Prom 46 (16.8.12): Vaughan Williams – Symphonies Nos. 4, 5 & 6

[An_Inspector_Calls]

The RVW 4, 5 & 6 Prom is now up on the iPlayer Listen Again facility. I noticed at least one audio drop-out via BBC4 Freeview. I will have a quick look at the dynamic profile of the Listen Again HDS offering before turning in.

A quick look shows no signs of dynamic limitation. Maximum peak was 3.9dB below saturation (clipping level), during the scherzo of the 6th. Off to bed now. Will have a closer look and listen in a couple of days time (after recovering from the Cage events).

Have you done this yet, Bryn? I've had a look and I think there's an easily detected fade up commencing at 0'.45" (from the beginning of the finale) to 1'.30". It's well worth removing.

[Boilk]

On this question of the importance of a composer's individual voice...

Individualism, and not just technical ability, seems justifiably to be a prerequisite for being generally deemed (in academia and the concert hall alike) a tier 1 composer. Are there any titans of the last two centuries whose mature work could be mistaken for veiled pastiches of their contemporaries?

What worries me is when extreme individualism has been chiefly responsible for putting a composer on a pedestal wholly disproportionate to the hit-and-miss quality of music on offer (Nancarrow, Cage and Glass immediately come to mind).

[Serial_Apologist]

Individualism, and not just technical ability, seems justifiably to be a prerequisite for being generally deemed (in academia and the concert hall alike) a tier 1 composer. Are there any titans of the last two centuries whose mature work could be mistaken for veiled pastiches of their contemporaries?

Precisely.

What worries me is when extreme individualism has been chiefly responsible for putting a composer on a pedestal wholly disproportionate to the hit-and-miss quality of music on offer (Nancarrow, Cage and Glass immediately come to mind).

I wouldn't myself describe Philip Glass's music as particularly individual or individualistic.

[Anna]

Precisely.erm: I wouldn't myself describe Philip Glass's music as particularly individual or individualistic.

Exactly, boring loop de loopsie, his sol-fa stuff is ok, but he is a one tune merchant, endlessly recycled but taking the money and laugihng all the way to the bank

[Nick Armstrong]

Exactly, boring loop de loopsie, his sol-fa stuff is ok, but he is a one tune merchant, endlessly recycled but taking the money and laugihng all the way to the bank

I have to say I am with every word of what you say there, Anna (including laugihng! )

[Extra Vaganza]

Sea, Antarctic and 8.

.

My Brits list would be: Elgar, RVW, Walton. Bax and (just) Britten - in that order

If I may return to the subject of Ralph Vaughan Williams for a moment:

I am surprised that the name of Gustav Holst has not appeared in the discussion on RVW's influences because I am sure that, although he was not a symphonist, his works must have had a great influence upon his contempories and not least upon RVW.

Does anyone have a view on this statement?

EV

[jayne lee wilson]

Have you done this yet, Bryn? I've had a look and I think there's an easily detected fade up commencing at 0'.45" (from the beginning of the finale) to 1'.30". It's well worth removing.

Very useful, AIC, thanks! This is what I reported hearing way back in msg.43, and you'll find there's a fade-down at the end of the epilogue movement before the applause begins. Haven't had time to listen again, but your measurements show it is still there.

[Bryn]

Have you done this yet, Bryn? I've had a look and I think there's an easily detected fade up commencing at 0'.45" (from the beginning of the finale) to 1'.30". It's well worth removing.

Recovery from the Cage events is still in progress. I might be able to have a look on Tuesday or Wednesday.

[Serial_Apologist]

Recovery from the Cage events is still in progress.

You're not alone in that...

[heliocentric]

What worries me is when extreme individualism has been chiefly responsible for putting a composer on a pedestal wholly disproportionate to the hit-and-miss quality of music on offer (Nancarrow, Cage and Glass immediately come to mind).

So how much individualism is the right amount? How do you measure it? Why should it matter to you, or me, or anyone else, that someone is "generally deemed ... a tier 1 composer"? If people admire the work of Cage, Glass or Nancarrow, in your words "putting them on a pedestal" (although I don't think admiring their work necessarily amounts to thus elevating them as heroic personalities), doesn't that just mean that your idea of "hit-and-miss" is different from other people's? and if so why should it "worry" you?

[heliocentric]

Very useful, AIC, thanks! This is what I reported hearing way back in msg.43, and you'll find there's a fade-down at the end of the epilogue movement before the applause begins. Haven't had time to listen again, but your measurements show it is still there.

Yes, the fade-up was pretty obvious, and led to a considerably different string sound and ambience in the closing minutes, which I think was quite a serious miscalculation.

[Boilk]

So how much individualism is the right amount? How do you measure it? Why should it matter to you, or me, or anyone else, that someone is "generally deemed ... a tier 1 composer"? If people admire the work of Cage, Glass or Nancarrow, in your words "putting them on a pedestal" (although I don't think admiring their work necessarily amounts to thus elevating them as heroic personalities), doesn't that just mean that your idea of "hit-and-miss" is different from other people's? and if so why should it "worry" you?

Suggest you read post #182 again, and you might see that I haven't attacked individualism.

As for your remarks above, best not to dignify the mentality behind them by responding.

[Bryn]

Suggest you read post #182 again, and you might see that I haven't attacked individualism.

Indeed, the attack seems to have been on what you perceive to be the variable quality of the compositional output of the composers you mention. I know fine musicians who play Nancarrow's 1st String Quartet but who dismiss his 3rd as not worth bothering with. I take a different view. They count the 3rd as a "miss", I regard it as a "hit". Some musically astute people count at least some of Glass's symphonies and concertos as 'hits'. I don't. I can't think of a Cage work which I know, and hear as a "miss". I do think he was too sweeping in his antagonism towards both Beethoven's approach to music and to improvisation in general. He also got quite mixed up re. improvisation sometimes, thinking, for instance, a performance by AMM of Cardew's Treatise was an improvisation, which it was not.

I don't find a need for others to share my views on such matters.

I don't think heliocentric missed the main point at all. Perhaps you should read h's comment again, this time concentrating on the issue of who assesses what is and what isn't "hit" or "miss", rather than the side issue of composers' individualism.

[heliocentric]

Suggest you read post #182 again, and you might see that I haven't attacked individualism.

As for your remarks above, best not to dignify the mentality behind them by responding.

You seem to reckon that both too little and too much individualism are not good, so I was just wondering what is for you the right amount, etc. As Bryn has seen, the "mentality" behind my questions was concerned with trying to get to grips with some of your assumptions, and whether you were really elevating these into dogmatic principles or just seemed to be doing so, but if you regard that as lacking in dignity I guess I shall have to draw my own conclusions.

[Extra Vaganza]

You seem to reckon that both too little and too much individualism are not good, so I was just wondering what is for you the right amount, etc. As Bryn has seen, the "mentality" behind my questions was concerned with trying to get to grips with some of your assumptions, and whether you were really elevating these into dogmatic principles or just seemed to be doing so, but if you regard that as lacking in dignity I guess I shall have to draw my own conclusions.

What on earth has all this petty squabbling to do with a thread devoted to the life and works of one of Britain's best admired composers?

Why can't you start your own thread, under "Music Matters" or something?

"A load of Bolix" would seem to me to be an appropriate title.

Miles (and years) off-post.

EV