Modern Art - Page 2

On February 10 2013 13:17 I_Love_Katheryn wrote:
I don't believe that any old thing can be called art. There must be some objective criteria to consider it as such.

On February 10 2013 14:05 wo1fwood wrote:
I hope you understand that you hit a nerve (because I am a composer) and that also I was trying not to be derogatory (though it seems unsuccessfully). Let me explain a little better, the primary reason that modern music is so difficult to parse, even for the musically trained, is usually due to the fact that they aren't familiar with the syntax or grammar of these ideas around the theory and presentation of a work.

99.99% of people know and understand functional harmony because that's what the popular genres do on a daily basis, but when a composer develops their own system (Messiaen and Carter come to mind, though there a plethora of others), or diverges from that system further and further, it becomes harder to understand that music on the most basic of levels. Is this something that we are constantly considering and asking of ourselves? Short answer, yes.

As a rather obvious though effective example, did you ever study post-tonal analysis, deal with matricies, tone rows, hexachordal combinatoriality, klangfarbenmelodie, total serialism, or any other technique developed around this school of thought? If you didn't, how can you then fully understand that music and appreciate it? It took me more than 3 years after steeping myself in that theoretical world before I actually started to properly hear the relationships in real time and derive enjoyment from that genre. Some of it is still incredibly dense, and some I would consider poorly written, but once you understand how the thematic material, motives, and gestural ideas work in that setting, you can begin to understand whats going on. Again, this will take years to develop, and you need to actually try to do some kind of application here or it won't sink in. If it's not your cup of tea then fine, but you cannot simply discredit what incredibly brilliant people have done just because its not common practice functional harmony and easy to digest.

Another more modern example would be Spectralist techniques. I find them to be beautiful and provocative processes, and yes I like this music quite a bit, both from a theoretical and an aesthetic standpoint, but its basic principles are founded on formant analysis and natural harmonic spectra which require at least a certain level of knowledge before you can actually hear those relationships. Is it difficult to hear, depends on how estute your ears are. Is it still, at least in a micro sense, organized and treated the way Beethoven or Bach is organized? You bet (though its hard to hear). The overall principles are the same, even if the language is different.

tldr, the difficulty that people have with modern music is their unfamiliarity with its language and its underlying processes, and why many people do not grasp it or think that it is music. Art music isn't supposed to be mindless music after all, that's why we call it art in the first place.

Edit: Not all modern music is the same either. I would suggest you look in to composers such as Nico Muhly, Michael Torke, Steve Reich, John Adams, John Corigliano, and Arvo Pärt as they are all very approachable composers (some of these guys I'm sure you know already).

On February 10 2013 13:03 fatfail wrote:

By that interpretation of modern art, anything can be construed as art simply by fabricating a cultural context. Yet again, you are using modern art in the ordinary fashion, which is to feign erudition and superiority by pretending to see what you can't. I'm not completely uneducated trash like you might think; I've been classically trained in violin and piano for 12 years, and I have studied art history through travel, documentary series, and books. What value does "art" hold if it cannot stand alone and holds onto popular culture as its crutch?

On February 10 2013 02:46 fatfail wrote:
Now we know what music is, we can confidently say that contemporary music isn't music. In both art and music, things went from bad to worse in the early to mid 20th century. We had composers such as Stravinsky and Prokofiev whose music was not very harmonious, but the melody and intention was still recognizable and palatable. Then, a musical vacuum came into existence; nothing good musically has been produced ever since.

On February 11 2013 03:39 farvacola wrote:
I'm not sure I'd recommend Jameson as my go to for art criticism, but hey, whatever floats your boat!