Music of the 1960's

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

In the 1960s, Roberto Gerhard produced a string of masterpieces: 3rd and 4th symphonies, Concerto for Orchestra, Epithalamion and the three astrological pieces. Much of this music excited me then, and still does.

[MrGongGong]

seconded

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

thanks for this ...quite taken by it and had never heard of Gerhard before

[Serial_Apologist]

thanks for this ...quite taken by it and had never heard of Gerhard before

Why don't they compose music like that anymore? Is it anything to do with serialism and the post-serial, pre-postmodern musical universes of Boulez, Berio, Maderna, Nono, Castiglioni nowsadays being considered outmoded?

Rhetorical question? - I know!

I played this to an 18-year old in 1972. "Where does one get to hear music like that?" she asked. "Here", I said.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

...whereas had a Vox LP of this and we listened many times in our young persons apartment

in the 60s indian Classical music was a noted feature of musical life in the capital, recitals at the V&A Wigmore and the odd cinema etc ... we took it very seriously but it was trashed by the sitar thing and the beatles ... a very great loss imv ... first wife took the lps ... that was another great loss! ... there used to be a wonderful vegetarian Indian restaurant just opposite the TUC if memory serves

ustad vilayat khan was incomparable

[Serial_Apologist]

...whereas had a Vox LP of this and we listened many times in our young persons apartment

in the 60s indian Classical music was a noted feature of musical life in the capital, recitals at the V&A Wigmore and the odd cinema etc ... we took it very seriously but it was trashed by the sitar thing and the beatles ... a very great loss imv ... first wife took the lps ... that was another great loss! ... there used to be a wonderful vegetarian Indian restaurant just opposite the TUC if memory serves



ustad vilayat khan was incomparable

Indian classical music spoke of more simplified, technologically-informed lifestyles, freed of the poverty, re-sensitisation to nature, ones fellows and their potential. I always felt the complexity more authentically expressed by what the western musical traditions could say to us of the post-imperialist iinheritance, whether in serial, stochastic, aleatoric, fluxussed beyond concert venue boundaries, cutting edge jazz, and especially improv in its no-time timely advent; and taking that complexity on board being inescapable en route to wherever whoever seemed deepest in his or her socio-artistic-anthropo-political thinking was welcomed to lead necessarily imposed a harder road to... today's perdition? .

[Chris Newman]

thanks for this ...quite taken by it and had never heard of Gerhard before

Thanks for that, Calum. Fond memories of a Prom in the last days of the 60s with the BBCSO and Colin Davis. Also Beethoven Emperor with Stephen Bishop (later Stephen Kovacevic) and Stravisnsky Rite of Spring. Interesting guy, Gerhard. He seems to try avoiding melody whilst often failing. Great music though.

[MrGongGong]

He seems to try avoiding melody whilst often failing. Great music though.

I'm on the train so the links don't work
BUT
as someone who writes music I find the whole "melody" or "no melody" thing more than a little puzzling ......... what can be perceived as a "melody" is simply a series of pitches , repetition can create "melody". But I don't know many composers who set out to be "anti-melodic" one simply creates music and sometimes people think you set out to write "tunes" but the truth is often far from that. I recently wrote a short string quartet to demonstrate how one could turn an image into music, I took a photograph of the place where the concert was going to be held and simply followed the contour of the horizon in the first fiddle part and made the other parts from the layers underneath. People used the term "melody" because of the way it was played NOT because it was inherently melodic , if that makes sense ? I hear Webern and Stockhausen as a series of melodies ............. I find it hard to think of instrumental music (apart from maybe some pieces like Atmospheres ?) that I don't hear melodies in ........ even without repeated listening.

[Serial_Apologist]

I'm on the train so the links don't work
BUT
as someone who writes music I find the whole "melody" or "no melody" thing more than a little puzzling ......... what can be perceived as a "melody" is simply a series of pitches , repetition can create "melody". But I don't know many composers who set out to be "anti-melodic" one simply creates music and sometimes people think you set out to write "tunes" but the truth is often far from that. I recently wrote a short string quartet to demonstrate how one could turn an image into music, I took a photograph of the place where the concert was going to be held and simply followed the contour of the horizon in the first fiddle part and made the other parts from the layers underneath. People used the term "melody" because of the way it was played NOT because it was inherently melodic , if that makes sense ? I hear Webern and Stockhausen as a series of melodies ............. I find it hard to think of instrumental music (apart from maybe some pieces like Atmospheres ?) that I don't hear melodies in ........ even without repeated listening.

Villa-Lobos did something of that kind based on the skyline of New York, GG. Things can be surprisingly melodic and easy on the ear when one is not expecting it.

Writing the above brought something back to me. I once told Keith Tippett about a recording of his and Julie's having been found unacceptable as serious music by my father because it had been improvised on the spot, rather than written out beforehand. "Next time", Julie said, "play it to him without mentioning that it's freely improvised, and see how he reacts". I did. Afterwards I asked what he thought of it. "Most impressive", he replied, adding "I'd like to hear some more music by that composer sometime, If you've got any"!

[MrGongGong]

Villa-Lobos did something of that kind based on the skyline of New York, GG. Things can be surprisingly melodic and easy on the ear when one is not expecting it.

Writing the above brought something back to me. I once told Keith Tippett about a recording of his and Julie's having been found unacceptable as serious music by my father because it had been improvised on the spot, rather than written out beforehand. "Next time", Julie said, "play it to him without mentioning that it's freely improvised, and see how he reacts". I did. Afterwards I asked what he thought of it. "Most impressive", he replied, adding "I'd like to hear some more music by that composer sometime, If you've got any"!

I've done an experiment with teenage music students where they had to try and decide whether the thing they were listening to was improvised or precisely notated. They all were convinced that Ligeti's piano concerto was improvised and "The Issue at Hand" (http://www.matchlessrecordings.com/such-issue-hand ) was carefully composed and notated !

[Bryn]

ustad vilayat khan was incomparable

Indeed he was. Late this evening I must spin something from the All-Night Prom he master minded in 1981.

[Bryn]

"The Issue at Hand"

That's another one I am prompted to spin this evening.

[Byas'd Opinion]

What about Hans Werner Henze? He composed several major works, including his operas The Bassarids and Elegy for Young Lovers and the 5th Symphony in the first part of the decade, before turning to more explicitly political music towards the end of the decade (The Raft of the Medusa etc.)