Howard Goodall on BBC Two

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

He didn't mention that blasting Shostakovitch's 7th out on speakers during the siege of Leningrad was one of Stalin's methods to repel the German army!

.. er he did but without mentioning Stalin i believe ...

[Ian]

If you would care to define what ‘classical’ ‘modernist’ music is...

The context here is HG’s story of 20C music. His examples of the ‘modernist’ movement were Schoenberg, Webern, berg and Milton Babbitt (presumably representing a larger contingency of the usual suspects from Darmstadt etc.) He makes the point that while this movement/aesthetic was in the ascendent classical music’s status as something meaningful to most people was at it’s lowest. I agree with this and add that I think it came about through over-reliance on the importance of developing processes.

HG then went on to point out that in recent years classical has re-joined the fold (so to speak) so of course you are right and I agree with you.

Although I still think the classical institutions still like to control and filter when they can - which can effect not so much what is composed, but what is heard.

BTW I don't think HG did atonal a disservice - the audio example of Babbitt was quite attractive.

[hedgehog]

Ian, to remind you of what you said:

Globalization (in the sense of the world becoming a smaller place) has come about though developing technologies - not any particular type of music, of course. Nevertheless globalization offers the potential for unprecedented musical cross-fertilization. It can be argued that ‘classical’ ‘modernist’ music has tended to distance itself from sharing and contributing to this enlarged gene pool in favor of ‘closing ranks’ and concerning itself way too obsessively with its own processes and instinctively developing its own hermetically sealed environment. (This obviously has to be seen as a generalisation and simplification)

Your assertion here is about lack of cross fertilization, not adding to the gene pool etc, now you are backtracking to something completely different as if to answer my question.

You haven't, you've just come with another presumption "Schoenberg, Webern, berg and Milton Babbitt (presumably representing a larger contingency of the usual suspects from Darmstadt etc.)" and this being of little meaning to most people at the time. This has nothing to do with the assertion of yours above and still you don't actually provide me with a list of names.

I don't know who the "usual suspects" from Darmstadt are, because those of whom I know were extremely interested in all sorts of musics and especially in "contributing to the gene pool".

So I'd like some names please. Composers that were active well beyond World War 2 ( I mean we've moved on haven't we?), aside from one Milton Babbitt. That's not a list.

[Julien Sorel]

The context here is HG’s story of 20C music. His examples of the ‘modernist’ movement were Schoenberg, Webern, berg and Milton Babbitt (presumably representing a larger contingency of the usual suspects from Darmstadt etc.) He makes the point that while this movement/aesthetic was in the ascendent classical music’s status as something meaningful to most people was at it’s lowest. I agree with this and add that I think it came about through over-reliance on the importance of developing processes.

Do you mean most people who are interested in 'classical music'? That might be true (but then most people who are interested in 'classical music' are mostly interested in music written between the mid C18 at the earliest and the early C20th, with say Shostakovich or Britten added on. That's not incorrect is it? Medieval music, or Renaissance polyphony, or early Baroque music are all pretty much minority within a minority interests).

If you mean 'classical music' has reengaged with a wider musical world, I'm not sure that's at all true. I think fewer people than 40 / 50 years ago have any interest or recognition of classical music other than as something that makes a sort of sound and has orchestras and opera singers. And that the audiences for 'classical music' get older by the year. Hence the frantic attempts to make what seems irrelevant relevant.

I could certainly imagine a situation in which someone unfamiliar with 'classical music' would find Luigi Nono's La lontananza nostalgica utopica futura more interesting and emotionally engaging than an opera by Verdi.

[Ian]

Ian. It is all what one perceives, of course, but I found HG to be extremely judgemental...and offhandedly dismissive of what he (personally and somewhat irrationally) didn't like. Schoenberg and serialism (they're not the same!) were more or less trashed...

Perhaps I need to check, but I found his history remarkably free from judgements. He didn’t dismiss serialism (actual) as being rubbish - something not worth bothering with, but rather as something that had very little resonance with mainstream audiences compared to earlier classical music. Therefore the question isn’t whether serialism (actual and shorthand meanings) is any good or not, but what place it has in history of music that is inclusive rather than exclusive.

[Ian]

Do you mean most people who are interested in 'classical music'? That might be true (but then most people who are interested in 'classical music' are mostly interested in music written between the mid C18 at the earliest and the early C20th, with say Shostakovich or Britten added on. That's not incorrect is it?

I think that’s right - but I would add that I suspect many of those people also like other types of non-classical music as well. That’s certainly true among the many professional classical performers I know.

Medieval music, or Renaissance polyphony, or early Baroque music are all pretty much minority within a minority interests).

Yes, although there seems to be a lot more baroque music on R3 than contemporary.

If you mean 'classical music' has reengaged with a wider musical world, I'm not sure that's at all true. I think fewer people than 40 / 50 years ago have any interest or recognition of classical music other than as something that makes a sort of sound and has orchestras and opera singers. And that the audiences for 'classical music' get older by the year. Hence the frantic attempts to make what seems irrelevant relevant.

Are you not mixing up the (debatable) decline in popularity of classical music (i.e. the entire repertoire of) with the recent greater acceptance of contemporary music? For example, thirty years ago it was very rare for choirs to seek out and perform new music. This has clearly changed in recent years.

I could certainly imagine a situation in which someone unfamiliar with 'classical music' would find Luigi Nono's La lontananza nostalgica utopica futura more interesting and emotionally engaging than an opera by Verdi.

Certainly true, but Nono isn’t the only alternative to Verdi. Such a person might also find more engagement with musicals or ECM type jazz...

[Serial_Apologist]

Perhaps I need to check, but I found his history remarkably free from judgements. He didn’t dismiss serialism (actual) as being rubbish - something not worth bothering with, but rather as something that had very little resonance with mainstream audiences compared to earlier classical music.

In the penultimate programme he stated unequivocally that atonality/serialism reduced music to something which no ordinary listener would listen to.

That's effectively trashing not only the works but those of us who have got a lot out of such pieces by dint of making the effort and reaping the rewards.

[ardcarp]

.. er he did but without mentioning Stalin i believe ..

As I recall, he said it was played both to the Russians and the Germans, but did not mention that to the latter it was played at lethal decibels and in a sleep-depriving sort of way!

[Mr Pee]

In the penultimate programme he stated unequivocally that atonality/serialism reduced music to something which no ordinary listener would listen to.

That's effectively trashing not only the works but those of us who have got a lot out of such pieces by dint of making the effort and reaping the rewards.

Well, he's right, isn't he? The "ordinary listener" does not want to have to make an effort. And the vast majority of listeners DO find atonal and serialist music virtually unlisteneable.

[teamsaint]

Well, he's right, isn't he? The "ordinary listener" does not want to have to make an effort. And the vast majority of listeners DO find atonal and serialist music virtually unlisteneable.

but much of life requires an input of effort, and rewards us for so doing doesn't it?

[Julien Sorel]

And the vast majority of listeners DO find atonal and serialist music virtually unlisteneable.

The vast majority of listeners would probably say the same about vast swathes of music, Josquin, Bach, Haydn, Beethoven, Wagner, Debussy, Thelonius Monk, Miles Davis, The Raincoats, AMM .... If you tell people something is virtually unlistenable to before they've had a real chance to listen to it what's the use of that? You are constructing a preemptive prejudice and then reinforcing it.

When people write "the vast majority of listeners" I always get this odd feeling that what they really mean is "I find x unlistenable to, therefore it is."

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

And the vast majority of listeners DO find atonal and serialist music virtually unlisteneable.

Getting mellow in your older years, Mr Pee?

[ahinton]

Well, he's right, isn't he?

On what grounds?

The "ordinary listener"

Who's that, then?

does not want to have to make an effort.

Then it's best that those who really don't stop even trying to listen to any music at all. Surely you understand that composers like Hildegard, Xenakis, Pérotin, Elgar, Beethoven, Carter, Bach, Sorabji, Byrd, Chopin, Mahler, Busoni, Roslavets, Haydn, Godowsky, Tallis, Alkan et al "made an effort" to write what they did, so by what conceivable logic might you come to assume that so such effort be reqired on the part of their listeners?

And the vast majority of listeners DO find atonal and serialist music virtually unlisteneable.

Atonality is not a specific phenomenon but a matter of degree. Most serial music would not necessarily be recognised as such by most of its untrained listeners. What, therefore, are you on about?

[Ferretfancy]

I worked on filmed music documentaries not unlike the ones that Howard Goodall has been presenting.

As an example, let's imagine a Horizon programme about cosmology.
Television of this type is essentially a linear visual narrative, point A leads to point B and on to point C. In a printed article in New Scientist there is room for qualification, and the reader can always refer back, thus we may be told that point C could be changed completely if point A changes in some way. This is much more difficult to achieve on television than it is on the printed page, qualification of this kind needs to be managed very carefully if the viewer is not to lose the argument.

The problem is exacerbated due to time constraints and budget limitations, one page of a printed article may well take 50 minutes to explain on the box, and of course the programme does not unfold in real time when it is being recorded. The production team have to judge how much material to use and decide when to make edits, it's perfectly possible that in the case of this series more time was given to the discussion of serialism, but it had to be jettisoned, we don't know.

Given how little time was allowed to cover such a vast subject, I think that Howard Goodall managed well. It would be nice if the BBC had the resources available to them when making Civilisation or The Ascent of Man, but they would be unaffordable today, and in any case the viewer's stamina would be challenged. I don't like the situation, but it is so.

[MrGongGong]

When people write "the vast majority of listeners" I always get this odd feeling that what they really mean is "I find x unlistenable to, therefore it is."

Me too