HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: JOHN CAGE
Originator: news@nimaster
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Mon, 24 Aug 1992 01:54:39 GMT

In article <LF7yPB3w164w@sys6626.bison.mb.ca> kevin@sys6626.bison.mb.ca (Kevin Scott) writes:
>maverick@cs.berkeley.edu (Vance Maverick) writes:

>> In article <c1JuPB3w164w@sys6626.bison.mb.ca>, kevin@sys6626.bison.mb.ca (Kev
>> |> > Got a definition of music handy?

>> |> No definition, just the idea that something in a piece should be fixed.
>> |> Fixed enough that listening to it lends it some sort of recognition.

>> I think this prejudice bars you from some pretty interesting musical
>> experience.  Thought experiment:  you hear a brief string quartet, in
>> "pointillist" idiom.  You only hear it once.  What is your reaction if
>> you now learn it was

>> 	* a Webern piece, played from a fixed score

>> 	* a Morton Feldman piece of the 50's, played from a loose
>> approximate score, in which players are told, for example, "Play seven
>> notes in the high register within this slow beat."

>> 	?  Do you reject it in the second case?  Does learning the
>> answer to the question change the experience you had?

>Well, let's say that I liked this particular hypothetical brief string 
>quartet. Say I liked it a lot. Say I wanted to hear it again the way it 
>was originally played. I couldn't do it, could I?

Sure.  Depends on your definition of "the way it was originally
played."

True story: a friend of mine asked a trouing Indian musician of great
renown if he might tape the concert to be played.  Of course, replied
the master.  May I tape both concerts?  Why bother; I play the same
thing every night.  

Of course, Western listeners disagreed when hearing the two tapes.  They
never guessed it was the same piece twice.

>That chaotic way of thinking is what I oppose. 

What's chaotic about the way of thinking?  Both scores are sets of
instructions.  Both leave room for interpretation.  

So does "Cottontail," say.  A hundred different arrangements; a hundred
different solos by Bird and others.

Same song.  And unless certain nights were recorded, you can't hear
those notes again.  

It's just not on the menu, that's all.   And I'm not about to restrict
my range of restaurants drastically over a single issue such as that.

>Not that Cage did it all 
>the time, but certainly things like "Fontana Mix" which sounds completely
>different when interpreted by different people is so vague in concept 
>that it's not surprising people were hostile with Cage.

People were hostile to Cage for all sorts of reasons, but mainly
because he made them think.  After hearing him play or talk, they either
had to run away and call him names, or challenge their own ideas of what
music was, and why they listened or played.  People *hate* that.

>This style of composition abandons philosophical thinking? I would have 
>thought it'd embrace it, if anything.

Let's say, it strips it down, and, where possible, exposes it.

Roger

Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: jittlov@gumby.cs.caltech.edu (Mike Jittlov)
Subject: John Massari's Music on multi-network special!
Summary: John Massari's Music on multi-network special!
Keywords: music, synth, composer, genius, Massari
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 1992 22:08:14 GMT

Attention and Alert!

To Music-Lovers everywhere, concerning the further sonic
adventures of one John Massari - who is a lookalike for his
hero-figure Frank Zappa, along with sharing a kindred spirit,
idealism, moustache, and nose.  To wit:

JOHN MASSARI, who co-starred as a Musical Genius (against his
protests, and under the pseudonym of "Steve Shostakovich") in
the critically-rave-reviewed action-comedy-adventure-special-
effects-laden fantasy and satire-on-Hollywood-and-the-System
feature film <gasp>, "The Wizard of Speed and Time" - and who
contributed much of the movie's music score - will once again
grace the airwaves of the entire North American Continent with
his most recent work, in:

      "SCARED SILENT - Exposing and Ending Child Abuse"
                 - Hosted by Oprah Winfrey -

A nation-wide simulcast Television Premiere, airing this Friday,
September 4, 1992, 10pm (9pm central), on CBS, NBC, _and_ PBS
- with an encore presentation on ABC, Sunday, September 6, 1992,
10pm (9pm central)!  This is the first primetime non-news show
ever to be aired by three broadcast networks simultaneously!

    John Massari composed all music for this TV special
    John Massari conducted all music for this TV special
    John Massari produced all music for this TV special
    John Massari performed all music for this TV special*
    John is very happy with all music for this TV special

  * with special thanks to John's friends, pianist Neil Posner
    and recording engineer Avi Hochberg.

Any immodesty in the above is due to the immense pride of this
note-poster.  John is the Prince of Humility :]

[Note 1:  the show's Executive Producer and Writer, Arnold
Shapiro, is _not_ connected with Shapiro-Glickenhaus Ent -
the corp >:p that is currently misdistributing our film, and
doing so without my authorization]

[Note 2:  info appreciated on Mr Z's mailing address, so I can
send him a free VHS of the movie he almost invested in - and
sagaciously did not]

[Note 3:  200 pardons if this is the wrong Newsgroup - I'm new
to the Net, just tapping all these keys & hoping for the best]


Views/News/Blames/Flames:
________________________________________ ___._`.*.'_._ ________
 Mike Jittlov - Wizard, etc       .   . +  * .o   o.* `.`. +.  
  Hollywood, CA 90026-2714       '   *  . ' ' |\^/|  `. * .  *
jittlov@gumby.cs.caltech.edu  (: May All Your  \V/  Good Dreams
  <& alt.fan.mike-jittlov>    and Fine Wishes  /_\  Come True:)
============================================= _/ \_ ===========

Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: diarmuid@uniwa.uwa.edu.au (Diarmuid Pigott)
Subject: Re: John Cage is Dead
Organization: University of Western Australia
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 05:20:52 GMT

mgresham@dscatl.UUCP (Mark Gresham) writes:
: As a Cageian?  (Now we can have only two types of
: musicians/listeners: Cageian and non-Cageian.  It's like there are
: only two kinds of automobiles: Chevrolets and non-Chevrolets.)
: :-)
: 
Not to mention Cajuns
Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Monday, 31 Aug 1992 14:15:10 CDT
From: <U58402@uicvm.uic.edu>
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Supertitling
 <1992Aug27.215817.13690@fid.morgan.com> <Btp9nG.MuI@news.udel.edu>

In article <Btp9nG.MuI@news.udel.edu>, conrad@brahms.udel.edu (Jon Conrad) says:
>
>I have an opinion, an unpopular one.  I hate them.  I think they wreck
>the live experience of an opera, and turn it into television (I don't
>despise television, but a live theatrical experience is something else).
>This gives us a reading-medium and a visual-medium that our eyes can
>flip back and forth between, to keep us from being bored....
>
As opposed to flipping from the opera to your program and back
again, I suppose?

> [discussion of English translations deleted]... SOMEbody has to keep alive
>the idea that it's the performers' job to communicate.
>
Well, I may get into trouble on this one, as I have not seen many operas
translated into English. However, I would suppose that the rhythms that
are inherent in spoken English may not translate well into music written
for, say, a French libretto. In order to fit sentences into the meter
and pattern of the melody, some stilted language may be unavoidable.
Also, musical climaxes may not correspond to climaxes in dialogue. (I
imagine a scene in which a long high note falls upon the word "death" in
the original libretto, but falls on the word "of" in the English
translation.)

After the John Cage discussion, I should be hesitant to draw an analogy
:@), but I think that the use of supertitles and English translation of
operas is like seeing a foreign film in subtitled and dubbed versions.
As for myself, I prefer subtitles. And one might make the point that in
film, the visual element is of more importance than in opera.

Wilbur Pan
(aka u58402@uicvm.uic.edu
 at the ever so friendly and personal univ. of ill. at chicago)


Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: cb@tamarack13.timbuk (Chris Brewster)
Subject: Re: Cornelius Cardew
In-reply-to: smoliar@argon.iss.nus.sg's message of Wed, 26 Aug 1992 11:32:06 GMT
Organization: pubs
	<1992Aug24.224742.6520@nuscc.nus.sg>
	<1992Aug25.072848.7464@fid.morgan.com>
	<1992Aug26.113206.5903@nuscc.nus.sg>
Date: 26 Aug 92 13:15:21 CDT

Stephen Smoliar writes:

   I was too wrapped up in [Cardew's] ideas about music, notation, and 
   performance. ...  The very idea of the Scratch Orchestra was 
   absolutely liberating ...

I have somehow completely missed Cornelius Cardew.  Could someone
summarize his ideas and what he represented (other than politically)?  

Chris Brewster
cb@cray.com

Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder)
Subject: Re: John Cage is Dead
Organization: Quake Public Access
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1992 08:25:19 GMT

In article <1992Aug27.064005.19708@uniwa.uwa.edu.au> diarmuid@uniwa.uwa.edu.au (Diarmuid Pigott) writes:
>brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder) writes:
>[stuff about the USSR deleted...]
>: Their offical policies on the
>: laws of physics are similar to mine too, but that doesn't make me wrong there 
>: either. 

>erh... Excuse me, I don't think you mean that. Remember Lysenko?

Of course I do, and Lysenko in particular was why I put the word "similar"
in there, just to forestall anyone like you who wants to focus on trivial
side issues instead of what I was really discussing.  I guess it didn't
work.

--Brian
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: More on CAGE CAGE CAGE!
Originator: news@nimaster
Organization: Princeton University
Distribution: rec.music.classical
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 15:09:13 GMT

In article <1992Aug30.012834.2631@highlite.uucp> alan@highlite.uucp (Alan McConnell) writes:
>'Twould be a pity to let this subject die - let's keep it going
>at least till Christmas.  I haven't posted yet, so it's my turn
>to slosh around jet fuel and strike a few matches.

>And I say:  Cage was not a _composer_.  A philosopher, surely,
>an aesthete, of course, a preacher, certainly.  But not a person
>who was primarily interested in "placing sounds
>together"( = cum + pono, to place with - or is my etymology all
>hooey).  I am going primarily by what he himself said, as quoted
>by various people in this thread.

This has been said so many times it belongs in the FAQ.  Alas, it doesn't
make much sense, because 

a) etymology is not syntax

b) Cage did LOTS of things that were indeed composition in any sense.

Try Kyle Gann's (admittedly hyperbolic) obituary in the Village Voice 
a couple weeks back.

>E.g. "I was with deKooning once in a restaurant and he said: 'If
>I put a frame around these bread crumbs, that isn't art'.  And
>what I'm saying is that it is."   It seems that Cage was interested
>in seeing how the sounds mixed and sloshed around and found their
>way into our ears, while a _composer_, in the common-sense way in
>which I am using the term, is usually a person who has a . .
>I'd have to invent an aural equivalent of "vision" . . and does
>his/her best to bring that inner-ear-heard concept to audible
>reality.

Well, again, many things that Cage did were just that.

>We all seem to react differently to this.  Some of us say, go to
>it Cage baby.  Others of us say, charlatan, crank.  But if one
>accepts my assertion that Cage was a "composer" only in an
>extended, not-usually-accepted sense, then the argument becomes
>clearer(I really mean, murkier).

Cage really didn't mind what you called him, as long as you called 
him when there were interesting mushrooms about.  If you didn't want
to call what he did "music," that was OK by him, too.  But he was a 
great listener, and focused musicians everywhere on the process of
listening, and on the question of what music was and how it related
to listening.  He himself didn't say much about it, which is why the
"philosopher" label is also a bit weird.

Roger
From: maverick@cs.berkeley.edu (Vance Maverick)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Borgesian Conundra [Was:  Manners, children please...]
Date: 26 Aug 1992 16:50:57 GMT
Organization: CS Division, UC Berkeley
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: mahogany.cs.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Aug26.051257.16487@uniwa.uwa.edu.au>, diarmuid@uniwa.uwa.edu.au (Diarmuid Pigott) writes:
|> 
|> Now get off your butt and make some suggestions for nominations of "The
|> Most Ordinary Thing Cage Ever Wrote".

OK, now that I know this is what you mean, I can lay off the silly
humor.  You wanted to find something along the lines of Picasso's
early work to show for Cage.  As it happens, Cage's path to his own
music doesn't seem to have passed through anything analogous to
harlequins.  (I understand his earliest surviving compositions are
exercises in a very strict personal form of serialism.)

Of course, as you very well know, the charm of the Blue Period says
nothing about the quality of _Les Demoiselles_....

|> Then Brian Yoder can make up his mind after he listens to them. (?)

Surely Brian would be capable of judgments like "What a waste of a
great talent", had Cage indeed knocked off a few Rachmaninovian
concerti in the his apprentice years.

	Vance
From: maverick@cs.berkeley.edu (Vance Maverick)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: How about some JOHN CAGE suggestions?
Keywords: cage, suggest
Date: 26 Aug 92 16:55:22 GMT
Distribution: world
Organization: CS Division, UC Berkeley
NNTP-Posting-Host: mahogany.cs.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Aug26.164440.12219@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu>, ujwb@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu (Jeff Beer) writes:
|> Saw a video about Cage that is published by Mystic Fire.  I think it is
|> from a series called FOUR AMERICAN COMPOSERS.

Yes -- our local video store (Le Video in the inner Sunset, for Bay
Area types) has all four: Meredith Monk, Philip Glass, Robert Ashley,
and Cage.  Directed (or somehow aegissed :)) by Peter Greenaway.

	Vance
From: smoliar@argon.iss.nus.sg (stephen smoliar)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Cornelius Cardew
Date: 27 Aug 92 11:41:19 GMT
Reply-To: smoliar@iss.nus.sg (stephen smoliar)
Organization: Institute of Systems Science, NUS, Singapore

In article <CB.92Aug26131517@tamarack13.timbuk> cb@tamarack13.timbuk (Chris
Brewster) writes:
>
>I have somehow completely missed Cornelius Cardew.  Could someone
>summarize his ideas and what he represented (other than politically)?  
>
If you can get yourself to a decent music library, try to get hold of Issue
Number Ten of SOURCE (which was published in 1972).  It has a rather large
section of information on the Scratch Orchestra and a copy of the score for
Cardew's THE GREAT LEARNING.  That should give you enough to start.
-- 
Stephen W. Smoliar; Institute of Systems Science
National University of Singapore; Heng Mui Keng Terrace
Kent Ridge, SINGAPORE 0511
Internet:  smoliar@iss.nus.sg
From: kevin@sys6626.bison.mb.ca (Kevin Scott)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: JOHN CAGE
Date: Sun, 23 Aug 92 12:08:17 CST
Organization: system 6626 BBS, Winnipeg MB

brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder) writes:

> In article <c1JuPB3w164w@sys6626.bison.mb.ca> kevin@sys6626.bison.mb.ca (Kevi
> 
> >Music and philosophy are a bad mix.
> 
> Interesting...that's a philosophical statement itself!  Do you really think
> that aesthetics is a worthless branch of philosophy?
> 
> If nothing else, a study of philosophy as it relates to art will explain
> why it is that people have such radically different ideas of what art is
> and what the difference between good art and bad art are.  Do you see no
> value even in that?
> 
> --Brian


When you listen to a piece of music you don't often find yourself asking 
yourself why you like it.
 
With Cage you're forced to, thereby bringing philosophy into it.
 
Do you think people who hear three radios playing together and are told 
it's a classical composition are thrilled with it upon first hearing it?
 
KS

;--- (Kevin Scott) a user of sys6626, running waffle 1.64
;E-mail: kevin@sys6626.bison.mb.ca
;system 6626: 63 point west drive, winnipeg manitoba canada R3T 5G8
From: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Jack Campin)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: clarinet arcana
Date: 28 Aug 92 18:08:40 GMT
Reply-To: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Jack Campin)
Organization: COMANDOS Project, Glesga Yoonie

meyer@uuisis.isis.org (Katherine Meyer) wrote:
> the Mozart Clarinet concerto sounds really nice on the Bass horn
> (originally written for Basset horn, Anton Stadler) since it has
> a much darker and mellower sound.  

I thought what happened was that Mozart started writing it for basset horn
but then changed his mind - there never was a complete version for basset
horn.

It looks like the Turkish clarinet I posted about at the start of this
discussion is an Albert-system version of what was called the "clarinette
d'amour" when introduced in France; it's in G, a minor third below the
usual B flat clarinet.  This is a standard folk instrument in Turkey (the B
flat is used as well, they're about equally common).  I have no idea how an
instrument so obscure in its country of origin could have got so popular
somewhere so remote.  Baines' "Woodwind Instruments and their History",
recommended by someone here, has been very helpful.

-- 
--  Jack Campin    room G092, Computing Science Department, Glasgow University,
17 Lilybank Gardens, Glasgow G12 8RZ, Scotland   TEL: 041 339 8855 x6854 (work)
INTERNET: jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk or via nsfnet-relay.ac.uk    FAX: 041 330 4913
BANG!net: via mcsun and uknet     BITNET: via UKACRL    UUCP: jack@glasgow.uucp
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: Bach undervalued? (was: Beethoven - overvalued?)
Originator: news@nimaster
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 02:11:43 GMT

In article <JWA.92Aug31001917@vipunen.hut.fi> jwa@vipunen.hut.fi (Jyrki J Wahlstedt) writes:
>In article <1992Aug28.213333.7213@Princeton.EDU> roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig) writes:
>>>Especially when you know that someone once sorted out that about
>>>xx% of Mozart's work could be directly related back to work of Bach.
>>>(in that he used Bach's structures, parts of melodies, or whatever)
>>Now, could you name some specific piece?  This sounds like a piece of
>>crank musicology that Bach-worshipers are especially good at.
>                                           ^^^^^^^^^^

>  That statement is somewhat crank too, I think. Not that I'd think
>  the statement commented too intelligent, however.

No, I mean this.  From Sirp's finding bits and pieces of chorales in
every  piece Bach wrote, to the chorale-based 5- and 10-way symmetry
maps of the St. Matthew Passion I've seen, to the endless number alphabet
and gematria mongering, to the programs for the WTC and every other 
large work -- Bach has been worked over by more  cranks than most other   
composers.  Some of the stuff I mean is real _Foucault's Pendulum_
material.  And I'm not talking about Joshua Rifkin, either.

Ask any respectable Bach researcher and see if they disagree with me.

>  As a more general question: how many composers are there, who can
>  on better grounds than J.S Bach be held undervalued? For instance,

Haydn.  Willaert.  Schoenberg.  Three of my favorites.

>  how many of you know the music of C.P.E. Bach? When I heard the
>  first time his Symphonies from his Hamburg period, I remember
>  thinking: "If Mozart was a genius, so was this man, too." 

Many agree with you, not least Haydn.  (Also Schenker.)

>  I hope it is not only my lack of knowledge, when I say that there
>  are surprisingly few wellknown composers contemporary to e.g. Mozart.

Why surprisingly?  The point is that "classical" music was invented
somewhat inadvertently by Haydn and Mozart: after Mozart's death his
music remained popular, and Haydn became a national hero.  Beethoven
solidified this new attitude toward music -- that some peieces should
be kept around and not just replaced with new ones.  Haydn and Mozart,
not other composers, were seen to be Beethoven's predecessors.

Now, CPE was a couple decades older than Haydn, so he's not quite a 
"contemporary."  His youngest brother JC was born the same year as
Haydn, though.  In general, you're right: only Haydn and Mozart are
really well known.  (Much better than, say, the composers of the 1750's.)

>  As I see it, the lack of articles about J.S.Bach may as well be caused
>  by his unquestioned status as by lack of interest or by his being 
>  undervalued.

Of course, we've had plenty of articles about the solo sonatas and suites,
the Clavieruebung, various cantatas, etc.  So perhaps you just missed
some postings.

Roger

Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: cb@tamarack13.timbuk (Chris Brewster)
Subject: Re: Reger's Song of the Hermit
In-reply-to: schissel@mace.Princeton.EDU's message of 26 Aug 92 22:38:00 GMT
Organization: pubs
	<1992Aug23.052219.5868@Princeton.EDU>
	<CB.92Aug24111046@tamarack13.timbuk>
	<1992Aug26.223800.3736@Princeton.EDU>
Date: 27 Aug 92 12:28:38 CDT


I just noticed that I saved a Reger discography from Dave Lampson, a
mere three months ago (must have been a busy week).  If anyone missed it
and would like it, just ask.  Note email address below (my newsreader
doesn't work correctly, but heck, what do you expect at a software
development facility?).

Chris Brewster
cb@cray.com
From: s9874194@phobos.ucc.umass.edu (s9874194)
Subject: Concert around Frankfurt area in January
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 1992 14:27:00 GMT

Hello, Every body. I am going to visit University of Mainz next January.
I hope our German friends can suggest me some good concerts and/operas
in that area during that period. 
Thank you in advance.

P.S. Have any body seen/heard the DG new recording of Tosca (Domingo/
Freni/Sinopoli/Philharmonia). How is it? I am a Domingo fun but not
quit a Sinopoli fun. 
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
From: cam@mullet.gu.uwa.edu.au (Cameron Neylon)
Subject: Re: clarinet arcana
Organization: University Computer Club --- Perth, Western Australia
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 01:31:35 GMT

jack@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Jack Campin) writes:

>meyer@uuisis.isis.org (Katherine Meyer) wrote:
>> the Mozart Clarinet concerto sounds really nice on the Bass horn
>> (originally written for Basset horn, Anton Stadler) since it has
>> a much darker and mellower sound.  

>I thought what happened was that Mozart started writing it for basset horn
>but then changed his mind - there never was a complete version for basset
>horn.

As I understand the story, he started writing a concerto for basset horn
in G, then abondoned this in favour of the basset clarinet in A.
The basset clarinet is an amusing but very useful insrtument. It iss 
precisely the same as a normall clarinet in the same key except, it goes
down to a (written) low C below the E. 

This means that a lot of the rather clumsy octave transopssitions in
standard editions of the concerto can be avoided. I particularly hate
the one in the third movement where the sense is completely destroyed
by a descending series is twissted by having its second, and third
appearance transposed up an octave. I play the hole passage up the

octave.

Have fun!


-- 
Cameron Neylon  cam@gu.uwa.edu.au
I can't think of anything witty enough that people 
would really want to see it time after time after . .
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical