What's good about twentieth century music?

[some guy]

Lance asked in another thread if I would say what I like about twentieth century music, and if I could list my top three.

Three? Lance, if I had to name only thirty, that would still kill me.

Even saying only briefly what I like poses serious difficulties. While I had heard some stuff earlier, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Janacek, it wasn't until 1972 and an lp of Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra (yeah, it was the Reiner) that I really started paying attention. And there's so much to like--so many things happened, so many different things.

Basically, everything was rethought--melody, rhythm, harmony, tonality--until eventually all sound (all sounds) were invited to play. The tape recorder was useful for that, you could not only put any sound on tape (from an orchestra to a train whistle to a clap of thunder), but you could change them all in many different ways.

And not only the sounds, but the whole idea of what a piece means, of what music means, changed. It was all pretty exciting and bewildering, and while some of the superficial excitement has died down a bit, the sense that there's so much to do has not faded I think. I hate hearing that we're into a new more melodic time now, as if Part and Taverner and the like were the only people writing music. I like those guys, but there's really no single trend. Dumitrescu and Rowe and Gobeil and Avram and Ferreyra are all still very much alive, and none of them are doing anything like what Corigliano or Rutter are doing, really they're not. Plurality became the name of the game early in the 1900s, and it's still the name.

[Chalkperson]

Lance asked in another thread if I would say what I like about twentieth century music, and if I could list my top three.

Three? Lance, if I had to name only thirty, that would still kill me.

Here's fifteen...

Morton Feldman
Sofia Gubadulina
Gavin Bryars
Avro Part
Frank Martin
Luigi Nono
Luchiano Berio
Eleni Karaindrou
James MacMillan
Peteris Vasks
Edgar Varese
Gyorgy Kurtak
Nino Rota
John Tavener
Witold Lutoslowski

[James]

though i do like stuff from the older composers the largest quantity of music i enjoy is in the 20th century...

[IcedNote]

For the most part, I can't stand 20th century music because I can't stand atonal music. Regardless of percentages, I dare say that most people think "atonal" when thinking "20th century."

That being said, I like a lot of 20th century stuff that's (mostly) tonal while pushing those boundaries:

R. Strauss
Mahler
Prokofiev
Scriabin
Shostakovich
some Stravinksy
Wolf


-G

[Lance]

For the most part, I can't stand 20th century music because I can't stand atonal music. Regardless of percentages, I dare say that most people think "atonal" when thinking "20th century."

That being said, I like a lot of 20th century stuff that's (mostly) tonal while pushing those boundaries:

R. Strauss
Mahler
Prokofiev
Scriabin
Shostakovich
some Stravinksy
Wolf


-G

I have the same problem with atonal music or compositions that are mostly just "noise." (I have the same problem with 20th-century art as well) ... simply little toleration for it. Most of the composers you mention come from the tonal school and are the offshoots of 19th-century tutelage. Still, some of those composers listed, primarily Shostakovich and Stravinsky, wrote some fairly raucous music. Perhaps, one day, it's time will come. Whenever I attend a modern-music concert or recital, it is very poorly attended with even fewer people showing up after an intermission. I'm not against it at all, it's just not for me. Thankfully we have enough music of all kinds to make everyone happy!

[IcedNote]

Whenever I attend a modern-music concert or recital, it is very poorly attended with even fewer people showing up after an intermission. I'm not against it at all, it's just not for me. Thankfully we have enough music of all kinds to make everyone happy![/color]

We talked about this in my Psychology of Music course the other week. One way to view this problem is with Information Theory. Information Theory basically states that the ability to perceive something is directly related to the redundancy of the stimuli. In other words, the more familiar you are with the language, the more readily you'll be able to perceive it and "make it meaningful."

Tonal music has been around all of us (presumably) our entire lives: advertising jingles, religious songs, popular music, and, of course, traditional classical music. We are able to perceive this tonal music because we are familiar with the language. Most melodies are step-wise and contain the notes of a typical Western scale. So when we hear a new tonal melody, we already have a basis for which to understand it.

When atonal music came about, we had no frame of reference for the language. It was so different from what we were used to that we had no way of understanding it. Atonal composers tried to work around this problem by restating ideas over and over within a piece...to make these ideas redundant. So sometimes - after repeated listenings - we are able to group these "atonal melodies" into a reference set and understand the rest of the work. Unfortunately (from my point of view), all atonal composers don't follow the same "rules," so even listening to a body of atonal works won't help you understand a new atonal piece. A lot of intense and active listening is required for a listener to understand these works, and the fact of the matter is that your average Joe isn't going to want to take the time. Hence, the failure of atonal music to truly "catch on."

-G

[James]

"atonality" is a term that has stuck but there is no such thing really...its inaccurate...even schoenberg himself disapproved of it. what you get is music that modulates from note to note, thus greater weight and importance on each one, and seeks to hault harmonic gravity....arnie was a bonafide genius and did what had to be done and it was apart of a natural evolution that stems way back, though he suffered for it...

this "crisis or crumbling of tonality" stems all the way to wagner and a clear lineage can be drawn, there are examples of it in jsbach as well and others....the big 12 tone composers schoenberg, berg and webern were definitely deeply entrenched and connected with tradition, if you've heard enough of their stuff it's obvious....same goes with practically all 20th century masters, things evolve and sure there is some pretty arbitrary stuff but after all the dust has settled it's the good stuff that's known....it's not as shocking and ugly people make it out to be, in fact it's the opposite, deep and profound music making and expanding and extending the language/horizons. i think it's just a matter of conditioning to be-able to hear and enjoy the textures, thus opening the ears more and having them able to decipher more complicated musical diction so to speak, when this is achieved lots of things that were once perceived as "noise" won't be, and the listeners idea and enjoyment of what music is an can-be will be widened....im perplexed that people still make a deal out of it actually.

ok, ramble mode: off

[some guy]

It's true. "Atonality" was coined by a journalist, to describe what he didn't like. It was a slam from the beginning.

I started out in classical music with Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky and Beethoven. I quickly added Brahms and Schumann and Grieg and Haydn and all the rest. I hit Bartok and Bruckner at the same time. I love Bruckner, but Bartok really did it for me. My ears have never been the same since then. I often wonder how much more I would have enjoyed Mahler if I'd gotten to him earlier.

It's true about the "noise," too. If by noise you mean "unpleasant sounds." One huge advantage I've found in listening to new music is that fewer and fewer sounds stay in the unpleasant column. After years of white boards, I discovered one day teaching again in a older classroom that fingernails on the blackboard had lost its irritating quality. That all that was left was a lovely sound.

I blame Cage!

[slofstra]

Plurality became the name of the game early in the 1900s, and it's still the name.

I might argue, and I think I will, that the atonal movement represents the culmination and then demise of a certain thread in Western music, that is, Germanic, male dominated, grandiose. Each successive generation stands on the shoulders of the previous, until there is nothing left to achieve. A progression that introduces dissonance as a spice in the music, and then leaves nothing but spice, not too appetizing. A progression that intellectualizes itself into something like 4'33" which is all intellect and no feeling.

Against that thread, there is indeed a 'plurality', which did indeed begin in 1900 as composers looked for new roots in their respective traditions, as did Kodaly, Vaughan Williams, Bartok, Gershwin, Takemitsu and others. And this plurality, I think represents the forward thrust in orchestral music today. But in my view, atonality is already being left behind. Or one way to say it, we've moved from 'modern' music into the plurality of 'post-modern'. To me, the British composers were the first to rise against the Germanic trend. WWI probably helped.

Warning: The preceding is the kind of highly contentious ill-supported conjecture I enjoy making from time to time. It might or might not be true.

[some guy]

something like 4'33" which is all intellect and no feeling.

Really? I've never been able to separate those two. And Cage has said things that would lead me to believe that he didn't think that anyone could.

Certainly the impetus behind 4'33" was an idea. But it's a cool idea. I don't know about you, but I always get excited (feeling) by a cool idea (intellect).

[Werner]

Ah, 4'33" - a score even I could read at sight!

[diegobueno]

Plurality became the name of the game early in the 1900s, and it's still the name.

I might argue, and I think I will, that the atonal movement represents the culmination and then demise of a certain thread in Western music, that is, Germanic, male dominated, grandiose. Each successive generation stands on the shoulders of the previous, until there is nothing left to achieve. A progression that introduces dissonance as a spice in the music, and then leaves nothing but spice, not too appetizing. A progression that intellectualizes itself into something like 4'33" which is all intellect and no feeling.

Against that thread, there is indeed a 'plurality', which did indeed begin in 1900 as composers looked for new roots in their respective traditions, as did Kodaly, Vaughan Williams, Bartok, Gershwin, Takemitsu and others. And this plurality, I think represents the forward thrust in orchestral music today. But in my view, atonality is already being left behind. Or one way to say it, we've moved from 'modern' music into the plurality of 'post-modern'. To me, the British composers were the first to rise against the Germanic trend. WWI probably helped.

Warning: The preceding is the kind of highly contentious ill-supported conjecture I enjoy making from time to time. It might or might not be true.

I think there is some truth in what you say. The atonal, or pantonal, thread in 20th century music is a specifically Germanic influence which Hitler unwittingly helped spread throughout the world by forcing its practitioners to flee.

I'd say that what is being left behind is the idea that this Germanic tradition is not a mandate for all music, but only one option among many. Atonality may be seen now as a supplement, not a replacement, to tonality. I think the 21st century will see new concepts of tonality appear which could not arisen without the experience of the totally chromatic music of the 20th century.

[CharmNewton]

Ah, 4'33" - a score even I could read at sight!

Yes, but the sound of your eyes moving would violate the composer's intentions.

John

[piston]

In contrast to previous centuries, twentieth-century classical music encompasses a wider range of human behavior, expressions, opinions, experiences, interaction, and ethnic/racial/national identities, as well as the more universal range of emotions/passions found in the Romantic Era. These more modern works, in my view, are more realistic (without reference here to the Stalinist conception of realism). Consider, if you will, what I am listening to this afternoon:

Joseph Curiale: Gates of Gold; Awakening:songs of the earth. A composer "whose works are recognized for their passion, beauty, and sense of wonder," Curiale left a materially rewarding position as a Hollywood film music composer in 1990 because "the time had come to write music without the limiting parameters commercial work demands." Nobody can characterize this composer has being too "intellectual" or dissonant; his music is most accessible, very much in the vein of American composers during the 1930's and 1940's.

James Kimo Williams: Symphony for the Sons of 'Nam. This composer impresses me, the "farm boy," for the long and winding road that led him from the Vietnam War to composing "program" music not only about the Vietnam War but also about the Black "buffalo" soldiers of the Civil War. http://www.omik.com/biographical.html Ironically, this African-American composer's music has been recorded by the Czech Phil. and the Academic Symphony Orchestra of the St. Petersburg Philaharmonic! Once again, nothing really dissonant here, the composer's musical idiom being very much comparable to early twentieth-century music.

Stephen Hartke: The King of the Sun is a more dissonant piece for a piano quartet, as it should be because it is based on or inspired by the paintings of Juan Miro. http://www.stephenhartke.com/New/King.html If I had the professional knowledge of the art historian, I would use paintings to draw parallels with twentieth-century classical music. It's very curious to me that people are willing to pay lots of money for a Van Gogh, a Dali, a Picasso, a Monet even though their works are not as harmonious, as symmetrical or as limpid clear as the Romantists. Meanwhile, the similarly "modernist" works of their musical counterparts are without any value for a majority of c.m. lovers. But it's true that while, in a museum, one can rapidly skip modern paintings, it's much more difficult to skip ahead (or backward) in a concert hall.

[MaestroDJS]

It's a shame that atonality has given 20th-Century music a bad name, especially because it is only part of the story. Certain composers, such as Schönberg, Webern and Berg, created stunning atonal masterpieces. The problem is that too many composers used atonality as a crutch to compose their music for them. Many of these trendy and cloistered academics composed only for other trendy and cloistered academics, and thereby alienated audiences.

Leonard Bernstein concluded his final Norton Lecture with his artistic and philosophical credo, his essentially optimistic and celebratory statement of beliefs. In 1973, his ultimate rejection of atonal music deeply offended many avant-garde composers. However he reached his conclusion only after a well-reasoned comparison between Schönberg and Stravinsky, in which he treated both with sympathy and understanding. Bernstein’s credo would underlie his practice as composer and conductor for the rest of his life.

“I believe that no matter how serial, or stochastic, or otherwise intellectualized music may be, it can always qualify as poetry as long as it is rooted in Earth.

“I believe that from that Earth emerges a musical poetry, which is by the nature of its sources tonal.

“I believe that these sources cause to exist a phonology of music, which evolves from the universal known as the harmonic series.

“And that there is an equally universal musical syntax, which can be codified and structured in terms of symmetry and repetition.

“And that by metaphorical operation there can be devised particular musical languages that have surface structures noticeably remote from their basic origins, but which can be strikingly expressive as long as they retain their roots in earth.

“I believe that our deepest affective responses to these particular languages are innate ones, but do not preclude additional responses which are conditioned or learned.

“And that all particular languages bear on one another, and combine into always new idioms, perceptible to human beings.

“And that ultimately these idioms can all merge into a speech universal enough to be accessible to all mankind.

“And that the expressive distinctions among these idioms depend ultimately on the dignity and passion of the individual creative voice.

“And finally, I believe that because all these things are true, Ives ‘Unanswered Question’ has an answer. I’m no longer quite sure what the question is, but I do know the answer, and that answer is ‘Yes’.”

[some guy]

MaestroDJS said

It's a shame that atonality has given 20th-Century music a bad name, especially because it is only part of the story.

I don't think atonality has done that. I think people have latched onto the word atonal to describe whatever they don't like. (Which is why I don't think "atonal" is a terribly useful word.) Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern were indeed only part of the story, but I think that plenty of the rest of the story is plenty hateful to plenty of the classical audience, though. Cage, Lutoslawski, Glass, Xenakis--none of them "atonal" in the sense of either twelve-tone or serial, but all of them roundly hated by many. I mean plenty!

The problem is that too many composers used atonality as a crutch to compose their music for them. Many of these trendy and cloistered academics composed only for other trendy and cloistered academics, and thereby alienated audiences.

I wonder if you'd mind naming names, here. I'm sure lots of people have used crutches, serial or tonal, but who here are you referring to? How did they get trendy if they were only writing for other academics? How did their music get out to where it could do any alienating on such a scale?

[IcedNote]

I wonder if you'd mind naming names, here. ?

Everyone except Dallapicolla.

-G

[johnshade]

That being said, I like a lot of 20th century stuff that's (mostly) tonal while pushing those boundaries:

R. Strauss
Mahler
Prokofiev
Scriabin
Shostakovich
some Stravinksy
Wolf

.
I agree with your choice of Richard Strauss (considering his 15 operas and 200 lieder as well as his orchestral music). I believe it is a consensus that Bartok should be in your top five.

[IcedNote]

I agree with your choice of Richard Strauss (considering his 15 operas and 200 lieder as well as his orchestral music). I believe it is a consensus that Bartok should be in your top five.

Comparison would lead you to believe that I enjoy Bartok, but he never struck my fancy. I'm not really sure why...he just never did.

-G