From: roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: Classical Music for modern instrument (was Re: The shortest distance between two chords is...)
Originator: news@nimaster
Reply-To: roger@astro.princeton.edu (Roger Lustig)
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 18:36:25 GMT

In article <1993Jan22.165442.20387@colorado.edu> judd@wilkinson.cs.colorado.edu (Stephen Judd) writes:
[much deleted]
>As to jazz, jazz certainly owes much to classical music, but simply moved
>it, as you say, in a different direction.

Huh?  Jazz didn't evolve from classical music.  Jazz evolved from
the blues, from popular song (Tin Pan Alley, etc.), from ragtime,
from dance music, etc.  Classical music of the time had hardly any
influence.

>However, you seem to imply above that reading Piston would degrade the
>music.  Why?  Is jazz so distinct from the more classical forms that the
>two are incompatible?  I don't think so.  

Well, for one thing, jazz is not based on formal ideas that involve
musical structures based on modulation and tonal return over a long
span, as with the sonata idea, for example.  In fact, there's very
little tonal modulation in jazz; so all the chapters of Piston where
this is discussed are pretty much irrelevant, as they are in popular
song as well.  (Sure, there are lots of tonal extensions in things
like the bridge of an Ellington song, but you don't need Piston to
write those, either.)

If you wish to speak of "Classical" forms on which jazz is based, you
must look to the simple binary forms of the 18th century, very few
of which involve great harmonic subtlety, especially when used for
songs or dances.

>And the same is true for rock and
>roll.  So I stand by my original statement: I see no reason why rock and
>roll, for example, must remain trivial harmonically and (usually) musically.

Well, if you could demonstrate that it *is* harmonically trivial, 
and not just simple, you'd do your argument worlds of good.  As for
"musically trivial," you're up against millions of listeners who find
some rock musically very rewarding, even cathartic.  Better to look at
what the world at large -- as opposed to 19th century European educated
classes -- think of as "musical."

>As an example, the album I mentioned earlier, _Intuition_ by TNT, is very
>musical, has a beat, etc., and yet manages to use far more sophisticated
>construction than others.

Well, I don't know it.  Of course, the example you gave -- a progression
of parallel sixths -- isn't all that different from lots of composed
jazz, so I guess we have to get the album or take your word for it.

Keep in mind, though, that you are measuring musics that are developed
by improvisation and group work (jazz, rock) against musics worked out
and composed and notated in advance by (often) non-performing composers.
These are quite different types of compositional activity.  Consider
The Art of fugue, which people like in a zillion different arrangements.
Yet we musical snobs only like the Beatles when the Beatles do those
songs. 

Modern pop music is FAR more subtle in its arrangements and orchestration
than pop music of the past -- or, for that matter, much of jazz.  Individual
performances are also a determining factor in the quality of the music;
composition takes a back seat, just as arrangement and performance do 
with classical music.  (Beethoven's Ninth is great, in a hundred different
great performances.)

>Although I have never studied jazz, it seems to me to be a music that
>developed considerable sophistication.  Why?  My theory is that a
>musician with a (first) an excellent ear and (second) a creative, intelligent
>mind will begin to become bored with the old form, and create something new.

True in any musical arena.  Rock, for instance.  Are you claiming it 
didn't happen?

Of course, jazz wasn't very popular through most of its existence, and
the cutting edge never was.  Benny Goodman was hot stuff for a while, 
but look at what else was on the charts in his time.  Rock involves
a very large popular base to start with.

>This is what pushes the music forwards.  This certainly is why classical
>has developed.  I would guess the same is true for jazz.  It happens for
>film scores, etc.  Curiously, though, the opposite seems to be true in the
>popular world, for the most part.

I think you need to look at the evolution of rock and roll.  A LOT of 
changes have happened.

>The Beatles were an exception, certainly.  It seems clear that they became
>bored with the older forms, of others and of themselves, and so they
>expanded the medium.  I want to know why nobody in the pop world wants to
>expand the medium, or if anyone has (TNT for instance).

I've mentioned Billy Joel, Paul Simon.  Are you telling me that Jimi
Hendrix didn't expand rock?  That rock was the same before and after
Dylan or the Stones?  

You seem to be ignoring types of expansion that have no easy analogues
in the classical world.

>As I am sure you have guessed, I could pontificate for hours on this
>subject.  Luckily, though, I have a class now. ;^)

What's it on?

Roger
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical