Howard Goodall on BBC Two

[ahinton]

Well, there's not THAT much money for sport, is there?

Whilst "THAT" does not denote a specific sum, I'd say that there was far more than is necessary, particular as most sport is far better able to attract private and corporate subsidy than is Western "classical" music including series about its history.

[Mr Pee]

Whilst "THAT" does not denote a specific sum, I'd say that there was far more than is necessary, particular as most sport is far better able to attract private and corporate subsidy than is Western "classical" music including series about its history.

You and I might well think that; however, the fact is that whether we like it or not, many more people will watch Sport on the TV than will watch a classical music concert, or a series about it. And if the BBC were to simply stop bidding for an event such as Wimbledon on financial grounds, rhere would be a far greater outcry from the general public than if they were to, say, halve the length of the Prom season, or cut an orchestra.

The BBC do have to at least try and give the great British public what they want, whilst also attempting not to dumb down completely, recent developments at Radio 3 notwithstanding. And it is fairly obvious that more of them want to watch Wimbledon or the 6 Nations than want to watch a TV series on the history of music.

[ahinton]

You and I might well think that; however, the fact is that whether we like it or not, many more people will watch Sport on the TV than will watch a classical music concert, or a series about it. And if the BBC were to simply stop bidding for an event such as Wimbledon on financial grounds, rhere would be a far greater outcry from the general public than if they were to, say, halve the length of the Prom season, or cut an orchestra.

The BBC do have to at least try and give the great British public what they want, whilst also attempting not to dumb down completely, recent developments at Radio 3 notwithstanding. And it is fairly obvious that more of them want to watch Wimbledon or the 6 Nations than want to watch a TV series on the history of music.

It's disappointing that your response above makes no reference to my observation (despite your quoting it) that "most sport is far better able to attract private and corporate subsidy than is Western "classical" music including series about its history", for that is a salient point; when Simon Rattle finally leaves BPO, for example, I do not imagine that there will fights involving eight-figure transfer fees, despite his international fame, but then that's not how the funding of the world of Western "classical" music works, as you surely know.

[Mr Pee]

Why should you expect Classical music to attract private and/or corporate subsidy? It is-sadly- a minority interest, with, like it or not, a somewhat elitist reputation. If I were running a large company, I would know full well that sticking the company or product name on the side of a Formula One car, or on a Premier League teams' shirt, is going to give it massively more exposure than sponsoring a series of concerts by the Berlin Philharmonic, or the production of an opera at Covent Garden.

[ahinton]

Why should you expect Classical music to attract private and/or corporate subsidy? It is-sadly- a minority interest, with, like it or not, a somewhat elitist reputation. If I were running a large company, I would know full well that sticking the company or product name on the side of a Formula One car, or on a Premier League teams' shirt, is going to give it massively more exposure than sponsoring a series of concerts by the Berlin Philharmonic, or the production of an opera at Covent Garden.

Oh, dearie me! It DOES get private and corporate subsidy but, as it gets but a fraction of what sport gets, sport is a far less needy cause! Do you get it now?!

[Mr Pee]

Oh, dearie me! It DOES get private and corporate subsidy but, as it gets but a fraction of what sport gets, sport is a far less needy cause! Do you get it now?!

I think I do, but not for the first time I really don't know what point you are trying to make. Or rather, I do, but it is a different one from the one you started off making. We all know that classical music gets less sponsorship than sport.

[ahinton]

I think I do, but not for the first time I really don't know what point you are trying to make. Or rather, I do, but it is a different one from the one you started off making. We all know that classical music gets less sponsorship than sport.

Indeed - and I'm glad that you at least think that you're now getting the point even though you then go on to say that you don't know what it is(!) - and it is that (most) sport is simply not in need of the level of financial support that Western "classical" music needs and doesn't get to anything like the same degree, so it's not therefore about minority or majority interests so much as who needs the most money from where.

[mercia]

just watching part 3 of this series

HG says that Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven use a "symplified palette of chords" [i.e. his chords I,IV,V ] compared to the Baroque era. is this quite true I wonder. surely there are great swathes of Handel [not to say Vivaldi] which are made up of those three chords and nothing else.

??

he says that the classical symphony was a completely new invention of Stamitz implying it had no connection with what had come before. I'm sure I was taught that it grew naturally out of the suite and concerto grosso of the Baroque period - ['symphony' wasn't a new made-up word]

?

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

...ah mercia but it is 'his view' of how music came to be as it is ... lovely as i find it, the programme speeds glossily along and has me wondering what is being omitted ... grateful to you for pointing to one such area of complexity masked by HG's veneer ...

[verismissimo]

I haven't watched much of this, and, wondering why not, I think it's partly because he generally sounds as if he's about to make a witticism, but doesn't.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

HG says that Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven use a "symplified palette of chords" [i.e. his chords I,IV,V ]

Oh, lor'! He didn't, did he? Ignoring the Dominant minor Ninths, the Augmented Sixth chords, the modulations to flattened mediants, the subdominant seventh chords - to say nothing of the Interrupted Cadences.

If he'd said "compared to the Harmonizations of a Bach Chorale", then he has a case (although a very oversimplified one). If he'd said that Stamitz and co use a "more simplified palette of chords" than Bach, Handel or Purcell, then he's on safer ground. But, as it stands, it can't be justified.

he says that the classical symphony was a completely new invention of Stamitz implying it had no connection with what had come before. I'm sure I was taught that it grew naturally out of the suite and concerto grosso of the Baroque period - ['symphony' wasn't a new made-up word]

?

Well, he's sort of on firmer ground here. Stamitz didn't invent the word "Sinfonia", but he and his contemporaries were the first to move the term from the Italian Overture sense of the word to an independent instrumental piece with its place in the "Concert Hall". The structures that make up the Classical Symphony are, as you say, founded in Baroque instrumental works - the problem of how the Enlightenment Mind made sense of Music without words could have an hour-long programme all of its own and as fascinating as Andrew Graham Dixon's Ice-Age Art. But Music doesn't get that sort of programme.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

he problem of how the Enlightenment Mind made sense of Music without words could have an hour-long programme all of its own and as fascinating as Andrew Graham Dixon's Ice-Age Art. But Music doesn't get that sort of programme

absolutely agree with all of that mr f

[french frank]

the problem of how the Enlightenment Mind made sense of Music without words could have an hour-long programme all of its own and as fascinating as Andrew Graham Dixon's Ice-Age Art. But Music doesn't get that sort of programme.

Radio 3 could and should attempt such programmes. And even BBC 4. BBC2, maybe not. But RW chairs the BBC Classical Music Board so his influence is key...

Ed: Removed reference to being an 'elitist', as there are some 'out there' who don't appreciate when it's being used ironically.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

But RW chairs the BBC Classical Music Board so his influence is key.

...alas

[amateur51]

Oh, lor'! He didn't, did he? Ignoring the Dominant minor Ninths, the Augmented Sixth chords, the modulations to flattened mediants, the subdominant seventh chords - to say nothing of the Interrupted Cadences.

If he'd said "compared to the Harmonizations of a Bach Chorale", then he has a case (although a very oversimplified one). If he'd said that Stamitz and co use a "more simplified palette of chords" than Bach, Handel or Purcell, then he's on safer ground. But, as it stands, it can't be justified.



Well, he's sort of on firmer ground here. Stamitz didn't invent the word "Sinfonia", but he and his contemporaries were the first to move the term from the Italian Overture sense of the word to an independent instrumental piece with its place in the "Concert Hall". The structures that make up the Classical Symphony are, as you say, founded in Baroque instrumental works - the problem of how the Enlightenment Mind made sense of Music without words could have an hour-long programme all of its own and as fascinating as Andrew Graham Dixon's Ice-Age Art. But Music doesn't get that sort of programme.

I love it when ferney gets on his tecknickle soap-box