From: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: Liverpool Oratorio - McCartney & Davis
Originator: news@ernie.Princeton.EDU
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 05:33:15 GMT

In article <1992Jul21.154344.22876@bas-a.bcc.ac.uk> 
ucap22w@ucl.ac.uk (Martin S T Watts) writes:
>roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:
>>In article <1992Jul18.192101.18770@bas-a.bcc.ac.uk> 
ucap22w@ucl.ac.uk (Martin S T Watts) writes:
>>>roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:
>>>>In article <1992Jul17.163230.16999@bas-a.bcc.ac.uk> 
>>>>ucap22w@ucl.ac.uk (Martin S T Watts) writes:

>>>>  If so, you'd have to argue that
>>>>all of culture was really a pack of prejudices.  One might also call them
>>>>"agreements," "consensuses," "standards," etc.

>>>Perhaps you would, but that doesn't mean that all of them are desirable.

>>Beside the point.  They're there.  They're what constitutes the culture
>>itself: a set of conventions and expectations.  Some may be in need of
>>change, but pretending they're not there will not bring about that
>>change.

>I don't pretend they're not there - I try to set aside those which I consider
>irrelevant to my assessment of the music. I think that's as good a way as any
>of initiating a change.

But what do we do when we have clear evidence that the composer or the
performer was making a reference to, or otherwise patching into, one of
the things you've chosen to ignore? What does that do to the value, or,
of you will, the location of your criticism?

>>>>>I can't deny that 'HDEs' have their effect on me too, but they still are
>>>>>not part of the music itself, 

>>>>The hell they aren't!  When a composer writes "symphony" on the title
>>>>page, he or she EXPECTS you to think of Beethoven and music since then.

>>>I'm afraid I'd have to disappoint them too then. When I listen to a symphony
>by Sibelius or Prokofiev nothing could be further from my mind than Beethoven.
>>>(You're a bit harsh on Haydn and Mozart too, not to mention C.P.E.Bach.)

>>No, not harsh at all.  The symphonies of Mozart and Haydn and Bach were
>>not what caused the symphony per se to be elevated into the central
>>musical art-form in 19th century northern Europe, and since then into
>>the stereotype of "absolute," "classical" music.  Beethoven's music was
>>the cause of this development.  

>Beethoven would have had a job getting started without Haydn.

Very good.  Have a cookie.  Now tell me what this has to do with
Beethoven's place in our muiscal culture, especially the part that
relates to the writing and playing of symphonies, and the things we
think of when listening to them or discussing them.

Haydn has very little to do with the cultural siginificance of the
symphony.

>>And it was also the reason that composers -- including Sibelius and
>>(once he got wise to what sold in the S.U.) Prokoviev -- continued to
>>write symphonies in the way they did.  And, yes, that includes the
>>"Classical Symphony" of Prokofiev.  Only by reacting against the model
>>that had evolved from Beethoven through Brahms, Bruckner, and Mahler
>>could he produce his satirical masterpiece.

>Obviously, Beethoven was an influential figure and symphonies of this
>century would certainly have turned out differently had he not lived,
>but that's getting off the point. 

No, it's an analogy to the point: we consider music in relationship to
other music, whether there are direct references or allusions in the
music or not, and whether or not there are references in the title,
program, etc.

>An appreciation of the historical
>context in which music is composed is no more a prerequisite for the
>appreciation of the music itself than an understanding of pure maths
>necessitates a knowledge of the circumstances in which a theorem was
>arrived at.

And that's a *terrible* analogy.  For one thing, listening to music is
not much like understanding a theorem (for most people; I can't speak
for Yoder, mind you); for another, understanding a theorem, or an entire
branch of mathematics, is ofte naided quite a bit by understanding the
class of real-world problems it's used for.  An understanding of
turn-of-the-century physics will indeed make tensor calculus make more
sense, even if the proofs of the theorems are no less easy for it.

Now, let's revise your sentence a bit: for "An appreciation of the
historical context in which the music is composed," let's substitute
"performed" for "composed."  I think it's pretty obvious that
appreciation of the piece you're listening to is very much tempered by
an understanding of why you're sitting there the way you are, listening
to this piece and not some other piece -- especially when the piece was
written 200 years ago or more, in another country.

>>>>Imagine trying to understand the last movement of the Brahms First
>>>>*without* a little understanding and expectation drawn from history!
>>>>What sense does the main theme make?  The mysterious chorale?  

>>>It's interesting, and fortuitous, that you should have landed on that part-
>>>icular example. The last movement of Brahms' 1st was something I heard for
>>>the first time on the telly, merely as an accompaniment to a programme that
>>>I was getting bored stiff with, and of which I have successfully managed to
>>>forget the title. I didn't know what it was, when it was composed, or who
>>>composed it, yet it impressed me sufficiently that I found out and bought a
>>>recording of it. I regard this as the ideal context for first hearing a work,
>>>one which admittedly is hard to arrange usually, and also the context in
>>>which I attempt to hear subsequent performances, free from these prejudices
>>>(not intended in its pejorative sense).

>>Well, Brahms would disagree with you.  If nothing else, he would have
>>wanted you to hear the other three movements first.

>I'm sure he would, although the last movement, to my mind, is a self-
>contained stretch of music, despite reference to earlier material.

And this "earlier material" includes quite a bit of material from
outside the symphony itself!

>>But he ALSO wanted you to get your face rubbed in the resemblance of the
>>main theme to the "Joy" theme from Beethoven's Ninth -- and then to
>>puzzle over the odd treatment the theme gets the rest of the way.  Why
>>does it laboriously transform itself into the horn-call theme at the end
>>of the development?  And then never return in its full form?  Why is the
>>*horn-call* theme later on replaced by the chorale at the final climax?
>>Why were all three themes previewed in the long introduction?  

>I'd be interested to know your views on the matter.

Well, mine are a lot like Reinhold Brinkmann's, which are published in
German in _Musik-Konzepte_ # 70, and which will appear in English next
year, assuming I meet my deadline.  Harvard UP.

>>One might not need to know that this is Brahms First Symphony, but one
>>*does* need to know that it's a reaction to Beethoven's Ninth.  And one
>>can hear that only if one *knows* the Ninth.

>Bunkum and balderdash! Certainly, if you compare the main theme in the last
>movement with that of Beethoven 9 it will influence your judgements on the
>'meaning' of the last movement, as it seems to have done in your case, but 
>an appreciation of this relation ( if there is one ) is not necessary to
>have a sophisticated appreciation of the work itself.

Indeed, one might do well without that, and enjoy the piece.  But if one
wishes to assume that the composer meant something by the piece, and
meant for his audience to hear that something and understand it, then
one must have some appreciation for the context in which the piece was
written and performed.  Of the expectation that Brahms would produce the
first truly great symphony since Beethoven.  Of Brahms' 20-year attempt
to deal with this burden.  Of his deep understanding of Schumann's and
Schubert's contribution to the form (and allied forms -- cf. the end of
the C major Quintet by Schubert and the end of the symphony...).  Of his
ambivalence about the choral finale of the Ninth, which is expressed
quite well in the movement -- the big theme does an impressive
disappearing act.  Of his inversion of the beginning of the finale --
the slow movements looks forward, not back.

The fact of the matter is quite simply that you DO have some
understanding of some of the contextual issues if you can make your way
through a complicated piece like that.  You know something about form,
about the sounds of the orchestra, about Romantic styles, and so on.
You may not have read them in a book, but you've picked them up via the
exposure to music that all of us receive in varying quantities.

>Personally, I hadn't even noticed the resemblance of Brahms' theme to
>Beethoven's until someone pointed it out to me. I refer you to Sir
>Donald Francis Tovey's potted analysis for further reading on this matter.

"The melody is great enough to stand on its own merits; and our
attention is distracted if we notice that its most complex phrase
alludes to a simple figure in an older classic.  So let us forget this
allusion."  (Tovey, _Essays in Musical Analysis_, I, 92-95.  Oxford,
1935.)

TRANSLATION: "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain."

Now, of course, Tovey is paying special care to ignore the obvious
elsewhere as well.  He refers to the alphorn theme as a "Bell-theme,"
making much fuss about Crotch and Cambridge, but doesn't notice that
bells rarely peal with a Scotch snap.  He also doesn't note the
resemblance of the beginning of this tune to the beginning of the second
subject.  He further ignores the absence of a recapitulation of the main
theme (though he does note that it appears at the beginning of the
development -- but here he speaks of rondo, instead of a feint at a
repeat of the exposition).  Otherwise, he merely talks us through the
score, ignoring the clear references to at least two other pieces (the
Quintet mentioned above and Schumann's Second) and not even pausing to
consider *why* Brahms might have done the formally weird things he did
here, formal peculiarities far more pronounced than those in the other
movements.

But, no matter how hard one ignores the resemblance, the question
remains: why would Brahms DO that?  If asked about the resemblance, he
would certainly have replied as he did wrt the Piano Sonata, Op. 1 and
its relationship to hte Hammerklavier Sonata: "Any ass can see that."  So
why SHOULDN'T we think about it, as we obviously should both here and in
Op. 1?  We should, and must.  We lie to ourselves if we pretend it isn't
there, and that the melody "stands on its own merits."  If Brahms had
wanted one that did that, he'd have written one that didn't point
elsewhere as hard as this one does.

>>>>"Classical" music -- especially that from the time since the canon was
>>>>founded -- is ALL ABOUT history and how it bears on expectations.  You
>>>>can't separate that out from the music.

>>>No, classical music may be partially about these things, but only on history
>>>since the development of the canon insofar as you're prepared to study it.

>>Which we all do!  By listening to it, and by being exposed to attitudes
>>toward it that are part of the definition of our musical culture.  We
>>don't come to the pieces we listen to by random chance -- there is agood
>>deal of history, and a good deal of cultural practice involved in the
>>very choice of pieces that get played and recorded.

>Well, it's all up there in the subconscious then - just sit back and enjoy
>the music!

Do you buy tickets subconsciously?  CDs?  Are concert programs selected
that way? Is "classical" music chosen for TV programs and the like on
such grounds?  I myself am happier when I know *why* someone's messing
with my subconscious.

>>>I think most musical archetypes that govern my reactions are probably older
>>>than that.

>>Indeed -- but the archetype of "classical music" -- of music from
>>another era being at least as central to our era as the music of our own
>>time is -- that is *not* older than the 19th C.  And our reactions to
>>the music of the 19th C are also based to a great extent on a system of
>>expectations built up around the transformation of those older
>>archetypes in light of a fixed basis for the repertoire.

>How can you talk about a single archetype for 'classical music'? If there
>were one, it follows that we'd all hear music in the same way, which we
>clearly don't. And if the archetype of classical music is not older than
>classical music itself, how did classical composers get going?

Oh, please.  Try a *little* harder to construe what I'm saying.

a) Note the quote marks around "classical music."  When I speak of an
archetype, I don't mean a piece in its technical details, but rather an
ideal that is indeed expressed in the Beethoven symphonies.  This is the
ideal of a piece with lasting value, a piece worthy of preservation
along with Dante and Shakespeare and Michelangelo.  A piece that
*everyone* should hear, and hear repeatedly.  A piece that stands for
history and progress, not only fashion and changing taste.

b) Again, with the quote marks, note that the concept of "classical
music" is indeed newer than the music itself.  Bach wrote for his time,
and indeed, most of his music was soon forgotten.  All composers before
him, and almost all in the century after him, wrote for their immediate
markets and no more; they had little thought of posterity.  (Bach did in
fact write for posterity, but his goal was to produce a monument to a
bygone age.)

c) Around 1840, a few musicians (notably Mendelssohn, Schumann, and
Liszt) institutionalized the growing reputation of Beethoven by
inventing the modern forms of concerts: the symphony concert and the
solo piano recital.  Their purpose: to play Beethoven's music and
similarly worthy pieces that "progress" from it.  Liszt also played
Bach.  This reinterpretation of the past was the moment at which the
canon was formally founded, and the idea of musical classics entered our
culture once and for all.

>>>He's obviously exceptionally
>>>gifted in some respects. I don't see any 'allusions' or 'references' in When
>>>I'm 64 - it's just a piece composed in a not-particularly-sophisticated style
>>>which I think it would have been perfectly possible for McCartney to emulate
>>>almost without thinking about it.

>>Then listen again.  It is a *most* sophisticated little piece.  From the
>>choice of instruments ( not only the clarinets, but also the drumming
>>style, etc.) to the melodic type to the self-deprecating singing style
>>-- this was carefully thought out.  And, more important, it *transforms*
>>the things it parodies and otherwise alludes to.  Listen to a few 1920's
>>hits from England -- even something like the "Lambeth Walk" -- and note
>>the similarities.  Then notice the DIFFERENCES, the ones that make it
>>fit into a rock album -- and, not coincidentally, something far more
>>worthy of being called a Liverpool Oratorio, a record about many of the
>>same things that get lost in the bloat of the new work.

[apologies -- The Lambeth Walk is from the 30's, of course.]

>Well, I'm still not convinced. Even if he did go to all this trouble, though,
>is an explicit recognition of these factors necessary for an appreciation of
>the music, or were all those people who bought Sgt. Pepper's just
>philistines?

No, one can indeed enjoy the work without being able to put one's finger
on this or that.  

But I think one should be able to do that if one is to write an informed
critique of the piece! Or even if one wishes to answer obvious questions
that result from curiosity: WHY the funny instruments on the rock album?
(This comes right after "Within you, without you", no less!  What a
putdown of George's pomposity--dancing around with a domestic little
ditty right after the sitars and tablas and whining profundities.  Come
to think of it, it's *followed* by yet another music-hall item, albeit a
much more perverse one: Lovely Rita.  Echoes of Lucy in the Sky, then
another little jaunty tune.  Only the polymeters of "Good Morning" break
the mood.)  WHY the explicit references to music hall?  You may sit back
and enjoy, but as soon as the music makes you sit up and wonder, it's a
different matter entirely.

>>>>>>>It just sounds a bit strange
>>>>>>>in the context of an 'Oratorio' (again a term that should be dismissed as
>>>>>>>irrelevant if you automatically associate it with more traditional English
>>>>>>>works). Nevertheless, the words have a particular effect that they 
>>>>>>>wouldn't otherwise, and an accessibility that is probably appreciated most
>>>>>>>by the Liverpudlians for whom the work was primarily written.
>
>>>>>>It was?  I wonder why he tricked it up in church/concert-hall dress,
>>>>>>then, and for forces that require high ticket prices, and wanted it
>>>>>>heard in a manner of listening that most Liverpudlians don't even
>>>>>>practice?
>
>>>>>The world premiere of the piece was in the Anglican Cathedral in Liverpool,
>>>>>and then at the Philharmonic Hall, where the seat prices were no higher than
>>>>>for one of the regular concerts of the RLPO. 
>
>>>>Which are no doubt teeming with working-class locals.
>
>>>Not necessarily working class, but audiences at Liverpool concerts do normally
>>>comprise a more representative cross-section of the population than in other
>>>cities I've visited.

>>Faint praise, I'm sure.  It's still the concert-hall audience, which is
>>hardly the audience he's, say, *writing* about...

>We don't all go into 'concert-hall mode' when we go to a concert. Besides,

If we don't, we get thrown out!  We don't smoke or eat except at the
interval, we don't talk or move around much, we dress a certain way.
All these things are part of the concert-hall mode, and contribute
mightily to hte atmosphere (and the presence or absence of certain types
of people in great number).

>who's to say how the social standing of Liverpudlians of McCartney's generation
>has changed since the Second World War? I can think of one, at least, who was
>a 'working-class local' then, but isn't any longer.

Well, I've since checked with Keith, and he assures me on the basis of
having attended lots of concerts in both Manchester and Liverpool that
in fact the concert hall audiences are pretty much the way I suspected.
In short, NOT the average Liverpudlians McCartney was presumably writing
the piece "for."

>>>>>Since the piece was commissioned
>>>>>by the RLPS to celebrate their 150th anniversary, I think I'm on pretty firm
>>>>>ground saying that it was written primarily for Liverpudlians. 

>>>>That sounds more like commisioning it to draw worldwide attention to hte
>>>>orchestra.

>>>in a city with Liverpool's economic difficulties I don't consider that a bad
>>>motive.

>>Rather a roundabout way to do it, wouldn't you say?

>What else can an orchestra do?

Produce something that will bring *lasting* attention?  It's worth a
try.  

>>>>>>>Who says? If your musical success has been based on a method of composition
>>>>>>>that involves no knowledge of musical notation, what reason is there to change
>>>>>>>this if you have a willing collaborator? 
>
>>>>>>Because the collaboration doesn't work too well.  Let's see their next
>>>>>>piece.

>>>>>Obviously, you can only say that with hindsight.

>>>>Hindsight is generally available after the first rehearsal.  Why was
>>>>this time different?

>>>Well what would you expect them to do if they considered it unworthy of
>>>performance (which they obviously didn't)? Enroll Paul McCartney on a
>>>course of lessons in musical notation?

>>No! Tell him to write something else!  But of course they can't do
>>*that* -- he's Paul M, and this is their big chance to cash in on that
>>fact -- certainly *their* first and last chance.  

>Again, money doesn't grow on trees in Liverpool. 

But it talks, and in the same language as everywhere else.

>You should pay a visit sometime.

Love to.  

>>>>>>(Nor do we know how much of what we hear is in fact his
>>>>>>musical idea, and what is the other guy's.  Who, of course, DOES write
>>>>>>music--what if our favorite bits turn out to be by him?)

>>>>>Does that matter?

>>>>For the next piece, it sure does!  Assuming word gets out...

>>>This still shouldn't affect your judgement of the piece in its own right.

>>Now pay attention: in its own right, the piece wouldn't have *existed.*
>>Carl Davis wouldn't ever have sat down with Joe Schmo (as opposed to
>>PMcC) to create the piece.  The orchestra wouldn't have commissioned the
>>piece from Joe Schmo.  The recording company wouldn't have promoted
>>Schmo's music.  The piece doesn't *have* an "own right."  And for this
>>very reason (which also applies to Beethoven, I might add, albeit in a
>>different direction, one related to "noblesse oblige"), it is impossible
>>to consider the piece that way.  If it *weren't* by McC, why would I buy
>>the CD among thousands in the store?

>So in other words, nothing exists in its own right, right? 

No, in MY words, "in its own right" is generally (and specifically in
this case) a smokescreen when the very issue of how and why a thing
exists is most acute.  In this case, the sound, the shape, the
production, the performers, are all inextricably bound up with the
unique historical position of the tunesmith.

>So in order to 
>be able to 'properly appreciate' any piece of music you need to have done
>a study into the development of the classical 'canon' since the early 19th
>Century. I'm beginning to see... 

No.  Those "other words" are simply your continued misconstruction.  To
*criticize* a piece one must ask why and how it was written, and how its
purposes mesh with, or clash with, the purposes of music like it, music
which it is clearly written as a part of.

>>>>>Just because some people have developed different methods of
>>>>>appreciating music to you and your students doesn't mean their judgements
>>>>>on music's value are inferior to yours.

>>>>Who ever claimed that?  In fact, if you look at ANYONE who actually
>>>>bothers to think about music hard enough to appreciate or judge music in
>>>>any but the most facile sense, they'll be doing some version of the
>>>>things I outlined (clumsily, I admit) above.  It's not a formal academic
>>>>thing, and that's the last thing it should be.

>>>Again, how  do you account for the opinions of our original poster?

>>Look, _Cats_ is *still* running in the West End.  If one can explain
>>that, one can easily explain that there are lots of people who will
>>enjoy listening to the L.O.

>But how do you explain it *other* than by claiming other people's judgements
>are inferior to yours?

They're not inferior -- they're just not particularly critical.  

>>>>>I presume that the inferences which lead you to this conclusion do not make
>>>>>allowance for the ways that the original poster listens to music.

>>>>Actually, I'd like to meet up with him in about three years and sit down
>>>>and listen to the piece together.

>>>I'll be sure to remind you!

>>You bet.  I hope he listens to it a dozen times or more in between,
>>though.  One really has to get to know a piece like this...

>Hmm... Irony again, very clever!

No, dead seriousness.  I'd like to meet the people who have actually
liked the piece as well on close listening #12.

>>>>>>Music is something that the vast majority of its listeners and
>>>>>>practitioners do NOT learn entirely by themselves, entirely from
>>>>>>intuition.  Music, one way or another, is taught.  And if you wish to
>>>>>>call the choice of what to teah "elitism," then so be it.  

>>>>>It wasn't my choice of term in the first place, but you seemed happy to go
>>>>>along with it. Besides, what do you mean by 'teach music' - it seems a bit
>>>>>of a waffly term? I have a sense of absolute pitch, though none of my music
>>>>>teachers did, so I cannot have been taught it - it was developed purely by
>>>>>a process of observation. I don't consider that it gives me a superior
>>>>>appreciation of music, although it must alter my perception of it relative
>>>>>to most other people. Neither should you assume that YOUR musical education
>>>>>gives you the right to objectively state what is good and bad in music.

>>>>Nor do I!  I state it within a context, one I take great pains to
>>>>announce as clearly as possible.

>>>Well, you should be in greater pain then! As I recall your first criticisms
>>>more or less labelled the L.O. as dross with virtually no qualifications.

>>A judgment by which I stand.  

>>But look around you!  There's *plenty* of dross!  And plenty of people
>>enjoying it!  Unless we give up  ALL critical approaches to art, we're
>>going to call something dross now and then.  

>On the contrary, it's when you DO start giving up a critical approach that
>you begin to  label things as dross.

I don't follow.  I labeled the piece as being dross in terms of
"classical" music and its pretensions to same.  (It's also some of the
most humorless prose I've ever encountered, now that I've been reading
the libretto; the Wedding makes "Within You, Without You" seem
positively witty.)

>>And when the circumstances of the piece/event are so obviously unrelated
>>to the normal way in which a musical work is brought before the public,
>>and especially those aspects which have to do with the qualities of the
>>work, how disingenuous it would be *not* to comment on the historical
>>and commercial and promotional peculiarities of the work!

>Comment, yes, but not use as the whole basis for assessment.

You've got to start somewhere.  And if there's something blatant about a
piece, why not start with the blatant bit?   We can't *always* ignore
the obvious, whether or not Tovey tells us to.

>>>>>>But the piece wasn't PRESENTED as such: it was given us as a
>>>>>>breakthrough, a major work, the musical event of the year.  You seem to
>>>>>>want things both ways.

>>>>>I think you're capable of modifying your opinions accordingly. I don't
>>>>>want things both ways - it just seems to me that you're criticising the
>>>>>music and the promotion in the same mouthful. I think the two are separable.
>
>>>>And I, having devoted a good deal of study to just this matter with
>>>>reference to the last two centuries of music, have come to the opposite
>>>>conclusion. The very invention of a canon of "Classical" music -- there
>>>>was none before the early 19th C -- meansthat music and its promotion,
>>>>its cachet, its presumed historical and cultural significance, are less
>>>>and less separable.

>>>What is observed to occur, in turn, may not be separable from the methods
>>>used for observation, as atomic physicists know....

>>Been jamming with Schroedinger and his Cool Cats again, eh?  To trump
>>your ace, Ace, let me point out that in matters of art, the thing being
>>observed also tends to dictate the manner of observation, to a great
>>degree.

>Of course, in what field doesn't it? Do art historians not sometimes need to
>be wary of tailoring their observations to suit their thesis, though?

So where's the part I've missed?

>>>It's still ONLY your opinion, and I respect it as such. 
>>>There are probably eminent musicologists who would beg to differ here.

>>Well, I have yet to meet one who actually likes it.  Many (and some
>>non-eminent ones such as Y.T.) will merely find it a wonderful example
>>of how the "Classical Music" idea has mutated into something that has to
>>live entirely in the musical past, or at least wear a cloak of the past
>>that's so thick, and so impenetrable, and so undistinguished in any way
>>but being past-like that anything that *is* inside is unlikely to see
>>the light of day.

>Well, I don't know how eminent the reviewer is in 'Chorus!' magazine, but
>he has an approach to the work, far more in line with what I regard as
>reasonable, and I get the impression that he's actively looked for positive
>aspects of the work, rather than becoming bogged down with cynicism before
>even hearing it.

Well, I can't answer this one, as Mark edits some of my work.  They
don't let spouses testify against one another, either, you know... 8-)

Roger