Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Anything musical that will not fit into the above fora
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Timtin
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Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by Timtin »

Well, the blood I worried might be spilt perhaps now has been.
(A world without Idomeneo, Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi, and Titus? Completely unthinkable!)
HullandHellandHalifax
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Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by HullandHellandHalifax »

Timtin wrote:Well, the blood I worried might be spilt perhaps now has been.
(A world without Idomeneo, Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi, and Titus? Completely unthinkable!)
Timtin, there has been no blood spilt here at all, that is a figment of your imagination. What for Rob is something he cannot tolerate is for me for example the only thing I can live comfortaby with. Music is intensely subjective caused by many factors and influences and what for one man is great is for another poison. we all know people who can only find music pre-1700 acceptable, for others only 20th century music has something to say. That doesn't mean we cannot agree that Mozart, Wagner and Liszt were great and important composers but that something in their music works against us personally, people like certain people, colours, styles etc. and we do not condemn them for that or condemn them for not liking the other possibilities so why should we condemn someone for disliking Mozart or Wagner or Liszt.
I can live very happily without having to perform or listen to music from the "classical" period and probably have a better life as a result, who knows I might turn to violence and criminality if I were forced to listen to Mozart every day (OK Extreme example but hopefully you get my point). I might make a joke of Robs aversion as I know he does of mine (liking Liszt!) but I don't condemn him for this.
No there is no blood spilt here unless of course you think everyone should slavishly follow your own preferences and that of course would be a different story.
regards
Brian
Timtin
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Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by Timtin »

Of course we all have different tastes and I wouldn't dream of trying
to influence anyone else's tastes (which is impossible to do anyway),
but do I tend to regard the history of classical music as a continuously
evolving art-form with one generation influencing the next, and so on.
Therefore to try to remove any of its major players from that continuum
would, of course, alter subsequent history. It's like a wall - remove some
bricks from it and the ones above start to shift.
Therefore, whilst I think it's perhaps not unreasonable to want to 'delete'
particular pet-hate works by particular composers, to want to 'delete' composers
themselves seems somewhat illogical. That would be like travelling back in time,
which Stephen Hawking has shown is impossible, since you'd need to travel
through a worm-hole, which would instantly become unstable and destroy itself
through feedback induced by the inherent contradictions which would inevitably
ensue. (Time travel into the future is theoretically possible.)
Ultimately though, this entire topic is purely hypothetical, but at least it provides
an opportunity for debate, something I'm always happy to engage in. :-) :-) :-)
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Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by HullandHellandHalifax »

Agreed Timtin, the debate itself is very interesting and well worth pursuing.
I would like to raise an objection to your idea that music is in continuous development. If you are right then the very sudden ceasing of polyphonic activity to a vertical harmonic system, i.e. from JS Bach to his sons and followers, hardly constitutes continuous development. We give labels to musical periods which in itself suggests that there came a point where one thing stopped and another thing started.
Certainly in the world of art and I also think music, development is a result of someone daring to do something different that had no precedents. Bach obviously saw what CPE was doing but was not bothered himself to go down that road and obviously CPE thought that polyphonic writing that his father was the ultimate best in had no future or could not be developed further, so he struck out in a completely different direction.
You could argue that Schoenberg "invented" his system as a reaction to what had gone before. It therefore seems to me that new developments are a reaction to and not an outgrowing from something. Sure there is development within a specified period but not necessarily overlapping into the next.
It does not seem strange then to me that we can sidestep a period of musical history as each period has its own charms and qualities that other periods do not have. As I said there are people who will only play or listen to, music from certain periods and maybe we are now living in an age of specialism where we do not want to see the whole picture anymore, but concentrate on specific areas.
over to you Tim
regards
Brian
Timtin
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Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by Timtin »

Everything in that happens in life is about cause and effect. The
butterfly effect is a perfect example of this. Tiny changes to the
initial conditions in any event can cause vastly different outcomes.
The history of everything is merely the sum of all tiny events causing
particular results, which themselves have provided the initial conditions
for another set of subsequent events to take place, and so on.
Within the arts, every period has been seen to reach a high point
in style or technique whereupon future generations of artists have
sought to develop new ideas. To me this doesn't imply lack of continuity,
but rather a restructuring of ideas within the overall movement forward
in that particular art form based one what's gone before. So when the
Bach sons moved away from their father's style, that wasn't a discontinuity
in the history of music, merely a logical step forward, which saw the
birth of classicism, and from that grew the romantics and so on. When
Schoenberg developed his new style, it arose and grew not out of nothing,
but from the very seeds high Mahlerian romanticism themselves. Therefore,
to my mind at least, everything is continuous and inextricably linked.
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Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by HullandHellandHalifax »

Mostly true Tim, but "everything is continuous and inextricably linked" does not mean that there was a smooth ascending line of development, and as each new era of change seemed to arrive rather quickly I see no need for each era to be necessary for the beginning of the next. Certainly in terms of concert performances no-one played music that was over 30 years old in and around the early 1800's as it was old-fashioned belonging to "ancient music" novelty and innovation was the order of the day.
We could easily argue that as the romantics "rediscovered" Bach and virtually transcribed everything for two hands then the classical era was not necessary for this development to take place. It probably had more to do with technological advances in instrument manufacture than musical development.
It would seem that in literature they were ahead of the artists and musicians beginning the gothic novels and using romantic ideas some 30 years before the musical development took place. In philosophy there were many movements on the go which influenced the arts in general and obviously many of the artistic changes were as a result of new thinking and a reaction to it, it doesn't mean that any of these changes were logical chronologically and should always be treated so. The same in music I don't see why if we imagine the classical era never existed that we would realise there was something missing, you would only miss it if you knew it had been there, all the trends and movements whilst linked chronologically through time are also independent of the clock. They have their own small place in the scheme of things and exist independently of events that came after and that came before.
In "1984" and many 20th century school history books from all the lands of Europe the events of the past were 'edited' in order that the people learned what was desired by the government of the time. Those that knew nothing different accepted the facts as given without thinking that some thing was missing. It is called censorship amongst other things but it comes back to the old saying that what you don't know about you don't miss.
Aren't we having fun?
Brian
Allan

Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by Allan »

Arjuna wrote:Anyone seen Ken Russell's "Lisztomania" with Roger Daltrey as Liszt, Ringo Star as the Pope and Wagner depicted as a Nazi vampire?
I actually own a copy of it!
sgambatiesque

Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by sgambatiesque »

Smetana - Piano Concerto
BWV846
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Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by BWV846 »

What a great idea!!
How about George Gershwin's Piano Concertos in G,A,B,C,D,E??
How about George Gershwin's Symphonies 1 to 9... maybe beyond into minor keys??
How about a Bruckner opera, who knows what subject...maybe the coronation or reign of Franz Josef??
How about Schubert's Organ Symphony??
How about John Adams 48 Preludes and Fugues??
How about Johann Sebastian Bach's opera about the Thirty Years War???
How about Gustav Mahler's 48 Preludes and Fugues??
How about Pierre Boulez "Erotic Rounds for Chorus"??
How about Charles Ives' "Sonata for Recorder and Keyboard"??
How about John Cage's "8'66""??
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Re: Pieces that SHOULD have been written...

Post by HullandHellandHalifax »

Ha BWV 846, some monstrous ideas there but the thought that would frighten me to death would be that John Cage might compose 48 Preludes and Fugues on 4'33.
Perhaps Pierre Boulez and/or Gustav Mahler could write a Simple Symphony!
How about Wagner 48 operas on The History of the World (Die Weltgeschichte Zyklus)

more than enough to keep us busy I would say!
regards
Brian
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