Ron Chaplin:

>>As long as a composer does not put someone elses name on the work, why not
>>try to enjoy the music for itself? Weren't a lot of composers influenced by
>>Mozart or Haydn? Is a classical composition, for example, valid only if it
>>was written during the years 1750 to 1820? I would love to hear a modern
>>piece written in the baroque or classical style.

I would like to offer these comments to Todd's reply (which follows) to
the above.  I don't mean to attack Tood's point of view, but his comments
touched some hot buttons in my beliefs and overall philosophy on the
evolution of music and this seemed a good opportunity to express them by
replying to his well-thoughtout points.

>Why? There is so much extant great music from both periods.  Who needs
>more?

Nobody NEEDS more but more is not necessarily to be avoided.  If one likes
Bachish music, one might find pleasure in hearing more, different, fresh
Bachish music.  Its like wondering how Chopin would have treated a melody
by Beethoven or how Beethoven would have treated a melody by Chopin.
Chopin who admired Mozart could have written a composition in that style
and it would have been, no doubt, a good composition, worthy of listening
to - Mozartish with a touch of Chopin.  I would like to hear something like
that.

>The social, artistic and psylchological conditions under which
>the composers of the past worked are long gone.

I happen to believe that, for the masses, life imitates art and for the
artist, art imitates life.  The sensitive artist/composer sees the reality
of today's state of affairs and says in their work, this is [your] reality
folks.  But in so doing, they seldom seem to say but here is how it could
be or as Abraham Lincoln put it "appeal to the better angels of our
nature.".  Artists, being rebels by nature, seem to want to emphasis the
bad to 1) draw attention to it to justify their rebellion, 2) to show that
they've not been fooled by efforts to conceal it i.e.  "I see the real
truth, not the hype", and 3) to make a hostile statement to those
responsible for it.  In many ways it is too bad that these things [The
social, artistic and psylchological conditions] are gone.  I happen to
think that the values of the past were not wrong when compared the robotic,
throwaway, fast paced, luke warm, sound byte driven conditions we often
face today.  Its up to the artists to reveal a reality that could be as
well as the reality that is.  Imagine if life today were like Mozart's
music.  We arrogantly presume within the spirit of "manifest destiny"
that this modern way of life is the logical next step in the evolution
of society when a case could be made for the possibility that we are
off in left field and away from the optium state of human affairs.Art,
specifically music, has the power to influence that and the artist, being
part of the intelligencia, has the responsibility to help in that effort.
Rock music of the 60's had a profound effect on the thinking of young
people of the 60's.  So does today's popular music with its emphasis on
sex, drugs, rebellion, etc.  I believe that better art (art generally,
including music) would produce better attitudes, hopes, dreams, etc.  I
think that is in fact why we listen to CM, to take us back there.  If
musicians in our own time would write that kind of CM, issue CDs, give
concerts, they might have an impact on today's thinking.  It seems
incoherent for Beethoven to have an impact on today's thinking.  It has
to be a popular composer writing music like Beethoven's.  Music for the
movies comes the closest.  We need that kind of music without the movie.

>Furthermore, no modern composer can be unaware of the achievements in
>harmony, form, etc.  That have taken place over the last two hundred years.

It remains to be seen whether atonal, formless, amelodic music is
an achievement.  Today's modern art with no perspective, subjectless,
formless, etc.  is not what I would call an achievement in art but a
disintergration in form.  Putting perspective in art in an achievement in
art, dropping it takes art back to the caveman days and is often done by
those incapable of producing traditional art.  Putting moving, dramatic
harmonies & melodies and exciting passagework in music is an achievement,
removing them, because the resulting music better reflects the state on
modern, chaotic society, is not to my mind an achievement.  I am suggesting
that today's composers not be limited to today's state of music evolution
but be allowed, if not encouraged, to produce music in historical styles.

>Even if he attempts to ignore them, the very fact of ignoring them
>would constrict his composing and he would occasionally have to reject a
>technique or gesture that might have come to the mind of a Bach or Mozart,
>always on the lookout for better and more profound ways of expressing
>themselves.

It seems to me that is is not an either/or case.  In popular music there
are fusions like jazz/rock, country/rock, blues/rock, country/blues, etc.
Why can't there be music that is Beethoven/Chopin or Mozart/Rachmaninov?
This would represent a new genre of CM that is not pigeonholeable and
wonderful sounding.  To reach the masses, the stigma that CM is for the
snobbish elite has to be dispelled.  That means the great music of the 18th
& 19th century written by today's composers who can become as admired in
their time as Beethoven was in his.  I hope Paul McCartney does write CM
maybe he can start a trend.

>No matter what he did, the modern composer could only imitate and there
>is no way that he could avoid sound like either an imitator or a very
>third-rate baroque or classical composer or, more likely both.

I don't think you meant to imply that the task is absolutely impossible.
If Beethoven were to come back to life, he could write more great music in
his style as could Bach, Mozart, and the rest.  I think it can be done.

I confess that I would not listen to any music that sounds like today's
art looks.  I am not convinced that different is better, newer is better,
today's values are better than yesteryears.  It is entirely possible,
despite our ego, that we have peaked in the arts and going downhill.  An
excellent book on this is Erich Kahler's "The Disintegration of Form in the
Arts".

Bill Pirkle