Peter Varley asks me:

>What's wrong with (amongst others) Alfven ...Wordsworth?
>20th-century, all of them.

Absolutely nothing.  They'lmost all in my collection, and greatly enjoyed.
I left them out because they are generally viewed by extremists of the
modernist faction as "retro", throwbacks to the dreaded 19th century.

>OTOH, I'm less in agreement with the following (also Len Fehskens):
>
>>I am very wary of the "music as language" metaphor.  Serialism is not
>>"another" language in the same sense that French is another language.
>
>Serialism as such isn't another language - it's just another way of coming
>up with thematic material.

I don't know, sounds like you're agreeing with me...

>However, there are other types of music - Indian Classical, for example -

Which I have a very large colleciton of...

>where the answer to the question "would someone who learned to understand
>this music find it rewarding?" is clearly "yes"

as it is for me...

>and the answer to the question "is this part of the Western Classical
>tradition?" is equally clearly "no".

no argument...

>IMO the "music as language" metaphor works very well here.  Western
>Classical music has its conventions, and knowing these conventions
>can help in appreciating Western Classical music, but doesn't help
>in appreciating Indian Classical music.

All you're really saying is that they're different.  The "language
metaphor" adds nothing.

len.