The five masterpieces that changed the course of musical history

[EdgeleyRob]

In the end I chose :
Monteverdi Orfeo
Beethoven Eroica
Wagner Parsifal
Stravinsky Rite of Spring
Riley In C

Wot no Mendelssohn ?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

And to think ... I only suggested 4' 33" as a joke.

[Mr Pee]

And to think ... I only suggested 4' 33" as a joke.

Excellent, Alpensinfonie. I should have twigged.

" A joke" sums up the whole "piece" and the pseudo-intellectual twoddle surrounding it very neatly.

[Bryn]

And to think ... I only suggested 4' 33" as a joke.

Don't give up the day job.

[John Skelton]

Excellent, Alpensinfonie. I should have twigged.

" A joke" sums up the whole "piece" and the pseudo-intellectual twoddle surrounding it very neatly.

http://genetics.biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de/behavior/learning/pavlov.gif

[cloughie]

And to think ... I only suggested 4' 33" as a joke.

So did Cage!

No I think you did right to include it - after 4'33" composers knew they could get away with anything - or even nothing!

[MrGongGong]

So did Cage!

No I think you did right to include it - after 4'33" composers knew they could get away with anything - or even nothing!

eer no he didn't
and surely one needs to go to a performance ?

and the conspiracy theory of contemporary music is bollocks

[cloughie]

eer no he didn't

Who Cage or Eine Alpensinfonie?

[MrGongGong]

Cage
IMV
the "joke" and "theatrical" performances of 4:33" I have been to miss the point of the piece

it's not a joke
it's not a con
it's not a conspiracy

its as significant a piece as the Eroica

[Bryn]

From Indeterminacy.

[Pabmusic]

I agree with Mr Pee that Gerontius is a great work but I don't really see how it changed the course of music history, even that of the country in which it was composed. I'm not sure whether John Skelton's trying to suggest that this work is replete with clichés, platitudes and banalities but, if so, I would have to disagree roundly.

(I've only quoted a paragraph, but the whole post is very good.)

Agreed. I've been following Gerontius as it has moved from thread to thread in recent weeks, and I am amazed at the antipathy it generates. I don't mean simple dislike (we all have pieces of music we don't enjoy - in my case, the last movement of Beethoven's Ninth, which I find boring and unsatisfying) but full-blown hatred. Why is this? I suppose it must be the text: I just can't see people getting so worked up about the music itself ("I think it's laughable the way Elgar has whole triads - the very foundations of harmony - performing Wagnerian side-slips; then there's the use of a semi-chorus: what rubbish! Layers of sound: bah! humbug!") No - I suspect it's the text, to which many (most?) people are antagonistic. In fact, the Catholic Dvorak considered setting Gerontius for the 1891 Birmingham Festival, but was persuaded it would be provocative. So he set the requiem mass instead (odd, isn't it, that no objections are raised to the myriad settings of other Catholic texts - the requiem mass, the stabat mater, the magnificat, etc.?)

None of this alters the fact that Gerontius could hardly be thought of as one of the five most significant pieces of all time. It certainly influenced many things that followed (sometimes surprisingly - Bluebeard's Castle for one, A Child of Our Time for another, not forgetting many Hollywood film scores) and the multi-layered choral/orchestral effects became so commonplace that it can be a surprise to realise that Elgar was the first, or even one of the first, to use them.

[Beef Oven]

My 5 are:

Rivers of Babylon - Boney M
Metal Guru - T Rex
Tie a Yellow Ribbon - Tony Orlando & Dawn
Ever Fallen in Love (with someone you shouldn't 've)? - The Buzzcocks
Gotterdammerung - Wilhelm R Wagner

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Cage
IMV
the "joke" and "theatrical" performances of 4:33" I have been to miss the point of the piece

it's not a joke
it's not a con
it's not a conspiracy

its as significant a piece as the Eroica

I wonder how long we can sustain a conversation about ... er... nothing!

[MrGongGong]

I wonder how long we can sustain a conversation about ... er... nothing!

"I have nothing to say and I am saying it" ?

[rauschwerk]

I think I would agree now about Tristan rather than Parsifal, and I did consider Schoenberg (but which work?)

I think it would have to be a Schoenberg serial piece - whichever one in which the value of serial technique is most convincingly demonstrated. As one to whom his serial music means very little, I am not the person to choose.