Someone suggested that the harmonic repetitiousness of Ravel's Bolero
ought to make it a "mediocre" piece.  Well, yes, it IS a mediocre piece.
Certainly there is much better Ravel, as others pointed out in another
thread.  But harmonic immobility alone is surely not what makes it, or
any other piece, mediocre.  There is little harmonic movement in the
second movement of Schubert's Quartet #14, which is anything but mediocre.

As Steve Schwartz pointed out, predictability is not (exactly) the
key variable either, for if that were the case, EVERYTHING would sound
mediocre to us once we got to know it.  However, we may have a clue here.
My own (subjective) criterion for great music is exactly the way a piece
affects me after I know it well.  Mediocre music quickly loses its
novelty, and its interest or emotional effect.  Certain great works have
the truly mysterious characteristic that they never seem to "wear out"
in this sense.  As Steve asks: "Does the Beethoven Fifth Symphony, for
example, become less good as you know it better?" That is as good a test
case as there is.  The first movement of the Fifth ALWAYS shakes me by
the throat, the millionth time almost as much as the first.  I don't
understand how it works.  If I did, I would program a computer to write
music with that characteristic, whatever it is.

Jon Gallant                and                    Dr. Phage