Musical talents that never quite made it....

[Richard Barrett]

(It's all very different nowadays, of course )

Quite. I was just looking at the threads for "composers you can/can't do without", and thinking that's much too much emphasis on composers, I mean composers as a "breed" are no more nor less interesting than doctors or bus drivers. (Actually I am personally acquainted with only two bus drivers and I find them both highly interesting and sympathetic personalities, which is a much higher average than with the dozens of composers I've met!) I presume that many people who "couldn't do without" JS Bach or Arnold Bax would at the same time reject the kind of personality cults that surround many pop music and film stars. But is it really such a different mindset? Sorry to be offtopic, I don't know whether this kind of subject is of interest to anyone here.

[MrGongGong]

Now that is an impressive CV. I on the other hand have been a member of Chas & Dave, Focus and Einstürzende Neubauten.

What a great gig that would be ...... could you get them all to play together as a finale ?
A kind of falsetto giant rabbit that will bring the house down (literally ?)

[salymap]

Quite. I was just looking at the threads for "composers you can/can't do without", and thinking that's much too much emphasis on composers, I mean composers as a "breed" are no more nor less interesting than doctors or bus drivers. (Actually I am personally acquainted with only two bus drivers and I find them both highly interesting and sympathetic personalities, which is a much higher average than with the dozens of composers I've met!) I presume that many people who "couldn't do without" JS Bach or Arnold Bax would at the same time reject the kind of personality cults that surround many pop music and film stars. But is it really such a different mindset? Sorry to be offtopic, I don't know whether this kind of subject is of interest to anyone here.

I spent mylife in jobs where I met composers, conductors and various musicians. The best way of coping with all of them wasto be as efficient as possible and treat them as you would a bus driver, if you knew one

I remember the little things, Boult's passion for collecting elastic bands for his batons,
Harriet Cohen's amazing chumminess on the phone, Geofrey Bush and his helping write another composer's detective stories.

On the whole, all extremely ordinary. The thread wasn't about them, their music is somehow a thing apart. In MHO of course.

[MrGongGong]

I presume that many people who "couldn't do without" JS Bach or Arnold Bax would at the same time reject the kind of personality cults that surround many pop music and film stars. But is it really such a different mindset? .

I don't think it is...... the Elgarians are a case in point (as are the loveable chaps of the Stockhausen society !), it's interesting coupled with the other thread as i'd bet hard cash that many who dismiss some composers haven't really bothered to listen to the music in a context that is conducive to the nature of the music in question. I remember having an "argument" on the old R3 board with someone who insisted that Alvin Luciers music wasn't music and was all rubbish on the basis of a few trips to Youtube.

[Richard Barrett]

What a great gig that would be ...

I'd also forgotten my esteemed fellow member of the so-called Swansea School, Karl Jenkins.

[Richard Barrett]

the loveable chaps of the Stockhausen society

They'd be enough to give Stockhausen a bad name if he didn't already have one.

[ahinton]

Quite. I was just looking at the threads for "composers you can/can't do without", and thinking that's much too much emphasis on composers, I mean composers as a "breed" are no more nor less interesting than doctors or bus drivers. (Actually I am personally acquainted with only two bus drivers and I find them both highly interesting and sympathetic personalities, which is a much higher average than with the dozens of composers I've met!) I presume that many people who "couldn't do without" JS Bach or Arnold Bax would at the same time reject the kind of personality cults that surround many pop music and film stars. But is it really such a different mindset? Sorry to be offtopic, I don't know whether this kind of subject is of interest to anyone here.

It's certainly of great interest to me and I for one would be delighted if you decide to develop it here!

[ahinton]

I'd also forgotten my esteemed fellow member of the so-called Swansea School, Karl Jenkins.

Ah, indeed (and how embarrassing!) - but what about your other Swansea School candidate, Gareth Walters?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Quite. I was just looking at the threads for "composers you can/can't do without", and thinking that's much too much emphasis on composers, I mean composers as a "breed" are no more nor less interesting than doctors or bus drivers. (Actually I am personally acquainted with only two bus drivers and I find them both highly interesting and sympathetic personalities, which is a much higher average than with the dozens of composers I've met!) I presume that many people who "couldn't do without" JS Bach or Arnold Bax would at the same time reject the kind of personality cults that surround many pop music and film stars. But is it really such a different mindset? Sorry to be offtopic, I don't know whether this kind of subject is of interest to anyone here.

I'm reminded of that footage of the young man who went to visit John Lennon because he was sure that Lennon was addressing him personally in one of his songs. Lennon reasons with him, but the guy remains unconvinced, so Lennon just gives him breakfast. It's because Artists give something that affects others so personally that it can seem as if they must know what we're like, and that their work gives us a sense of belonging and focus that other professionals don't. (Doctors, Paramedics etc can be more literally involved in our well-being, but we tend to meet them only at times which later we'd rather not dwell on.) The more their work does this, the more it feels as if the creator "must" be like us; must know us better than we do ourselves. It's a delusion: the Music, Art, Literature creates responses to what's already implanted by "experience" into our subconscious - which is partly why groups of people respond so very differently even to works that they all "can't live without", and why "Haitink's Mahler" is so different from Bernstein's - and why, if you put four Schenkerians in the same room with a copy of a Haydn Piano Sonata, you get half-a-dozen conflicting analyses of it.

Bus drivers (for example) tend not to do this - and those that do become our friends or lovers - but the Art that we love cuts through the crap and gets straight to our minds. Helluva responsibility you guys have!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

... and why it can seem sometimes like a personal attack when someone expresses contempt for the Art that gives us the greatest pleasure and fulfilment. And why it can cause a sense almost of personal betrayal when an Artist who has produced work that someone responds to positively, then moves into completely different means of expression. (Feldman's response to Philip Guston's work of the 70s, for example - or we could go to the extreme and return to John Lennon.) It's an unreasonable obligation with which some people try to burden creative Artists; which may be why the saying "Never meet your heroes" was coined - as much for the benfit of the "hero". Better get rid of the notion of "the Artist as Hero" altogether - very few of them could live up to such an unnecessary image.

[vinteuil]

Proust seems to have felt that a Great Artist wd probably appear to have a very nondescript 'personality' - all the 'interesting stuff' would have been put into the Art, leaving little left for any 'personality'. Hence the young Marcel's disappointment at the worldly ordinariness of Bergotte, Elstir, Vinteuil.

Tho' of course Proust hisself seems to have been a most interesting person as well as a great artist...

[Serial_Apologist]

Proust seems to have felt that a Great Artist wd probably appear to have a very nondescript 'personality' - all the 'interesting stuff' would have been put into the Art, leaving little left for any 'personality'.

This I have personally found very often to be the case, though there are exceptions, I've found, in the jazz world, with which I'm more familiar than the classical. Many artists, musical or visual, hate critics; yet we have our function, maybe; like artists, who have no innate requirement to verbalise their art and arguably much greater wish or need to be selective in their views of their fellows for all manner of reasons, justified and un-, we have our likes and dislikes. But by being, ourselves, non-creative, not to mention self-appointed elucidators, we are in the luxurious position of being able to be open-eared, open-minded, and under greater obligation so to be, if we are to be considered their mouthpieces.

Some people one just knows, of course, as a writer, one could have got more out of in an interview...

[Dave2002]

Call me old-fashioned, but I disagree (and with Dave2002): Music that has the power to astonish, awaken, delight and make the listener feel simultaneously humble and magnificently grateful to be alive is still being written, and that's my criteria for a work of "towering genius". I named 15 such figures (all of them living) on the "8 Composers you can't live without" Thread.

Perhaps you would care to enlighten us and in particular me about which are the composers you feel are "the ones to watch". Also, I'd suggest not being quite so hard on HS - or he'll go off again, and then we won't see any more of his really enjoyable photos.

I am aware of some modern/contemporary composers - some still alive, others not so. I can't say any of them stand out for me. I have enjoyed music by Graham Fitkin, but that doesn't mean it's great. I'm not particularly fond of Thomas Ades, though I've heard him play the piano, and the same applies to Mark Anthony Turnage, who I'm sure is a good musician and sincere. I once went to a concert/recording at Maida Vale with the BBC SO, and at the end there was an announcement that there was to be a forthcoming weekend of music by Turnage. Almost all of the orchestra, who were still there, came in on cue, with a very loud and extended "Boo". Harrison Birtwistle is another whose work I have not taken to. OK - you can blame me, say it's my fault, I'm not listening in the right environment, with the right frame of mind, right ears etc., but what am I as a mere listener supposed to do? Pretend I like stuff, when really I don't!

One piece which I did enjoy was Liquid Marble, by Anders Hillborg, though I didn't like his "peacock" clarinet concerto much. I might have been in the wrong frame of mind when I heard that one. I heard both of these live.

I do appreciate some of John Tavener's music - though perhaps a little of it goes a long way. Jennifer Higdon and Joan Tower have written music which I think is significantly more interesting than much other contemporary music - also Michael Torke - though he seems to have receded a bit in recent years. Further, there may be some form of regression, as some slightly earlier composers, such as Xenakis and Stockhausen have written music which is more interesting (to me, obviously) than some of the up to date music by others. Steve Martland wrote some interesting pieces, but that doesn't make his music "great". Elliott Carter has written some worthwhile pieces - even if HS doesn't like his work. Of some composers already mentioned I thought Richard Rodney Bennett was very talented, and mostly I enoyed his music, but that doesn't make it great. George Crumb has written some worthwhile, and also some large scale works - but enough to be considered "great". Maybe/Maybe not.

I'm obviously now old enough to remember the excitement of hearing new works by Britten, Tippett and Stravinsky. Who are the present day composers who generate similar excitement now?

[Richard Barrett]

I'd suggest not being quite so hard on HS - or he'll go off again

Well he always seems to come back, and if he's going to be so dismissive about modern music he ought at least to get his facts right!

there may be some form of regression, as some slightly earlier composers, such as Xenakis and Stockhausen have written music which is more interesting (to me, obviously) than some of the up to date music by others

That is very true. I think that succeeding generations of composers (with exceptions, obviously) have gradually abandoned the sense of exploration and discovery that motivated people like Stockhausen and Xenakis, which is a shame.

[MrGongGong]

That is very true. I think that succeeding generations of composers (with exceptions, obviously) have gradually abandoned the sense of exploration and discovery that motivated people like Stockhausen and Xenakis, which is a shame.

I'm not sure that that is strictly true ?
I think it probably is within the world of "contemporary classical" instrumental music
but not in other genres , it seems to my ears that some of the more interesting things I hear are hybrid musics that draw on traditions of Stockhausen, Xenakis , Acousmatic and improvised musics etc but have a more "handmade" quality than the work of the apparent "mainstream" (which is often competent but a bit dull !).........