"Classical Music" and other names for it

[Daniel]

Indeed. It's a pathetic approach, and one that's adopted by so many of the R3 presentation team.

I dislike the crass marketing as much as anybody else, but I just think James Rhodes, through an intense gratitude for the part classical music played in his life, seeks to enable others to connect with it also. He isn't aiming to talk to an audience who already are familiar with classical music, so I don't think your comparison with R3 presenters is quite apt. I also find the rock star/composer cliches slightly tiresome, but maybe others don't, and people are not stupid they can differentiate between an analogy and the music.
Personally his playing doesn't do much for me, nor did the one programme I saw from Notes from the Inside, but I think he is sincere, I wish him luck and would much rather he was there than not.

Coincidentally, I was just given a present of his autobiography by a young guy in his early twenties, who is now kind of dabbling on the fringes of classical music, and who is I suppose the kind of person we're talking about, so perhaps this is the Rhodes effect in action!

[ahinton]

Certainly there's a lot of fuzziness about what "classical" means. But it doesn't seem to have struck the author that there's also a lot of fuzziness about what "composed" means. Personally I find it clearest to use the word "compose" to mean the activity of creating music, with for example "improvisation" among the methods for doing it. (I know I've said this before in numerous contexts so excuse me if you've heard it too many times.) I didn't arrive at this conclusion for the sake of classificatory tidiness but because it had a fruitful and liberating effect on how I thought about the things I spend my life doing, which counts for a lot with me![/quote
No, that cannot be aired too many times, because most people still seem to think that "composition" is one thing (involving planning, problem solveing and writing down) whereas "improvisation" is something quite different when, in truth, the dividing line between the two activities is indistinct enough to suggest that it is the product of the imagination of those who believe in it; one has only to consider how so many "composers" (i.e. musicians who planned and wrote down their inventions) have also improvised - would Bach, Mozart, Liszt et al and so many organist-composers have perceived their "compositional" and "improvisational" activities to belong to distinctly different drawers? I think that this view arises from the sort of desire to over-compartmentalise, to pigeon-hole, that has prompted some to mistrust, for example, Rachmaninoff and Busoni because they couldn't just stick to composing, conducting, piano playing, editing or whatever else but insisted in doing some or all of these things.

QUOTE=Richard Barrett;537964]So, if all music is composed, that word doesn't really work as a label for some music which one assumes has been made in a certain somewhat ill-defined way, even though surely it isn't in principle possible to tell when listening to a piece of music how it was made. I know a violinist/composer who at a conservatory exam put a score by Webern on the stand and proceeded to improvise his performance; I don't recall if he told me whether the examiners could tell he wasn't playing Webern but one can imagine they might not. Thinking about it further, is it really a good and audience-inclusive idea to classify music according to how it's made, when presumably one is trying to help that music appeal to people for whom how music is or might be composed might be mysterious. I often get asked "how can you write music without working at the piano to hear how it sounds?", for example. I don't hold it against anyone if they don't know the answer.

So much good sense here, for which many thanks. One can indeed no more tell in every case whether a piece of music has been written down or is improvised just by listening to it than one can tell whether, either way, it's been done by a woman or a man. Atrtempting to "classify" music according to how it has been created is both daft and dangerous. As to the last question, whilst we all know Ravel's remark about composing at the piano (as in some do, some don't, but you, Igor, will), there's also Schönberg's admonition about the need to be able to compose away from the piano if for no more practical reason than the fact that one might not always have a piano at one's disposal. I can't compose at the piano, anyway; it becomes an almost immediate distraction. Then there's the bizarre presumption that one can only get the sounds that one hears down on paper with the aid of a piano regardless of one's prowess at that instrument, the implicit assumption being that composers need pianos as some kind of aural pit-prop and that the sounds come out of the composer's fiddling at the piano as much as they do from his/her head, which is patently nonsensical. I've tried to focus people on this by asking if they can hear, in their own heads, speech that they have heard - or themselves speaking ther own thoughts, but to little avail.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I've tried to focus people on this by asking if they can hear, in their own heads, speech that they have heard - or themselves speaking ther own thoughts, but to little avail.

I've tried this, too - asking them to try to imagine their friends reading from a text (novel/poem/newspaper article), or imagining their friends' voices as they read a letter they've received from them. I've received many a scared look as a result - "I'll keep him talking, you hide the whisky and call for a taxi" sort-of thing.


BtW - wasn't it Rimsky-Korsakoff, rather than Ravel who advised Stravinsky about working at the piano?

[ahinton]

I've tried this, too - asking them to try to imagine their friends reading from a text (novel/poem/newspaper article), or imagining their friends' voices as they read a letter they've received from them. I've received many a scared look as a result - "I'll keep him talking, you hide the whisky and call for a taxi" sort-of thing.


BtW - wasn't it Rimsky-Korsakoff, rather than Ravel who advised Stravinsky about working at the piano?

Now you come to mention it, perhaps I've misremembered this (and, given the teacher/pupil relationship, you couls well be right!); I'd better check when I have a moment or three...

[NatBalance]

Before deciding on a proper name for the music we call 'classical', how about defining what classical music actual is? I don't know if I'm the only one but I find I cannot define the difference between pop and classical, I mean in the actual sound. I can recognise classical music and pop music when I hear it, but ask me to define what the actual difference is, how I recognise them, then I get a bit stumped.

What is it about a Strauss waltz that makes it classical and this waltz …

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVgDRnyZJ8U

… pop? Is it just the instruments used?

What makes this a pop song?:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73UgeY_b91Y

What makes this a classical song (go to 1:50)?:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVQzlbl-fyg

Do the drums make the difference? Is it always the case that pop music marks the beat heavier? What about Bach?

I reckon I have figured out one, repeat one, way of defining the two, and I'm sure certain members here will say it's a load of ****, but it's an attempt at a part definition. You don't get anywhere if you don't have a go, and although I don't agree with 'Composed Music' as a replacement for 'Classical' I applaud the guy for having a go ….. NEXT!

I think I've given this definition before. I want to make it clear I do not think this definition in any way states that classical music is superior to pop. They are just different, one is not better than the other. One may generally be more complicated than the other, but complication does not necessarily equate to better.

Pop - the music itself only portrays happy or sad. It needs the words for the music to say anything else.
Classical - the music itself can say what it wants to say without words.

You must remember that there are many pieces of music that straddle both classical and pop, or have bits of both within them.

[Richard Barrett]

Pop - the music itself only portrays happy or sad. It needs the words for the music to say anything else.
Classical - the music itself can say what it wants to say without words.

What do you mean by "the music itself"? and by placing such importance on music "saying" something?

[MrGongGong]

What do you mean by "the music itself"? and by placing such importance on music "saying" something?

Tread carefully
some folks think there are only ever two possibilities

[NatBalance]

What do you mean by "the music itself"? and by placing such importance on music "saying" something?

Remember I stated that this was a part description. When you have a full description then maybe we can find a better word to describe it

[teamsaint]

Remember I stated that this was a part description. When you have a full description then maybe we can find a better word to describe it

i'd be interested to know where this pop song fits into your classification / description system.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1hKSYgOGtos

Doesnt seem to be particularly happy or sad,and I really dont know how the words add in either direction, or if those terms are applicable at all.

Incidentally,it might be informative to listen to how Bowie's often opaque lyrics affect the emotional respose we have to his music.

Just two examples that spring to mind,of course.

[Richard Barrett]

Tread carefully
some folks think there are only ever two possibilities

I know, I could see the worms pouring out of the can as I was posting...

NatBalance, I don't wish to pursue an aggressive line of questioning but I don't really see why possible responses to my questions hinge on whether your description/definition is partial or not. My own response, for what it's worth, would be: (a) "the music itself" is a highly problematic concept and can be made to mean whatever one wishes it to mean; (b) surely the demand of music that it "say something" is highly limited. Many questions such as both of these become more complex and at the same time more clear by considering a wider context, including in particular musics outside the supposed "pop/classical" divide, for example from the hundreds of other musical cultures around the world (and for that matter also Western musical culture at more distant points in history).

The "classical canon" as it's generally understood consists very largely of atypical musical phenomena. JS Bach wasn't a typical 18th century composer, Wagner wasn't a typical 19th century composer, Stravinsky wasn't a typical 20th century composer, etc. - and many assumptions about how to define "classical", or whatever else one wants to call it, for example in terms like "the music itself can say what it wants to say without words", applies principally to such atypical figures, while an "average" composer in any of those periods might not be capable of writing music with such characteristics.

[NatBalance]

i'd be interested to know where this pop song fits into your classification / description system.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1hKSYgOGtos

Well it seems quite happy to me, or perhaps something in between happy and sad.

I'm not saying my definition does not need some amendments, and it is only a part description. Have a go at describing classical music yourself? Someone else have a go! I don't see how we can come up with a better word for it if we can't actually describe what defines it. Go on Gongers, you're the man with the knowledge …. I've stuck my neck out, go on …. be a devil …. my axe is waiting ….
:)

[Beef Oven!]

Before deciding on a proper name for the music we call 'classical', how about defining what classical music actual is? I don't know if I'm the only one but I find I cannot define the difference between pop and classical, I mean in the actual sound. I can recognise classical music and pop music when I hear it, but ask me to define what the actual difference is, how I recognise them, then I get a bit stumped.

What is it about a Strauss waltz that makes it classical and this waltz …

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVgDRnyZJ8U

… pop? Is it just the instruments used?

What makes this a pop song?:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73UgeY_b91Y

What makes this a classical song (go to 1:50)?:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVQzlbl-fyg

Do the drums make the difference? Is it always the case that pop music marks the beat heavier? What about Bach?

I reckon I have figured out one, repeat one, way of defining the two, and I'm sure certain members here will say it's a load of ****, but it's an attempt at a part definition. You don't get anywhere if you don't have a go, and although I don't agree with 'Composed Music' as a replacement for 'Classical' I applaud the guy for having a go ….. NEXT!

I think I've given this definition before. I want to make it clear I do not think this definition in any way states that classical music is superior to pop. They are just different, one is not better than the other. One may generally be more complicated than the other, but complication does not necessarily equate to better.

Pop - the music itself only portrays happy or sad. It needs the words for the music to say anything else.
Classical - the music itself can say what it wants to say without words.

You must remember that there are many pieces of music that straddle both classical and pop, or have bits of both within them.

I find myself pondering similar questions. I've been following this interesting discussion, and I find that not having a satisfactory answer to the question of what music actually is in the first place, rather gets in the way.

I take a different perspective anyway. Not believing we have to forensically work up a definition of music or subgroups thereof (because there will always will be something or other that can't be accommodated by such a definition), we can communally agree an approximate 'working' definition that will explain 4/5 of our topic. Mary Chambers mentioned something along the lines of not being able to define classical music, but knowing it when she hears it - this for me is a necessary part of the approach.

On your point about music saying something, to some degree I've always resisted this idea, but given that music is so much about communication, I suppose it can't be dismissed.

[MrGongGong]

Well it seems quite happy to me, or perhaps something in between happy and sad.

Banned words in many music classrooms (and rightly so IMV)

[P. G. Tipps]

Banned words in many music classrooms (and rightly so IMV)

Why?

[MrGongGong]

Why?

Because to simply use "happy" and "sad" as descriptors of music is superficial and lazy.
Along with the nonsense about minor and major keys being "happy" and "sad".