Baroque Form/Structure Discussion

Once again, trying to put words in my mouth is not going to work.

Anyway, from this thread I see a rather disturbing sentiment against creative freedom. I believe that creative freedom is a composer's fundamental right - any attempt to diminish it should be viewed with skeptical eyes. Mods: what's your opinion on enshrining some universal tenets into YC's board rules?

Are you daft?

"Against creative freedom?"

So because we don't happen to agree with your argument, we are somehow against creative freedom? Do you READ what we say, at all?

Plus what's with the mods there, eh? You want to apply censorship to opinions that are not your own? How INTERESTING, coming from someone talking about creative freedom. GTFO.

Baroque music is NOT music that sounds like something. Baroque music is music composed in some historical, cultural and social context, and as a result these pieces composed in that era share some common characteristics which are evident in the musical aesthetic of them. But the pure musical aesthetic of those pieces (i.e. the audible result we get when these pieces get performed) is NOT Baroque music - it's a result of their property of being Baroque pieces. So two pieces might sound similar, but one might be baroque, while the other isn't. Bach is Baroque, Glen Shannon is not. They might sound similar, but Glen Shannon is not Baroque. Do you see the distinction?

Baroque music is defined as "music under certain historical, cultural and social context of Western countries approximately between the period of 1600 to 1750" (dates are from Grove) (and they are not precise dates, as I mentioned 'before - they're meant to limit down the timespan of the baroque era; obviously, Alexander the Great wasn't Baroque, and also 1970's is not Baroque).

This certain historical, cultural and social context is no more. Therefore, Baroque music IS dead. No one can compose Baroque music anymore. Nor Gregorian chants. Nor common practice music. Nor romantic music. You can of course compose music that tries to imitate the style of the X era, or X-inspired music, but it's not going to be X music, because X (in the aforementioned examples) is something that has passed and is defined according to its historical, cultural and social context which is now gone and can no longer be reproduced.

That argument should be pursued to its ultimate end. If music ceases to be valid in the absence of its historical, cultural and social context, then the only music worth performing is contemporary music, is it not?

Why bother performing the Schoenberg piano concerto (1942) - surely, its historical, cultural and social context is now gone and can no longer be reproduced?

If Elliot Carter died tomorrow (God forbid), will his music suddenly be something that has passed, its historical, cultural and social context now gone and can no longer be reproduced?

I think you are reading too much into the definition provided by western music history treatises. Of course they are going to view Baroque music from the historical perspective, but my recollection is that the emphasis is always on the music, not the historical, cultural and social context - that part only fills the first page of the chapter. You might see a different definition of baroque music if your source takes into account baroque revivalist movement.

Are you daft?

"Against creative freedom?"

So because we don't happen to agree with your argument, we are somehow against creative freedom? Do you READ what we say, at all?

Plus what's with the mods there, eh? You want to apply censorship to opinions that are not your own? How INTERESTING, coming from someone talking about creative freedom. GTFO.

What I'd like to hear from you is that creative freedom is indeed a fundamental right of a composer. What say you?

You might see a different definition of baroque music if your source takes into account baroque revivalist movement.

No, but what I'll do instead is start an Elvis revivalist movement. And if you think that starting an Elvis revivalist movement is stupid, then maybe you should come to see what you're talking about in your own terms.

Is music in the style of Elvis written after his death still Elvis? Hmmmm...

People may have connections with baroque music, but new music written in the baroque style is no longer baroque, just like new music written in the style of Schoenberg or Elliot Carter isn't by either of those people. Music imitating 60s serialism isn't 60s serialism. (On the other hand, I believe impressionism never really referred to any specific time period, so one could still write impressionistic music. It just wouldn't be Debussy's or Ravel's impressionism, since it isn't in their cultural context. I can't really say much, though...)

What I'd like to hear from you is that creative freedom is indeed a fundamental right of a composer.

Well, duh. I have the freedom to write a piece calling for the performer to cover himself in monkey feces. You have the right not to like it or call it music.

Plus, we're saying it's impossible to write baroque music, not that it's wrong to.

Oh, and

If music ceases to be valid in the absence of its historical, cultural and social context, then the only music worth performing is contemporary music, is it not?

Where did I ever say that?

And where did I even say that these people (VS) shouldn't compose music in the way they do?

All I ever said is that I personally don't believe we can even listen to Bach's music as his contemporaries did, let alone play it or compose it. We can of course do our best in interpreting that music (as performers do their best to interpret any composer's music, really), and we can physically listen to it, and it might sound nice and all, and we might even understand how it's composed and all - but I don't believe we can actually experience the same thing that the people back then experienced.

And as long as they don't call their music "Baroque music" or "Baroque revivalist music" but they call it "Baroque-inspired" or "Baroque-styled" music, then I have no problem with whatever they write! But the problem is that they don't. And also that most of their music is boringly ugly.

I never said there's no point in performing contemporary music, nor is this in any way implied in anything I've said, nor a consequent argument or continuation of a claim I made.

And I personally believe that Schoenberg is as historical as Baroque music. Or Byzantine music. Or Messiaen's music. Or early Boulez's music. Carter has lived for over 100 years now - his early pieces were obviously written in a completely different historical, cultural and social context than his latest ones. And yes, they should be interpreted as such, just because the composer lives in a different context than the piece he created that doesn't act retroactively on his previous compositions.

If you actually paid the least amount of attention to my words, you see that I never mentioned "a composer's output is the result of..." - I said "a piece of art is the result of certain historical, cultural and social context", to which the artist is subject to, consequently. Thus yeah, Stockhausen's "Zodiac" (the last thing he wrote before he died) was written in a different historical, cultural and social than we live currently. But it was oh so ever slightly different that the difference in interpretation of that work is not as big as the difference between experiencing Ancient Greek music and contemporary music. Furthermore, most of us have experienced (at least part of) that historical, cultural or social context that the piece was written, since we lived through the year 2007.

And nowhere did I mention "western music". The "historical, cultural social context" applies to all music, whether balinese, ancient african, native american, western european, american, aboriginal, chinese, japanese, jazz, rock, pop, metal, you name it.

What I'd like to hear from you is that creative freedom is indeed a fundamental right of a composer. What say you?

Uh, when have I said the opposite?

Stuff like that makes me think you don't really read what I've typed the entire time I've been around. :x

Oh, and

Where did I ever say that?

And where did I even say that these people (VS) shouldn't compose music in the way they do?

All I ever said is that I personally don't believe we can even listen to Bach's music as his contemporaries did, let alone play it or compose it. We can of course do our best in interpreting that music (as performers do their best to interpret any composer's music, really), and we can physically listen to it, and it might sound nice and all, and we might even understand how it's composed and all - but I don't believe we can actually experience the same thing that the people back then experienced.

I never said there's no point in performing contemporary music, nor is this in any way implied in anything I've said, nor a consequent argument or continuation of a claim I made.

You said that baroque music is DEAD because it's historical, social, and cultural context is gone, and can no longer be reproduced. Which means, as you said, that we can't actually experience the same thing. From there I'm merely interpreting your comments to mean that the music is no longer valid and therefore not worth performing.

SO enlighten me, are you saying baroque music is DEAD but it's still worth performing? Similarly, is all non-contemporary music DEAD, but it's still worth performing? Are orchestras around the world performing DEAD music, and are recording artists making CDs of DEAD music? It's not the real deal, right, because the historical context is no more?

Who is writing DEAD music, and who is not writing DEAD music?

You said that baroque music is DEAD because it's historical, social, and cultural context is gone, and can no longer be reproduced. Which means, as you said, that we can't actually experience the same thing. From there I'm merely interpreting your comments to mean that the music is no longer valid and therefore not worth performing.

SO enlighten me, are you saying baroque music is DEAD but it's still worth performing? Similarly, is all non-contemporary music DEAD, but it's still worth performing? Are orchestras around the world performing DEAD music, and are recording artists making CDs of DEAD music? It's not the real deal, right, because the historical context is no more?

Who is writing DEAD music, and who is not writing DEAD music?

Does the fact it's dead music mean anything? Does it prevent anyone from enjoying it? I love how Latin sounds, but nobody really has any idea how it really sounded like and it IS a dead language, but people still use it tons for specific things.

I wouldn't call music styles/systems of composition DEAD really, but the period is long gone. People can write in style if they want, why not. The point is not doing so out of ignorance or laziness.

Have you understood that so far I have been talking about the process of composition? Of creation?

Performance is an interpretation. It will always be further away from what is in the composer's mind. It just so happens that today's performers are even further away from a composer's mind who lived 300 years ago.

Performance of music is always of interest,

I personally don't really care if a piece of mine gets performed or not after it's been performed once. As long as I'm still alive, I want to write more music, and I'd like to avoid re-performances of older pieces of mine. And when I'm dead, I simply don't care what happens, as Gardener says if he doesn't know if he'll want his pieces to be played after his death.

Famously, John Cage had no music reproduction equipment at his place in New York. He only went to see live performances of pieces, and he never saw any performances of pieces he had seen in the past (apart from Satie).

And I think you've misinterpreted my statement of "baroque music is dead". When I say baroque music is dead I mean that the Baroque era is gone ("dead"), therefore we cannot reproduce anything that was produced at that era simply because we don't live in it anymore.

If you lived in Japan and were a Hagi-Yaki maker, and suddenly you moved to Austria, no matter how hard you tried to reproduce the Hagi-Yaki there (without the local clay that Hagi-Yaki makers use in that specific region of Japan to make them), you would never be able to do so - you might invent a million ways to create something that looks like the Hagi-Yaki, that feels like the Hagi-Yaki, but it will never be the Hagi-Yaki; it will always be a Hagi-Yaki imitation, a tea-cup in the style of Hagi-Yaki, or a cup inspired by the Hagi-Yaki cups. And just as the name itself in Hagi-Yaki implies that the product is the result of the material that is local to the area where it comes from, Baroque implies that the product of that period is local to the area and period where it comes from.

To make it even more straight-forward clear, if suddenly all people were evacuated from the Yamaguchi area of Japan where the Hagi-Yaki come from (and the special local clays they use to make the Hagi-Yaki comes from), and no one was ever able to go back, the "Hagi-Yaki" would be dead: no one would be able to create a new Hagi-Yaki anymore. People might be able to use the Hagi-Yaki already created before they went away from that area, but they'd never be able to create any more Hagi-Yaki. They might be able to create things that look like a Hagi-Yaki, that feel like it, but they wouldn't be able to create the thing itself because the Hagi-Yaki is not just the aesthetic value of the end product and the process of its making, but is also characterised by the properties that the local clay that is used in its making (and it's an essential part of its production).

(Mind you, the Hagi-Yaki change by time and by usage as one of the properties of the clay they use is that it absorbs the tea slightly so by time the colour changes a bit towards green -or whatever colour tea you'r drinking- and you can see small cracks in the clay itself, made from the heat and the tea/water going inside the clay. So every single time you use them they change slightly; consequently, the next generation of people to use the Hagi-Yaki will no longer be able to witness and experience the Hagi-Yaki cups as the previous generation saw it, because although the Hagi-Yaki will still be there -tactile and visible- they will have undergone certain changes. That's what I meant that we can't listen to Bach's music as people back then listened to it - it's not that we physically can't listen to it or that it shouldn't sound nice to our ears, but that we certainly hear it differently than people back then did because of all the historical, cultural and social changes that have taken place between the composition of the piece and our experience of it.)

Therefore, the art of the Hagi-Yaki would be dead.

Therefore, the art of composing Baroque music is dead. While we can still perform Baroque music and physically experience it, and maybe we can also find it beautiful or associate with it. But the art of composing such music is dead.

Cyngus, Glen Sannons trio sonata is wonderful :)

Juji, you talk much bullshit from my point of view. Copy? That is not even a point, if composing baroque is copy, all of music is copy, all is based on the baroque and early music, if there had not been bach, we would not know mozart as we know him, not chopin, not anyone. To compose in a style is NOT copy, but to use the vocabulary of that certian style. If what you say is true, everything we do is copy, everything form writing to surfing, all we know today is based on developement trueout the centuarys.

If you want to talk english you cant use russian words. The write in a style is NOT copy, if it was, every metal band are copying. The style reflects the culture, yes, but that has nothing to do with writing baroque now. The modern baroque composers uses the same thing as the old, based on the same as it would if the composer lived in the baroque period. You build the sentence the same way, but there are new themes and stuff never heard before, ofcourse it sounds simmular, if not it would not be recognized as baroque.

Do you know how hard it is to do baroque music when you live in 2009? at that period they had it much more easy, they grew up with the music, listening to it from they where born and learing from people that do it. Revivalist composers should have credit for what they do, they do it the hard way. Its insulting to hear what you say about this matter and how ignorant you are by the way you talk about the music of Glen Shannon who is a GREAT baroque composer, im sure if we had renamed the file, and told you it was Vivaldi you would say "Ohh this is great", you are up against the wall now, a desperate attemt to justify yourself and your music. What are you compared to Shannon?

Errr...cygnusdei, what'd you get on the critical reading portion of the SAT? :P

Yeah, sometimes it feels like some people never read a word anybody else writes.

ok, I think the children have played enough.

this thread is just a whole lot of :headwall:

since it has veered quite radically into the realm of the ridiculous, it no longer serves a purpose, and will be closed.