention was attracted to certain pop music composers and works. What stood out, as far as they were concerned, was of particular interest, not the genre per se but what it might produce.



Like Paul McCartney, significant in his time and in the context in which he worked/lived. It's lesser intellects and those with a narrower education, who evaluate the known and are uncuriously ignorant of the unknown who get more attention than they deserve..

Wouldn't one say evaluating the "known" is due part and parcel of the open scientific principle?

[french frank]

Absurd or not it attracted considerable musical intellects like Hans Keller and Prof Wilfrid Mellers.

Their attention was attracted to certain pop music composers and works. What stood out, as far as they were concerned, was of particular interest, not the genre per se but what it might produce.

Now , according to the endless trails , we have Radio Four series on great thinkers like Malcom X. A very significant figure no doubt but a great thinker?

Like Paul McCartney, significant in his time and in the context in which he worked/lived. It's lesser intellects and those with a narrower education, who evaluate the known and are uncuriously ignorant of the unknown who get more attention than they deserve..

[Master Jacques]

And then there’s the vast sphere of ethno-musicology studying music of the various peoples of the world. It’s often struck me how very “unstuck up” musicologists are about their work.

You must know a different cross-section from many of the ethno-musicologists I've encountered, who tend to be very imperious about the qualitative superiority of "their" areas of study to (a completely fictitious) elitist, white-male and monolithic Western tradition.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I moved from pop to classical at the age of thirteen, and ever afterwards couldn't separate pop (or 'rock' as it later came to dignify itself) from immaturity . The sight of middle aged men avidly listening to it and describing it in the language I associated with Bach and Wagner's masterpieces seemed absurd to me.

Absurd or not it attracted considerable musical intellects like Hans Keller and Prof Wilfrid Mellers. There’s very Little harmonically in the Beatles that isn’t in Wagner - even in Beethoven. Elton Johns music has a very heavy African American spiritual influence. Rap is now studied as a section of the Oxford music degree and rightly so as it is probably the most successful musical genre there has ever been.
And then there’s the vast sphere of ethno-musicology studying music of the various peoples of the world. It’s often struck me how very “unstuck up” musicologists are about their work. In English literature there’s a real hierarchy of interest - or used to be - about what’s worth studying. All this of course academic theorising would have been par for the course on R3 in the ‘80’s . Now any such programme would have to be so dumbed down as barely worth listening to.

Now , according to the endless trails , we have Radio Four series on great thinkers like Malcom X. A very significant figure no doubt but a great thinker?

[smittims]

I moved from pop to classical at the age of thirteen, and ever afterwards couldn't separate pop (or 'rock' as it later came to dignify itself) from immaturity . The sight of middle aged men avidly listening to it and describing it in the language I associated with Bach and Wagner's masterpieces seemed absurd to me.

[Master Jacques]

I've found that once people start deepening an interest and knowledge in complex subjects (such as politics) their desire for more sophisticated music begins to take off, and they leave their "obsession" with pop chart music behind, often with some embarrassment at what they have, in their words, wasted years on.

Yes indeed - it's a pity that in their eternal quest for "youthful converts", BBC Radio 3 forgets that the best gateway into complex art music is "life experience", not condescending auntie-chat presenters. The obsession with trying to attract younger listeners, often at the expense of older ones who offer a ready-made, never-ending supply chain, blights Radio 4 even more bleakly, of course. It's a sign of just how out of touch The Suits are, in persistently trying to mimic pop music and football as models for serious radio.

[Serial_Apologist]

'Gateway' theory remains a pious hope, in my opinion, with no reference to experience. The real hope is contained in your key line, "when you show people how..."

Getting people's brains working in a new way will make those lightbulbs go on. Repeating the same passive listening without thought will merely harden a glass ceiling.

I've found that once people start deepening an interest and knowledge in complex subjects (such as politics) their desire for more sophisticated music begins to take off, and they leave their "obsession" with pop chart music behind, often with some embarrassment at what they have, in their words, wasted years on.

[smittims]

I too suspect that Radio 3 doesn't know what kind of audience it wants; just that they've been told to get a bigger one at all costs, if possible by still pretending to be 'the home of classical music' however orwellian that trope gets to sound as its definition is stretched to breaking point.

[Master Jacques]

You could play Elton to the end of time and not be able to tackle a Scriabin etude . That is seriously difficult stuff. A better analogy would be a grade 6 Chopin piece. On the listening side I do think the better pop music is a good gateway into classical music . When you show people how the building blocks are the same there is a moment that they get the connection.

'Gateway' theory remains a pious hope, in my opinion, with no reference to experience. The real hope is contained in your key line, "when you show people how..."

Getting people's brains working in a new way will make those lightbulbs go on. Repeating the same passive listening without thought will merely harden a glass ceiling.

[Ein Heldenleben]

Technique is one thing: we start with simple exercises and expand our technique with practice. But listening is quite another: giving children Elton John to listen to won't prime their brains for Scriabin. They need the expert enthusiast to say, "hey, just listen to the fantastic things Scriabin does with this little scrap of melody...." which might enthuse them to the kind of active listening needed, if they're to get something richer out of the music.

You could play Elton to the end of time and not be able to tackle a Scriabin etude . That is seriously difficult stuff. A better analogy would be a grade 6 Chopin piece. On the listening side I do think the better pop music is a good gateway into classical music . When you show people how the building blocks are the same there is a moment that they get the connection.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I would suggest that you don't learn 'excellent sight reading skills' without working hard at it.

Well playing stuff like that doesn’t feel like work. Nor does playing any half decent piece of music even Czerny exercises .

The specially constructed ABRSM sight reading tests* definitely are “hard work” because they don’t make sense as music and are of zero musical interest. And how much of a test are they ? Even the grade eight ones are easier than sight reading a complex jazz chart.

* to ensure you haven’t played them before.

[Master Jacques]

Well I spent years playing Beatles and Elton John songs on the piano and it was a crucial factor in developing excellent sight reading skills.
Just got to work on the technique a bit .

Technique is one thing: we start with simple exercises and expand our technique with practice. But listening is quite another: giving children Elton John to listen to won't prime their brains for Scriabin. They need the expert enthusiast to say, "hey, just listen to the fantastic things Scriabin does with this little scrap of melody...." which might enthuse them to the kind of active listening needed, if they're to get something richer out of the music.

[french frank]

Well I spent years playing Beatles and Elton John songs on the piano and it was a crucial factor in developing excellent sight reading skills.
Just got to work on the technique a bit .

I would suggest that you don't learn 'excellent sight reading skills' without working hard at it.