Steven Schwartz writes:

>It's just as funny as presuming to know how music a couple of centuries
>old sounded to its contemporary audience.

Well, this would be funny if it had any basis in fact.  Unfortunately,
though this red herring makes for snappy banter, sounds as though it came
out of one of those ill-informed anti-HIP tirades we so often see in print.
To my knowledge, no major player in the HIP world has ever claimed to know
how audiences in the past perceived music.  They have investigated what
people wrote about their experiences.  They have ventured to recreate the
sound of original instruments, both solo and massed.  But I think just
about everyone realizes they can't know what it was like to be at a Mozart
or Beethoven premiere without knowledge of what has come since.  Hell, I
can't even figure out how music sounds to Steve, much less someone 200
years dead, and he and I have remarkably similar tastes and background.

Johan van Veen's original statement:

>>Isn't it funny that HIP opponents who always tell us how little we know
>>about the wishes and intentions of composers of the past, seem to know
>>for sure that they would have loved our instruments, had they known them?

Is dead on...  This happens *all the time* in anti-HIP discussions, and
even happens here frequently.  Some anti-HIP pundits denigrate the thought
of investigating composer's intentions in the performance of their music
(How can we possibly know?  They were changing all the time.  Composers
aren't even the best interpreters of their own music! etc.), then blithely
tell us that all of these artists would surely have used modern instruments
(oddly though, not too modern, just "modern" enough - no Synclaviers or
computers) had they had them.  There is no analog on the HIP side that I
can think of.

>Ultimately, neither position matters aesthetically.

Exactly.  But the political side exists, and to assume that all sides play
the game the same way does not match reality, and does an injustice to
those who might be trying to bring a little integrity or honesty to the
discussion.

>I like certain HIPsters, but I do think it a shame that fewer modern players
>take up this music any more.  The music is bigger than any one approach.

I think it's probably a phase.  There are certainly no lack of reissues
of modern instrument performances of Bach and Mozart, and plenty of new and
old releases of Beethoven, to name a few.  True, you don't get much Corelli,
or Rameau, or Telemann, but I think as the exploration of these and other
composers continues, those works that benefit from modern instruments will
be played more.

Dave
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