David Matthews SYMPHONY NO. 8 First Performance 17/04/15

[ahinton]

In the case of the Nazis the aesthetic denial consisted in believing in the superiority of some tradition of Ayrian culture, musical and artistic they had concocted to propitiate the Fuehrer's racist agenda; in that of "formalism" the idea of a simplified music celebrating of the supposed triumphs of the Stalinist state and immediately appealing to the masses - none of which one would think Richard to be remotely advocating!

No, of course he wasn't - and I'd hope that it would be clear that this was not at all what I meant by reference to them!

[ahinton]

That's an interesting idea, I'd never really seen it like that before. But complexity (in music, say) isn't just a reflection of social phenomena and historical processes; I think there's something deeper than that going on, in the sense that the certainty, the divine order if you like, which ultimately lies behind the necessity for closure (or the implication that there's a closure-shaped hole which isn't being filled), has been progressively dismantled, for example by Marx, Darwin, Freud, Einstein, Heisenberg, Schoenberg, Kandinsky, Joyce etc. etc. - of course their discoveries required a certain stage in social evolution to be conceivable in the first place - and the result is on the one hand something profoundly exciting for artists (and their audiences) of a progressive frame of mind, and seemingly something rather scary for their more nostalgic colleagues.

I'm with you on all of that except the last bit; on the one hand, is this kind of thing really only "profoundly exciting for artists (and their audiences of a progressive frame of mind" (whatever that might be - is everything necessarily respresentative of progress just because it's new?) and, on the other, is it so certain that all those of a less "progessive" frame of mind will be "scared" by it? I think that it's also potentially dangerous and misleading to imply (not that I'm suggesting that you are doing) that the world-view - especially the historic one - of what you call "their more nostalgic colleagues" is necessarily all about wearily and despondently bemoaning the passing of bygone "golden ages" that never really existed in reality anyway. To relate this to the thread topic, I am not persauded that David Matthews' latest symphony - or, for that matter, any of his other music that I've heard (and I admit that there's quite a lot of it that I haven't yet) identifies him as a purveyor of any kind of nostalgia and I imagine that he might be horrified at such a prospect were it actually the case.

[Serial_Apologist]

That's an interesting idea, I'd never really seen it like that before. But complexity (in music, say) isn't just a reflection of social phenomena and historical processes; I think there's something deeper than that going on, in the sense that the certainty, the divine order if you like, which ultimately lies behind the necessity for closure (or the implication that there's a closure-shaped hole which isn't being filled), has been progressively dismantled, for example by Marx, Darwin, Freud, Einstein, Heisenberg, Schoenberg, Kandinsky, Joyce etc. etc. - of course their discoveries required a certain stage in social evolution to be conceivable in the first place - and the result is on the one hand something profoundly exciting for artists (and their audiences) of a progressive frame of mind, and seemingly something rather scary for their more nostalgic colleagues.

This puts it much more comprehensively, thanks!

Edit: One thing howerver that always strikes me is the coincidence that the acceleration in the complexification process really took place after the establishment of capitalism, though for detail one would also have to take account of the concomitant (and resulting) weakening of interrelationships between church, state, business and art.

[Serial_Apologist]

Well, that's undoubtedly the most comprehensive view of the notion of what reflecting, or responding to, one's time might represent for the composer that's been expressd in this thread so far, although given that, as you say, "the modern composer can give expression to all this [i.e. the ever increasing range of available musics, techniques et al] with access to the technical means of linguistic expansion and sound generation [that] makes the world of musical complexification more readily available to the composer", it might be taken to suggest that reflecting or responding to one's time means reflecting or responding to ever more and more means of musical expression in part because of its availability for exploration and absorption rather than reflecting or responding to extra-musical events, societal developments, discoveries and all the rest of what makes up contemporary life in the various contrasting environments in which it is lived by "composers and other lunatics" (as Sorabji once put it, albeit with sharp tongue firmly in both cheeks).

Perhaps the politically and historically conscious artist or composer might see the two facets of what you refer to as interdependent? It wouldn't seem too much to ask - or would it? I'm thinking now of pieces such as "African Sanctus" and the accusations that erupted around it and similar such pieces of "neo-colonial expropriation".

[teamsaint]

Critical theory offers us a rich, wide and exciting variety of ways to approach a text, texts of courses having potentially a very wide range of meaning.

All of these theories, if used wisely, can help us to new insights on a text, some perhaps more helpful than others, and, importantly, some more appealing to an individual than others.

The value of these varying approaches are surely the potential to approach texts in many different and illuminating ways, not that one is necessarily required to prevail, in order to prove its worth.

[ahinton]

This puts it much more comprehensively, thanks!

Edit: One thing howerver that always strikes me is the coincidence that the acceleration in the complexification process really took place after the establishment of capitalism, though for detail one would also have to take account of the concomitant (and resulting) weakening of interrelationships between church, state, business and art.

After, perhaps - but wholly or partly beause of?...

[ahinton]

Perhaps the politically and historically conscious artist or composer might see the two facets of what you refer to as interdependent? It wouldn't seem too much to ask - or would it?

Not necessarily, no.

I'm thinking now of pieces such as "African Sanctus" and the accusations that erupted around it and similar such pieces of "neo-colonial expropriation".

I've not thought about that in years; what did/do you think about that particular brouhaha?

[Serial_Apologist]

Critical theory offers us a rich, wide and exciting variety of ways to approach a text, texts of courses having potentially a very wide range of meaning.

All of these theories, if used wisely, can help us to new insights on a text, some perhaps more helpful than others, and, importantly, some more appealing to an individual than others.

The value of these varying approaches are surely the potential to approach texts in many different and illuminating ways, not that one is necessarily required to prevail, in order to prove its worth.

I'm sure that if I understood Derrida I would agree; maybe it's a sign of my own nostalgia that I still find myself stuck around the issue of why it is that the great modernist art movements of before 1975 (roughly) have become reduced to a handful of individuals left still bravely pursuing their meaningful aims and the ideals underpinning them in times when (for the first time in my lifetime, and I'm nearly 70) one sees the ugly re-emergence of fundamentalisms in all sorts of areas apart from the scientific, and, rather in the same way that the "centre" of mainstream politics is way to the right of what it was in the 1950s/60s, composers of concert music are having to re-position themselves according to some taste consensus dictated by concert planners and recording producers to be consdered artistically valid. On the one hand I can't believe the wealth and range of resources once available to the modern composer have become exhausted

[Serial_Apologist]

After, perhaps - but wholly or partly beause of?...

Concurrently - it being the one common linking factor, I would think.

[Serial_Apologist]

Not necessarily, no.


I've not thought about that in years; what did/do you think about that particular brouhaha?

I remember my immediate response on first hearing the piece being along the the pilfery lines I mentioned above, and that was before reading about it.

[Richard Barrett]

On the one hand I can't believe the wealth and range of resources once available to the modern composer have become exhausted

I certainly don't believe they are - quite the opposite in many ways. Personally I draw a great deal of optimism from the feeling I increasingly have, with advancing years, of there being so much to do, and to discover, and so little time. Especially given what you call the "ugly re-emergence of fundamentalisms", with which the piece of music ostensibly under discussion is if not directly connected then at least not entirely disconnected.

[jayne lee wilson]

Going back to the David Matthews 8th after a week, the 1st movement allegro energico sounds far stronger, varied and more purposeful than it did before - the lack of focus was in me, not the music (hence the need for careful remarks after the premiere! - though the rather colourless sound balance & slightly cautious performance didn't help). What gives the piece an unusual shape is the lengthy return of the brief introduction as an extended 3rd section, almost as long as the allegro itself, which sounds as if the allegro has been interrupted by another slow movement. That threw me a bit. I'd also missed how the four dances in the finale all reappear briefly through the coda, with the first appearing last of all. I've probably overlooked other intricacies.
(I've only recently twigged to the Lutoslawski-Chain-like construction of the 2nd Violin Concerto's 2nd movement, too transfixed by its chameleonic, catch-your-breath beauty (or the Australian Birdsong interlude later on) to focus on that feature...)

Again, the stark contrasts between each of the 8th's movements now sound much more vivid and strange. With the last two, Mahler's 4th kept coming to mind. But all of this won't matter much if a listener is out of sympathy with the music's ethos...
I hope we get a big, bright & shiny hi-res Chandos recording soon!

***

Teamsaint's mention of French Structuralist ideas put me in mind of intertext or intertextuality, one sense of which is that "texts" or artworks have their richest meanings in relation to other works, perhaps only mean anything in relation to them. It seems to me a logical contradiction to deny or minimise the importance of Matthews' other orchestral works in relation to the meaning or understanding of this 8th Symphony, whilst insisting on evaluating it through reference to the works and musical styles of others!

[Barbirollians]

An elegant and profound formulation to be sure.

Three farts and a raspberry - was a saying of Barbirolli to describe contemporary music that he disliked .

[Richard Barrett]

Three farts and a raspberry - was a saying of Barbirolli to describe contemporary music that he disliked .

What a shining wit he must have been. It's saddening to hear he could come out with such ignorant nonsense, given his outstanding abilities as a musician, but of course he isn't alone in that.

Regarding intertextuality, Jayne, I did write a couple of pages back: "There is a level of understanding of an artist's work which can only be gained by a broad and sustained engagement with it." In other words I was by no means "denying ... the importance of the context of Matthews' other orchestral works", at least in principle. But I also said that if that's the only way to appreciate a given piece there must surely be something lacking in it. Anyway, as I keep saying, discussions of taste are a side-issue here as far as I'm concerned. It's easy to say that one likes or dislikes some piece of music, and nobody has any right to claim that one should or shouldn't like it. I'm interested, as I've said, in wider issues of music and culture, although of course these always exist in some kind of symbiotic relationship with one's tastes.

[Beef Oven!]

Three farts and a raspberry - was a saying of Barbirolli to describe contemporary music that he disliked .

How ignorant of Barbirolli.