What about Cheltenham eh?

[Sydney Grew]

In the "Radio 3" introduction to last week's "Hear and Now" we are presented with the following bit of babble: "Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival is the largest festival of its type in the UK, a truly international focus on the best in contemporary and new music."

The first question which at once arises in our mind is, "What about Cheltenham?" Is that not an altogether superior sort of locality?

And a second question is, "What is this claimed difference between 'contemporary' and 'new' music?" We are at a loss there and no distinction is evident.

[MrGongGong]

What about Cheltenham ?
Nothing wrong with it
but its not the same sort of festival as Huddersfield
which (quite rightly IMV) has a huge international reputation (a few years ago i was working in Japan and one of the people i was with asked me where i was off to next , "HCMF" i replied to which the response was "wonderful, i've always wanted to go to Huddersfield" )

[maestro267]

"What is this claimed difference between 'contemporary' and 'new' music?"

Personally I think the two terms are interchangeable. Maybe 'new' music is music that is being composed now, (in which case a piece can only be classed as 'new music' until after its first performance), and 'contemporary' music can encompass the music composed during one's lifetime.

[french frank]

And a second question is, "What is this claimed difference between 'contemporary' and 'new' music?" We are at a loss there and no distinction is evident.

Hmmm, well, I'm not being flippant in saying 'It's what the person who uses it intends it to mean.' Not helpful, but merely indicating something of a difficulty in finding terminology which is generally used, understood and approved of.

My own use is for 'contemporary' to mean the work of living composers, perhaps over recent decades; and for New Music to be an umbrella term for, broadly speaking, post war work including experimental, electronic, and excluding anything written in traditional tonal styles.

It satisfies me but will probably incite hordes of objectors

[doversoul1]

If pressed, I would think that new music implies something more experimental, Musique concrète types and contemporary music refers to the music composed by (largely) living composers and mostly irrespective of their composing styles. Would you call, for example, James MacMillan a composer of new music?

I have got my coat ready.

[ahinton]

Personally I think the two terms are interchangeable. Maybe 'new' music is music that is being composed now, (in which case a piece can only be classed as 'new music' until after its first performance), and 'contemporary' music can encompass the music composed during one's lifetime.

I would find it hard to agree with this, given that it would identify the definition of "contemporary" music as personal to whoever might define it, which would effectively mean that, to Elliott Carter, Florent Schmitt's Piano Quintet, Delius's In a Summer Garden, Rachmaninov's Second Symphony and Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde all fall under that category since they were completed in the year of his birth, which would surely be rather ridiculous to most of us!

[Alain Bashung]

I'd agree completely with you, FF - except exactly the other way round!

[french frank]

I'd agree completely with you, FF - except exactly the other way round!

I think that might be progress!

The problem with your interpretation (well, and mine too, when I think about it) is that it would be hard to deny that Karl Jenkins, Nigel Hess and Patrick Hawes were 'contemporary' composers. But the meaning of the word clearly has a chronological implication, 'those who are composing at the same time' - either the same time as each other or at the same time as us, their audience.

[MrGongGong]

So that would make Einaudi (penny in the bad taste box !) "Contemporary" but not "New" music ?

[french frank]

So that would make Einaudi (penny in the bad taste box !) "Contemporary" but not "New" music ?

I knew the name but not the music. Having listened to a few YouTubes, I'd say he wasn't 'contemporary' under my definition because he goes with Karl Jenkins, Nigel Hess and Patrick Hawes. In an etymological sense, of course he's contemporary. But stylistically he sounds more like certain pop musicians who aim at mass audiences. If you include both strands of development, the term seems meaningless.

[ahinton]

Not wanting to name specific individuals here, I would nevertheless opine that "new" music and "contemporary" music are one and the same thing at any given time, since the epithet "new" could reasonably be expected to apply to music that has not been written before by its composers; I don't think that the style/s involved or the extent to which any music has, or is perceived to have, recourse to music that is not new/contemporary can be a deciding factor.

[MrGongGong]

I knew the name but not the music.

lucky you
and to think who his teacher was !!!!

[french frank]

I don't think that the style/s involved or the extent to which any music has, or is perceived to have, recourse to music that is not new/contemporary can be a deciding factor.

So would you consider that Hear & Now should be focusing on recently composed music, regardless of the "style" in which it's composed? (And I do mean "regardless")

[doversoul1]

But do we actually talk about ‘new music’ to mean a newly composed work? I have an impression that the term ‘New music’ came about to refer to the music that had particular characteristics other than simply being a chronological reference.

[ahinton]

So would you consider that Hear & Now should be focusing on recently composed music, regardless of the "style" in which it's composed? (And I do mean "regardless")

I would consider that Hear & Now's brief is and indeed should be whatever its producer/s believe/s that it should be; if its chosen brief is principally to promote and disseminate what it might consider to be "cutting edge" work, that's fine, although it has to be said that there is already quite a wide stylistic divergence between the various works that have been featured on it to date, so if it chose to focus on recently composed music I'm not so sure that the programme title would necessarily be undermined as a consequence.