Bill Pirkle <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>Is the lack of acceptance of music in its own time a defining
>characteristic of the avant-garde genre? Seriously asking and not being
>nit picky.

By definition an avant gardist must reject mainstream aesthetic thought (&
supposedly gain moral &/or aesthetic strength from such a rejection...  a
pretty good working definition of seige mentality, if you ask me); & given
that audiences have never been overly fond of being patronised by their
artists, i think it's fair to say that a lack of acceptance _is_ a defining
characteristic of the avant garde....

...  however, the idea that such a thing as an avant garde exists in
art which self consciously rejects mainstream thought is very much a
20th century dogma inspired by the threat of popular recording (which
essentially meant that artists lost the ability to solely define the
artistic agenda; in much the same way that moveable type printing ripped
the theologians power to define Biblical thought in the 16th century); & as
such has no obvious analog in earlier times.  Even such intellectual fellow
travellers as the Music of the Future schools of the 19th century saw their
music as part of a popularist revolution...  a popularism the
sel-consciously elitist avant garde rejected out of hand.

Never make the mistake of confusing novelty (which Beethoven was as fond of
as Madonna is now) with avant-gardism...  philosophically, they're almost
180o apart....

All the best,
Robert Clements <[log in to unmask]>