Jeff Dunn <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>Irony is just ONE of the alternative methods of postmodernism.  There
>are a large number of postmodernist works that treat quotations just
>as Ives did.  Were Ives writing today, there's no doubt in my mind he'd
>be considered postmodernist.

Being considered postmodernist & actually being postmodernist are two very
different beasts.

The literalness of Ives's use of musical quotation (even when he's being
ironic) puts him firmly in the romantic tradition - there's no collaging;
& no sense of aesthetic difference between the quote & sourced material.
Claiming the style is anything else (perhaps because From Hanover Square
North..., say, using a quasicollage structure) is a bit like calling the
paradigm romantic Glenn Gould a HIP performer because some of his
instrumental experiments occasionally prefigured HIP textures.

The misrepresentation of Ives as first a modernist & then a postmodernist
began in the 30s when figures like Schoenberg tried to coopt his
experiments for their own tradition; & has never really ended.  Good to
see that Scott is prepared to put that misrepresentation in its place.

Live in peace
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