Howard Goodall on BBC Two

[Julien Sorel]

I didn't, but thanks for the link . It was remembered from the Faber Mozart book (companion?) H. C. Robbins Landon edited in 1991 (and which is in a box somewhere hereabouts but I know not where ).

[Ian]

I think a convincing case could be made that he was failing. The G minor piano quartet was commissioned as one of a set of three by Franz Anton Hoffmeister, a music publisher. Once he'd seen the G minor he told Mozart not to bother with the rest: the one he'd written was too difficult for Hoffmeister's public and wouldn't sell.

Not only Mozart, but the evidence that the Beatles were turned down by DECCA and many other companies just goes to show what failures they were.

[Julien Sorel]

Not only Mozart, but the evidence that the Beatles were turned down by DECCA and many other companies just goes to show what failures they were.

Don't follow. DECCA were wrong about The Beatles. Hoffmeister may well have been right about Mozart's G minor piano quartet. The work isn't widely reckoned to be a failure now (it's widely reckoned one of Mozart's greatest works), but that shows it depends how you define failure, doesn't it? If Mozart alienated his audience by writing music they didn't want (or music the music buying public couldn't play: only with the Schuppanzigh Quartet that I know of did public, professional, chamber music making enter the scene), then in that sense he was a failure, wasn't he? Maybe someone who could have done OK if the conditions for private patronage had been better, but not someone who engaged with the needs and interests of a general audience. Which I'd thought was sort of your touchstone?

You wrote: At the pub quiz last night a friend asked if I had seen the HG series. He had just watched the Classical period episode and had enjoyed it immensely. He particularly liked the comment about Mozart and Haydn, finding that it concurred with his experience and (and this is the important bit) found the explanation, that Mozart had to find and keep an audience as a freelancer, convincing. Except it's not convincing if it's not true, is it? (or if it's very partially and selectively true). So maybe the important bit is Mozart had some success, struck as it were a chord, and then failed to engage properly with his audience.

[french frank]

that Mozart had to find and keep an audience as a freelancer

From 7 Dec 1787 Mozart was back in employment, in service with the Emperor as Kammerkomponist at 800 gulden p.a, aged 31. (Gluck, his predecessor in the job got 1,000 gulden.) Not exactly a flourishing freelance career.

And re subscriptions: in June 1788, Mozart refers to three string quartets which had been offered 'on subscription' in April that year and when he received the money, a loan could be repaid. The subscription was later extended until January 1789, so it sounds like it was hard going.

[aeolium]

At the pub quiz last night a friend asked if I had seen the HG series. He had just watched the Classical period episode and had enjoyed it immensely. He particularly liked the comment about Mozart and Haydn, finding that it concurred with his experience and (and this is the important bit) found the explanation, that Mozart had to find and keep an audience as a freelancer, convincing.

So I wonder, if this view is merely polemical, what would an opposing view posit?

Well, I hoped it would be possible to post a non-polemical view but apparently not I just thought that someone watching that who had not heard any of Mozart's or Haydn's music (unlike your pub friend) might conclude that Mozart was mainly an exceptional tunesmith and Haydn couldn't write tunes at all. That seems to me both reductionist and inaccurate: reductionist in that it does not take account of the music Mozart wrote which did not consist of exceptional tunes, or the way in which he developed his music, and inaccurate in that Haydn certainly was capable of writing tunes, even if melody was not as important to his music as it was to Mozart's. The statement about listeners to serial music just seems insulting, as if they suffered from some mental disorder.

[Quarky]

i did not hear either HG nor the Sound & Fury either telling me what to like or think .... what i thought i saw and heard were two lengthy essays of the development of music in historical context, one modern one more 'universal' .... how any author could do this in three to six hours when i have no doubt that entire degree syllabi fail to encompass some element that may be an essential key in some point of view or constituency beats me ....

i thought they were both polemical television at its best .... and as posted afore can we have lots more please ....

i do not find the posts here that reflect on HG's competence at all convincing since he clearly disagrees with posters here as to the nature and importance of eg serialism etc as posters disagree with his pov ... indeed the negative reaction to the programme series rather makes the point that it was polemical and a jolly good thing too.... Fry was waxing Wagner to a high gloss no? ... anathema to some of us but it made me think and open my ears .... [then the fat lady warbled at volume and i fled] ...

both of these programmes [HG and Sound and Fury] are fine examples of what we should die to defend ... polemic with sincerity and integrity ... and imv we need loads more of them not less

Having heard and enjoyed Steve Reich's concert last night at RFH (Radio Rewrite!), and also having heard HG's extravagant claims on the influence of minimalism on the course of 20th Century music in a trailer on R3, I think I see where he's coming from. Of course Elvis was the greatest, or the Beatles or Beyonce - it all depends who is making the statements and for whom the statements are intended. I guess this is true and has to borne in mind, no matter the amount of intellectual analysis and alleged "objectivity".

[Ferretfancy]

Oddball
To be fair,in the introduction repeated each week he does say that there are many different ways of telling the story of music, and his is one.

[Quarky]

Oddball
To be fair,in the introduction repeated each week he does say that there are many different ways of telling the story of music, and his is one.

OK Ferretfancy - since I did not watch any of the programmes, I guess I should not criticise HG overmuch.

However I do have a bone to pick with Steve Reich. What is the point of attempting to slag off serialism? If the justification for minimalism is simply that it prevents an alternative path, one is much more aligned with popular music, then that is not much of a recommendation, in my book (Cf. John Cage - Beethoven was wrong!). Minimalism should stand or fall by the musical value of compositions within that genre, some of which will be pretty ordinary, and some of which are more outstanding.

[Sir Velo]

Hi Oddball, bit OT, but isn't your Location a bit of an oxymoron these days?

[Quarky]

Hi Oddball, bit OT, but isn't your Location a bit of an oxymoron these days?

And Hi to you Sir Velo. I thank you for reminding me of that strange word oxymoron, but as far I know, we don't have any of those in Hertfordshire. But it is good place for veloing around!
Anyhow, what did you think of the Steve Reich concert?

But just to correct an inaccuracy in my previous post: "In an interview with The Guardian, Reich stated that he continues to follow this direction with his piece Double Sextet (2007), which was commissioned by eighth blackbird, an American ensemble consisting of the instrumental quintet (flute, clarinet, violin or viola, cello and piano) of Schoenberg's piece Pierrot Lunaire (1912) plus percussion. Reich states that he was thinking about Stravinsky's Agon (1957) as a model for the instrumental writing".

[mercia]

the Goodall series getting a repeat by the looks of it

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01rlm5r/howard-goodalls-story-of-music-learning-zone-episode-1