Jocelyn Wang ([log in to unmask]) wrote:

>Donald Satz <[log in to unmask]> writes:
>
>>Jocelyn's comment is snide and insulting to those who appreciate Carter,
>>Boulez, and others.  Do I hear a vote for 'variety'?
>
>It may be insulting to Boulez, Carter, and company, but I don't see
>how it's any more insulting to their listeners than those occasional
>What's-so-great-about-Mozart threads are to Mozart lovers.

Really? And do those WSGAM threads sugest that Mozart didn't write *music*?

As a listener to BC & co, I did find your remark insulting - becaue it
implied (or, shall we say, it was very, very easy to infer) that people
who like such "cacophoy" are somehow being fooled.  You didn't actually
mention the Emperor's new clothes, but I sensed the thought....


>>Does the music of Carter and Boulez do any damage to Jocelyn and others of
>>similar musical taste?
>
>well, for one thing, it gives me a headache.

So don't listen to it.  How often does one find oneself in a position where
one *has* to listen to something by Boulez?

>For another, it makes a great many listeners wary of anything composed,
>say, within their or their parents' lifetimes, and for those who want
>classical standards to continue.

I'm not sure I even understand your last sentence.  Classical "standards"?
Of what?

You have a point that many listeners, who otherwise seem perfectly
intelligent, seem to lose the use of their frontal lobes when the phrase
"20th century music" hoves into view.  They forget that, inter alia, Elgar,
Vaughan Williams and Rachmaninoff wrote most of their music during that
much-maligned century.

And how about Peter and the Wolf?

Accuse impresarios, marketers, managers, agents but I really can't see how
this one can be laid at the feet of the "offending" composers.

>Many living tonal composers have a hard time even being considered for
>programming because there is the ridiculous attitude among many music
>directors that if it's modern, it has to be tonal.

Typo? did you mean "has to be atonal"?

deryk barker
([log in to unmask], http://www.camosun.bc.ca/~dbarker)