The Eternal Breakfast Debate in a New Place

[Serial_Apologist]

This realisation came as a bit of a ( slow motion) shock to me some while back.As a History student I should have known better I suppose. Not sure exactly when it started , but possibly triggered by the Iraq war.
One of the disappointing things about contemporary life is the generational warfare being waged by large sections of the media ( and I don’t mean just The Mail) the fallout from which may well include cultural impoverishment .

Advances in AI are going to be a further issue for the arts. If I was in charge, 6th form and Uni students would have compulsory lessons in, among other things, how to deal with cultural over- abundance. The change from music being expensive and hard to access to the current situation has happened far too quickly for comfort.

I see that a college professor has written a book on The Future as a Political Idea:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=At2G-BI44jo

[Master Jacques]

I wonder whether it all goes in phases or cycles . We tend make the Enlightment assumption that everything constantly improves . It doesn’t. Cultures decline , libraries are burnt , cities are sacked. Then seemingly new things emerge , new talents, it’s just that there aren’t that many around at the moment. Even popular culture is in massive decline. Taylor Swift is massively less musically interesting than the Beatles.
. We live in a time of cultural abundance - everything available at the touch of a button - but with so much rubbish to sift through,

It certainly is cyclical, unless you prefer the Yeatsian image of the gyres, i.e. a repeating pattern that never quite comes full circle, as evoked at the end of Midsummer Marriage. And "progress" is indeed not always improvement: that assertion is one of the most harmful made by the prevailing, arrogant presentism.

Most of the arts are indeed moribund, within the declining West; and that itself might be a symptom, rather than a cause, of the equally strong decline in the quality of popular culture. Without a strong popular culture, there can be no "high art". In the UK we have precious little of either which speaks to us directly, with popular music (Beatles included) having been reliant on American models (and accents) since the mid-1950s. And despite the current political winds of change, there is no sign of our chronic cultural, transatlantic dependence ending anytime soon.

Aside from all that, your "touch of the button" is of course the root of the problem. We no longer have to make our own music, art - or even our dinner. And this diminishes us. Just as it has diminished Radio 3.

[smittims]

I've noticed this decline in the 'new' music played on Radio 3, which is so often 'old' music re-gurgitated: repetitious cliches of diatonic melody and tonal harmony, often referencing still older music. I'd love to think that somewhere there are composers who are producing genuinely creative and imaginative work, which is being ignored by Radio 3 because, as it seems, Sam Jackson doesn't like atonal music; there's been a big reduction in even 100-year-old music since he took over.

[Master Jacques]

I've noticed this decline in the 'new' music played on Radio 3, which is so often 'old' music re-gurgitated: repetitious cliches of diatonic melody and tonal harmony, often referencing still older music. I'd love to think that somewhere there are composers who are producing genuinely creative and imaginative work, which is being ignored by Radio 3 because, as it seems, Sam Jackson doesn't like atonal music; there's been a big reduction in even 100-year-old music since he took over.

Yes. Try searching for even such a significant musical creator as "Alan Rawsthorne" in BBC Sounds. Instructive.

[oddoneout]

This realisation came as a bit of a ( slow motion) shock to me some while back.As a History student I should have known better I suppose. Not sure exactly when it started , but possibly triggered by the Iraq war.
One of the disappointing things about contemporary life is the generational warfare being waged by large sections of the media ( and I don’t mean just The Mail) the fallout from which may well include cultural impoverishment .

Advances in AI are going to be a further issue for the arts. If I was in charge, 6th form and Uni students would have compulsory lessons in, among other things, how to deal with cultural over- abundance. The change from music being expensive and hard to access to the current situation has happened far too quickly for comfort.

And arguably still hasn't addressed the existing issues of access, participation, earnings etc etc.

[LMcD]

Yes. Try searching for even such a significant musical creator as "Alan Rawsthorne" in BBC Sounds. Instructive.

William Alwyn also seems to be another victim of a wilful neglect of British composers.

[oddoneout]

I've noticed this decline in the 'new' music played on Radio 3, which is so often 'old' music re-gurgitated: repetitious cliches of diatonic melody and tonal harmony, often referencing still older music. I'd love to think that somewhere there are composers who are producing genuinely creative and imaginative work, which is being ignored by Radio 3 because, as it seems, Sam Jackson doesn't like atonal music; there's been a big reduction in even 100-year-old music since he took over.

Music written for a mass audience to generate airtime and thus income, rather than a free expression of the composer's creative inspiration - or lack of. I haven't read the whole article but I wonder if the same issues apply in the world of 'classical'.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/mar/09/spotify-algorithm-artists-music-musicians-money-songs-playlists

The requirement to be all things to all listeners can't help either - lowest common denominator comes into play, to the detriment of all.

I don't think SJ is keen on Classical either, and as for Baroque and Early - forget it.

[Ein Heldenleben]

It certainly is cyclical, unless you prefer the Yeatsian image of the gyres, i.e. a repeating pattern that never quite comes full circle, as evoked at the end of Midsummer Marriage. And "progress" is indeed not always improvement: that assertion is one of the most harmful made by the prevailing, arrogant presentism.

Most of the arts are indeed moribund, within the declining West; and that itself might be a symptom, rather than a cause, of the equally strong decline in the quality of popular culture. Without a strong popular culture, there can be no "high art". In the UK we have precious little of either which speaks to us directly, with popular music (Beatles included) having been reliant on American models (and accents) since the mid-1950s. And despite the current political winds of change, there is no sign of our chronic cultural, transatlantic dependence ending anytime soon.

Aside from all that, your "touch of the button" is of course the root of the problem. We no longer have to make our own music, art - or even our dinner. And this diminishes us. Just as it has diminished Radio 3.

I would agree with you about the vital links between “high” and popular culture. The Vienna of Haydn and Mozart was one alive with music of all sorts - the street bands that influenced both composers. I would take issue with the casual dismissal of the Beatles and “American “ influence. Yes a lot of their music is Blues based ( and the better for it) but they also drew from Tavener , Stockhausen, Music concrete (Sgt Pepper ) , Indian Classical music British / Irish folk music (throughout) the English modalists (Eleanor Rigby ), Music Hall (when I’m sixty four ). In short it would be hard to think of a band that had a wider range of influences, Peter Townsend of the Who has acknowledged his debt to Holst - their work is full of modal chord sequences.
Of course nie we have the harmonically unvarying monotony of rap and the four chord repetitive wonders of Taylor Swift .

[Master Jacques]

I would agree with you about the vital links between “high” and popular culture. The Vienna of Haydn and Mozart was one alive with music of all sorts - the street bands that influenced both composers. I would take issue with the casual dismissal of the Beatles and “American “ influence. Yes a lot of their music is Blues based ( and the better for it) but they also drew from Tavener , Stockhausen, Music concrete (Sgt Pepper ) , Indian Classical music British / Irish folk music (throughout) the English modalists (Eleanor Rigby ), Music Hall (when I’m sixty four ). In short it would be hard to think of a band that had a wider range of influences, Peter Townsend of the Who has acknowledged his debt to Holst - their work is full of modal chord sequences.
Of course nie we have the harmonically unvarying monotony of rap and the four chord repetitive wonders of Taylor Swift .

I take your medicine on The Beatles, though I'd say that underneath all these borrowings, at root they are culturally aligned with American traditions over and above European ones - thus their popularity in the USA, notoriously insular when it comes to popular taste in music. As for the aggressive monotony of contemporary pop - an aridity which has failed to fertilise art music in the way Vienna, Paris and London (at various times in musical history) managed in the dim and/or distant past - it signals the current triumph of brutal commercialism over artistic integrity.

There was some fighting talk on that from Cindi Lauper, on this weeks Desert Island Discs. I'm afraid they made La Laverne tangibly uncomfortable. Not On Message at all!

[teamsaint]

William Alwyn also seems to be another victim of a wilful neglect of British composers.

Even the forum thread on such composers has become stuck in the sidings….

[teamsaint]

I take your medicine on The Beatles, though I'd say that underneath all these borrowings, at root they are culturally aligned with American traditions over and above European ones - thus their popularity in the USA, notoriously insular when it comes to popular taste in music. As for the aggressive monotony of contemporary pop - an aridity which has failed to fertilise art music in the way Vienna, Paris and London (at various times in musical history) managed in the dim and/or distant past - it signals the current triumph of brutal commercialism over artistic integrity.

There was some fighting talk on that from Cindi Lauper, on this weeks Desert Island Discs. I'm afraid they made La Laverne tangibly uncomfortable. Not On Message at all!

Accidental exposure to potential influences is so important, especially for aspiring young musicians and algorithms are likely dealing this a knockout, if not a death blow.
I wonder about non-musical influences on musicians , EG Shelley’s influence in Paul Weller. Are these also being curtailed by algorithms and over - abundance, or is that too negative a take ?

[Master Jacques]

Accidental exposure to potential influences is so important, especially for aspiring young musicians and algorithms are likely dealing this a knockout, if not a death blow.
I wonder about non-musical influences on musicians , EG Shelley’s influence in Paul Weller. Are these also being curtailed by algorithms and over - abundance, or is that too negative a take ?

To put it the other way round, what earthly chance would there be of Shelley influencing any teenager these days, outside the public school system? How many have even heard of him? This disconnect has happened relatively quickly. But once the connection's gone...

Your focus on the need for accidental exposure - far less likely these days - is very much to the point.

[french frank]

it would be hard to think of a band that had a wider range of influences,

"Have been influenced by" is, on its own, of less interest than "have influenced". Vaughan Williams and Britten didn't compose folk music.

[Ein Heldenleben]

"Have been influenced by" is, on its own, of less interest than "have influenced". Vaughan Williams and Britten didn't compose folk music.

Ooh I’m going to nitpick there and say that in my view RVW’s and Britten’s folk song reworkings, extended integrations and arrangements are very much original compositions. They recomposed “folk” music and indeed in the case of RVW wrote original neo “folk” compositions . Folk is a notoriously catch all title after all. And what tunes :

Prof . Wilfrid Mellers on Linden Lea “ it was a small creation of genius with the pristine flavour of a genuine folk song . Having heard it one seems to have known the tune all one’s life.”

[Ein Heldenleben]

Accidental exposure to potential influences is so important, especially for aspiring young musicians and algorithms are likely dealing this a knockout, if not a death blow.
I wonder about non-musical influences on musicians , EG Shelley’s influence in Paul Weller. Are these also being curtailed by algorithms and over - abundance, or is that too negative a take ?

This timely Guardian article is wholly germane to your post .

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/mar/09/spotify-algorithm-artists-music-musicians-money-songs-playlists

Sadly playlists are taking over parts of Radio Three - the range of music it plays is perhaps diminishing. There are fewer “accidents” of exposure and thus a loss in our collective creative imagination.