Essay on Composition at the Moment

Hi All

I am shocked and awed at the stimulation and lively discussion around my "essay." But it seems like you guys just go off on a lot of things. Cool.

Thanks a lot for all the criticism and compliments. Thanks especially to Antiatonality for the spirited defense!

I definitely see your point, haters & nitpickers (jp)-- this was totally unresearched, off-the-top-of-my head musing about music. I was bored one summer day and I wrote it in one sitting. It is deliberately provocative... so that people will read it. Sorry if there are some factual errors... I hope they are not too far off.

About music education stopping with Beethoven-- Referring to theory and not performance, and referring to required courses for a music degree, not electives. Of course this is based on personal experiences, but I know a lot of musicians from a lot of schools and seems like most of them probably have to re-take Harmony II. (Please don't nitpick this paragraph)

Re Citations: not a chance. This is not a school project or a paper for an academic journal-- it is an online magazine entry. A glorified blog post. Audience is people who go to classical music concerts. Titles and subtitles are all from the editor.

If ya'll REALLY want to make a fool of me write a letter to the editor debunking my "essay" and he'll probably post it. ;-)

And lastly, sorry for not following the discussion... didn't get a chance to read everything but I'm on a road trip right now. Spent the last couple of days camping in Idaho & Wyoming. In the Grand Teton Lodge right now where WiFi is in the air. It's beautiful here!

I thought for the most part that schools had Music Theory I, II, III, IV. Beethoven for me was in Theory II, beginning of III. Theory III for teh most part was Romanticism, and IV was a crash course of 20th century. I'm not trying to debate here, just curious. Where do/did you go to school?

P.S. I don't go to the greatest school for music either :P

Vince

I had the same experience as tg, at another less-than-stellar school. I and II were exactly as you describe -- but there's two more semesters after that for music majors. In addition, the labs that went with those classes worked with music from the renaissance to interpreting recent graphic notation throughout all four years.

And, to be true, if you're not taking electives, then what purpose is served by getting a degree? My electives were sociological, ethnographical, and analytical... And this is all at a school that does not feature its music department, which means that a real music school would have even more, higher quality classes.

Re Citations: not a chance. This is not a school project or a paper for an academic journal-- it is an online magazine entry. A glorified blog post. Audience is people who go to classical music concerts. Titles and subtitles are all from the editor.

Certainly, footnotes and bibliographies would be inappropriate. Even still, there's a difference between saying "People say..." and "Adorno says..." What if your reader wanted to know more? They lack the roadmap that brought you to your understanding.

And even if you don't want citations (which is totally understandable in an essay), just little terms like "In my academic studies I made the experience…", "I was told by a friend …", or "I assume for the following reasons…" are way better than nothing at all, since they tell the reader where you are coming from instead of just being forced to either accept or reject a certain statement all by itself. Even if the reasons for your statements are very personal and not objective, it helps the reader if they are clearly stated, so one can can appraise the plausability of said statements for oneself.

The other option is to stay completely neutral and don't attack certain kinds of music. As I said before, the more judgmental and offensive you are, the more you need to be able to explain yourself in order not just to annoy people.

Haha, I'll revive this just to point out someone proceeded to own Beeri on the online publication(?) he wrote the thing for!

Here:

Broad Street Review: Composing music: A reply to Beeri Moalem

Then he proceeds to just own him further. The entire exchange is pretty funny.

I'm amused that you're amused, SSC.

LET THERE BE A WEENER!!!!! YAYS!

Sometimes there's just no winner in argumentation. Sometimes there is one person's opinion and another person's opinion... and neither of them really mean much to the other. In much the same way that there is a Yin and a Yang, there is one person's opinion and another who disagrees. You don't have to agree with either to at least 'respect' the opinion and 'understand' the rationale behind such positions.

I'm okay with this topic remaining open if everyone agrees to discuss, instead of fight.

Otherwise I will close this thread.

Thanks!

Sometimes there's just no winner in argumentation.

And your point is?

And your point is?

I don't think there's a winner. I don't agree that anyone 'owned' anyone else in the discussion. That's my point.

I'm okay with this topic remaining open if everyone agrees to discuss, instead of fight.

Otherwise I will close this thread.

Thanks!

When did you become a mod? By the way, congrats on modship.

I don't think there's a winner. I don't agree that anyone 'owned' anyone else in the discussion. That's my point.

... Uh, whatever you say, AA.

I don't think there's a winner. I don't agree that anyone 'owned' anyone else in the discussion. That's my point.

When did you become a mod? By the way, congrats on modship.

A few weeks ago. And thanks!

I agree that no one really got 'owned'. I think both parties remained respectful of each other, whereas by the very definition of 'owned' one party must leave the situation feeling completely devalued.

I guess our definitions of "owned" are different, but that's not really important at all. He still got called out for what he wrote and that's all I wanted to point out here.

I guess our definitions of "owned" are different, but that's not really important at all. He still got called out for what he wrote and that's all I wanted to point out here.

And this is where I emphatically disagree.

Case in point:

But when you’re expressing ideas, you must accept a certain amount of responsibility for facts.

I disagree with this statement when the facts in dispute have no tendency to make the argument more or less valid. If the fact in dispute has no direct relevance to the point, then pinning the author down to such a statement as if it's the one and only point at issue is just a smoke screen, a pluralistic attempt at making a larger issue out of something that would otherwise go overlooked. It's just more confusion, more BAD ARGUMENTATION.

I disagree with this statement when the facts in dispute have no tendency to make the argument more or less valid.

Yeah because saying that modern music theory is not taught at academic institutions is exactly the kind of thing that doesn't matter to the central point of an essay about modern composition.

Whatever you say, AA.

And this is where I emphatically disagree.

Case in point:

I disagree with this statement when the facts in dispute have no tendency to make the argument more or less valid. If the fact in dispute has no direct relevance to the point, then pinning the author down to such a statement as if it's the one and only point at issue is just a smoke screen, a pluralistic attempt at making a larger issue out of something that would otherwise go overlooked by the common reader. It's just more confusion, more BAD ARGUMENTATION.

If the fact in dispute has no relevance, why would it have been brought up? Scatterbrained writing reduces cogency of the argument, creating straw men and red herrings.

There's nothing wrong with streamlining the sum of all that is happened into a history, nothing wrong with generalizing, nothing wrong with abstracting, nothing wrong with any sort of history or world-view; however, there are ways to assess value to those histories and world-views.

One is to check facts. If some historical figure acted incongruously to the world-view, there is a chance that the world-view does not adequately reflect the reality it's trying to streamline. Essentially, it's missed the point.

Think of it as natural selection for ideas -- it's why freedom of speech exists, because "bad" ideas (as deemed by whatever you wanna say deems it) will naturally fall to extreme minorities of society.

Now, don't get me wrong. Every history is warped; any streamlining misses something. But it is so long that the bend sits within a standard deviation of what actually happened that it passes muster for each of us.

this is all very ot

Ferk,

Sure, when the point at issue is whether Brahms or Beethoven were the first to break these so-called 'rules' of music. This is ancillary. It's just icing on a cake, not the cake itself.

And it's not just this author that tries to pour water on the icing to try to destroy the cake (the substance of the argument). In effect, it's just banter you're calling the guy out on, not his world-view. And THAT'S the point. Coren isn't really "owning" anyone in the argument if he's not addressing the central issue, the actual opinions of the author.

Why are you arguing about this?

Why are you arguing about this?

Because he can, and it's the internet. Really.

Seriously, this is so pointless. I'm not trying to troll this thread or make it go off topic. Actually, AA is pushing it in the direction

Why are you arguing about this?

Because reducing one's opinion to factual inaccuracies that bare no weight on the position is bad argumentation... because Coren's response never actually addressed the issue, just the 'factual inaccuracy' of ancillary material... because no one really 'won' the argument or made anyone look better or worse in the end as SSC would like to believe.

Take your pick. It's the kind of ridiculous argumentation of over-educated academics who think they can challenge a young composer's opinions based on factual data instead of, first, understanding the position and addressing it with relevant information. Call it a pet peeve of mine.

Because reducing one's opinion to factual inaccuracies that bare no weight on the position is bad argumentation... because Coren's response never actually addressed the issue, just the 'factual inaccuracy' of ancillary material... because no one really 'won' the argument or made anyone look better or worse in the end as SSC would like to believe.

Take your pick. It's the kind of ridiculous argumentation of over-educated academics who think they can challenge a young composer's opinions based on factual data instead of, first, understanding the position and addressing it with relevant information. Call it a pet peeve of mine.

Damn those academics, they have the NERVE to think they know something about what they spend years studying!

Y'know what's my pet peeve? People who conveniently forget how to read when it doesn't support their argument on the interweb.

I already stated this before, but here I'll do it again for those playing at home:

The 20th Century is hardly even discussed in conservatory music theory classes— not even established repertoire masters such as Stravinsky, Bartok and Schoenberg. Some exposure is given to their music to acknowledge its existence. But their techniques are rarely studied in depth.

Consequently, many amateur classical composers end up writing what is sometimes referred to as “Grandma Music.”

The assumption is wrong (20th century IS discussed plenty as far as anyone who actually has anything to do with the academic world is concerned) therefore his conclusion and opinion, based on that WRONG bit of info, are garbage. This is just one example, there are many and...well, I already pointed them out before didn't I?

So, yea, embarrassing stuff all around.

The assumption is wrong (20th century IS discussed plenty as far as anyone who actually has anything to do with the academic world is concerned) therefore his conclusion and opinion, based on that WRONG bit of info, are garbage. This is just one example, there are many and...well, I already pointed them out before didn't I?

So, yea, embarrassing stuff all around.

This has what to do with Brahms/Beethoven being the first to 'break rules'?

This has what to do with Brahms/Beethoven being the first to 'break rules'?

The original article makes no mention of that, so it is quite irrelevant. What it does say is:

Even Beethoven

Well as far as I'm concerned Wagner's music can be quite happily analyzed for most part (99% of the time) with traditional harmonic analysis (functions, for example.) The emphasis on things like the Tristan chord do not mean that the "functional analysis stops making sense" for everything. More over, Wagner in no way invalidates any voice-leading rules and in fact he's QUITE strict about parallel movement/contrary motion, etc etc.

I think the portion in bold invalidates most of what you said more than anything I could ever say in response. Unless you're going to speak for all music theory professors across the entire gamut of available courses taught across the world, I don't really count your opinion of how 'happily analyzed' Wagner's music may be. You don't really speak for the continuum of music education across the world, many of whom I've witnessed at Music Theory Symposiums in Los Angeles, CA chomping at the bit to argue over the harmonic inconsistencies in Wagner's music and how they DON'T FIT the mold of functional harmonic progression.

That being said, I do agree with you that Wagner's music is not difficult to analyze (if you're used to, for instance, inverted triad positions and suspensions from measure to measure and unexpected harmonic functionality, which is the bulk of the Tristan Prelude and Liebstod that interests theorists most about Wagner's music). But that doesn't mean music theory professors agree, that music theory textbooks will concur, or that music students will be given access to such knowledge universally. The author makes a good point that if it doesn't fit the mold of the theory curriculum, it's not given as much weight in explanation as it should/could be given if addressed at all. I believe his words were, "...most analysis classes conclude when functional analysis stops making sense. I base this observation on the musicians I know, the schools I attended, the textbooks I’ve seen, and statistics on concert programming."

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Just as an aside: This has been my EXACT EXPERIENCE as well. This has also been the EXACT EXPERIENCE of all my classmates in those classes, all music students in classes which teach based on a very similar curriculum (I know this because our professor explained how music theory is taught, the justification, and the reasons behind this method, which I don't agree with but hey, what do I know??), and so on. When functional harmony stopped making sense, we started learning analytical methods for 20th Century music like making a matrix, set theory, Hansen Analysis, and a variety of other things. But the music that appealed to me most was the music we spent the very LEAST amount of time covering, if at all. Forget Brahms, we didn't even TOUCH it because there wasn't enough time due to the curriculum, yet we spent a great deal of time on Beethoven's Third Symphony, "Eroica", more than we ever spent on the Tristan Prelude I adored.

By the way, my theory professor received his Doctorate from NYU, studied under Leonard Bernstein, and has an impressive Curriculum Vitae of theory publications in music journals across the US... he was the head of the entire Theory Department at my Undergrad University when I was there (still is, I believe) and is also a published, respected composer as well (Just in case Gavin wants to chime in about how FSU is way better than ANY OTHER SCHOOL I've ever attended - which we discussed today before he abruptly left. Good for you, by the way. Glad you can afford it, and hope it works out for ya!). We can actually thank Hindemith for the curriculum method used at so many universities (who, by the way, wrote incredible music we hardly even covered... his own ideas on teaching music bumped him out of the core theory classes, which I can't help but point out the irony in all of that). What I learned about Wagner, Hindemith, and many other favorites of mine was in a Graduate course called 20th Century Literature. Guess you have to be a graduate to actually expect any of these guys to be covered at all, if for anything more than a one or two-day lecture. I forget the name of the article (or publication, for that matter), but I remember distinctly how ironic I found it that Hindemith wrote it and it was HIS philosophy that bumped his music out of the core theory curriculum that was based on his writings.

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This goes for a variety of other areas of music where theory just tags on bits and particles of information about other styles instead of really digging into the meat of material available. You've even expressed your distaste for how much emphasis is given to traditional harmony as opposed to more recent compositional styles. In essence, you've more or less supported this author's position from your own perspectives and interests in music, yet you chastise him for offering his view. You have similar opinions yet you don't express them here. Instead you argue that his 'facts' are wrong, which by the way, you use your own OPINION (again, the bold portion clearly indicates this) to refute. Please. Spare me.

Then as far as the Brahms and "rules" go, I think both have a problem since nobody is really defining what "rules" is in this case or what the composers specifically were doing. Nevermind that you can point to everyone from Mozart to Schubert and Chopin for examples of "breaking the rules," (whichever they may be.) It's a silly point and it doesn't matter.

Okay, I agree that it's a silly point and it doesn't matter. That's why it irritates me that this, along with other silly points that don't matter and statements of experience you refute with only your opinion, is your justification for why the primary author got owned. No one got owned. That's all I was saying, I'm not trying to make a wall-of-text argument out of it, either, but if that's what you want...

Sorry, but after reading this I feel i must wiggle my way into this just slightly. ;)

SSC, what do you have against Mozart? I am curious.