Len Fehskens wrote in response to me:

>>I think it is grossly unfair to stereotype all pantonal music as being
>>therefore no different to noise
>
>That is not what I said.  Please reread what I wrote.  I did not say that
>"all pantonal music is noise".  I did not even say "all pantonal music
>approaches this ideal most advanced form".  In fact, I said nothing about
>pantonal music.

Apologies for any misunderstanding but your post was in the context of
a discussion on 20th century music.  It also just happened that Stephen
Heersink did write that all "atonal" music was no different to noise.  He
wrote:

>All I and most others heard was noise that made a nearby freeway sound
>delicious by comparison...  At best they are "ordered" sounds, but not
>ordinarily what one calls "music."

In the context, I assumed that your post was a defence of this position,
and that you were arguing that the "progression" to "atonality" was akin
to the movement to the heat death of the universe (and thus a form of
'degeneration').  This is the danger of taking a fairly neutral position in
a heated argument.  You can be misunderstood.  Nor did you do much to avoid
being 'caught in the cross-fire'.  Apologies for this in any case.

>>The 20th century - were you there?
>
>It is just this sort of snide implication of closemindedness or
>philistinism that grates on those of us who think that serialism was an
>interesting idea that didn't pan out, but still listen to a great deal of
>"modern" music.  I regularly listen to the likes of Adams....Zwilich
>
>So yes, I was there.

And I see I have no doubt you were.  My comment was by no means directed
at you, nor was it a defence per se of dodecaphonic serialism.  It was
an attack on those who feel music ended with the conclusion of the 19th
century.  It was also an expression of the share joy of having experienced
the music of our times as not only a necessary expression of our times, but
also as a fundamental expression of who we are/were.  I regards OURselves
as being akin to those contemporaries who heaped praise on JS Bach.  Like
them we experience an immediacy of creation denied to us those who must
listen as we do to Bach's music 'in retrospect'.  There is nothing quite
like 'being there'.  That also means to fight for this music, much as
Mahler or Wagner had to fight.  I shall continue to believe in what I do,
to love and fight for what I love in the face of this being as hopelessly
unfashionable as the music of JS Bach was in his day.

Satoshi Akima
Sydney, Australia
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